Patriciawillwrite

04/24/2026

Making money moves.

04/24/2026

Remember: If you're a resident of Knoxville, you're a resident of Knox County. And if you're registered to vote, you can vote in the primary for the next Knox County Mayor, Knox County Sheriff, multiple County Commission seats, Trustee and more. Early voting is happening now through April 30, with election day on May 5. Who's running in your district? Where are early voting locations? Visit Knox County Election Commission at https://www.KnoxVotes.org to find out.

04/24/2026

Totally locked in.

Long before he was my IMO Podcast co-host, he was the all-star big brother I looked up to. I still do. Happy birthday to the wise, hilarious, and big-hearted Craig!

02/22/2026

02/22/2026

Remembering Nina Simone (February 21, 1933 – April 21, 2003)
“She was one of those artists that really broke the mould,” opines China Moses. The statement is no exaggeration given that Simone, who died in 2003, ranks as one of the key musicians of the 20th century whose body of work continues to inspire and challenge all and sundry in the 21st.

Moses lends credence to that view by mentioning one of the icon’s enduring signature tunes, 1957’s ‘My Baby Just Cares For Me’, the first Simone track she ever heard.

“Who can sing that song like her?” she muses. “Nobody. I’ve heard it covered like 40,000 times. But a version that makes you forget about her version? Ah, no.”

“She had that same kind of melancholy to me, as Billie Holiday, except she was a little more joyous because of her vocal range,” Moses argues, taking a sip of mixed fruit juice with a ginger shot before shrewdly observing, “The voice that Nina had, which was not a girly voice… it’s lower than most vocalists at the time.

“She let the arrangements and the precision of her delivery, do all the heavy lifting, actually. When you listen to renditions of her stuff…. people can over sing ‘Feelin’ Good’ (another key moment from I Put A Spell On You, which differs greatly to ‘Ne Me Quitte Pas’). But she would interact with her musicians, she would direct them… she was a great arranger. Put away the piano playing and the unique voice, you realize how much she’s under singing, how brilliant she is at the twisting of words, or putting the energy into the word, as she lets the arrangements, the words, the melody, do the heavy lifting… like a singer-songwriter, who knows how it should be done.”

Source: July 2025 issue of Jazzwise
Photo: Ron Howard/Popperfoto/

02/22/2026

02/22/2026

America has lost one of its great moral voices. Reverend Jesse Jackson spent his life working to ensure our nation lives up to its highest ideals. From his early days as a young staffer with Dr. King onto the national stage, he fought for freedom, racial justice, equality, and for the human dignity of the marginalized and the poor. As a kid growing up in public housing while watching him run for President, Rev. Jesse Jackson gave me a glimpse of what is possible and taught me to say, “I am somebody!” As an adult, I was proud to call him a friend.

With an eloquence and rhythmic rhetoric all his own, Jesse Jackson reminded America that equal justice is not inevitable; it requires vigilance and commitment, and for freedom fighters, sacrifice. His ministry was poetry and spiritual power in the public square. He advanced King’s dream and bent the arc of history closer to justice.

My deepest condolences are with his family and to all those who were shaped by his witness. His legacy will remain a beacon for generations to come, and I pray it inspires us to continue the work he started.

12/22/2024

12/22/2024

BREAKING: President Biden delivers a brilliant response to a question about how he'll react when Donald Trump falsely takes credit for all of his accomplishments.

This is what a real leader sounds like...

"What are you going to do when the other guy goes out there bragging about accomplishments under you?" Ben Meiselas of MeidasTouch asked in a new interview.

"The Medicare $2,000 cap, its going to kick in in 2025. He’s going to be out there saying, 'I did this.' How’s that going to make you feel when that happens?" he asked.

"Look: I’ve invested more in red states than in blue states with all these programs we just talked about," said Biden. "The reason for that was that the red states didn’t operate very well, and they really hurt their constituents so those factories closed and the like."

"The fact is that I represent all of America, not just Democrats," the president continued. "And I think what it’s going to do is bring the country more together than separate it."

"And for example, you already have folks like Marjorie Taylor Greene and others saying, 'Don’t eliminate the factory,' after talking about how the proposal to build it was the worst idea anybody’s ever had," Biden continued. "She didn’t vote for it."

"So I think there’s going to be a bit of a comeuppance here but the bottom line is I'm convinced that over time the American public will respond to what is the intention of the party to try to help ordinary people," he went on.

"And the fundamental change I made — and I made a speech at Brookings Institution about it recently — was on the economy," said Biden.

"The fact is that we had a long time this idea of trickledown economics," he said. "Let the wealthy do very, very well. They'll have so much money it'll trickle down on people's kitchen tables and coffee tables and the like and everyone will benefit. I never bought that theory!"

"And so what I've decided to do is to change it to build the economy from the middle out and the bottom up," explained Biden. "The wealthy still do very well but the middle class and the working class people do much, much better.

"And that's exactly what's happening and so I think the long term prospects for the country are very good," he added.

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09/04/2023

Exactly!

Follow Occupy Democrats for more.