IF Michael Jackson was a child molester, there are some differences. "a drug-induced cloud or living a life of public promiscuity" does not necessarily have victims, allegedly not checking IDs on all the groupies ain't working out too well for R. Kelly - another black, hmmm - these days, and few criminal convictions are as ugly as child molestation, with some even being kind of cool.
It may be easier for old farts like you or I to enjoy MJ's art than anyone younger that sees it after coming to believe that he's a child molester, and we're way past the prime music and video buying demographic, anyhow.
Good point. A person's societal offenses might keep me from watching/listening/going to see somebody concurrently, like I might have said, "I'm not buying any Kid Rock crap because he's such a right-wing Trumper asshat. But if it turned out now, say, that Roger Waters had also become a right-wing Trumper asshat, I'm not going to stop playing and enjoying "Dark Side of the Moon" from 1970-something.
Michael Jackson was a child molester, there are some differences. "a drug-induced cloud or living a life of public promiscuity" does not necessarily have victims, allegedly not checking IDs on all the groupies ain't working out too well for R. Kelly - another black, hmmm - these days, and few criminal convictions are as ugly as child molestation, with some even being kind of cool.
It may be easier for old farts like you or I to enjoy MJ's art than anyone younger that sees it after coming to believe that he's a child molester, and we're way past the prime music and video buying demographic, anyhow.
Good point. A person's societal offenses might keep me from watching/listening/going to see somebody concurrently, like I might have said, "I'm not buying any Kid Rock crap because he's such a right-wing Trumper asshat. But if it turned out now, say, that Roger Waters had also become a right-wing Trumper asshat, I'm not going to stop playing and enjoying "Dark Side of the Moon" from 1970-something.
I used to have the Michael Jackson "Thriller" album back when it first came out; some catchy tunes on there. If he's a child molester, well, fuck him I guess...doesn't change what''s on the record, though. Catholic clergy have been dong this shit for centuries, and they're still a big hit with lots of Catholics. Plus, I don't give a hoot in hell about crab legs....wouldn't have them if they were free. Now if they were handing out or had a nice green bud buffet I could see folks getting excited. I wouldn't be surprised to find out crab legs are somehow linked to child molestation. ok
He covers our entire conversation, but better. Well worth the 4 minutes, but if you can't:
Spoiler:
“I’m just saying you don’t know how good someone’s music really is until you find out they’re a pedophile. And the reason everybody’s so upset is because R. Kelly and Michael Jackson made great music.”
“If I found out Macklemore did some stuff, I’d be happy to free up the space on my iPhone,” he joked.
As for Kate Beckinsale, he's dated Carly Aquilino and Cazzie David, and was engaged to superstar Ariana Grande. Dayyum, he must be really funny . . . or something.
Depressing and infuriating. We even have our own participant sporadically here:
... Deprived of political power, black Americans have fought an uphill battle against institutional racism in the legal system and the economy. Blacks are arrested twice as often as whites for drug offenses, are more often jailed before trial, and receive harsher sentences for similar crimes.
John Ehrlichman (President Nixon’s Chief for Domestic Policy) actually admitted that this unjust behavior against black Americans was deliberate and premeditated. Here’s a quote from John Ehrlichman himself:
“We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course, we did."
Ehrlichman’s confession actually helps to explain a lot. Although black Americans aren't more likely to use or sell drugs, they're much more likely to be arrested for them. And when black people are convicted of drug charges, they generally face longer prison sentences than their white counterparts for the same crimes....
Though I don't think he's ever admitted the intentional racism of his deeds.
A clown with a flamethrower still has a flamethrower.
-- Charlie Sykes on MSNBC
1312. ETTD.
“When this started out, it was a story about people who hated Jussie Smollett because he was black and gay. But now people hate him because he’s an asshole. In other words, they’re judging him on the content of his character and not the color of his skin. And that, my friends, is progress.”
-- Trevor Noah
There's a certain strange logic about that.
Well, at least we can have a new term for totally fucking up your own career. In place of the outdated "milli-vanillied" we can now say "the idiot smolletted himself."
... The judge also granted a motion to seal the case, according to CBS Chicago.
"Today all criminal charges against Jussie Smollett were dropped and his record has been wiped clean of the filing of this tragic complaint against him," Smollett's attorneys said in a statement. "Jussie was attacked by two people he was unable to identify. He was a victim. He was vilified and made to appear as a perpetrator as a result of false and inappropriate remarks made to the public causing an inappropriate rush to judgment."
They added: "Jussie and many others were hurt by these unfair and unwarranted actions. The entire situation is a reminder that there should never be an attempt to prove a case in the court of public opinion. That is wrong. It is a reminder that a victim, in this case Jussie, deserves dignity and respect. Dismissal of charges against the victim in this case was the only just result."
"After reviewing all the facts and circumstances of the case, including Mr. Smollett's volunteer service in the community and agreement to forfeit his bond to the city of Chicago, we believe this outcome is a just disposition and appropriate resolution," read a statement from the Cook County Attorney's Office....
Wow, I didn't see that coming. I'm not saying that Smollett is entirely innocent, but CPD and the Cook County Attorney clearly overreached. This is a humiliating day for them and for the racists and homophobes that thought they "knew" the full truth. I wonder if the true and full story will ever come out.
A clown with a flamethrower still has a flamethrower.
