I had not noticed it until my son pointed it out to me.   But recently a very large car dealership here closed.  One day their lots were full…and the next everything was gone.  It happened so fast…I hadn’t even noticed that it had.

The MG bankruptcy is very impactful upon us all. 

What happened to all those mechanics…sales people…parts people etc….?

http://www.detnews.com/article/20090613/AUTO01/906130324/1148/auto01/58+Michigan+dealers+axed

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/23198.html

The dealership was large and had been in business for years…many years.  And I would have never guessed anything going on in the middle of this country would have effected it.   But it did.   And now a long time city company is now gone.  A city tax contributor…and employer is gone…a community event sponsor and underwriter is…very gone.

Now, one has to wonder what has happened to all those people who worked there?

Did they go to another dealership?

It is highly unlikely.  Even if one or 2 or…even a few of them managed to get a job at another dealership…the vast numbers of them did not.  Because every dealership is suffering from the same thing.  And all of them are fighting to keep their heads above the water.

Why?

Well, lets face it…who has money to buy a new car?

Everybody is trying to sit back and watch how things are going to work out.   So, it really isn’t a good time to go out and try to buy or make any large investments right now.  There is just to much…uncertainty.  That’s what people are thinking.   And rightly so.

So, there is an air of apprehension…and unsurety everywhere in this country…and probably around the world.

So, if people really aren’t spending money right now…every industry and company in this country is going to suffer. 

Then there is the other side of the coin too…

Many people have found themselves out of work and without any real prespects for future employment.

So, how is this thing going to work itself out?

How can it work itself out?

One of the most booming business is in the market today…is the computer…or better put is the internet.  Now, that is not to say that we are seeing the number of millionaires being churned out of it…as we did some years ago when interest in the infant stages of the internet initially started to take root.

What you see is a booming in wthe eb social sites…such as facebook, youtube, myspace etc….   And things like blogging, tweeting etc.

But people need jobs.  They need to be  able to meet their daily responsibilities and needs.

What about jobs?

What good is retraining people when they have nothing to be retained for?

It is  just a process with no real hope of a positive outcome for those who are being retained.

I recalled talking to someone who was in the process of graduating from a jr. college after being in a retaining program there.  She had worked many years in a factory doing piece-work.  So, she had to learn about computers…their operation and so on…and a bunch of other things which she never had to have a knowledge of before…nor had to worry about learning before.  She was happy and looking forward to a progressive and shinning future following her graduation and all the time she had invested in her retaining.

But after coming across her again some months later…all that hope and enthusiasm was gone.  It had turned into desperation.  She had been retained and was hoping to get into medical billing…but there were no jobs in our town or any of the neighboring towns in the field.  And her other problem was…her age.

Retraining people sounds good…but where do they go after they get retrained? 

Are they just being sold a bill of goods…false hopes…with no real relief once they have been forced out of their old jobs.

The first problem with the retraining system is that employers  need to be honest with the people they push out of  jobs.  Stop selling them a bill of goods…and false dreams when they know that there are no jobs out there for all these people.  And that those workers will never get back what they are loosing…by way of their old jobs…not to mention the pay…or benefits.

The only real way of fixing this problem is to bring  jobs back into America.  All this farming out of  jobs abroad has to stop.  Manufacturing has to be brought into this country.  There must be a recreation of  jobs in America.

All these American companies have gone abroad…where they can get labor cheaper…and this has seriously hurt the workers in this country…our economy…our neighborhoods…ownership of homes…and means of providing for our familes.

Jobs that millions of Americans used to get up and go out to daily are now gone…vanished into the thin air.  While their factories…and buildings…and compounds…sit abandon…or have been rehab into condominiums…or artists lofts. 

And the internet didn’t help any either.   It made it easy for companies to employ foreign workers…by merely writing a deal and providing them with phone lines.  It was just that easy.  They made a deal with someone sitting in a house or some back room somewhere…who you can’t even understand…and sounds like the exact same person from company to company whenever you have to contact a customer service department for any reason.   Some guy with a thick accent handling customer service for a lot of different companies.  

Forget about the fact that…you can’t understand them…rather him…because they (he) can’t understand you…and if  it’s not him…then it is her.  They must be related or a husband and wife team.   Because they have the exact same accent.  And you get them all the time…just him…or her…no matter what company or product you think  that you are calling about.

So, you call trying to work out a problem and hang up with a headache…having resolved nothing.  Because neither of you could understand the other.  Perhaps, the company who make deals with these type of service providers in various countries…and it sounds like one specific person…handling many different lines…but maybe the companies that farm out their customer service departments to entities such as these…really shouldn’t be getting our business in the first place.  Because they could care less if we get helped or not.   

They just want to say that they have customer service…because it makes people feel better when they buy a product or service to know that if their is a problem or question they can hound somebody about it.   So, these companies just want to say that they offer customer service…not intending to actually provide it.  So, they hire someone who can half speak English to help us.  

These companies…that gave away those jobs that Americans used to have in their customer service departments…they only look at the bottom line.   What do they care about service…or whether we get some or not?  Or whether the guy understands you or not?   They don’t have to talk to him…but we do. 

These companies really shouldn’t be getting our business…because in fact when they farm out jobs abroad…they are in fact…destroying this country…by destroying the job force here…by deleting more and more jobs in America in pursuit of  cheaper and cheaper labor.  It is really unfortunate that we never experience their poor customer service departments…until after we have bought into the service or purchased their products.

I understand that we live in a capitalistic society.  I even understand global capitalism…and that for capitalists the bottom line is everything…but not if you cut off your own nose in spite of your face.  And that is exactly what sending America’s  jobs abroad has ended up to being. 

Without jobs…people can’t buy…anything.   The whole country is at a stand still…because everything has been farmed out…outside of our own borders.  And though those countries are getting the jobs…but they are not earning enough money to uplift them or their country.  Therefore these companies seeking the cheap labor cannot create any other potenial customer markets for their companies which are taking advantage of these pooper countries…by under paying them.  Because they can’t afford anything…either…though they have the jobs.  But they are making no real money…or better put…earning.

GM dealership closings by state

Ala —.33; Alaska — 0; Ariz. — 11; Ark. — 17; Calif.— 65; Colo. — 15; Conn. — 11; Del. — 2; Fla. — 35; Ga. — 24; Hawaii — 2; Idaho — 8; Ill. — 66; Ind. — 48; Iowa — 46; Kan. — 29; Ky. — 23; La. — 10;.
Maine — 14; Md. — 21; Mass. — 29; Mich. — 58; Minn. — 39; Miss. — 14; Mo. — 38; Mont. — 16; Neb. — 21; Nev. — 3; N.H. — 6; N.J. — 33; N.M. — 10; N.Y. — 60; N.C. — 36; N.D. — 6.
Ohio — 79; Okla. — 17; Ore. — 21; Pa. — 90; R.I. — 3; S.C. — 24; S.D. — 16; Tenn. — 30; Texas — 55; Utah — 6; Vt. — 26; Wash. — 18; W.Va. — 25; Wis. — 50; Wyo. — 6.
Nation — 1,323

Therefore, greed just does not pay.

What seemed like a great idea…going abroad to obtain cheaper labor has in fact worked against these American companies.  So, it seems that the only way of rectifying the problem is to bring the jobs back to America…which is still the largest customer market in the world…when we are working.

So, yes…THE BISHOP’S WIFE, my book is due to be out soon.  A matter of a couple weeks now…and I am so excited.  I will keep you abreast.  And soon you will be to see the youtube ad for it.   Haven’t completed it yet…but I am working on it.  In it you actually get a chance to hear me.  I don’t think you will see me…but you will hear me…and perhaps see a phone.   As I see that many of you have checked out my ABOUT page…seeking to find out more info on me.

I am media…that is what I am.

 Well, enjoy the rest of your weekend. 

Just finished getting my hair done…and plan on being in church tomorrow.   And yes… I am still trying to catch up on my sleep…and will be doing so for quite time as I have a weeks of sleep to catch up on.

God bless…

Thank you for reading this blog…and  my others.  Please be sure to continue to share this blog site with your family, co-workers and all your friends… “pass it on…” www.bsmith101.wordpress.com ©2009

I really do not like people who like to laugh and kajol themselves on the back of other people’s suffering.  As if Chrysler’s going into bankruptcy only impacted the top dogs at Chrysler.  If that was so…then maybe my attitude might be somewhat different too.  But it does not…the top dogs rarely feel much of the ping…when the zing falls hardest upon those at the bottom.  The top dogs get paid out…retire…and go on vacation for the rest of their lives while the poor factory workers get squeezed out of  jobs.   And are left suffering…wondering about tomorrow.

So, I really hate when I hear people laughing and joking about situations which impact poor innocent people…thousands upon thousands of them…just trying to make it…as black folks say…from day to day.

What could possibly be funny about another large American corporation having to declare bankruptcy?

It merely means more re-organizing…further cut backs and down-sizing…and the shuffling of more folks off into the unemployment lines.

It also means more mortgages can’t and won’t be met…due to people loosing their jobs.  Credit card bills that won’t get paid…because…  Well, people have lost their jobs.  Less consumer wares and other items being purchased…because…well…   Yes, people have lost their jobs.  More people waiting to collect unemployment…more food stamps that will have to be given out…more medical problems for Medicare to add to their rows etc…   More…more…more people who will need to be re-trained…for jobs which do not exist etc…etc…etc..

So, what is there to cheer about…concerning Chrysler filing bankruptcy?

And yes…President Obama should do everything he can to help constrain and assist Chrysler from totally going under.

Had I not gone to visit in Detroit last August such things would have never crossed my mind…but I cannot forget all those houses and all those buildings which I saw…street after street in Detroit all boarded up.  There is something about having seen that…that has compelled me to never forget the plight of others. 

Sometimes we get caught up in how big we are and how well we ourselves are doing… and what our family has…what we have…etc…etc…   That we forget all about others…and about what is going on with them.  But this is wrong.  Other people lives do impact our lives…whether we care to believe it or not.

Recently, we have seen a series of shootings…where people just walked into some crowded place…office…church…mall…store…house…neighborhood…and just started shooting.   And as you listened to the story unfold…you heard or read that the person who had done the shooting had just lost their job…been laid off…went seeking help and met up with nothing but frustration. 

When your world comes tumbling down around you…and your family needs to be fed…the rent is due…the utilities are beginning to be cut off…and you are facing eviction…I wonder if you would be laughing because you worked for Chrysler…and your livelihood company just filed bankruptcy…and that meant it was going to cost you your job…your only means of a livelihood…for yourself and your family? 

I doubt it.

The lost of jobs…corporate bankruptcies effect us all.  And though you may view it as a government bailout because Uncle Sam is trying to help these companies out…the situations are bigger than their CEO’s.  That money that Obama is taking to aid these companies is far less than what it would cost taxpayers to sustain those people…massive numbers of people who stand  to loose their jobs.  And I really hate to hear people who have limited vision…short sightedness…and who can’t see beyond their own nose…so much so…that they fail to see the bigger…and much broader picture concerning this issue.  

Trying to re-train people for new jobs…many of whom have no computer skills and only know how to work in a factory…who many may be well up in age…meaning old…too old in fact to actively and with any real hope of ever being hired for a decent job outside of becoming some store associate, perhaps… far from receiving the pay they earned while doing piece work while on their factory job.  Yet, they will be sent to school…enter junior colleges and things…on taxpayer dollars…and into various training programs…still on taxpayers dollars…they will receive unemployment…food stamps…Medicare etc…all of which will add up to far more than the cost of trying to keep Chrysler or any other large company on the verge of sinking from going totally under.

So, what is there to laugh about…and to say-

“There goes more taxpayers money.”

It is pay now…or pay far  more later. 

This recession thing is real.   I may not be feeling it personally…but there thousands upon thousands upon thousands of Americans who are.  And they are in dire need of this country’s help and support…without the criticism.

Most people in this country have had a desire for a piece of that American pie…and when circumstances change…they should not be held responsible because curved balls have been thrown their way.   They only work  for these companies and they should not be made to suffer because of them…ridiculed…or made to feel to blame because of any changes in the global economic environment…or the one here in America.

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/player/popup/?rn=3906861&cl=13241226&ch=4226713&src=news

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090430/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_obama_automakers

Well, it is not something that many black people had not known.    That is the fact that Africa is the cradle of civilization…the place of the origins of all man.  

The first shoes made were made in Africa.  University…library…books…etc…first in Africa.  It is a widely known fact that most of the great Greek  philosophers all studied in Africa.  Africa is also known to be the place where the Garden of Eden had been.   And where it may still well be…as there are still parts of  Africa not yet seen by modern man…as you probably remember that most recently in some South American country they had found some unknown tribe of  people who had not seen the modern world.   And that was in South America…a place which is not  two-thirds the size of  Africa.

But none of this should really be a secret…as much of the Bible takes place in what as then ancient Africa…as Africa in ancient times stretched all the way into Asia.   Ethiopia and other current African countries are cited in the Bible.  Haran, a village in Africa, was the original home of Abram whose name was later changed by God to Abraham.  And mentioned a few times in the Bible is the Queen of  Sheba…an great African queen, who upon one time where she is mentioned she paid a visit  to young king by the name of Solomon where she questioned him concerning things of  God…as she was woman of God.

So, if you want to read more on this story just CLICK the LINK BELOW.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090430/ap_on_sc/us_sci_african_origins

If you want to get an understanding of early African History…CLICK and watch the video BELOW.

http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/africa/video/x1uic3_lost-civilizations-africa-a-history_travel

http://www.specialtyinterests.net/sheba.html

That being said…then China would really not be the oldest civilization known to man…as history is starting to show…but Africa…the oldest civilization of  all mankind. 

