Let Me Tell You...: A Smart Joke Or Insensitivity

Let Me Tell You...: A Smart Joke Or Insensitivity: President Obama wants everybody to go to college. What a snob? -- Rick Santorum President Obama wants everybody to go to college. He wants...

A Smart Joke Or Insensitivity

President Obama wants everybody to go to college. What a snob? -- Rick Santorum

President Obama wants everybody to go to college. He wants everybody to be like him. -- Rick Santorum

First, I'd like to address the "snob" comment. Anyone who thinks the president is a snob needs to know this: That isn't a snob-type of comment. And here's why:

A snob doesn't care if anybody else gets educated. A snob's too arrogant and possibly narcisstic to care about anyone else's American Dream. A snob looks down on people because they aren't status quo of the rich and/or famous. A nobody has no right to education -- snob thinking.

In fact, to feel good about one's self, some people need to feel superior to others. It's a good thing that everybody is equal in God's eyes.

Here's what I know for fact. The president knows that to partake in the American Dream college or technical training allows everyone a viable chance.Those who don't think everyone needs an education, remember that those tax deductions rise with income unless you're millionaires who get large tax cuts.

A snobbish attitude is one's own business -- though wrongheaded -- unless they're president or vying to become one because that would tell people you're for the status quo. There's no need for higher education for all, and that shouldn't change, they'd think.

Yep! The snob's got his. Why worry about others less worthy? they'd think.

Everybody doesn't want to attend college. Many never want to complete high school. Santorum should check the high school dropout rates of all groups, and he'd know everybody couldn't go to college. Period.

I'm so sorry that higher education isn't a barometer for success in everyone's mind. Unless we get tens and thousands of manufacturing jobs back, the uneducated are not likely to get those good jobs that brought middle class status to their parents' generation.That's why I'm not laughing. Tough times and illiteracy are no joke.

Birth Control? Who's Business Is It?

Anyone who is pro-lfe or anti-abortion, like Rick Santorum -- GOP's candidate vying for presidential ticket -- and other men leaders -- stand tall in a hypocritical posture. Mentioning or trampling birth control necessity for women is another political ploy to control women's bodies.

But they said the government shouldn't be involved with this and that. Why would they want to deny birth control or even discuss it, for that matter, if they're against abortion. Are they telling us that women must not have sex? One way or another, women need protection from unplanned pregnancy because if they have sex there's a good chance pregnancy (Oops) is likely to happen.

Where would these oversexed men get their ...? Let's see, married women ought not to use birth control or abortion to control their own bodies in case their libido runs wide. Single women ought to save it for marriage. Is that the message in the misguided political pill? Return to Good 'ol Boy Days? And guess what?

These women out there competing with men for political positions or high ceiling jobs would be "tied down" with babies. Men used to, and some still do, want to keep their women "barefoot and pregnant."

Is that what these bragadocio(s) are saying? Oh, maybe they haven't got that far in their "Bring back yesterday" rhetoric, but the protect women's body code is hidden in the sound bites.

Regardless, if we don't have birth control, there's a good chance pregnant women who want an abortion will opt for one -- more or less. Now opponents against women's rights, you cannot eat your doughnut and keep it unthawed in the fridge.

Besides, it's a woman's business about taking birth control, too, and she doesn't need politicians using the issue to plump up their political position by addressing that privacy. Aren't there enough political needs to discuss and fix?

Politicians -- state or federal -- should wrap their lips with duck tape on this personal matter?

Morality? What About Child Sex Abuse?

Those birth control pills were originally a political ploy until Obama reversed the decision to avoid a morality issue for Catholic leaders who would've had to pay for contraceptives for women employees. I was elated that this issue was solved without GOP ticket contender Rick Santorum continuing to blast off his misguided (Shall I say lie?) message about the president trampling on religious freedom. "This is not about contraceptives," he bellowed into living rooms across America.

Where was Santorum when the moralistic Catholics and the Evangelicals or Moral Majority pasted their lips with Elmer's Glue in the aftermath of child sex scandals across this country -- churches, schools, homes, and even Hollywood -- who've taken advantage of children -- in the worst way. Isn't that a lack of morality? It certainly is loss of  freedom and dignity morality, and a destruction of boys turning to men or girls turning to women. Many turn to alcohol and drugs to assuage their guilt. Don't believe me? Ask Dr. Drew and other alcohol and drug experts. Besides I have personal knowledge about that, too.

It's aggregious that boys and girls are sexually abused in this land of freedom, but we churn and chew over freedom and morality about church's rights. Isn't this taking advantage of our most vulnerable? Where's freedom when neither girls or boys are protected? I want to see the outcry for freedom take a minute to mention children's freedom not just birth control or the unborn.

