Archive for April, 2008

Atmosphere On Job Satisfaction

Wednesday, April 30th, 2008

Hip-Hop DX.com has an interview with atmosphere with some interesting insights.

I’m committed for being who I am 150% of the time, whether it’s on record, in an interview or ordering coffee, eating, sleeping, I’m committed to being me. It’s your issue to make people relate to me or recognize me, or make me their friend, or hate me or think I suck. I can’t put any thought into what can I do to make people think I suck, or make people think I’m cool. The minute I do that I don’t know that I can necessarily do this job. I’d have to go find a new job, and not on some martyr me shit, but on some like, the reason I like this job more than any other job is not because I get to travel, it’s not because I get to smoke as many cigarettes as I want, any time that I want. It’s because it feels purposeful, and I don’t mean that what we do has this higher purpose. I mean like, this, compared to driving a delivery truck is soothing me. This makes me fucking happier than shit. Driving a delivery truck would make me happy too, much more than working a cash register…so it’s just the elements of this job that I love, I try to stick to in order to keep me in check and keep me from taking this for granted. That makes me a loser now, anyone who takes their job for granted is a fucking loser. If you come to terms that you deliver newspapers, and that’s what you do and you take that for granted and fuck that off? Then you’re a loser, cause you’ve got something that someone would kill to have. That’s how I see it, I don’t want to be a loser.

Slug of Atmosphere has a point here in his approach to the jobs we choose in life.

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Posted in Atmosphere, economics, hip-hop, Rap | No Comments »

Rappers Can Sell Anything

Monday, April 28th, 2008

Rappers haven’t been doing a great job selling records recently but marketers realize rappers can promote just about anything. Endorsements by rappers have gone beyond the financial stables for rappers of clothing, cars and malt liquor to now the range of endorsements seems almost endless with Nas recently endorsing SanDisk’s line of flash memory players; SanDisk also is a sponsor for this years Rock The Bells tour.

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Posted in hip-hop, marketing, NAS | No Comments »

Chris Bennett ends campaign for VP under Libertarian Party

Monday, April 28th, 2008


Chris Bennett has announced he will no longer seek the Libertarian Party’s nomination for Vice-President. Bennett ended his campaign for VP because it was no longer financially feasible for him. Chris Bennett is not giving up on the Libertarian Party,

“I want to thank those who did contribute and keep contributing to Libertarian candidates all over the country. My campaign was solely focusing on the growth of the LP. Even though I am no longer a candidate, the LP needs to reach out to younger voters, minorities and women. We need to elect more principled Libertarians at all levels and I promise to continue to lend any support I can to our candidates. We need to strengthen our state and local organizations and increase college campus libertarian groups across the country. The LP is not just about our principled ideas it’s also about growth and without growth we can’t assure that our party will exist for future generations. Thank you for your support and please keep supporting the Libertarian Party!”

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Posted in 2008, Libertarian Party, Presidential Election | No Comments »

Brent Bozell Is Not Hip-Hop

Monday, April 28th, 2008

Brent Bozell uses Obama’s recent reference to Jay-z as an excuse to attack Obama and hip-hop. Obama has been critical of the lyrical content of rap music in the past, even being accused by the website HipHopDx of hating hip-hop.

But Obama’s criticisms of hip-hop are not enough for Brent Bozell who would probably only be happy with politicians referencing hip-hop as code for insulting black people like Bill Clinton did in his 1992 campaign for President when he brought up Sista Souljah.

Bozell cites a Parents Television Council study that points out some problems with the hip-hop videos being aired on TV by Viacom:

Obama should take a look at a new report from the Parents Television Council about three popular rap-music programs that air in the afternoon or early evening — “Sucker Free” on MTV and “Rap City” and “106 & Park” on Black Entertainment Television for two weeks in December and a week in March.

In 41 and a half hours studied, analysts found 282 uses of the N-word. Is that “a little too frequently,” too?

A little too much degrading of women? In those same hours, there were 143 uses of the B-word to describe women.

A little too much focus on material things? Here, Obama is gliding by the question of what material things are acquired. The rap shows included 205 depictions or discussions of drug sale or use and other illegal activity during the study period, for an average of 7.5 instances per hour, or roughly one instance every eight minutes.

Obama did not discuss the heavily sexualized world of rap in his answer. Sexually explicit scenes or lyrical references on these shows appeared 27 times an hour in December and 40 times an hour in March. No one could miss that drumbeat.

In just one week of programming — 14 hours in March — PTC analysts found 1,342 instances of offensive/adult content, or 95.8 instances per hour, or one instance of adult content every 38 seconds.

There certainly are problems with hip-hop and the programs Bozell mentions but it is not fair to say that 106 & Park represent all of hip-hop. Obama has mentioned that he has discussed the problems he have with the lyrics in hip-hop with Nas and Jay-z who are certainly high profile rappers. What more could Brent Bozell want?

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Posted in Barack Obama, Brent Bozell, hip-hop, Jay-z, poverty | No Comments »

Did Obama Make a Jay-Z Reference?

Friday, April 18th, 2008

Obama may be the big government candidate for President, but is hard not to like the guy.

In Wednesday’s debate about trivial issues, Obama did not perform at his best. Obama’s not worried. At his speech the following day, Obama makes what I think is a clear reference to Jay-z by brushing the dirt off his shoulders.


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Posted in Barack Obama, Jay-z, Presidential Election | 2 Comments »

Bobb Barr is Running for President as a Libertarian

Monday, April 7th, 2008

Bob Barr is now clearly running for President of the United States as a Libertarian. Bob Barr should be the Libertarian Party’s candidate for President for the primary reasons that he is a libertarian and he would provide the Libertarian Party with a large amount of credibility as a former member of Congress.

The main concern some libertarians have with Bob Barr was because Barr used to be a strong proponent of the war on drugs but Bob Barr has changed his stance on this issue as of late including actively lobbying for the Marijuana Policy Project.

Bob Barr’s website is focused on four issues: big government and big spending,individual liberty, secure our borders and national defense. Bob Barr does support the fair tax which I think is a bit of a strange economic policy but politically it has the advantage of attracting some former Mike Huckabee supporters. Bob Barr argues for a non-interventionist on foreign policy providing a true anti-war candidate.

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Posted in 2008, Bob Barr, Libertarian Party, marijuana, Presidential Election, war on drugs | 1 Comment »