Biography
Eric L. Wattree is a writer, poet, and musician, born in Los Angeles. He's a columnist for The Los Angeles Sentinel, The Black Star News in New York, and a Staff writer for Veterans Today. He's also the author of
A Message From the Hood.
[Only] 14% of blacks marry. [Seventy-four percent]74% don’t know who their fathers are. Their contribution to the arts is gangsta rap, nasty, foul chattering, that passes as music. [Ninety-six percent] 96% voted for Barack Obama, who is the worst fraud and fake ever to set foot in the US. Per capita, blacks represent 80% of prison population violent crimes segment. Billions have been spent on blacks in the US to mainstream them to no avail.
March 23rd, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
I wonder if the president has considered the fact that Cheney just might be trying to get him to make the same kind of mistake in Afghanistan that the Bush Administration made in Iraq in order to take the Iraq issue off the table for the 2012 election? If during the 2012 campaign America is bogged down in Afghanistan with the useless death of thousands of U.S. troops, all of a sudden, Bush, Cheney, and the GOP won’t look all that bad. The president should think about that possibility, since the mechinations of Dick Cheney makes Machiavelli look like a trainee.
March 22nd, 2011 | Posted in Government,Politics | Read More »
Actually, what’s both curious, and insulting, is why conservatives can’t understand the reason that most Black people see the GOP in exactly the same light as the GOP sees Al Qaeda. After all, the people who lynched Black people in the South may have called themselves Dixiecrats, but the bottom line is, they were radical conservatives, and they eventually migrated to the Republican party. So why should Black people hate radical conservatives any less than the GOP hates Al Qaeda – they killed many more Blacks, and for a much longer period of time? The only logical reason that conservatives can’t seem to grasp this very simple concept is that they obviously believe that the lives they took were not of equal value to the lives taken on 9/11.
March 21st, 2011 | Posted in Corruption,Politics | Read More »
So what I’d like to know is this – if a shade tree journalist sitting up in his den in the heart of a Los Angeles ghetto could see what was going on, why couldn’t the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post, CNN and all of the other media networks; why couldn’t Harvard, Yale, and all of the various and sundry Ph.D.s from America’s great institutions of learning; and why couldn’t the nation’s so called “think tanks,” all of the nation’s political scientists, and the United States Congress figure it out?
March 19th, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
In spite of the GOP claim that they believe in limited government, The Michigan Messenger has reported that newly elected Republican governor, Rick Snyder is poised to sign an emergency management bill that will hand total control of local governments over to “emergency managers” appointed by the government. “According to the law, which has already been approved in the House, the governor will be able to declare “financial emergency” in towns or school districts and appoint someone to fire local elected officials, break contracts, seize and sell assets, and eliminate services.”
March 15th, 2011 | Posted in Corruption,Politics | Read More »
Unfortunately, politics is much like religion – no matter how much evidence is brought to bear that a person’s preacher is a hypocrite, a crook, and a pedophile, many of the people in the church will refuse to believe their lying eyes, because it’s not what they want to see.
March 10th, 2011 | Posted in Corruption,Politics | Read More »
Friends
validate their own existence,
lending independence to the soul;
They slay their dragons from a warm cocoon,
with a kindred spirit to console.
March 8th, 2011 | Posted in Veterans Affairs | Read More »
Receding hairline, failing vision,
hair now turning grey,
an aging boomer in final protest,
Father Time his foe this day.
.
Donning his headband, tie-dyed jeans,
and scorched draft card of protests past,
he set out for one last battle,
as in his youth that had quietly passed.
March 7th, 2011 | Posted in Arts & Entertainment,Living | Read More »
I bear witness
to a once vibrant people greedily gulping down society’s hemlock. Even as they claim to be “keeping it real“, they continue to kill, maim, and despise their own in hot pursuit of the prime directive with the passion of a sheetless klan.
