RIP Andy Griffith

1926-2012

Memo to John Boehner et al

You lost. Nanny Nanny boo boo.

Nikki Giovanni: Adulthood

“I usta wonder who I’d be
when I was a little girl in Indianapolis
sitting on doctors porches with post-dawn pre-debs
(wondering would my aunt drag me to church sunday)
i was meaningless
and i wondered if life
would give me a chance to mean
i found a new life in the withdrawal from all things
not like my image
when I was a teenager I usta sit
on front steps conversing
the gym teachers son with embryonic eyes
about the essential essence of the universe
(and other bullshit stuff)
recognizing the basic powerlessness of me.
but then I went to college where i learned
that just because everything i was was unreal
i could be real and not just real through withdrawal
into emotional crosshairs of colored bourgeoisie intellectual pretensions
but from involvement with things approaching reality
i could possibly have a life
so catatonic emotions and time wasting sex games
were replaced with functioning commitments to logic and
necessity and the gray area was slowly darkened into
a black thing
for a while progress was being made along with a certain degree
of happiness cause i wrote a book and found a love
and organized a theatre and even gave some lectures on
Black history
and began to believe all good people could get
together and win without bloodshed
then
hammaskjold was killed
and diem was killed
and kennedy was killed
and malcolm was killed
and evers was killed
and schwerner, chaney and goodman were killed
and liuzzo was killed
and stokely fled the country
and le roi was arrested
and rap was arrested
and pollard, thompson and cooper were killed
and king was killed
and kennedy was killed
and i sometimes wonder why i didn’t become a debutante
sitting on porches, going to church all the time, wondering
is my eye make-up on straight
or a withdrawn discoursing on the stars and moon
instead of a for real Black person who must now feel
and inflict
pain”

Statement From Lauryn Hill

It was reported yesterday that Ms. Lauryn Hill has been charged with three counts of misdemeanor failure to file taxes. These charges were incurred for the years of 2005-2007, during a time in which Ms. Hill had removed herself and her family from society, in order to keep them safe, healthy, and free from danger. In response to these charges, Ms. Hill has issued the following statement:




“For the past several years, I have remained what others would consider underground. I did this in order to build a community of people, like-minded in their desire for freedom and the right to pursue their goals and lives without being manipulated and controlled by a media protected military industrial complex with a completely different agenda. Having put the lives and needs of other people before my own for multiple years, and having made hundreds of millions of dollars for certain institutions, under complex and sometimes severe circumstances, I began to require growth and more equitable treatment, but was met with resistance. I entered into my craft full of optimism (which I still possess), but immediately saw the suppressive force with which the system attempts to maintain it’s control over a given paradigm. I’ve seen people promote addiction, use sabotage, black listing, media bullying and any other coercion technique they could, to prevent artists from knowing their true value, or exercising their full power. These devices of control, no matter how well intentioned (or not), can have a devastating outcome on the lives of people, especially creative types who must grow and exist within a certain environment and according to a certain pace, in order to live and create optimally.

I kept my life relatively simple, even after huge successes, but it became increasingly obvious that certain indulgences and privileges were expected to come at the expense of my free soul, free mind, and therefore my health and integrity. So I left a more mainstream and public life, in order to wean both myself, and my family, away from a lifestyle that required distortion and compromise as a means for maintaining it. During this critical healing time, there were very few people accessible to me who had not already been seduced or affected by this machine, and therefore who could be trusted to not try and influence or coerce me back into a dynamic of compromise. Individual growth was expected to take place unnaturally, or stagnated outright, subject to marketing and politics. Addressing critical issues like pop culture cannibalism or its manipulation of the young at the expense of everything, was frowned upon and discouraged by limiting funding, or denying it outright. When one has a prolific creative output like I did/do, and is then forced to stop, the effects can be dangerous both emotionally and psychologically, both for the artist and those in need of that resource. It was critically important that I find a suitable pathway within which to exist, without being distorted or economically strong-armed.

