YouTube – Martin Lawrence stand up 6:
““
(Via YouTub.)
If you listen from 1:00 to about 3:30, you get an apropos discussion on today’s brouhaha. Note: this is circa 1995. (WARNING: NSFW!)
Technorati Tags:
crowley, gates, racial profiling, society
Will Cops And Black People Ever Get Along? « The Michael Eric Dyson Show:
“Are the perceptions that have been heard about the relationships between cops and black men really as tense as projected or nothing more than big misinterpretations?”
(Via The Michael Eric Dyson Show.)
I would say things have been always tense. When one has to fear for his life, that’s not a calm and cool situation. That said, it was an interesting show.
Technorati Tags:
crowley, gates, racial profiling, society, beer
The Henry Louis Gates Jr. Arrest: When Race Matters – TIME:
“Obama, in all likelihood, has had similar experiences with the police, exchanges in which he was left with the impression that his Ivy League pedigree could take him only so far. And so it’s unfortunate that he felt unable to continue to express what he truly felt. He was forced to revise and turn what was an objectively true statement — that it’s stupid to arrest a man in his own house for being rude — into a vague ‘teachable moment’ [emphasis mine] about nothing particular…
This is deflating. If the rest of the country is too immature for some straight talk about the relationship between blacks and the police, delivered by our most accomplished and temperate diplomats, then the prospects for a broader dialogue about race are not good.”
(Via TIME Magazine.)
Exactly. With all of the defenses I’ve heard for Crowley, not one addresses the fact that they arrested a man in his own home for essentially being rude. All those small government, losing freedom folks said nothing about this. This is the central argument for black folks accurate or not: That Gates’ race made this kind of violation sanctioned in our society. Crowley’s defenders simply prove that fear right.
Today I had to take my son for his 15 month well visit. All day in the car as I listened to NPR, universal healthcare was the topic. Little did I know I would get a reminder of the problems with our system up close and personal today.
At the doctor’s, my son developed a strong fever. It turns out this was due to a new ear infection. Great. His shots would have to be delayed another few weeks and we’d have to give him a course of antibiotics. All of this would be handled well by my insurance. The full course, between generic substitutions in pharmacy and our family’s insurance coverage, would run me $12. No sweat. With a $15 copay my running total so far was $27.
But there was a problem.
My wife was concerned with the wheezing she still hears in my son’s breathing at night. My doctor was as well. She prescribed a 30 day supply of Pulmicort, an asthma treatment medicine. Since there are no generic substitutes, I have to pay full boat with my plan reimbursing me for 60% of the cost. And that cost? $365!
Now I don’t know about you, but how is a person with few means supposed to shelve out that kind of money on a monthly basis to treat their child? First you have to have the cash on hand or the credit to shell out what amounts to a car payment. Second, you’d have to be able to afford the 40%, or $146, you’d be responsible for if you have insurance. What happens if you are one of the 47,000,000 people who don’t? What’s wrong with this picture?
Truly, when I think of folks defending our healthcare system, esp. with regard to the pharma companies, I find it hard not to think of the phrase “full of shit.”
UPDATE: I can’t really take credit for the title, it was from a teacher and mentor who corrected me when I mentioned that the UK’s universal healthcare system was socialized medicine. She said, “No, it’s civilized medicine.”
Michael Jackson’s Mirror. – Ta-Nehisi Coates:
“I think, despite the jokes and the sarcasm, we all knew what the plastic surgery was about. There was the stuff that MJ did that we joked about because it was weird, and there was the stuff he did that we joked about because it made us uncomfortable, because it told us something really ugly about the way things are and about ourselves too–I’m not talking just about white people, it’s 2009 and ‘good hair’ hasn’t gone out of style quite yet. I think things are different from the way they were in Jackson’s heyday. But not so different that it’s funny.”
(Via Ta-Nehisi Coates.)
What Single Women Can’t Learn From Michelle:
“Black women hoping for a monopoly on black men have to realize that they’re like General Motors in a Toyota world—either develop your own hybrid technology or prepare to go out of business. “
(Via The Root.)
Newscoma » Blog Archive » Racist And Ridiculous:
“Christian Grantham talks to Ms. Goforth, who admits she sent the email.
When I asked her if she understood the controversial nature of the photo, Goforth would only say she felt very bad about accidentally sending it to the wrong list. When I gave her a second chance to address the controversial nature of the email, she again repeated that she only felt bad about sending it to the wrong list of people.
I sent it to the wrong list of people? Huh.”
(Via Newscoma.)
My problem isn’t with the racists so much as it is with the GOP environment that would give them aid and comfort.
