Reporters try to harass Black Conservatives at the Historic National Black Conservative Press Conference in Wash DC at National Press Club on Aug 4, 2010.
Black Conservatives gathered to introduce themselves to America and support that the Tea Party Movement is NOT racist and there are Blacks that support the Tea Party Movement.
This is CNN questions…..
By Abby Goodnough
January 1, 2005
ELTONA, FL, DECEMBER 29 -It is a safe guess that all of Florida was ready to relegate 2004, with its freakishly active hurricane season, to the history books. But Deltona was especially eager.
The town, a sprawling bedroom community between Orlando and Daytona Beach, suffered through three of the state’s four hurricanes and still has plenty of blue-tarped roofs and disfigured trees to prove it.
A week before the first storm, six teenagers and young adults were bludgeoned to death with baseball bats in a quiet neighborhood here, a crime that was provoked, investigators said, by the disappearance of a video game system.
Then, on Dec. 13, a sinkhole began opening along a busy thoroughfare, possibly an aftereffect of the hurricanes and their pounding rain. This sinkhole, a quintessentially Florida phenomenon that is now 225 feet wide and 50 feet deep, brought sightseers, traffic nightmares, more unwanted publicity (“Next up: A plague of locusts, frogs, hail and lice,” a columnist for The Orlando Sentinel quipped) and new longing for a fresh start.
“It’s crazy, the things that have happened here,” said Larry Amos, walking back to his home after watching crews plug the sinkhole with truckloads of sand – 1,282 truckloads, to be exact – on Wednesday. “The storms, the big murders and now the big sinkhole right in the middle of the road there. It’s time for something nice.”
Deltona was meant to be nothing but nice when the Mackle brothers, developers who built an empire designing inexpensive communities for northern transplants throughout Florida, created it in the 1960′s. Brochures circulated in Chicago, Cleveland and other chilly cities said Deltona, its name a hybrid of Daytona Beach and DeLand, another nearby city, offered “everything for zestful living.”
A yellowed newspaper clipping at the Deltona Arts and Historical Center shows throngs of visitors arriving on charter flights from New York and St. Louis for a glimpse of the land they had bought sight unseen. “Mackle Brothers is bringing the property owners to Deltona to dispel rumors that they’re selling swampland in the Central Florida area,” the caption read.
Then, as now, people moved here for the affordable housing (initially as low as $6,960 with $210 down and $43.11 in monthly mortgage payments) and the weather – generally warm and sunny but, unlike in South Florida, occasionally crisp enough to remind them of the sweetest autumn days back home. Advertisements bragged of Deltona’s meandering streets, sandy terrain and many small lakes, but those have proven troublesome as the city’s population has grown to more than 80,000.
Poor drainage has led to serious flooding, and the city is now building an expensive system for controlling storm water. Traffic bottlenecks have forced several road-widening projects, including on Howland Boulevard, where the sinkhole appeared in the middle of one expansion.
Gerald Brinton, the Volusia County engineer, said the sinkhole was probably thousands of years in the making but was precipitated by the hurricanes, which saturated the ground.
The gaping hole, which within minutes swallowed trees, chunks of sidewalk, a utility pole and a blinking roadside message board, was probably the largest to appear in Central Florida since 1981.
A sinkhole in Winter Park, outside Orlando, consumed a three-bedroom house and five Porsches from a repair shop lot that year and created a 350-foot-wide lake.
Because of its geology, Florida gets more sinkholes – caused by the dissolution of underground limestone by acidic rainwater – than any other state.
The region around Deltona is especially plagued by them, Mr. Brinton said, adding that many of the small lakes visible from the air over Orlando were in fact old sinkholes.
But if the Howland Boulevard sinkhole was somewhat predictable for Deltona, the murders in early August were anything but, people here said. The four men charged in the crime broke into a house on Telford Lane late at night and used aluminum bats to kill six people sleeping inside, prosecutors say, because one victim had not returned an Xbox video game system to one of the killers.
“They were just bad eggs, that’s all,” Mr. Amos, 62, who moved to Deltona from New York seven years ago, said of the accused, who have pleaded not guilty to the crime and await trial.
Lloyd Marcus, president of the Deltona Arts and Historical Center, took it upon himself to do some public relations for his city in the last days of 2004, writing to a local newspaper about how some residents recorded an album to raise money for a man who had been in a serious accident.
“I can’t tell God he’s unfair,” Mr. Marcus said, “but I do think a lot more positive things are happening here that go unnoticed.”
Mayor John Masiarczyk, who said he was playing hooky on Thursday afternoon to work on his storm-pummeled yard, said 2005 would be a year of rebuilding, replanting and, he hopes, reprieve.
“We could use your kind thoughts,” he said.
November 14, 2004
Lloyd Marcus adds Soundtrack to the presidential campaign.
