Let's Play Politics without Playing Dumb 2016

Hi, good to see you again.

Once again "It's been a long time, I shouldn'ta left you..."
Life has kept me hyper busy, I was away most of last summer on a film series (I'm blessed) but there is so many thoughts I want to share in response to some wonderful and intelligent friends’ comments on social media, especially Facebook, who seem to have caught what I call "Trump-itis".

You know the condition caused when people are exposed to so much Trump coverage that alarm bells go off in a person's subconscious and results in them spending a lot of time and posting a lot of words discussing Donald Trump’s presidential chances with no eye or ear to the fact-based realities of his chances of being the next President of the United States.

So in short I wrote all this. Trump has little chance of being president of the United States, if a majority of the electorate shows up.

Now I do have a lot to say about a lot of recent NYC and of course especially Brooklyn news, like the planned streetcar line, the method of redevelopment in East New York, the (I'd estimate) 500 new units of housing coming to small area of Crown Heights destined to shift lift further from "affordable", and best of all The Brooklyn Community Foundation, a non-profit that is directly and positively impacting Brooklyn communities.

So posts on all that will come. However I’m going to put that on hold to address more of this Trump fascination.

First, I'd ask you to humor me and do this: swap Bernie Sanders for Barack Hussein Obama, and Donald Trump for John McCain (remember early 2008 John McCain? The very experienced, war hero, centrist who speaks plainly and has the support of all sides!!) and it becomes obvious that a lot of what's happening in media coverage year is playing out like 2008. Personally on the Dem side I know many friends support Hill over Bern, and that's fine because it doesn't matter. We all on the Dem side essentially have the same politics, it's a matter of who we prefer and trust (for a number of reasons) to enact and fight for a majority of those policies.

I believe voting matters, but given the opposition, at this point if the Democrats nominated that creepy robot in the new Boston Dynamics videos everyone will come around and support it. It doesn't matter, after the convention there will be one Dem candidate and we'll all support them.

After the Dem convention someone electric probably joins someone's ticket maybe one of the Latino-American political twin Castro brothers from San Antonio TX, and then they go campaign, with 2 (maybe 3) former Democratic presidents in tow, because the Dems won't make the mistake of 2000 again and not use the sitting president's bully pulpit to galvanize turnout among African Americans especially (which is one reason why the talk of if Bern can get support from the African American electorate is silly)

So no matter who is nominated on the Dem side, no significant number of voters on the Democratic side are going to defect to Trump, Rubio or Cruz. Just like no significant number defected from Hillary to McCain in 2008. I'm sure some people in 2008 refused to vote for Obama, but ultimately twice in the last two elections, with wars and soldiers abroad and a bad economy all making people feel unease, the majority of presidential voters picked the guy who supposedly couldn't overcome the heated anger of the Right wing.

Trump doesn't have the numbers to win. And the entire GOP set of candidates this year are too extreme (Except Kasich who interestingly, Trump's wins is pushing out of contention) to get any major traction with the entire electorate.

And a note about Trump’s “wins”.

Primaries in most states are closed, meaning usually when Trump wins he's winning ONLY among Republicans, he's getting no Democratic votes and no Independent votes because most of those voters are not allowed to vote in the Republican primary. For example in Nevada there are approximately 750,000 self-identifying Latino’ s in the state.

Of that number about 16% are and were able to vote in the Republican primary and Trump won 7% of them with the other Republican candidates splitting the remaining 9%. Trump declared that he had won the Latino vote in Nevada, and if you’re counting that 16% as the entire vote, yes his 55% of that 16% is a win, but it’s not near all the Latinos in the state. The Democrat and Independent self-identifying Latino's in Nevada are over 70% of all Latino. Trump didn’t "win the Latino vote in Nevada" he spun it, said he did, and everyone keeps repeating.Please stop.

Many people are writing, and endlessly reposting these and other numerically inaccurate stories about Trump, and Trump's chances and its a waste of time, energy and a distortion of reality. A better more important more long impacting story is about the remaining vocal fringe of unabashed racist Americans that make up a significant number of his supporters.

It’s a difficult habit to break, reporting sensationalism. The news media gets more money in views, paper sales, and TV ratings by talking up Trump, they think they have to. But it's as useful as when the NYC media pretends to be excited for a new New York Knicks and Nets seasons, knowing damned well they are not going to be anywhere near the championship when the season winds up.

The real issues are making sure more than 40% of the eligible electorate comes out to vote, because the national electorate swings overwhelming democratic. (It doesn't seem like that because of news and congress, but the congressional districts have been rigged by Republican (and sometimes Democratic) governors to corral people into voting districts based on their party affliction.

So I suggest the real issue is getting more people to vote. I suggest we share those articles about denial of voting rights, about voter registrations drives.

Post more articles about what people need to be sure and do so they are prepared to vote. That information better ensures a democratic win. Sharing the news on how much our vote matters is the best news to share this election season.

OBAMA IN BROOKLYN, BAM!

