I was really waiting for LMs take on this sad day. Truly wonderful.
damn. Once again, LM, you have brought a lump to my throat with your eloquent prose.
I thank Steve Gilliard for the brilliance that he brought to the world, and i thank him for inspiring all you fine folk at GNB to carry on and WRITE.
amen. fight the good fight, guys. it matters.
He was a revelation to me, when I found his blog.
Ongoing, rowdy, REAL, town-hall meeting/bar and grill :o)... and one that they couldn't fuck up.
(Although they sho'nuff tryin'...)
What was it Eldridge Cleaver called Berkeley:
"This sweet sty of revolution..."?
Works for me, for Steve and Jen's old place, and the new one, too. :o)
And the saddest thing of all, is that Steve would BE as happy as a pig in shit, to be wallowing in it right along with us. :o)
"I often wonder when you, the reader opt to point your web browser Group News Blog-ward, what goes through your mind. What are you expecting to find?"
I expect to find good writing that doesn't insult my intelligence. And I do. This is one of the few places which I read almost everything, because it's all so good. I'm not looking for a particular thing. Just the consistent level of quality.
LowerManhattanite,
I was one of those who kept begging you to start your own blog. Your comments on Steve's blog were always such a delight to read.
The only thing that in any way mitigates the sting of our loss is that you, Jesse, Hubris, and Sara have chosen to keep his community together by producing this marvelous GNB, which I am quite certain he would have loved to read and comment on himself if he were still with us.
Thanks to all of you for the work you do. The GNB is one of my first stops each day when I sit down at my computer.
nothing to add... amen to all the above comments.
Thank you all for keeping this going... I like to think that Gilliard's voice was not silenced, but amplified by the universe... through writers like you and all the others here -- and the terrific commenters and community.
Did you see this one up on Kos Now...
amazing archive and they say nice stuff about us too.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/20...65757/56/
527777
But I am mostly blown away by the chance to go back and read Steve's kos stuff all in one spot. and here about his remarkable dedication to the blogging community all over again.
sheesh, It would be nice to finally get rid of this lump in my throat.
Wow, LM, you did it again. What are we expecting to find? Writing like this. The good thing about us, as humans, is that we are able to keep learning. And learn, I do, when I come here and read what you and Jesse, Sara, Jen, Hubris et al put down for us.
We will continue to mourn Steve, but what all of you give us is a way to celebrate him too.
Many, many thanks.
thank you for this, LM, it's beautiful.
I cried a lot, off and on throughtout the day yesterday. I read this and now I'm starting the second year without our friend the same way. Thanx for the remembrance LoLo...
LM, I remember many of your great comments at Steve's place. The one that really stands out is Mudbone joining the Steele campaign. Three comment panels, maxed out. A masterpiece. It's sadly ironic what got you to 'get your own blog', as Steve told you, but you carry on his fight, and you do him proud. 'Do You Understand Where You Are' may be one of the best posts I've ever read, anywhere, by anyone. I printed it, made about 20 copies and passed it out. Gonzo's 'Fish Tacos' is about the snarkiest thing I've ever read. And since I daily read the Editors at the Poorman and the folks at 'Sadly,No', you, sir, can snark with the best. Except maybe Driftglass, he really is a man I'm glad is on our side of the fence. And since I live about 2000 niles from him, I never have to worry about meeting in a dark alley.
Lm I have to call you out....why back in solo advengers volume 1 (hawkeyes first title where he was teh man) he fought and beat abomination (some nifty trick errors and a high tension power line where involved). If he na beat abomination he can beat the hulk (same guy basicly).
why are we here..
tanbark naild it...This is our nheighborhood pub, you guys are the bartenders (LM, Sara, HS, ect) Jesse is the proprietor. I like to think of myself as norm (realy im probably cliff 
)
Thanks, for the good writing, the explanation of WHY GNB, and why you write.
I dearly miss Steve's military analysis. Day after day I muse, "Wonder what Steve would have written about....?"
BUT, we all must soldier on, with joy and passion to make our country better, what it can be, not merely more of the same crap.
Thanks for that reminder.
LM,
Thanks for your reflections. I'm another one who is glad that commenting for Steve allowed you to write more, and more freely.
Thanks
Ah, fuck, LM. I've been waiting with bated breath for your take, and as always, you don't disappoint.
For what it's worth, YOU inspire me every time I read something you write. Steve inspires you and you inspire me and I'm sure I inspire someone else, who inspires someone else, and so on.
And that is how Steve achieves immortality. Because we are all better writers because of him.
If only the price weren't so fucking high.
Thank you for everything you do, day after day.
Thank you ,I forward your writing many times. I still have the old link to Steve's blog on the top of my favorites list. He is still missed by many who never met him in person.He was a bright clear engaging wit,with a gift for writing,and weren't we all lucky to have read his words?
Nicely done LM...
I found it interesting that you connected to an African Americanness in Steve G's writings. I started reading him back at Netslaves and had no idea what he looked like or what race he was until much, much later. I picked up his New Yorkerness immediately. It just never occurred to me to care when faced with such brilliant writing.