By Ludmilla Lelis
Sentinel Staff Writer
October 27, 2004
DELTONA — When local Republican Party leaders needed entertainment before President Bush’s campaign appearance in Daytona Beach, Deltona singer Lloyd Marcus was the obvious choice.
He is a smooth tenor who specializes in patriotic tunes, a loyal Republican and a person who loves the chance to excite a crowd.
“My thing is getting out there with the crowd and getting the crowd going. Make it fun. Make it uniting,” Marcus said. “I try to really inspire and unite people. That is my forte.”
That was certainly the vibe that Marcus and his band left with more than 14,000 people who attended the president’s Oct. 16 political rally in Daytona Beach.
“He is such a talented guy,” said Jim Coffield, who is co-chairman of the Bush-Cheney ’04 campaign in Volusia County. “He really gets us pumped up and ready to rock ‘n’ roll.”
A Baltimore native, Marcus first sang publicly as a boy at his father’s storefront church, and he has been in bands and choirs throughout his life. During a two-year stint in the Army, he sang in a Green Beret choir, a USO show and a barbershop quartet.
After leaving the military, he kept active in musical theater, television and radio. He performs with his band at Fourth of July events and corporate functions and is the president of the Deltona Arts and Historical Center.
Marcus got his first chance to sing at a presidential event when he performed a solo at a Washington inaugural ball for President Reagan in 1985. Though he is the son of longtime Democrats, Marcus said the late president’s message of less government and “doing things for yourself” clicked with his own values and made him join the GOP.
Since moving to Florida five years ago, Marcus has been active with the local Republican Party and is a precinct chairman for the Volusia County Republican Executive Committee.
Combining his musical talent and his political interests, Marcus is creative director for the local Republicans and has worked on the party’s annual Lincoln Day Gala for the past four years.
His involvement gave him the chance to meet Gov. Jeb Bush on several occasions and made him the top choice for musical entertainment for the president’s recent campaign stop.
Earlier this month, Marcus got the invitation to play at the political rally, but the information was vague. “It was all very mysterious,” he said, laughing. “They couldn’t tell me when or where or how. They just told me to be ready.”
As the date approached, Marcus got better details about the gig and soon word got around that he would be performing for the president.
He laughs today at the reaction from friends and acquaintances, many of whom wanted to give him huge photos and musical CDs to give to Bush. None of that would have even been possible, given the tight security surrounding the event and the limited time that the president would be in the area, he said.
Marcus admitted he had butterflies, but only because he was fighting off a cold and was worried that his voice would be hoarse.
His voice held up, and the event was a success. During the half-hour show, with his wife, Mary Parker, as a sound technician and with keyboardist Frank Starchak and drummer Sonny Gebo behind him, Marcus gave the performance of his life.
The show featured patriotic favorites such as “God Bless America” and Marcus’ own original works, “United We Stand” and “Celebrate America.” One big hit was a parody of the classic rock anthem from Queen, “We Will Rock You,” popularized at many a sporting event, which was rewritten as “Re-Elect George Dub-U.”
The only disappointment was that with the president’s tight schedule, as he tries to squeeze in as many campaign appearances as he can, Marcus didn’t have the chance to meet him that day.
Marcus hopes he’ll have his chance in January. “I want to sing at the inaugural,” he said. “I’m excited about helping the party, helping W win.”
Ludmilla Lelis can be reached at 386-253-0964 or llelis@orlandosentinel.com.
Victory supports traditional American values
I’m elated. The dominance of President Bush’s powerful red-states victory tells me most Americans feel as I do regarding God, family and country. It confirms that my love for my country and traditional American values is not corny and outdated.
I’m a black professional singer, songwriter and entertainer. I produce a patriotic review, “Lloyd Marcus & Friends: Celebrate America.” It is becoming a Fourth of July traditional at the historic Daytona Beach Bandshell.
While my family-friendly show is always extremely well-received, compared to what’s on TV today, my show appears out of step and more suited for a time gone by, a time when primetime viewers enjoyed Andy and Mayberry.
Showbiz today is obsessed with being in your face or cutting edge. As evidenced, the media and showbiz gurus were shocked when last year’s Super Bowl halftime show fell flat, offending many and leaving most Americans thinking, “What the heck was that?” The industry mindset seems to cultivate the philosophy, if you’re not offending somebody, you ain’t doin’ your job. The message being: Want to become a major star? Trash the things which most Americans hold dear. The critics will ordain and worship you as a “true artist.”
Strongly, I take exception to this mentality. I enjoy simply making people feel good about themselves and their country. I respect my audiences and feel grateful for their time. I want them to leave my concerts and show feeling happy, inspired and encouraged.
Just as America has given President Bush a mandate to pursue his agenda, I feel that it has also given me a mandate to continue celebrating the good life of America: God, family, flag-waving and apple pie with a huge dollop of extra thick real whipped cream on top.
LLOYD MARCUS, Deltona FL