MF GALAXY

Thanks to Br. Cedric Muhammad's always excellent BlackElectorate.com for this link to a Reed article on the hypocrisy of the corporate media establishment, the faux-feminist matriarchy and the anti-hip hop forces in wake of the firing of openly, repeatedly racist-speaking broadcaster Don Imus . And I, like many others, am disgusted by the way that the Euro-American libservatives have used the firing of Imus to launch yet another attack (perhaps the most vicious ever) against two of the leading figures in the ongoing movement for social justice in the US: Reverends Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. Reed writes: " The other talking point set forth by Imus was that his smearing of the Rutgers team was his first offense and an apology to the Rutgers should have been enough. "On March 14th, this line was parroted by Tom Foreman after yet another ignorant CNN rant about Hip Hop. Foreman complained that Imus was being punished for 'a few ill chosen words'--thus obscur...

TONIGHT ON THE TERRORDOME 6 PM Mountain Time CJSR FM-88 Edmonton or www.cjsr.com The recent firing of Euro-American broadcaster Don Imus has caused a hurricane of controversy and unleashed a backlash against Afrikamerica. Don Imus, known to most for calling a group of Afrikan-American young athletes “nappy-headed hoes,” apologised, but later blamed hip hop culture as a whole, seemingly implying that his behaviour was rooted in that experience. What he and most reporters glossed over was Imus’s extensive history of racially offensive remarks. The backlash against Imus’s critics, most notably Reverends Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, seems to serve as covering fire for a general tendency by liberal and conservative Euro-Americans to deny the on-going destructive power of cultural and institutional Whitesupremacy. The effects of that power system are wide-ranging. As recently reported by the US Centre for Disease Control and in the Whittier Daily News , Afrikan-Americans have the high...

By Minister Faust Anyb ody over the age of 25 knows the terror of the following five words: “You’re not getting any younger.” Some have even heard the horror in the warning: “Past 30, you lose one thing a year,” where “thing” means bodily efficiency, process, or, heaven forbid, part. What’s there to lose? Quick metabolism. Sex drive. Endless energy and quick recuperation. Hair where you want it, and lack of hair where you don’t. Muscle power. Skin tone. Lack of sag. Pain-free exertion. Pain-free rest. Vision. Hearing. Taste. Bowel and bladder control. Kidney, liver and heart function. Memory. And, finally, life. But what if you could get it all back , roll it all back to age 25 of peak performance, plus the benefit of your years of knowledge and wisdom (youth is wasted on the young, and wisdom on the old)? And all it would cost would be a fo rtune... and your natural connection to everyone you’ve ever known? Such is the alpha and omega of Robert J. S awyer ’s latest novel Rol...

I rece ntl y read Richard Morgan's Altered Carbon and man, was I impressed. I'd already loved Morgan's Market Forces and was looking forward to Altered Carbon, Morgan's debut. It's a stunningly inventive, inquisitive 26th century noir thriller, oil-slippery in technophilia and resplendent in ultra-violence, and vibrating with fascinating questions about power, longevity, authority, artificial intelligence... and it's also surprisingly touching with exquisite prose. Dig it.

My daughter continues to fill me with absolute wonder, joy, delight, marvel... maaxeru! She's seven months old this week, and she loves baby-babbling. She'll go on for a few minutes: "Lar-lar-lar-lar-la-la-la-la-larr...." Damn . My wife and I'll look at each other and laugh. And our girl has strong legs. Give her a couple of fingers to hold onto and she'll stand there swaying, smiling and sunshining up the whole joint. Life was never better. You know what a red-bean bun is? It's a Chinese confection you can get at a whole lotta Chinese bakeries. Some folks just call 'em Chinese buns. People call their kids all kind of "sweet" names: honey, sugar, sugar pie, sugar beet, sweety, sweet pea, hilwa (Arabic for sweet and also a specific type of fudge). I have a dozen nicknames for my daughter, but of late I end up calling her "my little Chinese bun." No, my wife isn't Chinese. And before anyone in the Chinese Anti-Defamation League g...

Check out these episodes which include the very first episode of Asiko Phantom Pyramid - look at the link on the right under PODCASTS . Dig it. Rock on. Let the jam gel.

