Now That The Stimulus Is About To Go Into Effect…

Some music for the occasion…

Someone get Rush on the phone and tell him that’s what we’re singing over here (while also rotating in “My President Is Black”).

Japan’s Answer To The Global Financial Crisis: “Man, fuck it.”

You know, every once in a while, if I’m having a bad day at work I might sneak off at lunch and have a bourbon on the rocks to calm my nerves.  Now, I can only imagine if I was Schoichi Nakagawa and I was the finance minster of Japan and I got news that out economy was the most fucked its been since the 1970’s and the only answer I could muster was “OH SHIT, SON!”, then I’d probably have a drink or two then.

Well, this guy’s clearly drunk:

Add him to the list of people who probably need a sip or two for the job they have to do right behind the drunk astronauts.

Schoichi Nakagawa, this Bud’s for you!

Let’s Not Throw The Bonus Out With The Bathwater…

We stay fly, no lie, you know this...

Alright, alright… So I watched some of the congressional hearings today with some Wall St. CEOs getting grilled about what they’ve done with their businesses since they recieved TARP fund.

Admittedly, some of it was quite interesting… I rather enjoyed seeing some of the fine minds that got us into this shit having to answer for how it all happened in the first place.  It was like watching a parent ask a child where he or she went wrong during the course of a semester that caused them to bring home a D in English (I know this well, I got a D in English).

But one thing really concerned me about the discussion; the demonizing of bonuses.

Let me make this abundantly clear as both a capitalist and a corporate monkey…

WE NEED OUR BONUSES, MAN!

I know it seems like the in thing to do to say that people who work for bailed out banks shouldn’t be recieving bonuses and that its inconsiderate to taxpayers that our hard earned money is going to pay for them.  Hell, I even said I was gonna rob bankers yesterday, but I just want my cut of the TARP money, not their bonus money.

Let’s break it down for a sec.  Alright, these banks involved in the bailout are giant, multi-faceted entities that on paper exist as a singular corporation, but in practice operate as independently functioning arms.  Its kind of like you and your cousins; you share a name and grandparents but not Lil Lonnie’s gambling habit or Toya’s crack addiction, so while you may be subject to the same set of genetic traits, your success and failure aren’t predicated on theirs.  That said, some divisions of these banks have done well (see: You graduating Cum Laude from Harvard), while others have really screwed the pooch (see: Your Uncle Charles who just finished doing a bid for armed robbery back in ‘87).

Now, would it be fair for you to be penalized for the actions of another member in your family?  Of course not, so why suspend bonuses for guys on Wall St. who may have had nothing to do with the financial crisis.

Let me put it to you another way…

I’ve worked at several companies throughout my professional career.  Some of them gave bonuses, some of them didn’t, and based on that, I gauged my level of commitment to a project.  Don’t believe me?  Well, here’s a story…

A few years back, I was working at a company that told me that I was going to get a bonus if I contributed to helping grow the business and making a positive impact on the bottom line.  So I did just that.  I worked late, I worked hard, I gave it 150% on everything and made it my concern to do everything the best way I could, not because I’m a perfectionist, but because I’m a capitalist.

Fast forward to bonus time… I didn’t get a bonus, instead, we got new furniture for the reception area.  Bullshit.  At that moment, I no longer felt invested in my company or my clients and I decided that I was going to do just enough to be good enough, but not enough to be great.  I showed up at work late and left early.  I didn’t take work home of weekends or even weeknights.  At 5:00, I was out the door.  Gone.  That is if I hadn’t already left at 3:00 to get drunk with some of my other bonusless coworkers who had all adopted the same “Fuck it” mantra that I had.  Long story short, I left that company soon after and went to a company that did bonus.

Night and day difference.

When the principles of the company told me that bonuses were contingent upon hard work and protecting the bottom line and I saw how everyone was commited to protecting the bottom line (see: their chunk of the bonus money), I jumped in whole hog.  At the end of the year, when the same principles sat me down and gave me a check, I was fully converted.  Its not that I liked that job any more or any less, its that I was invested in it.

