Thoughts on The Sentencing in the Henry Glover Case

Today former NOPD officer David Warren was sentenced to 25 years for killing Henry Glover after Hurricane Katrina. Former officer Gregory McRae was given 17 years for setting Mr. Glover’s body on fire after he was killed. I really don’t know how to feel about the sentencing because I always think things would be better for everyone if Henry Glover were still here with his family. Seeing people get long prison sentences really doesn’t do anything for me no matter how awful I think their deed was. Nevertheless this kind of sentence was necessary in a city that is trying to turn the corner on violence and crime. I don’t think the police department can reduce the murder rate on their own. The community has to take the lead in that but the police have to be a big part of it and it’s hard to come to terms with some of the things certain officers have done and cooperate with them. We can’t expect to clean up our neighborhoods with hardcore criminals roaming the streets. We also can’t expect to move the city forward when officers don’t value the life of every citizen. From my perspective today was a positive day.

There’s always going to be extremes on any side of an issue. There are some people in the community including some officers that think these two officers got a raw deal. They will point to the fact everyone was stressed and under pressure during that time and under normal circumstances these men would have never just killed someone and set their body on fire. I think if the stress and pressure was that bad they could have always just quit their job and evacuated. They would be in better shape than they are now. We can’t make excuses for what they did.

The other side is the folks that think both men are getting off easy. They wanted to see double the amount of time handed down. I saw Henry Glover’s aunt saying she expected David Warren to get life. I can understand how the family and others feel. If it was my family I would want a longer sentence too. A longer sentence isn’t going to bring Henry Glover back to life so there’s no such thing as real justice. I see a 25 year sentence and I think to myself that they almost got away with it totally if it wasn’t for news stories about it a few years after the storm. Before that Henry Glover was well on his way to being another random casualty of Katrina’s chaos. I know the family wanted more time but I am glad they at least get some closure. Besides, I don’t think spending 20 years in a federal prison as an ex cop who shot a black man and set his body on fire is no country club visit by a long shot. Both men will have more than enough time to think about what they did and pay for it.

Hopefully soon we can start to put this one behind us and wait for the Danziger seven to get their day in court. If David Warren got 25 years for shooting one black man, it will be interesting to see what happens to the guys that shot a man in the back and tried to take out an entire family. It seems like we never run out of things to deal with down here.

I Just Want To Say That You're A Good Man

It’s difficult to maintain a positive mood in such negative times. Yesterday afternoon I was headed back to work and drove right up on a fresh murder scene. I was blown away because it was so early in the day at busy area and across the street from a school. It was a sad situation. I had just left a meeting full of positive people and watched a young brother who I admire receive an award. When I did get back to work I found out another gentleman who I admire had a new and exciting position at City Hall. In one hour the two positive things were balanced by the worst possible thing. Such is life for a man like me in the city.

I know I am not alone in feeling the way I do. It’s like every day we are fighting an image problem. It feels we are being attacked by the cats who display their ignorance for the entire world to see without any shame and all the people who use their actions to lump us all together. I don’t think we have the time or the resources to stop either one of those things from happening so the only thing we can do is make sure that we keep one another afloat. Whether it’s the college educated professional or one of the delivery men at my office building, my brothers need to know that they have value.

I try my best to give my brothers encouragement. When I am around a man that is trying to do something positive I let them know that they are good men. I tell them to keep moving forward. I try to explain all the things I did wrong and the bad choices I made so they won’t make them. There are a lot of ladies out here raising boys on their own. When I meet their sons and their heads are on straight I let their moms know that she is raising a good young man, to keep up the good work and call me if he’s going through something that requires a man’s perspective to help him with. There are plenty of impressive young men in our community but they don't get enough attention because our failures make better news stories.

Mutual admiration for one another is important. There are some things that should be routine like spending time with your kids and getting your education that should be so routine that men shouldn’t expect or receive any praise for. I would love to be at that stage in our community. I think one of the main issues we have is that we don't do enough to recognize the good things men do but the guys that do and say the wrong things get so much attention that it became popular and cool. Now we just keep trying to legitimize destructive behavior and it's not working. Since each day is a constant barrage of negative images and subliminal messages suggesting how cool it is to be ignorant, patting one another on the back for encouragement seems perfectly fine to me. Appreciation has a lot of value when you are trying to kill a destructive culture.

If you know a good dude shake his hand and let him know.

With Bombing Comes Responsibility

All Americans should have an opinion about war and military action. There are people in our armed forces from all walks of life and from every section of the country so it affects everybody. You don’t have to share it with anyone but I think it’s one of those topics everyone should think about. I don’t have a problem sharing my views. I think that if it’s a matter of national security then military action is a necessary evil and we need to do it. The problem in recent years is since information and truth has gotten so fuzzy it’s hard for me to determine what’s necessary and what’s not.

I don’t know if Libya was necessary. It seemed to me like they were having a civil war and some bad things were happening during the fighting. It’s not like Egypt where the majority of the country including the military seemed to put the people over leadership so army didn’t open fire on their own and create mass carnage. Libya seems to be a bit more complicated in that a lot of people still support Moammar Gadhafi. I could be wrong but that’s the way it looks to me. If I am wrong about the people I don’t think I am wrong about the military because they really shut the rebels down.

Now America is part of another coalition and is bombing Libya. The president says there will be no ground troops and I hope it stays that way. I don’t think it was a good idea to get involved in that country. I have two main issues. The first one is that Saddam Hussein was this evil dictator who harmed his own people like Gadhafi is doing right now. We removed Saddam from Iraq but the people of that country were so tribal and divided by religious sect that it took less than a year to whip Saddam’s army and then almost another ten years to try and get the people we freed not to kill us. We might be spending money to help Libya five years from now.

