Getting In My Head

Round 2....


Grrrrrr. Have you ever met people who just irked your soul? People who irk your soul are those who just make you want to kill yourself or kill them because they are just that annoying. They are the people who talk and when they talk the only thing going through your brain is OMG! Why are you still here on this earth! I have a name for these people who irk my soul...they are called Tomato Hitlisters. I call them that because they are people who if I saw them on the street, I would most certainly hit them with a tomato...or a brick to knock some sense into them. I'm not going to name specific people in my personal life but I will name some general people that most people could relate to....

Some famous Tomato Hitlisters are: Puff Daddy aka Puffy bka P.Diddy ktma Clown (note to everyone k.t.m.a. means "known to me as"), Tyra Banks (she's so phony and such an Oprah wannabe)

I'm not here to talk about celebs because that is some white-girl locker room gossip type shit but I just wanted you to get the gist of what Tomato Hitlisters are.

N e ways, with that said, I must say that there is a guy in particular who IRKS MY FREAKIN SOUL MAN! Ugh. I just do not understand niggas who have hissy fits. It's so.....so......so......bitchy. I will not name any names but there is some nigga that is out there in the world poking his lip out because I did not call him to tell him that I was back in Bmore until yesterday. Apparently, he thinks that I have "issues" because I did not ask to bless him with my presence. I mean really, he needs to grow up. I think he has issues considering he is really that mad about the fact that he thinks I should go out of my way to see him.

The only people I came to see while I was in town were my niece and nephews. I have not hit anybody up. I'm tired of dealing with Baltimorans and because I'm a non-committal person, I'm working on developing more meaningful relationships with people in general. Therefore, I have not been putting time and effort into people who I associate with. If I cannot truly relate to a person....I'm bypassing them.

My sister and company (ktma Danielle Incorporated), asked me the other day "Why when everyone comes home from work do you leave? How come you just do not stay and chill with us after being around the kids all day?". I did not need to respond because HGM (hot ghetto mess) responded for me and said "Because she don't care about us". Damn Skippy. I came to see the kids, I accomplished my mission, time to go. I just do not have time, tolerance, or patience for foolishness.

The unnamed guy that I mentioned told me "oh so now that you left Bmore, you shittin on it real hard. That's not even right". Why ain't it? I was never known to sugar coat anything so why should I start now....and the fact is, B-More is filled with Baltimorans who continuously B-Less. It ain't for me and I'm not going to pretend that it is.

Hmmmmmm.........

If it were not for my JuJu Beans and my Niyah, I'd be chillin in Pittsburgh with my Roomie and the white chic (we address our white roommate and her boyfriend as Anabelle and Peanut).

OMG. EWWWW. Two days ago, I had the strangest conversation with my dad. Of course him and my mother are not currently together but like with all break-ups there is a lot of back and forth. My dad has always been pretty laxed in conversation with me but Ewwwww....I do not need to hear about him and my mother's sex life. THE TERROR, THE TERROR. I'm the type of person who when people do things that I do not particularly like, I usually just nod, smile, and give them the okey-doke (unless it's something significant in which case I act like a damn fool).

He was telling me all this because he apparently has a new love interest and he wanted my advise as to whether he should pursue the new interest or work on it with my mother. I told him to pursue the chic...and I met her yesterday. It was a little awkward but copacetic nonetheless. I think the chic has an interest in my dad but because he has a bad rap sheet concerning his relationship with my mother, she's proceeding with caution.

I'm kind of having a problem with divided loyalties. In most of my relationships with people in general, I'm always playing the middle man. And I always have a problem with divided loyalties. The only difference is, if someone gets mad because I do not choose a side, I usually do not care. I usually look at them sideways and think that they should not make me choose. But when it comes to my parents, it is definitely a little deeper than that. But I will not go into details.

Of course my greedy ass is hungry. I think that I was a fat kid in a past life or something because I'm always hungry. I think that's just my personality in general. I'm hungry for everything...the world is not enough. Since my dad has been livin on his own, he has become a master chef. It's funny because the whole time that I've known him he has rarely cooked a damn thing. But I must say that surprisingly his food is OFF-THE-CHIIIZZZZAIN!

I'm ready to go back to Pittsburgh but I feel obligated to stay in Bmore until Sunday because I do not want JuJu Beans and Niyah to think that I'm permantly leaving them. Spring Break with them has been definitely bitter sweet.

I used them for a project that is due some time after spring break for my Photography class. I am enjoying photography but it is a lot more involved than I would have hoped. You have to manually develop the film and manually make prints....then you have to mount it. It's very very time consuming. But once you get a good picture, it all seems worth it. I'll probably be posting some of pics soon....stay tuned.