It is funny to me now…as I think back…but in one of my history classes about a year ago…I handed in a paper stating just that.  Not about Africa…but about history…and how depending upon who is writing that history it may or may not bare the whole truth…or even be correct.  I wrote that no matter how much man may try to corrupt history by purposely negilecting to tell some things…or by accidently doing so…that in time all things…meaning the truth…is eventually revealed through time.

Here is the newest African Beauty to emerge upon the stage of the world…and she is a high school student living with her family in Germany…and she is Germany’s next Top Model, Sara Nuru…an Ethiopian.

You must remember that it was a young beautiful…and evidently a very knowledgeable Ethiopian Queen…Sheba, who paid a visit upon King Solomon who brought him gifts and quizzed him.

Now, I am still trying to catch up on my sleep.  So, if  you will have to forgive me.   I got up and out early this morning.   I had to do what I really do not like to do too often…and that is catch the bus.  But I must say…as a writer…it really does give you a great source for acquiring interesting little stories.  

Hope you had a beautiful day…and for some reason I am feeling much anticipation.   I guess because my book, THE BISHOP’S WIFE…is due out soon…and then the work really begins.  I will keep you abreast.

God bless…

Thank you for reading this blog…and  my others.  Please be sure to continue to share this blog site with your family, co-workers and all your friends… “pass it on…” www.bsmith101.wordpress.com ©2009

Well, we  are just getting back in from our weekend little road trip.  The weather was beautiful all the way down and back…90’s, baby…and felt like it.

One of my nephews preached his first sermon in his very own church this past Sunday…and we all went down to be with him for his opening ceremony…a monumental Christian event…in a place where I could see he was much needed.  In Wilmington, DE…which is a much bigger place than I ever expected and has a very sizable amount of  black folk.

While there I could not help but marvel at most of the homes…which were mostly made of stone and brick.  They looked very historic…and I remembered that Delaware was an old State that has a very long and rich history due to George Washington having travelled and stayed there.  And I could see that many of those homes dated back to that period in history…and had been well kept up and cared for through their long history…and still are.

But Wilmington reminded me of  Detroit except for one distinct difference…there were no boarded up homes or boarded up businesses there…as far as I could see.   Very much to the contrary was it to the situation in Detroit…in which as I stated in an earlier blog on Detroit…every other building and house was boarded up there due to foreclosures, down-sizing and massive job losses.   Detroit was consumed by boarded up and vacated buildings and homes due to the shutting down of  many of the factory jobs of  its chief industry and job producers…the Big 3…the motor industry.  And it looked every bit of  it.

But contrary to Detroit…it seemed to me that Wilmington’s future was bright…the city that sits back off of  I-95…but not too far off…just far enough off the main North Eastern throughway so you can’t see it.

But who knew that was really back there…down that short stretch of road where the signs lead you over to.

Little had and is ever said about Wilmington, DE.  But then I remembered as I glanced across and looked at the old beautiful mansions that our Vice President, Joe Biden and his family,  also lives here…in that quiet little place which isn’t really all that little…and certainly not little at all compared to where I come from.  Just 20 minutes South of Philly and not far from Baltimore…Wilmington really struck me as a great place to invest in…if you could find property to buy.

It has all the pluses… Wilmington… including sitting on the banks of the Delaware River...you do remember that great picture they had in your history book of  Washington standing on that boat looking very regal and General-like as he crossed the Delaware.  It is funny the things you will remember years later from when you were a little grade school child sitting in various classes at school…of which none of  it meant anything to you at the time.  You just had to rememorize it because of the test tomorrow…and that was the only reason you placed it somewhere in your memory bank.   Who knew 20-30-40-50-60 years later you would still be able to pull up and access that information stored somewhere in your brain?

This is why education is so important.  Nothing in school ever seemed important to me.  Teachers failed to be able to show the true value of why you should learn something.  For some reason they cannot link anything that you do in school with real living.  And then later in life you find out that it was all relevant to your everyday living.  Like learning how to get up and go to school.   Relevance: Getting up and going to work.   If you never learned how to get up and get out to school on time you will certainly have problems at getting up and getting out to work on time.   Therefore, it is relevant to real everyday living.

(2) Math…this is a big one (well, learning to get up and go to school was big too…)   Relevance: Being able to keep track of your money…count your change…add up your groceries before you get into line…monitor your daily spending and align it with your budget and your pay check etc…   I told you it was big.   But for some reason teachers cannot appropriately inform students of the real value of learning math.  There is not one kid…or child…or teen in school who doesn’t like money…and if  they realized that math had something to do with money there would not be one student failing math.

Well, I guess you can tell that I am really tired from our trip to Delaware the place where George…oh, never mind…I’ve already said it…how he crossed that river and made history right there in that little…well…not so little town.   Yeah…I am real tired.

When we were through in Delaware…my son and I hit Philly.   I could not get so close and not drop by and visit with the true matriarch of our family…my mother’s Aunt Kate.

Having talked often with Aunt Kate…it was not hard for me to tell when I first realized her mind was not as sharp as usual.  You used to could say a name and she filled in all the blanks.  I loved talking with her…and each time I learned more and more about our family.  Her mother…was my grand-mother’s mother.  She was a woman who had somehow ended up owning a very large portion of  land…and I do mean very large.  It ran along the shores and back a ways off from Lake Okeechobee, the 2nd largest lake in the United States…2nd only to Lake Michigan.

I found this out once during one of our last annual summer trips to Florida…when suddenly my mother began crying saying-

“You see this land it all belonged to my grand-mother.”

I was surprised…as my mother rarely became so emotional over such things…and certainly not out of the blue as she had that day.  As many times as we had passed through that little town and across that bridge heading over to where I was born and where my grand-mother at the time stilled lived…my mother had never before said anything regarding the size or proportion of any of  that land.

That day she told us that as far as we could see and as far back as we had just come…how it had all belonged to our  great grand-mother.  I had not realized until that moment that seeing where this town now absorbed all of what had been our family’s property…nor had I  realized that seeing it as we drove pass it sadden my mother so until that day…as she sobbed loudly over her grand-mother’s property.  She had spoken of  it before but never had I any idea of  the vast amount of property that was involved.

It is from that moment that I started paying more attention to those programs that I saw on PBS about black families going back through city records and trying to regain property which had been stolen away from their families during the mid-40’s through the 50’s…which included very large farm lands…by various people in those towns who simply just re-wrote the deeds to those black people’s property…giving themselves ownership over it without even bothering to purchase the property from any of the black families.

Very little has ever been said about my great grand-mother except for how extremely religious of a woman she was.  But Aunt Kate had began sharing with me more about her.  She told me of her giving nature…and how she had owned a restaurant.   She told me that there had been people during the course of my great grand-mother’s restaurant business who could not afford to pay for the food…but she fed them anyway.  She had even opened up the doors to her home and raised a child or 2 which was not her own…because they had been homeless.

“One little boy,” Aunt Kate said was a friend of one her brothers…whom they had found out that when they thought he would leave to go home…that he was actually sleeping down under their house.

Aunt Kate said, “Well, mother, wasn’t going to let him stay down there.”

She raised him along with her own children.  He became another brother to our Aunt Kate and my grand-mother along with their other siblings.

Back in those days the houses in those areas of Florida were built raised up off the ground and sat upon concrete blocks.   This was how they built all the houses back then down in Florida…raised up off the ground because of flooding.   If the waters came up over the banks of Lake Okeechobee…it was hoped that they would not rise above the height of the concrete blocks.

Because Zora Neale Huston stayed in my great grand-mother’s area once upon a time…in fact, her book “Their Eyes Were Watching God”…takes place in a little town sitting on Lake Okeechobee.  Imagine my great grand-mother being the great land Baroness that she was…and owner of  the black folk’s only restaurant in that town…and just based on how folks lived down there…and still do…I imagine that they…my great grand-mother and Zora Neale Hurston may have known each another.  Nobody lives in any of those little towns without knowing everybody…so much so…that they all become very much like family…caring and knowing everything about everyone and everything about them.

But Aunt Kate now being the last of all her sibling…out of 10 of them…was my source for much family history…which seemed to just pour out of her.  I never had to ask any questions of her or try to coax her into sharing it with me…very unlike my own grand mother…who always seemed suspicious if  you asked anything about  our family history.  Why I do not know…but it was something that I accepted thinking that perhaps there was something which I should not know.

But upon seeing Aunt Kate for the first time in years…I was somewhat surprised.  She was much smaller now…though she had never been a big woman as she always kept herself up, as they say…meaning she always kept herself  looking good and in good condition.  But she wasn’t looking so good yesterday…most of her hair had thinned out…and she had this large black…what looked like smut smudge straight across her forehead.  She had on no shoes or slippers on…of which I had never seen her walk  around barefooted before…as Aunt Kate was quite prime and proper.    And her feet were terribly ashy…meaning…well…you can look that one up…as I do not want nor wish to continue talking about my aunt in such a way.

But it was her mind…the thing most recently I had noticed in the last few phone calls we had had…her mind was slipping.   She was not getting lost…but she had started forgetting things…and who such and such was…when she had always been so sharp about such things.

Aunt Kate was now in her 90’s…and though throughout all of these years age had somehow managed to not show up on her…yesterday was different.  She seemed older than her 90 in fact…and she was now walking with a cane.  That strong little woman was now…an aged shadow of  what she had been…and though I smiled and was happy to see and talk with her and my cousins…it was hard for me not to notice the vast difference in our Aunt Kate yesterday…from the Aunt Kate I had last seen just about 3 years ago and throughout all the prior years.

I often think of  the little church mothers in our church…woman who proudly proclaim their ages with such glee…because none of them looks anything near the age that they truly are.  They are strong and fit…able to get onto and off  buses…walk around their blocks…run errands on their own.   There is a distinct difference between them and women who are not in the church.  And it is very recognizable.

Though her mother had been an extremely religious woman…Aunt Kate may have been…and may still be quasi-religious.   Until a few years ago…Atlantic City had become her friend.  She had gotten bitten by that bug…called gambling.   And if someone had not stolen some money from her…she still might be going…as it had become a weekly habit for her.

I really do believe that there is something about being in the church…and living a life separate from the ways of the world that will make a difference in your life…as witnessed by the many mothers who are in various churches around the world.  There is just something about trusting and living your life as God intends you to live it…that will make a difference.

Yes, I am tired…but I am so thankful that God gave me the opportunity yesterday to finally go and visit with my very kind and loving Aunt Kate…through all the years this has never changed about her.  I suspect that it comes from her mother.

There is little wonder that Obama’s approval rating for his first 100 days has been and is high…as he is actively pursuing to achieve exactly what he went into the White House knowing what he had and needed…and said he would do.  Handle the business of the American people…and try to undo and dark mark the Bush Administration had put upon this country.  And thus far…as my father would say…he has been doing  just fine.  But what I really like is the fact that the dynamic duo which we put into the White House are both getting high marks.

I always knew that Michelle was going to show herself to be simply wonderful as both First-Mom, First Lady…friend and confident to the man that sits in the top seat and wears the heavy crown…or in this country…heavy hat…President Barack Obama.

I really like reading all this good press about them.  He was media darling prior to entering the race…media darling after entering the race…and still media darling after having won the race.

I like people who are consistent…don’t you?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/obamas-first-100-days-the_b_191831.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/27/the-secret-to-michelle-ob_n_191677.html

As you know…I do not watch much television.  But often while sitting around in a hotel room…I find little  else to do.  So, this is how I happened to hear about the ‘Swine Flu.” As far as I can tell…it is very much like most of the other flu’s…causing diarrhea, vomiting, fevers, headaches…etc.   But thus far it has killed 81 people in New Mexico…and a series of people…up to 40 cases have been diagnosed here in other parts of the United States.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8021384.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8022437.stm

To protect yourself they say that you should continuously wash your hands…and when out in public keep your hands out of your mouth and eyes.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/04/27/swine.flu/index.html

http://www.floridatoday.com/article/20090427/BREAKINGNEWS/90427003&referrer=FRONTPAGECAROUSEL

http://www.webmd.com/cold-and-flu/news/20090428/swine-flu-and-travel-what-should-you-do

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/med_swine_flu

http://www.trinidadexpress.com/index.pl/article_news?id=161469997

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/player/popup/?rn=3906861&cl=13188442&ch=4226723&src=news

http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Swine-Flu/ss/events/hl/042409swineflu#photoViewer=/090428/ids_photos_wl/r3827649806.jpg

Could not resist this story…CLICK the LINK BELOW to read it and see the video.

It is about a southern preacher who believes that having ‘good sex’…or as this pastor puts it “great sex’…is something which the body of Christ should be preaching about.

I know you do not want to hear my opinion on that…because you probably already know it…if you have read any of these blogs at all with any degree or level of understanding.

But it just goes to prove…just how overboard this whole sexual revolution has become.   And I am not shocked…as it seems to me that there are some in the church…or seemingly of the church…who have great interest in the subject and are doing everything they can to spread that interest.

Though, I have to admit that my book, THE BISHOP’S WIFE… certainly touches upon the subject.   It is…I guess important…but not something which should be preached or for that matter…needed to be taught in church…any more than sex education in school.

http://www.floridatoday.com/article/20090427/NEWS01/904250314/1086

Speaking about my book, THE BISHOP’S WIFE…between it and counting down the days to when it is ready for sell…launching my website…blogging…and hitting the road to promote my book…and menopause…it is wonder that I am anything but tired.