The second thing is whenever it’s a country that we have a vested interest in changing we always pull out the Protecting Innocent People card instead of just saying that we want the leader removed and get it over with. I don’t want to see innocent people get killed no matter what country they are in but innocent people have been getting killed in fighting all over the place especially in areas like Sudan and The Congo and we haven’t fired anything at anybody. It makes that argument look like we have no real reason to be doing what we are doing because it’s not consistent. The other thing part of that is how you know when those people are no longer in danger. If we stop the bombing tomorrow is Gadhafi just going to let bygones be bygones in those areas where the rebellion started? He’s not going to let it go so we can’t leave him in power and that means we are going to have to be involved in that country to make sure things go well. We might not have troops there but we will have to do something.

Regardless if you are for or against getting involved in Libya we should all agree that we will have to pay for something to keep this from blowing up in our faces. When it happens I am going to find it really sad that we got involved and financially invested in Libya’s business when we are supposed to be so financially strapped as a country that teachers are made to seem evil just for wanting good benefits.

Sitting On My Porch Part Sixty Four

Tonight is one of the best nights in a sports junkie’s life. It’s NCAA tournament time. Normally I would be watching CBS and letting Greg Gumble switch me to the game that is the most interesting at the time. Now I have to keep turning to all these different channels with no guarantee that anything exciting is going on. It doesn’t matter. I got beer. Everything is done for tomorrow so I’m going to sit here and watch Gonzaga and St. Johns.

There are a lot of things going on in the world. I’ve been watching Japan and hoping they can hold back most of the radiation. I don’t want to say anything misinformed or ignorant that disrespects the plight of the Japanese but I do have two thoughts about the nuclear problem. The first thing is that I don’t know how reactors work but I have to believe there’s a way to back up the back up system to the back up system before you start operating these things around people. I know that was a powerful earthquake with a tsunami to follow but this just seems ridiculous.

The second thing is that everyone who works in those nuclear sites is underpaid. I am sure they are making a lot of money right now and they are still underpaid.

The Justice Department released their report on the New Orleans Police Department. It wasn't good. My favorite quote from the report is this one…

”The patterns of policing in New Orleans are biased against several demographic groups, including black residents, people who don't speak English fluently, gay and transgendered people and women.”

Given the demographics of the city, this quote means that the NOPD is fair and balanced to about 500 people. I don’t have a problem with Chief Serpas personally. I just think he has the same weakness that Chief Riley had before him. There are too many personal allegiances to officers that need to be fired. It doesn’t make either man corrupt. It just makes them products of the culture of the city like the rest of us. Chief Serpas may eventually clean up the force but he’s going to have to be willing to not be invited to a lot of parties and seafood boils. That’s more difficult to deal with in your hometown then most people will admit.

The last thing I want to mention is the story about the 14 year old kid at McDonald City Park Academy who was put in an equipment locker. He called his mom saying he was being locked in a cage. I don’t know this kid or his behavior but there is no reason to lock them behind a cage at school if that’s what happened. I don’t know what the alternative is besides suspending them but being behind anything that looks like a cage conditions them for the wrong thing. You don’t want them to get used to that. In the story it is noted that the mom of the kid quit her job just to be able to get him on track. I don’t know if that means she wanted to be home in the evenings to help him or he was getting in so much trouble that she couldn’t stay at work anyway because she had to leave. I know one thing for sure. When you go to school with the kind of kids that need to be removed and isolated from everybody else there’s no way your teacher is going to be able to focus on educating you. She’s going to spend the entire time trying to get them under control and little time showing you what you need to be successful.

When I was in 7th grade there were a few guys that I thought needed a cage, medication and shock treatment. My poor old 7th grade English teacher spent an hour and a half fighting and dodging things being thrown at him and the other 30 minutes trying to remember what he was supposed to be teaching us. I guess that’s why he just gave up and passed everybody who turned in the ten definitions for homework. When people start talking about low test scores and horrible graduation rates these are the kind of things that lead to that happening.

Statistics Are The Enemy of The Status Quo

Governor Jindal is going to merge the University of New Orleans and Southern University of New Orleans. The governor hasn’t shown that he can be moved from his position much from rallies and emotional testimony so I don’t see him changing his mind. Regardless of how you feel about the governor you have to admit that he is a good politician and knows his state. He already knows that merging UNO and SUNO won’t do much financially in terms of saving the budget for higher education but it will help ease the pain when he raises tuition across the state. It’s the symbolism since both of those schools have New Orleans in their name. Having Jesse Jackson come in on SUNO’s behalf makes it even better. While everyone is feeling good about him sticking it to the folks in the city he’ll be making it more expensive for them to send their kids to school and it won’t get much coverage. I know it’s going to work out this way because even some of the students at UNO who have been interviewed about the merger on television have made comments like they are getting prisoners from Angola instead of other college students from right down the street.

The biggest thing to me in this entire process is how the supporters of SUNO are falling victim to the same weapon that has led the charge for every initiative implemented in the city the last few years. The statistics are not on their side. Whenever someone wants to make a change or take something out of our hands like we can’t do for ourselves they throw out a bunch of negative statistics and we have nothing to counter that with but emotion. Emotion doesn’t have much value when you don’t have revenue, don’t show up to vote and have lost political influence. It kind of makes people wonder why we fight so hard to maintain a status quo that hasn’t done much for us. It doesn’t matter if it’s crime statistics, standardized test scores, graduation rates or anything else you can think of; it appears that we didn’t really do a good job at taking care of our people and institutions.

