Disqus - Latest Comments for Ben G.

Re: Blogging off subject, though not really

Ben G. — Tue, 08 Jun 2004 12:09:35 -0000

Jonathan, thanks for your thoughts on this post. And yes, of course, you're right when you say:

Man, this is *your* blog and, as I take it, digressions are the discursive provence of blogispation. I for one appreciate "reading" your thoughts as they unfurl.

I've been a little slow and a little shy to follow the blogispatic convention of writing about things as they cross my horizon—not because I worry about what's acceptable or appropriate but because I've been using this blog more as a kind of elaborate system of note cards for the book that I hope this will one day be. Also because I'm mostly writing about things of the past rather than things of immediate present. So it's for these reasons that I feel slightly self-conscious as I engage the goings on of the blogosphere in my own blog. I'm interested in the fact that my blog as hyper-text notecards use is somewhat unique. Though I've looked around for other examples of it, I have not found many. This is a subject that I will probably post on sometime soon in the main section of the blog.

As far as more poems go, you may have to be patient this time. Though you might find one up here sooner than you think. We'll see . . .

Re: Lunch

Ben G. — Thu, 10 Jun 2004 16:17:10 -0000

I am fortunate not to have suffered abuse from either of my parents. I wish my father could have said the same about his parents. I just started digging around for something he wrote in the 1980s, a prayer of sorts, about his feeling painfully bound to follow the religous commandment to "honor thy mother and father." When his piece turns up, I'll post it . . .

Re: Now I’m psyched

Ben G. — Thu, 10 Jun 2004 17:10:39 -0000

Well, so far I am very happy with this Epson Stylus CX5400, though I don't really have anything to compare it to. One thing I like, not reflected in the uploads to this blog, is that when I scan small 4x6 photos at high resolution (1200x1200 dpi), the enlarged image on my screen shows details I could not see in the original.

For my own photographs I've switched over to taking them in the digital format. I use a now older model Nikon Coolpix 990. I've been pretty satisfied with the prints I get through ofoto. I haven't yet tested the photo printing on my Epson. I suspect I'll still print with ofoto when I want higher quality results for framing or the like.

As far as the Peekskill riots go, I know about them, of course, but I haven't done much research abou them. My parents weren't at that concert—though, as for many on the left, Paul Robeson was one of my father's great heros. I do remember hearing a feature about Robeson and Peekskill on NPR a year or two ago. If you search on Paul Robeson in either Morning Edition or All Things Considered, you should be able to find the segment and stream the audio.

Also you might try googling Peekskill and/or Robeson and Bill Mandel (see his website to get a load of who he is). He has written a first hand account of the Robeson concernt and subsequent riot in his book and posts excerpts of his book, when relevant, on a number of left-wing list-serves.

And click on the American 1950s link in my sidebar. There's a lot of interesting stuff collected on that site, including Howard Fast's account of the Peekskill riot.

My recollection is that my parents were visiting my mother's parents at their summer home, in the Mohegan colony, very near Peekskill, and they saw some of the people who had fled the violence and heard about it first hand. I may, however, be conflating my parents with my grandparents or their friends . . .

Re: Blogging off subject, though not really

Ben G. — Sun, 13 Jun 2004 16:47:33 -0000

Thanks for your encouragement, Kim. I'll read your piece on Rustin. When my dad was Exec Director of the Greater New York Council for a Sane Nuclear Policy (1960-62), he worked with Rustin and probably worked with him again in the context of the SCLC. Rustin is of great interest to me. When I get to my SANE documents from the FBI, I'll be able to detail some of the things Rustin and my dad did together.

For the record, I don't have any worry about blogging about the past. I have been struck by the fact that, despite the versatility of the medium, there aren't more folks using blogs to work out a complicated writing project. Current events, personal and/or political, seem to hold sway out here in the blogosphere. I benefit a lot from and enjoy all these present-focused blogs, but I'm curious about other ways people may use this technology.

When I blogged in reaction to Jeanne's piece, I started out thinking I was "off subject" because I was writing about current things mentioned in someone else's blog. Once I started writing I realized my response to her post had everything to do with what this blog is all about.

