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Open Letter to Bill Maher + Comedy World:

Barak OBama Ain't No Joke.

11/6/08

Dear Bill Maher:

(cc: comedians)

On Real Time w/Bill Maher you've repeatedly said that you would boldly go after OBama if he won because "we always need to laugh at ourselves" and "our leaders need to be taken down a peg."

Well, now that he's won, it's open season on O.B., right? But throughout this entire electoral process, you've not only failed to come up with any quality material on OBama, but since he secured the nomination you went so far as to publicly request that Barack OBama to give comedians "something to "work with;" specifically using your "new rules segment" to demand that OBama "'black' it up" for you.

WTF?

Now I agree that it's not racist or malicious to tell OBama jokes—no one's above a laugh or a critique.

But when you say that OBama needs to give comedians ammo by "blacking it up," what you're actually saying is that only thing funny about Barack OBama is his ethnicity—more to the point, your deep-seeded low opinion of his ethnic background.

Now if that ain't racist, that's at least inviting racism over to dinner.

Despite having similar backgrounds, I'm pretty indifferent to Obama. Far as I'm concerned he's an incredible politician; hopefully he'll live up to his promises; I'll judge his impact on my life once he's had more than a heartbeat in office. But as a Black male (with a Muslim name)  from Chicago who's achieved a certain level of success in my own life, nothing's been more irritating than  having to jump through additional hoops and being everything you're told you need to do to be accepted, be validated and be taken seriously for your abilities then get blindsided with "hey, you're doing a good job, but can can you 'black it up'—we need the entertainment."

For better or for worse, forced or otherwise, Barack OBama's been everything America has said that a Black presidential candidate needs to be to be taken seriously: Besides beyond-exemplary speeches filled with transcendent themes and ambitious (albeit broad) ideas, OBama has no ties to the Civil Rights Era or any of its remaining leaders. He's gone out of his way to repudiate every single Black person that white voters don't like, fear or are uncomfortable with whether they have any tangible connection to Obama or not. Obama's  youth and upbringing in Hawaii by a white mother has buffered his awareness of the struggles that many Blacks in his age range and their parents have endured and still endure. Consequently, OBama only mentions his ethnicity in the celebratory context of America's inherent goodness (i.e. "my story couldn't happen anywhere else"... "America has fulfilled its promise"), and something we can all finally "get over and move beyond." Furthermore, the sum total of OBama's plan for acknowledging inequities between Blacks and the rest of America has consisted of telling Blacks to "turn off the TV and raise your kids."
Beyond his public service, OBama leads—by all accounts—a tame, noncontroversial, nondescript life. He's a Christian but he keeps it to himself—unless he's defending himself from his various pastors. And for all his community organizing, his circle of friends are highly elite, largely ivy-league educated and pretty detached from the hoods, barrios, and blue collar towns he 's vowed to help.

Yes, OBama's said, done, and become everything American society has demanded and then some. He couldn't be anymore mainstream-friendly if he were being played by Will Smith. in a Disney flick. But  again, he's had to be all this just to get our consideration and trust. Yet his reward (far as you're concerned)?

Congrats on being elected president... now can you "black it up" for us, please?

That's mighty Condescending White Liberal Hipster of you, Bill Maher. Mighty White indeed.

So much of modern comedy is about
stereotypes and expectations—the ability to live up to/down to them.
The ability to reinforce, reflect them... (Why does society so often
refer to the black guy whose articulate as "talking funny"? Because the
expectations is for blacks to be verbal and intellectual morons.) Why
is the black guy with the saggy pants funny? because we expect that
from him. We expect blacks to be clowns and charicactures. We expect Blacks to be societal punchlines, self-destructive jokes and non-threatening entertainment that reinforces our superiority.
So when a black persons rises to prominence (apparently) free of these
constructs, he's deemed not "black enough" and not doing his part to
maintain the stat quo.

And we can't have that, now can we?

I mean, is it really Barack Obama's job
to make Bill Maher's job easier? Does Barack Obama need to get his
"nigga on" just so comedians can have some jokes to tell? 

Besides, haven't we had enough ignorant, amoral, incompetent, backwards-hustling clowns in the White House already?