A lot of people who go to SUNO never get the chance to graduate in four straight years because life gets in the way. They get a better job or change schedules. Something happens so they take off a semester or two and then go back. I know a few people who started making money without the degree and didn’t go back at all. You don’t get extra credit for those situations when graduation rates are involved but the value in the school is that it’s a place where people from the community feel comfortable enough to turn to if they decide to try and better themselves. I think that’s the way the folks at the school see their mission even though I don‘t think they have done a good job at articulating that since the merger discussion began. You can’t put that into any statistical category either so I think that in this current climate if the governor goes with the plan that will allow those kind of students to still have a chance at improving their situation then we are going to have to settle for that. The numbers don’t support anything that would stop the governor’s plan.

I just got back from taking a nice long ride through the Louisiana countryside to attend a meeting in Shreveport. I’m a little confused on why we had to drive since it’s about the same distance as Memphis and Houston and we would have flown to either one of those. I’m not complaining. A bunch of hours in the car by yourself driving through the sunshine can be therapeutic. It was cool because I didn’t talk on the phone or anything while I was on the road. I just tried to clear my head and gather my thoughts. It was a productive meeting and training. There’s going to be a lot of work involved on my end but I feel good about the changes and the capacity to do things that may benefit the community. If the hotel I was staying in didn’t have those lumpy ass beds and the refrigerator that wouldn’t stop making noise I would have gotten some good rest too.

I guess I am ready to engage the world again. I left Shreveport 1:00 PM this afternoon and that’s the middle of talk radio chaos. I gave the MP3 player a rest and decided to scan through a few shows. I have come to the conclusion that the hardest thing to do in this time is achieve a balance between being positive and going to bed waiting for the world to end (Don’t worry. I am not one of those people that think the world is ending soon because something horrible happened. Horrible things have been happening since the beginning of time. It was just a figure of speech.) I admit that this is often a struggle for me. My outlook pendulum swings back and forth at a moment’s notice. I like at those folks in Japan and try to rationalize that and I can’t. At this point all you can do is hope the death toll doesn’t rise too much higher and that their government and population don’t have the divisions that will keep the survivors from getting the proper assistance they need to move forward. I don’t even want to think about the nuclear meltdown part. I’m still in denial about that.

I guess we’ll just hope for the best. In the meantime I will be enjoying my own bed free of lumps and no refrigerator noise. I'm going to listen to the Original Samples channel on Youtube and try to figure out what hip hop song the sample belongs to.

This is an easy one from the best rap album ever.

The Stages Of Life At Carnival Time

Yesterday was a busy Saturday for my standards but that comes with the territory of Mardi Gras season. I went to KIPP Central City School and helped build a couple of parade floats with some good parents. There parade is Thursday at 11:00 AM. It’s not a long route but you can stand on Martin Luther King Boulevard and catch a few beads from the kids. I also managed to catch two parades last night. Mardi Gras parades and be a great morale booster in days of struggle. You see the kids out there marching with their schools or marching teams along with the chaperones and realize that not all is lost in the community. I know that sounds corny but it’s true.

While I was standing out there last night I realized how the season changes as you get older. When I was a kid there is nothing like going to parades. That might be one of the few things kids in New Orleans have over other kids. We got to do that year after year almost every day of the week. You couldn’t beat it. The best part besides catching beads was the time before the parade passed or in between parades when you could run around and play with all the other kids. There were some epic football games on the neutral ground of Canal Street and in parking lots in St. Bernard Parish waiting for those long ass night parades. It wasn’t a good day if you didn’t have at least a bag full of beads and cups to bring home and play parade with. That was good innocent times.

Once you get a little older you stop worrying about going with your family so much. If you aren’t participating in the parade by marching you want to go hang out with your friends. A bunch of teenagers walking together can cover the entire parade route from start to finish and back again like it’s nothing. I don’t think I ever actually saw a full parade during those times because I was too busy clowning. It was a good day if you didn’t get in a fight and made it home before curfew. It was a great day if by some luck you got a girl’s phone number in the midst of all that chaos and competition. My parents don’t know this but the first time I ever had a beer was with my friends at Mardi Gras parade. It probably doesn’t count because I only too two sips being afraid of going home like a drunk to Big Cliff. I perfected the art of parade refreshments in my later teens and early 20’s. Those times weren’t always as innocent as the childhood years but they were definitely fun.

Now I am older. My priorities and perspective on parade season is different. These days the perfect day is getting a spot within two blocks of the parade route, I have enough space to open my chair so I can sit down half of the time, and when I get there I want to hear the sound of the first band within 20 minutes which means the wait was short. It feels like I am trying to watch everyone's child to make sure nothing happens. I really hope the float riders don't throw me a whole bunch of beads because I might throw them all away before I make it back to the car. I don’t mind the young cats walking around just as long as they don’t stop too long behind me and my people. That’s when I get nervous. I used to look around at the girls and say “DAMN! I need to thank her parents for making her fine like that!” Now I look at girls walking around and I think “WTF? Why did their parents let those babies out here dressed like that?” It’s the progression of life.

I probably won’t be chasing any floats for throws unless they are handing out money or utility assistance vouchers. Unless I get stuck being a chaperone me and my bad feet won’t be walking with any parade either. Nevertheless Mardi Gras time is still fun. After everything that’s happened down here I am just glad we are still here for the experience in any form.

Sitting On My Porch Party Sixty Three

All day long I debated whether or not to kick off my Mardi Gras season and hit a parade tonight. I passed on that because in the morning I have to go help make floats for KIPP Central City’s annual parade. I’ll let that be the start of my holiday season then I’ll catch the 2PM parade after that. The other reason I decided not to go is that it seems to be really warm for February. My seasonal clock is all off. Today women were out stopping traffic in their outfits and that doesn’t usually start happening until April. If the weather stays this way Mardi Gras day is going to be wild.

It’s been a long week and I am not much into being out in the crowd tonight. I just want to tell everybody that I have some wonderful friends. I treat a lot of them like they get on my nerves but I really appreciate them.

