Occasio Gee I Don't Think I Contemplate & Ponder

Response to McDonnell

What I see happening from this is with less money going to the education system we will not be able to recruit and keep the best and brightest educators.  This will lead to an inferior education experience for most students.  There will be an increase in drop out rates.  Based on a 2009 Washington Post article VA has a 9.9% drop out rate for high school students.  Now lets compound this issue with the fact that our police departments will be hit by cuts.  So we will have more individuals without proper education in our population.  That can lead to an increase in crime.  Let’s say it doesn’t what jobs can these individuals afford?  Some of the statistics I found for Hampton Roads cities with the highest poverty levels is Norfolk (19.4%) and Portsmouth (16.2%).  We are also cutting pregnancy prevention funding so one could extrapolate an increased rate of broken families and juvenile child birth.

I will personalize my thoughts.  My family was not poor but due to brain cancer in my baby brother’s brain medical bills were extreme and my mother could not work as she normally would have.  My father was in the Navy.  My brother and I both participated in a school lunch program when my mother was able to work and became involved after school to save money on after school programs.  We even both served as Student Body President of our respective schools in the same year.  We both lettered in over 4 sports each in high school.  We also both were in the Gifted and Talented Program.  Every single one of these programs are going to be affected by these budget cuts.  I wonder if I would truly be who I am today if these cuts had gone into effect when I was in school.

Currently my wife is a state employee.  She has not seen a pay raise in three years I believe.  Though she has a college degree she makes under 30K a year working for our alma mater.  Now she is being required to take furlough days as well.  In her office as well as many others there are state employees who have been working for years making much more than they deserve.  We have individuals who are not proficient at computer usage, even the basics, yet they have ballooned salaries due to experience.  We need to force retirements and cut back on benefits for seniors.  We need our next generation to succeed where our last generations failed.

So quickly we state it is because our Governor is a Republican.  He should be a Virginian first.  Personally I could care less about party affiliation.  Vote them all out and start from scratch.  My generation could do no worse.

Doing The Deeds

Every poll showed that Democratic Gubernatorial Candidate Creigh Deeds is set to get blown out the water in the race for Virginia Governor by GOP candidate Bob McDonnell. All political spinsters can talk about is how this defeat is a reflection of the Obama administration. The cloud of idealist partisan politics blinds so many from writing presenting objectionable analysis. The entire Virginia election was lost during a small 60 day window starting of August until October 21st when the Washington Post ran its article showing a thesis written by McDonnell in 1989 for a master of arts in public policy and juris doctorate in law from Regent University in my home town of Virginia Beach. The Deeds campaign put a huge thrust in advertising around this essay and it seems to their own demise. This factor became to defining factor of the entire Deeds campaign though to the amazement of them. Their amazement is based on data from TNS Media Intelligence, an independent company tracking campaign advertising, show that in the Washington market for that 60-day period, Deeds aired 1,783 ads mentioning McDonnell. Now in contrast McDonnell and the RGA aired 2,177 ads focused on Deeds. To McDonnell’s credits many of the statements were usually made in defense of the Deeds ads.

Rapper behind ‘Roxanne’s Revenge’ gets Warner Music to pay for Ph.D

BY Walter Dawkins

SPECIAL TO THE NEWS

Updated Sunday, August 23rd 2009, 1:07 PM

Watts/NewsRoxanne Shante was a young rap star. When the music stopped, she didn’t miss a beat.

Roxanne’s revenge was sweet indeed.

Twenty-five years after the first queen of hip-hop was stiffed on her royalty checks, Dr. Roxanne Shante boasts an Ivy League Ph.D. – financed by a forgotten clause in her first record deal.

“This is a story that needs to be told,” Shante said. “I’m an example that you can be a teenage mom, come from the projects, and be raised by a single parent, and you can still come out of it a doctor.”

BET (Barely Even Tangible)

Such a commotion was made over the 2009 BET Awards due to the fact it was filmed in the wake of the death of Michael Jackson, the King of Pop.  MJ left us just 3 days before the awards.  As an event planner myself I could only imagine the stress one would be under to make the show give MJ his due honor.  I will start that saying Jamie Foxx was an excellent host.  He is musical, comedic & extemporaneous.  His ability to adapt to the situation really shined.  I enjoyed him as the host years ago for the ESPY awards.

The award show seemed pretty run of the mill for BET. One interesting thing they decided to do was eliminate the listing of nominees with the announcement of each winner. This was done to make the show go faster however there seemed to be many missed cues. They also did this to fit in more performances. Let’s talk about performances.

Kheri Baby did her thing. She impresses me with her ability to actually perform. She is a good singer/dancer. The little freestyle dance portion was “interesting” for lack of better words.

I would like to declare that Ne-Yo should never go san-sombrero. His head is entirely too big. He might want to look at putting a little powder on his head to cut back on the glare from the lights.

You have to love old school & there was a plenty. New Edition did their thing. I honestly went to get a Cuba Libre at this point so I didn’t pay much attention.

J Foxx got it going with his “Blame It” performance. T Pain was flossing a chain that said BIG ASS CHAIN on it. Seriously. This would be good if it was a symbol of the idiocracy of the bling culture but he was doing it to be an ass. He thought it would be cool. This song really threw me for a loop when Snoop Dogg came out. The stage was covered in smoke which is where I think he came from but I think it was actually a tie in to “Gin & Juice”. But on June 28th this man was wearing a 1992 leather trench coat. He had to be hot as hell on stage. He did 8 bars because he almost suffered from heat stroke & couldn’t get the other 8 bars out. The highlight of this performance was Travis Barker. I’m a big fan on Hip Hop & Rock like it was in the beginning.

Check Back Later for Part 2

Old Angry Black Men

I find the entire Rev Wright situation very puzzling. One of the most important things I was taught coming up is to respect my elders. I truly do that. I listen to what my mother & father say though I feel they are wrong quite often. That is just my parents. Let’s take into account some of the things people the age of my grandparents say and think. There is a point in black lineage where people are mad. It’s going to take a whole lot to stop them from being mad. Like the saying goes I forgive you but I can’t forget. These people may have stated that they have forgiven America as a whole but they will not forget. Let’s look directly at the Obama situation. If he is guilty of anything, it is trying to politically handle this situation. Simply be open. Powerfuly say Rev Wright is family as many people consider theit pastors family. I cannot and will not disown my mother over comments that she makes which I don’t agree with. I can and will answer for comments I make, but have no control over others. I consider myself a leader. One of the most important things for a leader is to know how to follow but the way to distiguish a following person is knowing when to stand out and display differences from the person leading.