I'm not looking forward much to the bus ride back to Pittsburgh. On my way down I met this wierd lady who told me that she had a dream where I told her my name was Fran Franklin. She told me that in her dream I kept getting mad at some chic typing on her laptop too loudly so I told the chic to stop typing before I put her in the emergency room. Then she told me that in her dream me and the guy who was sitting in front of me was discussing marriage. The whole bus ride she kept addressing me as Fran. I did not feel the need to correct her because 1) crazy people should not have my real name and 2) it's funny to fuck with crazy people so I played it up and said "OMG! How did you know my name was Fran Franklin. You must be psychic"....more like psycho.

She was on her way to DC from Pheonix, AZ. Her boyfriend kicked her out the house after beating her (her face was beaten in). A friend wired her some money for the bus to DC. All she had on her was her pajamas and some flip flops. It was her first time ever riding the bus.

People are interesting.

Well...that's really all that has been on my mind lately....I'm about to raid the kitchen and make myself something to eat.

Lata Bitches!

Get At Me! Get At Me!

My travel plans to the ATL were canceled due to inclement weather. Therefore I'll be arriving in Baltimore earlier than expected. I'm coming into town today! I'll be there until the 16th. I'm mainly coming into town to strictly spend time with my niece and nephews but either way.....

GET AT ME!

Let's Continue the Discussion......

So with all the political commotion and after discussing different topics with different people, I decided to post information regarding the top issues surrounding the political debates. During each presidential election, there is usually two-three issues that are at the forefront of voters minds. Historically, since I have been born, the main issues of presidential elections has been affirmative action/minorities in the workplace, social security, and taxes. During the 2008 presidential campaigns the biggest issues are Iraq, Health care, the Economy, and Immigration. Immigration has always been an issue but more so in the last couple years since 9/11.

The reason why I'm posting detailed information regarding the aforementioned issues is because a lot of people have strong opinions about them without knowing the details. Since this is a very historical presidential election, I figured it would be appropriate and important to discuss these topics accurately.

(Note: There is a lot to assessing these issues, but here is just a brief assessment of these complex issues)

The Economy

When it comes to the current state of the economy, the U.S. is now in a state of recession. A recession is when unemployment is high. Many American citizens blame the economy on the Bush Administration. But this is only partially true. In economics, the economy is cyclical meaning that it naturally increases, then naturally decreases, then naturally increases, etc.... When Clinton was in office the economy just happened to be in it's natural increasing state so when Bush came into office, it was the time where the economy was naturally suppose to be in a decreasing state.

This does not mean that the Bush Administration should not take any responsibility for the economy. According to economic theory (the RBC Theory), government intervention exaggerates these increases and decreases. So when Clinton was in office, even though the economy was suppose to naturally increase, the increase was substantial because the Clinton Administration had good ideas. The Bush Administration has made the natural decrease in the cycle just as substantial.

The main problem with the economy is this: Americans culturally live above their means. Back in the day, women left their homes and entered the workforce to increase their household income. But because Americans value financial prosperity, they had to find more ways to increase their income so that they can live above their means. So they started working more hours. We are considered one of the most workaholic countries in the world. When working more hours stopped allowing consumers to live above their means, they started borrowing. Now everyone is in debt. Debt has led people to decrease spending. When people stop spending, businesses stop profiting. When businesses stop profiting, they increase prices to offset costs. They later discover that increasing prices is pointless because no one is still buying so they decrease prices so consumers can buy in. But they still need to offset costs....so they lay people off.

What I Think: Intuitively, it seems that to stimulate the economy, the government needs to find a way to get people out of debt. Not only do they need to find a way to get people out of debt, they need to make it harder for people to borrow...and they need to make laws to stop credit card companies from targeting young consumers. The war has effected the economy not just as far as spending is concerned, but it has decreased consumer expectations of where the economy is headed. When consumer expectations decrease, people also spend less...and the whole cycle that I described above occurs ending in lay offs.

In addition, taxes should increase with income. The wealthiest should pay more in taxes (percentage wise) than those who make less. After talking to a lot of people around my age, I have discovered that many of them do not fully understand the necessity of taxes. As much as we may hate that our disposable income is the net income as opposed to our gross income from our paychecks because of taxes, people need to understand that taxes fund the government so that it can be put back into the community. I go to school in Pennsylvania where they have a 7% tax on goods as opposed to my hometown in Maryland where the tax is 5%. Even though PA has higher taxes, they only tax things such as soda and candy whereas in MD they tax just about everything accept for medicine. Because of this, in my opinion, PA is relatively poor. They have to take out $52.00 every January from everyone's paychecks just to keep the public schools from shutting down. Almost every year since I have been there, the city has run out of salt to salt the streets when it's snowing. How can a city run out of salt? Paying taxes is important for the whole. It is collectivism that is very looked down by an individualistic American society.



