FRIDAY
okay, so mccain throws a monkey wrench into negotiations
which may be for the best, i dont much care for the plan myself
feel like mccain and the house republicans setting up some sort of mccain coup
we will have to see how it plays out, but too much politics on it will turn americans
off on this one, folks against it and bush aint convince nobody w/his weak mackology
as for the debate:
“With new polls showing his campaign dead in the water among California Republicans, Arizona Sen. John McCain has pulled out of a long-scheduled debate with Texas Gov. George Bush, set for Thursday in Los Angeles. ”
--San Francisco Chronicle, Monday, February 28, 2000
----------------
didnt work then, wont work now
i know i know, i used doc snake yesterday didnt i but the good dcotor speak to me
i got a couple of days, have finished rebuild on rest - ima try to redpen it again
redpen is i print out the manucript (i read better hardcopy) sit down w/a redpen - or blue, green
purple - i like doing different sessions in different colors cause it look pretty) and read thru rewriting
the 1st redpen i actually get thru is a brutal process of bleeding all over the page
but at the end of that 1st redpen ive got my real draft, from that point its just polish
problem is you start redpenning you get halfway in and find structural problems
then its back to the drawing board, last redpen i attempted was about two months ago,
last couple of months been cleaning up structurals, so lets try it again, dont really expect to get
thru, im willing to bet ima find structural problems but im sure going to try to forcemarch thru
gon stonewall all these student manuscripts and take fri & sat poss sunday for my novel
went to see juno diaz last night, he spoke here at syracuse, kinda interesting because juno
used to teach here and left not under the best conditions, must have felt good coming back w/a
pulitzer under his belt, he gave a reall strong presentation and talked about the 10 year span it
took him to write oscar wao, talked about how you had to have the courage of your literary convictions
and now be susceptible to the external pressures and give your book whatever it take
when juno was here we were the ones working on forever novels and it really meant a lot to me
when he finally finished his and got acclaim and putlizer for it, it was like okay rick, juno did it you can
too, then he talked all that literary courage at the presentation and im liked fired up and ready to go
but later at the house he told me that mit had jacked him up and forced him to do it cause of tenure
and like some reformed junkie out to clean up the rest of the world he start jacking me up talking about
just close it down and call it a deal and bonnie susceptible to this argument you know and he real
insistent about it and im feeling kinda under the gun and had to tell him you got to back up off me on this
man, told him i might have been more susceptible if he had jacked me up before he gave his manifesto
on literary courage, start dropping his own words on him - if it take me 10 years to do the next one thats
what it take - he had laid out some wonderful mackology at the presentation, talked about how he had
to write 200 (his count) versions before he hit on the write one, and he had to be wiling to walk into
uncharted territory to come up with something new and fresh and be impervious to external pressures,
it took me a couple of years just to get comfortable with this language im using, this colored mackology i be trying out here in rootsblog, this the voice of my novel, i be using rootsblog to trialrun, work out the kinks but i struggld with it years before i accept it as my rest voice, years i try to force rest into conventional narrative strategies but the novel wont accept being told in no other way with licks so strange i cant judge them but am forced to accept on faith cause novel just wont tell no other way
so i just got to make it work, i do not accept failure in this regard
juno say he could probably do another novel real quick if all he want to do is reprise oscar wao but he gon want to stretch and i felt that in my soul, i remember some years ago as in maybe 2 when i realize i was just rewriting another good loving blues and i couldnt do that, this novel saying something different and so i had to sitdown and refocus it and that cost me a couple more years
i got segments, my historical one for instance, that i thought to invest a couple of months into that turned into investments in the case of the historical section of about 4 years, actually a novel in a novel, a story in a story - it cost me years
and i still fear this novel doesnt and never will be the wondrous tale i have in my head to tell, i just really have reached that point in a work where its like okay, time to close it down
but that aint like a switch where you just stop and its done, that mean okay we driving toward closure here, whatever aint been said aint going to be said with this one, polish this bad boy off take what i get
but at the same time there is my mentor, john o killens, the great griot master of brooklyn,
i followed john killens from school to school for 13 years (sometime that amaze to this day) i was his chief acolyte and went to workshop every sat for 13 years as john grew older and finally died and there are certain precepts of john that have been burned into my literary soul because he said them over and
over and over with total conviction of life experience as a literary visionary
i remember when he told me i was a brilliant writer but with a little compassion i would be profound
i been trying ever since i figured that out to manifest the compassion of o klllens in every thing i do
i remember john used to tell us a writers name is sacred, that you never sell your name
i remember johns constant rejoinder for us to be long distance runners, long game players
