Moboma vs Billary

01) Michelle Obama isn't any less ambitious then Hillary Clinton was during Bill's Presidential Campaign.

02) Michelle Obama is also Barack's closest advisor, which is good for a marriage, but when it comes to bedroom discussion about running the country, I think Bill is better suited.

03) Michelle and Hillary were both born in Chi-Town (that would make KA happy.)

04) Michelle is an earth sign and Hillary's a water sign, so they would make a great lesbian couple running the White House well together.

05) And if you're offended by number 4, think about the latest poll. A woman can be viewed as competent or well-liked but never both.

06) So while Michelle is busy rolling eyes and sucking teeth, she's not viewed any different then Hillary, So if Hill's a Bitch that makes her the _____ Bitch.

07) I'm just sayin'.

08) Barack's a Leo. A fire sign...

09) Bill's a Virgo, Leo cusp.

10) Consequently, you know Virgo is the only sign represented by a Female? Kind of like his Presidency was marked by a female.

11) Virgo is an earth sign... At least Hillary knows how to deal with them.

12) Both Bill and Obama fathers' died in car accidents.

13) Obama and Hillary have spouses who speak before they think.

i guess there is really little difference between the two families. as is with the presidential campaigns. but there is.

i guess what i'm saying is this. don't allow your race, ethnicity, gender, celebrities, hype, a good sounding speech, momentum or some fcking music video (sorry jo) sway your vote. a week or so ago in dallas, when i declined to stand in line at the obama rally, an older black woman frowned upon me when i told her i was on the fence. i also told her if i had to vote today she wouldn't be happy with my response. she then scold me with "this is history, you may never get another chance." i mean really? i may never get another chance to vote for a woman either.

when it came down to it, i voted with my beliefs and values. yes, i know it's history, but i'm also old enough to know that history doesn't always yield good lessons. remember the boat ride? remember the civil rights?

i keep listening to the subtlety in the commercials, and would not be surprised if it weren't a republican financing them. best skilled and temperament? WDF? temperament? come on people. don't get me wrong. I LOVE OBAMA. and i know why they love obama. He's that "black friend everyone say's they have. remember he's so articulate, he speaks so well. but what are you really saying? and as my girl says, "is america really ready for michelle?"

i think if he and hill could get it together, then, that's a fcking ticket. in the end, there's still a political machine waiting for them in november. and i can only hope, that the hype continues til then. in our microwave world, i'm not sure if "everyone" will stay focused enough to remember what's needed most in november. SOLIDARITY!

Home with the flu, not in any order..

01) My nurse!!!!!
02) That you're dirty thirty and ain't taken _______ into your new year!!!!!
03) Moments of clarity.
04) Hosting the youth slam!!! I mean I love it. REALLY.
05) Him asking me to host. WOW! Like WOW. Sorry I was sick.
06) Moments that reminded me of how the poetry world used to be.
07) G.O.D. answering questions before they are asked.
08) Becoming a bit more humble.
09) Convos with him... Next lifetime and every lifetime. L n Z.
10) Hanging out at the door with ELM.
11) A new Badu that she hasn't opened yet.
12) That my women friends are moving patiently forward in careers, life and love (YOU ACED IT!)
13) KIM'S ROCK HARD!!!!! PERIOD!!!!

bonus) copa texts. voting early.

A switch

reading my coffee cup

the way I see it #279

"Beware of turning into the enemy you most fear. All it takes is to lash out violently at someone who has done you some grievous harm, proclaiming that only your pain matters in this world. More than against that person's body, you will then, at that moment, be committing a crime against your own imagination."

I got a call, actually several stalking like calls from an ex a couple of weeks ago. One could only imagine loving someone deeply only to have that love fade into disdain. To say hate would be strong. Let's just say, I learned later in life what we shared was not love in an adult sense. That actually, in the seven years we were in relationship, we made the shift from lovers to luvemies (lovers you love to hate). So to hear the voice only the other end of the line, sent eerie chills down my spine.

