Upstate Apostate

I am starting a music thread that I will occasionally update with my musical musings. I may even try to pull in some of my previous music tweets, but that seems like too much work.

I respect that farmers had the right to vote for what they believed in I also respect that they are now facing the consequences of their adult decision I’m not interested in fawning profiles of how noble they are. You voted for this, you got it

Black people in America need to be registered to vote, all of us. Full Fk’n Stop. In states like Georgia, Maryland, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, turning to vote can shift outcomes in House, Senate, and gubernatorial races. Look at Georgia. About 3.5 million Black residents live here. Roughly 2.5 million of us are eligible to vote, yet only around 1.4 million of us actually do. That leaves between 900,000 and 1.1 million eligible Black voters not participating. Now compare that to the margins of the last two Ga: governor’s races. In 2018, the race was decided by about 54,000 votes. In 2022, about 191,000 votes. The number of eligible Black voters not participating is between 7 and 10x larger than those margins. This isn’t about theory, it’s about MATH. If we show up consistently, outcomes change. The shift starts with registration, and it is sustained by turnout. Register and VOTE.

I have been sick at heart since the announcement of the Supreme Court decision which gutted the Voting Rights Act. Republicans throughout the south are racing to eliminate Black electoral power to elect representatives who look like them. We have seen this before, throughout Reconstruction and then as political deals and other Supreme Court decisions stripped away the brief gains that former enslaved people received with the 14th and 15th Amendments. But why as a Black person I despair is the stripping of rights is never enough. I fear that like before, the New Jim Crow will be brutally enforced by a corrupt, soulless social order that will stop at nothing to maintain its power. I am a child of Jim Crow refugees. There is history. Shame on the Supreme Court and shame on every person who voted to impose this regime. This is why elections matter. Vote them out in November.

Lee lost the war. Grant won it, first in the west, and then by crushing Lee on his home turf. Trump is buying the “Lost Cause” image of Lee, which sought to portray him as blameless and noble. In fact, Lee supported slavery and killed countless Americans in defense of it.

Trump seems to think '86' definitively means 'kill.' Let's roll the tape and see if that's true:

@raywylie Yes sir

thanks, shelton. a funky old blues cat in dallas told me a long time ago: "you can't put cool between two slices of bread and eat it." .. which was a really badass cool thing to say, don't you think?

He’s not wrong.

Don’t use passive voice here. We weren’t saddled with it. Millions of people thought it would be hilarious to own the libs and that groceries (whatever those are) would be cheap and that government is just a tv show.

If the Black vote wasn't powerful Republicans wouldn't be trying so hard to weaken it.

Lousiana has the second-highest percent of Black residents of any state in the country, second only to Mississippi. New Orleans, Baton Rouge and Shreveport are three of the Blackest major cities in the USA. The Supreme Court just ruled that Louisiana cannot have a single Black representative because, that say, that's racist. But a state defined by Black history and culture having all-white representatives is not. MAGA America, y'all.

This is a good reminder that John Roberts is exactly who John Lewis told us he was.

CANADA: Our Prime Minster studied at Oxford and Harvard, was the Governor of both the Banks of England and Canada, and is recognized as one of the sharpest financial minds around. AMERICA: oh yeah? Our guy passed THREE dementia tests. (Allegedly)

The face of someone who’s devoted their life to service, science and space exploration needing to listen to some draft-dodging, out-of-shape bozo brag that he easily could’ve been an astronaut.

“A REPUBLICAN PRESIDENT COULD STACK THE SUPREME COURT WITH JUSTICES WHO WILL RIP AWAY ALL OF THE PROGRESS WE’VE MADE.”—Hillary Clinton in 2016. Again she was right. She deserves to be respected

The President is an idiot.

Ed Martin is correct about one thing. The “constituent” I opposed pardoning was Greg Lindberg, who was convicted of defrauding North Carolinians to the tune of billions of dollars and attempting to bribe public officials. Keep up the great work, Ed.

I was fired from my job in a gas station in 1962 for singing along to a Contours song (broom handle=mic) instead of working. My boss’s parting words were, “This ain’t the Ed Sullivan Show, kid!” Today in 1967, The Raiders appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show. edsullivan.com/artists/paul-r…

Btw it's "deep six" is the mob term "86" is Trump's IQ

If you're in a financial position to spend more on clothes, I think you should. This does not guarantee humane conditions, but a $12 dress guarantees mistreatment bc you leave nothing on the table for workers. Given the vast, complex global supply chains that go into clothing production, it's not always possible to ensure that what you're purchasing was made ethically from fiber to finish. However, if you've heard of a company being associated with human rights abuses, you can not shop there until conditions improve. Shein has a long, long record of being associated with such abuses.