Michael Jackson Causes Car Accident!

The Freedom Rider has been telling her loyal readers that it is very dangerous to spend too much time thinking about celebrities. But even I didn't think that talking about Michael Jackson could cause a car accident.

A Long Island woman, Cheryl Picker, pulled on to a highway shoulder to call a talk radio show. I am a bit sympathetic only because she wanted to tell the hosts of the program that they spent too much time talking about Jacko. I agree with her but she ended up making her point in a way that she could not possibly have intended.

While parked on the highway shoulder another car rear ended hers and flipped it over. Fortunately Ms. Picker was wearing a seat belt and was not seriously hurt. However, given that as she put it, "The back of the car was in the front of the car," she was very lucky indeed. Of course Ms. Picker's misadventure was recorded for the entertainment of other listeners and the rest of us as well.

Let this be a lesson to you all. Paying too much attention to media drivel may be hazardous to your health.

Gore Endorses Dean and the Kerry Implosion Continues

Gore gets it. He learned the hard way that the inside the Beltway pundits can't be satisfied. They must be taken on and sometimes completely ignored. Already they are targeting Dean but Dean isn't having it. Check out this exchange with CNN's Judy Woodruff about Dean's change in denomination.


WOODRUFF: Was it just over a bike path that you left the Episcopal Church?

DEAN: Yes, as a matter of fact it was. I was fighting to have public access to the waterfront, and we were fighting very hard in the citizens group to allow the public to use it. And this particular diocese decided to join a property rights suit to close it down. I didn't think that was very public spirited.

One thing I feel about religion, you have to be very careful not to be a hypocrite if you're a religious person. It is really tough to preach one thing and do something else. And I don't think you can do that.

WOODRUFF: And you don't believe, Governor, the Republicans are going to have a field day with comments like these?

DEAN: The Republicans always have a field day with things like this. That's the reason Democrats lose, is because they're so afraid of the Republicans having a field day with comments like this or like that, that they never make any comments.

I don't know if Dean will beat Bush, but he certainly knows the right way to go about it. I don't think he will be another McGovern. Dean isn't as liberal as the pundits make him out to be and he is making an effort to expand votes beyond Gore's blue states. He is not only acting like his nomination is inevitable but he is acting like he is already president.

Dean will be the nominee. As I have said before, the other candidates who are in Congress blew it when they voted in support of war in Iraq. I am sorry they didn't have more courage because I would be happier if there were a real fight for the nomination instead of a blow out before any votes have been cast. Speaking of which, it really is time for Kerry to hang it up. As I said back on November 2nd he is only embarrassing himself.

Kerry's latest shot in the foot comes from a Rolling Stone interview. There isn't much he can say to justify supporting the war, but this now famous quote is just pathetic. "Did I expect George Bush to fuck it up as badly as he did? I don't think anybody did."

Pardon me Senator, but millions of people around the world knew this misadventure was just that. Without benefit of intelligence briefings I knew the reasons given for going to war were a lie and that the results would be catastrophic for the U.S. and to the world. Plenty of us knew that Bush would f_ _k it up and we didn't have to curse to make our points. Then again we weren't desperate to stay in a presidential race we should have won handily. Kerry looked less foolish shooting birds and riding motorcycles with Jay Leno.

I Miss Papi

I miss George H. W. Bush. Just think of it. He got Arab countries to help beat Saddam in the first Gulf War and he got Europe and Japan to pay for the effort. Pretty neat wasn't it? There was no request for $87 billion from the tax payers when dad was running things.

I am joking of course. You have to be pretty bad to make me nostalgic for the guy who waged war to get Manuel Noriega. Unbeknownst to me at the time, Daddy Bush got Arab support because he wasn't afraid to stand up to the Israelis. Here is an excerpt from Juan Cole's site.

The Bush senior administration had a big fight with then Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir in winter of 1991 because it would not share the "Identify Friend or Foe" codes in use over Iraq with the Israelis. Without broadcasting the right IFF codes, Israeli fighter planes that had tried to strike Iraq would have risked being misidentified as Iraqi hostiles and shot down by the US or other United Nations forces. Shamir was livid, but Bush senior refused to relent.