To be an effective blogger and cover the type of content I do you have to try and pay attention to what’s going on in the world. I have been watching this fight over collective bargaining that started in Wisconsin and it’s puzzling. Everybody is in an uproar now but with two years of passion and fire coming from the Tea Party and other conservative groups, what did everything one think was going to happen when you put guys like Scott Walker in office? Did you think they were going to win the election with an energized voting base and then all of a sudden start compromising? That’s what Democrats do. Republicans don’t usually go compromise their agenda like that. If they say they are eliminating half of the state employees they are going to eliminate half of the employees or try their best to do it. The time to fight was before the election. Now there are 14 senators in Wisconsin that can’t come home until the governor’s term is over because it’s the only way he stops trying to pass that bill.

After all the rallies and all the passion for two years before the 2010 election we have ended up with unions, Planned Parenthood, and PBS being the reason we are spending too much. Our solution to too much government was to take out Grover and Cookie Monster. Once the spending on health exams for poor women stop the jobs will just start rolling in.

Down here in South Louisiana people dislike the president so much that Democrats are changing parties just to keep their opponents from putting their name and Obama’s name in the same sentence. I hear them talk about the stimulus breaking the bank and I know Governor Jindal took a stand and sent money back. Everybody thought that was great. Even though I felt he should have taken all the help he could get I was willing to respect his decision. Then one day was driving out to the mall and I got to the Causeway where they are doing all kinds of work to make the ride to and from work easier for people that live on the other side of the lake. I was wondering how we had the money to pay for that kind of thing when I seen the signs that said the project was paid for by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act”. That’s when I realized that the governor was only turning money down that made him look good to his close minded supporters. If he really wanted to take a stand he would have stopped that Causeway project because the money came from the tax payers. It’s all just a dog and pony show.

That’s why Governor Jindal can have a press conference to suggest the UNO/SUNO merge. He knew a lot of people in this state would see the “NO” parts of those schools’ name and have his back. Now when he cuts the budget for higher education again everyone will blame SUNO and UNO and he’ll be alright politically. There are dead fish and oil showing up daily on the shores of the state and I haven’t heard anything from our leader. I bet if President Obama said tomorrow he was putting a hold on deepwater drilling again the governor would have a press conference ten minutes after the announcing saying the president was killing jobs.

The country was in such turmoil financially when President Obama got elected. We were in two wars, employment was high, and the Republican president had blown the deficit wide open with his tax cuts and refusal to end the two wars he started. The country was so starving for change that they elected President Obama because of his passion and promise to change the way the government does business. Its two years later. We are still in Iraq and Afghanistan. The tax cuts for the rich got extended two more years. The only time I hear President Obama get angry is when he’s talking to his own supporters and his opponents seem to be trying to implement things they didn’t even try when they had all three houses of government. So far this isn’t working out quite like I thought.

A Blog For Big Easy Slim

Periodically I get mentally and physically tired. When I’m tired a lot of small things seem to bother me and I feel disengaged from everyone. I usually just snap out of it provided that nothing major happens to make the small stuff seem petty in comparison. Today I was at work being aggravated by something I really didn’t need to waste energy on when I got a call from dad to tell me that my cousin passed away. From now on if he calls me before 6PM I am not answering because something is wrong. My cousin was the eldest grandchild and the first one to pass away. No matter what issues he may have had it still feels pretty strange. None of the other things that were upsetting seem to matter as much.

The daily challenges of living in the city for a black man who grows up without a lot of money is not exaggerated. Regardless of our much your parents try to keep you out of the traps it’s still not a sure thing that everything is going to work out. I think that paranoia about everything falling apart is what keeps me on the path that I am now. Some brothers choose a different path and they hope somehow they can manage to live a long time without the consequences of their actions coming back to get them. A few of them make it that far. Most of them don’t. It’s rough out there.

If you are lucky you can make it through all the challenges and lack of opportunity that everyone swears is there if you just wake up and decided to go work without anything bad happening. If your loved ones are healthy and your personal situation is reasonably stable then you did a good job. If all of those things are not the way you want settle for the consolation prize that you tried. There’s a bunch of cats that didn’t try as hard as they should. We have to love them too. Maybe they didn’t know how to try or the pressure was just too much. I’m not making excuses. I’m just keeping it real.

There are times when I am driving and I see a bunch of older cats sitting under a tree in the middle of the day drinking or something. Most days I want someone to stop them from loitering and bothering everybody. There are other times when the reality of their lives hit me and I feel like going into the store to buy them another cold one because you never know what those cats had to go through to end up sitting under that tree. Tonight I am going to have a toast for Big Easy Slim from the Lower Ninth Ward.

Rest in Peace Harold. Try not to get on grandpa’s nerves when you see him.

Busy Times Are Upon Me

You have to forgive my lack of blog posting. I’ve been a little drained lately. Things have gotten a little hectic in the professional life. If I wasn’t so competitive things might not be as busy as they are. There was a time when no one really knew my name or had any expectations on me. Even though I try to stay out of the spotlight I still feel the need to go out of my way to show people my value. I really don’t know why I do that kind of thing but I always do. I jump into everything full speed. I take on responsibilities that I probably shouldn’t because I don’t get paid enough and I’m always coming up with new ideas and things we can do to move the program forward. I thought a lot of those ideas fell on deaf ears because no one ever said anything about them or tried to put them into action. That was until now when almost everything I have been saying has been requested all at once. Not only are new things happening there are agencies around the area who won’t submit reports or any information to anyone unless I look at it first. Even when I try to pass them along to another person they refuse. On the one hand I feel good about being so busy. It shows the effects of my hard work. I take pride in getting things done and getting them done right. More responsibility comes with that. On the other hand it can be overwhelming when it all seems to come together at one time. I’ve been taking work home a lot more than I should.