March 6th, 2011 | Posted in Arts & Entertainment,Living | Read More »
Is the modern Republican Party really “the party of Lincoln,” and responsible for freeing the slaves? I don’t think so. But the GOP regularly, routinely, and with a straight face makes that claim. One Republican recently confronted me and stated the following:
“It was Republicans who beat Democrats in the Civil War, thus freeing the slaves. It was Democrats who started the KKK as its military wing to intimidate the (largely black) Republican party who were running the south after the war. Can a leopard change its spots?? Are the Democrats now the party FOR the black people after being against them for so long? So many of you are duped by the Devil’s trickery. a few table scraps from massa’s table and you run right back to his side. The Democrat is the racist.”
March 3rd, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
One of the founding fathers of conservative thought was Alexander Hamilton. He was an aristocrat who advocated that poor and middle-class Americans should be relegated to second-class citizenship, and the GOP has fully embraced his agenda. While Hamilton’s position was resoundingly rejected by the vast majority of the founding fathers – whose primary reason for coming to America in the first place was to get away from the European class system – there were many of Hamilton’s ilk who chose not to recognize the American ideal that “All men [and women] are created equal.” Then they were later joined by Southern Dixiecrats, or social bigots, who also rejected the ideal of human equality.
February 28th, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
The mere thought that man’s primary imperative is in pursuit of conflict and greed – and that’s essentially what competition is – is counterintuitive. The fact is, our tendency to be competitive rather than cooperative is man’s primary dysfunction.
February 18th, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
I have a friend and fellow vet in Texas who’s a confirmed teabagger. The only thing we agree upon is that we like and respect each other, but other than that, we come from two different planets.
February 11th, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
So, Mr. President, we need to start practicing the virtue of defending human rights here at home before we start lecturing others abroad, because the only thing that rivals the horror of what this United States Government agency is doing to its employees is what it’s doing to your stature and credibility in the eyes of people who want very much to respect you.
February 7th, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
He stepped from the mist,
eloquent and bold,
a message from our forefathers,
and the dreams they foretold.
January 29th, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
George W. Bush’s more sensible supporters found that out the hard way. Had they not allowed themselves to become cheerleaders and completely drowned out by Washington’s special interest groups, vice-president and military/industrial lobbyist, Dick Cheney, wouldn’t have been able to destroy Bush’s presidency. Bush himself seemed to recognize that in the end. That’s why he refused to pardon Cheney chief of staff, Lewis ‘Scooter’ Libby, and he became estranged from Cheney toward the end of his presidency.
January 27th, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
I’d also like to take a moment to debunk the myth being widely spread by the corporate media that merely mentioning the Nazis in response to what’s currently going on in America is irresponsible and beyond the pale. That’s total nonsense and is in direct contradiction to another adage that states that a crazy person is one who does the same thing over and over again and expect a different result. Thus, the corporate media is literally asking us to embrace insanity.
January 23rd, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
It is indeed interesting to see how all of a sudden the corporate media and the GOP have come together to praise the president’s Arizona speech – even FOX News. After two years of calling him a communist, a friend to terrorists, a fraud, and a liar, the GOP has finally found a reason to praise him. The reason they’re praising him, however, is because, yet again, he’s allowed GOP criminals off the hook.
January 15th, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
It was my intent to do part IV of my Common-Sense Plan to Save the Postal Service, but in light of the senseless shooting committed by Jared Loughner in Arizona on Saturday, January 8, and the grossly disingenuous response by the GOP, I felt that I would be unforgivably remiss if I joined much of the weak-kneed press in failing to point out that anyone who doesn’t recognize that this shooting is a direct result of the GOP’s irresponsible and concerted campaign of violent rhetoric is either a fool, complicit, or blind.
January 12th, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
The pay-for-performance program was initially put into place based on the widely held assumption that outrageously higher pay would draw a higher caliber of executives, but there is absolutely no evidence that there is any correlation between greed and competence. In fact, our recent experience with the postal service, and on Wall Street, seems to suggest that just the opposite is true. Thus, a more accurate rule of thumb should be, any person who places more emphasis on wealth than character is not smart enough to be trusted.
January 3rd, 2011 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
As we sit around comfortable in our complacency and telling jokes about “going postal,” postal workers are literally drowning in a cesspool of injustice and corruption that’s needlessly destroying their health, well being, and many of their home lives. While that may seem funny to some, the United States Postal Service signals a pronounced change in this nation’s attitude toward poor and middle-class workers. And since it is a government agency, and both our president, and the policing agencies mandated to protect our interests are completely ignoring the situation, the ramifications are chilling.
