This is no conspiracy theory. I have no absolute proof. I've been moved today to just tell you what happened to me approximately 15 years ago and you can come to your own conclusions. This is the first time I've wrote extensively about this because I haven't really been that concerned before, nor am I that concerned now. That's because I see my function as doing the work for liberation and I know that if you seriously do this work, things - all types of things - are going to happen to you. The other reason I've never really focused publicly on this incident is that I am usually not very good at talking about my personal self/life and that's simply because when I was young, the message I always got was whatever was happening with me wasn't important. So, this is a day of reflection. The reason today is that day is because I just received a call from my daughter earlier informing me that my older brother, the brother I didn't even know I had until I was 17, had died. As long as I can remember, he had been involved in our family, although his relationship was never made clear to me. As I entered my teens, I began to try and figure out his connection and in doing so, I resolved that he was also my mother's son. When I confronted her with this information as a 17 year old would, she and the entire family acted as if I had fired a cannon in the house. So, I dropped it and I never discussed this with my mother and father again. After they died, I tried to reach out to my brother, but I felt he responded to me like someone would respond to a person who was just released from a long prison stint for killing a mutually loved relative. Eventually, he and I would talk and he would tell me he always knew. I wondered why he hadn't said anything, but because the atmosphere was so tense between us, I didn't ask him. We didn't talk much after that. Maybe because he felt I should have reached out sooner while I wondered why he hadn't. Especially since he was the one who knew. Also, I've always been conscious of the impact the changes I've manifested in my life have had on all members of my living biological family who are not my daughter and next oldest sister. I'm talking about my dedication into revolutionary Pan-African politics. My "legally" changing my name in 1984. The decision of my ex-wife and I to raise our daughter with revolutionary African values that didn't include celebrating imperialist holidays, any of them. None of this may sound like much to you now, but back in the mid eighties, all these things were the equivalent of national treason. It was always an issue. During job interviews. In social circles, and certainly among family members. The changes scared people. They thought I was a terrorist. That I hated White people. That I had joined a cult. All of this made me an outcast in my own family beyond my parents and two sisters who grew to accept, and respect, my way of life. Unfortunately, all of them are gone now except that one sister. So, now that my brother is gone, I'm thinking today about him and this feeling of being an outcast which has defined my relationship to my biological family today. And, please don't feel sorry for me. I feel overwhelmingly fortunate to have developed an outstanding extended and ideological family over the years. People I have been able to depend upon and people who can depend upon me. My daughter has grown up surrounded by revolutionary love and the shortcomings I experienced growing up I was able to translate into healthy behavior in raising my daughter. I am thinking of this isolation outcast thing today though because I realize this extended far beyond my biological family. I hope I don't come off as dismissive or insensitive about my brother's death. I do feel the loss, but I'm no hypocrite. The inner city taught me how to manage pain and honestly, its a skill that has come in handy over the years. I am thinking today about how this isolation I've always experienced in my family actually has always extended beyond biology. Its defined my existence to this entire society I live in. My life and actions are, have always been, and will always be, in direct contradiction with this society. That has always made me the oddball to most everyone. And, as I thought about the question of my brother and his death today, I naturally thought about my own mortality and whether there is more I should be contemplating about the incident 15 years ago that I'm about to tell you about. Was that incident just an isolated health issue or could it have been something designed to take my life because of my political work, or who knows why?
On July 29th, 2002, in Sacramento, California, I developed the most intense headache I've ever experienced. This is especially true because I'm not a person who typically even gets headaches. I've exercised routinely on a daily basis since the 1980s. I haven't eaten red meat since 1983 and I've never smoked - anything - or drank (except for a period between 1981 and 1982 when I briefly took up an affinity for beer). So, I'd lived a very pain free life in all spheres, and this is still basically true. That's why I was concerned when I got this devastating headache that day. My concern amplified when I tried to massage my head as people typically do when they get a headache. My thinking was doing so would provide some relief against the pressure. Imagine my shock when not only was there no relief, but once I applied the pressure to the lower right portion of my skull, the pain began to immediately spread to other parts of my head in a shooting fashion. This panicked me and the panic intensified when I suddenly began to get extremely dizzy. As I was attempting to check into a hospital Emergency Room and they questioned me about what meds, etc., I'd taken in the last couple of months, I recalled that I had recently had an inoculation shot. I was headed to Senegal and Gambia that next month and the shots were needed to secure visas to those countries. I had fallen sick after receiving the yellow fever shot, but had recovered and felt fine until this occurrence this July day.