Now, I think I am going to get some much more needed sleep, thank you.   Being on the road somehow drains me these days.  I love it…but it tires me.   I think it throws my whole internal clock off…as I usually am the one driving through the night…and most of the day.  But I love the road, baby.   Ain\’t nothing like it.

So, if you will excuse me…I am going to rest now.   Good-night.

God bless…

Thank you for reading this blog…and  my others.  Please be sure to continue to share this blog site with your family, co-workers and all your friends…

\”pass it on…\” www.bsmith101.wordpress.com ©2009

See…I said it.  And she hasn’t proved me wrong.

I love her.

I really hate people who don’t know how to go home and just be quiet.

It is not like Cheney and his friends did anything but put this country into a whirlwind spin downward.  And we have yet to set the turbulent waters still.

Cloaked in secrecy since they went into the White House…it is hard to believe that they had not planned this whole mess from the very beginning.  To get in steal what they could…and cause havoc just because they could.

Or maybe all the chaos was just a shield…to cover up the crime.  You know how the criminals do…create a disturbance or some type of confusion somewhere else to divert the attention from what they are really doing.

Man…you know I never thought of that before.

But what if it was?

What if  9/11 had been cooked up by some of our own people…in high places?

It would certainly address the issue as to why they never really went after Bin Laden.

I  hope with all my heart that would never be found to be true.

I personally believe that every covered record, tape and piece of video…recorded phone calls, messages, emails, faxes, text messages…and everything else used to imprint messages on…or engendered dialogue…including documents…should be thoroughly gone over by some high commission seeking illegal irregularities by the Bush Administration…pacifically the lying and untruthful behavior of now ex-Commander and Chief, George Bush,   and his bully, Dick Cheney.  And they should be dragged before some court or tribunal to face charges of some sort…if for nothing else but for all the lives which have been lost and the families destroyed by an illegal war that not only devastated a country but the world economy…as well as, our own.

What a herculean mess the previous administration has left behind.

From 4.2% under Bill Clinton…to 7.6% unemployment by the time George Bush left the White House.

The number of  Americans living in poverty when Clinton left the White House under 33 million…by time Bush left White House 37.3 million.

When George Bush went into the White House…Clinton had left it the country with a $128 billion surplus…while George left us with a deficit…of $1.3 trillion.

So, how dare Dick Cheney sit around on the sidelines now…sipping his champagne and smoking his big Cuban cigars chirping like a canary over what the Obama Administration should be doing…and is now doing…calling it ‘a risk’…in trying to bring this country out of the Bush/Cheney mess…and to get this country back on track again.

Who put us here…where we are today?

Inflated gas prices…highest ever in the history of America.  Unprecedented number of home foreclosures.  Failed economy…massive job losses…daily bodies flying back from Iraq…corporate thief…Enron…Bear Sterns…Halliburton…war…inflated cost of living…etc…etc…etc…etc…etc…

If only Dick Cheney could have been but so wise in the advise he was shoving down his fellow Texan’s throat…while they both were sitting in the White House.

Who put us here?

And then want to question how Obama is running the country?

Are you kidding me?

I know exactly where Obama is trying to take this country.  OUT OF THE MESS THAT YOU GUYS PUT US IN…that’s where.

Thank you, Condi Rice…tell Cheney to put a lid on it again…and again…

He seems to be the type who just can’t seem to stop talking.

I can’t stand big fat hypocrites.  Particularly, when the hypocrites are the ones to blame.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/03/15/cheney.interview/index.html

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/03/15/cheney.interview/index.html#cnnSTCVideo

How could something like this happen?

On their way rushing to the hospital they get stopped by the police in the parking lot of the hospital while leaping from their vehicle trying to rush inside the hospital.

A cop tells them to stop prohibiting them from going inside.  He tells them that they ran a red light…all this mind you while they had their red hazard lights flashing while rushing to the hospital.

The officer is told over and over and over…”my mother-in-law is dying.”

To which the officer acts as though he is making an ordinary…what they call a routine traffic stop.  And he did so without any kind of concern or consideration regarding the situation of  his captives.  Well, that is what they were to him…because that is what he acted like with regard to them.   He acted as though there was no type of any emergency…and that Ryan Moats was just out joy riding to the hospital.

All the pleading and trying to get the police officer to understand…it all fell upon death ears.  He could have cared less…as you hear in the video because he turned a deaf hear to everything that Moats was saying to him.

The cop threatens to arrest him…tells him that he is going to tow his car…etc.   But the cop does everything but attempt to even try to comprehend…or make any sense out of the situation…as to what is being told him.  Nor did he  offer any help or assistance to the family members of the vehicle of near death mother as they tried rushing to her bed side.

How had this scene might have played out differently…if…

If the occupants of vehicle had not been African Americans but some other race…namely white?

The officer might have ran into the hospital with them.  Maybe…

He might have been a lot more understanding and helpful to them…probably.

But I doubt that the above scenarios…and the way that it actually happened did get played out as it did because of…who they were…or are.  They were black…African Americans.  This officer saw their color…and paid no attention to their situation…or anything else.

And the police chief’s apology wasn’t much better.  Near the end of his apology…he states that to the credit of NFL  player Ryan Moats-

“At no time did Mr. Moats state that he was a NFL football player. Or expect any special consideration.”

What kind of statement was that?

Was that meant to be a compliment?

It is all on tape.

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2009/03/26/lavandera.tx.nfl.player.hospital.cnn?iref=mpvideosview

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2009/03/26/lavandera.tx.nfl.player.hospital.cnn?iref=mpvideosview

Historian John Hope Franklin…didn’t know him and never heard of him before.  But  just read something about him…how he had a way of  telling our history.  It really made me feel like I would have liked to have known him.  Would have loved to have heard his name before now…and certainly would have loved to have heard him lecture on our history.  There had been a time when I couldn’t read enough on it.

http://www.lastingtribute.co.uk/tribute/franklin/3050019

There is something about our history that amazes me.  So, many many stories…as varied as the people.  Stories of  lives shattered… broken… and often torn…and yet many victorious.   Stories of a peole who were really a mixture of various people…thrown into chains…transported on ships…carried across the Atlantic…to stand upon auction blocks…and herded like cattle.

Yet, they were able to turn scraps into meals…later called Soul Food.  Messages into songs…that later transformed into gospel, blues and R&B.  People who turned hardship into culture.   People meant to have not to survived…but did.  Kind of like the stories of  the blankets infected with smallpox given to the American Indians.   They weren’t suppose to survive either.

I guess that is kind of why I cried when I saw them riding…strong and tall upon their horses…all dressed up in their traditional headdresses and everything…in the parade for Barack Obama on Inaugural Day.   That was special.   What a sight they were…just like all of us who flocked to D.C. to see…to hear…to cheer…and to cry as we bared witnessed to the dawn of a new American era.

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/crime/2009/03/26/pn.anchor.death.cnn?iref=mpvideosview

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/politics-obituaries/5056617/Professor-John-Hope-Franklin.html

Wow…I wish I had heard him.  Had known of  a  place where he had been lecturing…or had booked him myself.

Now, that I have had an opportunity to find more info on Dr. Franklin…I had heard and seen him once.  He was on Charlie Rose…a show I used to love to watch…at a time when I used to watch television.

They said he had a gift…a gift for telling our history.   Wow…I sho’ wish I could have heard that.  Not much of  it going around any more.  Soon, I guess it will all be dead…all our real history…dead and gone…buried when all our elders have all gone to their graves.  Because nobody will be left carrying it on.   Nobody studying it…nobody who thinks that it is now still important…or relavent.

So, now…almost all of the African American Studies departments have been done away with…removed…squashed…vacated…because “ain’t nobody taking the classes no ways.” Yeah, because they need to make room for all of this new stuff…like the history of rapp. ..and hip-hop.

No one taking an interest…too busy thinking about rapp…hip-hop…and baby/mama drama.  I hear those classes are jam packed.

Or maybe we should wait on others…others to come and pick it up for us…and start claiming it for their own.   Like they came and picked  up jazz.   That was on its way out too.  It was dying as the masters began to die.   And would have been dead too…ifin’ they hadn’t.

Our history in this country sprang up out of the toil and sweat…and  out of bearing chains in this country…and there is no reason why we should ever let the memory of those who walked before us…and broke those chains die.  Nor our history prior to slavery ever be forgotten…which so few of us know little if anything about.

Teach it!

Preach it!

Recite it!

Pass it on to your children…because a tree without roots will fade away.   Strengthen the roots.

Don’t let it die.  It is far too important for our children…and the legacy we leave behind.

I had said to myself-

“You are going to go home and go to sleep early tonight.”

And I did get in early.

And I did shower and get ready for bed.

But then I started writing this blog…and here I am at almost ll:30 PM…and I got in before 5.   And I am still not finish yet.

Eleven Native American tribes from all across the country participated in the ceremonies celebrating Obama’s Presidency by marching…or riding if you will…in the inaugural parade and various other events that day and week in Washington, DC.

God bless…

Thank you for reading this blog…and  my others.  Please be sure to continue to share this blog site with your family, co-workers and all your friends… “pass it on “

www.bsmith101.wordpress.com ©2009

http://www.aaanativearts.com/article1632.html

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/Indians-on-the-Inaugural-March.html

I must say…if I have to say so myself…that I am so proud of me today.  Oh…I mean this morning.  I do not know what time I got up but by the time I laid back down…it was only 7:57 AM. 

I got up and had my Cream of  Wheat.   And yes…I am still enjoying it.  I had me a cup of tea…and read my Bible and then laid back down.  A few minutes later…perhaps an hour later…I got up again.  I pulled out my bucket…got the scrub brush…and pulled out the cleaners and scrubbed down the kitchen again…then I hit the doors and wall in the small hall leading towards the bathroom.  I sprayed down and lightly scrubed down the bathroom…and left it soaking. 

Wow…yeah….  I think I should be proud of myself…and it is not even noon yet.

There is something about getting up early.  You will get so much more done for some reason or another…if you get up and get started early.  There is just something about getting up early…there really is.  I do not know what…but that makes you work a little bit quicker and harder…and you just acheve more.  And now I feel so good.  And so…so proud of myself for taking care of my parent’s house in their absence.  For me having gotten up early today..and gotten started the very first thing this morning.

I have been busy working on building my website for the past couple of weeks…and the pages are coming along well.  I am really impressed with the pages that I have created thus far.  A few years ago I decided to begin taking some graphic arts classes. 

When I was in New York and started my own homebased business, an advertising agency, Queen Bee Multi-Media Advertising Agency.  I used to hire students from the campus right around the corner from my apartment…Pratt Institute, to do artwork for me.  Pratt has a very high reputation as a good art school…which I never knew at the time…but the students on that campus turned out some fantastic work for me.  I never went to see a client without feeling proud of our presentations which they had prepared under, of course, my direction.

I represented schools, furniture stores, boutiques, concert promoters etc…  There is little about advertising that I do not know about…having also a history in radio sales, media buying, telemarketing, product placement…etc…etc…etc…  But I had always had an artistic bug.

When I was a child, I had begged and begged my mother to buy me a home study art school course.  After begging for some time my mother finally broke down and ordered it for me.  That home study art school cost $300…and my mother ordered it for me.  As much as I begged for it…I only did one lesson of that course.  

Eventually, I gave away one of the books…of which there had been 3.  They were very big and thick…in a large binder…bound in expensive red binding filled with my untouched drawing lessons…and I gave away one of the 3 large lesson books and never touched those books again.  Something that my mother had sacrificed to buy for me…and that I had begged and begged for it.   And I did nothing with it…short of giving it away…and back then $300 was an awful lot of money…that really had to have been a sacrifice.   But she did it for me.

I guess she always recognized that I had talent…that I was gifted.  Though she would have done no less for any of my other sisters or brothers…and did.  As we all had to take music lessons…and all had various interests.  She had bought us all our own instrutments which she had purchased for us one Christmas. 

I will never forget that Christmas…which was our musical Christmas.  My mother must have bought everything the music store had.  Whoever owned that music store must have loved her.  That Christmas morning when we awoke…we found a large electric keyboard, piano, drum set, guiatar & amp and accordian all up under our Christmas tree. 

Before the day was out I had mastered that keyboard and could play several songs on it.  The next day that keyboard was gone.  My mother replaced it was a real full size organ.  I think back on that now and believe that she did it…because it had posed no real challenge in order to learn.   Today both the piano and the organ are still here in the house with me…and nobody plays a note on them.  That is not to say that they cannot play them…they just do not bother to do so.

My father, who had a saxaphone, a ukalie and a trumpet…which you could hear him practicing on sometimes late at night…he made me play the accordian.  When he would come home from work…I would have to pull it out  after he ate dinner that is when he forced me to practice…night after night.  None of my sisters or brothers had to practice anything before him…but me.  And he always would fall asleep on me. 

The accordian which was under the Christmas tree was my 2nd accordian.  It was the bigger version of what they had already gotten for me before a year or so ago.  And I went out every week to accordian lessons for years. 

I hated the accordian.  I loathe pokas.  I wanted to play the piano…and in the beginning I had both piano and accordian lessons.  But daddy wanted me to play the accordian…and we never argued against my mother or my father’s wishes.  So, then my piano lessons were stopped.  

