The key word is privilege! Being weeks away from 2008, I felt it appropriate to start my commitment to the political process in this country. The 2008 Presidential Election has a very historical undertone and the old guard realized in the last two elections that their grip on society has slipped. So much so, both parties resulted in unscrupulous tactics to influence the vote or it's outcome. Many of the individuals that became prey to the political system weren't savvy enough to understand what was happening to them. Hispanics for the most part are still challenged by a language barrier. African Americans have become apathetic or chose assimilation. Native Americans are still slaves in 2007. Asian Americans are supporting their respective foreign cultures and tend to vote on economic issues and the poor are just undereducated and don't understand the process. My mission is to keep it very simple and dispel the myths via the facts. This serves as a first in a series on disfranchisement and disenfranchisement. I would like everyone to understand that our biggest problem as a culture is language. Once we have a grasp on the language used to control society then we have the ammunition to create a strategy for change. The language contained in the laws of this land is so important to understand. Language is not static, it is dynamic and fluid and ever changing and the key word for us is privilege. Disenfranchisement is defined by many as the revocation of suffrage (the right to vote), but it is actually the revocation of freedom and the opposite of freedom is servitude or slavery. The word franchise is derived for the French word franc which means free in this interpretation. Enfranchise means to set free, stemming from the same derivative. So with franchise being the goal and enfranchisement being the action item, what is the next step? Education! Simply, this basic lesson in the language and etymology of the two words presented as a subject gives us incite to dispel the myths of a particular school of thought. The key word becomes privilege when understanding the myth of disfranchisement and disenfranchisement. I will attempt to define and discuss how this myth came about and how it relates to citizens in the U.S. Stay Tuned, The Revolution Has Been Digitized!!! Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) fran·chise- Noun [Middle English fraunchise, from Old French franchise, from franche, feminine of franc, free, exempt;] fran·chise- Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This en·fran·chise – Verb 1. to grant a franchise to; admit to citizenship, esp. to the right of voting. 2. to endow (a city, constituency, etc.) with municipal or parliamentary rights. 3. to set free; liberate, as from slavery. [Middle English enfraunchisen, from Old French enfranchir, enfranchiss-, to set free : en-, intensive pref.; see en-1 + franchir (from franc, free; see frank1).] WordNet - Cite This Source - Share This enfranchisement 1. freedom from political subjugation or servitude 2. a statutory right or privilege granted to a person or group by a government (especially the rights of citizenship and the right to vote) [syn: franchise] 3. the act of certifying or bestowing a franchise on [syn: certification] [ant: disenfranchisement] Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) dis-
noun
pref.
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Disenfranchisement or Disfranchisement
Saturday, December 15, 2007
Nation Building, International Police Action and Imperialist Americans
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Our fine American Government!!!
WASHINGTON, Illinois (CNN) -- Ty Ziegel peers from beneath his Marine Corps baseball cap, his once boyish face burned beyond recognition by a suicide bomber's attack in Iraq just three days before Christmas 2004.
The VA initially told Garrett Anderson that his wounds sustained in Iraq weren't "service connected."
He lost part of his skull in the blast and part of his brain was damaged. Half of his left arm was amputated and some of the fingers were blown off his right hand.
Ziegel, a 25-year-old Marine sergeant, knew the dangers of war when he was deployed for his second tour in Iraq.
But he didn't expect a new battle when he returned home as a wounded warrior: a fight with the Department of Veterans Affairs.
"Sometimes, you get lost in the system," he told CNN. "I feel like a Social Security number. I don't feel like Tyler Ziegel."
His story is one example of how medical advances in the battlefield have outpaced the home front. Many wounded veterans return home feeling that the VA system, specifically its 62-year-old disability ratings system, has failed them. 
Watch Ziegel display his model skull »
"The VA system is not ready, and they simply don't have time to catch up," Tammy Duckworth -- herself a wounded veteran who heads up the Illinois Department of Veteran Affairs -- told the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee in March.
VA Acting Secretary Gordon Mansfield said cases like Ziegel's are rare -- that the majority of veterans are moving through the process and "being taken care of." He also said most veterans are fairly compensated.
"Any veteran with the same issue, if it's a medical disability, ... it is going to get the same exact result anywhere in our system," he said.
Saturday and Sunday, 8 p.m. ET
More than 28,500 troops have been wounded in Operation Iraqi Freedom, including about 8,500 that have needed air transport, according to the U.S. military. 
See photos of these Iraq war heroes »
A recent Harvard study found that the cost of caring for those wounded over the course of their lifetime could ultimately cost more than $660 billion.
In Ziegel's case, he spent nearly two years recovering at Brooke Army Medical Center in Texas. Once he got out of the hospital, he was unable to hold a job. He anticipated receiving a monthly VA disability check sufficient to cover his small-town lifestyle in Washington, Illinois.