When I finally answered the phone, I said things that were cruel. And I can be pretty dang cruel. I meant every one of those things. I had grown way past polite many years ago when we departed. I mean, how many times can you break up with someone? At the time of our breakup, C (not Craig) caused me a great deal of pain. I had met Craig by now and was relatively happy in the semi dating phase with him. Initially, like most, I believed we could be friends. I never want to lose touch with someone I shared so much of my life with. Later, all I wanted was to part ways and fade desperately into oblivion. After I refused to contemplate a reconciliation, I received threatening phone calls at my home and place of employment. The places I frequented were invaded in an effort to "run into me". Any potential relationship I thought about entering into was quickly diminished as I was slandered in an effort to shame me back into our old circle of friends, patterns and relationship. Anyone who has ever had a horrific break-up would simply understand how I felt when I heard this, this person, this voice on the other end of my phone, oddly enough, wanting to be..... friends.

Then something else happened. I became of victim of frienvy. You know, a friend wanting what you have. I was pretty perturbed and angry about that. But the problem was we "really weren't friends anymore." I'm no so co-dependent and childish that we have to talk everyday. I have friends I speak to monthly, and we know almost everything going on in each others lives. But to call when you want something, when you need a hook-up/favor, when some thing's going wrong in your life, when you want to bum rush my plans with my friends, doesn't constitute friendship. I mean this person had grown, not into an enemy, but a frenemy. She walked that fine line, so the frienvy moment was the defining one.

Then, I was reminded of how loose some lips are... Don't believe what you hear and definitely be cautious of what you see. It's all deceiving. If it's not your life or your truth, don't repeat it. Another frenemy that would swear we were Fam.

And it went on and on and on....

But you know what I did. I turned off that switch. I turned off the "people are out to get you switch", and turned on the "live and let live switch".

I mean, it's so much more positive to see these things as:
Someone who once loved you is reaching out to you. You don't have to reach back.
Imitation can sometimes be the greatest form of flattery.
Wow, I am important and powerful. Talking about my minuscule problems frees others from the mundane obscurity of their own simple lives.

What a difference that switch makes! Because I have been that enemy that I most fear. And damn, I don't want that for myself, my family or my friends.

So today, I'm turning on that switch for me and asking all my friends to do so as well.

If you were closer, I'd hug you. I swear.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ANGEL!!!!!!

superwoman, revisited.

she doesn’t know that I see her the way
she really wants to be seen;
feel her the way she really wants to be felt;
love her the way she really wants to be loved
like I love my sistesr… like I love myself
yet
she wears victoria’s secret like a masked marvel,
leaping buildings not yet constructed..
boundless
she wears explicit prose
draped ‘ round stiff collars
and fights demons
lurking in her shadowed
controlled movements..
she vieled in family secrets
real and imagined….
not realizing she does more harm to self
than any evil villian…
I wish I could write her wrongs
color her in hues long abandoned
but, In her youth she learned heroes
aren’t people or sandwiches
just bullshit
caught ‘tween wonder bread and miracle whip…
so she simply remains a wish
a healthy reminder for the family
to do and be more…
than what falls between
the cracks in ghetto sidewalks
colored in vibrant blood
spilled by those before her..
that basic color can’t capture or contain
the dreams that bleed past lines
there is no color for Invincible..
so She she uses strong blacks
to paint the woman she wants
everyone to see..
transparent to me
so she waits for a poem
that she doesn’t want to be written..
kdtaylor, 2007

Expectations, and no, I'm not an Alcoholic, but I play one on TV

Ordinarily today would be my grateful list; however, I am filled with something... Something I believe we all could learn from...

Acceptance is the answer to all my problems today...... When I am disturbed, it is because I find some person, place, thing or situation unacceptable to me. Perhaps the best thing of all for me to remember is that my expectations are inversely proportional to my serenity. The higher my expectations of others are, the lower my serenity. I can watch my serenity level rise when I discard my expectations. But then my "rights" try to move in, and they too can force my serenity level down. I have to discard my "rights" as well as my expectations by asking myself "How important is it really?" The Big Book Online Fourth Edition, Acceptance Was the Answer.

The text goes on to discuss "Keeping my mind on acceptance and off my expectations, for my serenity is directly proportional to my level of acceptance." And lately, I've had difficulty accepting things, especially those things I believe I have the power to change. I have made myself believe that manipulation, kindness, anger, threats, gossip, love; even this blog would make people do what I want. Some people believe placing their hands on others in the form of violence will actually make someone do what they want. It doesn't. And often we are left angered, disappointed and hurt. More so, we believe thier unwillingness to change the "offensive/unwanted" behavior is direct attack against us. It isn't. It's just people being themselves. We are taught to be kind, but not door-mats. Anything socially above or below is deemed odd or deviant. Think about it when someone is too nice, we always ask what's the catch? What do you want? Right?

