WCS 58: A Black job would be easier

w/: Fresno brain drain + PDX Pike’s Place + Diddy's defense plan

Not often, but sometimes when my day gig was getting to me I would muse upon having never aspired to having more than a Black job. Then I wouldn’t be out here on this hot-ass playground. In those disappointed moments it seemed so ignorant, having gone pro at telling the unvarnished American story to a nation that acts allergic to that history.

What a self-sabotaging idea.

A bunch of White United States citizens despise people of color—especially Black ones—and will go to their graves that way. All that’s in question are the degrees and percentages. This bedrock fact ought to be the foundation for every serious political beat in the US.

Of course, that bedrock fact is not what American political reporting stands on. CNN, the New York Times, your local news media outlets, and even Jon Stewart and the preponderance of your YouTube faves have pushed the premise of confusion:

How can this race possibly be close?

The news delivery vessels mentioned above can’t or won’t meaningfully explore racial antipathy’s impact. Income inequality is real, as is misogyny. But when voters say they “don’t know” VP Kamala, they’re actually talking about trusting her California Black lady butt. Some wouldn’t trust her in a thousand lifetimes. And the entrenched nature of that distrust is a story.

Hardcore racism is where our truth search begins. Acknowledging a story is the opposite of reaching a conclusion.

So, fuck the “confusion.”

The following song came to me via text from my friend John, talk partner in 2023’s first Sojourn conversation-interview. This was Thursday and I was working my day gig on a school playground west of Pasadena. It’s a Texas Public Radio CAKE performance and, yes, the band is on an elevator.

Lil Hit

• The founder of Berkeley’s Patients Care Collective used to do this party called The Gathering. Between the Beats—Martin O’Brien’s document of the incandescent and musically spot-on local party scene—is now streaming on Apple TV.
  48 Hills

• Drug Recognition Experts are officers who claim to know when you’re too stoned to drive. Critics of DREs call them the product of “police science” and complete BS.
  Oregon Live/AL.com