Instead, he got a check for far less than expected. After pressing for answers, Ziegel finally received a letter from the VA that rated his injuries: 80 percent for facial disfigurement, 60 percent for left arm amputation, a mere 10 percent for head trauma and nothing for his left lobe brain injury, right eye blindness and jaw fracture.
"I don't get too mad about too many things," he said. "But once we've been getting into this, I'm ready to beat down the White House door if I need to."
"I'm not expecting to live in the lap of luxury," he added. "But I am asking them to make it comfortable to raise a family and not have to struggle."
Within 48 hours of telling his story to CNN this summer, the Office of then-VA Secretary Jim Nicholson acted on Ziegel's case. The VA changed his head trauma injury, once rated at 10 percent, to traumatic brain injury rated at 100 percent, substantially increasing his monthly disability check.
So You Call Yourself A Gangsta!!!
We live in a country that for the most part still provides some type of moral fortitude and yet we have idiots here who for some reason act out violence as a since of bravado. Just thank God, Allah or whoever you pray to that you don't live in Chechnya. They snatch bodies for real, and you call yourself a gangsta!!!
Grassroots Guerilla Marketing and Social Networking help influence popular culture and politics
So when does the social commentary of America become responsible for its conversation, seems like now. So I promise to keep this in the realm of social networking as much as possible, but at the end of the day you can’t help but to like Ron Paul. That being said, I have been preaching for the last 2 years that once corporate America realizes that $20 million budget they just awarded Ogilvy & Mather is not as effective as say maybe sending $1 million in IPhone inventory to bloggers and selling 1.5million phones instead of 500,000 on opening day. Thank you Howard Dean, John McCain and now heavy weight champion of online presidential campaigns, Ron Paul. This guy is so effective at grassroots marketing its phenomenal. Just a year ago if you polled the average American on who is Ron Paul is and they would probably ask you if you meant to say Ru Paul. Today, you can’t help passing the record label style displays of “Ron Paul for President” posters in the smallest cities. You have to a understand I come from a street team marketing background, of snipe posting, email blast, flyer and sticker distribution, hand to hand, city to city, all for $20 per diem. To walk down 16th street in Atlanta and see students and young adults doing the same thing I was getting arrested for ten years ago is truly amazing, Americans fighting for an honest answer about the state of the Union. Seems Paul is reaching a savvier political base via the internet. Supporters being excited via his extensive social network online seem more eager to research his position and more likely to activate them selves as personal spokespersons for his campaign. Paul has done an excellent job appealing to a particular segment of the population through pop culture venues such as YouTube, MySpace, and television shows such as Bill Maher. The impact of social networking by political candidates targeting hard to reach supporters and raising campaign funds has been outrageous, Paul raising an astonishing $4.2 million in 24 hours. Paul’s ability to reach such huge support base in a small amount of time really speaks to the democracy of media in the hands of the people. You Decide in 08!!! I have included a few videos for you guys to make your own opinion!!!
Joe Biden speaks to young America
American youth seem to more worried about candidates with a concrete platform than rock star quality. This video speaks to just that. Many of America's youth are concerned with where the war leaves us twenty years from now. Foreign policy, geo-politics and stability in second world countries armed with nuclear weapons are more of an issue to youth than older Americans. The youth seem to have more faith in the resilient economy than the rest of America. Check out the video, this kid is very articulate on American policy issues....
The weak American economy and the eternally abating American Dollar
If pop stars have the ability to influence pop culture, can pop stars influence politics?
So many of you who know me can vouch for the fact that I am a on again, off again Jay-Z fan. I have my intention, which I prefer not to discuss in this forum for obvious motive to some of you. We will get in to Hov a lil later.
To begin anew, many of us cruise idly through life giving faith to system we do not take time to understand. We skip of over front page articles on the war to make it to the fashion & entertainment or sports section. We TiVo, Grays Anatomy and Ugly Betty so that commercials from presidential candidates are easily fast forwarded. Not to mention, it’s always easy to watch Extreme Makeover Home Edition from last Sunday when the debates are on. We buy On-Demand movies when the annual State of the Union address is on, but are the first one’s to complain about Bush in an office quarrel.
Many of us do not realize that, was not only attributed to predatory lending practices aimed at the poor, not just minorities. The sub-prime lending debacle is an on-going scheme to sell bad paper (banking instruments) to gullible investors. Who are the gullible investors??? Let’s see, how do I paint this picture to still include a dozen roses??? Well since it can’t be done, here goes it. The gullible investors were college educated, middle and upper middle class Americans who were coxed into buying hedge funds. Middle class employees, whose employer was convinced to roll over 401k programs into fund management and baby millionaire idiots with expendable cash and know banking acumen, who said “I’m just going to retire and day trade.”