We are selfish and self seeking. It is in our nature. It isn't anything negative, however, we are taught that it is so. We never believe that acting in someone else's interest is against our nature. A perfect example is a person who stays in a marriage for the kids or stays in a relationship longer because they don't want to hurt the other person. It doesn't last odes it? You know why? Because it isn't natural to abandon your wants for someone else's. PERIOD. We can be thoughtful, respectful; often anything more is against our true nature. So no matter how much we think someone is doing something to and against us, they are really doing something for them self. When I am cut off on the road, the other driver is simply trying to go on their way, not block my way. And it is pretty damn arrogant of me (and I have been arrogant) to believe that the driver got up this morning just to cut me off. Mind you racing up to flicking him off and engaging in other "controlling behavior" is allowing your rights or expectations to get in the way. I mean "How dare he! I'll show him." You can discern which (rights or expectations) elicit the behavior.

The same thing is happening in my life, and with a few of my friends. I shared this with one, prolly more for me then the friend. Because I have had a problem with my expectations. An acquaintance recently purchased a car like mine. How do you go the Volkswagen lot looking for an Acura? Especially since that what you wanted, Baller. (Opps my rights kicked in.) She did not want a Volkswagen, by her own admission. But she drove off the lot with an older darker model then mine. Didn't give them my name so I could get my little referral fee. (Opps my expectations kicked in!) Initially I was furious, and those who know me, know how well my rights and expectations manifested themselves. Proudly, I didn't call the acquaintance. Truthfully, I don’t know why she bought the car, and I really don't care, anymore. I lost a full day complaining, thinking, and rationalizing her behavior. For example, you don't go buy another woman's shoes, clothes and purse to wear them around her. Why would you copy a major purchase? Anyway, you get the jest. At the end of the day, she was prolly just trying to get a good, reliable nice looking car (which it is). And this is only one area where acceptance of situations/people I can't change or control and it is driving me f'ing nuts.

I just hope that you are able to find some solace and hope in these words. Really. I applied this simple thing to my last relationship. It was prolly the healthiest relationship in regards to communication I've had in my entire life.

We separated our rights, unrealistic expectations, unspoken expectations, negotiations, and commitments. And when we were angry, upset or bothered we simply asked each other which is it you're most angry or upset about? And often we became angry about everything except: negotiations and commitments. Because we knew...

The anger was all about the expectations and rights. I'm working on abandoning them, as I follow a shared motto of not taking _______ into my ______ year!

So I'm learning to expect nothing and pray for everything (that I can handle of course...)

If you were closer I'd hug you. I promise.

my mind's checking in on me...

• okay, Angel, so i've flipped it. ain't it amazing that i am that trendsetter.
• it's f'd up, that a woman can spit a hella love piece in a slam and not make the grade, because the audience is predominatly a bunch of females looking to get mind-f'd or laid.
• that i wrote one hella piece and a half that i can't wait to memorize.
• that at the end of the day, i am def where i need to be, with whom i need to be with, and friends with the people that make me want to be and do better.
• that we evolved from the card/domino table to the WORLD. (ha!)
• that the poetry world with the kids is ABSOLUTELY THE MOST REWARDING.
• that after a couple of years our being raised by old folks has transcended into a lifelong thing. i know i ain't taking ______ into my _______ year.
• that even though i love mae lou, on days like today, i still miss hip hop.
• that he and him are STILL my bestest male friends.
• that they both find the love they deserve and that deserves them. (there is a HUGE DIFFERENCE).
• that middle girl finds the love baby girl has. it is amazing.
• that poetry is in my world, it isn't my WORLD.
• convos with the zen master, damn you are funny and she is soooooo blessed!
• i miss my magnolia!!!! monday lunches are not the same.
• that brooklyn is so damn far away, and it houses my two best female poetesses...
• that you don't hold my not texting against me.
• how i'm loving lupe and jill live....
• not going to see jill tonight or tomorrow... BOOOOOOOOO
• if you were close enough I'd hug you and tell you how much I miss you!
• and while it seems i'm much too busy, it never means i'm not thinking about you, wondering about you, and knowing that you're all good!
• that we don't have to talk everyday to know your still in my heart.
• ain't life f'ing grand!!!!!

grateful...

