ClydeStyle

Category: current events

  • Modern day house slaves function like their past counterparts

    During slavery, house slaves were unique in that they could live in the Master’s house and always be in close proximity to the family. They would learn domestic skills like cooking, cleaning, and even child care. Sometimes, the slaves would be taught how to read. Definitely, these house slaves had greater benefits than being just a field slave that worked outdoors.

    House slaves dressed better, did not have to work as hard, could get scraps, and other items considered trash by the Master. Life was definitely better.

    But at no time did the house slaves have any influence over the Master, nor could they even express their opinions. When the Master did something that they didn’t like or agree with, they’d better just keep it to themselves. The wrong kind of expression on your face could end in a backhand by the Master if he thought he wanted to say something about his actions. So the house slaves were just that – a slave and they had no opinion or independent thoughts of their own that they could express.

    In Congress these days, we have seemed to resurrect the house slave. Republicans in Congress, instead of serving at the pleasure of the people who elected them, are now serving at the pleasure of our new dictator, Donald J. Trump. He is never challenged, questioned, or  advised even when he makes a decision that violates the constitution.

    Now, let’s not be nieve and think that Democrats have no house slaves because they sat back and allowed Joe Biden to leave our border wide open. They didn’t wave or salute. Trump has been a bit outrageous with his latest decisions, and the recent town hall meetings in Republican districts have been very vocal about their concerns over Trump’s decisions.

    The bottom line is this: We can not properly implement democracy if the checks and balances won’t hold the line. In other words, Congress has a job to do, and it is not to be the Congress for the president, but for the people. We voted for representatives who would be the voices of the people. Our country has lost sight of this. If we continue down the current path, it won’t be long before we are all house slaves or we really have an insurrection.

  • It’s all a plot: LGBTQ is becoming the new birth control

    Throughout my life, I have heard of White Fear, and I wondered what it was and was there really any validity to it.

    You see, there are some in America who fear the inevitable time when white people will lose their numerical majority. The fear is that they will be paid back for all the wrong they have done from slavery to Jim Crow to denying civil rights to police brutality to income disparities to incarceration. White guilt leads to white fear, and so since the 80s (or probably before that), there have been measures taken to slow the process. I thought it sounded too far-fetched, but then I started looking at some facts.

    In the late 80s, there was a book written by Ben Wattenberg called The Birth Dearth. I had learned of this book through some volunteers who were working with me during Jessie Jackson’s presidential run in 1988. This book outlined America’s problem, which was that white people were not having enough children. Whites were definitely not producing the number of children to equal the children of color who were being born.

    Back then, it was predicted that by 2035, White’s would lose their numerical majority. This prediction was also fueling the undercurrent of people who are hoping for another Civil War and are stockpiling assault weapons and ammo in anticipation of the opportunity to fight.

    In the book, Wattenberg cites three ways other countries have dealt with the population problem. In Finland, Japan, and Australia, they paid women to have children to increase their population. This would not work in America for two reasons: It costs far too much to raise children here as compared to these other countries, and America could not discriminate and only offer this option to whites.

    A second option would be to open the borders around the country. You will notice that in America, there is no talk of closing the Northern border because Canada is there. They want to close the southern border, build a wall, and all that jazz to keep out the Mexicans. A former president said it was because they had rapist, murderers and thieves coming from there, but what, in actuality, it was just people of color.

    Sadly, no matter what political party has the white house, the same is true. The Biden Administration put a policy in place last year to offer social security to Ukrainian refugees so they could stay here comfortably. However, this same administration sent Haitian refugees back home.

    The last solution listed in the book to solve the population problem is to eliminate abortion. We were told that this had something to do with Christianity, but it had more to do with the fact that 60 percent of all abortions in America are white babies. Therefore, ending abortion would preserve that number. All of this is an attempt to stop the growth of the minority populations while increasing the white population.

    Over the last five years, there has been increasing legislation to allow children to change their gender. Hormones can be prescribed without parents’ consent, and irreversible surgeries are taken place so that these young, confused kids can have their way and ruin who God created them to be. How can you increase the population by allowing same sex relationships?

    It looks like the “powers that be” have found another solution to solving their problem. Consequently, Wattenberg’s book will now cost you over $1,000 on Amazon. I wonder why?

  • Living With regret

    I must admit that I don’t normally watch the Oscars, but I am a fan of the industry and I absolutely love Chris Rock and Will Smith. I would like to believe that these two guys would be friends of mine if they were not famous and lived near me. We are in the same age bracket and have a lot of similar qualities.

    Now with that said, I was going to be disappointed in both men for their actions. I was also going to be embarrassed by the actions of both as an African-American male because of the stereo-types that will follow as a result of what happened. And then I wanted to write a blog and explain all the things that they did wrong. Then it dawned on me that context is everything and I was putting these two men in a category they do not belong.

    What I mean by context is that we are witnessing the results of previous interactions we don’t understand or have no full knowledge of. It’s disappointing that the interaction we saw was violent but there is much more to this situation that we may never know about. In addition, if this were just two average men (any race) and one had slapped another it would not have made the news and we wouldn’t be discussing it. Their fame made this newsworthy.

    We place people in categories, sometimes sub consciously, but in our minds we decide whether a person is good, bad, ugly, charismatic, funny or talented among other things. We develop beliefs about these people based on the categories and then expectations are set. Then we become disappointed when our heroes (in this case) do not match the consistency of our expectations. This is what is happening with all the commentary posted on social media.

    What should happen is we realize the truth about what we saw: the fact that these two humans were placed in a human scenario and both had an opportunity to do good, but failed. I truly believe if they had a do-over they could make a better decision. But above everything they proved that they are human and that they are flawed. If they were placed in the “flawed human” category from the beginning, then this interaction would not dominate the news cycle.

    Shout out to Tyler Perry, Denzel Washington and others who tried to bring healing to the situation. Believe it or not, sometimes things are allowed to happened for the purposes of seeing what others would do. God uses this tactic more often than you think. So I wondered how many people thought to pray when the incident happened? I wonder how many others were willing to do what they could to bring healing to this situation? Both Smith and Rock will have many private interactions following this incident. I wonder how many of those conversations would be with people who are trying to honor God in the moment?

    It’s sad when your own actions cause you to live with regret. Every time Will looks at his Oscar, the memory of the slap will come into focus. Every Oscar ceremony from this point on will remember the slap. How many business deals will not happen for these two because of this incident? Have they made peace with their God? Michelle Obama rightfully said that when they go low we go high. Going high requires us to process things in the highest part of our brains — and that’s our spiritual side. I pray the learning curve happens for all who are involved.

  • Truth telling: Before politics makes you disinterested

    Every now and again I like to expound on the political climate. After all, being a true independent I feel obligated to call out both sides of the aisle as our government is to be blamed for the condition of Liberty’s kids.

    Democratic candidates stumble over each other trying to convince portions of Americans that they would be better than the status quo. No different than three years ago when the Republican candidates did the same thing. We now know they lied — just like the current group is lying. If democracy is defined as the have nots hoping that the haves will show mercy each year then what nation would want democracy?

    An argument could be made for a dictatorship. The reason is simple: A dictatorship is one guy and his regime, but you cut the head off and it’s over. In a democracy, particularly ours, you have to deal with the full government of 435 in Congress and then an executive branch who are all wealthy, beneficiaries of a system that oppresses people and does not work for everyone.

    But the point of this blog is to point out the obvious lies and give the truth where applicable.

    First truth: Our president committed crimes. Say that in any other decade and he would immediately be impeached — whether it was in an election cycle or not.

    Second truth: The media is biased and their reporting is not helping hand, it flat out stinks! The media is too busy lashing back at the president to report useful informaton to the republic for which it stands. They would do better to review what Ben Franklin and his brother had in mind when they invisioned the media.

    Lastly, healthcare is what Dems would let you believe is the biggest issue but it is not. Here are issues that are more important: Income inequality, justice reform and prison reform. Look these up and see how many people they effect and don’t forget the families of the folks dealing with the justice system.

    You see, half the healthcare problem is that consumers are half the blame. There are just some things we should not be eating because it is unhealthy and leads to obesity and many other health problems. You know, meat, dairy and processed foods to start.

    I’m just trying to make you aware. The three I mentioned are not controlled by the people they effect.

    This needed to be said.

  • Forever chasing nothing

    Forever chasing nothing

    As a nation, we pride ourselves as being an advanced culture with highly intelligent people and as having the best of everything — pound for pound — the world has to offer. Sadly, I struggle to find anything we do as signficant to mankind.

    Now this is not a bash America blog! I used to say I love America but like many I could not tell you why. It was my only frame of reference so I loved what I knew. I assumed that people in government were looking out for the little man — looking out as defined as making laws and provisions for the little man to grow and develop into something more, not throw him a bone and keep him dumb.