It would probably be a lot easier if I could hire one or two people to do the tedious work but in this economy there’s a lot of extra work and responsibility without any guarantee for extra manpower. You have to do more with less. This is especially true for non profits that depend on donations and grant funding. Budget cuts shake agencies like the one I work for to the core and everybody starts holding on to every dollar they can find to just maintain the stability they currently have. As aggravated and drained as I am right now there won’t be much rocking of the boat from me. I’m just like most working Americans. I recognize the competitive job market we are in now and I am not trying to put my name back in competition with all the other people searching for an opportunity if I don’t have to. I’ll just suck it up and ride out the busy time until we get everything straight and things are running on cruise control again. When you get right down to it I would rather be busy and have my phone and email blowing up from people contacting me for things they need than my director looking at resumes in his office with my replacement in mind because I can’t get the job done.

Conflict and Revenge Have No Schedule

There was a shooting Monday at around 1:30 in the afternoon that wounded five people including a three month old baby. The baby didn’t die so this may not qualify for the most tragic story of the year later. There may be something worst coming along. It’s not even hot outside yet. One of the things that always concerns me is the high number of people just hanging out during the middle of the day on weekdays. You can ride around and see entire blocks of people just sitting around like it’s a Saturday. I was going to make this post about the need for police officers to do a better job at spotting this kind of trouble during the day when the streets are less hectic than the evenings but I thought about it today and I didn’t think that was fair. Granted I have passed some blocks and thought to myself that something is going to happen around there if no one starts breaking up those groups of people standing around. I guess the police department deserves some of the responsibility for that. It doesn’t take a train detective to spot that. You just need experience living in the city.

The actual criminal act is a bit more complicated to snuff out because you never know who or what caused the conflict to begin with and how long it’s been brewing. It’s hard to blame the police for that or the woman for having the baby out near guys who were being targeted in a shooting. She was just an innocent bystander out in the middle of the day but even if she knew the other victims and had knowledge of who they were beefing with she had no idea to know when things were going to happen. People in New Orleans don’t plan rumbles to settle scores like they did on The Outsiders. I wish we did then everyone could just stay clear until it was over. Our statute of limitations on having issues with one another goes a lot longer because we have trouble letting things go. I remember people I knew in school holding on to something from the first day of class until the last week of the school year before they decided to get the person they were pissed with. Many times the person that they were mad with didn’t remember what they did to deserve the ass whipping they were about to get. All you could do is fight them off and hope someone refreshed your memory on what the hell happened. Even now as adults we run into people we remember from the past and have to wonder are these fools still upset. You just never know for sure.

For all we know those guys were targeted for something they did two years ago or two hours before the shooting. The police can’t stop that unless they turn physic and the neighbors really can’t either unless they can call and report two people being mad with one another so they can be arrested for future crimes. They can call now and report who they think pulled the trigger Monday but it’s still too late to bring back the deceased or take the bullet out of that baby’s leg. The only real solution is education, self esteem and death to that part of the culture that says conflict isn’t over until you get the last lick in no matter how long it’s been.

20 Things That I Hate

The last two weeks have been draining and frustrating. I must be getting close to hitting the burnout wall that I get too every few months or so when the routine starts to get to me. As usual with this kind of feeling there’s always something personal that bothers me like a few issues at work are now accompanied by news coverage of something that I take to personal and it sticks with me. The census numbers and all the stories of the lost citizens of New Orleans was more than enough to get under my skin. Me and one of my friends talk to one another throughout the day in and effort to keep one another sane. Whenever something has really bothered me I will explain it followed by the phrase “I hate everybody”. That’s not true. I don’t think I hate anyone personally. I try very hard not to because all it does it eat at you until it consumes you. Hating people is not healthy but hating situations and things is another story. I have developed my own personal list of things I hate. It changes everyday. In the interest of therapy I thought I would share a few with you tonight. Hopefully I feel better by the end of this.

1. Being bitter

2. Hypocrisy

3. Cold rain

4. Ironing clothes

5. Parents my age or older that put things on Facebook with foul language or their asses hanging out when their children are on their friend list.

6. Any leadership on any level that is not straightforward with me.

7. Out of state consultants that the city pays to tell us about things we’ve known for 20 years.

8. Copyrighted Mardi Gras Indian costumes. – I don’t like to play the old school New Orleans card more than I need to but the whole point of the tradition is for people to admire how pretty you are. That’s the reason they do it. It’s not to make money. The first time some regular person gets a request to remove a picture of them and a Mardi Gras Indian that was posted without permission the culture is officially dead.

9. Oil tainted seafood. – I know the oil is in there but until it changes the taste I am still eating it.

10. Brake tags.

11. Police checkpoints because I still don’t have a new brake tag.

12. I hate the fact that I don’t have a son only because if I did I would make sure he played baseball and got good enough to accept a scholarship to play for this dude. Wake Forest should have the number one recruiting class for twenty years after this.

13. The overuse of the N-word on Twitter. - For a social network that can be seen by just about anyone we sure don’t care how we through that word around.

14. Valentine’s Day and spending money on junk that doesn’t prove how you love someone. What if it’s not a pay week?

15. Relationship experts especially the ones that haven’t had a successful relationship themselves. If your daddy had totaled five cars and had three DWI’s would you let him teach you how to drive?

16. The Black Eye Peas – I guess the Saints Superbowl half time wasn’t that bad with The Who.

17. People who try to make you feel bad for enjoying something by reminding you of a serious issue like watching a game or something means you are not involved. I hate seeing those messages like “While all of you are fussing about the Saints and the Falcons there are families struggling in the streets.” Everyday I work with people on the frontlines of the fight to help struggling people and today we are all going to watch this game. Shut up and leave us alone.