i remember how much john considered literature a sacred calling, being a writer meant something to john killens
he passed that sense of literary responsibility on to us, he taught us to be literary visionaries
i remember his generosity to young students, he gave so much to pass it on, i can do no less
i have so internalized john o kllens precepts on what it mean to be a writer that they guide me to this day
and one thing i remember he used to tell us is that all future generations will have is your work, they wont
care that you were pressed for time, for money, for tenure, for nothing, all they will have is your work,
john o made us to understand you better leave something worthy of the struggle, that you give your work
whatever it take, john o made us understand that the 1s thing you must learn as a writer is patience,
that is if you would be a writer of historical stature and significance, if you would be a voice of destiny,
if you would as as penda aiken once said, move a novel from bad to good to great
juno basically say the same thing last night, course he say it like the dominican mackologist
he is and im sorry they didnt tape it, even though i know as he saying it some of it presentation it
was damn good presentation and presentation count when you a mack, the boy mackdown last night
hadnt seen juno in years and he was still juno but he a mature juno now and sharp as ever
and his presentation spoke to me, made me that much more assured im on the right
track but i got to be on it to justify my stubbornness in this matter, i want a moneydraft by the
end of the year do or die,
fri and sat im taking for sure, sun i might have to give to palf, depend on how much i get done tomorrow
and day after, okay forgive me, the minutiae of production, my apologies cause i know this a personal,
its just where my mind is at my mind my heart and my soul
all my love
rdoc
THURSDAY
im probably my biggest fan, i think im so good it amaze me the world dont
was just reading over my latest posts and im thinking i wish
i was getting paid for what i do, i put as much time in as any columnist
my mack just as strong - it perplex me sometime why life treat me so hard
only thing speak in my favor is i got no gatekeepers, nobody to please
but you dear regulators, i like that freedom of movement i guess
say what i want and how i want to say it - i like that, i like that a lot
and i feel like im in tune with my literary times, anything that force words for my
legacy im down with that, it dont cost me a lot to do this, i just sit down and
start typing and usually something interesting come out
words that have value and perhaps historical/destinical substance
that kind of time investiture i can live with that
ima delta mack - got to mack to live
okay some quick commentary, got to prep my 330 class - so what do you think about
this campaign suspension, smell like another hail mary pass by john mccain to me
numbers start falling and he suspend his campaign
say he want to delay the debate (and palins by the way)
goes back to dc to inject presidential politics into an already toxic mix
then when it becomes clear just how much of a bungle this move is
bush pull him out of the fire by calling leaders to whitehouse (at mccains request)
otherwise mccain would have been just standing there looking like a fool
he is not even part of the committee considering this
rules say he cant even be in the room
this is a transparent even clumsy stunt and will be ridiculed as such, also
show that him and his hug buddy bush working as a team, need to spotlight that
then mccain diss letterman, canceled out on him then
show up at courics joint, letterman diss back
WEDNESDAY
as expected, economic meltdown increasing obamas numbers
significant numbers from recent washpost/abc poll
obama 52 percent mccain 43 (right after repub conv mccain 49 obama 47)
support among whites w/college dropped 20%
white w/o college education favor mccain by 17 points, whites w/college ed favor obama by 9%
(rootsblog management has no comment on
these number, well maybe one comment, it has been made abundantly clear that we have to educate whitefolk)
palins unfavorable numbers have risen from 28% to 38% and she is still being shielded from press (becoming obvious even to whites w/o college ed)
palins support among independent women dropped 65 to 43%
84% of obamas say fervent, 46% of mccain (was 50 50)
tied among men, whitevoters 50% mccain 45% obama
african american voters 96% to 3% (ima let you guess who got what)
50 50 white women but black womens 90 something put him ahead w/women
independent 53 obama 39 mccain (reversing mccain lead after repub conv)
who do you trust on the economy: obama 53% mccain 39% (whoat planet they been on)
shift toward obama on iraq, foreign policy and who can be trusted to deal with major crises
among 'economy voters' obama leads 2 to 1
these some good numbers dont you think
numbers that dont support my case im not interested in
but right now numbers across the board looking good
im outta here, mcarthur awards broke my heart
again, how is it they keep missing me
show some love
rdoc
TUESDAY EVENING
the more the bailout terms become known the more problematic they become
stocked with passage like this one:
“Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are
non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be
reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency,”
they must be kiding, let me get this straight
they expect us to give bush and cheney and their operatives total power beyond any precedent
review or control of any court of law or agency
“The Secretary is authorized to take such actions as the Secretary deems necessary to carry out the authorities in this act without regard to any other provision of law regarding public contracts.”