Would it better if OBama got caught nailing interns and assorted white women like Bill Clinton and JFK? Would it be better for comedians if OBama only hired incompetent half-educated friends and relatives for critical jobs like GWB  did for 8 years? Would it help if OBama went around the world telling every leader "you're either with us or you're against us?" and started invading random countries based on half-assed misinformation? Should Obama just start making crap up and engage in character assassination and petty politics like virtually every candidate he's outlasted did?S hould Obama start working angles, taking kickbacks and under the table deals like all the other politicos in DC?...

In short, does Barack Obama need to be as ghetto as his predecessors in order for comedians to have something to talk about?

God-forbid we have a president who actually tries  to live up to demands of the office he aspires to hold. (How dare that uppity negro.)

So bomb away, at your own risk Bill Maher—Obama's a big boy and he'll smile it off as he's done with most of the attacks aimed at him. But you and the other comedians just might have to step your game up—be smarter, more insightful... And actually wait for the guy to do  actually something funny before you try to make funny of him. Now if some random black guy with a Muslim name that nobody heard of 4 years ago can step his game up, I just know you and yours can.

But if you can't, then the joke will be on you.

Sincerely,

BCanseco

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This is the 6 year anniversary of JamMaster Jay's murder. Here's an ode/look back.

Okay, I know you guys have heard this one, right?

Ashely Todd, a McCain campaign worker gets mugged at an ATM. By a 6'4, 220lb angry black male who stomped, kicked and sexually assaulted her.

Why?

Because she was a McCain supporter minding her biz at an ATM; and some random black guy, upon spotting her McCain bumper sticker lost it. He assaulted her, then decided to carve a large "B" into her face and yelled, "You'll go for Barack now!"

See, this is Ashley Todd. And her rouse of a bruise:

And this is proof that it's all a big stinking pathetic lie.

Yeah, ol' girl made this ish up. All of it. She wasn't even at an ATM. Now based on the pic, however, somebody did something to her. Unless she went all Ed Norton on us and popped herself. (Word to Fight Club.)

Speaking of which...

There's already talks of cutting Ashley Todd a break because she may or may not be "mentally unstable". In, fact authorities said that part of her recant included the following:

"She is stating that she was in her vehicle driving around, and she
came up with this idea... She said she has prior mental
problems and doesn't know how the backward letter 'B' got on her face."

Well lemme just say this:

Crazy doesn't excuse Racist.

Again, I'm gonna repeat that: Mental Illness doesn't excuse bigotry.

You can be mentally ill, crazy, intellectually stupid, desperate or suffer from emotional stress, i don't care. but when you intentionally plan-out, concoct or leverage racial slurs, stereotypes, "temporary insanity" isn't a defense.

When i was an adjunct professor at my alma mater, a 20 year old white female student—not unlike Ashely Todd—told campus and city authorities that she had been raped by a black male. She described her attacker as 5'9-6'2... 180-210lbs, dark-skinned, beard, 25-32 years old. i know this because they put up posters all over campus. The police questioned seemingly every black male on campus plus a 5 mile radius. And with a description this generic, I thought i'd done it.

After a few weeks, it turned out, she'd made it all up. Every bit of it. There was no assault. no black sex-fiendin' boogey monster. Nothing.

In fact, we later learned that this female student was a transfer student from a college in Michigan where she'd been expelled for telling the exact same story 2 years earlier. That's right, she was a serial black-man-did-it teller.

And like Ashley, this broad pleaded mental illness, blamed her parents' fear of interracial dating, etc. And it worked. She was quietly allowed to leave school and go on about her life. As for all the black men accused of raping a white girl with little cause? Some of us are still dealing with it to this day. (Something about being the black-guy rapist that just doesn't quite fade gently into the night.

It's a common tale that feeds the old false myth of black criminality.

Like far too many in the media, politics and even law enforcement, Ashley Todd played around with among the most dangerous of all cultural slurs = Black men as perennial sexual predators. For 400 years at least, innocent black men have been arrested, imprisoned, executed, lynched, fired, blackballed, assaulted and worse for nothing more than someone pulling the "a black guy did it" card. (And anyone who thinks there aren't more than a few Black men rotting in prisons and graves right now because someone played this card isn't familiar with U.S. justice at work.)

