If you're going to “report” on something like this, at least get some quotes from folks who actually care about the issue. For the most part, I agree that there are some siginficant things that can be done legislatively around this issue – but using McWhorter and Murray as support isn't going to help.

If you're going to “report” on something like this, at least get some quotes from folks who actually care about the issue. For the most part, I agree that there are some siginficant things that can be done legislatively around this issue – but using McWhorter and Murray as support isn't going to help.

If you're going to “report” on something like this, at least get some quotes from folks who actually care about the issue. For the most part, I agree that there are some siginficant things that can be done legislatively around this issue – but using McWhorter and Murray as support isn't going to help.

I was fortunate to have my dad around for a loooong time. My parents were married for 64 years! :>)

I enjoyed his speech! He couldn't do it all in20 -30 min. If people need that much hype, then they have some needs! Just do well by your family. That should be enough reward!! My dad did just this! And we told him what a great job he was doing. And that was ENOUGH for him!! :>)

Obama-Biden '08!

“You cannot legislate societal behavior. Period.”

Conservatives say this a lot, usually before they argue that social programs encourage dependency. But if social programs encourage dependency, then they have in fact “legislated” behavior.

The point I see behind the bill is that it removes disincentives–essentially accidental punishments –exacted on people who do their what they're supposed to do. If you pay your child support it gets taxed. If you're married or not on public assistance, you get taxed more. That's just bad public policy. We tax things we DON'T want people to do, like smoke cigarettes.

Money can't make up for a missing father, which is why I used Charles Murray's quote at the end, but we shouldn't be making it harder to pay child support, or using child support money to recoup the federal government. That kind of legislation does affect behavior–for the worse.

. . . unspoken consent. . . . or “THE LOOK!” My mom could do that from the choir stand and CONTROL errybody's behavior!! :>) :>)

Obama-Biden '08!

We need to return to where, by unspoken consent, it was indicated which behavior would be tolerated, and which behavior was not. You got ostracized if you, as a man, wasn't handling your business and leaving your woman to fend for herself – real men spit on you and called you out in attempting to shame you.

It wasn't a matter of being tolerant – it has become a matter of just not giving a damn anymore. How do you legislate someone into giving a damn?

Brothas raised in the early 20th century knew the drill. If they fled, they had to stay gone or else get ridiculed by other brothas handling their business. My father ragged on several of his cousins about that shyt, and like Chris Rock, when one of those cousins bragged about how he “took care of his kids”, my father responded, “Damned fool, you're supposed to do that. Kiss my ass if you looking for someone to give you a reward.”

My mom howled in laughter in the kitchen as she said, “Burdett might not be right about somethings, but he sure told the truth on that one…”

As you can tell, my dad was the original “Ride and Die” before that phrase got coined. LOL

That talk scared the beejeezus out of me, too. I was too afraid to come home pregnant and still in high school, having been told by my mom that abortion would be out of the question if I came home knocked up. Even though we were in the swinging late 70s and going into the 1980s, when unwed teen pregnancies were beginning to be more and more accepted, what amazed me were the guys getting these girls pregnant, and no one blinked when those guys disappeared to jail, college or the Armed Services. Far more is when these same brothas come back 15-20 years later and want a “relationship” with the kids they literally abandoned, and those fathers wonder why their kids tell them to go to hell and that they're not interested.

I was blessed because I had a father and later on, a stepdad; both of them knew what time it was regarding their responsibility towards their children, and rather than run off, they stuck around.

Obama's speech bothered some because it appeared he didn't give props to the guys who stuck around in addition to calling out the deadbeats. It looked too much like he was trying to curry favor with white voters by calling out Black deadbeat fathers, when the reality is, all ethnicities have deadbeat parents of both genders, and he probably would have done well to call ALL of them out.

