Both Sides Of The Fence

 

I think Steve Cohen is a mountebank who no longer has to look for a mark. He has the 9th congressional district on the hook. That's not completely a bad thing though. The voters just need to know and use it to their advantage. He'll push for anything  they say to get reelected.  For eleven years they had someone with higher aspirations. So Cohen is a refreshing change. He reminds me of the local used car magnate Mark Goodfellow. They invite you  to dinner and charge you for the plates and utensils when it's time to eat.. They have the same type grip on the black community. We thank them for their good fortune.

Steve Cohen never planned for this Holocaust comment to get this much media coverage. He thought it would be played on channels 3,5,13 and 24 here in Memphis. He didn't expect CNN,Fox and MSNBC to get on board and give the story life. Now he has to quietly eat crow and apologize to the Republicans and the Jewish community. As long as he was only swindling blacks they ignored him. His true colors are now showing. Every time he is interviewed he takes back more and more of what he said. I predict we won't be hearing from him much in the near future. He'll be doing his best to play both sides of the fence.

Where It All Got Started

I know Antonio 2 Shay Parkinson is pandering to his constituents so I'm not shocked at his comments. He was elected to his office with 353 votes. His community activism amounts to organizing a couple of block parties for peace and a mayoral debate. What do you expect to happen when all the shoppers move away? Raleigh Springs Mall is a victim of the same plight as Frayser  and other similar neighborhoods all over the city. A former viable working class community has been transformed into what we have now due to government intervention. Someone once said "the only government that can give you everything, is one that takes everything in exchange". Government intervention is where it all got started.

Still Around

Millington Mayor Sounds Off on Merger: MyFoxMEMPHIS.com

Here is an example of what I was talking about in my last post. On so many levels what he says is right but I also can read between the lines. Why even bother consulting with an "admittedly reluctant appointee"? They will only sabatoge the process. Don't take them for granted. They are still around.

Twenty-One Years Ago

January 11, 1990 - City Mayors (from left) Bobby Flaherty of Bartlett, Herman Cox of Collierville, George Harvell of Millington, William Howick of Lakeland and Charles Salvaggio of Germantown listen to comments concerning school consolidation during a January 11, 1990 public meeting at Bartlett High School. They mayors said they planned to secede from Shelby County and start their own. (By Michael McMullan/The Commercial Appeal files)

Lately I have kept my opinions concerning the merger of the school systems to myself.  It's largely because different people are supporting it for different reasons.  Unfortunately some grandstanding and politics have taken the forefront in this issue. I have seen some that were adamantly against it all of a sudden have a change of heart. Before it's over they may be trouble. I see this as a cleansing opportunity for the MCS. Not a chance to stick it to the white man. The problem is those who think that way have a valid argunent. This time there really is a white man working against them.

What jumps off the page when you look at the photo above? One thing is all of the men pictured upfront are white. The problem with that is they're deciding the plight of a population made up of 60 to 70% black residents most of whom don't even live in their cities. Talk about taxation without representation. Times supposedly have changed but they really haven't. To say race doesn't have a part in this charter surrender debate is either naive or intellectually dishonest. Even attempts to circumvent or change the law have been made to keep things the way they are. Everyone against the merger is not racist but some of them are. It's not so hard to believe some of them are still out there. This picture was taken only twenty-one years ago.

Cutting Down Any Nets

I have always hung this teams success squarely on the shoulders of Will Coleman. It appears he can't take them to the next level.The university was in the same position last year with Joey Dorsey. He was the better of the two. A trend starting with Joey Dorsey, Will Coleman and now Tarik Black won't win the big games. They are just beefed up power forwards filling the center slot. In my opinion we are still a team relying too much on the three point shot. They also can't hit their free throws. This year we don't have a Derrick Rose or Tyreke Evans to mask our weaknesses.

Everytime time they win a game the daydreaming starts. But I'm not ready to bring out the confetti yet. The double trouble combination of Black and Coleman worked in a couple of games, but that doesn't make it the nissing lnk. I still don't think this is one of our better teams.  They need to shoot less three point shots and practice one hour every day on free throws. This team will provide it's moments of excitement. Like the last second clutch shot against SMU by Charles Carmouche. They'll live up to the name the "Cardiac Kids".  But they won't be cutting down any nets.  

Jack Lalane (1914-2011)

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_LaLanne

Dirty Laundry

  

Don't take for granted that opponents of consolidation aren't taking out all the stops or so they thought when it comes to making the city and it's residents look bad.. "Why in the world would we want to join a system ridden with problems like this already?" I had revelations for my speculations this morning while watching the TODAY show. No one expected the 7-2 vote on the school board or the actions of the Memphis city council voting to back them up. This interview was only meant to give a negative image of the MCS and a somewhat forgotten part of the city.

I am more critical than most, but I'm suspicious of the timing of tbis whole Frayser ordeal anyway. It wasn't a coincidence that they happened to be using a ethnic looking sister with four young girls of her own and a Phd, so she must know what she's talking about. I bet that was the logic behind using a stranger to this region. The shot backfired though when she said this county obviously didn't have any OBGYN's. She has never even been to Memphis. What was meant to be a blackeye for the former working class neighborhood of Frayser and MCS, ended up making the whole city look backwards and out of step . Teenage pregnancy didn't just get started yesterday. This is some of the city's dirty laundry.

Martin Luther King Speech

FYI

Maybe it's just a coincidence that this little tidbit of information gets so little mention in this controversial MCS/SCS merger debate. White Station High School MCS is a diamond among the rocks. A blip by Newsweek Magazine in a much heralded June 2010 ranking failed to rank WSH properly.

UPDATE: Newsweek has admitted that it blew it, and White Station High School is now #1,090 out of the top 1,600 high schools in the entire U.S.

Another One Caught Up In The Crosshairs

This is just an exaggerated version of what we have witnessed in other isolated less media covered incidents over the last two years. Tea Party members and Conservative voters are eager to separate themselves from the actions of Jared Lee Loughner (the Tucson shooter). But all terroist and serial killers have warped thinking and have taken someones comments out of context. The big difference here is the right wing cut you loose soon as it is known that you have gone astray. The left spends an equal amount of time and money trying to justify why they did what they did. What if that suspect had been a young black man with Muslim ties? The Right would have chalked it up to a brainwashed Muslim sympathizer and the welcome extended to all beliefs by the Obama administration.

Don't say it wouldn't or couldn't happen, it already has.What about Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad? He is the shooter who admittedly killed one and wounded another Arkansas military recruiter back in May of last year. God only knows  how much money will be spent to downplay how postings like the one below could have influenced  Jared Lougher. Any senseless loss of life is sad but obviously all don't get the same attention. When you look at the big picture he is just another one caught up in the crosshairs.

Still Around

Six years ago I made a prediction concerning the Senator John Thune SD-(R) and it seems I was on to something.His name is on the short list to run against President Obama on the Republican ticket in 2012. I liked his policies in 2004 though they weren't necessarily mainstream. With the rise of the Teaparty it appears the country has moved more toward the center since then. Times have changed and he's still around.