As I stated in an earlier blog…our piano teacher was also my mother’s voice instructor…a little white woman who used to pay a couple of visits per week to our home…Mrs. Marlow.   She was a very nice lady…and she knew her stuff.   We were fortunate to have her.   And that she didn’t mind coming to the home of black folks…though we lived well.  At that time my parents had bought their 2nd house.  This house had 15 rooms not including its full basement…and the house sat upon a hill overlooking the waterfront…with a long driveway leading in to our house.

I liked the house…but not as much as our other house.   But it was grand…and it was spacious…but it was far more for us to clean…and especially for me…being the oldest. 

Oh, man…the living room had windows all the way around so you could look across at the water no matter whether you stood or sat.  And it had a very big fireplace…where we used to roast marshmellows…as though we were at camp.   It was fun.  And that house also had a raspberry tree growing in front of it, with a big lawn and all these beautiful trees with branchs swirling within it that yielded beautiful blossoms in the spring and summer.  

I liked it…but it was a lot of work that house…and none of my sisters or brothers had to do more of it than me.  I never held that against my parents though.  But I did against my sisters and brothers though.  They could never just drink from ‘one’ cup…or ‘one’ glass…I was washing dishes all day and night long.  I truly know how Cinderella felt.

My parents were hard working people…who always did things for other people…and were always doing  for us.    Their lives centered around us.  Which is why I regret never appreciating them as much as I should have. 

I appreciated them…in that I never once caused them any problems…(well…except for the time I thought I could drive…I will tell you about that in some other blog, I am sure).  I can’t say I may not have been a heartache…because I am sure that my being gay was not something hard for them to deal with…though they never once spoke about it.  I am sure they would be surprised that I am no longer in gay life.   But perhaps they had already known that at some point God was going to change my mind and my heart. 

But I never gave them as much as I should have.  Though they gave us the world…and everything else.  There was nothing new that came out that they didn’t buy…from dishwashers on.   As we became of age they bought us all cars.  And we were always going on trips. 

We went to the World Fair…

Do you remember that?  

It was here in the states…in New York City that year.  Now, only the big globe of the world remains at that site as a reminder of that very huge event.  The location today is where they play the US Open.  

But we were going to this place and that place…by train mostly when we were smaller…as we grew and learned to drive…mostly by car…and on by plane.  They took us everywhere…and everything was a family thing. 

I guess they lived the life that people who work…live for.  To be able to buy whatever they wanted…when they wanted it…and to do as they wanted.  And then…to be able to educate and provide for their children…which they certainly did.   And they did it well…as well as, for their god children, neighborhood kids, church people…and those in need. 

My parents had 8 of us…and spared nothing…including correcting us when it was called for. 

Today, I think my mother would be proud to know that her $300 investment in me…really didn’t quite go wasted.   As I later taught art in high school…which is so funny that should have happened…but it did.  But I don’t think my mother saw any humor in my wasting her $300 the way I did…because I didn’t even try to pretend to do any of those lessons from that home art school once I got pass the 1st lesson. 

One day…I think I was asking her for something else and she flared up at me suddenly saying-

“You are too talented and that is why you will never do nothing.”

Which was the tail end of whatever else she had said…I cannot remember the first part of it.  But she was mad when she said it.  And I was quite young…but somehow that always stuck with me.  I don’t know if I quite understood what she meant…but I had somewhat of a clue.  That statement has made me look at everything I have ever done…or thought to do…and it governs the things I am now doing. 

Everything I have ever done is in media.  From that day…when my mother told me …‘that is why you will never do nothing’…I have sought to not  half learn anything…or half do anything…but to become proficient in everything I lay my hands to…no matter how long it takes me…or how many hours in a day or night.  But if I set out to do it…then to stick with it. 

I had to learn how spend the time learning to perfect things.  To not get up from anything that I am doing…becoming readily interested in other things…other gifts…practicing something else. 

I do not eat or drink when I am working on something.   Nor do I take lunch breaks…or go to the bathroom…nothing.  I am throughly engulfed. 

Someone, an ex-,  told me that I have tunnel vision.  Meaning whatever it is, at that point or moment of my life, that I decide that I am going to do…I become so emerged and engrossed in it.  So much so…that I only see it…think about it…and in some cases dream about it.   I eat…sleep…and drink thinking about only what I am doing…when I am working on something.  When I had my advertising business…which I still do…there have been many nights when a client’s project concept came to me in my sleep.

A wise elderly woman…my friend who passed this pass August…whom I have wrote about in a couple of these blogs…she told me that my habit of not eating or going to bathroom from morning into the very late hours of the evening was not a good thing.   She told me that I would ruin my stomach…if I continued that practice.  So, I have since been working on adjusting myself…my schedule and my body.  I would hate to cause myself any medical conditions that I could have avoided.  I had always found her wise in her counsel to me.

Yes, I was too talented…like my mother said.  I could do a lot of things…and still can.  And there is a trap to being able to do so.  Most people are good at just one thing.  So, they focus on that one thing.   But to be multi-talented or gifted…you have to struggle with balancing your gifts. 

I had to learn to direct all those gifts…or I would have become a ‘jack of all trades…and a master of none.’   

My mother saw that…and that is what caused her to flare up at me telling me what she did that day…and how she told it to me.   From that moment I began to focus upon everything I do…like these blogs which to date I have written nearly if not more…than a 130 of them since starting in mid to late June of last year.   So, if you have just started reading them…you have alot of catching up to do.  And you will have an exam in the morning…

I have always had to direct everything…just so I wouldn’t be all over the place.  Though I do not think I have quite been so successful at doing that…I have endeavored nonetheless.  But the most I can say…is that it has all been media related.  But thank God for my mother saying that to me…and at a time when I needed to hear it…or I would have never been aware of something that was so crucial for me to grasp…and to have graspped it early.

It did not prohibit me from being more or less talented.  But made me aware that I needed to channel those talents and not be flighty with them…but to engage them…focus them…and develop them to their highest levels.  So, through my years that is what I have been doing.  And from time to time…I find myself taking classes here or there…just like my mother.  

That is so funny…when I think of.  That I continue to take classes just like my mother…which is also something that I wrote about….in a blog or 2 prior to this one. 

So, a few years ago, I decided to take some graphic art classes.  The marketplace has changed so vastly with the influx of computers and software…everything is done totally differently today no matter what field you are in.  So, I began taking these classes…and when I take classes I invest many after hours outside of the class to master the thing. 

I do nothing without mastering it…and I invest the time to do exactly that…and the effort.  Which when I decided to learn video production… it required me lugging around tons of heavy and very bulky equipment.   It was not uncoummon to find me shouldering a 3/4″ video recorder deck, tripod, large light kit and large video camera trying to board a bus.  And people wonder why I have muscles now…(smile).   And I learned all that equipment…every piece of it…every cable connector…every cable…every kind of editing system, software etc…everything.

It was a joke then…people would see me coming and say-

“Here comes Spike Lee’s sister.”

They don’t laugh any more though.  No, not today…instead they ask about my film projects and what I’m getting ready to do next.  I am no longer a joke…but it did not come without struggle.  Hours upon hours of vested  time, training, exploring…learning what I was doing wrong and trying to trouble shoot on my own…and sitting there until I got it done.  Never looking for pay…but always looking to assist others so that I could learn more and sharpen my own skills.  But I did what it took…and I still do. 

Sometimes even in writing these blogs…I work on them straight for more than 6 or 10 hours…if not more…and it is usually more dependng upon what I am writing about…including searching for pictures…seeking out errors etc.  

A professional is what I am…but a perfectionist is what I seek to be.  

So, to date the classes I have taken in graphic arts are these…Photoshop, Quark and  Illustrator…and additional software I have learned is FinalCut, Adobe Primere, Director, Flash,  Dreamweaver, Avid,  Fireworks…not to mention being able to write and read html…and having learned also all the latest stuff in radio studios.  Though I played a bit  with Freehand and at some point will try my hand at InDesign.  I love playing with this stuff…exploring the capabilities.

So, I am proud of myself  for having gotten up early this morning and gotten off to an early start with my cleaning.  I am proud that the website is coming along too.  And here is a preview , at the bottom of this blog, of something which I did this past week using the skills I have learned in graphic arts.  Those Pratt students can eat their hearts out now.   But those kids taught me a lot though…when they used to come for our conferences to discuss what my clients wanted.

Thank God for my mother and father…which is why I cannot understand that girl in Florida who killed her daughter and posted drawings of skeltons and other things symbolizing her acts.  Clearly, she was troubled.  But a guilty conscience will trouble you everytime.

There is something about mothers…real mothers…that when their child is missing nothing in this world can contain them.  They act in a certain way…they become obssessed…and there is no consoling them.  They are overtaken by grief and concern…and they are not interested in anybody or anything other than finding their child.

Once my son got separated from me.  You will not know the sheer horror that ran all through me during that very brief span of time…but it seemed to me to be enternity.  I was terribly horrorified.  I was overcome and on verge of perhaps loosing my mind.  I had lost my child in a large crowd of people at an outdoor affair which was quite crowded.  One second he was right there with me and the next he was gone. 

I felt someone had stolen him.  And that was all I could think.  I did not know which way to turn.  People were all about me.  I thought to scream out…but suddenly I looked up and across the field.  It was as though a  path had opened up…and there was my son.  One of  our neighbors had found him somewhere in the midst of all those people…and was bringing him back to me.  

I dropped to my knees and embraced my son so hard…I know I must have been crying.   I was so relieved…so happy…so overjoyed that someone had found him…and that it was one of our neighbors.  I never experienced another moment like that…as I learned like every good mother who loves her child or children…how to keep my eyes or hands on my child at all times. 

So, I certainly know the state that a real mother can fall into just believing her child is gone.  She begins grieving immediately…because she will only think of the worst scenario.

That is what I thought about the Susan Smith case.  The mother down in South Carolina…or somewhere south…that said that some black man had leaped into her car while she was stopped at a stop light.  She said that he had stolen her car and drove off with her 2 small children in the back seat.  I do not think that many people had to think twice about that story…but it was her actions following the supposed incident which gave her away.  And likewise…were the actions of this young woman in Florida.  She was out partying and having a good time.  

http://news.aol.com/article/caylee-anthony-documents/373178

When I thought of this young woman’s actions following the supposed disappearance of her 2 year old daughter…it made me think of that teenager who was at the prom and gave birth to her baby in a bathroom stall.  And how she had walked off and left the bady there in that stall.  She had returned to prom dance floor…and continued to dance and enjoy herself as if nothing had happened.  For which she only got 2 years…or something…might have been counselling.

I understand denial.  I understand that mothership may be difficult for many.  But what I do not understand is when someone…a mother…or who be it…commits such acts as these young women against innocence.  I cannot understand it.   I just can’t…I just can’t…   There are so many other options.

Parenting is a process…but some people they are just not equipped or mature enough to handle the responsibilities that it brings.  This is the reason…that I know that young kids should never be bearing children.  Everybody deserves to enjoy their youth…and have a time to grow up before taking on the task of motherhood and fatherhood way beyond the grade school level…and many times even beyond college.  I was 48 years old before I realized that I had become a woman…and that I needed to grow up and start acting like one.  Truthfully.

Not  to say…that I did not mother my child.  Oh, no…  I was at doctor’s appointment, dentist appointment…sitting in the back of  of my son’s classes when I had to…at every open house almost…and when I wasn’t my mother was.  You have to stay on top of your children (just a frame of speech…not literally)…and certainly not in a bad way.  But you have be conscious of them…what they are doing…who they are with…caring of them…and for them.   And you should never feel that they are an inconvenience to you…and certainly never give them to feel that.  

Therein lays the problem for the 3 young women whom I mentioned above.  They felt that they could just rid themselves of their unwanted burdens by doing away with them.  How sad for their children.  How very very very sad……..  Sad.

I was checking through my blogs today…I watch to see what people are reading and who has linked up with me etc…  I came upon this link in which the blogger found fault with a person who was standing in a soup kitchen line…and that person having a cell phone.  The blogger felt outraged because the person was supposed to be down and out…yet he had a cell phone.

I found that to be as selfish…as a time I was waiting in the grocery checkout line.  I never pay attention to what other people are buying…but this person near me…I believe she was just ahead of me but after the person who was checking out.  I overheard her saying-

“Did you see that?  She’s buying shrimps with foodstamps.  And do you see her pocketbook?  Honestly, buying shrimps on our money.”

Overhearing that, my curiosity was pricked…so I leaned a bit and saw that the woman had a Louis Vuitton handbag…a very nice and big one…and very nice expensive coat.  These are things I also never pay attention to.  What do I care about what people have on…as long as they have on clothes…or what type of pocketbook or handbag they have?  

It doesn’t make a difference to me.  

But I thought it a bit aburd of that the woman making the comment…that she was upset about the shrimps being purchased with the government supplied foodstamps.

Now, how stupid is that?

Even if she had gotten upset over the woman’s handbag…that would have been stupid too.

But she got upset…as if  poor people can’t…or should not be allowed to eat shrimp.  And that is not to say that that woman was poor…as none of us standing in that line knew her circumstances.  But to question what people can or cannot eat depending upon what is or is not our preceived notion of them and as to their place or circumstances in life is absolutely foolish. 

Why should that woman in that line…or anyone else in that line…or the whole store, for that matter…care whether or not that woman paid for those shrimps with her foodstamps?

Or whether or not she should eat shrimps or not?

She can eat whatever she wants.  And she had legal tender by which to purchase it.

Perhaps, it is just me.   Maybe, I’m the one obssessing.   Could be…

But I think that some people concern themselves with so many things that really…that they have no right to be thinking about.  As it is simply not their concern…or any of their business…nor their place to assess who can eat or cannot eat whatever. 