During this period of crisis, much was said about me, both slanted and inaccurate, by those who had become dependent on my creative force, yet unwilling to fully acknowledge the importance of my contribution, nor compensate me equitably for it. This was done in an effort to smear my public image, in order to directly affect my ability to earn independently of this system. It took a long time to locate and nurture a community of people strong enough to resist the incredibly unhealthy tide, and more importantly see through it. If I had not been able to make contact with, and establish this community, my life, safety and freedom, would have been directly affected as well as the lives, safety and freedom of my family. Failure to create a non toxic, non exploitative environment was not an option.

As my potential to work, and therefore earn freely, was being threatened, I did whatever needed to be done in order to insulate my family from the climate of hostility, false entitlement, manipulation, racial prejudice, sexism and ageism that I was surrounded by. This was absolutely critical while trying to find and establish a new and very necessary community of healthy people, and also heal and detoxify myself and my family while raising my young children.

There were no exotic trips, no fleet of cars, just an all out war for safety, integrity, wholeness and health, without mistreatment denial, and/or exploitation. In order to liberate myself from those who found it ok to oppose my wholeness, free speech and integral growth by inflicting different forms of punitive action against it, I used my resources to sustain our safety and survival until I was able to restore my ability to earn outside of it!

When artists experience danger and crisis under the effects of this kind of insidious manipulation, everyone easily accepts that there was something either dysfunctional or defective with the artist, rather than look at, and fully examine, the system and its means and policies of exploiting/’doing business’. Not only is this unrealistic, it is very dark in its motivation, conveniently targeting the object of their hero worship by removing any evidence that they ‘needed’ or celebrated this very same resource just years, months or moments before. Since those who believe they need a hero/celebrity outnumber the actual heroes/celebrities, people feel safe and comfortably justified in numbers, committing egregious crimes in the name of the greater social ego. Ironically diminishing their own true hero-celebrity nature in the process.

It was this schism and the hypocrisy, violence and social cannibalism it enabled, that I wanted and needed to be freed from, not from art or music, but the suppression/repression and reduction of that art and music to a bottom line alone, without regard for anything else. Over-commercialization and its resulting restrictions and limitations can be very damaging and distorting to the inherent nature of the individual. I Love making art, I Love making music, these are as natural and necessary for me almost as breathing or talking. To be denied the right to pursue it according to my ability, as well as be properly acknowledged and compensated for it, in an attempt to control, is manipulation directed at my most basic rights! These forms of expression, along with others, effectively comprise my free speech! Defending, preserving, and protecting these rights are critically important, especially in a paradigm where veiled racism, sexism, ageism, nepotism, and deliberate economic control are still blatant realities!!!

Learning from the past, insulating friends and family from the influence of external manipulation and corruption, is far more important to me than being misunderstood for a season! I did not deliberately abandon my fans, nor did I deliberately abandon any responsibilities, but I did however put my safety, health and freedom and the freedom, safety and health of my family first over all other material concerns! I also embraced my right to resist a system intentionally opposing my right to whole and integral survival.

I conveyed all of this when questioned as to why I did not file taxes during this time period. Obviously, the danger I faced was not accepted as reasonable grounds for deferring my tax payments, as authorities, who despite being told all of this, still chose to pursue action against me, as opposed to finding an alternative solution.

My intention has always been to get this situation rectified. When I was working consistently without being affected by the interferences mentioned above, I filed and paid my taxes. This only stopped when it was necessary to withdraw from society, in order to guarantee the safety and well-being of myself and my family.

As this, and other areas of issue are resolved and set straight, I am able to get back to doing what I should be doing, the way it should be done. This is part of that process. To those supporters who were told that I abandoned them, that is untrue. I abandoned greed, corruption, and compromise, never you, and never the artistic gifts and abilities that sustained me.”

What is Going on with Die Linke?

German Left Party congress exposes divisions and crisis

By Lucas Adler
6 June 2012

The Third Congress of the German Left Party, held last weekend in Göttingen, exposed sharp divisions and a deep crisis. The two-day meeting was marked by bitter clashes between opposing factions centered on the election of a new leadership.

The congress took place against the backdrop of a series of dramatic election defeats for the party and dwindling membership rolls. In 2009, the Left Party polled 11.9 percent in federal elections. Now, according to opinion polls, the party would have difficulty meeting the 5 percent threshold for gaining representation in the German parliament (Bundestag).

