Truth or Consequences?

"If you know the truth and don't speak out, then your voice becomes heard with the lie. Silence is a lie when you know the truth. If you know the truth but say I'm not going to get involved, I'm going to remain neutral, then you are siding with a lie. There is no neutrality when you know the truth."

There are so many instances where the truth is known but routinely hidden.

Prosecutors withhold exculpatory evidence from the defense; police observe the 'blue code' of silence to shield each other from censure, dismissal or prosecution; witnesses refuse to testify out of fear of reprisals from perpetrators.

And as yet, we have not found out what really happened on 9-11, and who were the conspirators.

And then we have Bill Bennett knowingly spouting his false 'truth', - "I do know....if you aborted every black baby, the crime rate would go down."

Also athletes who feel pressured to take performance enhancing drugs, just to compete with those who are already doing so, but successfully hiding it.

The lie by BushCo about WMD's in Iraq and the need to go to war, and the shameful complicity of Colin Powell and others, in rubber-stamping this lie.

The media routinely censures 'inconvenient truths' in order to lie from silence.

For years, baseball's management ignored rampant steroid use, to benefit from enhanced athletic performances, resulting in increased media ratings and much higher profits.

Rape is one of the world's most prevalent but underreported violent crimes.

Racist whites, routinely lie and say they are not racists.

What is clear, is that there is much more lying, than truth-telling going on, and few would argue with this.

"Evil flourishes when good men do nothing to reveal and further the truth"

"Africom" For Africa - But Not Egypt ?

This military command, 'Africom', just created by BushCo, is the latest being launched to grab the world's resources that we need to maintain our imperial empire.

I have not written anything about this previously, because so far, the only sources for news and assessments, have been our own governmental sources. But a friend of mine just commented about it, and I think it would be good to give my preliminary take on it as well. I will write more definitively, as African, Middle Eastern and other world sources become available.

In a nutshell, 'Africom' has a dual purpose - one, is to steal the natural resources that we covet, using our military; and the other, is to protect other natural resources that we will need in the future, from other thieves like China, Korea and Russia.

The worst thing about this 'Africom' con, is that BushCo just appointed a black army general to head it up, thus sending a black face to Africa to fool them as to 'Africoms' true intent.

Also we should be aware of something interesting as illustrated in this recent news headline - "U.S. Creating New Africa Command to coordinate and oversee all military efforts in all of Africa, except , Egypt".

So here again we are continuing to pretend that Egypt is not part of Africa, and to do so, we must separate Egypt from Africa. Thus we can continue to extol the genius and wonders of Egypt, while denying that Africans were the architects and the geniuses who created these wonders.

Although some things seem to change, they really just stay the same!

Love Thy Brown Neighbor???

According to polls, immigration is a much more important issue among Republican voters than among Democrats. That's especially true in early voting states such as Iowa and So. Carolina, where sizable pockets of illegal immigrants have settled in the last decade.

The intensity of Repugnant resentment towards illegals, has come as a surprise to Mike Huckabee, an ordained Baptist minister. As an abortion-detesting, evolution-denying homophobe, Huckabee is fast winning the devotion of his party's Christianists, who seem to confuse the office of president with that of preacher or priest. But Huckabee has one glaring flaw in an otherwise perfect Repugnant doctrinal resume, he has shown (gasp) some compassion towards illegal immigrants.

As governor of Arkansas, Huckabee supported legislation that would have made undocumented college students eligible for college scholarships and in-state tuition discounts. Huckabee said "he wouldn't hold children responsible for something their parents did," like crossing the border illegally.

For that modest bit of pragmatism, Huckabee is being hammered by Mitt Romney, who lost to him in Iowa. Though he was relatively moderate on immigration as governor of Massachusetts, Romney now presents himself as the leader who bravely "stood up and vetoed in-state tuition for illegal aliens, and opposed driver's licenses for illegals."

Polls notwithstanding, Huckabee's position is more Biblically correct. "We welcome the stranger because the Savior himself was not welcomed in mainstream society," said Robert Parham, executive director of the Baptist Center for Ethics. "The whole teaching of 'no room at the inn' was about someone poor and marginalized and pushed off to a stable."

The more thoughtful question is then this, what would Jesus do - and would He be a Republican?

What Does Life Have To Do With It ???

Looking back on 2007, brings to mind the extraordinary number of deaths of family members and friends, unlike any single year that I can remember previously. This has caused me to think more deeply of life and death and the purpose for each of our lives, which must eventually end.

I believe that God is the author of all life that is conceived, and He alone determines who is actually born and who is not. So He allows some lives to be born, and others to be aborted or miscarried as He sees fit. The issues of being 'pro-life' or 'pro-choice' are really moot points, when you consider that God holds the final trump cards concerning all lives and deaths. I believe that man cannot do anything that God does not actively or passively permit, and this includes the ending of lives. Being all knowing, all powerful, and perfectly just, is what defines and distinguishes God from man.

What is really important though, is the purpose that God has for each life that He permits to be born. Whether born with disabilities, deformities or no handicaps at all, each birth has a reason and a purpose, known only to God and sometimes made clear to man, as his life progresses. This explains how lives that would normally be written off like Ludwig Van Beethoven, Stephen Hawking, Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder and many others, could be so purposeful and fruitful, in spite of the seriousness of what we would call their handicaps.

So as I look forward to 2008 and away from the sad events of 2007, I can rest assured that God had a purpose for each of those loved ones that passed from the scene. During their lifetimes, they surely fulfilled their purpose as directed and controlled by God, and when that purpose was completed, they left this life, some willingly, and some, probably unwillingly.

