Being A Man

Tonight I was flipping through the channels and came across one of my favorite episodes of "Fresh Prince of Bel-Air." This episode is not one of the funniest ones, but instead it is one of the greatest commentaries on society and being a man I have ever seen. It is also, in my estimation, some of, if not the, best acting Will Smith has ever put on display.

So, here is the synopsis. Lou Smith, Will's long-lost father, jumps into the picture for the first time in 14 years. Lou is a truck driver and finds Will during a trip to L.A. Suddenly, Will's dream has come true...daddy's home. This causes some painful friction with Uncle Phil as Will wants his Daddy to be what Will missed for a decade and a half. At the end, we see Lou bail on Will again, then Will reacts as most teens would. He got angry, indignant, then let the pain come through in one of the most powerful lines in television history..."How come he don't want me, man?"

I have seen this episode several times, and it still makes me emotional and feel for the millions of kids who live without fathers everyday. Having worked in the childcare industry, I have seen the damage bad parenting, as well as a complete lack of parenting, can cause children. And this episode of "Fresh Prince" just rings home so true.

In life, for a guy, there are a few defining decisions that will determine who you really are. Sometimes those are small decisions, sometimes they are life-changing decisions. However, there is usually only one choice that a true, real man will make.

Some of the big decisions are based on relationships with people in your life. For instance, no MAN has ever hit his wife/girl friend/fiance. Yes, there are males who hit females, but, I say again, no MAN has EVER hit a woman. In my book, you officially lose your right to call yourself a man the second you lay your hand on your woman.

Next, no MAN sits on his rear end and does nothing to better himself and the lives of those he cares about. A male who waits on a free check, or spends all his time drunk or high, or otherwise wastes his life and does not work to provide, he is not a real MAN. Now, let me clarify, if there is a family unit in which the wife has a career and the man is a stay at home daddy, as long as that daddy works to keep the house operating and provides discipline and structure and love for the kids, then that man is providing for his family. However, the drunk/high, loser sitting at home not taking care of what needs done is not, in my book, a man.

Then we get to the point of the show, and that is no MAN ever, ever up-and-abandoned his family. No MAN ever left his child in the rearview mirror to fend for him- or herself in life. Daddy is, in many ways, just as important as mommy in the development of a child. Daddy needs to be there. No MAN ever left that responsibility behind. If you are someone who left his child or children behind, you, sir, are not a man. If you didn't do everything you possible could to be in your child or children's life/lives, you are not a man.

I just needed to get that off my chest. Our society is in a severe shortage of real men. We are in a desperate need for daddies. If you are man enough to have sex, you better be man enough to be there for the kids you create. They need you.

Don't ever be the kind of person who leads a kid to ask, "Why don't he want me, man?"

Big Mac...Slammin' Sammy?

In 2010's first "Well, duh!" moment in sports, Mark McGwire came out to announce that he had, in fact, taken steroids and Human Growth Hormone, throughout most of the 1990's.

So, Mark McGwire is no longer the last man on earth denying his steroid use. We all knew. Everyone on ESPN knew. Everyone on the Cardinals roster knew. So, no shock and no suspense-relief there. However, this opens the door and gives way to the question: What about Sammy Sosa?

Did Sammy do it? Most likely. So, if he did, perhaps its time for Sammy to clear the air as well. I think everyone who earned major prominence during the "Steroid Era" should go ahead and come clean. Cal Ripken, Jr., might have used some supplemental support to make that Iron Man streak a reality...who knows? The thing is, at the time, such supplements were NOT ILLEGAL. So, it is not like rules were violated.

Yet, there are purists who are arguing that steroids, regardless of the rules of baseball, are a black mark on the history of baseball. Many think that any records or marks made by those guilty of participating in the Steroid Era should be somehow erased or covered up. Some would wipe the books clean of any mention of the steroid users and their impact on the game.

I would argue that, despite your feelings on steroids and whether the fact there was no rules broken at the time they were taken, both Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa deserve to be in the Hall of Fame. Put an asterisk or a parentheses and explain the Steroid Era, but put these two in, and even give the same treatment to Barry Bonds. However, McGwire and Sosa deserve to be in the Hall, and here is why.

Whether they get enshrined or not, McGwire and Sosa need to be included in the story of professional baseball and the Hall of Fame. Four years after a season that ended on August 12, cancelling a World Series, baseball was reeling. Ratings were hurting. Baseball was becoming a footnote.

