EPMD said it best in 1991: "rap is outta control."

And almost two decades (holy shit, time flies when you're high on drugs) later in 2007, all you need to do is to read the headlines of your favorite near-bankrupt hip hop magazine, rap website or blogger's haterade-filled soapbox, and you will see or hear the antics of some rap world personality inspire you shake your head in god-awful shame. For every redeemable and insightful moment in modern rap history, you have some thug-lovin' hustler with a stolen gat made of crack cocaine embarrassing himself, his mother and his crew over some two-bit scheme to become the next 50 Cent ("Curtis: Sound Scan Killa" coming in June!). Concepts like "hard work", "perseverance", and "integrity" just were not taught to some of these so-called hip hop artists, and the subsequent insanity that influences man, woman, and child alike needs to STOP... NOW!!!

Yeah, as if it were just that simple. I wish.

I mean, you can even tell everyone in hip hop the answers to their problems. That doesn't mean they'll have the will power, discipline or even ability to solve them. Much less, feel the responsibility to solve their own problems, and even less than that, the problems of others. I mean, why help your fellow female get her songs out when you could just let her get devoured by the man-iacs on the mic and scoop up her contacts, her budget and her entire ethereal space in the wake of her career's demise?

I digress. There's a lot to complain about in hip hop, but this is only because it consistently contains so much potential, regardless of the daily cultural self-destruction.

Today, I'd like to celebrate the insanity of one Robert Kelly, the Pied Piper of child pornography (I have a copy of the tape and believe me: IT IS HIM. Unless YOU have platinum plaques behind you in your computer room where you eat out the a-hole of some well-endowed booty goddess, there's no way R. Kelly isn't guilty as sin).

(Oh yeah, and in the vein of out-of-touch media outlets that call singers "rappers" and calls rappers "singers", I'ma drop the hammer on the perverted little Lolita-exploiting prosecution-avoider. Oprah, how could you praise this man?! Shame on you, sista. SHAME! But I know you're too rich to feel any shame, so we'll continue...)

In the new issue of HipHopSoul, put out by the fine people at XXLmag.com , this philandering pedophile psychotically professes to be approximately 'the best human being in existence on the planet today.' Swig a gutfull of Absinthe and moonshine first, you will need some poisoning to offset the violent reactions you might feel when contemplating the insanity of the following quote:

"My greatest competition is, well... me. I'm the Ali of today. I'm the Marvin Gaye of today. I'm the Bob Marley of today. I'm the Martin Luther King, or all the other greats that have come before us. And a lot of people are starting to realize that now."

Take a look at his waist (but don't look too long, he might pee in your eye). Can THIS man POSSIBLY be a better humanitarian than Robert Nesta "One Love" Marley or the Right Honorable Dr. Martin Luther King? Hmmmmm.....

A hard, sarcastic, skeptical "hmmmmmm....." is my most respectable response.

I mean, I've heard rappers that suck worse than vacuum cleaners say they're the best, and I suppose that old "freedom of speech" idea in this society allows any nutbar with a semi-functioning frontal lobe to be able to spew out fantastical delusions of grandeur to try and convince others of their "greatness".

I once heard the saying "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." And to validate R. Kelly's Guinness Book of World Records-worthy, mind-melting, hubristic blast of mouth-poo, we'd have to see the illogical War in Iraq single-handedly and immediately halted by a flying R&B songwriter, a shorter and tighter version of Spiderman 3 to come out in theaters (also edited by R. Kelly) and a brand-new Bentley GT for every poor child in the ghetto who takes the pissy yellow bus to their dilapidated excuse of a facility for public education (delivered to their doorstep... courtesy of one Robert Nesta Mar.... oops, I mean Robert Kelly. You know, Marley, Kelly... easy to mix them up. C'mon, don't you mistake that song "I Like the Crotch on You" for "No Woman, No Cry"? I do, all the time).

Michael Helfand, a Chicago attorney with no connection to Kelly's case told www.hiphopdx.com, "Most child pornography cases find themselves in a courtroom within a year or two." What the blood clat?!

R. Kelly did the deed in 2002. Michael Jackson was arrested, tried, and released all within the time of R. Kelly's sham trial dates, and there wasn't even anything but speculation and circumstantial evidence in that case. BOOTLEG DVDS OF R. KELLY'S UNDERAGE SAUNA DEBAUCHERY EXIST EVERYWHERE! This shoutout goes to the swift and relentless wheels of justice that refuse to stop spinning over there in the Chicago Courts of Law. Keep up the good work, guys! I'll be sure to never let any daughter of mine within a 500-mile radius of your entire collective existences.

In conclusion... THIS SHIT JUST KEEPS GOING ON! It never has a conclusion. People do sick shit. John Q. Law takes his cut and turns a blind eye. And the public outrage never does anything good for any of the victims. And R. Kelly puts out another platinum CD to a seriously morally malnourished mass of memory-deficient consumers.

I shudder to think about all they consume if they can so easily neglect remembering about Sparkle's innocent little niece, who's now in her 20's and now actually ~refuses to testify against R. Kelly~. Just when you thought things couldn't get more insane!

Looks like the truth is Trapped in the Closet, and won't ever escape, no matter how many episodes R. Kelly warbles out...

In 2007, even R&B is outta control... it's a wrap!

Try to create a bit of peace and love. I know it's hard.

sincerely yours,

Marshall Lesane Jackson

p.s. for the lucky readers who take this in during the first week it's up, here's a copy of the NEW Lauryn Hill song, called "Lose Myself." It's the perfect anthem for Rap is Outta Control, cause Lauryn is crazy outta control...

http://download.yousendit.com/14C87D041D5CFBB9

In the immortal words of the immortal Rick James, "It's a celebration, bitches!"