Oscar Peterson - R. I. P.

A musical giant and a great human being just passed away, after over 75 years of making music which gladdened the hearts of all that heard him.

To say his piano playing was influential is one of the biggest understatements one could make. As a pianist I can testify to his impact on my playing for the many, many years I've been listening him. I know of no other pianist that would not agree that his impact on their playing was enormous. My playing was most affected by his peerless ballad playing, and his incomparable ability to accompany other soloists, in the most tasteful and understated way. His touch, his harmonic sense, and his total command of the instrument was the standard that I aspired to and continue to do so. He, like Erroll Garner and Art Tatum, who also gained total command of the piano, are the gold-standards for all musicians to aspire to and emulate.

I remember first hearing him in the late 40s and being astonished at his virtuosity and touch. Later in the 80s I was able to meet him in person and spend a rewarding two or three hours with him in a piano emporium owned by a dear friend, David Abell, who also has passed on. He was in town on that occasion, to play at a jazz club owned by the bassist of his first great trio, Ray Brown. In our conversation, we discovered that we had a similar cultural background, and that our fathers were both immigrants from the West Indies, and had immigrated from there approximately the same year, his dad to Canada and my dad to New York. They were both amateur musicians and had started each of us in music lessons around the age of five.

From that time on, right up to his recent passing, I was able to more deeply identify with him as a person, along with continuing to being inspired by his awesome musical gifts. The outpouring of love and affection for him from around the world, as well as the universal admiration for his prowess on the piano, is a tribute to the man and his music.

Rest In Peace Oscar - musically, you left this world a much better place, and we are the richer for it.

The 'Cause' or the 'Effect'?

All year, on topics of race, I have been ranting and raving at the ongoing news stories that highlight the dual-standards that the media applies to blacks, particularly athletes, versus whites. I've also been outraged at the plethora of black so-called 'truth-tellers', who are supposedly 'keeping it real', while savaging mostly the black underclass for their lack of sophistication, morals, poor English, and a litany of other supposed sins.

I say they are neither 'truth-tellers' nor 'keeping it real', instead they are cravenly, crass, well-paid opportunists, who will say anything for fame and fortune, while giving aid and comfort to unrepentant whites, most of whom are hiding their racist agendas behind the 'cover' provided by these black proxies. The proof is how whites generally fawn over them, providing them with lucrative book deals, bully pulpits, media appearances, and constantly commend their 'truthfulness' and their 'independent thinking' which they say runs refreshingly counter to the prevailing mindsets of those blacks who they dismissively label as 'poverty pimps', or worse.

The latest in the lengthening list of these black proxies is Roland Martin, a CNN contributing columnist. Another, is author, Pamela Wilson,who claims to be a born-again Christian. Both are being lauded by the white media and praised to the sky for their 'fearless truthfulness'.
http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/12/11/roland.martin/index.html
http://www.christianpost.com/article/20071217/30521_Black
_Christian_%27Racialism%27_Challenges_Faith_in_America.htm

I say nonsense! - they are guilty of half-truths, false straw-men arguments, and a host of other pandering-to-their-benefactor, sins. But my biggest problem with them, is their appalling failure to identify and excoriate the historical, systemic racism of whites, which is the context and the 'cause' of much of the black dysfunctions they are railing against, and instead are obsequiously slamming the conduct of the black underclass, which is merely the 'effect'.

Bill Cosby, Juan Williams, Roland Martin, Pamela Wilson and a host of others, are in this stew of black foot-shufflers, who are being lauded, feted and patted on the head by whites, and commended for their 'refreshing honesty'. They are either too stupid, too greedy or too self-hating, to recognize that if the accolades are coming more overwhelmingly from racist whites than from blacks who agree with them, then their screeds must be demeaning and hurtful to the black underclass in particular, and to blacks in general.

Perhaps they don't even care - this is what makes them so utterly contemptible.

The 'Roids of Summer

Now that the Mitchell report has been released, the untouchable teflon wall erected around Clemons, the multi-Cy Young award-winning pitcher, while the home-run champion, Bonds, was being savaged, has now crumbled as it should.

In fact I would say, if the pitchers were on steroids, the hitters arguably had a duty to counter their pitching advantage with their own steroid use. I probably would not use steroids, but then again, I'm not being judged on how well I am hitting against steroid-enhanced pitching, which also could affect the size of the contract I could get next season based on my hitting. Bonds and others could certainly have used this rationale, and probably did. But let us not forget one important fact, Bonds never failed a drug test, and based on that, remains innocent of all charges.

But I have another angle that is seldom considered, all of baseball history and records are suspect, going back to the days of segregated baseball. The white 'record-holders' like Ruth, Cobb, etc., got those records by being shielded through the farce of segregation, from the pitching and fielding of many of the superior negro-leaguers like Satchel Paige and others. Had they had to face them, many doubt they would have obtained a fraction of those records.

So once again, this country's sorry racist history is coming back to bite it, and baseball now embroiled in the steroid scandal, is 'reaping-what-it-sowed' for disenfranchising worthy black ballplayers for 50 years, and denying them an equal opportunity to make a living and earn the records that whites got credited for, by not having to earn them on a level playing field.

Those early records should have been given an asterisk but were not, now the current records are plastered with those asterisks. And the Hall of Fame, which had already embraced wife beaters, murderers, gamblers, and drunkards, now has to embrace 'Roiders....so much for baseball's supposed 'integrity'