The Audacity of Dope

After weeks of teaser pics, behind the scenes vignettes, sneak previews (and sneak previews of sneak previews), the long awaited follow up to Drake’s “Best I Ever Had” video has finally hit the net.

First off, I prefer the mixtape version of this song from So Far Gone (minus Weezy’s completely unnecessary appearance) rather than this edit with an added verse from Trey Songz.  Plus the hook just doesn’t catch the same without hearing “the hoooooooes.”  Why is “hoes” even edited?  That’s not a bad word at all.  “Hoes.”  See?  No censor.  Thank you Don Imus.

Aside from the [Ludacris] HOErrible [/Luda] censorship, visually, I think the video is pretty much spot on.  If there was one iota of sunshine in this clip, I would have been livid.  The beat, melody, subject matter, etc. all combine for a perfect late night soundtrack.  It’s almost too bad the single couldn’t drop later in the year.  This would be ideal for the cold Pacific Northwest winter.

Saw this in the NY Times today and I thought it was equal parts heartbreaking and infuriating. I generally prefer to keep sports and politics separate, but I really hope that the world uses the upcoming Olympics to put pressure on China’s government. Between their human rights issues and the intense censorship of the press and their own people, something has to change. Sheer economic numbers won’t make China the super power it wants to be. At some point, its ethics need to catch up with the times.

When the final numbers are in, this earthquake will have killed over 100K people. We always think less of these tragedies when they happen abroad, but just imagine if we lost that many people here. To put it in perspective, Hurricane Katrina killed less than 2K. It’s insane.

Also, the audacity of the Chinese government to “have begged parents to quiet down and accept financial compensation for the loss of their children” is unbelievable. They don’t want money. They want their children back. And since you can’t provide that, you damn sure better give them some answers.

Chinese Stifle Grieving Parents’ Protest of Shoddy School Construction

DUJIANGYAN, China — Police officers here on Tuesday surrounded more than 100 parents protesting shoddy school construction and mourning the deaths of thousands of children during the recent earthquake.

The police dragged away several crying mothers and removed some journalists trying to report on the event, according to witnesses and photographs of the protest.

The attempt to snuff out the protest was the strongest sign so far of the government’s growing impatience with public airing of grievances over unsafe school construction.

A standoff between the parents, many carrying framed photos of their dead children, and the police officers, dressed in black uniforms, lasted for several hours. In the end, the parents walked away.

Read the full article describing the protest in detail and all the censorship these people are facing here.