Health care

In the U.S., co pays and deductibles have significantly increased. This is due to the fluctuations in the economy. Health care is closely tied to employment. Approximately 71% of Americans have employment-based health insurance. Because consumers are spending less and businesses are making less, businesses have to offset costs by making their employees responsible for health care costs. The reason why health care is employment-based is because businesses get deductions for providing health care benefits but because of the state of the economy, these deductions are not as significant as they once were.

What I think: There is a big debate about having Universal Health care. I think that ultimately the government should work toward providing universal health care but it is not the immediate answer. The answer is to not make health care so employment-based because it gives too much power to corporations and ties the fluctuations in health care too closely connected with fluctuations within the economy. In addition, if they fix the economy, they fix health care.


Immigration

Immigration has always been ongoing debate but its significance has been highlighted since 9/11. In the past, border patrol has been increased in Texas and California to decrease the amount of illegal immigrants. The current state in question now is Arizona. The government has been using Arizona as a "test" state for immigration laws. Through Arizona, the benefits and disadvantages of immigration are clearly defined because it shows the impact of immigration on a grander scale.

The influx of immigration in Arizona has shown significant alleged problems. There has been an increase in crime, increase in welfare and medical expenditures provided by the government, and a large decrease in the school system. Many of the schools in Arizona are largely populated with native Hispanics. This has held back many American children because teachers have to take the time to significantly slow down teaching to make sure that all students are caught up. Since the majority of immigrants do not speak English fluently the task is a very large feat. It also cost the government more money to make sure that Hispanic students are taught English.

As far as welfare and medical expenditures are concerned, hospitals do not turn away people. So if an illegal immigrant does need medical care, the hospital provides it. Because many illegal immigrants are poorer than the average American, the crime rate among them is higher (statistically the poor committs more crimes...intuitively that makes sense).

It has been a long standing argument that immigration decreases the availability of jobs for American citizens and they keep the minimum wage low.

On the flip side of the argument, businesses feel that allowing illegal immigrants into the country is necessary because it is cheap labor. They feel that certain positions that immigrants are willing to take are not wanted by American citizens so they do not understand what the big problem is. When the government began cracking down on businesses who hired illegal immigrants, some businesses completely moved over seas because labor costs were too high. When businesses move out of the country, it also has the same effect as allowing immigrants into the country in that it decreases jobs for American citizens and decreases tax revenue.

In recent years, the governement has made tougher laws against employers who higher illegal immigrants. This year, there is speculation that the government is trying to change the law which states that if a child is born in the U.S. and both of their parents are illegal immigrants, then that child is not automatically considered an American citizen. This law has caused a lot of controversy in that it may be deemed as unconstitutional.

What I Think: I'm a big believer in INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITY! If you want to be in the United States so badly, then go through the process and become a citizen. It's that simple. Everyone has to grind to make the life they want for themselves...even as a citizen. Therefore, an illegal immigrant should not be an exception to the rule. If they want a better life for them and their children and that's why they come to the U.S.....then they should do it the right way. By coming into the country illegally they are breaking the law. Point blank. As a black person, I'm oppressed in my own country and if I want to build the life I want, I have to have the hustle. Some of my friends have that illegal hustler spirit while others are on their grind but are doing it the right way. It's an annoying process...and some ways unfair....but it's a necessity.

Some people may say "well that's all fine and good but what do you do with the illegal immigrants who have been here for years before the government crackdown?". It is these illegal immigrants who have brought their five year old children over with them and their five year olds are now eighteen and in college. The government crackdown has caused many of these families childrens to have to quit college because they are no longer elligible for government funding and has sent many families on the run across the U.S. Many illegal immigrants now have to take lower paying jobs becauses employers are getting the heat.

All I have to say to that is.....the government is enforcing the law. There is nothing wrong with that, it's what they are suppose to do. I do not understand how someone resides in the U.S. for damn near a decade and does not try to become a citizen...or at the least, have their child become a citizen. If it is that important to be here, then why not go through the process. If the government were not paying attention to drug dealers and then one day they decided that they were going to really crack down on drug dealers...is there something wrong with that? I'm not saying illegal immigrants and drug dealers are the same....but both are hustlers with justification. Regardless how justified they may be, they are law-breakers. What else is there to say?