Funny thing is I've been around crazy people. My girlfriend works with the mentally ill folks. You ain't heard excuses until you've seen a 40 year old man smack himself upside the head yelling about talking kittens and flying cotton balls. that's the kind of stuff mentally unstable folks come up with.

Ashley Todd didn't talk about aliens or ghosts or spooky monsters chasing her. She didn't talk about dragons or trolls or goblins... no. No UFOs or secret agent excursions. A crazy person might do that. No.

Ashley Todd went for the "black guy did it" story. Why? Because she ain't too mentally ill to know what's really good. Just like Susan Smith killing her kids then blaming some random black man with a gun, or Willie Horton or Sistah Souljah or 90% of what comes out of Hollywood still, Ashley went for the easy image. And if she'd had thought her story thru enough, it might've worked.

Come to think of it, it did. Have we heard an apology yet from her? Or the McCain camp? No McCain didn't put her up to this, but since we're all about relationships and repudiation, Todd's gotta be right up there on the "distance yourself from them or else" list ain't she.

And by the way, both McCain and Palin called Ashley Todd to see if she was okay after finding out she made this crap up.

Why?

Now, ill or not, does she deserve a phone call from anyone other than a psychiatrist and Jesse Jackson? Can you imagine if Todd were
a democrat and Obama had called to see how she was doing?!

So if you make up crap about black folks, you get a sympathy call? Nice.

Crazy or not, Ashely Todd knew exactly what she was doing. And to be honest, that's worse than what she was alleging had been done to her.

And again, that this is being dismissed as some crazy/silly girl or some sort of political ploy diminishes the severity of the problem of how we see black men.

For my money, Shai Linne is one of the most gifted and insightful MCs you'll hear anywhere today. I've listened to the brother's work for a couple years now; and his rhymes just grab you like handcuffs and hem you up from first track to the last.

He's got a new album dropping in November on lampmode recordings. If it's anything like his last 2 offerings (The Atonement and The Solus Christus Project), it's gonna be a long hot winter.

Here's an interview with the guy that I found on YT. Hopefully I'll get to chop it up with him one day myself, HK style. Until then, this one will have to do.

Here's part one. Shai Linne on faith, hiphop and more.

Here's Shai Linne, part 2

For more on Shai Linne, hit lampode recordings or myspace.com/shailinne

No doubt you've all heard of Minn. Congresswoman Michele Bachmann by now... What? you haven't? Well allow me:

Uh, yeah, Mrs. Bachmann... that engine sound you hear is the bus coming to pick you up and cart you off.

This woman's given me another good reason to stay out of Minnesota, huh? Kidding. I just think they made a huge mistake putting this woman in office. No doubt they're embarrassed by her.

But Michele Bachmann, Sarah Palin and so many in the DNC as well have made an interesting point in this election:



You must worship America. America must be your God. You must see America as the sole source of goodness—the mythological shining light on that metaphorical hill that all the uncleansed global masses flock to.

If you see America as anything other than an idol, beyond a God worthy of your prayers and praise, then you are unworthy of being called an American. America is to Americans as Christ is to Christians. You must worship. You must submit to America, the God of all Gods.


Call me crazy, but America is not my god. I repeat: American is not my god.

God is my God.

Now maybe I'm in the minority on that one—wouldn't be the first-time...

Something about blind secular idolatry that creeps me out. Brad Pitt, Hollywood... I'm tired of people telling me what i need to worship and bow to.

I actually feel sorry for Bachmann... but I will credit her for saying outright and going down fighting on a position that so many over the years have espoused only casually in secret and in less blunt terms.

Michele Bachmann is a country worshipper. She's, well, an idolator. We all worship something—money, celebrities, ideas, people... Guess it just depends on which God you chose to pray to.

Maybe Michele's right. Maybe Obama is un-american, by her standards.

And maybe, just maybe, that's a good thing.

Shouts to Electronic Village:

With about 8 days till election here in the US, it's amazing all the voting myths and frauds floating around. Between reading the info I get from the County Clerk's office--they usually coordinate the election duties duties in major cities here in the US, and getting my google on, you can find all the relevant info you need.