Steve wrote in a very personal way as if he was only writing for you and I appreciated his talents. Sometime before that buffoon Goldberg the Lesser accused Steve of misunderstanding some aspect of "Blackness" I learned he was AA. It made for a great laugh and a happy looking forward to the rejoinder to the idiocy.
Somewhere else Steve's skills at troll murder were brought up. I miss his skillful use of wit and scorn. Truthfully a lost art that he practiced with panache.
my first "contact" with an A-lister came from gilly. he had written a thing about the horrible mess the whole "monument" thing at the trade center site. i commented that the folks at the WTC were folks who were just going to work. they weren't heroes or any shit like that. they went to work on a bad day. the fitting monument in my eyes would have been to build another glass and steel phallic tower. a paen to capitalism, wealth, and go back to work. that would have told terrorists, "sure, you can give us a bad day. you can give us one of the worst days, but we'll go on."
that was the attitude that brought london through the blitz, which was nearly two years of 9/11s.
gilly sent me an email. he told me to keep writing. he told me he liked how i thought.
that meant stuff to me. i knew gilly was black right off too. and, he couldn't put his finger on what it was about my voice, he knew i wasn't white, or at least, not all white. being gilly, he just asked straight out and up front.
he also asked some very incisive questions about the differences in the language. he wanted to know if growing up speaking apache influenced the way i think in english. he was intruiged when i told him that there is so much that simply doesn't translate i have to pretty much purge my mind of english thoughts before i can function.
gilly was insatiably curious. about everything.
thanks for carrying the torch LM, all you guys at GNB.
Damn, LM .... just ... damn.
Amusinc wrote:"Somewhere else Steve's skills at troll murder were brought up. I miss his skillful use of wit and scorn."
Oh. Yes.
LM- I never have to read more than a paragraph or two to recognize your voice on this page. In this post, you said so much that resonates deeply with me on so many levels. If you weren't just a few years younger, I'd swear you were my long lost twin separated at birth!
Like you, I found myself checking in to see what Steve had to say every day. And I wait for your posts, too. So thank you. We're definitely a community of people brought together by Steve. I find many of the commenters here as provocative as the posts! Thank you all.
I've been mostly a lurker at TNB and GNB. Comment once in a while, but mostly just enjoying all your writing. Especially the strong New York Voice.
Gotta say, pretty axe though. Hows OSX run on that?
LM,
Ha. You know that black folks know other black folks no matter the complexion or the prose. :D
I can't remember if it was something written by Driftglass that brought me here or something that Steve wrote about Michael Steel but I was hooked.
When he died I was so upset that my husband thought that I had gotten news about a family member.
It does feel that way.
Thank you, Jesse, Hubris, Evan, Sara, and Jen for carrying on.
Steve would be smiling.
Well, LM, by now you know that we all think that you have a great gift. Thanks for sharing it. And thanks to Steve for inspiring you.
Billy Rotten:
I run OSX on it via XPostfacto. It has a G4 550 shoehorned in and half a gig of RAM as well as a DVD burner. Wireless via PCMCIA card, USB and FireWire via same.
Fun piece. I'm customizing an old 9600 (upgraded via a vintage G4 NewerTech card) into a “Tony Stark” model in red and gold metallic.
Should be fun.
Once I had discovered the News Blog, it was the first site I fired up every morning-- that fresh, raw, raucous, brilliant writing and the attitude that drove it was better than 10 cups of coffee to get my day going. I loved Steve's sensibility, and I loved reading the comments, even though I seldom contributed to them.
I can't express enough thanks to Steve for opening up new worlds of thought for me, and to all of you who have picked up the mantle, especially you, LM.
Thanks LM.
I miss Steve's military history posts and wonder what he would have thought of the surge and Petreus, etc.
And I'd bop you over the head and take that Mac. I have the first G3 version of that Mac, OS 9 only but I can couchsurf.
Aw, DAMMIT.
Part of the reason I don't hang here like I used to, is because of stuff like this.
Hold on a sec; let me explain. Mostly, it's because I'm not in grad school anymore, and can't avoid work for three hours at a time checking out the posts here. It's also because for the first time in a solid decade, I am in a real, honest-to-God relationship with a real, honest-to-God woman that I love very much, and (who knew?) that takes care, feeding, and time.
But at least a little bit of it was that I just *knew* that if I happened by for just a quick look-see, I might stumble across one of LM's pieces, and if the sumbitch was bringing the snark, or the soul, and doing it long-form, well, I could just kiss off the next hour.
And God DAMMIT, you just did it to me again.
God bless you, dude. Gilly lives.
LM-Writing like this is why I read Steve first thing everyday, and continue to read GNB everyday. Thanks. OK, the picture made me cry, again.
Thanks LM--a very moving post....
I still miss Steve, too. I read the blog every day just to find out his take on things. He answered an email of mine once--that's pretty cool! I envy those who actually knew him....
And now GNB has become a daily stop--
Thank you for these beautiful words and memories you have shared here today.
I miss Steve too. I didn't know him but he was one of the first bloggers I followed and I was hooked.
Peace.
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