18. Birthday parties for little kids.

19. Girl Scout cookies, spirit cards, Worlds Finest Chocolate, those stupid coupon books that you never get to use anything out of and whatever other item the fundraising hustlers at schools try to get parents to sell. I extra hate the parents who leave their kids sitting outside of the store for hours pushing that candy. Give that baby twenty bucks for candy and let those children play instead of pushing chocolate.

20. I hate anytime someone compares my beard (which is my current pride and joy) to the rapper Rick Ross. I take this as an insult. Rick Ross and I have nothing in common. He’s an overweight, untalented, fake drug dealer who raps about things he didn’t experience. I’m just overweight and untalented. That's a big difference.

Undercounted : My Take On The New Orleans Census

Just for the record I have always disagreed with the population count of New Orleans. I thought it was too low before the storm. According to the census there are 343,829 people living in New Orleans now. Yesterday I read a great blog about this yesterday by Sean Fitzmorris. You can read it here. While I agree with him that there seems to be far more people here than the census counted. I can’t say that the population is as big as it was before the storm. Since I know at least 200 people personally that’s not here anymore there’s no way that can be true. What I really agree with is the silly fact that not everyone sent in the census forms to be counted.

I wasn’t surprised by that because after looking at the voter turnout for the last citywide election I knew too many people are tuned out of reality to even think about the impact on the city that a low census might have. We have too many people that are worried about their own individual daily hustle and don’t see the bigger picture. I bet you there are some people who sent it in and only listed a few people living in their house and left other people off because they have a voucher or a subsidy that doesn’t allow all those extra people. That’s why homeless families pop out of nowhere because they were living in someone’s house as long as they could and no one knew they were there. Those are going to be the folks hurt most by a low census count because they need the most help.

Then there’s the complicated part of post Katrina New Orleans that includes all the folks we can’t count in the population but we should get credit for. We can’t count all the people who came back to the area after the storm but couldn’t find a place inside of the city so they settled in all of the surrounding parishes. It really doesn’t make sense for them to move back into the city limits because they have to drive back out to where they are to shop and do things anyway so they just stay there but they consider themselves New Orleans residents. We should get half credit for them.

Then we have the yo-yo residents who have moved back and forth three or four times because they really want to be here but they keep getting frustrated so they leave out and then come back again in a few months. I always seem to hear someone’s coming home at the same time someone else is leaving. Who knows where those people were when the census was going on. We should get half credit for them too and they need to keep still and stop moving every six months.

We will probably never know what the population of the city is. The census is the official count so we have to roll with it for now. I guess we’ll lose some political power and some funding. In some ways I think we deserve to lose. It's not good for us but we brought it on ourselves. I am not one of the rich and elite or lucky enough to live in a neighborhood that wasn’t flooded. I am also not one of the voucher carrying people who got to come up and suck up all the available rental property because landlords wanted that sure money. I’m part of that middle group who didn’t have to live her but chose to and while the powerful spent all of their time trying to keep the poor from coming back they made it hard as hell for regular people to get their lives together.

I don’t have a romanticized few of post Katrina New Orleans. From where I sit the truth is that we didn’t do a good enough job at trying to get as many people back to the city as we could, not enough people care and try to understand the big picture to vote and make sure they are counted in the census. Let them take the congressional seat and send less money. Maybe that will wake everyone up and make them pay attention.

Wednesday Groundhog Freestyle Blogging

I have to post this before midnight or the title makes no sense.

It was a pretty cold day today. I tend not to try and get caught up in harping on how cold it is down here because there are other cities buried in snow right now. Plus, it won’t be long before the heat and humidity have me carrying around a damp towel to keep my face from being drenched in sweat. I will deal with a few more days of this kind of weather. I heard the groundhog didn’t see his shadow today so it will be an early spring. I always wondered how in the hell they know what that groundhog sees and how did that one rodent qualify to predict the seasons.

I have been real busy at work but this morning I couldn’t take my eyes of the coverage of things going on in Egypt. I knew it wouldn’t make it all the way to the end without violence. Those pro Mubarak protesters just came out of nowhere. I knew he wasn’t just going to step down after all that time. Tomorrow may be a rough day once the sun comes up. This story is not over.

I watched the coverage on Al Jazeera. I know all of the journalist there are brave and dedicated people but the correspondents for Al Jazeera were really on the front line. There was one lady describing the situation on the ground and ducking rocks at the same time. I was just amazed how she could talk like that in the midst of all that chaos. I wasn’t productive as I could have been this morning but I couldn’t take my eyes off the coverage.

America is going to look like a bunch of hypocrites if they keep allowing Mubarak stop the progress of democracy after we went to war in two other countries for the same principle the Egyptian people have been peacefully protesting for.

Five years after the storm we have many new condominium developments popping up all over. At the same time we have meetings where parents have to argue the case for building or repairing a new school in their community.

Thank you Ms. King and Good Nola.Com for the profile. That was nice.

Thank you for the Archdiocese of New Orleans for posting the baptism records of slaves in Colonial New Orleans. I don’t know how many people are going to have time to do the work to connect their family but it will be enlightening for everybody to go through them and take in that kind of history. I know what's going to happen. As soon as I see anyone with the last name of one my elders I am going to become obsessed thinking that's my great great great great grand people.

Why is the government messing with the definition of rape? I know what rape is. Rape is touching anyone sexually when they didn’t give you permission. If it’s someone under age it doesn’t matter if they gave you permission or not it’s still rape. This is not the way to go even if you are anti-abortion.

