Archive for July, 2008

Obama Is Here

Posted in 2008 Election, Society on July 31st, 2008

Sen. Barack Obama is here and like all personages who’ve gained “rock star” status his entourage or “posse” is here as well – and they’re doing their best to feed off of Obama’s celebrity fame. Sycophants and leeches are one of the unavoidable prices of being in the limelight; sadly such parasites often kill their host.

Obama current problem is caused by the poison dripped from the slack lipped orifice of one parasite in particular – the rapper Chris Bridges, aka Ludacris. Ludacris has released a new rap spiel entitled Politics as Usual which is also frequently referenced as Obama’s Here.

Ludacris’ “Politics as Usual” Lyrics

I’m back on it like I just signed my record deal
Yeah the best is here, the Bentley Coup paint is dripping wet, it got sex appeal
Never should have hated, You never should’ve doubted him
With a slot in the president’s iPod Obama shouted ’em

Said I handle my biz and I’m one of his favorite rappers
Well give Luda a special pardon if I’m ever in the slammer
Better yet put me in office, make me your vice president
Hillary hated on you, so that bitch is irrelevant

Jesse talking slick and apologizing for what?
If you said it then you meant it how you want it head or gut?
And all you other politicians trying to hate on my man,
watch us win majority vote in every state on my man

You can’t stop what’s bout to happen, we bout to make history
The first black president is destined and it’s meant to be
The threats ain’t fazing us, the nooses or the jokes
So get off your ass, black people, it’s time to get out and vote!

Paint the White House black and I’m sure that’s got ’em terrified
McCain don’t belong in any chair unless he’s paralyzed
Yeah I said it cause Bush is mentally handicapped
Ball up all of his speeches and just throw ’em like candy wrap
’cause what you talking I hear nothing even relevant
and you the worst of all 43 presidents

Get out and vote or the end’ll be near
The world is ready for change because Obama is here
’cause Obama is here
The world is ready for change because Obama is here, yeah
cuz Obama is here

Two quite easily expected things happened as a direct result of Ludacris releasing his latest example of hip-hop filth: a large number of civilized people complained about Ludacris’ vile, jabbering mouthings, and Barack Obama’s campaign staff very quickly condemned the rapper’s piece and attempted to distance the Presumptive Democratic Nominee from his “friend” Chris Bridges, aka Ludacris.

As Barack Obama has said many, many times in the past, rap lyrics today too often perpetuate misogyny, materialism, and degrading images that he doesn’t want his daughters or any children exposed to.

This song is not only outrageously offensive to Sen. Clinton, Rev. Jackson, Sen. McCain and President Bush, it is offensive to all of us who are trying to raise our children with the values we hold dear. While Ludacris is a talented individual he should be ashamed of these lyrics.

— Bill Burton
Obama Campaign Spokesperson

It seems that once again the Senator’s biggest image problem is his friends and the sort of people who go to great lengths to support him – or feed off of his fame.

Cut His Nuts Off!

Posted in 2008 Election, Society on July 17th, 2008

Jesse Jackson’s response to Sen. Barack Obama’s Father’s Day speech at at the Apostolic Church of God in Chicago was both stupid and brutish. Jackson made a rude and thuggish comment to a fellow guest at Obama’s speech, not realizing that the microphone he was wearing for an upcoming interview with FOX News was already on.

See, Barack been, um, talking down to black people on this faith based…I wanna cut his nuts off. Barack…he’s talking down to black people.

— Rev. Jesse Jackson

Jackson was apparently incensed by Sen. Obama’s call for Black men to take responsibility for the children that they sire. Jackson was angered enough by Obama’s desire for Black men to become involved in the lives of the children they breed to both forget he was wearing a FOX News microphone and to feel the need to threaten to castrate the Senator.

At first glance the situation and Jackson’s reaction seems fairly typical, stereotypical in point of fact. The elder generation of “Black Leaders” have a long history of denouncing and deriding anyone – especially any Black man – who speaks out on the issue of absentee Black fathers. Their “party line” has always been that Mother and Father being replaced by Baby Daddy and Baby Mama in the Black Community is solely or primarily the fault of Whites and racism. Bill Cosby and now Barack Obama have run afoul of people like Jackson whenever they admit that the irresponsibility of Black men is a major part of why 67% of Black children are born into single parent households.

If one looks a bit deeper into this though, it becomes plausible that Jesse Jackson was not just spewing the same vitriol as one would expect. Obama’s speech may have hit Jackson far too close to home. For Jackson the feeling of insult might have been entirely personal.

In the early weeks of 2001 the national press was reporting the scandalous details of Jackson’s long-term adulterous affair with Karin Stanford, a top aide working for his Chicago-based Rainbow Coalition, an affair that resulted in the birth of a daughter in 1998. Jesse Jackson then used his Rainbow Coalition’s funds to pay his mistress $35,000 to relocate her to Southern California and to provide her with continuing $3,000 a month in support. He also used $365,000 in funds from the Rainbow Coalition to purchase Stanford’s house.

By any reasonable accounting, this was a gross misuse of the funds of the Rainbow Coalition, which is a tax-exempt entity bound by strict rules governing dispersement of it funds. Yet, the Rainbow Coalition not only didn’t complain about spending this money on Jackson’s mistress and bastard daughter but actually signed off on it with their official approval. The larger organization willingly chose to overlook Jackson’s behavior and shield him as best as they could from the consequences of his transgressions.