December 29th, 2010 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
The United States Postal service is literally on the verge of collapse. Customer service is being curtailed, the price of stamps are going up, much needed employees are being excessed, and the wages of gainfully employed workers are being stolen with impunity. Yet, it has been widely reported that former Postmaster General John E. Potter walked out the door earlier this month with the greater part of $6 million in bonuses and perks in his retirement package. In 2008 Potter reportedly hauled in $857,459, while he president of the United States had to settle for less than half that.
December 22nd, 2010 | Posted in Business,Economy,Politics | Read More »
So yes, the postal service has serious problems on its hands – and money is the least of them. Their biggest problem is that they’ve lost all respect from their employees because they’ve tried to replace intelligent and innovative thinking with harassment, cooking the books, and defrauding their workers. Now they have a Tea Party brewing within their ranks. And since they no longer have anyone left with either the intelligence, foresight, or common sense to address the issue, it’s about to explode in their face. You can mark my word on that.
December 15th, 2010 | Posted in Economy,Investing & Finance,Jobs & Careers,Politics | Read More »
The hip hop community takes great pride in “keeping it real.” But are they really keeping it real, or are they simply struttin’ around saying, “look at me,” while the corporate elite have them unknowingly doing an updated version of Steppin’ Fechit – right down to the ape-like body language?
December 7th, 2010 | Posted in Arts & Entertainment,Living | Read More »
The failures of the postal service are often held up by corporatists as an example of why public service should be privatized. But actually, the postal service is a prime example of why public service should never be relegated to the private sector. The forty-year experiment of trying to run the postal service like a private business clearly demonstrates that whenever you attach a profit motive to public service, the corruption and greed attendant to making a profit will invariably overwhelm the primary purpose of providing that service. Thus, by insisting on using that approach you will always, virtually without exception, end up with service so negligible that it can be drowned in a bathtub.
December 1st, 2010 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
It is my firm belief that the appropriate attitude for a progressive to bring to every discussion is a firmness of thought and an open mind to divergent ideas. A progressive, by definition, should have the intellectual capacity to recognize that one can neither scream, nor insult, one’s way to a solution to any problem. And what should always set a progressive apart from all others is an affinity for humanity, independence of thought, and a fierce determination to remain a seeker of truth above all else, regardless to where that truth may lead.
November 17th, 2010 | Posted in Government,Politics | Read More »
On the other hand, if the president had walked through the door and kept his mouth shut – as he should have, since the attorney general is suppose to be independent – freeing Attorney General Holder to investigate and then charge Bush and Cheney for lying to congress to take the nation into war; illegally attacking the sovereign state of Iraq; the conflict of interest, misuse of funds and corruption; the torture, killing, and displacement of a million people, among other war crimes, the Republicans would have been so busy trying to cover their butts that they wouldn’t have had the time to cause so much trouble.
November 15th, 2010 | Posted in Government,Politics | Read More »
The ultimate grunt,
Dress Blues now white;
One Marine standing tall
on this most sacred night.
Young and vibrant,
wounds of battle now gone.
No more suffering or pain,
As he rose to move on.
November 11th, 2010 | Posted in Military | Read More »
Yeah, I said it. Racism is the driving force behind the GOP’s unprecedented anger against this administration. No, not all of them are racist, some are acting on greed, and others are simply dumb, but the greedy are the ones who are pulling the strings, and they’re relentlessly stoking the flames of racism within their social conservative stormtroopers to promote their own interests.
November 10th, 2010 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
The Black community didn’t turn out in unprecedented numbers to simply elect the first Black president; we turned out to elect a strong Black president. In that regard, as a student of history, I hope you recognize that you’re dealing with a Rosa Parks moment here, and you’re completely missing the boat. Do you see the strong stand being taken by that one courageous and solitary Black woman above? That’s what we elected you to do.
November 8th, 2010 | Posted in Politics | Read More »
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