-- Charlie Sykes on MSNBC
1312. ETTD.
They are correct to oppose Cain, but it's notable that after scores of horrendous POSPOTUS picks it's a black man that the Repugs finally object to.
Comment:
Cain is more qualified to be on the Fed board than Trump is to be president.
That's actually true.
"The GOP’s descent into vaudeville began with the 2008 vice presidential nomination of Sarah Palin, it accelerated in 2011 when Cain was taken seriously as a presidential candidate, and it reached warp speed with the party’s capture by the man who takes Cain seriously as a maker of monetary policy. Cain’s certitude about his economic nostrums is inversely proportional to the study he has invested in the subject, which probably has involved less effort than he recently invested in organizing a PAC to promote Trump’s reelection. Cain’s and his nominator’s boundless confidence in their economic beliefs demonstrates the Dunning-Kruger Effect. It is named for two Cornell psychologists who in 1999 described the bias by which the lower a person’s intellectual ability, the more the person tends to overestimate it."
-- George Will https://www.reviewatlas.com/opinion/201 ... ts-for-gop
A clown with a flamethrower still has a flamethrower.
-- Charlie Sykes on MSNBC
1312. ETTD.
The Letter from Birmingham Jail, also known as the Letter from Birmingham City Jail and The Negro Is Your Brother, is an open letter written on April 16, 1963, by Martin Luther King Jr. The letter defends the strategy of nonviolent resistance to racism. It says that people have a moral responsibility to break unjust laws and to take direct action rather than waiting potentially forever for justice to come through the courts. Responding to being referred to as an "outsider," King writes, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere".
The letter, written during the 1963 Birmingham campaign, was widely published, and became an important text for the American Civil Rights Movement.
A clown with a flamethrower still has a flamethrower.
-- Charlie Sykes on MSNBC
1312. ETTD.
In the final chapter of Just Mercy, Stevenson writes: “I believe that so much of our worst thinking about justice is steeped in the myths of racial difference that still plague us. I believe that there are four institutions in American history that have shaped our approach to race and justice but remain poorly understood.”
Those four, he says, are: slavery, the reign of terror following the collapse of Reconstruction, Jim Crow and mass incarceration.
One of this country’s major problems, Darin Waters maintains, is the culture’s inclination to ignore the past and focus on the future. “We don’t think in historical terms much,” says Waters, an assistant professor of history at UNCA. As a result, he continues, “People have a tendency to think these problems are new when they’re not.” ...
Makes sense, but I'd never really thought about it in terms of 4 phases of the same thing.
A clown with a flamethrower still has a flamethrower.
-- Charlie Sykes on MSNBC
1312. ETTD.
Another scholarly article addressing many of the issues of race and results of the previous couple-hundred years.
BRYAN STEVENSON ON WHAT WELL-MEANING WHITE PEOPLE NEED TO KNOW ABOUT RACE
An interview with Harvard University-trained public defense lawyer Bryan Stevenson on racial trauma, segregation, and listening to marginalized voices.
“110 young men, women, and children crowded into the schooner’s hold … 86 feet long with a 23-foot beam and a six-foot, 11-inch hold,“ plus crew. 25 people on a 150 foot ship and I would feel crowded.
A clown with a flamethrower still has a flamethrower.
-- Charlie Sykes on MSNBC
1312. ETTD.
Recently uncovered documents reveal that prominent Russian saboteurs seriously considered an elaborate plot to round up America’s top gang thugs, send them to Africa, arm them, take over the Southern United States and start a separate country where presumably “Knuck If You Buck” would be the national anthem.
This might be the stupidest idea in history. Imagine how dumb an entire group of people would have to be to start a civil war against their own country in hopes of creating an entirely separate society based on racism? It would be bloody and pit brother against brother. Secede from the Union? Who does that?
... One of the maps even showed what the new Pan-African country would look like, covering South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama Mississippi, Louisiana and maybe Texas.
But do we really want Texas? I’m pretty sure Blackmanistan’s Congress would be willing to keep Houston and maybe Dallas. We’d trade the rest of that bullshit for D.C. and a hood to be named later. And if they balk, fuck’em. As long as we have Atlanta, we’re good.
And no, we’re not taking Florida. Those motherfuckers are crazy.
... Sure, we’d make a few bucks off tourism but we’d probably have to build a wall to keep out white girls, Nick Saban and most of the Kardashians.
... Even though the plan sounds crazy, it does seem a little fun. First, we’d have to come up with a flag for New Wakanda. We’d call it the “black man’s flag” and every time white people see it, the hoowyatts would get upset and we could just tell them: “It’s about heritage, not hate.” We’ll probably have to build some monuments to the rebels who committed treason so that we could be free.
... The plan to take militant black people to Africa for slave uprising summer camp was shared with powerful Russians including businessman Mikhail Potepkin. Ultimately, the Russians decided that installing a dullard scofflaw with a God complex, a minuscule vocabulary and an addiction to Day-Glo spray tan would probably fuck this country up even more.
Turns out, they were right.
A clown with a flamethrower still has a flamethrower.
-- Charlie Sykes on MSNBC
1312. ETTD.
Incredible. Not only is the woman hopelessly trapped in a self inflicted victimhood status, check out how white her leg is. Can you imagine how white her ass must be? Hell, I bet it could be used as a lighthouse down on the coastal areas if they got it up high enough.
He covers our entire conversation, but better. Well worth the 4 minutes, but if you can't:
plus crew. 25 people on a 150 foot ship and I would feel crowded.