Mark McGwire was consistently teasing us with the home run record, but could not push over the hump. It was fun to talk about it, to dream about seeing number 62 go over the fences. Yet, there was no buzz. The country did not take notice of baseball. We needed a reason to get excited about baseball again.

Then, June 1998 happened. Sammy Sosa drives 20 long balls and suddenly, the chase for Roger Maris is a two-man sprint through the summer. McGwire and Sosa spent the summer playing "Anything you can do, I can do better!" And the nation, and the world, took notice. Baseball was fun. Baseball was exciting. Baseball was BACK!

The 1998 season was a magical year. In May, a young fireballer, sharing the same lockerroom as Sosa, named Kerry Wood turned a lot of heads with his 20 strike-out performance against the Houston Astros. Wrigley Field would soon become the stage for a year of history. In baseball's second oldest stadium, some of the most memorable moments of all time would occur.

Kerry Wood's 20 Ks started it all, but Sammy Sosa's 20 dingers in June caused baseball fever to spread faster than H1N1 hysteria. For about 3 1/2 months, America, and the world, watched magic happen.

Sosa. McGwire. McGwire. Sosa. Back and forth. Day by day, history inched closer. Who would finally cross the threshold?

The fun, excitement, and joy that all of baseball experienced that wonderful summer saved Major League Baseball. McGwire and Sosa took baseball and carried on their broad shoulders back to glory. Major League Baseball would not be anything close to what it is now were it not for 1998 and the McGwire-Sosa Home Run Derby.

So, put an asterisk, footnote, parenthesis, or some other denotation to make note of the Steroid Era; do what you will. But, McGwire and Sosa deserve to be in the Hall of Fame for their contributions to baseball. Barry Bonds, on the same grounds, deserves that as well.

Negro Dialects and Liberal Gifts to Blacks

Democrat Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid referred to Barack Obama as not having a "negro dialect." But, it was meant as complimentary, and not as an insult. So, since he is liberal and in a position of power that is vital to the further government take-over of America, his comments are excused, defended, and ignored.

It just amazes me the blind, and often ignorant, manner in which minorities, especially African-Americans follow Democrats. No matter what the facts are, African-Americans, speaking only in terms of the vast majority, will blindly follow the left and buy whatever it is they are selling.

In so many instances, such as affirmative action, liberls spew this mantra of how unfair and uneven the world is for minorities, and then tell minorities only politicians can help them overcome the biases. Rarely, if ever, do you hear a liberal politician preach on the merits and efforts of minorities, but how they, the politician, can help lower the bar and assist the minorities in getting to where they want to be.

The truth is, liberals treat blacks, hispanics, and other minority groups like caged animals. They give minorities small bits of raw meat to keep them happy and fed, the whole time killing their insticts to hunt and work for themselves. "Here, here is a free check because you're black and life is unfair." "We will never cut welfcare because cutting it would be racist since so many blacks are stuck on welfare." "Here, take this job that you aren't trained for because you are black. You won't get fired, either, because you are black and life is unfair for you."

Liberals are some of the most racist people known to man. They hold minorities back by constantly lowering the bar and lowering expectations, thus cutting their legs from underneath them. They take away their desire to succeed by telling them it is near impossible to succeed because of so much stacked against them. Liberals are racists because they do everything to take away minorities' desire to better themselves. Welfare and Affirmitive Action are the new slavery.

Everything the liberals try to give to minorities is an empty suit, empty promise, and crippling to their human potential. Liberals will give everything they can think of to minorities, as long as it is on the taxpayers' bill, to keep them from actually trying to do it on their own.

In the 1960's, the democrats and liberals fought AGAINST the Civil Rights movement. Yes, AGAINST. It was the Republicans that supported and pushed-through the Civil Rights Act. Republicans and the Conservative Right love all people and support them in their struggles to improve their own lot. We, do not, however, think that anyone who is able, regardless of color, creed, religion, sexual orientation, sex, or gender, should be allowed to sit at home and live off the backs of the taxpayer. Some people cannot work, we know. However, there are millions of people who sit on their butt and live better than many who work to provide that life for them.

Yet, for me to put forth that belief, that people who are able need to earn their way and not mooch, I will be accused by some of being a racist, a bigot, and insensitive. There are too many people who refuse to ask people to earn their way because they are afraid of being called racist, which is sad. Telling the truth is racism? If telling the truth offends a race of people, then perhaps that group of people needs to work to change their truth.