In a letter to delegates, the party’s senior council presented a grim vision of the state of the party. The party program adopted last year had hardly played a role in the life of the party and had been partly undermined, the letter declared. “Elections have been lost, there is a loss of 8,000 members, a loss of political influence, a lack of transparency in inner-party life,” the council complained.

In his speech to the congress, the outgoing chairman, Klaus Ernst, a leader of the faction centered in the west of the country, described the condition of the party. “We have approval ratings of 6 percent at the federal level,” he said. “We failed by a large margin to enter the state parliaments in Baden-Württemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate. In Schleswig-Holstein and North Rhine-Westphalia we were tossed out unceremoniously. Our poll numbers are crumbling in the east. Overall, we have lost 9,000 members since 2009. Entire district organizations in the west have dissolved. We have signs of decay in our party.”

At the congress, the party demonstrated its inability to confront and discuss the political roots of this decline. Instead, the opposing wings attacked one another once again, claiming that each side was responsible for the deplorable state of the party.

For Klaus Ernst, the problem lay in the fact that the party had failed to establish a strong centre to counter the centrifugal forces within the party. “The only future for our party is to stay and fight together,” he told the delegates.

Ernst was followed by the chairman of the parliamentary group, Gregor Gysi, who heads the faction based in the east. In an angry speech, Gysi expressed his frustration over the infighting between the opposing wings of the party.

Gysis complained in particular about a criticism raised by members from the former West Germany which, he said, reminded him of the “western arrogance that prevailed following the unification of our country.” He continued: “But there is also hatred in our group in the Bundestag. For years, I have found myself standing between two locomotives moving towards each other, and I know that one can end up being crushed. For years, I have been in a situation where I had to make myself unpopular with one group or another, and I’m fed up with it.”

Gysi threatened to split the party. “Either we are able to choose a cooperative leadership that integrates and organizes the party, so that we are once again a major political force,” he said, “or we are not in a position to do so.” He continued, “In that case I say openly: It is better to separate cleanly rather than stay together with hatred, trickery and behind-the-back blows in a thoroughly ruined marriage.”

Most of the media reports on the congress depicted the debate as a conflict between a left wing based mainly in western Germany and led by the former party chairman, Oskar Lafontaine, and a right wing with its base in what had been East Germany, headed by Gysi and the party’s former national director, Dietmar Bartsch.

This presentation is misleading. The conflict within the party is between two right-wing factions with only marginal differences in terms of policy. Less than a year ago the delegates of both wings voted by 97 percent in favour of a joint policy statement that defended all the pillars of capitalism.

The media claim that the Lafontaine wing is not prepared to cooperate with the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and participate in bourgeois governments is false. Lafontaine said so himself at the party congress. “Who made the offer in Hesse to form a government? It was the Left Party in Hesse,” he said. “Who made it possible for the government (the SPD-Green Party minority government in North Rhine-Westphalia) to constitute itself in the first place? It was the Left in North Rhine-Westphalia. Who offered on television to support the SPD taking over the premiership of the state after their successful election? I did.”

The intra-party dispute revolves, in fact, around the issue of how best to support the SPD.

Lafontaine was a leading member of the SPD for forty years until he quit in 1999 because he had concluded that the policy of Chancellor Gerhard Schröder was unnecessarily undermining workers’ support for the SPD. Lafontaine is convinced that what is needed is a party capable of controlling workers and suppressing the class struggle. He is a student of Willy Brandt, the SPD chancellor who defused radical demonstrations in the 1970s with the slogan “dare more democracy” and a significant expansion of the universities and public services. At the same time, he introduced reactionary laws aimed at suppressing any serious opposition.

Lafontaine was the architect of the merger in 2007 between the group of prominent trade union officials and ex-social democrats organised in the Election Alternative (WASG) and the Party of Democratic Socialism, the successor party to the ruling East German Stalinist party. Lafontaine’s aim from the start was to divert political radicalization among workers into harmless channels. He did so primarily by encouraging the illusion that it was possible to return to the type of social democratic reforms that had characterised the Brandt era, simply ignoring the process of globalization and the increased domination of the international financial markets over political life.

