Since all the outrage broke out over his "remarks" I have been baffled as to why anyone even noticed this - coming from Don Imus. Remarks like this aren't out of character for Don Imus at all. I've never been a big fan of his show but sometimes in the morning, I'll catch it on MSNBC and watch/listen for a little while. He has good guests on the phone, so it is mildly entertaining... but then, without fail, he or one of his "back-up singers" in the studio says something cold-hearted or just plain insensitive about one group or another that might be intruding on their straight-white-male-dominated turf. In my case, it was their very obvious homophobia creeping out in their brief exchanges between each other. Like their constant expressions of deep love for jerks like Rick Santorum, whose only successes in life have been by exploiting the fears of "good christians" at the expense of regular gay people like me.

So this whole controversy struck me as somewhat overblown - almost phony even. This is Imus we're talking about. He's a crusty old guy stuck in a different time. A time where it is okay to make hateful off-color jokes, so long as you don't use certain "forbidden words" while doing so. The joke is still there, even though it may be said in code. And I know that "faggots" like myself, "Cleaning ladies" like Gwen Ifill or some "nappy headed ho's" on an underdog  college basketball team who are rightfully seeing some success are just being "put back in their place" like we always have.

I guess I just got used to it. Shame on me.

Maybe America really is starting to change. First Ann Coulter gets called out on her hate. Newt Gingrich. Bill O'Reilly. Now Don Imus. Wow. Who's next? Limbaugh? Glenn Beck? So many more I couldn't possibly name them all in one sitting.

Carry on...

I know I've said it before but I'll say it again...I loved his speech at the Dem convention even more than Obama's....he knows how to give a speech that can be entertaining and still say something substantial.

'Poverty is the worst form of violence'--Gandhi

But, then that is turned around, again, and thrown back at the black community to justify the hate all over again.  A sad spectacle.

The pimps and hos routine was somewhat amusing when it was used as parody, like in Hollywood Shuffle or the Afros.   Its time is long over now.  Hip-hop should move on and find something political and progressive to talk about.  That goes for celebrating gang-banging too.  It started as a statement about police brutality...now it celebrates criminality.