In our country, liberals like Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid talk a good game for minorities during election cycles, but in all this time, with all these promises, with all these speeches, how much better off are minorities now? Most homeless are black. Most uneducated are black. Most unemployed are black. Most under employed are black. Most living in poverty are black. Its not racism, it is fact. It is tragic.

So much of what the liberals give to minorities is nothing but a half-hearted effort to manipulate, control, and quiet the minorities. Promises of freebies, free checks, reparations, free health care, and the power of the media and political machine to put pressure on anyone who dares hire more whites than blacks all work together to control minorities. Everything is an empty suit and an empty promise.

Liberals celebrated the candidacy of a black man for President of the United States. They talked about history and how important it was to elect a black man. They created an environment where people were made to feel guilty along the lines of bigotry and racism to vote for the black guy. In the Iowa caucuses, there was incredible pressure on these cornfield white people to pick the black guy and not be a racist by picking one of the whites. It is hard to vote for a white over a black when you are in a face-to-face group. Obama was selected by means of affirmative action in 2008. His selection was billed by the left as history in the making. It was moving and meaningful. Black President! Finally! Let's select the First Black President! Black President! That's what we heard from the left for 18 months...and still hear today.

Yet, just like everything else the left promises blacks, this promise and this event was only half-hearted and a way to gain control over blacks. They promoted and promised a black president...but what did the blacks get? A half-white president controlled by white 'massas' in Congress and at MoveOn.org.

2010 Predictions

1) Obama and the Dems will tout their victorious passing of "something" for health care reform. No one outside of talk radio and FNC will dare question what that "something" actually is, but the "something" is a historic "something." It could be good...could be bad...but they actually passed "something." And that "something" will be the landmark success that the media will tout to help build momentum toward the November mid-terms.

2) Cap and Tax will eventually pass. Another "something." It will include the promised tax payer funds for the global warming initiatives Obama agreed to in Copenhagen. Stimulus money will be used to put thousands of illegals to work to build homeless shelters and YMCAs to house the massive influx of homeless due to the high energy costs. Al Gore will fly around with Obama in Gore's private jet to various golf courses, taking breaks between holes to tout the green grass, the clean air, and the new green technology that is coming out in the coming months. The spike in homelessness will be blamed on the careless Bush policies that encouraged the alleged price gouging of big oil.

3) As the health reform bill gets through reconsiliation, and cap and tax builds momentum toward passing, the Obama administration will announce that television services and access to the important messages carried with the Emergency Broadcast System. They will blame Bush and rehash and rewrite the history of Katrina to emphasize the need for everyone to have access to clear, understandable television. A new tax on the viewers of the most successful cable news channel will pay for TV for all. Every person in America will be required to purchase a government approved television service with government approved channels with government approved programming. Finally, Barack will have an answer for Fox News....

4) In conjuction with the Right to Public Broadcast and Emergency Information Act, Chuck Schumer, D-NY, will add an amendment that will ressurrect the Fairness Doctrine. The Fairness Doctrine will garner the support of all Democrats. The justification of the amendment will be explained as follows: if all broadcasts, television, radio and otherwise, are subject to fairness and avoid one-sidedness, more people will be tuned in, therefore will have more readily available access to any important news and information through the Emergency Message System.

5) For anyone with a job, the government will absorb 100% of your check, send your family a box of food each week, all of which is grown on "green" and animal friendly farms, and determine the amount of kilowatthours your family can use in electricity each day. Hit the limit, your power goes off. So, cook dinner in the crockpot FIRST!

6) In late October, as more and more families lose jobs, homes, and cars, crime rates skyrocket, and civil unrest starts to become a trend, Barack Obama makes a heartfelt, sincere announcement in reference to the fear and worry America is feeling. With the support of Congress, Obama, in the interest of safety for the innocent, hard-working, suffering American people, the United States will not expose its citizens to the potential dangers and heightened emotions of an election night. As of November 1, 2010, all state and national elections will be post-poned until such time as joblessness, homelessness, and crime all see drastic declines.

Unlikely?

Yeah. And if I told you in 2006 that by 2009, the US would have a weak puppet for a President who led an immature, unrestrained Congress into taking over General Motors, the banking industry, and the health care industry, you would think I was crazy then, too.