And that’s the key, you want employees to feel invested.

When they’re invested they show up early and leave late.  They work on weekends and holidays.  They check the Blackberry at midnight and catch the 6am flight to visit clients.  Not because they feel like they have to, but because they know that its worth it to them.

You don’t want to cut out bonuses for the folks on Wall St.

Trust me.

I’ve showed up to a non-bonus job surly, irritable, late, and drunk enough to know that people are only gonna work as hard as they feel is neccessary not to get fired but not too hard since they’re not gonna get broke off at the end of the year.

Stop hatin’ and get money.

I’m Gonna Get Me Some TARP Money Too

Ante up!

After hearing Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner outline his plan for the rest of the Trouble Asset Recovery Program (TARP) funds today (about another $350 billion to the banks), I kinda got worried.

-The plan lacks any kind of specifics as to what the banks are supposed to do with the money.

-There’s no guarantee that credit is going to be easier to get in the forseeable future.

-It looks a lot like more of the same, just with a different group of bankers running it.

But after about ten or fifteen minutes of pondering what this means to me and my pockets, I had an epiphany.

I’m gonna get me some of that TARP money too.

At first I contemplated declaring myself a Bank Holding Corporation and then petitioning the government for some dough… But then I realized that I might have to pay that money back one day.  Then I thought about maybe changing careers, heading to Wall St. and trying my hand as a fraudulent hedge fund manager… But that shit would take to long and let’s face it, I need relief, now.

So I did a quick check on Orbitz for a plane ticket from Austin, TX to New York, double checked my checking account balance, looked in the closet for a ski mask, and pulled the old baseball bat I keep in my trunk out.  I had a plan… Oh yes, a plan indeed.

I’ve decided that I’m going to take my case directly to Wall St.  If they won’t give me and those around me the credit that we need, I’m just going to use other tools at my disposal (see: Ski Mask, Bat) to try to “coerce” them into changing their minds.  Or at least handing over their wallets.

Oh yeah, muthafuckas, I read the paper… I know its a whole lotta bankers about to get their hands on a whole lotta money and well, it’s time to g’head and have them break the average taxpayer (see: Me) off with a lil’ sum’n sum’n for our troubles too.

Now, I’m not advocating armed robbery, all I’m saying is that its about time our friends tithed some of that TARP.  You know, do it like church and put both hands in the air while you holler out “Jesus!”… Right now, that’s just the best plan of action I think the average American can take to get their finances back to where they used to be.

OR…

Maybe someone up there at Treasury could use some sense here and say that the money that these banks are getting needs to go back to the people who gave it to them in the form of credit, loans, and cashflow that’s been choked up for the past seven months.  I mean, that would be fair, right?  But if not, and you’re a CEO out in these streets shinin’ and flashin’, me and my bat might show up outside your place of employment for an impromptu loan application session.

What say ye, bankers?

I Think The Republicans Picked The Wrong Black Guy…

Say what, nigga?

Lawd, I’m trying to root for this guy on the strength of wanting to see a black man succeed… But yo, Mike Steele is already fucking up.  If this was hip hop beef, he’s Shawty Lo to Obama’s T.I.. I think they picked the wrong nigga for the job, yo.

Corey Richardson Celebrates Black History Month…

Colonel Sanders, step off!

Special thanks to Melody Waller for bringing this to my attention…

In an effort to celebrate Black History, I thought it was appropriate to honor a true pioneer and trailblazer, Harold Pierce.
Harold Pierce (August 11, 1917 – March 8, 1988)
was an African-American entrepreneur who founded the successful Harold’s Chicken Shack restaurant chain in Chicago.