If Glen Beck was a black man he would only be known on YouTube by his twenty subscribers and not have his own primetime show on the highest rated news network. Not only would hardly anyone know him but he would have changed his username about 10 times by now because people would report him and they would keep suspending his account. No brother could be that crazy, loud, and disrespectful yet become rich and successful unless he was a rapper. Glen Beck is the Wacka Flacka Flame of political commentary. He goes hard in the paint for fear mongering and insanity.

The sun is about to come up in Egypt. I hope I don’t stay up all night watching this.

Stepping Up For Change in Egypt

I have been watching the coverage of the protests in Egypt for the last few days but I didn’t want to give an opinion because I wasn’t sure if the President Mubarak was going to start feeling desperate and order the army or police to start hurting people and turn the whole event into a tragedy. There is still a chance of that happening because it’s not going to be easy for him to give up thirty years of power without fighting for it. I hope that doesn’t happen because the unity and dedication of the Egyptians have been quite inspiring. I know there have been some deaths and foolish looting that’s only going to take away from the message of the people but I have been quite impressed. There’s been Christians and Muslims out there walking side by side. I have seen shots of the soldiers in the military standing on top of their vehicles and cheering on the protesters.

One thing that looks apparent to me since this started is that the Egyptians seem to be putting their differences and status aside for the greater good of democracy and a better situation for all. They seem to be saying that if we all get up and work hard everyday we shouldn’t be struggling as much as we are and our government needs to change in order to change that. The people want to have a voice. Things can be complicated when you try to bring about change on this scale. There’s some people who like the status quo who will do things to end the movement. I wouldn’t be surprised if the lack of law and order over the next few days made the citizens start turning on one another for safety reasons but at least they let their voices be heard and brought attention to their struggle.

I can’t think of anything that would make people do this in America other than aliens invading and taking over. That would be the only way we would like at one another in a common vein to join as one and take a stand. When the people in control of things in our country don’t do things to make us all prosperous we blame the people who aren’t prosperous like it’s their fault. The police would be out spraying water on the homeless or people in public housing and other people who are one paycheck away from being in the same situation would be cheering it on. Just look at our military. Every day I see images from the Middle East of our military and it includes people from different races, gender, religions, etc. Those same people out there fighting for our country can come home and see, hear, or read someone blaming people with their background for destroying the same country they are fighting for.

The strange thing is that as much as that angers me, we still got the best deal out there compared to these other countries and that’s what the Egyptians are trying to get. It might be a challenge for U.S foreign policy if the wrong person comes into power but democracy isn’t easy. If that’s what the Egyptians choose then we just have to deal with it.

Sitting On My Porch Part Sixty Two

Last night I had decided I was boycotting the State of the Union address by President Obama. I just wasn’t in the mood for being inspired. Earlier during the day I had been really upset about the case of Kelley Williams-Bolar who was sentenced to ten days of jail for fraud after she used a family member’s address to send her kids to a better school outside of her neighborhood in Akron Ohio. I didn’t think that story would piss me off as much as it did. I must be hanging around kids too much these days. I don’t condone her breaking any laws. I was just heartbroken that she had to put her freedom on the line just to try and save her kids from a substandard education. The judge laid down the law like she went on a crime spree when she was just trying to be a good parent. Make her pay the tuition she should have, fine her or expel the kids from the school and send them back to the hood if you feel the need to but don’t send the lady to jail and try to kill her future career. After reading about that all day I was in no mood to hear the president’s inspirational words that don’t seem to be making it down to real America.

There’s a strange bi-product going on around the country since President Obama was elected. Most black people tell themselves that they don’t expect him to be just our president and that’s true. He’s the president of the country for everyone. At the same time there have been these local stories here and there that seem to be racially motivated but none of the so call leaders we have seem to be saying anything because they are trying not to hurt the president. A school system in North Carolina reversed the desegregation of their schools and there’s been hardly anything said about it. If the sheriff in Jena Louisiana would have locked up the Jena Six in 2009 or 2010 they would have probably still been in there because no one would have went down there to rally.

While I didn’t watch the speech live I did read up on it later and I noticed a lot of people in Louisiana were upset that the president didn’t mention the oil spill or offshore drilling. When will people understand that modern politics is all about independent voters and swing states like Wisconsin and Pennsylvania? The president knows that even if he came down here and handed out the offshore drilling licenses himself the people in this state still won’t vote for him. There was no need to mention us in his speech. Our electoral votes have already been counted for his unnamed opponent two years from now.

One thing America could improve in is trying to understand what a person does or says based on their perspective. When George W. Bush was president I knew his dad had been president and that he made money working in the oil industry. He could have done the first 30 minutes of his state of the union address on the benefits of oil and offshore drilling and I wouldn’t have been the least bit shocked. I would have thought he was wrong and delusional. I may have even called him stupid but not part of an evil plot to destroy the world. Even without the tragedy in Arizona there are thousands of people dying from assault weapons throughout the country and most of them are young and brown. Would it had really been a socialist plot to kill freedom if the president had mentioned gun control last night? Even if you have ten guns in your home and haven’t murdered anyone, wouldn’t it be understandable if a man that started his public service working in Chicago where there are a lot of issues with gangs and violence just mentioned that gun control and illegal weapons was something we should at least have a discussion about? Maybe he wouldn’t bring it up to destroy the second amendment and come and take everyone’s guns. He could just be concerned with young men dying where he comes from. We have to stop discussing issues like everyone in the country came from the same neighborhood, in the same state with the same amount of money and access.

On This Same Day Last Year

This happened........

Congratulations Green Bay and Pittsburgh. We'll be back next season.