Why did the senior Bush behave this way? Because he wanted Egypt, Syria and other Arab states to continue to support the Gulf War. They were upset with Saddam because he had invaded Kuwait, a fellow Arab League member, and they were willing to join the US in a war to get the Iraqis back out of Kuwait. But they would not have been willing to fight another Arab country as direct allies of Israel, and if they had done so, they would have been so delegitimized at home that they might well have face revolutions. Bush senior knew this.

W. doesn't have his father's experience with the world, and is, frankly, an ignoramus. If he is letting the US effort in Iraq be tarred with the brush of Israeli occupation, he is actually acting as the world's most prominent recruiting agent for al-Qaeda in the Muslim world. Because that is al-Qaeda's message to angry young Muslim men who feel humiliated by US power and by Israeli brutality in the West Bank and Gaza. Al-Qaeda says, the Americans are not in Iraq to bring democracy. They are bringing Israeli hegemony to the Middle East.

Do you want more bad news? Israeli assassination teams are training U.S. soldiers. That's right. The actions that have made Israel a target of suicide bombers are being brought to Iraq. What's next, bulldozing homes, and arresting the family members of wanted Baathists? How forgetful of me. We are already doing that. Now we know why.

Civil Disobedience

The time has come for federal judges to go to jail. They should do so willingly if that is what we need to fight the latest right wing outrage. The far right wing in this country count on the fact that very few Americans have the inclination or the ability to pay attention to details. The media usually help by ignoring the news we need to know but occasionally even the New York Times does its job and gives us the news that is fit to print.

You probably have not heard of the Feeney Amendment. It allows Congress to have access to all of the supporting documents from federal sentencing decisions. As I recall from my school days in the last Ice Age, we have a separation of powers in this country. The legislative branch can't tell the judicial how to do their jobs. Our conservative friends are at it again. They change the rules as they go along.

By the way, the Feeney Amendment was sneaked into the Amber Alert bill. How did we get the Amber Alert bill? Once we were terrified about child abductions it was easy. You now see why I caution against being influenced by the latest media effort to scare us. The truly scary people always use these things to screw the rest of us later on.

Poster Art of the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict

One of the most important issues in American politics is sadly one of the least discussed. Check out an online exhibition of Israeli and Palestinian poster art.

Child Snatchings! Shark Attacks! Influenza Pandemic!

The media is at it again. Of course they could give us useful information but noooooo. Celebrities are out this week but death and fear are in. The press aren't satisfied unless we are distracted by nonsense or in a state of fear.

Yes, the makers of flu vaccine have run out of this season's supply but your doctor probably has some on hand. But Freedom Rider, you ask, isn't the flu more dangerous this year? I'm glad you brought that up. In fact the flu is dangerous every single year. An average of 36,000 Americans die from influenza every year. Most of those who die are the elderly or others with serious health problems.

I get flu shots every fall because I have asthma. My suggestion for chicken littles across the land is this. Talk to your doctor. Ask if you are among those who need the vaccine.Follow his or her advice and then relax. When you finish relaxing send an email to the media outlets who told you the sky was falling. Ask them why they love to send you into a state of terror. If you get an answer let me know.

By the way, colds and flu are passed hand to mouth. So don't panic. Just wash your hands a lot.

Double Your Pleasure, Double Your Fun

Not with gum, but with Black Commentator. You get a double dose of the Freedom Rider and a great web site too.

American Terrorists

The New York Times and the rest of the allegedly liberal media missed this story. White supremacists armed with 500,000 rounds of ammo, 100 bombs plus components, machine guns, chemical agents and a sodium cyanide gas bomb were seized by federal agents last May in Texas. I guess this news isn't fit to print. I had not seen this story reported until this week. Read about it here.

A Lynching in Minnesotata

One of many reasons I can't stomach Clarence Thomas is that he trivialized the word lynching. During his confirmation hearing he whined and complained about a "high tech lynching." From that day to this every black person with a gripe has complained about being lynched.

In Duluth, Minnesota in 1920 three young black men accused of assaulting a white woman were dragged from jail and hung from a lamp post. A crowd of 10,000 watched. That is a lynching, not Michael Jackson being arrested, not black conservative judges being denied confirmation. Now as they say, everyone has gotten in on the act. White conservatives are now calling their black colleagues lynching victims.