Pierce was born in Midway, Alabama and moved to Chicago in 1943 from Freemanville, Alabama to work as a chauffeur for Jack Stern, a furniture store owner. By 1950, he was running a small restaurant with his wife, Hilda, on 39th Street. The H & H specialized in chicken feet and dumplings. Pierce thought that he could adapt his recipe for fried chicken, and a friend, Gene Rosen, who ran a poultry shop nearby, offered him some chickens to experiment with. The resultant recipe caused Pierce to open Harold’s Chicken Shack at 47th and Greenwood in 1950. About fifty years ago, Harold Pierce noticed that the major fast food chains tended to avoid African-American neighborhoods in Chicago’s South Side. His protest took the form of starting his own restaurant, Harold’s Chicken Shack. Over the years, dozens of Harold’s franchises have popped up in and around Chicago, winning the love of both casual consumers and more particular palates. And, though it seems to have gone largely unnoticed, “The Fried Chicken King” has now opened all over the US.

He franchised the idea out to friends and family who opened additional Harold Chicken Shacks throughout Chicago. One of Pierce’s stipulations was that they purchase their chickens from Rosen. Otherwise, Pierce didn’t interfere with the management of the stores, which led to deviations in the te chniques, flavors, and qualities of the product as well as variations in the menu from one restaurant to another.

After retiring in the early 1980s, he moved to Beaverville, Illinois, where he indulged in a passion for raising hunting dogs.

Pierce died in Kankakee, Illinois of prostate cancer in 1988. His second wife, Willa, took over running the business and began expanding it outside of Chicago. Willa died on January 21, 2003 in Beaverville.

Complete list of Harolds Chicken Shacks

No. 1 7136 S. State Street 773-487-9817	No. 2 6419 South Cottage Grove Ave 773-363-9586	No. 3B 8316 South Ashland 773-298-0964
No. 4 6241 South Ashland 773-925-9674	No. 7 208 E. 47th Street 773-285-8362	No. 8 2521 W. 63rd Street 773-778-9659
No. 9B 2000 W. 51st Street 773-373-9249	No. 10 565 Fair Street, Atlanta, GA 404-523 -0060	No. 12 917 West 87th Street 773-224-4621
0A
No. 13 7310 S. Halsted Street 773-723-9006	No. 14 1208 East 53rd Street 773-752-9270	No. 15 7136 S. State Street 773-487-9817
No. 17 12262 S. Pulaski, Alsip, IL 708-489-9472	No. 18 8820 S. Stony Island 773-768-9712	No. 19 808 East 79th Street 773-723-3545
No. 20 574 Torrence Avenue, Calumet City, IL 708-868-4880	No. 21 6843 S. Ashland Avenue 773-778-9890	No. 22 4142 W. 167th Street, Oak Forest, IL 708-596-1100
No. 23 3792 West 79th Street 773-582-8960	No. 24 407 East 75th Street 773-488-9533	No. 25 1350 West Jefferson, Joliet, IL 708-945-2266
No. 26 9151 South Ashland 773-881-9884	No. 27 10259 S. Halsted Street 773-2332042	No. 29 307 East 51st Street 773-373-9016
No. 31 19767 S. Torrence Ave., Lynwood, IL 708-418-8705	No. 32 918 W. Market, Bloomington, IL 309-828-8880	No. 35 12700 S. Halsted Street 773-785-4153
No. 36 1361 N. Milwaukee 773-25 2-2424	No. 37 5608 S. Ashland Avenue 773-476-5445	No. 38 2444 East 79th Street 773-933-9409
No. 39 518 West Harrison 312-662-9000	No. 40 307 E. Garfield 773-324-5529	No. 46 3418 W. 183rd Street, Hazel Crest, IL 708-798-0008
No. 52 7118 S. Western Avenue 773-778-9182	No. 53 2517 W. 79th Street 773-737-5777	No. 55 100 West 87th Street 773-224-3314
No. 56 1039 West 63rd Street 773-778-8270	No. 59 7247 South Racine 773-783-9499	No. 61 1537 S. Western, Chicago Heights, IL 708-481-7080
No. 62 636 S. Wabash 312-362-0442	No. 65 11857 S. Western 773-779-9911	No. 66 15914 S. Kedzie, Markham, IL 708-596-5816
No. 69 2218 State, Burnham, IL 708-868-9120	No. 71 2109 S. Wabash 312-326-5575	No. 76 2139 S. 17th Ave., Broadview, IL 708-345-6058
No. 77 39 N. Wells 312-345-1200	No. 79 15411 S. Cottage Grove, Dolton, IL 708-841-0400	No. 81 1994 Grant Street, Gary, IN 219-949-7599
No. 83 3577 East New York, Aurora, IL 630-499-8393	No. 87 7348 S. Stony Island 773-288-1200	No. 88 3844 Martin L. King Dr., East Chicago, IN 219-378-0400
No. 89 14224 Indiana, Riverdale, IL 708-849-0400	No. 91 5460 Broadway, Merrillville, IN 219-887-5891	No. 94 2117 W. Broadway, Minneapolis, MN 612-529-0114

