A Gentleman’s view.

The rate of children being born autistic is good TV.

I usually stay away from issues addressing women’s rights when it comes to their bodies as we men haven’t the foggiest idea what exactly that entails in the least. Sometimes life by way of entertainment coming into our homes 24/7, lends itself to subjects about the impact of conflicting views of how we as citizens in one society make personal choices. The morning shows are entertainment businesses and I understand that bottom line, profit is what they are seeking for themselves. However, as with most experiences in life, nothing happens in a vacuum and the ‘Morning Shows’ expose more than the required amount of information about today’s celebrities personal lives as they are the essence of entertainment. They also have their so-called feel good or feel sorry for medical issue of the week. Depending on whether or not the subject matter is good or bad for the pharmaceutical sponsors presently engaging advertising spots with them the stories will be either propaganda for or an indictment against a medical cause or procedure. There has been of late much debate and opinions about Autism and the increasing amount of women choosing to start their families much later in life after spending sometime as full time professionals. Mothers want to have their cake and eat it too, are actually not ending up living the life of ‘Riley’.

Many Famous celebrities have been making the rounds talking about the subject and even former Governor and Republican Vice Presidential nominee; Sarah Palin of Alaska carried to term a baby she was informed would be born with major developmental issues, Jenny McCarthy is another prominent figure with an opinion of note with a child with Autism. The religious point of view holds for no life should be terminated no matter the quality for the child or parent or consideration of financial burden ultimately to the child, on the immediate family, on society or the future of our country by reproducing less than capable citizens to have the rest of our society be responsible for later. When the mature parents are deceased and those children will still be here and most likely need full time care. The point of view that all life has value, a damaged child with mental deficiencies, children not asking to be born deformed, or one who is autistic or  many other physical, mental or emotional shortcomings may exist to the degree that the child will never grow up to being a productive member of this society in any way ever or know just enough to be sad or regret this experience. This now appears to be a trend supported by the numbers found in a study published in the Boston Globe analyzing 5 million births that there is a 50 percent increase in the chance that a child will be autistic if the mother is over 40 years old. So last week there was a big brouhaha on the medical roundup of all the shows about mothers having babies later in life because of pursuing professional careers and competing more with men in labor period and this is good for equality for women but bodes bad for any American future for a question arises who will be left to leave it too if they can’t run it?

The hypocrisy of these morning shows is that they make a very big deal about finding out about this study and bring in not one, but two or three medical doctors to explain the impact of such a study and what will it mean to mother who thought they had time? How will it affect a society’s perception of a mother’s freedom of choice when it comes to deciding when to have a child? Not to suggest these aren’t legitimate questions to raise, but after spending a few days scaring the heck out of women with that study, the fourth day is a medical heartbreak, one of trials and tribulations of woman like the ‘Octomom in her 40;s who was artificially impregnated with half a dozen kids already living in her mothers house and winds up with several of those kids being born damaged, or seeing Sara Palin’s Trig and countless others and wonder about the kids right not to be born with a level playing field to start or less than a full deck just because its parent insisted that self duplication was mandatory or out of their control at any price no matter the quality of it for the child.

But not for nothing, in the vernacular of my street friends peep this: We have two groups of women taking this action; those who use religion, greed or ignorance to be irresponsible and those with the need to leave something behind or must create, or have it as one more thing on the check list of life or personal failure kind of thing.  So a good follow up to finding out that women over forty years of age who insist on having children are fifty percent more likely to produce a child the rest of this society will like to have to pay for in later, if not sooner as it will not be able to provide for itself or contribute to our forward development as a country. We now want to share with you the story of “Celine Dion”, ultra rich and fabulously famous singer 41, who is married to a man who was 27 years her senior when they got started back there in the tough mid-nineties. They have been blessed with one child, a boy 9, but that is not enough. The study which has been all over the news about women over 40 having an 50 percent increase in the chance of having a child with autism is not enough, that her body has rejected the notion 4 times, (she has had infertility treatments four times and they have not been successful,) she stated on a talk show “ fifth time’s a charm”. I’m hearing this study and wondering ‘Hey Celine ‘I’m going to keep trying until it works!’ Dion; ‘You have been more than fortunate than the average person when it comes to your life and your body said no 4 times since, you are forty-one, your man is damn near 70, don’t you think you should quit before you wind up with a half a dozen children in an extremely poor state of health and the shock kills your husband, the loss crushes your son and you have no help raising all those kids. No amount of money can ease that kind of life for anyone. But for Good Morning America exclusively with Celine’s story, that’s entertainment! Yet no one will suggest that ladies just cut that out after 40.

Men of power on Wall Street and in DC are still learning how this black man two steps.

For the first time the State of the Union that we call the United States of America, was presented by a black man. The State of this Union is quite fine, thank you very much to the Black Man in the White House. This experience is proving to be challenging for so many men of power who never had to deal with a black man at this level before as an equal on both sides of the political spectrum, Republican and Democrat. It seems both sides are being educated, we as a people just don’t roll the same way the white culture does when we do anything, especially so with our President, Barack Obama. I was off too on judging him for his handling of the Health Care Reform debate until it occurred to me that he couldn’t really do it any other way. As much as the white culture wants to claim this experience as proof that we ‘overcame’ our issues with race since the President was elected, reality keeps finding ways and situations to blatantly state the opposite. There have been more groups and individuals disrespecting the Office of the President than ever before and the amount of racially charged rhetoric is worst than any time in the 55 years of my lifetime, though needed. The battle with the opposition is about nothing but teaching blacks in this country they have no right to be seeking election to the office of the Presidency ever! You must first understand the Democrats as a group of men of power don’t necessarily have a problem with that or even adding the office of a Senator to that list also but they can never say that or suggest it. The power brokers and the pundits all proceeded to look at and treat the President as though every thing he does will be a statement of his blackness and to us, he will never be black enough or he wouldn’t have made that far. Not having  stero-typical black roots here sure didn’t hurt his cause at all.

If he came out the gate claiming mandates and taking a hard stand on the exact type of plan to put in place for fixing the problems with people who can’t get protection from getting sick or stopping the companies who refuse to protect people with illnesses already such as heart disease or diabetes or high blood pressure to get protection from getting sicker, everyone would have been screaming about the angry black man coming to Washington dictating to all the old white men and brow beating them into getting legislation passed that is not in the best interest of rest of the country. I still feel he was setup with this financial crisis waiting in the Oval Office by the Republicans trying to stack the deck against his success. Had he not been a more engaged fellow say like; McCain, or just sharp as Bush, or Reagan, this might have just been the one of the worst downturns in this country’s history. Underestimating his intelligence, although his reputation as a professor and intellectual preceded him, because of the color of his skin seems to be a continuous theme for most of those out of his inner sphere of influence. He comes into office facing banking going down the tubes, the country’s auto industry on life-support, housing and mortgage DOA, two wars to prosecute, the world in recession and us losing jobs at over a million a month for the last year. The man walking out the door started with a major surplus and left that mess in the Oval office with a trillion and a quarter in deficits that the Congress, mostly aided and abetted by the power of the Republicans, and the intimidation of the Democrats went along with to the country’s detriment.

So the President had to spend a lot of political capital his first year cleaning up this mess and the Republicans had the audacity not to participate and yet and still, paint this expenditure of government resources at this time of financial chaos and turmoil, though they inflicted it at best, allowed it to happen and look the other way at worst, as poor leadership on the part of the ruling party of Congress today and overreaching and imposed socialization by the President.  As it is, they consider him to be uppity, arrogant, elitist, and aloof, all code words for a Black Man in a position that is way above his pay grade or undeserving of holding it to begin with. The Democrats have the majority in both houses of Congress and still cannot get legislation passed or positions filled. He has been wise enough to give them said required rope in order for them to hang themselves and true to form as he said it was in Springfield, when he was State Senator, same Bullshit, different local. He has given them a year to contribute to the dialogue if not some solutions to no avail. He put them on notice during the state address to both houses of Congress and held his own quite well at gathering of theirs two days later.

No knows how this Black Man who happens to be the President of the most powerful and prosperous nation on the planet will react to anything. No matter our perception of his being lite-skinned black not dark enough to be perceived as a threat or not black enough at all because of his mother and growing up in was mostly an white culture environment in Kansas, there are those of us who have yet to see the tough man we know must be in there in order for him to have made it this far, no black man has held this much responsibility before our very eyes and those of the white power structure here and abroad. One might’ve decided at one point to take a certain tact with the Clintons because of the known hard politics they play, but a black man has never had the opportunity to display his talent at this level, and all of us haven’t the foggiest idea how this man rolls. This is going to be extremely enjoyable for me to watch as this man learns how to work his magic in this the most visible of all stages. I will say this; Chris Matthews, host of the MSNBC show ‘Hardball’ made a very telling comment of what he saw: “I wouldn’t want to be on the other side when this President finally learns what it takes to get things done in this town”.