Just how dumb is that? 

But that is how I felt about that blog about a supposed poor person standing in a soup kitchen line taking a picture with his cell phone.   And here is that picture…

Yeah, he was standing in a line that Michelle Obama, First Lady Obama, was assisting in at a shelter kitchen feeding needy people in Washington, DC…which I believe she does every Friday.  I imagine a bunch of people were taking her picture including the camera crew that got these shots.  If I was there…I would have taken her picture.  And then asked her-

“Can we get one together?”

And whoever wrote that blog probably would have done the same thing. 

How many times do you come face to face with the President of the United States…or his wife?

“Better start snapping, baby.”

But why should anyone feel that other people…black… checkered….green…poor… or otherwise are not entitled to have certain things?

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/44/2009/03/05/at_miriams_kitchen_michelle_ob.html

That really seems stupid and quite selfish to me…and certanly demeaning.

It is the way I feel when I hear someone say-

“Well, if they couldn’t afford the mortgage they shouldn’t have bought the house.”

 And I have heard this more than a few times…particularly following the last bailout of the banks on Wall Street. 

Did not your parents struggle?

Don\’t we all struggle to pay off stuff?

Most people do.  And they are not wrong to do it.

I believe that everyone wishes they had the money to buy and pay for everything that they want…when they want it…or need it.  But that is not how life is. 

The unfortunate thing about it…is that no one knows what tomorrow will bring.  And we are all looking towards tomorrow. 

When I looked upon house after house..and business after business boarded up in Detroit…I know that those people had been looking towards tomorrow.  But none of them realized that when tomorrow came it would mean that jobs would be cut back.  They did not see that the company they worked for…that their father and grand father had worked before them…that they would be downsizing or laying them off.  Or as they call it now…’re-organizing.’

Who thinks like that? 

 The wrong does not lay with them…most of the people who find themselves in foreclosure…it lays with the mortgage companies which preyed upon people with over inflated interest rates…red lining, offering higher rates to certain people…higher closing costs…a bunch of double talk and small print…with high late payment penalties…and absorbent legal costs which they love attaching to their costs.

I don’t know if any of you have ever had anything repossessed.  But once they repossess your vehicle or house or whatever…the company then comes back at you to extract the money even though they repossessed and sold off whatever it was…and they leave it sitting on your credit reports for years upon years hindering you from getting anything else.   This clearly is double dipping…and these companies…none of them should be allowed to do that. 

Once they have repossess the object…and they have sold it off that should settle the debt.  But no…they come back after you.  And not for the debt minus whatever they got for it…but the entire debt plus all other costs. 

A friend of mine who worked for Greyhound buslines once told me how she had been sold a faulty vehicle.  She said it was a real lemon from the day she pulled it off the dealer lot.  So, she returned the vehicle several times to the dealership who in turn never did anything fix the problem. 

Finally, she became tired of trying to deal with the auto dealer…and just returned back to the car to the dealership where she had bought it.  She said that she drove right up on the lot in the middle of the day and left it there.   She stopped making payments on it…telling them as she left the lot that they could keep their car. 

Years later, however, she noticed that her pay was being garnished…it was the dealership.  They had kept the car but now they were forcing her company to withdraw payments from her pay check in order to pay them for a car which she had given back to them.  And at this point…she just folded her hands and gave up.  She let the company take her money…because she felt that it was a hopeless situation.  

There is something seriously wrong with the system that allows companies to use these kind of tricks to get over on and rob people.  Companies like that dealership abuse…exploit and use the system…to their benefit…a company that knowingly sold her automobile which was not in sound operating condition…and they knew it.

I had asked her if she hadn’t gotten the notice to go to court?   And she told me that she had not.  Without going into court to defend yourself…as I have stated in another blog…the other side wins automatically.  If summoned to go to court…go.  It is scary…yes, but go.

The most that can happen is that the judge won’t decide in your favor. 

There is always a case that you may not receive the  summon…if they have it sent to another address.   These are games that people play.   It is the game that CitiMortgage played against my parent’s property.   But they had not counted on the fact that I knew…by the grace of God…to go into court and file my own complaint against them…to stop the auction…and have since gotten that mortgage nullified and made void.  And believe me when I said…by the shear grace and mercy of God.  That is how it was done.

In closing let me just say…

“Stay away from bad deals.”

If you are interested in something…or getting ready to sign a contract for the purchase of  something and that contract is not in your favor…do not sign it.  Do not go into a deal…or debt…in any type of an agreement in which you are not at least a partial winner.  Or at the very least…where the pain is not so great. 

Sometime, we have all had to swallow a little pain…until we can fix things…like our credit.  But yet beware of the sharks…stay away from them.

In the claim I had to file against CitiMortgage…they claimed that my father had taken a loan against the house for some $27,000 at a 16.20%  interest rate.  This total agreement netted CitiMortgage over $60,000 in interest money…making the total contract for over $97,000 worth of debt against my parent’s house. 

My father would have never made an agreement like that.  And the other part of it is…he wasn’t much of a borrower.  Didn’t have any charge cards or anything like that…because he earned money to pay for what he wanted.  And that is what he did.

Nobody in there right mind would have signed a deal like that.  The company was making 3 times as such as it was giving out…that is robbery no matter how bad your credit may or may not be.  And my father did not have bad credit.  

I knew that document was a forgery even before I saw the signature upon.  So, I took the case to court…claiming that they had preyed upon my father, if indeed he had signed it.  At the time that contract was supposedly sign my father had been diagnosed as having Alzheimer’s which would have rendered him as being legally incompetent to enter any type of legal or binding agreement.  Plus my father had several bank accounts and definitely had at least one which had more money than that in it.   So, I sued…of which I wrote about in a prior blog also.

I continue to pray for you and whatever situation or condition you are facing.  Be encouraged.   And stay away from bad deals.

Well, my little siesta is over…it is time for me to go back to work.   Actually, it ended hours ago.  

I have to finish scrubbing down the bathroom.  And I am getting a bit hungry now too.   But enjoy your weekend.  

I just finished looking out and it looks like snow…again.  But it is warm on the inside.  Though it might be that I am running a slight fever.  Been fighting off a dry cough for the past few days…but I am winning.  Well…some times…I think.

Maybe, I will just finish the bathroom…take a shower and crawl back into bed…and forget about mopping the floors tonight.  It’s late now.

Well…God bless…

Oh…yes, here is a taste of what the website will look like.  Now, you tell me whether or not if  you think some of those classes that I have taken are starting to pay off? 

Thank goodness for a mother who was not afraid to speak truth into the life of her child.

Thank you for reading this blog…and  my others.  Please be sure to continue to share this blog site with your family, co-workers and all your friends… “pass it on “  www.bsmith101.wordpress.com  ©2009

Already getting started President Obama signed the order to close Guantanamo Bay, the high security prison housed on the shores of Cuba…where thousands of detainees had been stored and warehoused since post-9/11…not to mention where they had been tortured by the Bush Administration.

Obama also ordered a review of all the trials and then placed a banned upon the harsh methods of interrogation used to extract information from detainees within that prison.

http://news.aol.com/?feature=310532

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/us/politics/23GITMOCND.html?_r=1&hp=&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1232650854-OzqyteNFK2JEY7RNpZO+Jg

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/video/2009/01/22/VI2009012201779.html?sid=ST2009012101583&s_pos=list

The behavior of the Bush Administration concerning enemy combatants and those thought

 to be enemy combatants…or possessing information went against the Geneva Convention concerning the handling and treatment of detainees, combatants and non-combatants.  The time has long been overdue for Bush’s policies regarding such matters to change…and the standards lifted once again as to how America carries herself.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/21/AR2009012102009.html

The problem, however, that arises with the closing of Guantanamo Bay is what to do with all those angry prisoners?

And, yes…I can see them being very angry…particularly those who may have been housed in that high security prison system for years now…who may have been innocent of any wrong doing.  But are now more than ready to blow America to smittereens due to what happened to them.  That is what a bunch of bad policies can do.  It creates long time and hardened hatred…and lasting enemies

Two semesters ago I had to pay a visit to the court house in regards to some family matters.  While before the judge…I was ordered to put my hands behind my back.  I could not imagine what was going on.

They were arresting me…and the charge was…  Well…  ’Not serving Jury Duty.’

The only problem here was…was that I had served my jury duty.  Not only there but in New York a couple of years earlier. 

I protested before the court.  I called it an ‘outrage.’ 

I called it an ‘injustice.’

I proclaimed my innocence. 

But no one heard me.   In fact, they took my actions for a joke. 

I was outraged.  

I was enraged….I was mad…insulted…and had been made to be embarrassed. 

And I knew while I sat down in that cold jail cell after they un-handcuffed me and bent to remove the shackles…that that day was going to be revisited.  And I knew it beyond a shadow of a doubt.   Because yes…I had already made up in my mind that I was going to sue them.

So, I can understand the outrage and anger of people treated badly or unfairly…and those even treated in such as way…without due cause.  You don’t forget.

http://news.aol.com/article/obama-signs-order-to-close-guantanamo-in/314749?cid=12

Well, Hillary Clinton is looking happier these days…and certainly more confident.  And there is little wonder.   Today she was sworn in as Secretary of State.   

Though Hillary was indeed truly a heated contender in her fight to the White House…it is evident that the President saw something in her.  Perhaps he admired her aggressiveness…or maybe her doggit determination.  I imagine that these type of qualities are much needed when dealing various world leaders and other big time politicans.  If so…then she certainly has all the right credentials.

…and in a vote of 18 to 5 of the Senate Finance Committee Timothy Geithner was approved as consideration as Treasury Secretary of the United States of America.  Now, his confirmation goes up for  a full Senate vote in order for him to take over that position. 

http://news.aol.com/article/clinton-takes-the-reins-at-state/314201?cid=12

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-clinton,1,3732593.story

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090122/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/clinton

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/player/popup/?rn=3906861&cl=11658795&ch=4226716&src=news

Caroline Kennedy has withdrawn her name from consideration as the replacement for Hillary Clinton’s old Senate seat, as the Senator from New York.  Though the Governor of New York, David Patterson, had been toying with who his decision would fall upon…he has now allowed too much time to slip by.  What seems to me…should have been a fairly easy decision by way of choice…he now longer has. 

Having spent much of her younger years growing up on 5th Avenue in New York…I am sure that Caroline would have brought much to the State of New York.  Whatever the reason…it is New York’s great lost.  Too bad it was not seized upon earlier…it might have made a difference.

Boy, it is amazing that little Carline Kennedy is now 51 years old.   Seems only like yesterday when she and her brother, John, were the 2 little kids in the White House.

http://news.aol.com/article/kennedy-associate-says-decision-was/287640?cid=12

CLICK on this LINK  BELOW to see how Obama’s team is shaping up and where they currently stand in the process of their confirmations.

http://projects.nytimes.com/44th_president/new_team

IBM set to lay off  800 employees.  

I bought an IBM computer a few years back…but haven’t seen any more of them around since.  So, I knew that IBM had folded her hand in the desktop business.  But who knows what IBM sells any more? 

UNIX…Servers…LINUX…Power Systems…massive digital storage systems… 

So, I guess IBM is still pretty much in the computer industry…and as they have pretty much have been in the past…more corporate use…and less commercial consumer use.  Maybe, IBM needs to get it’s feet back into the everyday consumer market again.

Well, God bless…

Thank you for reading this blog…and  my others.  Please be sure to continue to share this blog site with your family, co-workers and all your friends… “pass it on” www.bsmith101.wordpress.com ©2009  

Well, she has decided that she is ready to go back to life in the regular lane…forget the fast lane…or the jet lane.   No, she doesn’t want that any more.   She is tired of all the lights…TV cameras and microphones being thrown into her face….and everybody holding their breath for her every word.  She is giving up getting up early on Sunday mornings to go Meet the Press.  She has finished shaking the hands of State leader  after State leader.  No, she is giving it all up to now go to greeting college students. 

Yeah, it is back to teaching.  And I can only believe she will be looking forward to it.  

But after a while will she still enjoy it?

That is the question.   It is hard to believe that going back to teaching will be something that will able to hold her for long.  After having the life that she has lead for the past 8 years…can you really go back to teaching and ever be satisfied again?

One thing you can really respect about Condoleezza Rice besides her poise, brains and quiet professionalism…is the way she has managed to keep her private life out of the media.  Having such a high profile life…it could not have been easy at all.   Because I am sure that they have all been looking…to spot Condi and somebody. 

But she mastered it…somehow.  Because I am sure that she has not spent the last 8 years alone.  When you are in the eyes of the world….somebody in going to try to catch your attention.   So, I am sure that there have been many suitors vying for her attention.   Yet, somehow she managed not to get tangled in one media story after another over her love life and who she was or is dating now.  

And on top of it all…no one will ever be able to say…that she did not do her job well.

“Bravo to you, Madam Secretary of State.”

And good luck at Sanford….I am sure your classes are all going to be quite full with long waiting list of students waiting on stand-by to get in.

I really admire another thing about Condoleezza Rice…and this whole new breed of black folk who are in positions of power and prestige.    They are no longer afraid or ashamed of their blackness.   They  love who they are…and celebrate their lives and history as black folk in America.    And we do have much to be very proud of…years and years of it…and all kinds of black folk who lit our way. 