The short version of this story is a few days later, after going through several traumatic instances that reflect the racist and inhumane nature of this capitalist health care system, I had a major seizure, something I'd never experienced before in my life, and I ended up in a coma for five days. I was placed on a respirator. The neurologists were so convinced I was going to die that they even had a Catholic Priest come in to perform last rites over me while I was out (I was not conscious when this happened, but I did distinctly remember this priest's voice when I heard it in the hallway some three weeks after I awoke. Once she and I talked, and I told her that I knew her voice in a serious way, not just from overhearing it, she admitted to me that she prayed over me when I was in that coma). Once I awoke, I was subjected to four different neurologists. In fact, they were so interested in what had stricken me, and how I had survived it, that they paraded a number of doctors and medical students in front of me for about a week. I was even told that my case was the topic at several training conferences in California. I can also tell you that the doctors were so confused that they sequestered me several times to interrogate me about whether I had been in prison or not. Although they didn't tell me at the time, they were operating under the incorrect guess that I had some sort of STD of the brain, whatever that is. Once they finally abandoned this very amateurish and racist theory, one neurologist, who had the social skills of a racoon, actually went to work and determined that I had experienced a brain clot, or a "leaky" brain stem. He told me that I came within a hair of experiencing a major stroke and major brain damage. And, even after he told me that, they spent the next two or three days testing me repeatedly to make sure this damage didn't occur (some people may still dispute that it didn't). I ended up staying in the hospital for over a month. I lost 40 pounds, and I left the hospital with a friend - diabetes, which I still have in my life today. Since that time, I'd had 0 issues related to this incident and today, while properly managing the diabetes, I'm in great health, probably the best of my life. In other words, there are absolutely no traces of this strange incident that afflicted me 15 years ago.
Again, I have no proof of anything. What I've described above are simply the facts of what happened to me. What I can tell you is just two months before this incident, I helped lead probably the most militant march in Sacramento City's history. We had been working for months to make our annual African Liberation Day march a splash. We were tired of the city's racist rules and regulations so we had collectively decided we wouldn't be getting any permits. Instead, we enlisted the support of the 40+ member strong Aztez Dance troop to lead the march (in accordance with our position that this is the land of the Indigenous people). We were supported by the local Soul Brothers, an all African motorcycle club who happily agreed to block all streets for our march. And believe me, no motorist dared challenge them, green lights or not. I remember during that march how there were a number of professional looking European camera crews, not media, they were there to - although we never called them. These other camera crews were set up taking lots of pictures along the march route. There was universal agreement among us that these strange camera crews were police agencies, but they didn't try to impede us so we didn't engage them either. We also had a large contingent from the Nation of Islam and their para-military Fruit of Islam (FOI) soldiers. This last part is important because when we arrived back at McClatchy Park to have our rally, as I began to start the rally as the M/C, several police cars dramatically drove up to the stage with sirens blaring and lights flashing. As they exited their cars and began to make their way to the stage, dozens of members of the Nation's FOI began engaging in their para-military drills, running circles around the police officers. There was no mistaking how much this frightened the police as hundreds of Africans openly laughed at them. By the time they were able to talk to me, all the women officer could say is that they found some car keys in the parking lot. So, they did all of that to give the M/C of this militant march and rally some car keys. All while we had amplified sound with no sound permit. A march of hundreds of African, Indigenous, Palestinian, (and a few Irish comrades - the only Europeans in the march), with no march permit. While we occupied the stage with no park permit. The march caused major issues with traffic on that Memorial Day weekend, yet they said nothing about any of that. They just gave us those keys. And, there was much more they could have said. We were engaging in intensive organizing all over Sacramento during that time and I can remember being pulled over by police several times for strange and unusual circumstances during that period. A year before, the City had actually sued me, and the All African People's People's Revolutionary Party, for our propaganda that was mysteriously wheat pasted all over town. Our ACLU lawyers told me the good rich Europeans living around William Land Park took great exception to the posters with Muammar Qaddafi's picture on them so close to their pristine homes. The City lost that case and they made it clear they weren't happy about it. But, again, I don't have any proof of anything else. I'm just telling you what happened. Maybe the blood clot resulted from the shot as a simple bad side effect. Maybe the shot had nothing to do with it. maybe the intensive political organizing that was taking place around that period of time and the subsequent trip to Africa to engage in more organizing work, was all a coincidence. Maybe the fact the neurologists had me endure several grueling appointments with the Hemotologist, who tried to tell me there was a glitch with my dad's DNA which probably caused the brain clot (I told him the only glitch was between the brain signals between his brain and his mouth). Maybe I'm just thinking of all of this now because I just heard today that my brother died. I can't say for sure. What I can say is the "official" story when Malcolm X was assassinated was that the Nation of Islam did it. What we know now is at least two of the actual NOI members who spent years in prison for Malcolm's death couldn't have been there and that the four other people who were there, were never arrested. We know that along with the fact the FBI has been forced to acknowledge that they had spies at the top level of the Nation of Islam and that they rewarded someone, unnamed, when Malcolm was killed. What we do know is that when Kwame Nkrumah's government in Ghana was overthrown in 1966, the "official" story was that this happened because Nkrumah was corrupt and stealing the money from the people of Ghana. What we know now is that the U.S. has admitted undermining the Nkrumah government through the Central Intelligence Agency and that Nkrumah had no money or assets of any kind when he fled to Guinea to live out the rest of his life. What we know is that the Western capitalist world wanted Nkrumah gone and that's what happened there. What we know now is despite the "official" story that Muammar Qaddafi and the Libyan Jamihiriya was overthrown in 2011 because the people of Libya wanted "democracy", the real story is that the Obama regime worked day and night to sabotage Qaddafi's government, spreading misinformation and importing mercenaries who posed as dissidents. As well as instigating the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to bomb Libya into submission as a tactic to force the Libyan people, out of desperation, to want Qaddafi gone. All of this, we know now, to stop Qaddafi from actualizing Nkrumah's dream for a united Africa through one African currency on the world economic market.