this is breathtaking, they must think we fools, absolute fools, worthy of nothing but contempt
“Any funds expended for actions authorized by this Act, including the payment of administrative expenses, shall be deemed appropriated at the time of such expenditure.”
they must be kidding me, we aint talking millions or billions, we takling trillions here
they can do whatever they want to do, with no recourse if we dont approve
they must think we forgot how quickly iraq became a giveaway to war profiters (an all purpose disaster)
they must think we forgot how quickly the medicaid bill became a welfare program for big pharma
how quickly the patriot act became a violation of civil liberties and breeder of the imperial presidency
how all of these were sold as too urgent for measured review, trust us
last time they sold a bill as too urgent for review we got iraq - we got the patriot act
how many times we gon fall for bush okeydoke #1
they aint never done nothing that wasnt about the imperial presidency and taking care of the rich
they aint never cared about governing, they let a whole city die cause of bad weather
once again bush shows his disdain for governing in favor of using a crises to forward his ridiculous agendas - hasnt he done enuf damage
agendas and a disdain for governing that has left us in most perilous circumstance
then we got the financial companies lining up to manage the trillions to be spent fixing their own mess - their latest proposal
is that other bad paper be included and a threat that they will reject any federal offer they consider too low - well aint that nothing
reject this whydont you
emperor say he dont need no stinking clothes
then we got the congressional democrats focused on mortgages and ceo salariies
instead of facing down a constitutional power grab of bodacious proportion
focus people please, work with me, i cant do this by myself
obama in a tactical bid for party leadership say he will approve it if 4 conditions met
taxpayer payback plan
bipartisan oversight board
making sure bailout doesnt become wall street payday
help homeowners with trouble mortgages:
this the gist of his statement on it, this the good part:
Given that fact, the President's stubborn inflexibility is both unacceptable and disturbingly familiar. This is not the time for my-way-or-the-highway intransigence from anyone involved. It's not the time for fear or panic. It's the time for resolve, responsibility, and reasonableness.
And it is wholly unreasonable to expect that American taxpayers would or should hand this Administration or any Administration a $700 billion blank check with absolutely no oversight or conditions when a lack of oversight in Washington and on Wall Street is exactly what got us into this mess.
Now that the American people are being called upon to finance this solution, the American people have the right to certain protections and assurances from Washington.
First, the plan must include protections to ensure that taxpayer dollars are not used to further reward the bad behavior of irresponsible CEOs on Wall Street. There has been talk that some CEOs may refuse to cooperate with this plan if they have to forgo multi-million-dollar salaries. I cannot imagine a position more selfish and greedy at a time of national crisis. And I would like to speak directly to those CEOs right now: Do not make that mistake. You are stewards for workers and communities all across our country who have put their trust in you. With the enormous rewards you have reaped come responsibilities, and we expect and demand that you to live up to them. This plan cannot be a welfare program for Wall Street executives.
Second, the power to spend $700 billion of taxpayer money cannot be left to the discretion of one man, no matter who he is or which party he is from. I have great respect for Secretary Paulson, but he cannot act alone. We should set up an independent board that includes some of the most respected figures in our country, chosen by Democrats and Republicans, to provide oversight and accountability at every step of the way.
