Some thoughts on the case of Ed Buck
Commentary by Chitown Kev
With the death of Timothy Dean, 55, in the West Hollywood apartment of Democratic mega-donor Ed Buck, the Buck case is receiving renewed media coverage.
Last year, terrypinder wrote a diary about the death of Gemmel Moore, which also occurred in Mr. Buck’s apartment.
L.A. black lesbian blogger Jasmyne Cannick has been doing tireless work on the Moore case and exposing Ed Buck so that the man can be brought to something resembling justice.
The details of much of what Ms. Cannick has uncovered are rather lurid.
Jasmyne also has a list of the candidates and causes that Mr. Buck donated to.
Blavity:
Buck is currently under investigation for Dean’s death. Authorities have also reopened Moore’s case. Writer Jasmyne Cannick has been interviewing men who allegedly met with Buck since Moore’s death. She publishes their stories on her website. She also led a protest outside his home on Friday, reports ABC7.
“We started to figure out there was this pattern and practice where he solicited and went after young, gay, Black men — usually men who were homeless, HIV-positive, who were in need of food or money,” she told NBC. “Not all of these men were on drugs when they met Ed Buck, but Ed Buck got them on drugs.”
The “Ed Buck got them on drugs” portion has always been the most confusing part of this story to me...but it is apparently true (based on some of the testimony that Cannick and others collected that is now public) that Ed Buck did forcibly inject some black gay men/escorts against their wishes.
I’m of several minds on this.
First of all, I want Ed Buck up under the jail...and I felt that way when reading about the Moore case last year.
I want these politicians to return the money that Buck donated to them (in her 2017 post, Ms. Cannick notes that Karen Bass did return her donation to Buck...I should look and see whether others did the same...including a certain former presidential candidate and I was highly tempted to drag that picture of Buck and the candidate on out...).
One would think, from looking at the donor lists, that black lives matter until donor dollars are involved.
But I have also read comments here and there, at Daily Kos and other places, that think that going to a more “grassroots” manner of collecting donor dollars in small amounts would solve something like this.
I cringe every time I read something like that, mostly because it turns it into a purely political issue as if only big-time donors do and/or get away with something like Buck has gotten away with (to this point).
Or as if this is something that’s rampant among the donor class...well, the getting away with ir part, anyway.
Back when I lived on the East Coast and back when I was actively using drugs, I knew a man like Ed Buck.
The man wasn’t white or (as far as I could tell from that rickety-ass car that he drove) rich or a Democratic mega-donor but he had gay boys (overwhelmingly...but not all...black) coming in and out of the house at all hours of the day and night.
I’d heard of who he was and stories about going over to his house weeks and months before I actually met the guy.
I was never forced to take anything that I didn’t want to (although I’d heard that a few people were forced by this guy to do so).
If I had died in that house from an overdose, I would have simply been another statistic in the crack wars, not even worthy of the write-up in the New York Eff’ing Times (as they do opioid abusers nowadays).
I think that I am saying all of this stuff rather inarticulately but...
Yes, I want Ed Buck to be held accountable for his crimes, and, to some extent, I suppose, the Democratic Party at various levels for seeming to be an enabler.
As someone who abused substances in the past, I know that addictions are a complicated thing, especially when someone is poor, homeless, and unloved and gay and black...been there and done that.
What I really think is that the Ed Bucks of the world are merely a symptom of the problem and the problem, in this case, is not “the donor class”...I will allow that Buck being a member of “the donor class” complicates things a bit...but that’s only a symptom, too.
The problem here is that black lives (particularly gay ones) still seem not to matter. Or if they do, it’s only as a means to an end for some.
UPDATE: After this Tuesday’s Chile posted, Buzzfeed Contributor George Johnson posted an Opinion Piece about the Buck case.
Now with a second death in Buck’s home, the Democratic politicians and groups he has bankrolled need to do what is right for the black queer community. Remove Buck’s class, wealth, and proximity to power from this scenario and it’s hard to imagine this story unfolding the way it has. He is not only a donor to the Democratic National Committee, but to many local politicians and council members in LA; they didn’t want to ruffle feathers during the first probe. That investigation took place amid a heated political atmosphere gearing up for the 2018 midterm elections, and Democrats didn’t want to rock the boat. Buck was not held accountable.