I also found a cool site called CivilRights. org, which is a collective of major civil rights organizations in the US. They list all kinds of info, do's and don'ts related to your rights and liberties as a U.S. citizen. Now as it relates to the upcoming election, let's see how smart you are:

You cannot vote if:

you have outstanding parking tickets, traffic violations, unpaid child support, utility bills, mortgage payments or other fines.

You cannot vote if:

your home is in foreclosure.

You cannot vote if:

you've ever served time in prison.

All those are false, actually. Yup. False...

Fact is, you being convicted of a misdemeanor does not affect your voting rights. If
you were convicted of a felony, your rights vary by state. And home ownership or credit  rating or financial status has nothing to do with your vote. If you're broke, in debt, owe your babymomma a grip, and renting, you can still vote. you need a legit mailing address is all.

Hey, don't laugh; a lot of people get hustled and talked out of voting for all kinds of randome reasons that are irrelevant.

My grandmother could vote because her grandparents were slaves. It was called the "grandfather clause". it was legal per se, but it was used to keep millions of blacks from voting when my grandmother was in her 20s. So it happens.

Be informed. Just make sure you and people you know are informed.

Visit CivilRights.org for more myths and info. And check with your city/state's polling officials and candidate's party offices if you're still stuck for what to do!

See y'all at the polls next week!

SONIC BANK IS A SCAM! AVOID THEM AT ALL COSTS!

One of the bigger scams out now is a PayDay Loan hustle perpetrated
by "SONIC BANK". They're some sort or bank that randomly calls people
demanding repayment of payday loans. Sonic Bank or Sonic Cashnet bank
as their reps sometimes go by will call you, often with heavy Indian
accents, claiming that you're behind on a payday loan; a loan that
they will claim you took out several months, if not years ago.

They'll give you a phone number, no more than a general vicinity of
their location and they'll somehow have accessed just enough of your
personal info for all this to sound plausible.

In the case of my girlfriend, she got hit with this in on a late
Saturday night in October—that's when a "Mr. Michael Smith" from "Sonic
Bank" (714) 384-9647 called up demanding remittance from an outstanding
payday loan she allegedly took out.

She listened nervously as Mr. Smith immediately explains that her delinquent account will be put into collections, subject to additional fines, penalties and possible legal action if she doesn't pay up.

Stunned, she asks what account Mr. Smith is talking about.

Mr. Smith claims that in June 2006—that's 2 years ago—she took out a $600 payday loan with Sonic Bank that was deposited into her checking account electronically; and despite several attempts to over the years they've been unable to get her to pay it back.

"What?! I don't owe you guys anything? I never took out any payday loan!" she says.

Mr. Smith then proceeds to rattle off my girlfriend's name, her address, her SS, and her bank's routing number, all as proof they've done business in the past. Smith claims SONIC BANK advanced her the money, deposited it into her acct and now needs her approval to get their money back.

Now she's scared. This guy wants his money and he's got her social security number and her Banking info. And she still has no idea who Sonic bank is or what they're talking about.

So keeping him talking, she runs to her laptop and logs onto her bank. She goes back one, two, three, four years… nothing. No such transaction for $600; and no transactions from a "Sonic Bank" or "sonic" anything.

Now realizing that this SONIC BANK must be some sort of scam and having proof from her own bank that she's never taken out any such loan, she demands to talk to Mr. Smith's supervisor. He refuses. She demands to be emailed or faxed paperwork--some tangible proof or record of this transaction. Mr. Smith claims to have no such information, but his colleague "Mr. John Smith" might be able to send her some documentation at a later time as receipt of payment—once she pays up, of course.

Taking the number off our Caller ID, I grab a cell and call Sonic Bank. It goes to "musak"—monotonous piano-y instrumental music—no voice, no id, no way of knowing if the recipient is residential business or governmental.

(It was as if the line was busy. How many banks do you know with one phone-line? And for that matter, how many banks do you know that if you call don't have some sort of audio ID—be it a voice-prompt, operator service, etc? This Sonic Bank seemed to have none.)

Annoyed, I hang up. But I'm concerned because, again, they have her SS and contact info. Now while much of this stuff is unfortunately public domain/easy to access by shady operators, that doesn't explain exactly who they are or where they're at.

