But, in the world of credit. With all of the states, nearly and completely defaulting on loans, banks who provide yes’s or no’s on small businesses themselves are now being evaluated for questionable credit scores. A lot of DOWNGRADES are happening but no one is actually failing.

Yes Standards and Poors and Mitch are coming hard and this strange trend seems to appear. No one is actually getting bad grades. There are A+’s and A-’s, A1′s and Aa3′s. Really Aa3′s? Really, in a state like Illinois, an Aa3′s in school…those fools would just get D’s and C’s. Seriously. If you can’t pay your bill back, if the state of Illinois or Cali was a small taffy making business, the load paper would simply say DENIED.

Sure I know there is technically in the labeling of credit ratings but seriously. If schools don’t pass out Aa3′s its as delusional as a big and tall store (for women) turning size 18′s into size 2′s, or call a fat chick thick. Serious if getting a Aa3 is just a damaging as saying a F why not just saying and get this thing fixed.

Let’s make this clear.

The BP Oil disaster is the first and official test of how non stereotyped and inconceivably calm, Obama is as a Black President. Yes I said it. Obama…is not Kanye.

For some reason, the envisioned sight of Obama as far back as the election of him freaking out and crying for a 2am phone call must have still stayed in the impressions for many people.  Remember the 2am call. Sure because we aren’t hearing what’s happening, it can seem like he’s not doing anything but, it just seems like it. If anything its probably worse and he’s way cooler that we’d be.

I’ll just say it, there seems to be this comfort of the crying, confused and/or violently emotionally charged Black man that people seem to expect . And this far in his presidency, it seems like  people still can’t shake that he’s not led by emotion but strategy. Go figure right.

Now from personal expereince, there is a strange need for people to be comfortaed by a person of color being broke down, flat out angry and in need of help. I dont know if its a matter of other communities thinking, “as long as they’re more jacked up, we can at least sleep knowing, they can’t pass us up in the morning.” But I speculate.

I remember in tennis, our team mental coach said, “when they hit the wall with the racket, they’ve lost their cool.”

When the oppurtinity to exhbit those attributes do present themselves, the slick talk of “too cool,” and even “robotic” comes up, all with the intent verbally expression frustration for failed attempts of manipulation. But, who’s problem is that really.

But has anyone ever thought that despite the freaking out like most people today seem to exhibit, some people just hand problems calmer? And isn’t a calm thinking person in the time of a catastrophe sometime called, um what is that….a LEADER?

I mean seriously, Bobby Jindal my Indian brother seemed to calm people down by freaking out. James Carevel, who is by the looks not White or even human freaked out, that’s okay. Obama said Ass oooh. So they all care, cuz they cuss.

But seriously if Obama acted like Arsenio Hall in Harlem Nights, I’m sure the concensous would be, “I knew that Negro couldn’t handle it.” I’m sure they thought he’d handle BP like this:

Could the calmness and collectiveness of trying to solve this problem expose the real issue (besides the oil situation) that people have with Obama? I mean not to slap a wet baby down but, that region was not the most color friendly and Jindal showed progress. ,But, during the distruibution of stimulus money they didnt want any and now this, they should have had it just as much as NYC with terrorism.

And despite the claims of the industry being ruined by the oil, based on the interviews I’ve seen most were going bankrupt before hand. Granted the addition of Katrina stress hurt. But damn. But I do have to give Jindal probs for stepping up or the boaters being honest and non-handoutish and junk. To be fair. The real question is, could Jindal act like this with flotilla, immigration and this junk on the brain…and be calm.

Personally I’m more disturb at Tennessee response more than anything. But shinny keys.

And to show how bogus Obama would have looked flinching to the suspicions ouf being cold, the Mayor of Alabama, who at first was mad that the President didnt say the coast was viturally clear, is now emotionally embarrassed after people came to their coast for vaycay, based on his clams a week ago, only to encounter oil that he made point was not there.

Now Black folks are not in the clear, they like to envision the dumb “Hill Billy” image on White America. But it is strange how there never seem to be any boaters of color being interviewed. I recall seeing a mad amount of gnerational Asians in a documentary a while back. In all fairness, its jacked up.

I have my thoughts and theories but in the end, the only race I want to see for anything and everywhere, is leadership.

A one on camera film about Michael Ruppert, an ex LA cop, turned reporter who “predicted” the economic collapse and additional things to come. In this sit down film that plays more like a less campy version of Michael Moore’s movie about the Collapse of the comfortable world as we know it.

Directed By Chris Smith | Official Site | View Trailer

]]> http://urbanmagnate.com/2009/11/17/collapse-trailer/feed/ 0 http://urbanmagnate.com/2009/10/14/the-rush-card/ http://urbanmagnate.com/2009/10/14/the-rush-card/#comments Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:06:58 +0000 Magnate http://urbanmagnate.com/?p=1430 Someone asked me if I had a problem with Rush Limbaugh owning a portion of the St. Louis Rams and my response was a real quick… No…not really.

