Cam’Ron, The Fallen + A Comfest Recommendation

Black and white pen and ink drawing of a little girl with long hair blowing straight out in the wind with a scepter in one hand next to a curvy large trunked tree

Jay-Z and Cam'Ron publicly squashed their beef last month during Jay-Z’ s BSIDES + Album Cuts show by performing “Welcome To New York City” at Webster Hall.  Makes listening to music less complicated for this Columbus rap critic.

Jay-Z’s rap impact seems almost absurd. Dipset making Columbus their second home during the Roc-a-Fella era was something this rap fan personally cherishes.

Jay-Z owned Roc-A-Fella with Cam’ron’s BFF Dame Dash.

You can hear Hov’s concert via Tidal.com. We were excited and played a snippet via Bboys Steal Attention. This new radio show plays via WCRSFM.org in Columbus. Ohio 92.7 and 98.3 @ 7pm Thursdays.

Both shows appeared online in April. I didn’t know Jay-Z was planning this.

While it’s possible Hov was surfing the web and found my show.

Let’s be more practical: Jay-Z and myself both liking rap music isn’t surprising at all.

I would like to congratulate Columbus’ the Fallen regarding their new release, “Stick Yo Self” EP with French based Decision Making Theory Records/Knotweed Records in March.

ColumbusMediaInsider: Ohio State's Sacred Cow Status Kept Dispatch, Others From Investigating

Words Columbus Media Insider with the M looking like broken glass

The abuse of OSU athletes by Dr. Richard Strauss for the better part of two decades went unreported for nearly four decades?

And when it did come to light, it was not uncovered by the Columbus Dispatch and the city's other mainstream media, but by victims coming forward.

Suffice it to say that the Ohio State University is a sacred cow in the eyes of the local news media. The university has so many patrons and loyalists that the news organizations are reluctant to investigate it for fear of alienating and losing their fickle audience. Not to mention that OSU spends a lot of money on local advertising that the local media does not want pulled as punishment for negative coverage.

The uncritical behavior gets worse as the Dispatch, among others, has a growing propensity to run press releases from OSU as news stories in prominent positions.

For instance, on May 16 on the front page of the second section, theDispatch ran the following headline: "Study: OSU has $15.2B economic impact." The article that followed was credited to an "analysis released by the school" in a recent speech by President Michael Drake.

DeWine lives up to his reputation

Round yellow circle with a face with eyes rolling up to the top left and a frown

One of the few perks about being a third party candidate after an election is the eventual collective realization that your campaign was right about most of the things you said, despite the fact this realization happens too late for it to matter. Of course, by “perk” I mean sometimes it’s just nice to say “I told you so” after everyone seemed to ignore your contribution to the political discussion. Whether it happens to be our various stances on an assortment of issues or what we predicted that our establishment, two-party opponents would eventually do if elected (despite what they said they’d do) it’s something third party candidates from local to federal office often get used to in the year after the dust has settled.

Columbus Community Pride 2019: Decades of Resistance - the origin, the history, and today

Four young black women posing behind an older black woman in a chair

Pride season is a monumental one this year, considering that 2019 is the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising. This revolutionary uprising, led largely by queer and trans people of color (QTPOC) against oppressive police forces raiding the Stonewall Inn, ignited the modern movement for LGBTQIA+ rights.

Their uprising in New York was very much in the footsteps of the LGBTQIA+ folks who rose up against violent, transphobic police officers three years prior at the Compton Cafeteria Riots in San Francisco’s Tenderloin District. Though white homonormativity soon began to dominate the general narrative around LGBTQIA+ experiences, there were militant trans women of color, like Miss Major, Marsha P Johnson, and Sylvia Rivera who rejected assimilation and instead fiercely advocated for the true liberation of the most marginalized. They consistently uplifted low-income trans women of color, houseless queer and trans youth, and sex workers in their communities until their dying days.

#CountOurBallotsCBUS Day of Action

A white sign on a wood wall with a flag and an arrow pointing left and the word VOTE

Monday, June 3, 2019, 3:00 PM
Pack the house to protect the vote! Advocates will present to the Board of Elections new findings that show voters’ rights may be in jeopardy. Now is the time to take action and protect voting rights! Use your voice by attending the Franklin County Board of Elections meeting at 3 pm on Monday, June 3rd, 2019 to advocate for Countywide voter education programming and more comprehensive poll worker training. High rates of provisional ballot use - and rejection - not only raise questions about the health of the election system but also reflect barriers to voters being able to cast a ballot that counts.Show up and let election officials know we need to reform the system now!  Location: Franklin County Board of Elections Office, 1700 Morse Rd., Columbus, OH 43229.  Sign up here:  https://go.peoplepower.org/event/action/20010

Community Pride Safety Training: Harm Reduction

Big white outdoor sign saying Columbus Community Pride with two fist drawings

Sunday, June 2, 2019, 1:00 – 3:00 PM
Mozaic, 2228 Summit St.
More than a naloxone training, this FREE workshop will address the fundamental principles behind harm reduction, describing how and why a compassionate, "nothing about us without us" approach to drug use saves lives by limiting the harm caused by stigma, lack of safe supplies, and de-humanizing carceral approach to addiction. Harm reduction advocates who organize in Columbus and across Ohio will describe what tools and programs are being used to value and save the lives of drug users.  Attendees will leave the workshop with important harm reduction supplies, such as narcan and sterile needles. Sheila Humphrey-Craig of Harm Reduction Ohio will also introduce her groundbreaking mock safe consumption tent, which will be on display as a resource at the Community Pride Festival.  Facebook. 

Murdering a ton of Iraqis

Shattering the Context of War

The U.S. government protects itself, not democracy. That’s what is most apparent about its 18-count indictment of Julian Assange, not to mention the ongoing imprisonment of Chelsea Manning, for the leaking and release of State Department and military documents and videos a decade ago.

The current reporting on the indictment is mostly about Assange himself: his expulsion from the Ecuadoran embassy in London after he’d been holed up there for seven years; the sexual assault charges against him in Sweden; and, of course, his role as a “tool” of the Russians, along with his flip-flopping appeal to both the political left and right (depending on the nature of the controversy WikiLeaks is stirring up). What a story!

You Can Almost Count on Each New Mass Shooter Being a Veteran

“He enlisted in the Virginia National Guard in April 1996, according to spokesman A.A. Puryear. He was assigned to the Norfolk-based 1st Battalion, 111th Field Artillery Regiment, 116th Infantry Brigade Combat Team as a 13B cannon crew member. He was discharged in April 2002 and held the rank of specialist at the time, the spokesman said. His records did not indicate overseas deployments.” —CNN on latest mass shooter

We’re supposed to overlook this bit of information. We’re supposed to focus on mental health questions or the inscrutable incomprehensible mystery of the inevitable human tragedy of mass shootings, which bizarrely and unfairly are inflicted by the universe on this particular 4 percent of humanity living in the United States, which quite irrelevantly has been glorifying violence through endless wars for many years.

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