Meanwhile, my girl is still on the phone being berated and threatened by Mr. Smith whose still demanding his money. He's talking so loud I can hear him. He's got this heavy Southeast Asian accent—possibly Filipino/pacific islander, but mostly likely Indian.

Rather than hang up on him, she tries to sweet talk them into giving her some info on SONIC BANK so we can dig up something online. She explains that she has never used a payday loan service of any kind (true); has never heard of Sonic Bank; and wants to know why if she had taken out such a loan they would wait 2 years before contacting her. She also asks for their number, their location so she can work out a payment plan.

i hop online and this is what i find when i google SONIC BANK. Now my google game's pretty tight--i can find anything online in a few seconds thru corss searches, etc. I found nothing for SONIC BANK_not as a full-on financial institution, at least. They're not real.

What I did find was: Tons of complaints from across the country: Random stories about guys with Indian accents from SONIC BANK harassing people by phone and demanding payment for past due loans.  People from Cali, New york, Chicago, Florida, overseas... SONIC BANK is one of the handles for a couple web-based payday lenders--bogus or not--they're apparently scamming people on multiple continents. Avoid them like the plague!

So, oh yeah... back to "Mr. Smith"—he's still on the phone trying to talk me into giving him some money:

Mr. Smith refuses to offer any info other than  SONIC BANK's phone number: 714-384-9647—the one with the muzak on the receing end. He also shares that SONIC's located in Irvine, California. Hut he won't provide a street address or a zip code or any other hard concrete evidence of his company's existence.

So this is where I take the phone. Mr. Michael Smith,  unaware she's no longer on the line, is now cursing at who he thinks is a frustrated woman: "You know damn well you borrowed this money from Sonic bank. And sonic wants it's money or you'll be in a hell of a lot of trouble!"

I proceed to shut Mr. Smith down with a series of questions beginning with: "What kind of bank gives payday loans?!" "What kind of bank loans $600 or any amount of money with no interest and waits two years to collect? "How come you've only got one phone line?" "How can she pay you if you don't send her an invoice or any paperwork?" "Why won't you give out your address so she can mail you a check?"

He gets nervous; and like Sarah Palin, he ignores my questions but  rather sticks to the script about her owing money to SONIC. As he babbles on about paying your bills and us being in trouble, I'm wondering how many old people, really young college kids and people that just get scared and pay him to go away does this bully and his crew actually squeeze money out of each week.

You know this sort of scam works a lot. it's low overhead and you only need to work it a few times a day to make it profitable. These guys are probably holed up in hotel rooms somewhere with random call lists that're Snickers-thick. I'm guessing 20 names per page and maybe 20 or 30 pages per caller? If you start on monday morning, you could be chillin' in first class on your way to Tahiti by Wednesday.

ID theft, scams like this are a real beyotch... I'm so steamed I don't know what to do. "Mr. Smith" is unable/unwilling to answer any of my questions including his location—he'll only state that SONIC BANK is based in Irvine, California. He won't give a website or a fax number, but I've found some info on my own.

about 10 minutes of mutual cursing, threats and yelling, he hangs up—but not without warning that my girl's acct is now in collections and that she's in "real trouble." I let him know that if I ever find out where he is, $600 won't begin to cover his medical bills.

That was Oct. 19th...

(But wait, it gets better:)

A few days later, this time during the day—a guy calls from SONIC BANK. His name is "Jack Borson". He's calling from the same number, with the same bad accent. He wants to talk to my girlfriend. When I tell him she's not home and can I take a message, he informs me that her application has been approved...

For a Job.

Swear to God, this guy told me that my girlfriend applied for a job at SONIC BANK and they were interested in offering her a position. All she had to do is call them back.

These guys at SONIC BANK are clowns. They're jokes. But they're good enough to phish. They can get just enough basic/public domain info on people then use it to scare them into paying them to go away.

Whatever you do, don't pay them. If SONIC BANK contacts you, don't give them any info, don't give them any money. And if they appear to have any personal info on you, look into changing and updating your key info--bank acct numbers, SS, etc. most banks can put certain parties like SONIC on a fraud alert list so they can't access your accounts. And check the credit bureaus to make sure no one's opening up bogus accounts or credit cards in your name.

Be careful out there, folks. it's getting ugly. The hustlers and scammers and thieves are getting hungry. And we're looking like dinner to them.