This time, it is unacceptable for this powerful man to get another free pass. During the first investigation, major news media let us down. It is not lost on any of us how coverage differs when the victims are black. We have seen reporting that far too often blames the victim and protects the abuser. When trans women are being murdered, articles are littered with misgendering and assumptions alluding to the victim being culpable in their own death. When Moore was found dead, many news sites described him as a sex worker — a taboo subject in this country that can devalue a life in the eyes of some readers.
CK 8:01PM
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
After nearly 70 years, all members of the Groveland Four — four young black men falsely accused of raping a white woman in Lake County — were pardoned by a unanimous vote Friday.
The Florida Cabinet met for the first time as the state Clemency Board Friday, where it heard from family members of the men who were either imprisoned, tortured or murdered by mobs and a racist sheriff. The Groveland Four matter was only supposed to be up for discussion, and families were not expecting to hear a vote Friday. But at the very end of the meeting, Gov. Ron DeSantis called for a vote.
“I believe in the principles of the Constitution. I believe in getting a fair shake,” he said. “I don’t think there’s any way that you can look at this case and see justice was carried out.”
Some call the treatment of the four men one of the worst episodes of racism in American history. In 1949, a 17-year-old white woman and her estranged husband told police that she’d been kidnapped and raped by four black men after the couple’s car broke down outside Groveland, in Lake County. Sheriff Willis McCall arrested the four men, even though Charles Greenlee, 17, was arrested in a separate incident 20 miles away when the alleged rape occurred and said he didn’t know the other three men.
Samuel Shepherd and Walter Irvin told police they had stopped to help the couple but denied assaulting Norma Padgett. After being beaten by police in the county jail, both Greenlee and Shepherd confessed. Ernest Thomas escaped but was murdered two days later by a posse of 1,000 men who shot and killed him while he slept under a tree in Madison County.
After Thomas’ murder, the other three men were convicted by all-white juries. Irvin and Shepherd were sentenced to death, and Greenlee was given a life sentence. In 1951, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered a retrial. Seven months later, while the sheriff was taking Shepherd and Irvin to a court hearing, he pulled over and shot the two men on the side of the road. Shepherd died, but Irvin pretended to be dead. The sheriff said they had tried to escape, but Irvin said they were shot while they were handcuffed to each other and lying on the ground.
Despite the evidence, Irvin was convicted again and given another death sentence. In 1955, Gov. LeRoy Collins commuted his sentence to life in prison, and he was paroled in 1968. Irvin was found dead in his car the next year. Greenlee was paroled in 1962 and died in 2012.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Get ready to be bewitched by a beautiful Afro-Latina actress in Netflix’s upcoming series, Siempre Bruja.
The highly-anticipated title translates to “Always a Witch” and is based on the novel, Yo Bruja by Isidora Chacon.
Angela Gaviria stars as Carmen, an Afro-Colombian witch from the 17th century who travels to 2019 in an effort to avoid being burned at the stake for falling in love. She is offered the time-jumping out only if she agrees to use none of her powers. She agrees and finds herself in Colombia (circa now) and attempts to start a new life, meet friends and even going to college.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The 35-year-old farmer in the arid mountains of South Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal province gnaws on a red plastic coffee straw with the look of a harried parent. His young goats are getting antibiotic injections, and there’s a nervous energy in the bleating crowd of brown, black and white kids.
A few clamber up the sides of the wooden pen, as if seeking an escape route into the grazing land beyond, an expanse of spindly acacia trees and short, scrubby green grass.
For Mhlabunzima, who came to help run his family farm after losing his job in Johannesburg, these goats are bringing much-needed stability to the business, which has been at the mercy of the region’s increasingly unpredictable weather.
The farm lost dozens of head of cattle — and thousands of dollars in income — in a drought from 2014 to 2017. At one point, Mhlabunzima’s family herd went from 60 cows to 10. Other farms in the area also lost up to 80% of their herds.
South Africans are coming to grips with how their environment and lives are shifting in the changing climate, as are people across the globe. Climate change is already affecting agriculture in many vulnerable countries, posing a widespread threat to food security, according to the United Nations. Farmers in some drought-stricken nations such as India are abandoning crops now deemed unsuitable as productivity and farmers’ incomes fall.
In southern Africa, temperatures have been increasing since the middle of the last century and are projected to rise drastically across the region by the end of this one, according to the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, a South African government research body. That’s creating huge challenges for South Africa’s vital agricultural industry, with small-scale cattle farmers hit particularly hard by intensifying dry spells.