I wish Americans did want to talk about lynchings. A monument to the Duluth, Minnesota lynching victims has recently been erected and everyone is not happy about it. In the Times article I linked to above, one citizen opines that, ". . . those men wouldn't have been killed if they hadn't done nothing, would they?"

From the end of the Civil War until the 1950s the lynching of more than 3,400 black men, women and children were documented. Victims who were hanged were the luckiest. Some were mutilated, burned alive and castrated. Lynchings were announced in the newspaper and drew thousands of onlookers.

The shame of lynching still haunts this nation. I am often amused when Americans criticize Germans for not acknowledging the Jewish holocaust or the Japanese who won't apologize for the rape of Nanking, China. Americans are no better at owning up to the many wrongs committed in this country.

How many of us are really ready to talk about lynching? White people are in denial or ashamed, black people often find the subject too painful or ignore it out of fear. If we talk about lynching we have to talk about how white supremacy still oppresses us. We have to talk about living with the anger that arises when we acknowledge our past.

I for one am more than ready to talk about lynching and the other chapters in the often sordid history of America. But if all we want to do is engender sympathy or score political points we need to come up with a different word.

Et tu Julian Bond?

I have a friend who is always in a snit because black ministers have been ordained, pun intended, by the media as the most important and prominent of those constituting black leadership. When Jesse Jackson first ran for president she would fume, "What about Julian Bond? Why doesn't someone like him run?" I agreed with her that Bond has one of the most dynamic, charismatic and articulate personas of all those given the title Civil Rights Leader. Needless to say I am writing this post because I have a few questions for Bond, the president of the University of Virginia and God only knows whom else.

Bond is a history professor at the University of Virginia. According to this account from UVA, several staff members were discussing the names of sports teams. One participant in the conversation used the Washington Redskins as an example of a team with an offensive name. The individual added that the word redskin is as offensive as the word nigger. Assuming this account is correct I see no reason for anyone to be upset. Julian Bond received an email from another black faculty member about the incident and suggested that the misspeaker in question be fired or at least be heavily sensitized. The president agreed that the word is insulting and recommended that the offender get a very strong talking to.

I hate to use the term political correctness. Whatever meaning it ever had has been discredited by conservatives who pine for the good old days when they could be as hateful as they liked without fear of reprimand. But this incident gives credence to some complaints about the era of correctness. I don't know what Bond was told or how the administration at UVA initially responded, but a person of Bond's experience should have had the facts on hand before making any comments. I am giving him the benefit of the doubt. I assume he was told a different version of events.

But suppose he was given the official UVA account? I don't even want to think about that possibility. I now know why we are stuck with the hated term "N word." I always wondered why people wouldn't say nigger, even if they were quoting someone else or acknowledging the term's offensiveness. Poor white America. They just can't win.

Because I am doing so well as a prognosticator, see yesterday's post, I will go out on a limb with another prediction. Julian Bond has a long and illustrious careeer but is largely self-educated. He is a poet and author but he dropped out of Morehouse College to pursue his passion as an activist in the movement. Bond should get a lot of credit for life experience, but I am certain that before the week is out the right wing will ask why he is a history professor at all and use the mantra of political correctness to discredit him. That will be very sad indeed. Julian Bond and many others like him have quite a lot to offer the world of academia. UVA students could do worse than be taught by him.

Imitation is the Most Sincere Form of Flattery

The New York Times has finally caught up with the Freedom Rider. On November 14th I said that the electoral college map favors Bush. Population shifts in America continue to favor the south and the west, you know, the red states. If he only wins the states he won in 2000 he will receive seven additional electoral votes. Yikes.

Just remember that the Freedom Rider scooped the Times.

World AIDS Day

Today is World's AIDS Day. What does that mean anyway? Apparently it means that we need to send celebrities to South Africa. Beyonce, of the brigade of one-named R&B singers, visited Nelson Mandela's old cell on Robben Island, had lots of pictures taken and sang and danced her little heart out. She also gave sage advice. "There is nothing sexier than being confident and taking care of yourself. Protect yourself." Oprah was there too. We can't discuss a life and death issue for millions of people around the world unless Oprah is around and promoting her book club. Cry the Beloved Country, written 50 years ago, is the latest entry. I really should stop complaining that Oprah picked a well known but dated book for millions of her fans to read. Something post apartheid might have been nice, but after East of Eden all complaints should cease.

