Showing posts with label black president. Show all posts
Showing posts with label black president. Show all posts

Friday, October 08, 2010

cornel west and prophetic christianity

Here is a new interview with Cornel West from the newly reorganized Jesus Radicals site. In the hour-long interview with Eliacin Rosario-Cruz and Mark Van Steenwyk, West discusses a wide-range of topics including his recent disinvitation from this years Christian Community Development Association conference in Chicago due to an interview he gave to Playboy magazine, the ways in which Latin America challenges the Washington consensus, Puerto Rican independence leaders, how to chant down Babylon, how so many Caribbean activists joined the Black freedom struggle in the U.S., the Tea Party, some fierce but loving criticisms of Obama's presidency, but mostly he talks about how prophetic Christianity (and as an afterthought Judaism and Islam etc.) can constitute a counter-hegemonic force, voice and vision to challenge the American Imperial moment.


Some excerpts from the Playboy interview:

On President Obama’s shortcomings: "While he’s made some good, positive changes, I don’t think he’s a messiah or even a very progressive politician...It’s already getting late for him, when you have a chance to speak to jobs, homes, infrastructure and you end up bailing out investment bankers. They’re too big to fail? They’re too big to be managed! And what do you do? You allow them to get bigger! So you’ve got the same conditions in place that will reproduce the same catastrophe from which we’re still cleaning up from the Bush years. And you don’t speak to jobs, you don’t speak to homes, and again the poor remain invisible."

On President Obama’s inability to push a strong black agenda: "I wish [President Obama] could be more Martin Luther King-like. Set an agenda that at root is a black agenda, and it would also be the best agenda for the nation and the world. King did that. His concern for civil rights was also the best agenda for the country...By necessity, Obama has had to downplay his blackness to appease the white moderates and independents and speak to their anxieties. He knows black folk will support him anyway, so he doesn’t need to spend too much time on the chocolate side of town."

On Michelle Obama: "Somebody of her brilliance, somebody of her vision, somebody of her courage confined to keeping gardens at the White House, reaching out to military families, highlighting childhood obesity. I think she could be a great force for change if she could only set herself free. She can’t though. Black sister exercising her power, willing to take a stand, would be too much of a threat."

On corporate greed and "gangsterism": "Humans have always had the propensity to be gangsters...but for much of the past century you had sanctions in place. You had regulation. You had a stronger trade union movement. You had some balance between the rich and the poor. More of the wealth was distributed to working people. But what is it now? CEOs in the 1950s made around $25 to every $1 for an average worker. Now it’s about $275 to every $1, and the CEOs say, ‘No, we deserve it. We’re working harder.’ That’s a lie. They’re getting away with more by holding on to a larger percentage of the profits...When you read the business pages in the past three years, it’s just gangster activity, people getting away with anything they can—looting the Treasury, billions of dollars made on speculation. Those people knew it was wrong, but it was short-term gain, scandal, preoccupation with the 11th Commandment: Thou shalt not get caught. The result is, we’re feeling the aftershocks of moral bankruptcy, and it’s going to hurt us for a long time."

On the Tea Party movement: "The Tea Party might look a mile wide on Fox News, but it’s only a few inches deep...Tea Party folk are not crazy people. They’re just misguided. They’re deeply conservative people who see the corruption of government. They’re right about that. But they react by being antigovernment. They’re wrong about that. They see the need for individual initiative and entrepreneurial possibility. They’re right about that. But then they affirm a corporate agenda and don’t realize corporations are a big part of the problem...They’re much weaker than people like Glenn Beck think they are. But I’ll fight for the right of Glenn Beck to express his opinion. Even he has a right to be wrong, which he is most of the time."

On Glenn Beck’s preoccupation with black people: "Glenn Beck appears to have a certain preoccupation with black folk. Why is he so obsessed with black people? I notice he doesn’t give the Amish that much attention. [laughs]"

On eliminating poverty: "Given our wealth, we could create a society with no poverty. We could do it...Brother, you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to eliminate poverty. Make it a priority. You allocate assets for everyone’s basic needs—housing, food."

On acknowledging race: "Some would like to believe we live in a postracial society, but that’s completely false. You’ve got to acknowledge race. Little kids notice it from the time they’re six or seven. ‘Dang, Jamal is darker than Johnny over here. What does that mean?’ Some people will try to say, ‘It doesn’t mean anything. We’re all the same.’ That’s wrong. That’s denial. We are different because of race, and we need to learn to embrace the differences, embrace the whole person...Then again, we have to make sure our awareness of our differences doesn’t translate into a hierarchy of how you treat people."

On the dismissal of his academic career: "My academic career is dismissed by means of invisibility. And I’m not the only one. If a martian came down to America and read The New York Review of Books, it would hardly know there were any black writers. There is a de facto segregation in the life of the mind in America, and black scholars, brown scholars, black intellectuals feel it every day."

On the hypocrisy of the Catholic Church: "Anytime you have people making claims of being virtuous, you have massive hypocrisy...Don’t project purity or an image of being pristine because you end up falling on your face. Or worse, you end up projecting a face of hypocrisy, as we see with the Vatican—a gay sex scandal among the people who preach against gay marriage and other deeply important issues. Not right."

On the things our culture is yearning for: "All across this culture I see a yearning for quality relationships, a yearning for integrity, a yearning for spirituality. But people—young people in particular—are manipulated by many forces to believe that what matters in life is something else: money, materialism, short-term gain, power and the kind of show that goes along with it."