And, worse, morality over birth control is hardly one that we should be screaming about. Why the silence about child sexual abuse across the country? Oh, yeah. I forgot about the public clamoring and political pundits sounding off until stories burn to ashes or gets archived in the computer. Or until the next story breaks. Then: Nothing's done. It suggests that we care more about unborn babies than live children who suffer at the hands of grown, rusty pedophiles. What a shame? America needs to focus on how to clean up sordid acts of violence against children.

States provide medical care for poor? Preposterous

Ironically, Michelle Bachman and her GOP gang who have sufficient medical care want to appeal what they call "Obama Care." Technically, it isn't Obama Care; Congress passed this bill that Sen. Ted Kennedy fought for throughout his political life. The states? Come on, politicians and people who think the 45 million uninsured have no right to medical care even though Congress and their loved ones have Cadillac Care at taxpayer expense. (Congress, how about paying premiums for your own health care? How about donating 10% of your salary toward so-called lucrative "Obama Care". That would be a start for you who claim you care about taxpayers' quality of life. While we're at it: How about reducing your salary by 10% to help balance the budget? And how about working half-time since you don't do enough for a full-time job and full-time taxpayer money)

It's God-awful that you choose to put politics before people who pay your salaries. And by the way, in case you forgot, it isn't just your district that pays your salary. The money comes out of the same iron pot. Oh, by the way, did it ever occur to you that medical cost is higher when people don't get preventive care or early-stage treatment. Oh, I cannot forgot the eerie words of  young and old who say: "They just want us to roll over and die. They don't care if we die." I try hard not to believe this, but I'm cynical by trade: You're widow- and widower-makers not to mention the young children losing their own lives and many left without parents. Many of you have no creative thinking skills and, of course, no shame either, but it's all about the money, isn't it? Well, that's why you should take at least one or two of my suggestion.

Oh, yeah, let's pass the torch to the callous states, which have had nearly a half century to provide health care the GOP debaters keep spewing about. Some states, like Wisconsin, are in the process of abandoning the Medicaid program that has allowed uninsured, necessary coverage. North Carolina lets people die from high blood pressure when that medication is widespread and dirt cheap.

 My brother fell dead because of hypertensive cardiac disease, which derives from long-term, untreated high blood pressure. He lost his health, his home, and his wife when he couldn't get a full-time job despite his brick layer skills. He was a homeless and indigent man who worked as a day laborer, and subcontractors refused to pay him on Friday as they promised. He was helpless and hopeless with a family of origin unable to take care of themselves. My sister, a caregiver for my mother, and minimal worker without health insurance on the job, fell ill because of a heart disease and continuous high blood pressure. Her fifty dollar co-pay prevents her from keeping critical meds on hand. Her doctor and many others require patients to return to their office to get refills. (It's all about the money, um huh) No matter how serious your blood pressure is, you get no meds even if the pharmacist requests it. My Walgreen's gets approval without hesitancy.

Most of my family and tens of thousand others are suffering and dying because they lack basic and/or critical care. State governments have had five decades to do what Republicans call state rights. Baloney. But the Bachman clan vows to  appeal "Obama Care" and let the state cover the uninsured. (Oh, by the way, every uninsured person isn't uneducated and poor. Many of these people lost their jobs or lost their coverage because employers dropped coverage or simply never could "afford" to provide it for their low-rent employees. In order to get around providing benefits with health insurance, in some cases, employers exempt part-time workers from the benefit. Others force employees to work 37 hours or less to avoid providing benefits.

Now the Supreme Court is going to decide what a lower court says was legal. I have no queries of why this country is off track: Rich gets richer. Poor gets poorer. Middle class is sliding in the mud. My dad always said, "Republican is the party of the rich." My great-grandmother, my father-in-law -- all who lived to be ripe aged wisdom -- said the same.

Literary Legend: Zora Neale Hurston

Zora Neale Hurston

I’ve been in sorrow’s kitchen and licked all the pots. Then I stood on the peaky mountain wrapped in rainbows with a harp and a sword in my hands. – Zora Neale Hurston

Zora, Zora, My Zora

            She’s a phenomenal, extraordinary, courageous and talented woman whose literary legacy stretches wide and deep. Zora Neale Hurston, a novelist, a folklorist, and an anthropology, has inspired me for decades and has influenced the fictional stories of African-American and other women writers. I imagine her as a younger and beautiful gardenia sitting underneath a “shade tree” reading a book of Grimm’s Fairytales. And as an adult I imagine her gazing at a purple moon, pondering her next book, or maybe she’s in Haiti collecting folk tales for books of folklore. Regardless of my efforts of imaginary grandeur, few descriptions transcend this one: “One of the greatest writers of our time,” said Pulitzer Prize and Nobel Prize for Literature winner Toni Morrison who’s a great writer by any literary standard. Words like incomparable, formidable, larger than life define Zora Neale Hurston. I call her a woman ahead of her time, a woman whose controversial life dwarfed alongside her literary lights.