Whoever had the idea of using Mandela's prison ID number to market this event was a genius. It is a ploy that silences all but the most cynical, people like yours truly. I know I am a tough grader. Some say I am overly critical. I plead guilty. We first had celebrity self love charity events nearly 20 years ago to fight hunger. Wouldn't you know it, Bob Geldof of Live Aid has popped up again. I am not opposed to using celebrities to bring attention to important issues. But it is important to remember this World AIDS Day that our attention must be directed toward interests whose actions are responsible for the deaths of millions of AIDS sufferers. If we successfully fight those interests we won't need free concerts in South Africa to bring attention to AIDS because AIDS will be irrelevant.

One of those interests is the American pharmaceutical industry. American drug companies could end the majority of AIDS deaths tomorrow. But of course the same people who want to punish Canada for selling drugs more cheaply aren't going to give up profits to help sick, impoverished people around the world. The drug companies and their biggest ally, the U.S. government, are deliberately withholding cheap, life saving, generic AIDS medication from poor countries. A free concert is OK, admirable even, but if it isn't getting AIDS medicine to the poor, it is ultimately unimportant.

The other enemy interest in this fight is religious fundamentalism. The Catholic Church has said that condoms cause AIDS. You read correctly. The Catholic Church, which sways the thoughts and attitudes of millions of people around the world, is advising against condom use. Now that I think about it I should lay off Beyonce. At least she has common sense about condoms.

I know I have brought a skunk to the party. I am not against concerts and candle light vigils. It is important to do what we can to feel empowered and involved. But somewhere along the line we have to talk about what really counts. Celebrity charity concerts are 20 years old, but so is the discovery of the HIV virus. We know how to prevent AIDS, we know how to treat its victims. The only thing lacking is the willingness to confront powerful interests such as the United States government, drug companies and retrograde religious leadership. That will be a lot more difficult than having a concert.

Happy World AIDS Day.


"Why did they shoot a kindergarten with tank shells?�

Why indeed. News reports say that U.S. troops killed 54 Iraqi fighters who ambushed them in the town of Samarra. The residents of that town say that at most 8 fighters were killed. The remaining casualties were all civilians, some of whom took up arms after U.S. troops fired indiscriminately. The money quote, "They claim we are terrorists. So OK, we are terrorists. . ." Read it here.

Wife Swapping FDNY Style

After 9/11 firefighters were all but deified. I suspect that it was mostly the result of yuppie guilt. Too many Americans ignore or feel superior to blue collar workers. I recall one smarty pants New Yorker saying of firefighters, "I thought they just sat around with dalmatians all day." This gentleman and many like him realized that in fact their lives could be saved by people they thought little about. Some of the firefighters in the World Trade Center walked as far as the 80th floor before the buildings collapsed. Even though they were doing their jobs they still deserve our thanks. If the job paid six figures I still wouldn't do it. I shouldn't shrink from thanking those who do.

Of course, because Americans attack every issue with religious zeal that realization wasn't good enough. Firefighters were heroes, saints, angels. No amount of worship was sufficient. Well, it seems some of them are flesh and blood after all. According to the New York Post some of the surviving firefighters got a little too close to 9/11 widows and their children. Some have left their own wives and children to hold hands with the damsels in distress. Oops.

Apparently the same thing happened in Oklahoma City after the American led terror attack. The practice of sending married men to take care for lonely widows should go on the "don't" list after the next terror attack. Yes, I said next. We clearly aren't prepared and even more people around the world hate us. In all probability it will happen again. Hopefully we will have prevented the scourge of firefighting swingers.

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Hail Britannia

Power and its trappings bring temptation. Wouldn't it be tempting to go to Buckingham Palace and receive the Order of the British Empire from the Queen? Well at least one person is able to say thanks but no thanks. In the British newspaper the Guardian, writer Benjamin Zephaniah says hell no I won't go.

Bush in Iraq

I had a great Thanksgiving with my family. After dinner, dessert and football I turned on the news. If I had known Bush pulled off another propaganda stunt I would have eaten more pie and skipped the news. Here is the real story.

