Nobody Plays Church Better Than Atlanta!

WSB-TV‘s Richard Belcher warned about *community pushback* over prosecuting the APS cheating investigation during a Sunday, July 17, 2011 TV special about the cheating scandal (as they’ve now branded it with special graphics and everything), up to that day’s point.

Go to 5:00 on vid for Belcher’s quote and avoid the audio dramatics at beginning.

I witnessed some of this at the community open house with new, interim APS Superintendent Erroll Davis on July 21, a man not the least bit stingy with his words and rhetorical side roads, highroads and by-ways.

I live-Tweeted during the July 21 community open house and Q&A session with Super Davis. One parent’s heartfelt remarks were powerful:

From my Twitter stream: *Parent in tears at mic over beloved #aps personnel who will no longer be there. People she felt, deeply, loved and cared for her kids.*

I think that’s pretty much what Belcher was alluding to in the TV special. And when that kind of raw (genuine) emotion gets fanned from the pulpit by preachers/emotion manipulators, well… hey, you’ve got yourself some good old fashion religion. A style!

I’m hoping MSM will visit some metro Atlanta churches so we can get their, uh, unique perspective. Because… nobody can play church like we do in the A.

I should also mention that security for the July 21 open house/new Super Erroll Davis was considerable. For good reasons too, I’d imagine.

There is no shortage of emotion-letting & vetting and general hand-wringing going on in Atlanta over the APS cheating matter.

And long-known local crackpots, trashcan media, assorted contract-seeking vultures, citizen journos, Joe Blows, MSM, national media, parents, onlookers, snake-oil sales types, very dubious leaders, people who kinda give a shit, you get the point, are all mixed into this civic stew still bubbling steadily along on the cooker.

Dish it up.

UPDATE: The second July 24, 2011 WSB-TV special on the APS cheating investigation is here.

The World Is Allergic To Ralph Reed

Poor Ralph Reed. Nobody appreciates him. He wrote a decent political thriller of a novel, but it’s not like The New Yorker was going to review it. Heck, I doubt even our local alt-weekly, Creative Loafing, bothered to review Reed’s novel, Dark Horse, as such a review might impact their SEO strategy for this comedic, graphic novel-style gem, The Book of Ralph, by Doug Monore… if Creative Loafing had a SEO strategy in the first place. But I diverge…

Now Reed’s just about the only Georgia Republican willing to raise money for McCain, yet no one wants him at that party either! From today’s AJC:

On Aug. 7, Reed wrote friends and supporters asking them to give to Monday’s fund-raiser. He praised McCain and said he had joined the “McCain Victory 2008” team in a message that was billed as a “special invitation from Ralph Reed.”

McCain Victory 2008 is a joint fund-raising venture of the McCain campaign, the RNC and various state Republican parties.

The first hint of controversy came Monday when Campaign Money Watch, a Washington group that monitors campaign finance, called on McCain to cancel the event.

“Senator McCain knows exactly how Ralph Reed helped Jack Abramoff defraud Indian tribes out of tens of millions of dollars,” Campaign Money Watch director David Donnelly said. “Senator McCain should spare himself any further embarrassment by canceling this event immediately.”

My thoughts on Reed and McCain and The Party, back in June of this year for The Huffington Post’s Off The Bus project, are here.

What’s a pretty, corruption scandal-tainted Evangie Boy gonna do when he so desperately wants to be an inside (R) party player that he’s willing to hang his hat on a Republican (McCain) “notoriously allergic to religion?” These is indeed hard economic and evangelical times.

Obama’s Preacher Man

This whole thing is amusing as last time I checked, plenty of white “goddamn America” is all for electing Obama Prez of this “goddamn America.” For the record, yes, I was offended by this charlatan preacher’s words and actions. Other than perhaps a history of slavery in “goddamn America” that was perpetuated by a very few priviledged white folk, I have no idea where some black people get off thinking all white people are so f-in priviledged. That’s about like saying all black people hate white people… and I know that simply is not true.  

In all reality, some of the worst, most horrendous cases of abuse and neglect and suffering I’ve known are from within supposed “priviledged” white people and their families.

Such idiot wailing and gnashing of teeth, and stirring-up of cheap emotions of one’s congregation in the name of Jesus is just another plebian crime of some bullshit, co-opted religion based on working oneself into a furious frenzy by going all foamy-at-the-mouth loco in public places. Someone needs to stay on their privileged white people-manufactured meds, eh?

Least Preacher Man OD on the Evil Whitey schtick, let me gently remind him that white people too gave their lives in the Civil Rights movement. One lesser known example is here.

Dude does have style and sizzle though, I’ll give him that.