Now I’m sure people would expect outradge and what the fuzznuts but, I look at things differently than most, for which I have long ago accepted.

See there seems to be a real sure thing, if you want someone do the opposite, basically just say “Rush likes it too.” Not only has he become the sure fire distraction for big issues in news/media. Its a sure way to get someone to do exactly what you want and for those that agree with him, its a two-fer cause the reality is, Rush doesn’t agree with half the stuff coming out of his mouth, making him dangerously impressionable but, in no way one of a kind.

So for my response to him owning a part of a NFL team, I asked this question to the person who asked me…”You know about Rush, but I bet you have no clue were the heart lays for the men who own most of this stuff. ” And that is the real question, if you found out a major company owner was a racist or a child molester or Michael Bolton fan, would you continue to use their products? 9 out of 10 chances is, you already have been and would come up with excuses to continue being a loyal customer.

Does it make it right? Well, the real question what can you live without? What most people fail to realize many of the owners of these teams have a lot in common with Rush, you just have the luxury to hear what he says most of the time. The difference, he gets paid to say it which makes him the victim of possibly sensationalizing for profit. Making him not really one of the billionaires that own teams but a wannabe, with a freshly cashed check. The  controversy of what he says keeps money in his pocket but, if he was caught in bed with Omarosa and Oprah, his career would be done, lets keep it real.  If anything it seems like he does everything allowed, to prey and profut off of the racial insecurity that plagues America.

What’s even worse, if you have a problem with him owning part of a team, imagine White rich men, over 60 years ago, who at that time where open and  unapologetically members of the Klan and actually went to the lengths to keep ppl of color on their team. I won’t even go into these baseball teams. Yet we all hear about Jackie Robinson or Clemente breaking barriers because at that time, ppl  just accepted most team owners were racist. Now, not so much. I wonder why that is? And if there is a problem with him owning a part of the Rams, should there be a problem with Jay-Z being apart of the Barclays invested franchise? I mean its no secret Barclays was the go to supply store of the slave trade movement, yet there was no major public outcry then.

Lets face it, if we stopped using products such that aided the Nazi movement or anything else we’d be left to riding bicycles, twigs and using rocks for pens. Rush prosing to buy in, just let the common folk in on what’s been happening for years. Should we be happy that is happens in a time when there is economic peril. It just seems like if he bought a stake in the team 15 years ago when ppl had money, very few would actually complain.

I’ve yet to hear one reason on why people are collectively worried about public health care, from the media and I’ve yet to hear one good reason on why American people should have to pay $3000 for a leg cast, from its opposers. Either way, people who are for, disagree on how free heath care should be and the others, well, they just don’t like public funding to affect their, um…social security income umm..errr, hmmm. And personally, no one is really explaining what we get out of all of this, if it passes or not *cough it will*.

For cash for clunkers, like I’d been saying for a while now, a car over $25K, albeit an expensive car means squat nowdays, if it doesn’t get over 19 miles to the gallon, and I’m pretty sure in about 2-3yrs, every car, praised and driven off the lot , by the time the owners pay off these new semi new cars with their Cars Rebate System, those will be just as illegitimate as the cars that replaced them. I can’t wait to see the emissions lines then. But here is the catch, the very clever catch and reason behind all of this… no matter how much we all complain to disagree or not, this will happen and without option. And unemployment, once seen as a bad thing, will become the easy manner to accept everything people now think they hate.

Cash For Clunkers
The car industry, once over supplied with cars, as much a month ago, was met with demand for the first time in nearly a year. Co-winkie? Nope, with everyone turning in their cars for rebates, it sent a shock pulse through the car industry. Giving it sorta of a reboot and making auto lots, popular again. With the government, on the back-end still managing the operating fiances of the auto industry, cash for clunkers too me seems completely necessary from their end, to get not only a return on investment after bailing out US automakers, but forcing the transition of new, seemingly better auto production on a consumer who, technically couldn’t afford it but now, some how has found a way to invest in a new car, just to drive…not to their jobs but to the unemployment line.

Unemployment, Health Care’s Best Friend
Ah unemployment. The true catalyst for making universal health care necessary. I mean if those government jobs for building new transits and infrastructures work out, people will flock to those jobs if there is nothing else for them…sorry, its a fact. And if the main job supplier is the government, like it or not, the government will be the main supplier for…health care. So like the Cash for Clunkers, and even the bank bailouts, its all clear now. Their decision is NOT based on your investment, its based on how the government foresees its spending in the next 20-30 years. And if your in need of their support, you ain’t got a word to say about it…period. And if they have to pay, trust, they will want to make the rules in their favor, meaning, we’re destined for universal health care no matter what.

With all that said, I can understand America’s interest regaining the olympics. New president, new direction, new…I won’t go there but, you get the idea. The olympics may be used as public relations event to cleanse the world of US antics, as far back as 1996. (I’m talking blatant generalizations ok but, we were asses, esp in 2000). And that whole doping epidemic of a lot of US athletics might not help either.