-------------------------
it seem to be a done deal but i want some hard bargaining, dont
want this to be no giveaway to wall street, i aint feeling that
its a shame the way bush cheney, mccain and palin and all their ilk treat us
they act like the american people aint got a lick of sense, and too often they
seem to be right
my position is just say no
last 50 days of their administration they gon come up with this imperial power grab
and its so urgent they have to have it passed by friday or civilization
as we know it will fall
buck up democrats
buck the fuck up
im gone
rdoc
TUESDAY MORNING
hello world, ive discovered the lazy mans way of blogging, use other folks
words, with attribution i might add, that wise piece obviously hit a nerve
wise did another piece addressed to white women but it basically says the same thing
and that the only reason they would vote for mccain, a man that so embodies the antithesis of all they have struggled for is - right, you got it
but we dont want to make this about race do we, then obama lose for sure
oxford american just ask me to do a piece on race in the south and it feels
like foreign territory to me, my race thoughts for some 20 years now have been
how to advance blackfolk, not particularly concerned with race relations, thats another issue
one thoroughly connected to be sure, just not my turf
as a hoodooman and a cultural nationalist child of the black arts movement i started addressing myself to empowering blackfolks, to working their spirit, their culture, their souls a long time ago - i believe its on us to flip this script, to be stone cold achievers, to be exemplary in every way, then racism will take care of itself, got to force folk to respect us thru the quality of our game
like obama
but i will come up with something, obamas run has kinda raised the curtain off race in america
okay so anyway, as i was saying, frank rich still my boy, did a hellvua column sunday on truthiness
but mareen dowd took the mackdaddy prize this week, a column written by aaron sorkin i think of president bartlet from westwing
giving obama advice, edgame is obama asking how do he hit hard w/o being considered angry, elite or heaven forbid uppity
---------------------------------
OBAMA The problem is we can’t appear angry. Bush called us the angry left. Did you see anyone in Denver who was angry?
BARTLET Well ... let me think. ...We went to war against the wrong country, Osama bin Laden just celebrated his seventh anniversary of not being caught either dead or alive, my family’s less safe than it was eight years ago, we’ve lost trillions of dollars, millions of jobs, thousands of lives and we lost an entire city due to bad weather. So, you know ... I’m a little angry.
OBAMA What would you do?
BARTLET GET ANGRIER! Call them liars, because that’s what they are. Sarah Palin didn’t say “thanks but no thanks” to the Bridge to Nowhere. She just said “Thanks.” You were raised by a single mother on food stamps — where does a guy with eight houses who was legacied into Annapolis get off calling you an elitist? And by the way, if you do nothing else, take that word back. Elite is a good word, it means well above average. I’d ask them what their problem is with excellence. While you’re at it, I want the word “patriot” back. McCain can say that the transcendent issue of our time is the spread of Islamic fanaticism or he can choose a running mate who doesn’t know the Bush doctrine from the Monroe Doctrine, but he can’t do both at the same time and call it patriotic. They have to lie — the truth isn’t their friend right now. Get angry. Mock them mercilessly; they’ve earned it. McCain decried agents of intolerance, then chose a running mate who had to ask if she was allowed to ban books from a public library. It’s not bad enough she thinks the planet Earth was created in six days 6,000 years ago complete with a man, a woman and a talking snake, she wants schools to teach the rest of our kids to deny geology, anthropology, archaeology and common sense too? It’s not bad enough she’s forcing her own daughter into a loveless marriage to a teenage hood, she wants the rest of us to guide our daughters in that direction too? It’s not enough that a woman shouldn’t have the right to choose, it should be the law of the land that she has to carry and deliver her rapist’s baby too? I don’t know whether or not Governor Palin has the tenacity of a pit bull, but I know for sure she’s got the qualifications of one. And you’re worried about seeming angry? You could eat their lunch, make them cry and tell their mamas about it and God himself would call it restrained. There are times when you are simply required to be impolite. There are times when condescension is called for!
OBAMA Good to get that off your chest?
BARTLET Am I keeping you from something?
OBAMA Well, it’s not as if I didn’t know all of that and it took you like 20 minutes to say.
BARTLET I know, I have a problem, but admitting it is the first step.
OBAMA What’s the second step?
BARTLET I don’t care.
OBAMA So what about hope? Chuck it for outrage and put-downs?
BARTLET No. You’re elite, you can do both. Four weeks ago you had the best week of your campaign, followed — granted, inexplicably — by the worst week of your campaign. And you’re still in a statistical dead heat. You’re a 47-year-old black man with a foreign-sounding name who went to Harvard and thinks devotion to your country and lapel pins aren’t the same thing and you’re in a statistical tie with a war hero and a Cinemax heroine. To these aged eyes, Senator, that’s what progress looks like. You guys got four debates. Get out of my house and go back to work.