    There was a study done in the 90s with 21k people across 7 nations to test there literacy. The study covered more than 30 tasks over a 45 minute span. The test takers were between the ages of 16 to 25 and the specific items on the test dealt with reading comprehension, following directions, reading maps, completing job applications etc. — things you would need to function and thrive in every day life. The results were astonishing (see table below). There were level grades from 1 to 5 where a 4 or 5 was pretty high functioning and of course a 1 was struggling. Sweden’s population of that age group were the brightest with more than 40 percent functioning at the highest levels. Only 18 percent of Americans at that age range preformed as well as the Swedes.

    What does that mean you ask? Well other than the obvious, it seems that the study has also proven that higher functioning was related to higher wages. When France talks about job creation and the US talks about it, those are two totally different conversations. France is only talking about a living wage where you can take care of a family with a modest living. In the US, we say a job is a job — better than not having one.

    Today we are in a literacy crisis. No one should be surprised about this but I don’t think we understand the effects.

     

    • More than 30 million adults in the United States cannot read, write, or complete basic math above a third-grade level. —  Proliteracy
    • Children whose parents have low literacy levels have a 72 percent chance of being at the lowest reading levels themselves. These children are more likely to get poor grades, display behavioral problems, have high absentee rates, repeat school years, or drop out. — National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)
    • 75 percent of state prison inmates did not complete high school or can be classified as low literate. — Rand Report: Evaluating the Effectiveness of Correctional Education
    • Low literacy is said to be connected to over $230 billion a year in health care costs because almost half of Americans cannot read well enough to comprehend health information, incurring higher costs. — American Journal of Public Health

    Our problem: Politics. We constantly elect people who can not relate to the problems of the average American and they could care less about those problems. It doesn’t even matter what political party you belong to — both parties have failed the little man.

    It seems that we have disfellowshipped the word demand because we don’t demand anything — nothing of ourselves and nothing from those who rule the world. So we sit and take it — you live your life paycheck to paycheck and die in a sea of debt. In our country they tell you that you have the right to pursue happiness, they just forgot to tell you it was nearly impossible to catch.

  • The Character of George H. W. Bush

    The Character of George H. W. Bush

    Former president George H.W. Bush died on November 30, 2018 at the age of 94. His wife, Barbara, died earlier in the year at the age of 92.

    I have issues with all of our presidents because I keep thinking that just maybe one of them will decide to act in the true interest of Americans and not in the perceived interest. What I mean is for a country which has as much wealth as we do, the disproportionate amount circulating throughout the country is still controlled by 1 percent of the population. The American dream is supposed to be for all Americans — not just a few. This doesn’t mean that everyone should be wealthy, but the lowest in our society should live better than the lowest in any other country.

    The playing field for success has never been equal and most of those who are wealthy started from a privileged place.

    But what I like about George and Barbara is that they were leaders of their time, lived a modest life (although rich, they were not greedy), and put family first.

    I love the fact that in Bush’s life he led on every level. I’m not just talking about being a hero in WWII or being elected to Congress nor being over the CIA or Vice President. I’m not even speaking of his presidency. This guy was always a leader and respected as one by his peers. High school and college he played sports and was the captain of the teams. He was an Ivy league grad (Yale) and jumped right into business not seeking assistance from the family fortune. I really admire this about him.

    Bush could have really manipulated things in the leadership position he was in (like most did), but he chose a different set of virtues to follow.

    I didn’t agree with most of his policies. Suc as his bank bailout for savings and loans which of course helped regulate the loans but didn’t begin to stop the discrimination in granting the loans to minorities; anti-drug law which gave our tax dollars to expand prisons and increase law enforcement which just led to more minorities going to prison; fair labor amendment that made minimum wages $4.25 instead of $4.55; and his veto of the civil rights act in 1990 which would have made a huge dent in discriminatory hiring practices were all detrimental to minorities.

    However, I admire him for putting his family first and establishing within his family a heart for service.

    He was the president who signed the Americans with Disabilities act, but I am shocked he did nothing to ensure that service men received their benefits.

    He was credited with ending the Cold War and taking down communism around the world — the Berlin wall fell on his watch — but never did anything to stop racism and discrimination at home.

    When he lost the election in 1992 to Bill Clinton, he said in an ABC interview that it hurt badly because he gave all he could and it wasn’t enough. That is probably the closest he would come to understanding the minority plight — to give so much to your country and be treated like you have done nothing.

    Rest in peace sir and thank you for the good you attempted to do. My condolences to the Bush family.