On sexuality: "Sexuality is such a precious gift, but it does take on a life of its own. I see people who fall down the path of lust, seduction and temptation, and increasingly I sense this conquest mentality in which sex becomes almost another thing to acquire. How many women can I satisfy myself with? It’s a form of pathology, and it’s a sign of our deep spiritual malnutrition."

On white fear of black sexuality: "Historically, white fear of black sexuality was always a basic component of white racism. Black bodies, white bodies bumping against one another—it’s been one of the major forms of mobilizing white citizens...Ancient associations still linger about the sheer touch of black body against white body, of being disgusting, dirty, repulsive."

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

i'm just hoping blair underwood doesn't end up sounding like al pacino in scarface

I was already intrigued by the ads I saw for the new NBC series The Event. The mix of science fiction and political conspiracies seemed right up my alley. Now I just found out that in the fictional world of the show, the president is an Afro-Cuban-American named Elias Martinez. Should be interesting. I think he's probably the only Afro-Cuban character on national (English-language) television since Gina Torres (who is Afro-Cuban herself) played Anna Espinosa on Alias.

The Grio: Playing a black president gets complicated in age of Obama by Ronda Racha Penrice

Sunday, August 22, 2010

why they want obama to be a foreign-born muslim

An excerpt from FogCityJournal.com: Why Republicans Need Obama to be a Foreign-Born Muslim By Rachel Kiernan

What needs to be addressed is why so many in this country want to believe that Obama is a Muslim, even when they criticized Obama for following a “radical” black Christian leader. This is true in spite of the fact that Obama was raised by his Christian mother and grandparents, having barely known his father. It speaks of the very essence by those who fear an America which no longer looks like they. This manufactured phobia of all things Muslim and of all things non-white (think “white slavery” and the anti-Hispanic establishment) is a response by those who feel that they have lost control over their own lives and power to those who traditionally have been the most disenfranchised and powerless.

This goes beyond those who wish that Obama was a Muslim and a foreigner. This is a manufactured crisis by those who wish to divide the country into two camps by whipping up hysteria against Muslims, blacks, Hispanics and anyone who does not look and pray as they.

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

more responses to wyclef

First, Former Fugee Pras Not Backing Wyclef In Haitian Presidential Bid, Slams Jet Use and also Sean Penn 'Very Suspicious' Of Wyclef Jean's Haitian Presidential Bid

But finally, on Savior's Day (with Wyclef in attendance) Farrakhan cautions the singer/candidate that people will try to get their claws on him in order to serve their own agendas:

Tuesday, August 03, 2010

if he was president...

Some of you may have heard that former Fugees-member Wyclef Jean is considering a run for President of Haiti. For those of us who like his music and are moved by his lyrics it is tempting to assume that he would be a wonderful choice.



But some are questioning that assumption by pointing to some of Wyclef's connections to right-wing elements of the Haitian polticial scene.

To cut to the chase, no election in Haiti, and no candidate in those elections, will be considered legitimate by the majority of Haiti’s population, unless it includes the full and fair participation of the Fanmi Lavalas Party of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Fanmi Lavalas is unquestionably the most popular party in the country, yet the “international community,” led by the United States, France and Canada, has done everything possible to undermine Aristide and Lavalas, overthrowing him twice by military coups in 1991 and 2004 and banishing Aristide, who now lives in South Africa with his family, from the Americas.

[...]

Fanmi Lavalas has already been banned from the next round of elections, so enter Wyclef Jean. Jean comes from a prominent Haitian family that has virulently opposed Lavalas since the 1990 elections. His uncle is Raymond Joseph – also a rumored presidential candidate – who became Haitian ambassador to the United States under the coup government and remains so today. Kevin Pina writes in “It’s not all about that! Wyclef Jean is fronting in Haiti,” Joseph is “the co-publisher of Haiti Observateur, a right-wing rag that has been an apologist for the killers in the Haitian military going back as far as the brutal coup against Aristide in 1991.


(For more see: Wyclef Jean for president of Haiti? Look beyond the hype by Charlie Hinton, with editing assistance from Kiilu Nyasha)


Wednesday, November 05, 2008

black president - brenda fassie

I had wanted to include a video to this song back when I started my "black president" series but didn't find one until now. Here is South African pop star Brenda Fassie singing about a different history-making Black leader. Personally, I think one of the most beautiful, powerful aspects of the song is that it was actually written several years before Mandela was elected. The dream became a reality. (And here is a clip of a sparser, more beautiful, less "pop" version of the song)





The year 1963
The people's president
Was taken away by security men
All dressed in a uniform
The brutality, brutality
Oh, no, my black president
Him and his comrades
Were sentenced to isolation
For many painful years
For many painful years
Many painful years
Of hard labour
They broke ropes
But the spirit was never broken
Never broken
Oh, no, my, my black president

Hmm maa (3x)
Mama
Hmm maa (3x)
Mama

Hmm maa (3x)
Madiba
Hmm maa (3x)
Madiba
Ahh, nyu ye uyee huu

He broke ropes
But his spirit was never broken
Never broken
Oh oh oh, my president

Now in 1990
The people's president
Came out from jail
Raised up his hand and said
'Viva, viva, my people'
He walked the long road
Back, back to freedom
Back, back to freedom
Freedom for my black president

Let us rejoice for our president
Let us sing for our president
Let us pray for our president
Let us sing, let us dance
For Madiba give us freedom
We thank you Lord
For listening to our prayers
Night and day
Oh oh oh, my president

Madiba

Zulu /Xhosa lyrics

My president
I will die for my president
I will sing for my president

I will stand and say
Viva, viva, viva, viva, viva, viva