01) simple understanding.

02) complex understanding

03) friendship

04) forgiveness

05) knowing my lane and staying in it.

07) getting my buttt kicked in dominoes, yes, we all need a reminder that we are beautifully human.

08) the invitation from the two/raincheck? so glad we've grown together, see #1, #2 and # 3

09) the ability to talk to you about any damn thing, even though i didn't need a detailed report about which aisle you were on.

10) wanting what is generally best for those i love without any JUDGEMENT OR CONDITIONS. (damn I've grown!)

11) my new poems..

12) uncertainty

13) those beautiful brown eyes...

and as always the creator.......

We argue as careful
as the tick tock ticking of clocks.
Hate as desperately
as the geometrical indecision of raindrops.
We are time bombs, bombing
just out side the gates of utopia.
Soldiers aiming tech-nines filled with daffodils and daises,
in the face of belligerent peace.
We are a three armed, two headed, heartless atrocity,
wrapped in our nation’s flag exchanging blood for oil on a foreign soil.
We are the precursor of imagination imploding
under the weight of indecisive reason.
We are the implausible recollections
dying upon the incoherent babble of a schizophrenic…
We are the tired, hungry and poor betrayed by reason,
kneeling in prayer at the feet of political treason.
We are faint breaths grasping for life, defying death
clamoring from the lungs of those left for dead.
We are that spoiled, yet proverbial, spilt milk that
no one is crying for or over.
Because frankly the entire world
was fucked by a dick hidden in a bush.
We argue as careful clocks,
spewing similes and metaphors with the intense precision of an assassin.
Hate as desperately
as sweat atop the beaded brow of a
junkie holding a fix in one hand and an empty promise in the other.
We are suicide bombers disguised as bumbling heroes in cloaked
democracy and patriotism.
We are the veracity of a liar, a pointless oxymoron
a paradox at war with enslavement and subjugation.
We are a religion with no origin desecrating mosques, temples, synagogues
fearing what we can’t control and don’t wish to understand.
to be continued......
kdtaylor
section 8 coffee publication
all reights reserved

1st thought as the election moves toward Tejas...