When I heard about her novel two decades ago, I marched right into the local bookstore and inquired about a copy of Their Eyes Were Watching God. To my dismay, the bookseller cashier informed me that he’d never heard of her, and he was sure they didn’t carry an author named Zora Neale Hurston. “She’s the greatest writer of all times, and you don’t have a copy of her book?” I asked.

I stood there trying to gather myself. He told me to try Waldenbooks’ competitor, B. Dalton whose bookseller seemed more lackadaisical. He just glared at me when I asked him about the book. Then he shook his head. “Now I know why my friends don’t buy books here." (We didn’t have the big chain bookstores in Milwaukee yet.) The more I thought about the pathetic situation, the more livid I got. . “They could be doing brisk business from this would-be book addict and the rest of the black women dying to pick up a book that spoke to them.” I thought.

            Both of them apologized profusely, but they couldn’t imagine how devastated I was and why I lied because at the time, I didn’t know enough about Zora Neale Hurston to comment with such braggadocio. I was angry, hurt, and desperate to read a book about someone who looked like me. The book market for black women readers had a hole large enough to bury a dozen bodies. In fact, we had black women writers, but they must have buried in the bottom of book bins (Oh, I forgot, these books were out of print, which might’ve been out of print. That was hardly the case at these defunct booksellers in our market because Hurston’s books were re-printed.

Back to the bookstore. I flinched and left the store, my heart pumping like my hubby revving his hot rod – in another life -- and drag racing. Singer Ella Fitzgerald was scatting in my head, but even she couldn’t soothe my body and mind. I never forgot that day I lost self-control over a book, but people who know me would've understood this book lover's dilemma. You could’ve called me an angry black woman, and I might've laughed after I calmed down. Maybe.

 “Welcome to the so-called big city, Joyce,” I mumbled. “It’s preposterous.”  I’d expect my hometown of Greenville, N.C., population 35,000, not to have such a book. “This is Milwaukee,” I thought, busily shaking my head and nearly running into a passerby. “What would it take to wake up these powerful, sleeping giants?” I thought.

Now I wonder if Zora’s spirit embraced me because I was calm and cool as a refrigerated cucumber when I returned to my office. A few days later, my co-editor of the opinion editor at the Milwaukee paper and book editor got in the usual shipment of books. As usual I perused every book and discovered Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God. I asked him if I could take it, and he said: “Any book you want, take it. And if you write a review for it, we’ll pay you $25.”

            “Great. A review is on its way.”

            That night after dinner and a bath, I climbed into bed with Zora and read until daybreak. After a long day at the office, I reread it because I’d fallen in love with the love story of Janie and Teacake that set off more fireworks for me than Fourth of July revelers. I’ve read the book six times, and I’m still plowing through everything I get my hands on. Hurston has inspired me to get back on my childhood dream of writing after a long, long detour, which brought great joy and frustration -- sometimes. When my motivation and inspiration plummet, I take a stroll down Zora Lane, and I think about how prolific she was. When I’m feeling purple or in physical pain, and that’s too often, I plug into her life story. I empathize with her – being from the South, growing up in poverty, having a dysfunctional childhood, and other struggles. She persevered, starting low and reaching the Harlem Renaissance period where she was a major writer. What’s sad was in the end, she died broke in a welfare home. I think she’d be proud and no doubt – rich.  

 Hurston’s language in this love story is devoid of racial or sexual inferiority. It teaches women they have control over their own lives, dreams and expectations. She accomplished in life what eluded her in death, and we can celebrate Black History Month because black writers don’t have to struggle as Hurston did.

With outstanding narrative, plotting, imagery, Hurston’s wisdom and wit dominated through some works, and her themes were divine and human justice, love, and jealousy. She paid rapt attention to the black vernacular with strong women characters. She’s been called the standard bearers for black women writers for years to come. She’s been called the foremother to Alice Walker’s The Color Purple. Walker led difficult and spirited journey to resurrect Zora from literary dust.   

Because of Walker’s campaign, a whole new readership has access to Hurston's work, and hundreds of literary critics, including Prof. Henry Louis Gates, have studied Hurston and her work with critical analyses from every angle. Scholars have made it easy for more critical analyses and more books. And they won’t even run into each other because the subject range is so wide. They’ve written more books about Zora’s work than she wrote in her own writing career. Reading ubiquitous pages of books about her, I could only say, "That’s a fantastic compliment to a prolific writer who published work in a male-dominated culture during a time when black women writers barely existed. A courageous Hurston prevailed without much money and without a compass or a roadmap.