Somebody’s Gonna Catch The Holy Ghost At One Of These Meetings…

He needs to have some deacons sitting in the front row and let folks know that the doors of the church are open.  The only thing he’s missing in an organ player.

File Under: “Celebrities I Thought Were Dead”

Not dead yet.

Etta James.

I really thought she OD’d on PCP back in ‘68.  Apparently I was wrong.

Not that it matters and not that I care, but she’s got beef with Beyonce and Barack Obama over the singing of “At Last” at the inauguration.  Let me just say for the record that now that I know she’s not dead, I’m most upset that I had to find out about it through some childish rant she had on stage… I mean, c’mon E, don’t be undead like that.

Other celebrities who still haven’t found their way to the grave

-Ted Lange

-Bob Barker

-The Iron Sheik

-Dionne Warwick

All of whom I’ve been shocked to find out are still on this side of the metaphysical world.

25 Random Things About Corey Richardson…

Oh yes, I got sucked into this one too…

1.) I’m awesome.

2.) I’m so awesome, my birthday is celebrated as a national holiday in 24 countries including Denmark, Malaysia, and Paraguay.

3.) I’m so awesome, if you’re taking a test and there’s a true or false section, if you answer “Corey Richardson” it will be marked as correct.

4.) I’m so awesome that 9 out of 10 dentists agree that shaking my hand can prevent cavities.

5.) I’m so awesome, a few years ago I recorded the sound of me thinking… it won five Grammys.

6.) I’m so awesome that I dream in 12 different languages.

7.) I’m so awesome, Stevie Wonder knows what I look like.

8.) I’m so awesome, they took the film footage of my birth and early childhood and tried to make it into a biopic about my life. Unfortunately, it was too long so they released it as a series… That film is called Star Wars.

9.) I’m so awesome, I can play a full game of beach volleyball by myself.

10,) I’m so awesome, I can light a cigarette with my thoughts.

11.) I’m so awesome, I’ve won the Daytona 500 three times. The second time, I was riding a horse.

12.) I’m so awesome that if you type my name in a Google search, it will give you the answer to Pi.

13.) I’m so awesome that you’ll know that you made a perfect score on the SAT if all the bubbles filled in form a portrait of my face.

14.) I’m so awesome, I was born with a full set of teeth and the blueprints to the space shuttle tattooed on my back.

15.) I’m so awesome that my boogers are the birthstone for the month of April.

16.) I’m so awesome that I can fish with a spoon and a light bulb. Don’t ask me how, just know that I have three fine sea bass in the fridge.

17.) I’m so awesome, I always have correct change. Not because I carry a lot of coins, its just that stores let me pay whatever I want.

18.) I’m so awesome, people can and do get high off my fingernail clippings.

19.) I’m so awesome, I’ve been elected Prime Minister of Canada, twice.

20.) I’m so awesome, I have three birthdays.

21.) I’m so awesome, I have an Academy Award. I don’t know why, just one day I opened my mail and there was something about an Oscar and this statue. Its cool though, It kinda matches the Grammys.

22.) I’m so awesome that I’m licensed to practice law and medicine in 37 states and all 10 Canadian provinces.

