(Akiit.com) There she stood right beside her man: an attractive, God fearing and loyal middle aged woman holding the hand of her fallen pastor husband. He walked her out ever so gently–held her close, and kissed her lips for all to see as he ushered her back to her seat on stage, before he took to the lectern to speak to his flock.

Bishop Eddie Long, a self-proclaimed prophet of God has been accused of coercing four male parishioners into sex. This Sunday, in his first public comments on the scandal, Long never once said, ‘I am innocent of what I have been accused of doing with these young men in my care.’ Instead he vowed to fight the charges and in doing so he did what all guilty defendants do (in my experience as an attorney): he used careful language such as “I am not a perfect man“, parsed his words and hid behind his lawyers admonitions. Something that a man of God likely would not do if he was in fact innocent.

As I watched the Bishop Sunday morning, images of other pastors (Ted Haggard) and politicians before him (Bill Clinton’s emphatic: “I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Ms. Lewinsky“) came to mind. But the person I was most intrigued by was Vanessa Long and the hell she must be living through right now.

So here we go again, yet another loving wife humiliated by her powerful husband, and once again by allegations of seedy, sexual activity with underage teenage boys. I grimaced as I saw Vanessa Long walk out to the pulpit on Sunday with her husband at her side. I felt for her as I know she must be mortified at the spotlight now focused intently on her husband and their marriage as well as their private sex life.

You have to wonder what was going through her mind yesterday. Women just aren’t that naive. Longstanding psychological and empirical data often show a sad trend that when husbands cheat, their wives usually suspect them, or when husbands are engaged in acts of molestation (even against their own children) or have a proclivity toward the “other sex” wives often suspect and still they look the other way.

Why do we do this? The reasons I suspect are varied and painful. Sometimes we like the lavish lifestyle we have become accustomed to; or, perhaps, we cut a deal going in and we knew our man was “not quite right” or that he had “a roving eye“–but we liked his potential anyway and we liked how he treated us. So we made a deal with the devil–we sold ourselves in order to protect ourselves from having to go it alone.

Clearly, I have no answer to such an age old question, but I do think I can shed a bit of perspective on why Vanessa Long is standing by her man like many before her.
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(Akiit.com) Considering his controversial explosion onto the scene with N.W.A in 1988, Ice Cube is a far cry from his Straight Outta Compton days and even further away from where you imagined he’d be 20 years after his solo debut, Amerikkka’s Most Wanted.

His ninth studio album, I Am The West, hits stores on today, as the rapper turned actor, screenwriter, director and producer is just the latest aging figure in hip-hop to step back in the booth after a successful detour from his musical career.

Other huge names from his era like Will Smith, LL Cool J and Queen Latifah have avoided a career mid-life crisis and successfully repackaged themselves into crossover stars outside of the genre.

Will Smith was arguably the first hip-hop crossover star to be accepted into the hearts of mainstream America. From winning the first Grammy in the genre to his success as The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Smith provided a blueprint for rappers turned actors to successfully navigate from one medium to another. Unlike some of his peers, he actually has to acting chops to sustain it.

Queen Latifah was another to go from the hip hop charts to the small and silver screens and has seen her journey go from a conscious, feminist rapper to a spokesperson for Cover Girl and clothing lines.

LL Cool went from rocking the bells and needing love to chasing down perps on CBS hit crime drama, NCIS: Los Angeles.

Before these rappers and others of their ilk, the closest thing you got to any sort of universal acceptance was Run DMC’s breaking the hip-hop barrier on MTV. Still, today’s success is unprecedented.

For hip-hop acts that didn’t kick out the catalog the aforementioned did, what more could they expect after their 15-minutes than a scrapbook full of memories and gigs on the convention circuit or maybe turning to religion?

Things started changing when big business quit making a mockery of the culture, like having old women breaking and rapping on Saturday morning cartoon commercials, and started to accept the financial viability of the art form, even if they didn’t respect its power just yet.

Those rappers, helped shift what a rappers career could be. Instead of depending on beats and rhymes to generate generational wealth, even new artists are approaching the profession with a business sense few had decades ago.

The Queen Latifah’s of the World’s current marketability is just a testament to their actual talent and a constant reminder to the trail they blazed for life after beyond the realistic scope of your musical popularity. Granted, all have enough in the catalog to tour on the greatest hits should they take a break from the silver screen, they’ve also proven to be successful entrepreneurs.

Few in their age bracket have touched Jay-Z’s level of success outside of music while simultaneously balancing a relevant hip hop career. Still cranking out impactful music after his eleventh studio album, if there’s anybody showing just how hip hop can grow up, it’s Hov.
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(Akiit.com) WASHINGTON (AP) — A stopgap spending bill that’s needed to avert a government shutdown on Friday advanced in the Senate as lawmakers prepared to head for the exits for the midterm elections.

The measure easily advanced, 83-15, Tuesday on a procedural vote that puts it on track to pass the Senate on Wednesday, and the House could clear it for President Barack Obama before the budget year ends at midnight Thursday.

To speed the measure through, lawmakers ignored administration pleas for add-ons such as $1.9 billion for “Race to the Top” grants to better-performing schools and more than $4 billion to finance settlements of long-standing lawsuits by black farmers and American Indians against the government.

A bid to use the measure to keep alive a grant program from last year’s economic stimulus bill that many states are using to subsidize hiring of the unemployed was also left off the measure, known as a continuing resolution, or “CR,” in Washington-speak.

“At the insistence of Republicans, who have refused to consider many important exceptions, we anticipate moving a clean CR that will clear the Senate and the House prior to the end of the fiscal year this Thursday,” said Rob Blumenthal, a spokesman for Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye of Hawaii.

“There is very little market for new spending,” said Chris Gallegos, spokesman for top panel Republican Thad Cochran of Mississippi.

The measure would fund the government at current levels until early December, with only a few exceptions, such as funding to make sure there’s no cutback in the number of flights protected by federal air marshals.

The bill is a reminder of the dismal performance by Congress in doing its most basic job — passing an annual budget and the spending bills for agency operations.

Only two of a dozen annual appropriations bills have passed the House this year and none has passed the Senate as Democratic leaders opted against lengthy floor debates and politically difficult votes on spending.
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(Akiit.com) School is back in session, and I’m now able to rest in peace… Still I miss the kids but it’s nice to have the home alone… Me and the wife is able to have quality time, etc… Well I was reading over this best sleep aid article and made me ask who needs such a product… Yes I know there are millions of people who just can’t fall asleep… A friend of mines happen to be one of them…

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(Akiit.com) Weekend is here and College football shall be on tv all day… Hoping a few close games as last week many of the higher ranked teams literally blew away their opponent… Well let me find my mbt shoes as I need to head outside for a while… Yes run a mile or two… Take in the first air, and exercise literally… I shall finish up this email then I’m out…

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