My Weekend Vibe: Lauryn's Coming To The Jazz Festival

It’s late Saturday morning now and I am finished with my favorite weekend breakfast of eggs sunny side up, toast, and CDM coffee. There’s no college football today so I am out of excuses for not getting up and getting out of the house. I will be going to a kids party later which is pretty much the worst thing ever. Between the work and news it’s been a rough and tiring two weeks. Despite everything going on we got through our deadlines at the office and things are well. Last night I went to the Mentoring Children of Promise annual banquet and saw some great kids. They let me know that all is not lost when it comes to the youth in our community. Everything isn’t good either but as long as the possibility to turn things around is there we have a shot at doing it.

Another thing that took place this week was the announcement of the acts for this years New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. It features the local favorites along with larger worldwide acts like Bon Jovi. The festival gets bigger every year by combining the local flavor along with major acts to draw in more people. That doesn’t bother me. The only draw back is the ticket prices but I guess you have to spend money to have a good time. I spend about the same amount of money to get into the Essence Festival. The only difference is the Essence Fest has air conditioning, no mud on the ground, and if it rains we’re in the Superdome drinking and having a good time so it doesn’t make everybody wet and miserable.

Lauryn Hill is listed as one of the performers for this years Jazz Fest. Ms. Hill is a legend for my generation despite not releasing a lot of music in the last ten years. Her album the Miseducation of Lauryn Hill is one of my top five albums of all times. She also had those classic Fugees records but I don’t expect she will be performing any of that during the Jazz Fest. After she released her first album Lauryn disappeared from the scene basically. Lately she’s been working her way back into the spotlight and doing shows. We don’t know how long this is going to last so seeing her at the festival may be the only time we get a chance to see her live before she goes back to her private life again. Some of the reports about her recent shows have been hot and cold. The main issue is that she’s been late to a lot of shows. I sure hope Lauryn is on time for her show at the Jazz Fest. Those tickets are 45 bucks and 60 if you wait until the day of the show. I would hate to see all those people standing out there sweaty, possibly wet and itchy from the mud waiting for her only to be let down.

Don’t let us down Lauryn and don't dress too heavy. It gets hot out there.

When Family Fails Us

I’m trying not talk about this depressing news about crime and violence but I can’t help it. I’m running out of ways to keep saying the same thing over and over but the issue deserves someone keeping the spotlight on it. Tuesday there was a 2 year old boy that was killed from his grandmother’s abuse. I was going to link to the story but I don’t feel like pulling it up and looking at the comments. It was difficult to read that story because grandmothers are usually the anchor of our families. You usually get more affection from them than anybody else. That's who you run to for goodies when your mama say you can't have any. Your grandmother is not supposed to be a danger to you. She beat this little boy until he died and that’s tragic but it got me wondering how many little kids get treated like this and don’t die. How many more Titus Gooseberry’s are there that are suffering but will survive and take the path of violent behavior. Titus had a three year old brother that’s still living and I am sure he’s had his share of abuse as well. Who’s going to save him from learning not to care about anything?

How many kids are hard and callous by the time they are ten years old because their innocence is gone? It’s hard to educate that kid or teach him right from wrong when he gets to school because he already hates the world. What difference does it make to him if he shoots a few people? The community didn’t come and save him so why should he be worried about our concerns? Besides, the only place he’s ever found acceptance and what seems like love is from a bunch of cats he hangs with who revere him for his fearlessness. Everyone wants to be loved and accepted even if they don’t know it.

A few years back I gave a good friend of mine a ride to pick up his brother. His brother had a young son at a time. He had to be somewhere between 2 and 4 years old. The baby started crying because his daddy was leaving like kids are prone to do. He starts shaking the kid telling him to be a man and not to cry. I let him know that the baby was crying for him because that’s what babies do and that if he did while I was standing there again I was going to bring him outside and kick his ass. He apologized to me and got in the car but I know that wasn’t the first time or the last he did that to his son. It’s 2011 and I am pretty sure that kid is close to being a teenager now. Maybe his mama was able to give him the affection he needed not to be a victim of the streets. I hope so but it wouldn’t surprise me if I seen him on the news for doing something crazy. If he’s out there doing wrong we are going to lock him up like an animal. The bad part is we can’t lock his daddy up too so we can send a message that raising our kids the wrong way won’t be tolerated.

Rest in peace to Titus Gooseberry. I wish I could have given him one of my grandmothers.

Cities Are Rough All Over

I read the story about the shooting at a high school in Los Angeles today. It looks like the City of Angels is trying to make sure they stay relevant in the battle to see which U.S city is doing the most to keep it real. So much for the non violent spirit of Martin Luther King Jr. The city I live in is a serious contender for the crown. We might be wearing the title belt right now. Nine murders in 17 days and a bunch of other people shot is quite a resume. I bet there are a lot of people who feel the same way we do in New Orleans about where they live. Crime and social issues are personal and it’s hard to see past where you live and the immediate danger and concern of that.

I’ve been ready for my city to come off of the list of dangerous spots for a long time. Since most of the victims around the country look like me no matter where they live I am ready for the culture of violence to die world wide but it would be great if New Orleans was one of the first places to turn the corner. I’m ready to have a few conversations with my friends where we look around and marvel at how far we have came and how safer everything feels. That might be a dream that seems impossible especially after a particularly violent night or yet another tragic story of a young lady like Mariah Woods whose only mistake was going out with her friends in the city she lives in and ending up in the middle of a police chase. It’s hard to recover from that mentally if you have any concern for your community.

We’ve been going through this same drama for a long time now but I am old enough to remember that it wasn’t always this way. Some of my best memories as a kid are playing in the streets at night in the 7th Ward by my aunt’s house when everyone was sitting outside for blocks and no on was scared of anything. There’s no reason we can’t get back to that. It’s going to be a rough road back but we can do it. We better to do something and get this stuff turned around because I’m not leaving. I’m sure people in other cities are feeling this way too. If they fix it before we do I hope they let us know how they did it. I'm open to anything.