The Lafontaine wing is just as conservative and supportive of the bourgeois state as the Bartsch wing. Lafontaine’s supporters have been recruited from long-time union officials with links to the SPD and former petty-bourgeois radicals whom the Left Party offered an opportunity to gain public office, with the attendant privileges. Ernst, the outgoing chairman and Lafontaine’s right-hand man, was a full-time district secretary with the IG Metall trade union in Schweinfurt. His successor, Bernd Riexinger, comes from the same region and is a district secretary with the Verdi public service union.

Lafontaine believes the Left Party can fulfill its task only if adopts a radical tone verbally and keeps a certain distance from the SPD, at least during elections and when the SPD is in opposition. But like Bartsch, his main aim is to assist the SPD in coming to power as soon as the Left Party has achieved the necessary influence.

The Bartsch faction objects to Lafontaine’s radical rhetoric and occasional digs at the SPD due its roots in the Stalinist apparatus and its extensive involvement in government at the state and local level in eastern Germany. In the east of the country, the Left Party shares power with the SPD (as well as the conservative Christian Democratic Union—CDU) in numerous local administrations, and the eastern-based faction therefore regards Lafontaine’s rhetoric as disruptive to its daily functioning and its harmonious relations with the political establishment. Its motto is taken from the text book of Stalinist governance: “Adherence to public order is the highest civic duty.”

The intensification of the capitalist crisis has revealed the basic right-wing orientation of the Left Party. This is the reason for its current decline and the fierce infighting that erupted over the issue of a new party leadership.

Lafontaine wanted to prevent at all costs the election of Bartsch as co-chairman (the constitution of the Left Party provides for a duel chair, including at least one woman), but was not prepared to air his differences publicly. Instead, he employed all sorts of maneuvers and back-room deals to prevent the election of Bartsch. To this end he had to exert all of his influence within the party.

Initially, he had proposed his own candidacy as chairman on the condition that Bartsch withdraw his candidacy. Bartsch refused to play along and Lafontaine withdrew from the race in favour of his close confidante, Bernd Riexinger. Lafontaine’s girlfriend, Sarah Wagenknecht, also reserved the right to compete against Bartsch.

Following the election of Katja Kipping (east faction) by delegates, Wagenknecht made a speech in which she withdrew her own nomination while strongly advising delegates not to pick Bartsch as co-chairman.

In a run-off vote, the largely unknown Riexinger, with 53.5 percent of the vote, was able to squeeze out Bartsch (45.2 percent). This leaves the Left Party in the hands of Kipping and Riexinger, each representing one of the two warring factions. Both have in common, however, their loyalty to the bourgeois state and their profound contempt for the working class.

Kipping is a member of the group “Institute for a Modern Solidarity,” which she founded in early 2010 together with representatives from the SPD and the Greens. The aim of the institute is to provide the basis for closer cooperation between the three parties based on the subordination of the issue of growing social inequality to lifestyle questions and fostering the self-gratification of the petty-bourgeoisie.

Riexinger, 56, is an experienced trade union bureaucrat. He trained to be a banker and throughout the 1980s was union representative at the Leonberger Building Society. He became a trade union secretary in 1991 and is currently a full-time Verdi official in Baden-Württemberg.

The party congress has resolved nothing for the Left Party. The internal conflicts intensify as the crisis deepens. A split is quite possible.

Nevertheless, it would be wrong to write off the party prematurely. As the crisis develops, the ruling class may feel obliged to breathe new life into the organization. The sister party of the Left Party in Greece, the Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA), also went through a severe crisis and split before it was propped up by the media and gained political support following the collapse of the social democratic PASOK. Now it stands ready to take power following elections later this month and enforce austerity measures dictated by the international banks against the Greek population.

Bon Anniversaire, Josephine!!!

Happy Birthday, Grace Jones!!

(One of my future Mothers-in-law LOL!)

Robert Zimmerman, Former Judge, Father of George Zimmerman and the Reason He Has Been Treated So Nicely in the Media

Read about him here.

Repressed Tales, Vol. 1

So, I have been contemplating this series, or reports rather, for they are true stories, for a long time.What this series considers is my idea that if one lives under a system of repression, there is absolutely nothing you can be except repressed unless you are on your way to liberation. These stories, which I am about to present to you, all of which I can vouch for, speak to this idea. Here is the first installment.

