Quick Thoughts on the Trayvon Martin Case

April 30, 2012

By "quick" I mean long-winded. I'm still testing out this new camera (see below the fold), but while I'm at it I gotta at least talk a bit about the Trayvon story.

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Live CopperWire on the Railroad

April 29, 2012

On Friday we got a visit from the groundbreaking Ethiopian-American Intergalactic hip-hop collective CopperWire, who blessed us with a great interview and performance. See a snippet of their performance above and complete audio below. (We had the honor of Jasiri X coming through as well, video coming soon for that.)

Copperwire on WBAI 4/27/12 by jsmooth995

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"Phony" (A Song for Mitt Romney)

February 6, 2012

A song for Mitt Romney by my alter-ego Republican Jay Smooth.

After Jay-Z recorded "Glory" to welcome his new daughter into the world, I wondered what it would sound like if Republican voters made a song to welcome Mitt Romney as their now-inevitable nominee. Lyrics below.

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First Thoughts on Gingrich and Romney

January 23, 2012

Some freeform thoughts on this increasingly weird race, form right after the South Carolina primary. Transcript up soon. Theme music provided by Sabzi of the Blue Scholars & Das Racist.

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My Personal Pledge for the "Until Abortion Ends" Movement

December 15, 2011

Also see addendum here. Music provided by Sabzi of Common Market/Blue Scholars/Das Racist. Transcript here (thanks to feministing!)

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My TEDx Talk, "How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love Discussing Race."

November 16, 2011

This is the TEDx Talk I gave at Hampshire College last month, my first time doing this type of presentation but the school's all-star organizers and audience made it a great experience. Much thanks to everyone at Hampshire College for putting this event together, you should check out all the talks from that day, I felt like they each touched on related themes and complemented each other really well. Special thanks to my good friend (and Hampshire alum, coincidentally) Joe Schloss for the conversations that helped inspire the talk.

Text adaptation of the speech below. (thanks to Cat deVice!)

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Herman Cain's New Campaign Ad

October 26, 2011

A little parody I put up last night of the already legendary "smoking" promo by Herman Cain's campaign chief Mark Block (see the original here).

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Posted by jsmooth995 at 11:11 AM | Comments (0)

Occupy Wall Street: Outing The Ringers

October 19, 2011

A few thoughts on Occupy Wall Street..I've been watching it and going down there for a while now but hadn't had a chance to speak on it.

By the way when I say some news media people are "ringers," I don't necessarily mean that they deliberately obfuscate, or get orders from some shadowy figure to do so. I think they'll often just have a personal investment in the system and status quo that's being critiqued/threatened, so they'll naturally--without any need to conspire--have their perception skewed by an instinct to protect the status quo they're invested in. So though it's quite possibly not their intention to play the ringer, it's the function they wind up serving nonetheless.

"Rainbow in the Dark" instrumental provided by Das Racist:

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On Rick Perry and Superman

September 6, 2011

Just stating the obvious about this soundbite from last weekend where Rick Perry compares himself to the Man of Steel. (I'm sure I'm not the first to point this out) Also worth noting that Superman himself has come to reconsider his relationship with America and the world.

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12 Other Songs Ashford & Simpson Wrote

August 22, 2011

Tonight came the sad news that (along with fellow songwriting great Jerry Leiber) Nick Ashford passed away today. For those who know Ashford & Simpson only for "Solid As A Rock," here are a few of the other classics they gave us:

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Posted by jsmooth995 at 10:46 PM | Comments (0)


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