Okay, no, I'm not going soft on $cientology , but I just re-watched Oliver Stone's Born on the Fourth of July, and I must say it's hard to imagine anyone else evoking the transformation from True Believer jingoist kill-em-up-some-comm'nists to wounded, eyes-open patriot. He truly was superb, and manages what too few actors in his star-range ever do: he demonstrated skin-crawling depths of vulnerability. Tom Cruise should forget about the empty Mission: Impossible stuff and reinvest himself as an actor. Since he's the subject of so much vilification these days and needs to regain credibility, he might try returning to actual acting. But I doubt Hollywood logic will allow for that. Of course, what I'd love to see him do is a tell-all on $cientology, but that aint about to happen. If you're interested in that, try Operation Clambake or read L. Ron Hubbard: Messiah or Madman ? online or buy the book. Anyway, see BOTFOJ. It's freaking great, with a beauti...

Check out this... a comedy sketch that will make some folks say, "Oh no they didn't!"

Passing the Buck and Missing the Point: Don Imus, White Denial and Racism in America By Tim Wise April 15, 2007 Let us dispense with the easy stuff, shall we? First, Don Imus's free speech rights have not been even remotely violated as a result of his firing, either by MSNBC or CBS Radio. The First Amendment protects us against state oppression or legal sanction for our words. It does not entitle everyone with an opinion to a talk show, let alone on a particular network. To believe or to demand otherwise would be to say that Imus's free speech rights outweigh the rights of his employers to determine what messages they will send out on their dime. Secondly, those who are telling black folks to "get over it," when it comes to racial slurs, such as those offered up by Imus, are missing an important point: namely, the slurs are not the real issue. The issue is that these slurs (be they of the "nappy-headed ho" variety, or the semi-psychotic stri...

Democracy Now! reports that cell phone radiation is exterminating bee populations across for Europe. So what? Read on. "In science news, more theories are emerging on what is causing the disappearances of bees across the country and in Europe. As much as 70 percent of the commercial bee population on the East Coast have gone missing. The Independent newspaper of London reports that some scientists believe that cell phones might be causing the problem. "The theory is that radiation from mobile phones interferes with bees' navigation systems, preventing the famously homeloving species from finding their way back to their hives. A limited study at Landau University has found that bees refuse to return to their hives when mobile phones are placed nearby. The disappearance of the bees could cause massive food shortages because most of the world's crops depend on pollination by bees. Albert Einstein once said that if the bees disappeared, 'man would have only four yea...

I appreciated Sister Moody's article below, which is a helpful articulation of ma ny of the internal reasons why hip hop is in decline. I wish she also would have addre ss ed the deep er problem, the cause: the super rich elites who control the production, distribution and radio/video play of pop music in North America, the same people who bought out the small lab els when political hip hop was in its ascendan cy, the same people who replaced conscious hip hop and its aesthetics with gangsta and then playa rap. Nekesa Mumbi Moody writes (April 9, 2007) for the Associated Press, saying: "NEW YORK -- Maybe it was the umpteenth coke-dealing anthem or soft-porn music video. Perhaps it was the preening antics that some call reminiscent of Stepin Fetchit. "The turning point is hard to tap. But after 30 years of growing popularity, rap music is now dealing with an alarming sales decline and growing criticism from within about rap culture's negative effect on society. ...

Wednesday, April 4, 6 PM Mountain Time CJSR FM 88 Edmonton www.cjsr.com Tonight we’ll hear from Tim Wise. Tim Wise , a Jewish American, [is a leading anti-Whitesupremacist and has been praised by Professor Michael Eric Dyson as “one of the most brilliant, articulate and courageous critics of white privilege in the nation” and as a national treasure. Wise has spoken in 48 states and on over 400 college campuses including Harvard and Yale. He provides anti-racism training to teachers, doctors, government and military officials and other professionals across the United States . [Wise is the author of White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son , and Affirmative Action: Racial Preference in Black and White . He received the 2001 British Diversity Award for best feature essay on race issues. His writings are taught at hundreds of American colleges and he speaks widely in corporate media.] In tonight’s discussion, entitled “Trapped in a History They Do Not Understand: T...