Yeah…I think Jackson’s anger was quite personal. Any admonitions about taking personal responsibility for your misdeeds and the children they engender is going to hit far too close to home for Jackson’s comfort.

ICC Oversteps Authority

Posted in Politics on July 13th, 2008

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has once again attempted to overstep its authority by involving itself in matters which are outside of its jurisdiction. On Monday 14 July, ICC Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo will submit to the Judges of Pre-Trial Chamber I his evidence on crimes committed in the whole of Darfur over the last five years. Specifically he is requesting an arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir on the charges of genocide and crimes against humanity for the systematic killings in Sudan’s western Darfur region since 2003.

At first read this seems to be a fine idea. It isn’t.

The The International Criminal Court derives its powers from the Rome Statute signed into treaty on 17 July 1998 and entered into force on July 1, 2002. The Rome Statute is an international treaty which specifically grants the ICC jurisdiction in only in those States which formally expressed their consent to be bound by its provisions. These States voluntarily became “Parties” to the Statute. The 106 Nations who are currently States Parties to the Rome Statute do not include Sudan! The ICC has absolutely no jurisdiction over the Sudanese or their President Omar Hassan al-Bashir.

As bad as the situation is in Sudan, especially the Darfur region, I believe it is an even worse situation in the long run for an international body such as the ICC to be gratuitously overstepping its authority and ignoring the dictates and limitations of the treaty that created it and empowered its actions.

I’m fairly sure that the apologetics used to rationalize the ICC’s frankly extra-legal endeavors are that what is happening in the Darfur region of Sudan is an ongoing parade of atrocities, many – possibly most – of them committed systematically at the bequest of al-Bashir’s government. That’s fine and emotionally satisfying, but if one condones such actions by the ICC, then one must also condone the actions of Israel, the US, China, Russia, and any other nation that steps outside of international law and treaties to “do what it deems is necessary” to end an atrocity or protect itself.

For what little it’s worth the Sudanese government has exhibited a fierce defiance of the ICC. They even threatened to try Moreno-Ocampo in a Sudanese court for “terrorism” after the ICC Prosecutor tried to apprehend and arrest Sudanese State Minister Ahmed Haroun, one of the Sudanese citizens facing a previous ICC warrant, as he was about to go on a trip to Saudi Arabia.

NOTE: I really hate feeling the need to make posts such as this one. On a personal level I’d happily sell my life to visit the same horrors upon the Sudanese government and their forces that they’ve visited on the people of Darfur. One has to look beyond that though and see the ramifications the actions taken to redress these issues.

Thank you ever so much, Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo, for forcing me to side with al-Bashir and his ilk on anything! May the Gods create a special Hell for you rot within for eternity.

Obama’s Service Plan

Posted in 2008 Election on July 9th, 2008

On Wednesday, July 2, 2008, the Democratic Presumptive Presidential Nominee Sen. Barack Obama, in his speech at the University of Colorado on national service, promised that, if elected as president of the United States of America he would “set a goal for all American middle and high school students to perform 50 hours of service a year, and for all college students to perform 100 hours of service a year.”

Sen. Obama has promised that he would ensure that these federally mandated goals are met by, among other things, attaching strings to federal education dollars. States whose school systems and universities didn’t meet federal quotas for student performed public service hours would be denied federal educational dollars.

While this plan does not – despite some conservative pundit’s rants – violate the 13th Amendment which outlawed slavery and most other forms of forced servitude, it is still a vile and pernicious assault on both States’ rights and individual liberty.

One must remember that a similar (mis)use of federal education dollars to enforce a federally mandated curriculum, the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), has been reviled and complained about for years now. Yet it at least centered on curriculum and results-oriented accountability, whereas Obama’s proposed use of federal education dollars is for the purpose of mandating public service efforts by students.

Perhaps Sen. Obama should spend less time analyzing how he could, if elected as president, circumvent the 10th Amendment – which strictly limits the powers of the Federal Government – and spend more time reviewing the relevant Child Labor laws such as the the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA).

NOTE: This post only deals with that part of Obama’s National Service plan that deals with using federal education dollars to coerce the States into requiring public service work-hour quotas from students. There are other points in his plan that I endorse in principle, though as in all things involving the federal bureaucracy, I am skeptical of the implementation.

InfoWar – African Style

Posted in 2008 Olympics, Politics, Society on July 4th, 2008

InfoWar or Information Warfare is the use and management of information in pursuit of an advantage over an opponent. Information warfare may involve collection of tactical information, assurance that one’s own information is valid, spreading of propaganda or disinformation to demoralize the enemy and the public, undermining the quality of opposing force information and denial of information collection opportunities to opposing forces.

InfoWar has always been important in political and military struggles. In the modern world it possibly even more important for adversaries in a conflict to control and shape the information available.

Below is a video reporting on how some African citizen journalists – read that as Bloggers – are waging campaign of information warfare against the ruling parties in their lands who seek to maintain their authority at least partially by controlling and censoring what information is provided to their citizens and the world through the media.


This video is courtesy of Current_TV

These are some very brave and committed people who daily risk their freedom and their lives in an ongoing attempt to break their governments’ stranglehold on information dissemination. Across the globe citizen journalists – bloggers mostly – are engaged in an asymmetric war of information. They often manage though the porous nature of the internet to do what the Main Stream Media (MSM) is unable or unwilling to accomplish – the free and open release of information about unpopular, uncomfortable, and/or unprofitable issues.