Besides walking the halls and grounds of Sanford University…I am sure that there are plenty of book deals waiting on Condoleezza Rice.  And I am sure that she has many rich stories to relay…without the lost of her dignity or integrity.  You can just tell that about her…can’t you?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/26/AR2008112603232.html

http://www.wkrg.com/local/article/future_plans/12602/

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/telegraph/telegraphtv/tvplayer/?ID=News&bcpid=1137942530&bclid=1155254697&bctid=1730134653

Everybody should not be allowed to have a gun permit and I don’t care who they are.

Saturday I was in the beauty salon getting my hair done when this peddler came in.  He was towing a suitcase loaded with incense, oils and various special soaps.  I had seen this guy for many years and never said more to him than ‘hi’….or him to me.

But on this particular day he took a seat beside me and began talking to me as if we went way back as friends.  He began to tell me how he and his wife had broken up a couple of years ago and how foolish she had been.  To my surprise I had known his wife…and he knew that.   I didn’t really know that this guy knew me.  But he not only knew me, but one of my brothers and my father. 

Needless to say, I was quite surprised by all of this.   But what surprised me even more was when he lifted up his jacket and showed me a pistol he was packing on his side.

I don’t like guns…and I don’t trust people who carry them.

After having seen this guy for years standing out on the streets peddling his wares I never once thought he had a gun…or anything close to a weapon on him.  I never really ever thought the guy was…   Well, was all there…if you know what I mean.   There was just something about him.  He never smiled…and certainly never seemed to have much of a personality.

The person whom he had been married to…  Well, I was surprised when he told me that she had been his wife.  I wouldn’t have thought that she would have married someone like this guy.   Not that I knew him…but he just didn’t seem to have much going on.  And she was nice and smart…and not someone who I thought would have fallen for a guy such as this guy.

But the guy went on talking to me about his gun.  How he could pull it apart and how quickly he could put it back together again.  How he had taken it apart when he boarded the train to come back to our town…and how he had wrapped it in a special plastic so that it would not be detected. 

This guy was dangerous.

Then he started pulling out his gun permits.    Yes, I did say gun permits.

All of this this guy did…and he had never in his life every spoken to me before.  And he did this while he continued to talk to me about his wife.  Needless to say…when he finally got up and I thought about it over a few hours…I have come to the conclusion that that guy was a walking time bomb.   And that the clock was ticking…

Because I could hear and see that he was depressed over the divorce of his wife…and he was walking around carrying a very dangerous weapon.

We never know from one moment to the next…who we are standing beside or what they are going through.  In the world we live in today with all the problems of people being out of work, laid off, job closing, forclosures, evictions, divorce, separations etc…etc… there are a lot of time bombs walking around.

I really don’t want to come across the guy again…because I recognized that he was unstable as well as being dangerous.

Well, it is beautiful today.  Still plenty of snow and ice though.  And all I can think about is how nice it is not have to get up for any more 8 o’clock classes…in fact classess at all.  I am so happy…I just keep smiling….‘free at last…free at last…thank God, I am free at last.’

God bless…and thank you for reading this blog…and  please be sure to continue to share this blog site with your family, co-workers and all your friends… “pass it on” www.bsmith101.wordpress.com ©2009 

 Gulf War Syndrome

For some time the US government has failed to accept responsibility for having placed US Troops in harms way.  Part of the problem is that this country has boldly and somewhat routinely experimented on unsuspecting US citizens without consideration to them, their quality of life, or the effects such experimentation would have on their families.  And many times this experimentation has been on those serving in our own military…as well as, on some minorities in this country. 

Chemical warfare is real and this country engages in it as much as any other. 

During the Gulf War the US forces released certain chemicals without regard to our own troops.  This was something which occurred also during Vietnam and various other periods in the history of this country.  Very rarely has the US government ever accepted any culpability for these actions.  But finally, after numerous charges and group action suits brought on behalf of the Vietnam Vets against the US government the government finally owned up to having dropped Agent Orange during the Vietnam war which left thousands of American service men and women with all types of health issues and irregularities, e.g. various respiration problems, children with birth defects, increased incidences down syndrome, body rashes etc.

Now, after hundreds of thousands of complaints the Gulf War viets will finally find some relief after their long battle against America’s denial that they too have been injured and are suffering various ailments due our countries non-caring attitude when it comes to her own people…and particular to those serving in uniform trying to protect this country…our own troops.  Who have found that their own country was more deadly to them than those they were sent to fight.  It is called the ‘danger from within.’  The one which they certainly should not have suspected…nor did. 

But while our troops were busy down in the Gulf under the orders of the first George Bush…he had the military dropping a bunch of dirty little bombs filled with all kinds of chemical warfare.  And never whispered a word of it to our own troops…after which thousands upon thousands on this side of the battle became contaminated…and for have been suffering the paining affects of…all to the denial of this country until just recently.

It is sad to say but Sadom Hussein wasn’t the only person who ever hurt his own people.  And for a country who is the only country to have ever dropped an atomic bomb…this country not only has much to apologize for to other countries…but also to those living right here in America as well.

Last week Tuesday was Veterans Day.  Every so often we really do need to stop and consider them and their service to this country.  Without them where would this country be?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081117/ts_nm/us_usa_health_gulfwar

WELCOME TO MY HOME….

I had to chuckle when I read the article below. 

It is about body language.  It says that Obama and Bush may not have taken questions from the press but their body language spoke volumes.  You have got to read the article…I think you will enjoy it too. Just CLICK on the LINK below to read it.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/20081111/pl_ynews/ynews_pl148;_ylt=ApgRill4SpzF1QfaMXlCDbQGw_IE

OBAMA and MCCAIN meeting…

The one thing you have got to say about Barack Obama…and that is that he is no fool.  And he is not afraid to extend a hand and seek…to solicit the aid the help he feels he will need to help him to put this country back on track. 

He is a person who doesn’t think party when he is looking for the best people or when seeking the allies he knows he will need to assist in getting things through Congress and the Senate when he finally takes over the White House.  Even though the Democratics made significant gains in both the Senate and Congress during this past election…I agree with Obama.  It still doesn’t hurt to have friends on both side of the aisles.

It is just unfortunate that more politicians fail to share his perspective.

THE BIG 3…give them what they need.

This whole thing about bailing out the ‘Big 3′….GM, Ford and Chrysler reeks of partisanship if ever I have heard of it.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20081117/ts_afp/usautoeconomypolitics

http://www.news.com.au/business/story/0,27753,24668402-31037,00.html

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/business/story/0,28124,24668402-36418,00.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/19/business/19auto.html?_r=1&hp

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/22887392#22887392

When you examine the map of this country you will find that the states whom the failure to bailout the big 3 will impact the most are those states which were ‘red’ and that turned ‘blue’ during this past Presidential Election 2 Thursdays ago.  If you want to talk about sour grapes and cry ‘foul’…now is the time. 

When those Republicans rushed back to Capital Hill to bail out Wall Street a few weeks ago…it was in the hopes of trying to save a sinking ship called the “Republican Party.”   It failed because…well, because John McCain did not win the Presidential race and a lot of their buddies and friends…and even some of them got voted out of office.  Now, as their last official act…that bunch of stub nosed politicians are targeting everyday people…who dared to go to the polls and voted them out.   And really…if the truth be known….they absolutely should have voted them out.

Had it not been for the Republican domination of the US Senate and Congress for nearly the past 8 years the Bush Administration may not have gotten away with as much…and we just might not be in the dire straights that this country is now in.

But why should that bunch of sour grape Republicans be upset?

They wholly deserved to be voted out of office because they failed to properly execute their positions properly.  Nobody voted them into office to ‘okay’ a bunch of failed Bush policies.  Then as a ‘new day’ came upon the horizon they all realized that they were in deep trouble…as well as they should have been for failure to represent their constituents.  But they were busy serving themselves, vying for higher and higher positions, and seeking ranking offices in their party rather than caring for what their voters had sent them to Capitol Hill to do.

So, Wall Street hit the wall and began to crumble a few weeks ago and they all went running in to Captiol Hill like a bunch of wild animals pretending that they hadn’t a clue…hadn’t expected it…didn’t know what to do…but knew that ‘no matter what Wall Street had to be bailed out.’   Now, those same nice little gentlemen with their righteous indignation say-

“Why should we bailout General Motors…or Chrysler…or the Ford Automobile Companies?”

I’ll tell you why…because it has nothing to do with one Corporate executive but everything to do with millions of soon to be displaced and out of work Americans who have depended on those companies to provide them with a living.  They are taxpayers…homeowners…and they deserve the same consideration and sense of emergency afforded to Wall Street.

How could we dare to be so jaded that we would dare to turn our backs on the workers upon which this country runs?

The blow to those people living in Michigan, Indiana and Ohio loosing any more jobs will be a shot heard around this country.  This country cannot afford to turn her back on these hard working people. 

I will not forget visting Detroit this past summer and seeing first hand every other house boarded up and every other business closed.  It is something that you will really have to see for yourself in order to understand just how extreme this thing was…and I do mean every other.  This was not a fantasy and I was amazed looking out at it street after street…main streets and side streets…all alike.  It is the reality that these hard working everyday people live in…many of them having already seen their neighbors loose everything due the downsizing and the shutting down of many automobile factories across this country as well as in Detroit, Indiana and Ohio.

And what industry was the one that has opened up in Detroit?

Casinos. 

Even GM has one which bares its logo very largely on the building.

For some reason every state and every politician believes that the cure all for the economy is to give people any kind of job…by the way of casinos.  They look at casinos as the new trend for job creation.  But somebody has to walk into those casinos and take some risk.  And usually it is those faced with what they believe is the last resort to saving their house or business.  Those who should least do it…but feel trapped and that there are no other options for them in oder to hold on to what they already have.

So, they go into the casino which has opened up while their jobs vanished…and they bet everything.  They bet it all.  And they end up loosing it all.  They gambled it all away.

Sooner rather than later, they found themselves without a job, had gambled away their severance pay…and then have no money left to even try to meet the debt on their homes or businesses which they had gone into the casino with the hopes of trying to save in the first place.  They are now in a worst state than they started in.

In Detroit many of factory jobs are gone…and yet that city has 2 very large brand new casinos…and a third, if you consider the casino across the waters from them in nearby Canada.  I had never been in Detroit before but I was amazed by all the houses that were boarded up and all the boarded up businesses…unbelieveably so.  In fact, between every boarded up house stood a house which wasn’t…and those people represented those who still had a job at GM.  And soon if something isn’t done for the ‘Big 3′ those people too will be out in the cold, and their houses will be boarded up as well…and other businesses will go under along with them.

That group of angry gentlemen Washington, DC…those Republicans seeking to pay back Americans for voting them out of office for their lousy job at co-governing this country and as the supposed ‘check & balances’ of this country.  They sincerely need to step back and take a deep breath to consider the millions of people who will suffer if they fail to vote in favor of bailouting the ‘Big 3.’   And it will hurt and it will reel some dire consequences upon us all if they don’t. 

http://money.cnn.com/2008/11/19/news/companies/gm_failure_consumers/index.htm

But of course, such things really don’t matter to them…they live in other states and will soon be back home fishing or flying off to some remote island to retreat.

I think that there is just too little love of neighbor these days.   No one cares about anyone else anymore.  The populous is beginning to become just like the bunch of selfish and self-serving politicians.  Whom many of us are starting to emulate in every possible way…and look just like them too. 

Recently in one of my history classes we hit upon this subject…of how during the building of the EU (the European Union) many of the opinions about what is wrong or right with the EU are shaped by those in charge of media and in power.  Don’t let these same groups shape you or your opinions of others…or what is or isn’t right.

There was once a time that neighbors looked out for one another.  But those days are sadly long gone.  And it really is too bad.

Oh, yes…before I end this blog. 

Let me just say…that the automobile industry started in this country.  It is as American as apple pie.  It is a part of Americana…because other countries have entered the marketplace does not mean that we should forfeit an industry that belongs to country to foreign interests.  This is how we got into the mess we are in today with the foreign oil countries.  We forfeited that industry too.  We found it easier to buy from other countries than to continue to build upon our own reserves and resources.  And look at the state we are in because of it.   

There is no question that the American automobile companies should be bailed out.  There is no question that the automobile industry in this country would be suffering…who is buying anything these days?

Who can afford to?

We are all suffering from this current climate of failed economic management.  But is that any reason to desert our own people and an industry which this country single handedly created.

If the airlines and Wall Street have been bailed out…the auto industry certainly should be too.  To thousands from New Jersey and thousands in other states around this country upon whom there will be a great impact in lost of jobs, there can be no other answer.  But ‘bailout.’ 

Not to mention the lost that every US citizen themselves will suffer.  Heaven forbid that every American citizen should have to turn to foreign imports only as possible vihicle purchases whenever we decide we want to buy a car or SUV.  And that the only selection we will have is a foreign vehicle.  If this happens…this country will really be in big trouble.

http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080827/AUTO01/808270408

For an industry which has done over $70 billion worth of business in this country, with millions of car owners on the roadway today who all would stand to loose big, not even including the police departments and large companies who are invested in U.S. autos…if these companies were forced out of business by not being able to service, get parts or have any recourse when problems arose with their vehicles imagine the problems.  This would be a very great problem for tons of us.  And it is certainly something to be considered.

BAILOUT the BIG 3.

Well, have a beautiful day…and thank you, as always, for reading.

In memorial of Obama’s grandmother, Madelyn Dunham…I take this time to thank her for all of her dedication and love that she showed to our President.  And the aid that she gave him in becoming the person whom he is.  We applaud you and celebrate you…along with Rosa Parks, Shirley Chisholm, Fanny Lou Hamer, Harriette Tubman, Mary McLeod Bethune and many numerous other women for whom we owe much…and upon who’s shoulders we certainly now stand. 

