POST NO ILLS E-Roundtable: Sucka-Free Democracy--Adam Bradley (1)

Moments of clarity rarely come to me while listening to Young Jeezy, but that’s precisely what happened the other day. “My president is black, my Lambo’s blue/ And I’ll be goddamn if my rims ain’t too,” Jeezy rhymes on the hook to “My President.” It’s a curious declaration—part political endorsement, part celebration of conspicuous consumption. Yet behind both is a profound sense of pride and ownership.


OPENING RESPONSE Moments of clarity rarely come to me while listening to Young Jeezy, but that’s precisely what happened the other day. “My president is black, my Lambo’s blue/ And I’ll be goddamn if my rims ain’t too,” Jeezy rhymes on the hook to “My President.” It’s a curious declaration—part political endorsement, part celebration of conspicuous consumption. Yet behind both is a profound sense of pride and ownership. ___Like Jeezy, many of us feel that Barack Obama is somehow ours—whether by virtue of common race, class, age, or experience. An Obama presidency would allow us to see part of ourselves at the pinnacle of American democratic power. ___Such identification alone, though, is little more than narcissism. This is particularly true when it comes to race. Voting for a candidate because he’s black like you is no more virtuous than voting for one because he’s white. The Game went too far when he said “It ain’t about race now,” but he was still onto something. It’s about how we use our identification with Obama to inspire us to give tangible meaning to his message of change. Might we become more involved in our communities? Might we change the way we see our country and our role as citizens? To borrow Obama’s words, might we discover that we are the ones we’ve been waiting for? ___Some people assume, because Obama’s candidacy itself is revolutionary, that an actual revolution will follow his election. Watching Rap City the other day, I heard Joell Ortiz spit a freestyle entitled “A Letter to Obama” in which he recounts his hard knock life as a child raised by a single mother addicted to crack. He ends his verse with this earnest plea: “So dear future president, I hope you hear this letter/ And do some things to make sure the next one I’m writing is better.” While the emotion is understandable, the expectation is unrealistic. It’s time for a reality check: Obama can’t solve all your problems, even if he wanted to. The circumstances rap artists most often decry—urban poverty, police brutality, gang violence—rarely lend themselves to direct presidential intervention. As president, Obama may oppose such abuses, but his role is limited. Solutions to these problems require local, state and federal government to work in concert with citizens; they require the president to work with Congress to craft effective public policy. This can take years. Obama’s most immediate impact lies in his capacity to empower us to move from inspiration to action. No matter what your T-shirt tells you, Obama is not your homie. If elected president, Obama won’t paint the White House black. He won’t play puff-puff-pass with his Secret Service detail or replace state dinners with BBQs on the south lawn. The day he takes the oath of office, he’ll inherit the stern challenge of governing a nation in crisis—wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, America’s woeful reputation around the globe, an economy in peril. As dead prez once said, it’s bigger than hip hop. ___A half century ago, Ralph Ellison imagined what our first black president might face: “I would like to see a qualified Negro as President of the United States,” he explained, “but I suspect that even if this were today possible, the necessities of the office would shape his actions far more than his racial identity.” To put it another way, Obama must find a way to lead a nation while balancing the concerns of its various constituencies. ___How hip hop responds to Obama will depend in part upon how Obama responds to hip hop. Will he find a way to show love to the culture without compromising his ability to govern? Will he evince a will to listen instead of just preaching and scolding as so many leaders before him have done? The early evidence appears promising. Even as he’s kept a calculated distance from hip hop over this long campaign, Obama has found ways to represent the culture at its best—its linguistic virtuosity, its sense of style, rhythm, and movement. While we may never hear rap’s familiar boom-bap coming from the Oval Office, rest assured that should Obama be elected some part of hip hop will have made its way from the streets of the South Bronx to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. OTHER PARTICIPATING RESPONDENTS: Mark Anthony Neal Natalie Moore R. Scott Heath Natalie Hopkinson Close Window

___Like Jeezy, many of us feel that Barack Obama is somehow ours—whether by virtue of common race, class, age, or experience. An Obama presidency would allow us to see part of ourselves at the pinnacle of American democratic power.

___Such identification alone, though, is little more than narcissism. This is particularly true when it comes to race. Voting for a candidate because he’s black like you is no more virtuous than voting for one because he’s white. The Game went too far when he said “It ain’t about race now,” but he was still onto something. It’s about how we use our identification with Obama to inspire us to give tangible meaning to his message of change. Might we become more involved in our communities? Might we change the way we see our country and our role as citizens? To borrow Obama’s words, might we discover that we are the ones we’ve been waiting for?

___Some people assume, because Obama’s candidacy itself is revolutionary, that an actual revolution will follow his election. Watching Rap City the other day, I heard Joell Ortiz spit a freestyle entitled “A Letter to Obama” in which he recounts his hard knock life as a child raised by a single mother addicted to crack. He ends his verse with this earnest plea: “So dear future president, I hope you hear this letter/ And do some things to make sure the next one I’m writing is better.” While the emotion is understandable, the expectation is unrealistic. It’s time for a reality check:

Obama can’t solve all your problems, even if he wanted to. The circumstances rap artists most often decry—urban poverty, police brutality, gang violence—rarely lend themselves to direct presidential intervention. As president, Obama may oppose such abuses, but his role is limited. Solutions to these problems require local, state and federal government to work in concert with citizens; they require the president to work with Congress to craft effective public policy. This can take years. Obama’s most immediate impact lies in his capacity to empower us to move from inspiration to action.

No matter what your T-shirt tells you, Obama is not your homie. If elected president, Obama won’t paint the White House black. He won’t play puff-puff-pass with his Secret Service detail or replace state dinners with BBQs on the south lawn. The day he takes the oath of office, he’ll inherit the stern challenge of governing a nation in crisis—wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, America’s woeful reputation around the globe, an economy in peril. As dead prez once said, it’s bigger than hip hop.

___A half century ago, Ralph Ellison imagined what our first black president might face: “I would like to see a qualified Negro as President of the United States,” he explained, “but I suspect that even if this were today possible, the necessities of the office would shape his actions far more than his racial identity.” To put it another way, Obama must find a way to lead a nation while balancing the concerns of its various constituencies.

___How hip hop responds to Obama will depend in part upon how Obama responds to hip hop. Will he find a way to show love to the culture without compromising his ability to govern? Will he evince a will to listen instead of just preaching and scolding as so many leaders before him have done? The early evidence appears promising. Even as he’s kept a calculated distance from hip hop over this long campaign, Obama has found ways to represent the culture at its best—its linguistic virtuosity, its sense of style, rhythm, and movement. While we may never hear rap’s familiar boom-bap coming from the Oval Office, rest assured that should Obama be elected some part of hip hop will have made its way from the streets of the South Bronx to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

OTHER PARTICIPATING RESPONDENTS: