The Hip Hop Anthropologist

The Bush administration’s startling revelation released yesterday by the White House Press office in the person of Bush spokesman Ari Flesher admitting that the CIA provided the president with daily briefings, which included information foretelling the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center as well as the Pentagon, is a dramatic departure from past positions. In the past, the administration’s official stance was that it had absolutely no knowledge of the voluminous intelligence known months ago by the alternative press clearly indicating that radical, fundamentalist Islamic fractions planned a “fatwa” or decree against the US. It persuasively illustrates that knowledge is empowering and why the government is assiduous in its efforts to deliberately keep its naïve denizens blissfully ignorant. The Bush administration did not release this information of its own volition. It did so in response to the mounting pressure heaped upon it by scathing, thorough, and relentless reporting...

Although it is true that unless an owner operator finds a lucrative niche market, he will not even earn what a union driver nets at say ABF, UPS, USPS, Roadway, Yellow, or New Penn per year @ close to $30/hour or $70,000/year, whose drivers are all represented by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, or even a good non-union local driver (I used to take home $800/week, drove less than 1,000 miles/week, and was home every night), but still have all of the responsibilities of an independent business person. Because of the country's current economic climate, some of those union drivers have recently experienced give-backs ranging from $1.90 or more per hour. The Master Freight Agreement, which governs salaries, benefits, and union member working conditions, is generous to a fault. But it can also be used as a broad barometer of what a good owner operator ought to be grossing on a monthly basis. After all what are you in business for if not to make money? To simply drive a ...

Many potential drivers have asked questions regarding past criminal convictions relative to employment opportunities in the trucking industry. Federal law has gotten stricter regarding hazardous materials endorsement. But other than that, the old rule still basically applies: No DWI/DUI, transportation related felonies, or homicide, rape, weapon or drug offenses. All other convictions are up in the air, and decided by the recruiter, company HR representative, on a case by case basis, which is usually dictated by company culture and hiring policy. Many companies will not hire a driver with a felony no matter what. Most of these companies are not worth driving for anyway. So, they are not hurting your prospects for a driving career. The Federal Trade Commission promulgates the minimum standards through the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) when a background check is done by a third party known commonly as a credit report agency (“CRA”). The FCRA does not apply to employers that conduct ...

Often as we navigate skillfully around preoccupied four wheelers pulling stunts on the big road, we hear uninformed chatter on our CBs relative to how our country, the trucking industry, and our way of life is going to hell in a handbasket. Some drivers unfairly lay blame for this situation squarely at the foot of our current President. But a great deal of the criticism of the Obama administration is simply misguided, motivated by racism, and, consequently, wholly inaccurate. Motor carrier deregulation was a part of a sweeping reduction in price and entry controls and collective vendor price fixing in United States transportation, which begun in the1970s with initiatives by the Richard Nixon Administration, carried out through the Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter Administrations; and, followed up on in the 1980s, collectively seen as trucking deregulation. Most of the problem stems from young, inexperienced, and unsophisticated drivers from the Deep South where there is little well pay...

It was a beautiful, warm and sunny, Wednesday afternoon on March 21st. I was traveling Eastbound in Jackson, Mississippi on I-20 at approximately seventy miles per hour in a tractor owned by my trucking company, Shipman Trucking & Transport, and a fully loaded trailer owned by Mystic Express. We were down a driver and I decided to go out myself. I have held a valid Class A commercial driver's license almost since the CDL Act of 1986 called for a single, federally administered commercial driver's license for all professional drivers; it was supposed to reduce fraud and increase accountability for bad drivers. The trip originated in North Brunswick, New Jersey with stop and a pickup in Chicago, Illinois, a delivery in Fort Worth, Texas and a backhaul in Tyler, Texas. I had just taken a nice, hot shower and eaten a small breakfast in Louisiana; routing myself to drive through Mississippi, Alabama - states I had never really spent any time in - before heading North back home....

On April 12th Representative Cynthia McKinney (D-Georgia) released a press statement critical of the Bush administration's actions in responding to 9-11. It raised serious concerns about the United States government's foreknowledge of the brutal terrorist attacks on both the World Trade Center in New York City as well as the Pentagon in Washington, DC. McKinney argued, "The need for an investigation of the events surrounding September 11[th] is as obvious as is the need for an investigation of the Enron debacle. The press release from McKinney's office further stated "news reports from Der Spiegal to the London Observer, from the Los Angeles Times to MSNBC to CNN, indicate that many warnings were received by the [US] Administration." There is considerable evidence that key players in the US intelligence as well as federal law enforcement community deliberately turned a deaf ear to persistent rumors that Mohammad Atta, who had been previously identified as a...

Tyrone Powers, a former African American FBI special agent announced on NYC's urban contemporary radio station 98.7 KISS FM's May 19, 2002 airing of the Open Line show, hosted by news director and morning personality Bob Slade, that he had credible evidence strongly suggesting the Bush administration did in fact allow the September 11th attacks to further a hidden agenda. Dr. Powers says that the administration miscalculated, though, and "didn't believe that [an attack] would be on this scale." Powers, author of critically acclaimed autobiography, "Eyes To My Soul: The Rise and Decline of a Black FBI Agent" is director of the Institute of Criminal Justice/Legal Studies and Public Service, and an assistant professor of law Enforcement and Criminal Justice at Anne Arundel Community College in Arnold, Maryland. Powers stated that "arrogant" US intelligence agencies underestimated the resolve of the terrorists. They have the American people dup...