Thanksgiving

Double your pleasure this Thanksgiving, read the Freedom Rider in Black Commentator. I hope you also take the opportunity to read all of Black Commentator. I don't know of any other website that has been villified by right wing Senator Orrin Hatch. As far as I am concerned that is the Good Housekeeping seal of approval.

Paris Hilton Sex Tape!

Spam in much discussed but merely an annoyance. Our cowardly Congress can't stop war or the privatization of Medicare but by golly they will stamp out spam if it is the last thing they do!

Frankly, if they can keep Paris Hilton Sex Tape ads out of my email box I will applaud their efforts. Recently I have received a minimum of 10 spam messages every day exhorting me to see the Paris Hilton Sex Tape. I fear for a society that exalts Paris Hilton. In listing signs of the end time the bible should have added pointless celebrity to plagues, pestilence, famine and rumors of war. (Matthew 24:6-7) Apparently even the apostles could not foresee Paris Hilton and her ilk.

Klan vs. Klan

Bodies with gaping wounds, some bayoneted through the eyes, some with skulls beaten through, others with hideous wounds as if their bowels had been ripped open with bowie-knives, plainly told that but little quarter was shown to our troops. Strewn from the fort to the river bank, in the ravines and hollows, behind logs and under the brush where they had crept for protection from the assassins who pursued them, we found bodies bayoneted, beaten, and shot to death, showing how cold-blooded and persistent was the slaughter of our unfortunate troops.
Witness to Fort Pillow Massacre

How should one react upon learning that one Klansman accidentally shot another during a bizarre initiation ritual complete with nooses, paint ball and real bullets? I for one just laughed out loud.

The Klan was founded in Pulaski, Tennessee by Nathan Bedford Forest. Forest made a fortune selling slaves and became a general for the Confederacy. He massacred white and black Union soldiers after they surrendered at Fort Pillow, which was located near Jackson, Tennessee. White soldiers were murdered, but black soldiers, particularly those with the rank of sergeant, were singled out for butchery. They were nailed to logs and burned alive. It is indeed ironic that this Klan shooting incident also occurred in Tennessee.

The Confederacy considered captured black soldiers to be fugitive slaves who had no rights traditionally accorded to prisoners. Union leaders such as Secretary of War Stanton and Secretary of State Seward wanted to execute an equal number of Confederate POWs but Lincoln denied the request. The Confederate refusal to treat black and white POWs alike resulted in the end of prisoner exchanges, which resulted in conditions at prisons such as Andersonville.

I never wanted to belong to any group that required initiation. I shake my head when I read that someone forced to chug too much beer died in an attempt to join omega kappa phoolish. Who wants to belong to the Klan, an organization filled with racist losers. A racist and loser of course.

We do need to be reminded that everyone did not accept the changes brought about by the civil rights movement. There are many racist losers in our society. Most of them are harmless, but lest we forget, Timothy McVeigh also joined the Klan. In 1995 168 Americans found out the hard way that this man may have been a loser, but he was far from harmless.

Read more about Fort Pillow here.

Good Riddance

Bush doesn't know or doesn't care that the British hate him, so it won't bother him that his visit wrecked the Queen's garden.

All the News Fit to Print

The U.S. Army has backtracked on its original assertion that 2 soldiers were mutilated after being shot in Iraq. Those of us silly enough to quote the Army must retract our statements (November 23rd post). Of course, we are now left to wonder which version of the story is true.

Whither Iraq

We will lose in Iraq. We have begun the destruction of a nation that was not a danger to us, all so that we can get their oil, let Israel have its way in that region and have a base for American troops. By the way, if you were in any way hopeful about the supposed turning over of Iraq to the Iraqis by June, you have been snookered. We will have at least 100,000 troops there until 2006 at least, even if they have their throats slit.

More Freedom Rider

How could I forget to give myself a plug? You get more where this came from right here.

Mujahadeen are the Good Guys

I am old enough to remember when the Mujahadeen were the good guys. They fought the evil Soviets in Afghanistan. You don't have to tell your age, but perhaps this will jog your memory.

Asia Times Online Cartoon - By Gavin Coates.gif