Repressed Tales, Vol. 1.

I was a sophomore or junior in college when one day I was standing admiring some display in the dining hall when all of a sudden, one of the foreign exchange students, Mack, from Korea, came up beside me and very nonchalantly grabbed my breast. Begging his pardon, in his words it was an accident. Mack was studying to be a minister, was thirty years old to my twenty years and led a very model existence by clerical standards. Not at all put off by the accidental grope, I invited Mack to my room that evening to discuss politics and history, two passions we both shared. My room was very private in the evenings as the roommate I had worked nights and did not get home until very late. So, that evening, and many evenings that followed, Mack would come to my room and I would sit on my bed and he would sit in a chair. We would discuss politics, history, and any number of things, while at the same time, without either of us saying a word, my hands would snake up and down his thighs while I stroked him to ultimate pleasure. Mostly, he came in his clothes, but once I jacked him off by hand as we continued our conversation. These meetings went on for about three months.Then I think he became troubled by what we were doing because he went to see his minister and subsequently after that showed up with a girlfriend. I continued to see him around, but we never fooled around again. I have no idea what happened to him after graduation.

Happy Birthday to Kathleen Cleaver!!

Happy Birthday, Stevie!!

Stevie Wonder

Interview with Steve Dorsey

When Oprah took her life class to St. Louis, Steve Dorsey inspired a worldwide movement when he stood and gave his testimony about overcoming addiction and conquering his life's demons. His session with Iyanla Van Zant touched millions of people across the globe who subsequently answered Iyanla's call to everyone to "Stand with Steve" demonstrating that suffering is universal. I recently became acquainted with Mr. Dorsey and asked him if he wouldn't mind sharing a few words with Julius Speaks. Here is what transpired.

1. What is your background? Where are you from?

I was born in Compton Ca and my mom moved us to Riverside in 74 were I really grew up at. Came from a some what poor back ground I guess, my mom was a house cleaner and she collected welfare because she worked under the table. She did what she had to do in order to try and give us a better life and tha better life took money and her back ground was basically a maid and that would not pay the bills. I say some what poor because all of my friends had brand new stuff we got used stuff, but at least we had stuff. My Mom was white and my dad was black, he was killed when I was 10 but they were divorced and my step dad who the only dad I knew was disabled. They were both alcoholics and my family back ground was this. My father died drunk. I was influenced very young in life.


2. What inspired you to become a photographer?

My daughter needed head shots because she wanted to be a model. She needed them right a way, so I said I could do it and did it! (LOL) I purchased a nice camera took her head shots and the company she was working for allowed me to follow them around and take photos so I helped out and the next thing you know I am doing it all the time and every book I could get my hands on I read. I spent hours researching other photographers and volunteering my time!


3. In Oprah's Life Class, your story inspired millions around the globe. In a few words, tell us your story.


I spent years learning how to reprogram my brain once I heard it can be done and nothing worked, every thing I did in life and business kept failing and I kept getting more and more discouraged and the final straw was when IRS cleaned out my bank account for the second time within a 6 month period and no one could help me even all the people I helped out never answered their phones.
I had people who owed me a lot of money just shunned me, so I was in a lot of pain and that was the topic so I wrote in about it and they contacted me and the rest has been on tv.

4. What have been some of the most important lessons you've learned in your life?

Everything we do in life has a story and watch what story you are telling yourself and what others are telling you!

5. Do you have any heroes? people you admire?

Everyone Oprah works with including Oprah especially, always God almighty, authors who write empowering messages.

6. What were those moments like with Iyanla Vanzant affirming you and calling on others to affirm you while you were on the show?

It was an amazing breakthrough and I was so grateful to have finally got it. I had this feeling inside of me for so long that I was so close to getting it and that day I got it!

7. What are your plans for the future?

Build Stand with Steve into a nonprofit and help others in all areas of life it can be of service with. Employ as many people as we can and do the work God has in store for me.

8. Are there any words you'd like to leave us with?

There is a reason why your brain does what it does. Make sure you understand the WHY and then your life will make sense. Keep an open mind and a closed mouth during the process and most important the only one you are lying to when you lie is yourself!

Thanks Steve!

Happy Birthday Muhammad Ali!!!