Goats could be part of the answer.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
After decades of dictatorship, Gambia has launched a truth commission. But in a country where some victims were also perpetrators, delivering justice to all won’t be easy. Foreign Policy: Truth First, Reconciliation Later
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Everyone in the room was patient. Many had waited two decades for a meeting like this. So they sat, quiet, even as monologues meandered and temperatures rose. The seven panelists stood, one after the other and spoke about the end of the old Gambia and the beginning of the new. For 22 years, this country had been in the clutches of a dictator as capricious as he was cruel. No longer, the justice minister said. Tall, dressed in an off-white robe, and with a bump on his forehead in the spot where it touches a prayer mat five times a day, he told the hundred-odd people gathered in August 2017 that each of them had a role to play in the building of their new nation. And that day, their role was to help build a truth and reconciliation commission.
The audience obliged. A man in a periwinkle robe stood. He operated the only Gambian mental health clinic and said the traumatized should receive counseling. One woman spoke of the need for reparations, lamenting that her friend, a torture victim, died destitute after his injuries left him unable to work.
These insights, offered by regular citizens, have been folded into Gambia’s Truth, Reconciliation and Reparations Commission (TRRC), which held its first trial this week. For the next two years (a tenure the government can extend), the 11 commissioners—apolitical individuals, “of high moral character” from diverse backgrounds—will oversee the televised trials and establish an impartial narrative of what happened in the violent shadows of former President Yahya Jammeh’s regime. They’ll also, more tangibly, produce a report with recommendations on what the government should do on reparations, amnesty, and prosecution—including, potentially, the prosecution of Jammeh himself.
Prosecution tends to be the most important objective for victims. The government’s emphasis, meanwhile, is often on reconciliation.
And this isn’t the only fault line—there is also the question of defining victimhood. So far, the word has been used liberally, even to describe those who suffered “pecuniary loss” at the hands of the former regime. But in a country whose poverty was deepened by Jammeh’s avarice, who hasn’t suffered financial loss by his hand? There’s also the challenge of what to do about the victims who, prior to their suffering, were themselves perpetrators.
After seizing the presidency in 1994, Jammeh and his allies consolidated their power through intimidation, disappearances, and torture. Finally, in December 2016, the unexpected happened: Jammeh lost re-election to a newly formed coalition and fled into exile. On the campaign trail, the coalition promised a truth commission, and it quickly got to work after taking office, going on a nationwide tour to get public input on the commission and drafting the bill that established the TRRC.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, an election is not a single decisive event, but just one part of a never-ending struggle to gain and keep power in which living to fight another day is as important as landing a knockout punch.
Of the half dozen or so major players a year ago, only two or three remain standing.
Felix Tshisekedi, named as the surprise, provisional winner of last month’s much delayed presidential vote, is the 55-year-old son of the country’s most respected opposition leader. However, he has never held high office or even a managerial role, and his Belgian professional qualifications have been questioned by opponents.
Tshisekedi is the leader of the Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS), DRC’s oldest and largest opposition party. Critics say he is unproven, inexperienced and lacks the charisma of his father. “His father was a man of the country. The son is very limited,” Valentin Mubake, former secretary-general of Tshisekedi’s party told the Guardian last month.
In 2008, he became national secretary for external relations and was elected to the national assembly in 2011 as representative for Mbuji-Mayi, the country’s third city. However, he never took up his seat as he did not formally recognise his father Étienne’s 2011 election defeat to Joseph Kabila.
He inherited the UDPS leadership when Étienne – who spent 35 years leading the opposition but never won office – died in 2017. Tens of thousands thronged the streets when Tshisekedi visited his political stronghold of Mbuji-Mayi, a southern city, in early elections, chanting slogans calling on the father of five to save the nation.
But Tshisekedi’s apparent victory is contested – not by the outgoing president, Kabila, whose own hand-picked candidate was soundly defeated, but by the opposition rival, Martin Fayulu, who came a close second.
The few reliable surveys of pre-poll voting intentions make it clear that Fayulu was the favourite by a considerable margin. The conclusions of 40,000 observers deployed by the church on the day of the election are that he won.
