Do You Feel That Shade?: Aretha Franklin tells Kathie Lee to Check Her Credentials

*sigh* I'm not sure what's in the water but this week yet another celebrity has written a check their relevance can't cash.

Recently on her televised happy hour morning show Kathie Lee shared some unpleasant thoughts about the possibility of Aretha Franklin joining American Idol, causing Aretha to evoke the spirit of Got 2b Real and made it known that her name is Terms and Conditions...nobody reads her.

The whole thing started when Gifford had the following to say:

" If they are looking for a younger demographic, there are a lot of kids out there (who) actually don’t know who Aretha Franklin is. It’s sad, but they don’t”

And of course High Queen ReRe was not tolerating the perceived shade and said this in a letter to CNN:

"While I enjoy Kathie Lee and Hoda daily, her assessment is totally wrong! I've been to California from Detroit four times this year and Florida. I go wherever I choose to go comfortably on my custom bus. Further, my audience and fans span the age of 8 to 90! And are multi-ethnic, and I am very well known to young adults, tweens and teens. Their parents play my music and I take care of my business whenever I sign on the dotted line! I'm surprised Kathie Lee did not research my worldwide celebrity audience… She should research me before she speaks about me."

Welp there you go! Aretha might not be selling albums but she's surely snatching wigs...hopefully Kathie Lee will take a quick peek at wikipedia before she comments on the Queen of Soul again.

Mitt Romney Responds To Being Booed at NAACP Convention

Apparently Romney felt a little salty about being booed at an NAACP convention recently and had this to say:

" I hope people understand this, your friends who like Obamacare, you remind them of this, if they want more stuff from government tell them to go vote for the other guy-more free stuff. But don't forget nothing is really free."

Really Mitt?!? Let's not pretend like you didn't see this WHOLE thing coming to begin with so don't try and cry about it now with all that free stuff nonsense.   I can't even say much about this whole thing because I honestly find like 80% percent of what Romney says is either hypocritical or irrelevant. That being said I truly wish he'd hire some new advisers and work on some new strategies for this election that does not include "obamacare" because that whole argument died when the Supreme Court passed their ruling.

Is Somebody In Their Feelings?: Wayne Brady Wants To "Slap The Sh*t" Out Of Bill Maher

Recently Wayne Brady decided to take a stab a being relevant again and respond to Bill Maher repeatedly calling Barack Obama "Your Wayne Brady" I'm not sure if he went online and downloaded some Waka Flocka and Pusha T and listened to them while he showered and plucked his eyebrows that morning or if he just watched his Chappelle Show skit on YouTube a couple of times the night before but apparently Wayne Brady is now "'bout that life".  In a recent radio interview Brady had this to say:

 "it's a diss to Obama to be called me because he wants a brother brother"  AND " I would gladly slap the shit out of Bill Maher in the middle of the street and then I want to see what Bill Maher would do"

Brady goes on to make it sound like he's mad because he's insulting the President  and because Maher doesn't know anything about black culture and basically all the things you'd say when your trying to cover up the fact that your feelings are hurt.

Now I'm going to leave my personal feeling about this whole debacle aside and just stick with facts. Maher is a LIBERAL COMEDIAN, he was not being malicious he was just doing his job.  Yes he calls Obama "Your Wayne Brady" probably because he feels like the president is a friendly black man who makes white people comfortable and displays no "scary negro" qualities that might make you clutch your Birkin bag which is true.  

Lastly let's just pretend we're on Oprah and be honest, Brady's always had a HUGE chip on his shoulder and Maher isn't the first person to make a joke about it.  In fact The Honorable Paul Mooney once said "White people like Wayne Brady because he makes Bryan Gumble look like Malcom X"  AND WE ALL KNOW IT'S TRUE.

 In reality he's like Tiger Woods....Black by genetics White by choice and THAT'S COOL to each his own but you can't be ready to reach for the strap every time somebody points it out.

BREAKING NEWS: Supreme Court Upholds Individual Mandate

If in my SHEER excitement I can be colloquial for a minute.......it looks like "obamacare" aint goin no where haters!!! Only moment ago in a 5-4 decision the Supreme Court has voted that the individual mandate IS constitutional, effectively upholding the Health Care Act.

