Aww, the whole world is racist I can prove it like this Everybody loves Raymond Everybody hates Chris From a city full of haters Ain't afraid to take risks Ol' bloggin'-ass n***a You should copy-paste this Fans call me Rhymefest Friends call me El Che Dip my bags in your girl's mouth She call me "Earl Grey" N***a, I kill your king Like James Earl Ray I'm in it to win You be playin' for a stalemate Twone, Mikkey, and Juice It's bigger than the four of us We should have a group And put a lot of whores on the bus Betcha if we made a group They would give awards to us Then Common and Kanye would probably stop ignoring us But I ain't the one to grieve Douche bag, Summer's Eve I be packing pipe I could make Joe the Plumber leave BREATH Control your bronchitis I still feel a storm comin' Like arthritis I eat a lot of Harold's Chicken So I get the itis This is history Jay Illa, archive us
He's just funny, and observant, and normal.
I can't find a YouTube link for this track, so check it at Ian's spot.
Over at FreeDarko, I have posted a recommendation for the Knicks' future. You'd likely enjoy the 8-10 minutes it will take to read. I challenge you to not find it at least a little amusing.
In, say, October of 2008, was there any liberal, let alone Democrat, who foresaw a Barack Obama victory doing nothing to stop the odd news phenomenon that developed under George Bush? You know, the phenomenon which saw governance and policy planning erode so severely that literally every day brought with it a new horror across the front page of The New York Times. Reading the news was a daily exercise in masochism.
Sadly, nothing has really changed. It's almost stupefying. Even when allowing for the most corrosive cynicism, did it seem likely that Obama would preside over so much daily discouragement? Here's the latest:
In Virginia, the General Assembly approved a bill last week that allows people to carry concealed weapons in bars and restaurants that serve alcohol, and the House of Delegates voted to repeal a 17-year-old ban on buying more than one handgun a month. The actions came less than three years after the shootings at Virginia Tech that claimed 33 lives and prompted a major national push for increased gun control.
Arizona and Wyoming lawmakers are considering nearly a half dozen pro-gun measures, including one that would allow residents to carry concealed weapons without a permit. And lawmakers in Montana and Tennessee passed measures last year — the first of their kind — to exempt their states from federal regulation of firearms and ammunition that are made, sold and used in state. Similar bills have been proposed in at least three other states.
In the meantime, gun control advocates say, Mr. Obama has failed to deliver on campaign promises to close a loophole that allows unlicensed dealers at gun shows to sell firearms without background checks; to revive the assault weapons ban; and to push states to release data about guns used in crimes. (emphasis added.)
He also signed bills last year allowing guns to be carried in national parks and in luggage on Amtrak trains.
Are you kidding me? This is Obama's country? A place where you can pack heat while getting sauced, pack steel in your easily accessible luggage, and maybe even carry an unlicensed concealed gun? What a joke. One more policy area in which there has been a startling absence of leadership. All those weak-sauce bipartisan bills that accomplish little had better soothe Obama as his sole term comes to an end in 2012.
I'd post some audio to download, but you know how the blog game has become. *sigh*
Freeway, "My Time"
Bun B, "Press Play"
DJ Khaled ft.. Nas and John Legend, "Victory"
It pains me to include any song from rap's reigning retard, Khaled. But Nas destroys this beat, and two solid minutes of Nasir rapping is serendipitous. Yeah, he sounds a little dumb, as usual, but you know....
Good story about Timothy Geithner in The Wall Street Journal today. Money (zing!) excerpt:
Mr. Geithner so far has been unable to achieve a key White House objective—revamping the U.S. rule book for banking and finance.
Last June the administration proposed sweeping changes to market regulation. The plan includes limits on risk-taking by financial firms and added consumer protection for mortgages and credit cards.
The proposal ignited a fractious debate in Congress over whether it went far enough. Hurting the effort: Critics framed Mr. Geithner as taking the banks' side.
It's hard to feel sorry for Geithner. He and his boss came to office promising meaningful financial reform, but they've yet to produce anything of that magnitude. Instead, as time has worn on, we've learned how brazen and insular Wall Street was ($); how happily financial titans took outsized risks they never understood to begin with ($); how recklessly complicated financial instruments were created, deregulated, and overleveraged ($). In response, Geithner has helped Obama prepare a weak-willed set of proposals that will not sufficiently ameliorate strutural problems. Worse, knowing stand-for-nothing Obama and bank-friend Geithner, financial regulation seems destined to be bargained into a bad compromise. It's sadly unsurprising, though: Obama's administration is as beholden to banks as any other political set.
What has Geithner done? Well, since he and the Obama economic brain trust have been in power, banks have been nursed back to health, record-setting profits have returned to the financial industry, and AIG has awarded outrageous bonuses after surrendering 80% of itself to American taxpayers. Meanwhile, unemployment is crippling and real job growth is stagnant. Everyday people continue to suffer through economic crisis as the elite financial actors who helped create it feign contrition and go back to counting money. These are the same people whose relaxed standards, classic greed, and happiness to protect anyone else in their small oligarchy created a disastrous financial house of cards that ultimately most severely injured the middle and lower classes.
I am not one who begrudges the wealth of Wall Street; what I begrudge is enriching people for poor performance. Just as I begrudge ignoring problems, or making old mistakes anew and expecting a different result. So while the Wall Street Journal helpfully and rightly considered Geithner's natural circumspection and moderation, it just as wrongly let him off the hook for what he has not done. If Geithner wants public sympathy, or even merely to ease the burdens he carries, he would be well served to explain how the actions he has taken will ultimately help people beyond Wall Street, and how the government will meaningfully reform the financial system so that another crisis isn't possible.
Seems like a cool event, right? Come to a game and honor Cazzie Russell, Dick Barnett, and Bill Bradley, three players from the 1970 championship team? That would be the famous 1970 team that is commonly regarded as a paradigm of basketball's team element. The one that beat the Lakers in 7 games in a series that saw both Jerry West's famous 60-footer and Willis Reed's locker room limp out for Game 7. Pretty big deal in Knicks and NBA history.
Then, I later received this email:
It's for the same day and event. I think there is an additional, separate audience to be had with LJ, but that's not really the point.
This is: Larry Johnson is now considered a Knick legend? By the organization? Really? A man who delivered zero championships? Whose most resonant Knick contribution was tucking his left fist into his right elbow?
To Larry's credit, he did fight Alonzo Mourning and wage battles in the most memorable basketball rivalry of the 1990s. He did consummate an improbable four-point play against the Pacers that propelled the Knicks to the 1999 NBA Finals. He did call that team a group of "rebellious slaves." Does that make him a Knicks legend, though? On par with players whose jerseys are retired? Who are central figures from a team celebrated by NBA history?
Johnson may actually be a basketball legend more than a Knicks legend. He was a critical member of those mythic UNLV teams that challenged NCAA hierarchy and orthodoxy (and legality). He came to the NBA with a memorable marketing gimmick. He introduced me to React Juice and gave Phife that wonderful Converse punch line from "Motivators." But regardless, I wouldn't say he's a titan of New York's franchise history.
So smarten up, Brickers. Pry TMac loose from the Kings. Fete the 1970 champions. You can even have Larry Johnson Night, during which people with children from multiple relationships get in free. But not at the same game.