OBAMA Wait, what is it you always used to say? When you hit a bump on the show and your people were down and frustrated? You’d give them a pep talk and then you’d always end it with something. What was it ...?
BARTLET “Break’s over.”
SUNDAY I THINK?
hello world
dont really have anything to say, just figure it was Wednesday i last posted
numbers been going up, want to keep them that way
kinda working kinda not, putting hours in just not enuf of them, behind on manuscripts, got to focus on that one weekend, just burn thru them
all the laudatories coming out on davidfoster wallace have been moving, i have a radical idea, how about showing writers a little love while they living
okay, you came here for commentary, let me give you commentary - mbeki going down - shame how that went down, in spite of being an mbeki doubter i thought he deserved a little more respect than that, zuma faction played him hard
zimbabwe, still waiting, still trying to give that benefit of the doubt - just like the rest of th world
as for the big news of the day, the bailout, dont quite know what to say about it, instinctively against it, bailing out the banks, do they get to keep the ridiculous profits, salaries, bonuses, options et al they been raking up
or do they get to start all over on the next get ruthless rich scheme, whats the penalty, what new regulations set in place to insure this doesnt happen again with a different set of exotic instruments, a different playing field next time
and let me get this straight, we spose to give bushs treasury secretary unbridled power over trillions of dollars and the economy, the imperial presidency/vice presidency, politicized bush administration
i dont think so, whatever bush doing its a trick
he aint never been serious about governing
and i am not willing to give him or his benefit of no doubt
paulson and bernake made a presentation to congress about it consisted of 9 pages that bush
admin pushing to get done by friday or else they claim civilization as we know it will fall
ie another blank check for bush, remember the last time we gave
him a blank check, a lot the same rhetoric, same playbook
i dont think so, no more blank checks for you buddy, sound
too much like the okeydoke they brought to trick us into iraq
bailing out the bankers, giving more imperial powers to the bush
administration - that have to be looked at w/all deliberate speed
been interesting to see de regulation republicans claiming biggest government failure/intervention since the depression, cute to hear mr de regulation mccain transformed somehow into a raging populist
they are signs all this face paint not working, the lipstick neither, im detecting i hope signs the fascination
w/sarah palin starting to wear thin, depend now on how mccain and palin handle themselves
in the coming debates, whether they can maintain the illusion they are a viable option
under the glare of the spotlight, whether they can sustain the okeydoke
dont even have to gaffe though that would be nice, just the exposure will help, which is why
palin dont do interviews that havent been thoroughly vetted (unlike her own selection),
now todd say he will ignore the subpoenas too - what exactly was todd palin
elected to, is enforcer a job definition that allows you to ignore the law
like cheney bush et al, do they get to determine which laws they
will obey too, howcome they get to do what would land us in jail
is this the way they gon do government business
been there done that
yet and still in spite of all the factors working against the republicans
i still fear racism will be decisive come november
this is a very unique moment, a unique political landscape
wasnt for bush and the republicans total loss of credibility neither obama nor hillary
would have had a chance in hell, its only because of national weariness w/republicans
that a black democrat has the slightest chance of beating the mccain palin farce
the financial crises been an opportunity for the obama campaign, keeps the focus on whats real and
what republican policies, shameless de regulation and unbridled support of the wealthy, have wrought
i like seeing them wiggle, i feel guilty about it cause i know folk suffering
but it will be worth it to get entrenched republicans out of office
only way we will foil the assassins they have put in charge of regulatory agencies,
whose primary responsibility is to kill the agencies they are supposed to head
i dont expect this bailout to do what it says its going to do,
no more than that 600 check they sent us,
this move suppose to make the bankers loosen up credit, restore
their shattered faith in the system by buying up their bad debts
we will see, they will probably just pocket it like i did that 600, that 600
did not change my newfound determination to cut back the inessential
times are going to be hard for awhile and everybody knows it
bankers will stay bunkered and if you got any sense at all so will we
got to live within your means, stock away savings and prudent investments, help your
family members get solvent, hunker down children, the rootdoctor call for defense
the easy credit party is over and probably for the best
it was an illlusion and you know what the old rootdoctor
think about illusion
the pendulum has swung and concentration on the fundamentals
is required, position yourself for the comeback
word by trickmaster
wouldbe prophet of
the hoodoo way
hangtough
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