We still have those "official" stories posing as the truth as it relates to other issues like who killed Huey P. Newton? How did Sekou Ture, Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichael), and Mawina Kouyate contact and die of cancer in such a close proximity to one another? How about Hugo Chavez? How did Khalid Abdul Muhammad die of a brain aneurysm? Why does all of this happen to our warriors, all the time, while archaic savages like David Rockafeller, Rothchilds, Rudy Guiliani, etc., live and live forever. Just the type of questions you think about before going to work on a blurry day after you receive the news I received about my brother's death. I wish him rest in power and I wish you peace and safety, although I have to add that there really is no safety as long as this decadent system is in place and we can never ever have real peace, without justice.
On July 29th, 2002, in Sacramento, California, I developed the most intense headache I've ever experienced. This is especially true because I'm not a person who typically even gets headaches. I've exercised routinely on a daily basis since the 1980s. I haven't eaten red meat since 1983 and I've never smoked - anything - or drank (except for a period between 1981 and 1982 when I briefly took up an affinity for beer). So, I'd lived a very pain free life in all spheres, and this is still basically true. That's why I was concerned when I got this devastating headache that day. My concern amplified when I tried to massage my head as people typically do when they get a headache. My thinking was doing so would provide some relief against the pressure. Imagine my shock when not only was there no relief, but once I applied the pressure to the lower right portion of my skull, the pain began to immediately spread to other parts of my head in a shooting fashion. This panicked me and the panic intensified when I suddenly began to get extremely dizzy. As I was attempting to check into a hospital Emergency Room and they questioned me about what meds, etc., I'd taken in the last couple of months, I recalled that I had recently had an inoculation shot. I was headed to Senegal and Gambia that next month and the shots were needed to secure visas to those countries. I had fallen sick after receiving the yellow fever shot, but had recovered and felt fine until this occurrence this July day.
The short version of this story is a few days later, after going through several traumatic instances that reflect the racist and inhumane nature of this capitalist health care system, I had a major seizure, something I'd never experienced before in my life, and I ended up in a coma for five days. I was placed on a respirator. The neurologists were so convinced I was going to die that they even had a Catholic Priest come in to perform last rites over me while I was out (I was not conscious when this happened, but I did distinctly remember this priest's voice when I heard it in the hallway some three weeks after I awoke. Once she and I talked, and I told her that I knew her voice in a serious way, not just from overhearing it, she admitted to me that she prayed over me when I was in that coma). Once I awoke, I was subjected to four different neurologists. In fact, they were so interested in what had stricken me, and how I had survived it, that they paraded a number of doctors and medical students in front of me for about a week. I was even told that my case was the topic at several training conferences in California. I can also tell you that the doctors were so confused that they sequestered me several times to interrogate me about whether I had been in prison or not. Although they didn't tell me at the time, they were operating under the incorrect guess that I had some sort of STD of the brain, whatever that is. Once they finally abandoned this very amateurish and racist theory, one neurologist, who had the social skills of a racoon, actually went to work and determined that I had experienced a brain clot, or a "leaky" brain stem. He told me that I came within a hair of experiencing a major stroke and major brain damage. And, even after he told me that, they spent the next two or three days testing me repeatedly to make sure this damage didn't occur (some people may still dispute that it didn't). I ended up staying in the hospital for over a month. I lost 40 pounds, and I left the hospital with a friend - diabetes, which I still have in my life today. Since that time, I'd had 0 issues related to this incident and today, while properly managing the diabetes, I'm in great health, probably the best of my life. In other words, there are absolutely no traces of this strange incident that afflicted me 15 years ago.