23.) I’m so awesome, I grew my first goatee at age 4.

24.) I’m so awesome, Clive Owen has been cast to play me in the Saved By The Bell reunion show. I was never on Saved By The Bell, I’m not white, nor am I British, but someone’s going to pay him to stay home that night, say he’s me and watch the show.

25.) I’m so awesome, if you go to a bar and order a Corey Richardson, you get two shots of bourbon, a beer and the cash register.

I’m just that awesome.

What’s Beef?

Protect ya neck!

Rush Limbaugh is fucking up.

I used to work the door at a nightclub (which is entire book unto itself) and I got friendly with the bouncers.  As such, I was often privy to the sage wisdom they could provide on life and survival not just in the club, but in life in general.  One bouncer in particular always seemed to break it down best.  His name was Frank.

Now, when you apply for a regular job you submit a resume and sit down for a protracted interview with management and explain why your services would be appreciated and applicable in the environment that they’re in, being a bouncer ain’t like that.  Basically, your resume is the list of folks’ asses you’ve kicked and the various instances in which you’ve had to dole out a “correction” or two… it also doesn’t hurt if you have a few interesting scars, scars are cool too… But I digress.

One night, Frank and I were talking and I told him about a bartender at another club who had said some pretty unsavory things about him the night before.  I mean, dude was talking sporty about him and basically said that he hoped bad things happened to him.  I asked Frank how him and that guy get into such a beef.  He taught me one of the best lessons I’ve learned in life…

Frank: “We don’t have beef.  I could cave that muthafucka’s chest in any time, any day, any place if I wanted to.  I fuck fools up for a living, he pours drinks.  Its not beef, I’m a guy who could destroy him, he’s just a muthafucka talking.”

Simple lesson- It ain’t beef if you aren’t on equal footing.

That’s why FAMU can’t claim a rivalry with the University of Florida.  That’s why Bow Wow can’t claim a beef with Jay-Z.  And that’s why Rush Limbaugh can’t really have a beef with Barack Obama.  Muhfuckas ain’t on the same footing.

Obama is the president and current leader of the free world.

Limbaugh is a muthafucka talking.

I think, more so than anything else in this whole Rush vs. Barack thing, there’s not an ideological difference on policy as much as there is an issue of Limbaugh just not liking black people.  Really, Rush just don’t like niggas.  The folly on Limbaugh’s part is that he’s gotten himself into a position where now he’s the defacto leader of the Republican party (sorry Mr. Steele) and now his mouth has written some pretty hefty checks that his ass is gonna be forced to cash.

When you’re a talking head on the radio stating your disagreements with policy or ideology you’re rightfully exercising your right to free speech… You’re like the bartender talking reckless about a bouncer because he got the girl you couldn’t get.  But when you explicitly state that you hope that the president fails and then make it a point to have the members of your party kiss your ring and come out and atone for crossing you (see: Bailout Vote, Republicans in The House), then you enter the realm of accountability for your statements… that’s like the bartender taking it one step further and stepping to the bouncer ready to fight.

And let me be clear here… I’m a blogger… I’m just a muhfucka with an opinion and time to type it… I’m not better or worse than Rush in that sense.

But the difference is that I ask for no accountability for my opinions.  I just want you to read this shit and laugh.

Now, if I said that I hope something fails and then lay out a specific plan of action to pursue its failure, then I move out of opinion and into participation and once I participate, then I’m accountable.

Nah Rush, this ain’t what you want.

You don’t want beef like this, homey… You just a muhfucka that talks shit, don’t trifle with the people who actually DO shit.  That accountability is a muhfucka and when people start following you and doing what you told them to do, you’re gonna hafta answer to someone if your shit don’t work.

You don’t want to wind up like Dee Barnes catching the two piece and no biscuit from Dr. Dre.  Or even worse, like Wendy Williams who’s credibility is all but gone after fomenting false beef after false beef.  But that’s the path Mr. Limbaugh’s heading down.

Someone tell that fool to calm down, pop a few pills and chill.