Re: Rep. Corrine Brown (D-Fla.) Names The Thieves, The Civil Rights Commission Thinks There Was A Crime: It’s Time For An Investigation

Ben G. — Thu, 12 Aug 2004 10:03:01 -0000

Carol, thanks for your interest in this subject. I checked out the article you linked, but I fail to see what facts it contains. Kirsanow's "facts" consist of his citing what "some people were saying" or "these ads before an election cycle" and then saying that the claims of the people of the ads are wrong. He sets up anonymous straw men whom he counters with unsupported assertions of his own.

Kirsanow asserts further that all allegations of voter intimidation are false. The US Commission on Civil Rights, for which he is a (Bush appointed) commissioner, has never stated that it reached any such conlcusion. Sadly, there are frequent reports in the presss of voter intimidation and trickery to suppress voter turnout. Also see the recent report issued by the the NAACP and People for the American Way.

For an overview of some of the other facts about voting rights in our country you can read this post on my blog. Additionally, a congressional report [pdf] shows that outside of Florida, in the country as a whole, low income and minority voters are more likely than anyone else to have their votes discarded. If subsequent to the USCCR's 2001 report on Florida, the Commission had found that there had not actually been any voter disenfranchisement, their April 2004 report would not conclude that "the potential is real and present for significant problems on voting day that once again will compromise the right to vote" in 2004. If you haven't seen the USCCR report on Florida, it's defnitely worth a look, especially the executive summary and the testimonies in Chapter 2.

Please review these sources and see how the "facts" in Larry Elder's interview with Peter Kirsanow measure up to the wealth of information available on the sad state of our electoral system.

Re: Nothing New In Tuskegee, Alabama

Ben G. — Thu, 26 Aug 2004 15:23:16 -0000

Kevin, Thanks for all that you've done. You may have seen that Illurminations, one of the blogs you contacted, blogged this. I hope the Justice Department is doing something about this. I was saddened to hear from one of my sources in Montgomery, who contacted the SPLC the first day that this story came out, that the SPLC person on the phone was patronizing, saying stuff like "these things hardly ever turn out to be real." Very, very disapointing.

Mz Ouiser, thanks for checking back in.

Judging from the data on my site meter, this is definitely getting around.

More soon, I hope.

Re: The Middle of the Internet

Ben G. — Mon, 30 Aug 2004 14:11:30 -0000

Oh, how embarassing. Sorry about that, Barry. Susan and I have exchanged a number of emails, but she never corrected me. Either she didn't notice my mistake or she was being very kind. In any case, it's a great site! I can't wait to read Uncivil Rights when it comes out.

Re: Exhibit No. 43

Ben G. — Mon, 13 Sep 2004 15:01:34 -0000

Kevin, I think you are being quite reasonable, but I have to disagree with what you're saying. First point of disagreement is in the post you're commenting on: when does this start to look suspicious enough to warrant action from the SPLC? If part of what looks suspicious is the poor quality of the police investigation, then what good does it do to wait and see what the police turn up first?

But I have a more serious thing to disagree about, too. It's fine to say that the police may have their reasons for not going public with all their information. BUT, we are talking about an incident where a black man was found hanging from a tree in a public place. That is ENORMOUSLY symbolic and can only be experienced as an act of TERRORISM by the African American communities in the area.

We are talking about something that reads as racial terrorism in an area that has a pitiful legacy of incident upon incident of racist violence going uninvestigated— bombings, shootings, cars getting run off the road, beatings, you name it. It is well documented that in the past such things went on with full knowledge of the police and that, in fact, the police were often the perpetrators themselves. Very few of the countless incidents were ever investigated. The police on the force now are the children and grandchildren of the Police/KKK coalition that used terror tactics to keep the "peace" by subduing and intimidating black folks. The past is still very near.

Right now, the Tuskegee Police has a professional and a historical responsibility to quell the legitimate fears of the community that they are supposed to serve. This means conducting the investigation seriously and carefully and as publicly as circumstances allow—even if this only means regular announcements that they are working hard at the investigation and will reveal the developments as soon as possible. If the police has good reason to think that this is a suicide then they must give some indication as to why.

If the police cannot vigorously maintain the sort of conduct I just outlined, they collude either in effect or by intent with terrorist murderers and send the message to all African Americans in the area that in Alabama lynchings are still a-okay.

Af far as the SPLC goes, if they are worth anything as an organization, they should be keenly aware of the symbolic force of Winston Carter's death and be doing EVERYTHING possible to bring pressure on the police to start acting appropriately.