Thank you Lord God for them.

 God bless…and thanks for reading ©2008

Loving You – Minnie Ripperton

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/obama/chi-obama-grandmother-madelyn-dunham,0,2249369.story

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/obama/

…pass it on…’ www.bsmith101.wordpress.com

After 8 years of essentially nothing but a bunch of failed economic schemes on the part of the Bush Team where we have seen one large company after another go under, Enron, WorldCom, AIG, Bear Sterns…now Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac and many large banks are headed for the drain.  Somebody needs to call in the plumber…and I guess that is what that $700 billion bailout is all about.

But what could have led George Bush to possibly believe that anybody in their right mind was going to underwrite for him a blank check giving him what would have amounted to a have virtually amounted to a $700 billion free roller coaster ride with taxpayers money with no oversights written into it…no promise of ever getting back…and was earmark directly to Wall Street.

Paulson had real cause to get down on his knees in the Senate and beg Nancy Pelosi to bless him with what evidently his boss, George Bush, had sent him to Capitol Hill to do…beg for it.  And as he dropped to his knees he was probably snickering to himself thinking about the big bonus he was going to get for brokering the deal.   And everybody…including large number of Republicans (well, it is an election year even for them…and many of them would like to return to Capitol Hill after November too)…so, they hemmed and haa-ed until finally all slowly broke down and gave him a yes.

Henry Paulson declaring that we were in a dire straits and if we didn’t act quick the walls would come tumbling down…sounded much like what Bush spewed out while rushing Capitol Hill into signing in that thing that…thereby ingratiated George Bush with the first blank check…called the Patriot Act.  And there was nothing Patriotic about it…it just gave Bush and all his little men much to much power, infringed upon our rights of privacy, allowed them to essentially set up a dictatorship right here in America.  And they had wrote it in a way that no one could…either say anything…or pose them any opposition.   They in effect have had total and absolute free reign.

At that time the powers that be on Capitol Hill…blindly turned everything over to a bunch of crooks worst than Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, the George Bush Administration gang.  The Senate gave them everything but the kitchen sink without any restraints, oversights or means of appeal.  George and his people got to do whatever they wanted to…and they did.  That is exactly how he happened to order a preempted strike against Iraq…which unarguably has been one of the biggest financial mistakes in Presidential history…and World political suicides since Woodrow Wilson launched the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  Bush and his crew put us into a war without end that has been draining this country of manpower, lives and absolutely huge unheard of amounts of money per day.

Since George Bush stole his way into the White House in 2000 this country has suffered one calamity after another.  Today America is in its worst financial condition since the Great Depression with both the Euro and the Chinese yen outperforming the American dollar.  Eight years of Bush Economics has virtually put this country in receivership to both China and Europe.

Since George Bush’s cooked the books on weapons of mass destruction throwing us into ‘yes’ a very un-necessary war inflation has ran wild in this country in ways we would and could have never imagined in the years prior to Bush taking over the country after Bill Clinton.

Who would have thought we would have ever seen nearly $5/gallon of gasoline at the pumps in this country?

When the gas went up…the food costs went up…clothes…medical expenses…everything went up.  And they are not going to come down…even if the cost of gas temporarily has .  The cost of gas as we once knew it is gone.  It will never be anywhere near where it used to be…$1.99 to $2.50/gallon ever again in this country…thanks to George Bush.

Everybody around the world, at the time….realized that when Bush had declared he was going to strike Iraq that the decision was for one primary reason…that decision was for the oil.  He sent troops in to plunder and destroy the infrastructure of that country…that could have never been about just a single man and his 2 sons.  The orders were too broad, too vast and far to destructive to have ever have been just about Saddam Hussein.

Halliburton was sent in….and a bunch of Halliburton sub-companies…all companies with special ties to Bush and his Administration were the only companies given contracts to enter Iraq to supposedly rebuild that country at a cost of billions of dollars to America’s taxpayers.  While Halliburton and others sent back to the U.S. Pentagon a bunch of bogus invoices and padded bills…filled with lies stealing from everyday people like you and me millions upon millions of dollars…for which they suffered no penalty and/or penalties for and are still on the Pentagon payroll.

Bush stole his way into the highest seat in this country…and immediately ate away the Bill Clinton surplus plunging America in a deficit his very first year in office.

Once he stole his way into the Oval Office, America came under attack for only the second time in her history…but this time it wasn’t some small distant South Pacific island that was hit.  A strategically planned and deployed attack on America took place on September 11, 2001… the likes this country or no country has ever seen.  It was a day I will never forget along with millions of other Americans and millions around the world.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/29/business/29bailout.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/29/business/29markets.html?hp

http://www.latimes.com/news/la-fi-bailout29-2008sep29,0,855202.story

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/09/20/bush-asking-for-700-billi_n_127926.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/09/28/congress-white-house-reac_n_129964.html

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-080928bailout-deal-reached,0,2436591.story

9/11….2001

At the time I lived just on the other side of both the Brooklyn and the Manhattan Bridges, in downtown Brooklyn. 

I remember awaking to one ambulance and siren after another…non-stopping all day. 

I remember looking out my bedroom window and watching the Twin Towers engulfed by heavy black smoke that soon became white/grayish billows of smoke as they went down. 

I remember the congestion of that day of all the roadways being block, train service being suspended, people having to find their way out of darken train tunnels all over New York City.   No cabs or buses allowed through the police barricades posted all through the city in every borough…nobody could drive anywhere. 

I remember looking out the window and watching as people lined the streets passing out bottles of water to those laden with ashes from their heads down who were walking the streets in disbelief trying to find their way home from Wall Street. 

I remember sitting near the radio listening and waiting most of the day…and all of the night to the reports…the questions… and people searching for answers. 

I remember hearing that the Pentagon had just got hit…and then how a plane went down in Pennsylvania.  And everyone was trying to figure out how many more planes were out there…and wondering what would be the next target…and where? 

I remember getting dress and walking into the Brooklyn Mall area with droves of people rushing pass me…stopping to stare into the window of an electronic store to watch the TV monitors along with many others who gatheed around…just watching the towers getting hit time and time again.  And hear in disbelief “Just like in the movies.” 

I remember trying to find my way to one of the medical emergency centers set up all over New York for victims so that I could volunteer.

I remember going to the medical center they opened up in downtown Brooklyn near where I lived…and nearing the location seeing the staff standing outside their door turning droves of people away who had all come to volunteer just like me.   But they had no victims…there was no one to help.  Because they had either gotten out…or they were gone…as if they had never been.

I remember crying and wondering about friends who worked in those buildings…if they had survived? 

I remember my utter and complete feeling of lost and being lost during that whole day. 

I remember how everything had been turned upside down…and I was sitting in the midst of it less than a mile from Wall Street and the World Trade Center.

I remember the days that followed…how there was not a sound down in the subways. 

I remember how no one spoke…not one word…not even a whisper.  There was no laughter or mirth on the trains, or buses or anywhere in New York.  Every face was like stone…expressionless, empty, devastated and shocked beyond all words. 

New York was in shock for months…and New Yorkers rallied behind each other as never before during that day, and days to come.  Every fraction and group was dissolved…everything that had separated them was gone…they were all now only New Yorkers and they had been attacked.  And nothing was as unusual.  But nothing would ever been the same ever again…the towers were gone.

The towers lit your nights…gave you direction if you got lost.  They stood beautifully…long tall and straight as could be.  From Jersey to Far Rockaway…from Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island, Manhattan and the Bronx…the towers stood as beacon on a hill lighting the way home…and now she was gone.   And nothing would ever be the same.

 

Please be sure to share this blog site with your friends.

…pass it on…’ www.bsmith101.wordpress.com 

God bless…and thanks for reading  ©2008

 

Reform…Change …McCain????

The real agents of change…McCain…or Obama?

It was interesting hearing the Republicans talk about change during their convention as though they were the first to conceptualized that idea of change…or that America was in need of a change.

And man do we need a change.

And that change is by way…of removing the Republicans out of office…getting their hands off of regulating the business of the United States of America.  Under Bush this country has hit rock bottom.  It has gone to places where it hadn’t been since the stock market crash of the 1930’s bringing about the Great American Depression, which lasted into 1940’s.

How could one group of people do so much damage?

From a huge surplus left by Bill Clinton to a massive deficeit that continues growing moment by moment as another bullet is shot or a war tank is moved through the dessert sands of Iraq.

Under Bush has come war, attacks on American soil, home foreclosures, U.S. takeovers of huge companies  with the hope of trying to stablize a highly flautering economy.  Companies like Freddy Mac and Fanny Mae…who ever thought anything would happen to her…or them?  

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/21/business/21cong.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/20/AR2008092000883.html?hpid=topnews

http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/lehman_brothers_holdings_inc/index.html?inline=nyt-org

And they say that Bush was an Economics Major. 

Well, that is one degree that Yale should go back and reclaim quick before everybody starts wondering just what is Yale teaching its Economic Majors?

It is easy to preach change…but without it being actually in your heart…or having the heart to actually implement it….change just becomes a catch phrase…a means of merely trying to get elected without the hope of making any change.  And that is exactly what ‘change’ means to the Republicans.  It is a catch phrase…a practical joke that everytime they said it…they almost choke trying not to laugh.

Those Republicans…they have no real desire to change anything.  And why would they want to?

From what I heard at the Republican Convention….they’re all happy with the way things are.  And why not…they have reaped the benefits from this mess that the Bush Administration has sunken us into. 

Who ever heard of paying $4.00/per gallon for gas in America before George Bush got into office?

Even under Bush senior…this country still was under 90 cents per gallon for gasoline.

But when you go into office and the first thing you do is increase your own salary that really should speak volumes to everybody in the country.  Bill Clinton as President of the United States only received $200,000 a year…but George Bush felt that wasn’t enough.  So, the President’s salary went up to $400,000 a year.  That meant that within the first 4 years of Bush’s term he was paid all of what Bill Clinton got for the whole of 8 years Bill was in office.  And Bill Clinton never took any 4 week vacations at any time while he was in the office of President of this country…a thing George Bush really loves to do  (that’s that party boy attitude he’s had all his life)…and he started taking them shortly after he stole his way into the Oval Office.

Honestly, when you look at the American Economy…Bush has really been on vacation for his entire 8 years that he has been in the White House.  Well, maybe if he had…then maybe we wouldn’t be here where we are right now. 

What a mess!

So, yes…drinking champagne and watching their stocks vested in fuel, food goods etc. go soaring through the roof those Republicans loved that. 

Why shouldn’t they?

They’re making money.  That’s why they are against better health packages for employees, more taxes for the richer Americans, help to the poor, disabled, sick and disenfranchised

When you get right down to it….those…those…those REPUBLICANS are a selfish bunch!

They could care less about anybody but themselves.

So, for the most part they enjoy their standing in America…they are vested.   Vested in things remaining just as they are.

When you looked out upon the people who filled the coliseum where the Republican National Convention took place…it looked more like a meeting of the Wall Street Klan.  They for the most part looked like a bunch of stuff shirt business people (who all by the way looked sad to be at their own convention).  The Republican Convention certainly didn’t seem to have a cross section of people from all sectors of America as were the people that attended the Democratic  National Convention.  And besides that…the Republican Convention didn’t have one person who was just an ordinary Joe or Jane who came up to tell their story…like the Democratic Convention did.  And all of those stories were quite moving and compelling…as to what the Republicans have done to the American Economy and how people…everyday people are truly suffering.

Not only did there seem to be a deep difference between the 2 types of crowds attending the various Political Conventions…but also…the Republican National Convention was geared towards personality and had nothing to do with what the maverick McCain would do differently for America.  In fact, the whole Republican Convention was one big war hero story.  It would have been great for Memorial Day or something…but it didn’t speak to what McCain plans to do for America.

The Republicans attacked Obama…his eloquence and ability to rally the crowds.  But they failed to offer up any meat on a Republican agenda.  They talked ‘change’…and spoke about ‘reform’…but never said ‘how’…or what differently they were going to do.  Because the reality is…it is all talk as it has always been when it comes to the Republicans. 

The Republican make promises…but only continue to enrich the rich and could care less about those who are struggling to keep above the water…as the Republicans steadily watch their bank accounts grow having invested in energy, oil and whatever else that is bleeding us into nothingness…we who don’t have their deep pockets…and have to work hard at trying to make every dollar stretch as far as we can get it.

McCain may well have been a hero…but having served in the military and making the decision to stay with his troops is not something that many others also did not decide to do when they had the option of doing something else.  I have watched stories of such people all the time on PBS.  And no one has said of them-

“This qualifies you to become the next President of the United States.”

If so, then we would see more military people running for political office along with mostly lawyers and other professional types who choose to become Senators, Governors, Mayors etc…  But no, you don’t see them…those just plain military people…and if they were to stand up and say-

“I can do a better job than of those guys.”

Somebody would tell them to sit down….and that they just did not have the experience or whatever else it takes to be in politics. 

So, therefore, military service is no prerequisite to be President of the United States…nor can it be a substitute for qualifications or experience.  When your military record is all that can stand on or all that can be said about you…one really has to wonder about John McCain.  And believe me that Republican Convention was all about John McCain’s military record.  Not once did I hear about some bill or anything else he managed to push through.

I say, give me a person who knows what it is to serve people though he may have not have been Governor or a corporation executive…but a honest caring person who has made it his life work to serve the everyday woman and man.   And that is the history of Barack Obama.

“Drill, baby…drill.”