Again, I have no proof of anything. What I've described above are simply the facts of what happened to me. What I can tell you is just two months before this incident, I helped lead probably the most militant march in Sacramento City's history. We had been working for months to make our annual African Liberation Day march a splash. We were tired of the city's racist rules and regulations so we had collectively decided we wouldn't be getting any permits. Instead, we enlisted the support of the 40+ member strong Aztez Dance troop to lead the march (in accordance with our position that this is the land of the Indigenous people). We were supported by the local Soul Brothers, an all African motorcycle club who happily agreed to block all streets for our march. And believe me, no motorist dared challenge them, green lights or not. I remember during that march how there were a number of professional looking European camera crews, not media, they were there to - although we never called them. These other camera crews were set up taking lots of pictures along the march route. There was universal agreement among us that these strange camera crews were police agencies, but they didn't try to impede us so we didn't engage them either. We also had a large contingent from the Nation of Islam and their para-military Fruit of Islam (FOI) soldiers. This last part is important because when we arrived back at McClatchy Park to have our rally, as I began to start the rally as the M/C, several police cars dramatically drove up to the stage with sirens blaring and lights flashing. As they exited their cars and began to make their way to the stage, dozens of members of the Nation's FOI began engaging in their para-military drills, running circles around the police officers. There was no mistaking how much this frightened the police as hundreds of Africans openly laughed at them. By the time they were able to talk to me, all the women officer could say is that they found some car keys in the parking lot. So, they did all of that to give the M/C of this militant march and rally some car keys. All while we had amplified sound with no sound permit. A march of hundreds of African, Indigenous, Palestinian, (and a few Irish comrades - the only Europeans in the march), with no march permit. While we occupied the stage with no park permit. The march caused major issues with traffic on that Memorial Day weekend, yet they said nothing about any of that. They just gave us those keys. And, there was much more they could have said. We were engaging in intensive organizing all over Sacramento during that time and I can remember being pulled over by police several times for strange and unusual circumstances during that period. A year before, the City had actually sued me, and the All African People's People's Revolutionary Party, for our propaganda that was mysteriously wheat pasted all over town. Our ACLU lawyers told me the good rich Europeans living around William Land Park took great exception to the posters with Muammar Qaddafi's picture on them so close to their pristine homes. The City lost that case and they made it clear they weren't happy about it. But, again, I don't have any proof of anything else. I'm just telling you what happened. Maybe the blood clot resulted from the shot as a simple bad side effect. Maybe the shot had nothing to do with it. maybe the intensive political organizing that was taking place around that period of time and the subsequent trip to Africa to engage in more organizing work, was all a coincidence. Maybe the fact the neurologists had me endure several grueling appointments with the Hemotologist, who tried to tell me there was a glitch with my dad's DNA which probably caused the brain clot (I told him the only glitch was between the brain signals between his brain and his mouth). Maybe I'm just thinking of all of this now because I just heard today that my brother died. I can't say for sure. What I can say is the "official" story when Malcolm X was assassinated was that the Nation of Islam did it. What we know now is at least two of the actual NOI members who spent years in prison for Malcolm's death couldn't have been there and that the four other people who were there, were never arrested. We know that along with the fact the FBI has been forced to acknowledge that they had spies at the top level of the Nation of Islam and that they rewarded someone, unnamed, when Malcolm was killed. What we do know is that when Kwame Nkrumah's government in Ghana was overthrown in 1966, the "official" story was that this happened because Nkrumah was corrupt and stealing the money from the people of Ghana. What we know now is that the U.S. has admitted undermining the Nkrumah government through the Central Intelligence Agency and that Nkrumah had no money or assets of any kind when he fled to Guinea to live out the rest of his life. What we know is that the Western capitalist world wanted Nkrumah gone and that's what happened there. What we know now is despite the "official" story that Muammar Qaddafi and the Libyan Jamihiriya was overthrown in 2011 because the people of Libya wanted "democracy", the real story is that the Obama regime worked day and night to sabotage Qaddafi's government, spreading misinformation and importing mercenaries who posed as dissidents. As well as instigating the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to bomb Libya into submission as a tactic to force the Libyan people, out of desperation, to want Qaddafi gone. All of this, we know now, to stop Qaddafi from actualizing Nkrumah's dream for a united Africa through one African currency on the world economic market.
We still have those "official" stories posing as the truth as it relates to other issues like who killed Huey P. Newton? How did Sekou Ture, Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichael), and Mawina Kouyate contact and die of cancer in such a close proximity to one another? How about Hugo Chavez? How did Khalid Abdul Muhammad die of a brain aneurysm? Why does all of this happen to our warriors, all the time, while archaic savages like David Rockafeller, Rothchilds, Rudy Guiliani, etc., live and live forever. Just the type of questions you think about before going to work on a blurry day after you receive the news I received about my brother's death. I wish him rest in power and I wish you peace and safety, although I have to add that there really is no safety as long as this decadent system is in place and we can never ever have real peace, without justice.
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