Goodbye To All That (#2) by Robin Morgan
February 2, 2008
Goodbye To All That” was my (in)famous 1970 essay breaking free from a politics of accommodation especially affecting women (for an online version, see http://blog.fair-use.org/category/chicago/).
During my decades in civil-rights, anti-war, and contemporary women’s movements, I’ve avoided writing another specific “Goodbye . . .” But not since the suffrage struggle have two communities—joint conscience-keepers of this country—been so set in competition, as the contest between Hillary Rodham Clinton (HRC) and Barack Obama (BO) unfurls. So.
Goodbye to the double standard . . .
—Hillary is too ballsy but too womanly, a Snow Maiden who’s emotional, and so much a politician as to be unfit for politics.
—She’s “ambitious” but he shows “fire in the belly.” (Ever had labor pains?)—When a sexist idiot screamed “Iron my shirt!” at HRC, it was considered amusing; if a racist idiot shouted “Shine my shoes!” at BO, it would’ve inspired hours of airtime and pages of newsprint analyzing our national dishonor.
—Young political Kennedys—Kathleen, Kerry, and Bobby Jr.—all endorsed Hillary. Senator Ted, age 76, endorsed Obama. If the situation were reversed, pundits would snort “See? Ted and establishment types back her, but the forward-looking generation backs him.” (Personally, I’m unimpressed with Caroline’s longing for the Return of the Fathers. Unlike the rest of the world, Americans have short memories. Me, I still recall Marilyn Monroe’s suicide, and a dead girl named Mary Jo Kopechne in Chappaquiddick.)
Goodbye to the toxic viciousness . . .
Carl Bernstein's disgust at Hillary’s “thick ankles.” Nixon-trickster Roger Stone’s new Hillary-hating 527 group, “Citizens United Not Timid” (check the capital letters). John McCain answering “How do we beat the bitch?" with “Excellent question!” Would he have dared reply similarly to “How do we beat the black bastard?” For shame.
Goodbye to the HRC nutcracker with metal spikes between splayed thighs. If it was a tap-dancing blackface doll, we would be righteously outraged—and they would not be selling it in airports. Shame.
Goodbye to the most intimately violent T-shirts in election history, including one with the murderous slogan “If Only Hillary had married O.J. Instead!” Shame.
Goodbye to Comedy Central’s “Southpark” featuring a storyline in which terrorists secrete a bomb in HRC’s vagina. I refuse to wrench my brain down into the gutter far enough to find a race-based comparison. For shame.
Goodbye to the sick, malicious idea that this is funny. This is not “Clinton hating,” not “Hillary hating.” This is sociopathic woman-hating. If it were about Jews, we would recognize it instantly as anti-Semitic propaganda; if about race, as KKK poison. Hell, PETA would go ballistic if such vomitous spew were directed at animals. Where is our sense of outrage—as citizens, voters, Americans?
Goodbye to the news-coverage target-practice . . .
The women’s movement and Media Matters wrung an apology from MSNBC’s Chris Matthews for relentless misogynistic comments (www.womensmediacenter.com). But what about NBC’s Tim Russert’s continual sexist asides and his all-white-male panels pontificating on race and gender? Or CNN’s Tony Harris chuckling at “the chromosome thing” while interviewing a woman from The White House Project? And that’s not even mentioning Fox News.
Goodbye to pretending the black community is entirely male and all women are white . . .
Surprise! Women exist in all opinions, pigmentations, ethnicities, abilities, sexual preferences, and ages—not only African American and European American but Latina and Native American, Asian American and Pacific Islanders, Arab American and—hey, every group, because a group wouldn’t exist if we hadn’t given birth to it. A few non-racist countries may exist—but sexism is everywhere. No matter how many ways a woman breaks free from other discriminations, she remains a female human being in a world still so patriarchal that it’s the “norm.”
So why should all women not be as justly proud of our womanhood and the centuries, even millennia, of struggle that got us this far, as black Americans, women and men, are justly proud of their struggles?
Goodbye to a campaign where he has to pass as white (which whites—especially wealthy ones—adore), while she has to pass as male (which both men and women demanded of her, and then found unforgivable). If she were blackor he were female we wouldn’t be having such problems, and I for one would be in heaven. But at present such a candidate wouldn’t stand a chance—even if she shared Condi Rice’s Bush-defending politics.
I was celebrating the pivotal power at last focused on African American women deciding on which of two candidates to bestow their vote—until a number of Hillary-supporting black feminists told me they’re being called “race traitors.”
So goodbye to conversations about this nation’s deepest scar—slavery—which fail to acknowledge that labor- and sexual-slavery exist today in the U.S. and elsewhere on this planet, and the majority of those enslaved are women.
Women have endured sex/race/ethnic/religious hatred, rape and battery, invasion of spirit and flesh, forced pregnancy; being the majority of the poor, the illiterate, the disabled, of refugees, caregivers, the HIV/AIDS afflicted, the powerless. We have survived invisibility, ridicule, religious fundamentalisms, polygamy, teargas, forced feedings, jails, asylums, sati, purdah, female genital mutilation, witch burnings, stonings, and attempted gynocides. We have tried reason, persuasion, reassurances, and being extra-qualified, only to learn it never was about qualifications after all. We know that at this historical moment women experience the world differently from men—though not all the same as one another—and can govern differently, from Elizabeth Tudor to Michele Bachelet and Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.