Fayulu, who has denounced the result as an “electoral coup”, is not a “fils de” (“son of”) like Tshisekedi and many other dynastic politicians across the continent. He is a former business executive and 30-year veteran of politics who has earned a reputation as brave, honest and effective. More importantly, perhaps, he also has the backing of political heavyweights Jean-Pierre Bemba and Moise Katumbi, both forced into effective exile overseas and unable to contend the polls.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Voices and Soul
by
Justice Putnam
Black Kos Poetry Editor
My son passed away a couple weeks ago, and I am still torn up. A parent never expects this, really. I’m a Boy Scout. I prepare for everything and I have inoculated myself to every possibility, but I was wrong. I might have given a passing nod to a child passing before a parent, but I really didn’t ponder it, and that was my mistake, I guess. When I stood as a sentinel at his viewing, greeting mourners coming and going, I stood there in the warm knowledge that we really lacked nothing in our relationship, we lived presently and with joy and respect and agency. He was a big man and taught boxing classes. I come from a family of Gold Gloves participants, so that was no surprise. His friends said you didn’t want to get on his wrong side in the ring, I taught him at a young age how to parry and use his hips. I heard he put that to good use.
He had mentioned ever so opaquely of a few fainting spells and seeing a heart doctor, we spoke passingly of it and I remember thinking he had it under control. I told him several times how I’d want to be attended to at my demise, but I never thought to ask him. Thank goodness he told my eldest grand daughter. He sure looked healthy. Of course, he did smoke cigars and could put the liquor away, he partied with drugs and women, though that did slow down considerably the last nine years when my second grand daughter was born. It is up to me to go through his papers and effects. It turns out he was having fainting spells a few times a month for the last year, not just a couple the whole year as he implied. I came across documents for tests and written notes for appointments, but not the results or the dates of the tests.
Thinking back, it only now makes sense. When Israel hugged you, he meant it. It was not some wimpy s’embrace and the little kiss on the cheek. You felt his embrace deep in your heart when he held you. He listened intently. All of his friends attested to that. He was present and did not have a conversation in his head while listening. He looked you deeply in the eye. His hugs the last several times over his last several visits this past year were more lingering, though. His gaze was ever so deeper and loving. I remember noting that in some small way, but never made the connection.
It seems this past year, he might have had a bucket list. He took the girls on long trips and camp outs. He ate steaks and sushi and dishes I spoke about discovering and trying to replicate. My grandson and he made that transition of father and child son, to father and young adult son, and became even more close. I found loving notes written recently of how much he loved his two ex-wives and what good mothers they are. He had gotten back to the studio and was recording a ton of work. His producers say there is so much unreleased issues to deal with, let alone all the written work he had yet to record. I have my work cut out curating that, gladly, I might add.
He had been taking care of my ex and her husband the last year and a half, they are a lot less healthy than me (my recent physical said I have the heart of a twenty-eight year old, the irony was not lost on me when I pondered that last week), and he was a good son and a lot of help. She is a matriarch, for sure, and all the kids from all the families are at her house anyway, and he reveled in it. I insisted that children should never be a rope in a tug of war between parents and always made sure that was so. We spoke of that often.
I slept in his bed when I was at my ex-wife’s house leading up to his viewing. He had cards from my mother and my dad and myself on his mirror. He had a collection of rosaries and menorahs, he had dog-eared tomes on Buddhism and one on the Sufis.
My ex said he had been speaking with a friend on the phone around fifteen minutes after midnight on the morning of 30 December 2018 when his friend heard the phone drop. She was able to get a hold of my ex and she immediately began CPR. It looked like he just dropped in place, slumped forward across his knees while sitting on the sofa, his head resting gently on the coffee table in front him, my ex said he had a serene smile on his face.
She handed me a letter addressed to Israel that was delivered on the Saturday morning after his viewing on Friday of 4 January, It was from a medical facility and she couldn’t look. I took it into his room and used the letter opener from the desk set I gave him when he was twenty-one. He had several heart tests on Friday 28 December 2018, the labs came in on Sunday 30 December at around 4 am. They began calling him relentlessly to come in immediately, beginning at 7am. The medical examiner had already taken his body and phone to the morgue by 5 that morning. He was forty-one.
I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men and women,
And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring taken soon out of their laps.
What do you think has become of the young and old men?
And what do you think has become of the women and children?
They are alive and well somewhere,
The smallest sprout shows there is really no death,
And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the end to arrest it,
And ceased the moment life appeared.
All goes onward and outward, nothing collapses,
And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.