Being chronically ill this is extremely important to me and I'm ready to celebrate and I know if I'm beside myself with glee President Obama has to be feeling remarkable. After taking years of heat and abuse over this he's finally able to shut all these conservative nay sayers up and now he has a HUGE political boost for the upcoming election.

Unfortunately this isn't a celebratory day for us all. I'm pretty sure Romney, his advisors and all these tea party lunatics are meeting in the Legion of Doom, sipping gin and calling up Pinky and the Brain so they can figure out an alternative world domination plan. So I'm going to keep my antennas up and my ears open 'cause I'm sure we haven't heard the last of this just yet.

ACLU Set to Represent KKK in Latest Case

As I write this I'm pretty sure David Duke is somewhere watching Hitler documentaries and steaming his favorite hood and sheet combo because it looks like his former organization has gotten a big hand up today.

In opportunistically hypocritical breaking news the ACLU has decided to represent the KKK in their recent highway debacle. Not too long ago the state of Georgia blocked the KKK's plan to adopt a stretch of route 515 in North Georgia and apparently the Klan is not taking this one lying down.

I'm not particularly shocked at the Klan, they're a racist organization who constantly attempts to spread their hateful propaganda so honestly their just doing their job. The ACLU on the other hand...I cannot. I understand that they believe in defending 1st amendment issue but getting into bed with an organized TERRORIST group who generally hate 98% of people or groups you've defended might help you politically but in reality it's BEYOND reckless and insensitive.

I'd like to believe this case won't go far but with the current climate of the nation that's unlikely

Hip Hop: The Music Of My Revolution

As Black Music Month winds to a close I thought I'd take a second to reflect on a particular genre of music that is close to my heart, Hip Hop.

Like most 20 and 30 something’s I grew up on Hip Hop. My mom taught me my body parts using "Whoop there it is", when playing hide and seek with my friends I'd often hum The Fuggees "Ready or Not", and one year for Christmas I instructed my family to "Give it up for Santa" while performing my own version of Naughty By Nature's "Hip Hop Horary" (and there’s footage to prove it). As I got older Hip Hop fueled my militant stage (one I'm not completely sure I'm out of). Public Enemy's "Fight the Power" was like my eternal theme song and NWA's "F the Police" was always on heavy rotation. As I moved from angry to conscious the music of Arrested Development, Brand Nubian and Dead Prez were like my bread and butter.

As I grew and developed I forgot something very important.....ALL Hip Hop is political. From KRS-One to Tupac to Ace Hood there are always political undertones. See for some time I had sub categorized what I believed to be conscious Hip Hop and in a way I was right. Most people wouldn't put Grand Master Flash and The Furious Five in the same league with artist like 50 cent and though they might not be on the same stream of consciousness their base message is the same.

Whether its 50 cent rapping about his life in the dope game, Kendrick Lamar spitting about the plights of prostitutes or J Cole flowing about life in the hood it's all political, it may not be conscious but it's political. They are rapping about a margin of society that is ignored and disenfranchised and that in its essence is political. Granted they might not be wearing Each One Teach One hoodies and calling us all to action like many artists have in the past but they are, in their own way showing America what's going on in their neck of the woods.

Of course there are always exceptions to the rule, artist like Nicki Minaj and her Mattel minions (and all of Young Money really) tend to just spit random raps about money, weed, expensive alcohol, strip clubs and their latest sexual exploits.

Luckily not all current artists are like that. In many ways Hip Hop is still political and is still is voice of the "youthful revolution" within black America. You just have to look beyond the surface to find it.

"That Dope Ain't No Joke": Florida man Gets Naked And Eats Man's Flesh

I'm not saying the Zombie Apocalypse is upon us but well this is some crazy stuff.  According to Florida police Charles Baker got naked, busted into his girlfriends house already high on some drug, bit a piece of another man's bicep and then ATE it.  This isn't the first bit of cannibalism craziness we've seen from Florida, not too long ago a Miami man was shot and killed by police after eating the vast majority of a homeless man's face.  Though we don't know exactly what Baker was on we do know that the Miami cannibal was high on bath salts, which seems to be a growing trend. 

Because of the face eating nature of these and several other attacks, the CDC released a statement assuring the public that there is not a zombie epidemic and everybody can calm down.  Logically I know they're right but I'm packing my survival kit and leaving it by the door just in case.