We remember when Shirley Chisholm and Patricia Schroeder ran for this high office and barely got past the gate—they showed too much passion, raised too little cash, were joke fodder. Goodbye to all that. (And goodbye to some feminists so famished for a female president they were even willing to abandon women’s rights in backing Elizabeth Dole.)
Goodbye, goodbye to . . .
—blaming anything Bill Clinton does on Hillary (even including his womanizing like the Kennedy guys—though unlike them, he got reported on). Let’s get real. If he hadn’t campaigned strongly for her everyone would cluck over what that meant. Enough of Bill and Teddy Kennedy locking their alpha male horns while Hillary pays for it.
—an era when parts of the populace feel so disaffected by politics that a comparative lack of knowledge, experience, and skill is actually seen as attractive, when celebrity-culture mania now infects our elections so that it’s “cooler” to glow with marquee charisma than to understand the vast global complexities of power on a nuclear, wounded planet.
—the notion that it’s fun to elect a handsome, cocky president who feels he can learn on the job, goodbye to George W. Bush and the destruction brought by his inexperience, ignorance, and arrogance. Goodbye to the accusation that HRC acts “entitled” when she’s worked intensely at everything she’s done—including being a nose-to-the-grindstone, first-rate senator from my state.
Goodbye to her being exploited as a Rorschach test by women who reduce her to a blank screen on which they project their own fears, failures, fantasies.
Goodbye to the phrase “polarizing figure” to describe someone who embodies the transitions women have made in the last century and are poised to make in this one. It was the women’s movement that quipped, “We are becoming the men we wanted to marry.” She heard us, and she has.
Goodbye to some women letting history pass by while wringing their hands, because Hillary isn’t as “likeable” as they’ve been warned they must be, or because she didn’t leave him, couldn’t “control” him, kept her family together and raised a smart, sane daughter. (Think of the blame if Chelsea had ever acted in the alcoholic, neurotic manner of the Bush twins!) Goodbye to some women pouting because she didn’t bake cookies or she did, sniping because she learned the rules and then bent or broke them. Grow the hell up. She is not running for Ms.-perfect-pure-queen-icon of the feminist movement. She’s running to be president of the United States.
Goodbye to the shocking American ignorance of our own and other countries’ history. Margaret Thatcher and Golda Meir rose through party ranks and war, positioning themselves as proto-male leaders. Almost all other female heads of government so far have been related to men of power—granddaughters, daughters, sisters, wives, widows: Gandhi, Bandaranike, Bhutto, Aquino, Chamorro, Wazed, Macapagal-Arroyo, Johnson Sirleaf, Bachelet, Kirchner, and more. Even in our “land of opportunity,” it’s mostly the first pathway “in” permitted to women: Representatives Doris Matsui and Mary Bono and Sala Burton; Senator Jean Carnahan . . . far too many to list here.
Goodbye to a misrepresented generational divide . . .
Goodbye to the so-called spontaneous “Obama Girl” flaunting her bikini-clad ass online—then confessing Oh yeah it wasn’t her idea after all, some guys got her to do it and dictated the clothes, which she said “made me feel like a dork.”
Goodbye to some young women eager to win male approval by showing they’re not feminists (at least not the kind who actually threaten thestatus quo), who can’t identify with a woman candidate because she is unafraid of eeueweeeu yucky power, who fear their boyfriends might look at them funny if they say something good about her. Goodbye to women of any age again feeling unworthy, sulking “what if she’s not electable?” or “maybe it’s post-feminism and whoooosh we’re already free.” Let a statement by the magnificent Harriet Tubman stand as reply. When asked how she managed to save hundreds of enslaved African Americans via the Underground Railroad during the Civil War, she replied bitterly, “I could have saved thousands—if only I’d been able to convince them they were slaves.”
I’d rather say a joyful Hello to all the glorious young women who do identifywith Hillary, and all the brave, smart men—of all ethnicities and any age—who get that it’s in their self-interest, too. She’s better qualified. (D’uh.) She’s a high-profile candidate with an enormous grasp of foreign- and domestic-policy nuance, dedication to detail, ability to absorb staggering insult and personal pain while retaining dignity, resolve, even humor, and keep on keeping on. (Also, yes, dammit, let’s hear it for her connections and funding and party-building background, too. Obama was awfully glad about those when she raised dough and campaigned for him to get to the Senate in the first place.)
I’d rather look forward to what a good president he might make in eight years, when his vision and spirit are seasoned by practical know-how—and he’ll be all of 54. Meanwhile, goodbye to turning him into a shining knight when actually he’s an astute, smooth pol with speechwriters who’ve worked with the Kennedys’ own speechwriter-courtier Ted Sorenson. If it’s only about ringing rhetoric, let speechwriters run. But isn’t it about getting the policies we want enacted?
And goodbye to the ageism . . .
How dare anyone unilaterally decide when to turn the page on history, papering over real inequities and suffering constituencies in the promise of a feel-good campaign? How dare anyone claim to unify while dividing, or think that to rouse U.S. youth from torpor it’s useful to triage the single largest demographic in this country’s history: the boomer generation—the majority of which is female?