She wrote four novels, an autobiography, collections of short stories, three books of African-American Folklore, and two major biographies – one by Valerie Boyd – the first African-American to write it. I often think of Walker whose laudable gift of Zora Neale Hurston, a literary gem. Our lives would be poorer without her work.

http://joyblog.blogspot.com/

 

King Day a Golden Prompt for Writers

            Martin Luther King Jr. Day and his legacy are a writer’s dream because of the controversy, the spiritual quests, the meaning or myths, and the wide spread accomplishments for all people. We quote his powerful quotes that fulfill our spirit, and we relish the magnificent triumphs, and we’re proud of his leadership. For every King Day, we’ve celebrated with the King family, with citizens around the country, and with memories of his poignant messages. We replay historical movies linked to the Civil Rights Movement, some reminders of bloody injuries and death of foot soldiers, imprisonments, police brutality, and marches. And we never forget the “I Have a Dream” speech, the cornerstone of the King’s fight for freedom and the challenge for change.
           Broadcasters, churches, and other organizations replay that speech repeatedly and rightfully so say the masses.  For years columnists, editorial writers, bloggers, even novelists and non-fiction writers use this golden prompt, and I joined the chorus. After so many years, we’ve strived to stretch our creativity and imagination for a new focus though the story never loses its meaning or its rhythm. And poets, of course, wouldn’t miss the golden opportunity to pen about this wordsmith who was so quotable that his famous quotations fill entire books.

            If King – who worked for all Americans, could return, he’d likely be humble and happy about the recognition given him. As we say at these celebrations, the movement is unfinished, and the slain leader would likely agree. I don’t know what he’d expect of us, but I know for sure that if he rose from the grave and stood on the “mountaintop,” he’d be appalled at the unfinished work or the changes – school integration for one -- that appear to have backfired on us. (Too many central city schools are still segregated, and loud voices clearly criticize public school failure to educate the poorest of children)

I  have some ideas about what King might articulate about our conditions today.  His son, Martin Luther King III, said the Arizona shootings that left six dead and twelve injuries, including U. S. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, show that King’s work must continue. Not only was this a shameful tragedy and a national outrage, it delves deeply into the core values of freedom. The compassionate, hard-working civil rights leader would certainly agree, and he’d likely pull off his jacket and delve deeply into making change.

 And I believe the drum major for peace and justice would be shocked and appalled at the level of violence in our nation and across the world. He’d work for resolution regarding gun control outside the periphery of hunting and military use. And he’d want to know what could be done about restrictions for people with mental illness? What about our other pressing needs?

 I lost sleep pondering how to write these words with compassion and understanding, avoiding blame. Wouldn’t he have something to say about how we spend his birthday?  And what about the need for unanswered challenges. I know a thing or two since I’ve devoted most of my adult life writing about social issues. Here’s my list:

·        Couldn’t children do more than play, shop, etc.? Why can’t they visit the library for studying that extends teachers’ responsibilities?

·         Even after school integration, why can’t Johnny and Jane read? If they don’t have books at home, why aren’t they going to the library?

Why do these King Day celebrations praise King for the work he’s done but stop short of proactivity? Why not extend work on social issues for 365 days a year? We don’t need a holiday to work for change for all Americans. Of course, I support the holiday and its value to children because it extends their education, and grownups get to talk about how wonderful the icon of justice was.

·         Where are those leaders who must work on citizens’ behalf?  For the most part, leaders emerge but isn’t anyone influential and powerful enough to step up to take the challenge for change.

·         Do students even know the guaranteed freedoms included in the Bill of Rights and that December 15 honors it? Those rights include: Freedom of religion, Freedom of Assembly, to keep and bear arms, Freedom of speech, Freedom of the press, Protection for those accused of crimes. (The most controversial right – to  bear arms – is a Herculean issue)

·         Why are there more black men in prison than college? Does a lack of money and poor education play a major role in unequal justice? The Sentencing Project based in our Capitol says so.

·         Why are known drug houses sitting in neighborhoods and destroying the fabric of the American dream? Why have gangs, drug addicts, and drug sellers continued to terrorize law-abiding citizens?

·         Why are pedophiles allowed to run amuck and destroy innocent children’s lives and/or kill them? 

·         Why do those whose lives are not affected look askance, sweeping trash under doorsteps, or staying stuck in denial?

·         Last but not least important, the Bible says the poor shall always be with us, but why do we have a poverty crisis worse than during the civil rights years. Child poverty has been reportedly at crisis level in a land of plenty.

Well, one thing we know. King won’t be back, but one thing I know with certainty – denial won’t make these issues disappear. America needs help or, better yet, a miracle, and more than songs, speeches national leader on the ground to work with communities and a yearly celebration of his memory, not saying that it shouldn’t occur every year. I can only hope that we will wake up one morning and say: By God, we need a King celebration every day, and that is about continuing his legacy of work. President and First Lady Michelle Obama have the right action when they ask Americans to participate in community service on King Day and at other times. I hope that one of these days, our collective voices rise up and say, “Let’s do something other than just celebrate King’s legacy.”