So yeh. I'm excited. I like the President, and I write a blog about Brooklyn. So if the 1st African-American President of the United States comes to Brooklyn (to the P-Tech High School on Albany Avenue in Crown Heights), just a few blocks from where I was born and I didn't have something to show for his visit, this site would be useless.

So without wasting more time, here's video of President Barack Obama landing in Prospect Park (which I am all down for)

And a photoslide show (who loves ya baby!)
(PS I just heard the President and our soon to be Mayor Bill DeBlasio are eating cheesecake downtown at Juniors) What's your Brookyn/Obama sighting?

NYC Mayoral election 09 - An admission

Watching the sun go down on Change.

Yesterday morning my first thought when I learned Bloomberg was reelected Mayor by a 5 point margin (basically squeaking into office more like an ambitious rat than a financial wizard) first thing I wondered was who to blame. Of course I blamed Bloomberg for running a campaign that was more of a purchase than an anything else. And then I gave some time to the what had been been and could have beens, which is when I began blaming Obama for the way I felt he fostered doubt in the form of neglect for contender Bill Thompson.

But eventually this morning I brought it home. We don't like to hear it, but it's the fault of any New Yorker who has a problem with the way things are and yet voted to prolong the problem or worse didn't vote at all. I'm sure you know self-incrimination is not concept we're excited by. Not as New Yorkers, not as Americans. It's not an attractive concept.

An attractive concept is that we are a nation of rules and principals. That we stand for something good and right. But at times some of us are too often willing to be very human and ignore the rules and our principals if we think there is something in it for us. And then worse, sometimes we close our eyes and pretend invisible.

A majority of voting New Yorkers decided it was okay to let our principals slip, and let Bloomberg get away with causing of a lapse in our democratic process.

We gave up on ourselves and so from this point on if Bloomberg fails anyone in this third dynasty turn, it wont be as much as what we the unprincipled and or apathetic have failed in ourselves.

I can't help thinking of that saying, that "Americans get the president we deserve" (based on our actions, which was brought up often in describing the Bush presidency as a reflection of the citizenry). This (and whatever may come) is what we get. The blame is not Bloomberg's for running a third time, the blame is ours for getting out of his way.

The United States of America

The results are in of course and Barack Hussein Obama is our President. I could not be any happier. To celebrate today's "PhotoWednesday" installment and the day after history was so clearly made I present this shot I took and was drawn to a few weeks back.



I don't normally do this but I want to explain why I took this photo and what I think it means. First the photo isn't doctored. There was no photoshop'ing no filters, and in fact no black and white film or setting. This picture came when my camera was set for a typical spectrum of colors. However the glare of light was so intense through the flag that it blinded the camera to those colors, leaving only the subtle spectrum from black to gray to white and back again. It's like an x-ray revealing to me, sameness, except for that delicate nuance between our positions as well as our unlikely unity resulting from the fact that were are all different values of the same substance. Sometimes we're more, sometimes less, depending on which angle and from whatever context we are viewed.

Everyone will not see this point of view. Some will refuse to see and accept how much more unity there is than is not. Some will look at what I think is so majestic and beautifully inspiring and see something foreboding and sinister. But that's the thing about hope it's usually only there when you want to see it.

On a lighter note I invite you to check out one of the first posts I wrote on this blog back on February which alluded prophetically to this momentous election victory.

Enjoy: http://umbrooklynborn.blogspot.com/2008/02/anything-is-possible-ny-giants-super.html

Yes, I did.

I got several text messages throughout the day saying "I voted! did you?" I got that message from friends and distant acquaintances so I guess it's a viral mass action.

I thought it was an interesting way to encourage the electorate.

The best moment of my day came on Kings Highway, I was skating to my polling place. It's miles from where I live in B'klyn because I haven't changed it since I was 18.

As I skated down the empty sidewalk, I noticed a dude walking toward me. He was a dark skinned brother with Island features in his late 20's early 30's and he made eye contact as he approached. The eye contact didn't break and I noticed he was giving a toothy smile now.

When I got within 20 feet of him he said causally and with an island lilt,
"ya beh'tuh be skatin' tah vote"

I couldn't stop laughing as we passed and I guess to assure him I looked back laughing too much to speak my agreement and he smiled and repeated, "ya gotta vote"

perfect.

When I finally got to PS 251 elementary out in "The Flatlands" as the ex likes to call it, I made my way to the booth and found I couldn't pull the lever. It wasn't mental, it was mechanical. The little lever wouldn't turn to the "X" position.

I asked some help from the kindly old lady standing vigil outside the curtain and she replied,"no you can't use that one only Democrat." Now before anyone misunderstands, I was attempting to vote for Barack Obama, and attempting (as is the option in New York City) to vote for them on the Working Families Party, which they are on in addition to the traditional Democratic ticket. So the kindly lady wasn't trying to influence or game my vote, at least that's not how I took it, but it did sound strange.

Anyway, she helped me. I was then able to make my selections and take a pic of the historic choice, but I got so overwhelmed by the moment that I took the pic above before I had marked the "X" so it's not quite the momento I was going for, but never the less, I voted, did you?