Old woman are the one group that doesn’t grow more conservative with age—and we are the generation of radicals who said “Well-behaved women seldom make history.” Goodbye to going gently into any goodnight any man prescribes for us. We are the women who changed the reality of the United States. And though we never went away, brace yourselves: we’re back!
We are the women who brought this country equal credit, better pay, affirmative action, the concept of a family-focused workplace; the women who established rape-crisis centers and battery shelters, marital-rape and date-rape laws; the women who defended lesbian custody rights, who fought for prison reform, founded the peace and environmental movements; who insisted that medical research include female anatomy; who inspired men to become more nurturing parents; who created women’s studies and Title IX so we all could cheer the WNBA stars and Mia Hamm. We are the women who reclaimed sexuality from violent pornography, who put childcare on the national agenda, who transformed demographics, artistic expression, language itself. We are the women who forged a worldwide movement. We are the proud successors of women who, though it took more than 50 years, won us the vote.
We are the women who now comprise the majority of U.S. voters.
Hillary said she found her own voice in New Hampshire. There’s not a woman alive who, if she’s honest, doesn’t recognize what she means. Then HRC got drowned out by campaign experts, Bill, and media’s obsession with everything Bill.
So listen to her voice:
“For too long, the history of women has been a history of silence. Even today, there are those who are trying to silence our words.
“It is a violation of human rights when babies are denied food, or drowned, or suffocated, or their spines broken, simply because they are born girls. It is a violation of human rights when woman and girls are sold into the slavery of prostitution. It is a violation of human rights when women are doused with gasoline, set on fire and burned to death because their marriage dowries are deemed too small. It is a violation of human rights when individual women are raped in their own communities and when thousands of women are subjected to rape as a tactic or prize of war. It is a violation of human rights when a leading cause of death worldwide along women ages 14 to 44 is the violence they are subjected to in their own homes. It is a violation of human rights when women are denied the right to plan their own families, and that includes being forced to have abortions or being sterilized against their will.
“Women’s rights are human rights. Among those rights are the right to speak freely—and the right to be heard.”
That was Hillary Rodham Clinton defying the U.S. State Department and the Chinese Government at the 1995 UN World Conference on Women in Beijing (look here for the full, stunning speech).
And this voice, age 21, in “Commencement Remarks of Hillary D. Rodham, President of Wellesley College Government Association, Class of 1969.”
“We are, all of us, exploring a world none of us understands. . . . searching for a more immediate, ecstatic, and penetrating mode of living. . . . [for the] integrity, the courage to be whole, living in relation to one another in the full poetry of existence. The struggle for an integrated life existing in an atmosphere of communal trust and respect is one with desperately important political and social consequences. . . . Fear is always with us, but we just don't have time for it.”
She ended with the commitment “to practice, with all the skill of our being: the art of making possible.”
And for decades, she’s been learning how.
So goodbye to Hillary’s second-guessing herself. The real question is deeper than her re-finding her voice. Can we women find ours? Can we do this for ourselves?
“Our President, Ourselves!”
Time is short and the contest tightening. We need to rise in furious energy—as we did when Anita Hill was so vilely treated in the U.S. Senate, as we did when Rosie Jiminez was butchered by an illegal abortion, as we did and do for women globally who are condemned for trying to break through. We need to win, this time. Goodbye to supporting HRC tepidly, with ambivalent caveats and apologetic smiles. Time to volunteer, make phone calls, send emails, donate money, argue, rally, march, shout, vote.
Me? I support Hillary Rodham because she’s the best qualified of all candidates running in both parties. I support her because her progressive politics are as strong as her proven ability to withstand what will be a massive right-wing assault in the general election. I support her because she knows how to get us out of Iraq. I support her because she’s refreshingly thoughtful, and I’m bloodied from eight years of a jolly “uniter” with ejaculatory politics. I needn’t agree with her on every point. I agree with the 97 percent of her positions that are identical with Obama’s—and the few where hers are both more practical and to the left of his (like health care). I support her because she’s already smashed the first-lady stereotype and made history as a fine senator, because I believe she will continue to make history not only as the first US woman president, but as a great US president.
As for the “woman thing”?
Me, I’m voting for Hillary not because she’s a woman—but because I am.

18 and then there was one.....

Borrowing the most infamous words in television known to the black community:
DAMN, DAMN, DAMN!
I am open to all barbs, comments, insults and jokes. In the spirit of true competition and loyalty, "On any given Sunday, anyone can win or lose. It was the Giants game on Sunday. We'll see you next year."
On a different note, others will make comment and not be a fan of anything other than pure harassment of me and hating on the PATS! That's cool, too. 'Cuz while I was born in Texas, in my heart I am a true New Englander, so F' it, I can take a joke, and you, my friend you can kiss my natural _____!