2010 Beef????

Cruising YouTube is like going to the supermarket. Your intent is to go to the store for 5 minutes to pick up one or two things and you end up leaving an hour later with a cart of crap you would never use in life. So I took a YouTube trip one night late looking for who knows what and ended up finding my intended video and everything else in between. This was interesting though, I ran across a chick from Baltimore named Keys who decided to lyrically take a swipe at Nicki Minaj and taped it. If you haven't seen it, let's look at the video tape shall we?

I saw this and I was like ok, you got skills and yeah you can rhyme but the comments were interesting to me. I would say from just glancing at what folks had to say, it was about 50/50 Keys/Minaj. In essence you had folks saying that Keys has skills and Nicki is garbage and vice versa. One of the other prevailing comments was Why is this chick going after her? She won't get discovered doing videos and dissing someone who is already famous. Some even went as far to use the H-word. Yep, our favorite black person word, hater. Once again, I don't in any way, shape or form see this as Keys hating on Nicki. What I do see is a gritty MC who is challenging the current state of the genre and showing that she doesn't like what is going on and that there is diversity of styles in the rap game. I see Hip-Hop becoming more and more divided among lines of those who can spit and the more commercialized type hip-hop of Nicki Minaj.

I will say it again for the record, I REALLY tried to like Nicki. I listened to one of her mixtapes and she had maybe one halfway decent track but for the most part, it was the most disjointed album I have ever heard by ANY artist. However, she has appeal to alot of folks for reasons I can't understand but that is why she is a star. But why when someone comes hard like Keys or keeps it real like Talib Kweli, it is classified as "alternative" or "underground" hip-hop. Hip-hop represents a wide variety of musical and lyrical styles. You can classify a particular hip-hop style by say the origin of the group or artist but to me it appears that we are denigrating some artists because they choose to remain true to the origins of hip-hop.

Not too long after this came out, Nicki responded. Initially I tried to watch this at work but damn this video is PAINFUL to watch. I finally watched it a couple of nights ago at 3am...I knew I had no place to go and at worse I would just fall asleep watching her form a sentence. If you have to go to the bathroom, choose any part of this video. Her sentences are so choppy, you can probably see 30 seconds and get the idea of what she is saying (or not saying).

A mind is a terrible thing to develop without help. I say it over and over and over again!!! Watching this video you can't help but think that. There are really no words, I have nothing to say about this train wreck. And so the back and forth continues as Keys pops up in response:

I shared this with my partner and crime Uniqpoet and we had a very interesting discussion about all of this. He did make a good point, what do folks want to hear these days: Another rapper from the streets talking about stacking chips and doing dirt or a rapper who delivers lighhearted, party-themed lyrics? Why, he adds does every "hungry" emcee have to be gutter and hood? I think this shows the wide divide in hip-hop as emcees from both sides battle for the soul of hip-hop.

At this point I am thinking, is this the next rap beef? Fat chance on that but it sure makes things very, very interesting! I wonder if Keys is going to get in the black trucks and ride on Nicki? Ha, ha...Stay Tuned!

Do you mind if I hang a Confederate Flag? VA's Gov strikes again!

I am getting really tired about writing about the mistake it was to elect Bob McDonnell Governor of Virginia. What's sad about that statement is that he and his administration have done more to reverse the achievements of Gun Control advocates and Homosexuals in 3 whole months in office. Just when you thought it was safe to think maybe it would be clear for a while and he would focus on roads, economy or even crime, this jackass creates Confederate History Month. Somehow, I kind of wish that this was a Ashton Kutcher "you got Punk'd moment" but it isn't, this guy is serious. Where do I go with this? Two points:

1. If Gov. McDonnell wants to advance the idea that the GOP is a compassionate party in the light of all of the bulls*it with health care, stop now. You are not helping your party garner any new favor among minorities or moderates whose voices are being drowned out by the right wing nut jobs in the GOP. Although I think if anything, this move was self-serving and outright insensitive. What do we gain by reliving the history of one of the most ugly periods in our nations' history? Also, who is telling the REAL history of not just the Civil War but of out nation? Texas has already decided that the history being taught in their schools wasn't diluted enough and opted to tell more lies to our kids who need to understand that the true source of the angst in our nation is the inability to tell the true story of our history and confront the pain that resulted from it.

2. I am a student of history and ok I acknowledge there are groups who live their life relishing in the Civil War and the roles their ancestors played. These folks wave the Confederate flag as often and as vigorously as the American flag but when confronted and ask why do they display a symbol of hate their reply is "It's heritage not hate." So your heritage is one of starting a war over enslaving a race of people and believing said race is inferior to your own? I don't know about you, but that is not a heritage I would want to be proud of. And if that argument wasn't complicated enough, then hate groups wave that damn flag and then a few Civil War ancestor groups quietly dispute that but not loud enough to make them look a little repentant for their "heritage."

Maybe the Virginia GOP wants to appear as though they don't give a rat's ass about anyone's beliefs, well-being or safety. Now that I think about it, that's the platform of the National GOP. What's next Mr. Governor, State endorsed lynchings???