All of that was a mouth full, so let’s dig a lil deeper. Not very long ago, the Democrats pushed hard for the deregulation of the banking industry. They concocted this hair-brained scheme that the banking industry could regulate itself. So before deregulation if you were a stock broker then you could not be a banker, because you may be tempted to use your banking interest to fund fugazi investments. To you the banker it doesn’t matter because you just made a fee on both ends. So as soon as deregulation was legislated guess who did you know what with you know who? So know a certain bank hires a former fund manager who convinces the bank to back a scheme to approve loans to people who can’t afford to pay. Add that in with our “Texas Oil Man” President who invaded Afghanistan and Iraq for energy interest and there you have it the current state of the American Economy.
So now gas is $4.00 a gallon, the economy is sluggish, many foreign countries are dumping the U.S. dollar like it’s infected with the plague, and Europeans are running around America buying real estate like its on Wal-Mart rollback. So when does the social commentary of America become responsible for its conversation. Super models requesting to be paid in foreign currency, Jay-Z flashing Euro’s in his “Blue Magic” video and now mainstream media invokes a level of interest into pop culture.
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Bamboozled!!!
So, Bob Johnson (BET) and Tracie Edmonds (Soul Food, College Hill, Keisha Cole and DMX documentaries) form a film House with Bob and Harvey Weinstein called Our Stories Films. You know the Weinstein’s. If you have bought or rented a DVD in the last 2 years then you have made them unbelievably rich, if you are still clueless then think Miramax, or just notice the extremely Jewish last name. Now that we have the introductions out of the way, let’s get back to Bob and Tracie. So Bob and Tracie devise this marketing and press initiative and begin selling “Us” Our Films. Now they begin by playing on the emotions of the creative artsy types by implying that Our Films is the first opportunity for African Americans to have relevant films greenlit to reflect our true creative community. Meaning no more stereotypical , Booty Call, High High, Blaxplotation bullshit. It seemed to be hope for serious African American filmmakers, like my homie Devaughn over at Digital Soul or my other friend Jeruvia at The 54th Filmworks. So as I read press releases and local genre driven rags, such as Rolling Out and Creative Loafing, stories by Tracie impress me that someone finally gets it. I was so excited to see Blacks in entertainment realize that distribution is the only way to change our image in media arts.
Well what the FUCK??? Who’s Your Caddy??? You have got to be fucking kidding me!!! You have got to be out of your rabid ass mind!!!! I have been bamboozled, hoodwinked, lead astray!!! I know Spike Lee went and shot a documentary on GP after this bullshit. Let me stop, I must remember the visionaries behind this venture. I mean BET is so much better since white people own it, and they stopped showing College Hill, reruns of Soul Food and docs about broke, disgusted entertainers. What more should I expect from these people??? I mean I was just fine with watching the Jamie Foxx show and seeing a white man fund and green light the movie that won him the Oscar. At some point, I know that I sound racist, can we stop getting rich and wealthy and buying cars, jewelry, sports teams, homes next door to people that don’t like us, stock in companies that don’t support us, and fund, create and distribute art that preserves our history and culture???
Flavor of Love, Charm School, I Love New York, Cribs, The Maury “You are not the father” Povich Show, ANTM, reruns of Jamie Foxx, Martin, Fresh Prince, (and I could go on for days with the buffoonery) are the only options a nigga got for programming??? And you wonder why I only I watch rap videos, BEEF The Series, and hood dvd’s like Smack, Sub Zero, The Raw Report etc… Thank God for Youtube… I must say that Girlfriends is one of the few shows that correctly mimic the “Black Social Commentary”, and I say that with sincerity and because Joan is my imaginary girlfriend!!
The Blak Haxor
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Black Bourgeois "Booghie Nigga's" get a slap in tha face!
With the anniversary of the Little Rock 9, the Jena Six and African American young adults amassing more wealth than any other time period in this country’s history, the top four GOP candidates decide to skip Tavis Smiley’s Republican debate at Morgan State. So where does our loyalty lie? Increasingly as a trend I have watched young educated African Americans align themselves with the conservative views of the Republican Party as a statement of personal responsibility and elitism. I have participated in dialogue with several individuals of America’s Black elite who weave tails of social Darwinism being the platform of discussion at our elite black educational institutions. Now the Kush doesn’t have me so stoned that I would begin to offend this position with the “Field Nigga, House Nigga” debate. I reserve that my intelligence is far surpassed an emotional dilemma I might have with myself, but has the idea of the “Black Political Party” become cliché and is it time for us to begin to explore other options in political and economic participation?
I mean for the most part we are socially divided in our race and culture and many of those divisions reflect how other races view our role in this country, politically and economically. Is it still an effective tactic for African Americans to divide and conquer within our race or is it high time to accept that our drunk uncle is also smoking crack? I mean, I am in my early thirties and only 4 generations removed from slavery, unless you are Black and from Africa we have the same propensity for being dope boy fresh. Again I reiterate, in the wake of recent black history, where do our loyalties lie???
Why Republican Presidential Candidates Skipped the Morgan State Debate
by Tracie Powell
Sep 27, 2007, 23:18