--Walt Whitman
“Song of Myself”
On Poetry and Fathers
The one thing
That always amazed me
Even from the
Earliest moment
Of your life
Was the utter trust
You had in me
And I was struck
At the time
By the amount
Of doubt
I had in myself.
Even though
Your mother and I
Had half a year
To practice breathing
I doubted that
I could remember
Properly when to
Encourage the right
Breath
And when the doctor
Said I could assist
And I finally held
You
Gray and small
I thought to that
Distant day
When you would
Hold your own son
In the same way
And I thought of
The resolve you would
Have
Just as I had
To love
Like no other
Father has loved.
So the years pass
And I doubt
You felt the
Prayer of love
Over that distance
And separation
You grew in.
A correspondence
Is a poor substitute
For a kiss
Yet each word
Was a universe
Of touch
I doubt it
Was enough.
I cannot now
Apologize
For all that you
Went through
I wish it were
Otherwise
But mere words
And sentiment
Are hollow.
You are now
A father
Kiss your son
While you can
Circumstance
Has a way
Of intruding
Upon the best
Of plans
And apologies
Become terrible
Temptations.
(Berkeley, California 2002)
— Justice Putnam
“On Poetry and Fathers”
The Lone Dog
It is said
That if you
Throw a rock
Into a pack of dogs
The one that is hit
Barks the loudest.
But I have to tell you
I am a loud dog
But not of the Pack
I am the individual
Surviving
By my wits
By my ability
To adapt to
The situation and
Accept that the
Given
May not be enough
I don't act out of impulse
I knew the rock
Would be thrown
But my survival
Depends on
My abilities
By my experience
And analytical prowess
Does the Moon
I howl to at night
Have power over me?
I suppose
It pulls at the
Oceans.
Does the
Hunger
I constantly
Feel have
Control?
The answer is obvious.
Is the two-legged animal
With the whip and leash
God?
No
God
Is much
More mysterious
Much more Powerful
Much more the
Provider
Much more the
Taking Away
God does
Speak to me
Yes
God speaks
To a loud
Lone dog
God doesn't
Speak through the
Pack
But to me
Personally
You could say
I have a
Personal
Conversation with
God
But not of
Words
God is
Much more
Mysterious
Than that
So I pray alone
For what
God and I have is
Personal.
I figure
It's the same with
Everything that has
Soul.
From: "The God Debate- a dialogue between Tom Paine and the Carthaginians”
© 2002 Justice Putnam
and Mechanisches Strophe-Verlagswesen;
and also appeared on verse 3, "The World is Mine" from the CD Judgement Time
by 50 Tramp Dawg
and World Wreckards Productions
I
You may have all things from me, save my breath,
The slight life in my throat will not give pause
For your love, nor your loss, nor any cause.
Shall I be made a panderer to death,
Dig the green ground for darkness underneath,
Let the dust serve me, covering all that was
With all that will be? Better, from time’s claws,
The hardened face under the subtle wreath.
Cooler than stones in wells, sweeter, more kind
Than hot, perfidious words, my breathing moves
Close to my plunging blood. Be strong, and hang
Unriven mist over my breast and mind,
My breath! We shall forget the heart that loves,
Though in my body beat its blade, and its fang.
II
I erred, when I thought loneliness the wide
Scent of mown grass over forsaken fields,
Or any shadow isolation yields.
Loneliness was the heart within your side.
Your thought, beyond my touch, was tilted air
Ringed with as many borders as the wind.
How could I judge you gentle or unkind
When all bright flying space was in your care?
Now that I leave you, I shall be made lonely
By simple empty days, never that chill
Resonant heart to strike between my arms
Again, as though distraught for distance,–only
Levels of evening, now, behind a hill,
Or a late cock-crow from the darkening farms.
-- Louise Bogan
"Fifteenth Farewell"
Give me a church
made entirely of salt.
Let the walls hiss
and smoke when
I return to shore.
I ask for the grace
of a new freckle
on my cheek, the lift
of blue and my mother’s
soapy skin to greet me.
Hide me in a room
with no windows.
Never let me see
the dolphins leaping
into commas
for this water-prayer
rising like a host
of sky lanterns into
the inky evening.
Let them hang
in the sky until
they vanish at the edge
of the constellations —
the heroes and animals
too busy and bright to notice.
— Aimee Nezhukumatathil
“Sea Church”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
WELCOME TO THE TUESDAY PORCH