So here we have a new pres, from Chicago and the mayor of Chicago, seems like the only person, other than the White House, oh and Oprah, that want it there. There has been so much of a struggle, you’d think there was some injustice going there with the whole ordeal….well don’t dust off your protest signs too fast. This IS Chicago and as I always say, nothing is ever that wrong, in this case, by accident.

See the alderman and the political flunkies of those, ergo cronies, have been very quick to complain about Daley and the Olympics. Yet, reporters can’t seem to understand why they wouldn’t want it. No one seems to be complaining about the real reason they may not get it, transportation. Have you ever tried getting around the ENTIRE Chicago region. wtf. There had been mention of development displacement…BUT a lot of that displacement is already occurring by the hands of the same people complaining, if not the new normal of foreclosure. So, what the hell Chicago?

My suspicious, is that Chicago politicians, esp in Black neighborhoods are complaining about the Olympics because of money. Money that comes from development deals and kick backs. You’d think they’d want to cool out with that albeit like 4 alderman/women, I think 3 Black, one Latino have already been under FBI arrest or informing for lesser sentences. Why, if someone wants to develop something in their neighborhood, they’ve gotta give up the cash.

In order to successfully be contenders for the Olympics, a lot of new development is necessary which means, how dare the Mayor (& the President) build something without giving them a cut. No money for them? So, no development and in the end, potentially no Olympics. I do want to say, if people are getting arrested one after another for doing this, what kind of dumb ass do you have to be, to be greedy NOW, with all of the problems going on, under a microscope. I’m sure when its all said and done, we can either lose the Olympics or gain it, but most of Chicago management would be in jail by that time. Or, maybe its all a bait to catch all the crooks in one, neat little pile.

This is what I have been waiting on. I could have posted heresy for the past 6 months but, seriously once I heard there was a potential change, in the monetary setup…nothing meant anything until this speech, right here. So watch and now read the flood in of posts from me to really see what’s up.

FTC is now looking into taking mofos getting over with Blogola. Sure when you go to a site and the background is blaring ads or a new show’s banner is all covering the damn text, you know somethings is up.

…such back-scratching endorsements could become tougher under a coming set of Federal Trade Commission guidelines designed to clarify how companies can court bloggers to write about their products. This summer, the government agency is expected to issue new advertising guidelines that will require bloggers to disclose when they’re writing about a sponsor’s product and voicing opinions that aren’t their own. The new FTC guidelines say that blog authors should disclose when they’re being compensated by an advertiser to discuss a product. [via]

Now I’m all for people getting legal tender by all “legal” means, cause the more legal it is, the longer you keep it but, I’m really worried about people’s perception of what they read and based on real life discussions I have had with people…some people really do believe everything they read. And are skeptical about actual things that could help them…well played.

See the whole blogola thing seems meh..but when Rupert and the boys start talking about charging fines on those copy&pasting AP articles, the once atmosphere of opinion sites known as blogs, start to create the illusion that opinions trump legitimate journalism. I mean there are whole schools dedicated to journalism ethics and to call yourself a journalist when all you do is blog is why all of this is bogus.  If you take opinion based writing or gossip and pass it off as ethical, of course people will want to make money off of it and…take money from it, it not be apart of the whole “machine” to dumb yo dumb ass down.

I like mentioned on Saturday, there seems to be something missing with this…”potential pandemic,” like people actually dying (in mass numbers..200 yesterday, 300 last week,etc). Granted tomorrow will be officially a week since it became hype. I’m sure with all of the tweeting,etc the rumors don’t help and if photos of dead bodies poppued up we’d know…right?

It doesn’t help that they mention over 250,000 people die from the regular flu. When you put in perspective, why would this be that big of an issue unless… there is more to this story, either way, this whole,  just enough info to worry and not enough to be concerned is a dangerous combo to create rumors and precautions that could actually lead to an issue, before something actually happens. Remember how 12 monkeys happened? Well the semi-spoiler led to a butterfly effect of the time-traveler, giving the idea of a flu to a guy, which resulted in a preemptive strike that, led to the actual release of a flu that would have been inevitable, no matter who started it. (I think my eyes just crossed trying to explain that.)

Either way, the prepping for this flu could easily leave us wide open for a real virus, if people don’t start getting gestation info and mapping. I would say how its interesting Africa hasn’t seem to be affective but, with Aids and all I doubt people are really relieved. Maybe a little smug…I get it, you’re forever dealing with disease. 

Oh and sidebar: All of this, fake-caring but, blaming Mexico talk on the flu. The real issue comes down to this, if the Mexican government had better communication with their rural towns, these outside towsn would have received the medical support to not die in the first place, let alone spread. At this point, its the people with no contact to the city I worry for the most. They’ve been alone before all of this.