Your account of your family really shows how times have changed. I have had this conversation with some relatives my age and older relatives. The older generation really appreciated and felt cared for when their parents worked and provided, even if they didn't know/have an intimate relationship with said parent. They will brag about how many jobs their dad worked to make ends meet, even if they rarely saw him.

The generation we have now really suffers if they don't have a relationship with the parent above a financial contribution. Our people are suffering from a lack of gatekeepers at the gate where our youth are concerned. Extended family is what kept us thriving in the old days. That and respect for/interest in marriage. But it also use to be scandalous to have a bunch of different baby daddys or mamas. People use to call them cat families and really look down on them. My neice is 25, and it's nothing for her to meet an nice young single man whose never been married but has 2 or 3 kids with 2 or 3 different women. Incarceration also use to be shameful, and now it's ho-hum/unfortunate. My parents told me that if I “did it” with a boy, he would tell other boys and they would be circling me like sharks. It scared me and I didn't want that kind of reputation. My mother also convinced me that she would kick me out of the house and I would be on my own. That also scared me. Neither my mother nor any of my friends mothers took us to get birth control. They expected that we would not participate in adult activities. Now mothers act like Sarah Palin and accept the pregnancies. They help the daughter & grandchildren and let them stay at the house. I can't see my dad letting me stay at the house at all. I have 19 female 1st cousins and 2 got pregnant as teenagers (it was very scandalous). Times were just different and we had much higher standards. I feel like there were more available men for me to select from than are available for my daughter (almost 10 yrs. old now) because there is higher incarceration now. I have so many students with parole officers. There are so many more boys tried as adults now. They are comfortable with the idea of incarceration. They don't fear it like my generation did.

In an ideal world, we wouldn't need state agencies to “force” fathers to provide financial support to their children; this should be done without prompting. And in a realistic world, we certainly wouldn't give them tax incentives for something they should already be doing. That's bulls***. This is basic biology people.

Sex = baby. If you are having sex, there is a possibility, even with protection and birth control that the female will get pregnant. If you are not ready or cannot afford to start a family, you should not be having sex. It is that simple. I don't know how we got here, but this is crazy. Instead of proposing legislation to cajole grown men into being parents by providing “incentives”; why not cut the problem off at its root–promote family planning (i.e. training that will show people what it will costs to feed, clothe, educate, and house a child) and comprehensive sex education, with an emphasis on abstinence.

I can't forgive that bastard for coining the Bell Curve and putting Blacks under the gun as being too “inferior” to educate in the first place. The messenger has issues with African-Americans AS A RACE, so he's the last one to talk about what's needed in Black Families, when he's perpetuated stereotypes and helped Washington write that legislation that essentially aimed at fracturing Black families from the jump.

My father's generation tended to shame their peers when daddies ran out on their families and those families ended up on “relief”. As a result, I grew up watching my dad work three jobs, plus hustle scrap metal on the side to make sure I wore a different dress to school every day, had ribbons in my hair, patent-leather mary janes on my feet with lace socks, and food in my belly. My moms dressed well; so did my brothers and for a Black family in the late 60s-70s, we were considered as close to middle class as could be obtained.

No thanks to Charles Murray and the bullshyt he spewed about Blacks being inferior to everyone else and that's why we don't do well in school.

As you can see, I felt pretty strongly about him being quoted in your piece – I just hope that Obama's bill isn't all talk, but really serves to rectify what caused the fractures in Black and Latino families to begin with.

Sorry, for the rant.

1. CONGRATULATIONS on being a “recent graduate of Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism! This achievement is a confirmation of the skills that you already possessed. :>)

2. APPRECIATING the fact that Democrats are changing the political conversation about fatherhood. That Mr. Obama was involved in /continued this conversation, is further testament to his leadership for ALL people!

THANK YOU for keeping the “conversation” going! :>)

Obama-Biden '08!

I just blogged about this article.

I just want to wretch when I hear folk blathering about lack of substance and whatnot.

It is all there…just gotta get out there and make it work.