Sounds like the Republicans don’t mind destroying what little lands this country has set aside in order to protect certain eco-systems and various species of wildlife, foliage etc.  As long as they can make money the Republicans could care less about anything else. 

Is this not the very reason that the investigators laid claim to about Hurrican Katrina?

Did they not say that that if the wet lands had not been removed that perhaps New Orleans might have had the flooding it suffered?

It was the eco-system that had been destoryed in order to increase the city limits…and in the end nature dealt New Orleans a death defying blow by the name of Katrina.

But destorying the eco-systems mean nothing to the Republicans.  Because they reap all the benefits and none of the fall-out from such decisions.

Money is the only thing most Republicans put first.

That sign being waved by many at the Republicans at their National Convention which said ‘Prosperity’ looked so much like a Hersey’s Chocolate wrapping…to me that I started craving a Hersey’s bar for the remainder of the night.  And finally got one just this week.

Prosperity…not change is what the Republicans want.  Its their same old game…they’re just trying to repackage it and give it a new name.   And during their own convention those Republicans were bold enough to display large signs reading just that…”Prosperity.” 

http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761584403/great_depression_in_the_united_states.html

Remember to get registered if you are not…the clock is ticking.  And be sure if you are registered to go down to the Voter Registration Office in your city or town and double check on your registration…just to make sure you won’t run into any problems on election day.  You vote counts.

Well, God bless…and enjoy the rest of your day.  And thanks for reading…and please remember to share this blog address with your friends….‘…pass it on…’ www.bsmith101.wordpress.com 

God bless…and thanks for reading  ©2008

Since I see that so many people have come here to read about Starbucks closing of several of their stores, I decided to give you a bit more info on those closings.

But let me begin with this…I really can’t see myself paying $4.00 for a cup of anybody’s coffee.   Sorry, Mr. Starbuck…but it is just the way it is.  It’s…it is how I feel.  I just can’t see it.

I know people are all wrapped up in image…but does holding a cup with ‘Starbucks’ logo really have more value than a cup with ‘Dunkin Donuts’ logo on it.

I mean all through the Decocratic Primaries…people were saying that Obama attracks the Starbuck crowd…and Hillary the Dunkin Donuts people.   Huh????

Why all this division?

Breaking people down by coffee lines…it is all a bit too much.

Maybe it is just that I am not a coffee person. 

My father being Jamaican…and Jamaica being a British Colony once upon a time…so what do the Brit’s drink?   Tea, of course.  And so that is what most Jamaicans drink…and Chinese too.  So, our household is basically all tea drinkers…following right after daddy and our Jamaican hertiage and tradition.  And it extends all the way down to daddy’s grand-children and great-grand children…and since they are basically still kids we haven’t gotten to the fourth generation yet.  Who will also undoubtedly also mostly be a bunch of tea drinkers too, I am sure.

Starbucks has to have the record for being one of the fastest growing companies in America.  I have never seen a company grown so fast.

But then they seem to have made all the right moves in the beginning.  They started off with statilite stores…branched off into deals where they went into places like Virgin Records and other high traffic locations which proved to be excellent decisions for them.  Because people who purchase $13/$15 CD’s certainly also have enough to buy a $4.00 cup of coffee.  And they did.

Starbucks a Seattle based company has 7,100 company owned stores across the country.  Some time this year the company plans to close 600 of its under producing stores.  Which means they will be laying off some 12,000 employees…which the company says it will try to place as many of them as possible at other store locations.

In February of this year, Starbucks fired some 600 other employees and is currently periodically shutting down stores during some regular business hours in order to do some re-training of its employees.

It is probably safe to say…that if you work at a Starbucks that is inside a Barnes & Nobles or a Virgin Records location…or any high volume/high traffic area…your store will probably not be closing.

For a listing of the closing stores Click Link below.

http://www.starbucks.com/aboutus/USStoreClosureInfo.pdf

Or go to…

http://www.starbucks.com/aboutus/pressdesc.asp?id=882

And to read more on the story via ABC News Click on the Link below.

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=5288740

These youtube videos may need some loading time…if so lower the volume all the way and read the blog or all of my blogs until it loads completely.  The stop and go will drive you crazy otherwise.  Thank you.   

And while I am sharing…don’t forget to share this blog address with all your friends, family, church, the people upstairs and down the street too…  www.bsmith101.wordpress.com      the place to be when it comes to staying on top of what is important…interesting…and insightful.   Pass it on….

Barack Obama is quite a family man…a man who clearly loves his wife and his children as is evident in his pictures with them, everytime you see him with his wife and in his comments concerning them.  For such passion to extend itself into the public and political area is a gift to those of us who shall soon reap the rewards of it…which shall also be reaped by those of the whole world also when he becomes President of the United States of America in November of this year.

Clearly the people in Germany, France, England and Israel who gathered to hear him speak recognized that Obama is an extrodinary person…that kind of person only goes around once in a lifetime.

So, to have been on this planet to have seen and heard the likes of Dr. Martin L. King, Jr., John Fitzgerald Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy, Nelson Mandela etc. we can truly say that we have been blessed.  Because we have truly be blessed to be here in the company of some very extra-ordinary people who have shown us what true love and commitment is all about.

Now, in walks Barack Obama.

From the time he hit the world stage at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. They saw it then…the press…they all saw it…and when he stepped from the stage they touted him ‘The Future of the Democratic Party.’

It was upon that stage as he addressed the members of the convention that Barack Obama literally looked out and saw his destiny. And from the moment he stepped off that stage he began working towards today and where he will be come November of this year, 2008…the President of the United States of America.

Some people don’t trust him because they look at him as not being black enough.

Others look at him and say he is too black.

The hispanic say he will only do for black people and forget about us.

 It is quite clear that Barack Obama does not wish for his children or grand-children to inherit the chaos and fear that the Bush Administration has ushered into the United States.

He does not want his daughters…nor their children to live under the cloud of uncertainty of what tomorrow may bring for this country or this world.

Through all of its current troubles, Barack Obama has chosen to shoulder the burden…to take on the responsibility of trying to right this country again…to rewrite the history of American that George Bush and his people so callously sought to undermind and undo.

When he left Harvard, he hit the streets of the ghetto working to undo social ills and injustices. It is in his nature to champion the cause of the people.  When you read about his mother, you see that it runs in the blood…the seeking to unify the world and caring for others.   It is what Barack Obama is all about.

This week in Germany, we got a chance to see that the world too sees something special in Barack Obama.  To hear those people in Germany chant ‘change’ and call out his name was more than moving.

They say that Barack Obama doesn’t know enough.  He has no experience…no.  And they are right.  He has not had any experience running with the liars and the cheats who have made up this country’s government for years. 

This country needs somebody who isn’t down with the ‘crew.’  Somebody not afraid to make his own decisions.  Not afraid to be wrong if he thinks it is in the best interest of this country.  Not afraid of second guess himself and yet comtemplate the decision and its overall impact.

This country needs somebody who is not afraid to stand alone.  Who is not afraid to say wrong is wrong.

Give me somebody young and yearning for training.  Don’t give me somebody who thinks he already knows everything…and doesn’t know nothing.

I don’t care who goes into the White House or who has gone into it in past…they all had to learn on the job.  It is not like going to work from one fast food place to another…or from one corporate office into another. 

It is not…it is the White House…the Presidency.  

Until you get voted in…you can’t possibly have all of or a fifth of the capabilities to do it.  Most of it comes with on the job-training.  For anybody to say anything else is a lie.  No corporate CEO has ever been under the pressure of the President of the United States…nothing is like the job of being the President of this country.

Barack Obama not only looked Presidential in Germany…he spoke Presidential.  He speaks with authority, leadership, knowledge and a zeal for this country that we have not heard for a very long time.  Give me that any day…because I know the rest will follow.

Unlike any other President of this country…Barack Obama has lived as a child in several other countries.   Having done so he understands other people, their language, their cultures…that gives him a greater sensitivity to other nations that no other President of this country could have possibly had.  On the world stage or on domestic politics Barack Obama is head over heels beyond Senator John McCain.  There is no contest.

For the problems that Bush has brought to America’s door…we are going to need somebody who can think outside of the box…not trying to hide within the box.  But a real thinker and doer.  Someone with temperance and perhaps even some tolerance…and between Hillary and Jesse Jackson…and Rev. Jeramiah Wright…Obama has shown lots of that.  And certainly for one thing for sure it will, also, take more than politics as usual to straighten up the Bush messes that we are in.

Just a quick note on Charles Barley.  Like Reggie Jackson and so many other athletes that chose to do for others, Charles Barley while recently out dining came across a young man who was waiting on his table whom he recognized was in need of some help…in order to go on to college.  Barley stepped in and told the young man he would take care of his full college tuition…brings tears to my eyes.   I love these kind of stories.

And I love Charles Barley in that television commercial…he is so annoying. 

Great for you Charles Barley…and you can read more on this story by Clicking and Link below.

http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/blog/ball_dont_lie/post/Charles-Barkley-tips-well-pays-busboy-s-tuition?urn=nba,95780

Okay, you China Olympics bound people…here is another Chinese word or saying…

Bu yong xie…pronounced   Boo you shay…    Remember that I told that ‘bu‘ is the Chinese negative… well, in this case too…but it depends upon what you want to say…

It translates into 2 meanings…     1.  You’re welcome

                                                     2.  No problem…

‘No problem’ is a popular saying or phrase in China.

If you remember ‘xie xie’… pronounced ’sure shay’ ….meaning ‘thank you.’   then you recognize ‘xie’ (shay) in  Bu yong xie, as well.

Ni hao….you are saying ‘hi’ to one person       Nim hao…you are saying ‘hi’ to a group or more than one      

Ni hao ma…    Knee how ma  …..it means   hi, and how are you?    or how are you doing.

Nim hao ma…means  the exact same thing except you are addressing more than one person.     And ‘nim‘….is pronounced as you think  …as nimb.

Now, I am going to advance you a little bit….

Wu chew chin sway…. means I want water     (this I forgot to write out in the actual Chinese spelling…I was great for sitting in class and writing down ‘what it sounds like’…it was the only way I could learn the language.  Other than that…in less than 30 seconds I would forget).   

So, this means ‘I want water’ but remember it is not written in the actual Chinese spelling…and of course the Chinese do not really write this stuff out….no.  They use characters…or what we call Chinese characters.  And you have seen what Chinese characters look like…but we have never been able to make them out…or knew that each character symbolizes a Chinese word…and there are thousands of characters…and some even have a gender…to reference male or female.

Now, you have learned something else.   And remember that “wu” ….means ‘I’ or ‘me’… first person singular.    pronounced “woo.”

Well, I am suppose to really be doing some work today.  So, I better get to it.

Have a beautiful day…    God bless…. ©2008

Today’s tempertures must have been somewhere in the 100’s.  I don’t think those Accu-Weather people know anything because they claim it only got up into the mid-70’s.   But this 100 degrees wasn’t Arizona weather either. 

No, it was hot, humid…very very very…very humid…and sweaty.

It was one of those days where you know you have a lot to do…but do nothing.  Because it is too too too hot.

Just got me a large cool glass of fresh water…and I will probably sip from that for the rest of the night.

The all mighty U.S. dollar is taking a real hit.  And based upon one report that I have read it is primarily due to…once again…Bush and his Administion not doing what it was suppose to…when they saw where things were headed…after having made several blunders to get us here in the first place.

But lets face it…when you are a billionaire…daddy’s rich…mama’s rich…you grew up rich…and currently live off the tax-payers of this country…do you really care?

That was the problem with Bush Senior…he was out of touch too.  But sonny boy…he’s more than out of touch.  He doesn’t even believe he has plunged us into a recession.  Or prehaps we should say it this way…he doesn’t want to confess to having plunged us into a recession.

So, he keeps calling it something else…like a ‘little slow down.’

A little slow down???

After 8 years of George Bush economics…and I would really like to see those Yale grades of his in economics…this country is seriously ailing. 

We had suffered more lossess, cuts, job diminishings…highest gas prices ever…Wall Street crashes, mortgage foreclosures, waste in tax dollars…a war that nobody but George Bush and his friends wanted…tremendous lossess in lives, numerous injuries, mental problems etc. of vets involved in that war not to mention the billion dollars a day cost of that war…and raging hospital costs, medicine costs, utility costs…loss wages and benefits…and nobody had to tell us because we already knew it…our dollar just doesn’t buy as much as it used to. 

The question is…do we really have to wait until November to get George Bush out of the White House?

This man has sent this country to the dogs.

How in the world could the American public, the Senate and the U.S. Congress allow this to happen?

Did we all have our heads just buried in the sand?

This country was supposedly set-up with checks and balances to keep this sort of thing from ever happening. 

What happened to the checks and balances?

Who turned out the lights?

Now that to some degree the breath of the mess is coming to light…one thing is quite certain…

Whoever walks into the White House after George W. Bush is not going to be in for a picnic.  And he and his team won’t have it easy.   They have a real mess to try to clean up…and it is not going to be easy…and it will take some time to undo…if indeed they can.  And they will certainly have to think out of the box…because the depth of Bush’s mis-uses and exploitation of this country and the seat in which he held will take some real and new techniques to undo some great and tragic problems not only here in this country but aboard as well.

Clearly, there is a reason why George Bush has received the lowest Presidential ratings of any U.S. President…of all times.

Well, enjoy your day tomorrow…  and God bless….

If you want to read more on the story about the dwindling dollar click on the link below.   ©2008

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080718/ap_on_bi_co_ne/all_business