We Overcame

I never thought I'd live to see it. I'm not talking about the Barack Obama nomination, I'm talking about Patrick Buchanan's effusive praise of his populist speech. If Obama can win over Pat Buchanan in a night, imagine what he can do in the next two months. America's fiercest culture warrior deemed the speech "magnificent." I have watched conventions since 1960, but I have never witnessed anything like last night. And after Obama's speech about the specifics of his direction as contrasted with the Republican agenda, I can't understand why anyone wouldn't wish to cast their vote for him. Oh, wait a minute. Yes I can. I live in Memphis, Tennessee, where racism burns like an open flame that some recoil from, while others can't help but draw near to stoke.

The headline of this post is both simplistic and in error. Only, as a songwriter, I couldn't resist a catchy title. But I know that despite the historic event we just witnessed, 45 years to the day of Dr. King's "I Have A Dream" speech, scores of people refused to watch while others watched while muttering obscenities under their breath. Racism lives all around me, and soon, maybe in the comments to this post, you'll see it raise it's pock-marked face once again. I received an anonymous message after Obama won the Iowa primary stating that "America will never elect a black man as president." I told the sender to get used to saying President Obama, but of course I am not that naive. The Old South will never surrender an ingrained white supremest mindset and embrace racial harmony until the last old dog dies. Why do you suppose Ronald Reagan opened his campaign for the presidency in Philadelphia, Mississippi?

But I have just seen a crossroads moment in history presented to the American people for their ratification, and I pray we don't blow it this time, like we did in 1968 and 2004. Last night, Obama said, "Let's not have a big election over small things." In the middle of two wars, the populace re-elected the criminal Bush to halt gay marriage. Then, after Obama's triumphant speech in Berlin, where 250,000 Germans stood and waved American flags, he was ridiculed by his opposition as merely a celebrity. I saw in the negative GOP ads every subliminal way to turn that triumph into a hollow moment, just by appealing to the good old boy American hatred of foreigners. Did you ever notice that those that scream, "This is the greatest country in the world" the loudest, are the one's who've never been anywhere else?

But this country is the only place I can think of where something like last night could have transpired. I read an editorial earlier in the day that spoke of the struggle from "the middle passage" to the present moment and realized, that's just it. Neither Obama's Kenyan father nor Kansan mother had anything to do with the "middle passage." That's why Jesse Jackson and the old guard of the Civil Rights Movement at first had such difficulty moving to his side. Obama was a child during the sixties and was not a participant in the physical, marching reality of the movement, but he is a child of Dr. King's dream nonetheless.

There has been much talk about a post-racial America, and although Obama may be the living representative of such a notion, the country is a long way from that day. As evidenced by recent political activity in Memphis, racism exists on all sides of the skin pigment spectrum and black racism is as insidious as white. But racial politics did not work in Memphis this time. It seems that people are sick to death of it, as well as all "identity politics." They simple wanted to elect a person with their best interests at heart, and not beholden to some party ideology. That is why Obama's multi-racial perspective gives him the ability to speak authoritatively about the subject to all races. I am supporting Barack Obama for the same reason that Oprah stated, "Not because he's black, but because he's brilliant." Don't believe, however, that it will happen without a fierce struggle. But isn't it great that the Democrats finally found a nominee who is prepared to fight back?

All About Hillary's Eve

There were rumors on the internets and from the mediates that there was the potential for 1968-style demonstrations at this years' Democratic Convention, but so far it's been the feel-good event of the summer, right after the Olympics, murder aside. Sometimes it seems there's a Leon Klinghoffer on every cruise. And instead of angry crowds chanting "The whole world is watching," the masses are gathering around the brightest new media star, Rachel Maddow, and chanting "MSNBC." A younger generation assumes everybody is either watching already or can catch highlights on YouTube. And on Maddow's new cable show, they should make Pat Buchanan play her Ed McMahon. He's the perfect foil, but can he say "Hi-yo?"

Melody and I like to watch the direct feed from C-Span, without the commentary about what we are currently seeing for ourselves, or distracting graphics on a crawl like, "Senator McCain sends Cindy to Georgia to access civilian casualties." Barbie is going to wake up in Tbilisi and wonder what happened to the uprising in Marietta and Buckhead. I wept through most of the Kennedy portion and felt it was Teddy's finest hour. I imagine that you have to be of a certain age to feel the full impact of seeing the last of the Kennedy brothers in his final campaign. It tugs at your own mortality to comprehend that the legislative accomplishments of the younger Kennedy, who was kicked out of Harvard and who's own presidential ambitions drowned with a young girl in Chappaquiddick, dwarfs the combined lasting achievements of his martyred brothers. It's nearly enough to erase a lifetime of personal sins. When Michelle Obama spoke, Melody noted that the only people crying were African Americans, women, and me. But I cry at old Gene Autry songs, too. I have the emotions of a woman trapped in a man's body, and she's pissed and wants them back. But, how could you not love those two children who were, literally, adorable?

We watched tonight's featured attraction, the Hillary Moment, after hearing James Carville say the Democrats "wasted a day," by not attacking BushCain enough. What's the point? This country's on the precipice and everyone knows it. In any case, first blood was drawn by Montana's Governor Schweitzer, who used a rapier rather than a bludgeon, and then we settled in for the main event. After watching Hillary's speech without punditry, I thought her endorsement of Obama was lukewarm and Melody said, "It was all about her." When we switched back to MSNBC to see what the gang was saying, Keith Olbermann called it "a 5-run home run," and Eugene Robinson declared it a "turning point." At first I wondered if I had watched a different speech. I felt portions of the speech were very moving, especially the Harriet Tubman bit, but even that seemed directed at her own supporters. But after hearing all the superlatives heaped in her direction, I started questioning my own experience.

Perhaps I've grown so cynical that I can't see sincerity in a politician anymore, or maybe it annoys me that after 35 years, Hillary still stomps all over her own applause lines, but I do not understand the emotional investment a lot of woman had placed in her candidacy. I'm not a woman, but I thought I was a feminist. I have some knowledge of the Suffrage Movement, but I believed that Hillary, in her Senate record and in her candidacy, ill-served the feminist ideal by being a war hawk with our children and presiding over a sleazy attempt to villainize Barack Obama, which his opponents are now using against him. If John McCain had a lick of sense, he would now nominate a woman to be Vice President, but he doesn't, so we don't have to worry. Still, the most significant line of Hillary's speech was, "Were you only in it for me?" She did what she needed to do and then some, and she became, like Teddy Kennedy, a potentially formidable force in the Senate, while still keeping her options open for 2012, or even 2016.

If Obama is elected, and that is no sure thing for sure, perhaps Hillary, like Kennedy, can be liberated in the Senate to allow her true self to shine through without the political calculations. Then she can begin to sponsor progressive legislation, rather than flag burning amendments and sabre-rattling in the Middle East, and with such a record, she could again ascend the heights and still become the first woman president. She made a good speech tonight and began the process of reconciliation among the Democratic factions. I wrote in a previous post (6/5/08) that had Hillary voted against the war in Iraq, she would be the nominee today. But she didn't, and she's not. Barack Obama is the nominee, and if half the voting population wish to protect their hard-won gains, voting for John McCain is antithetical to the cause. For the future of feminism, "Now is the time for all good women to come to the aid of their party."

Remember When?

I love to receive those nostalgic emails about life in the Fifties. All the Teabury Gum, and nickel Cokes, and wax lips, presented in a Rock n' Roll wonderland where all the guys acted like Fonzie and high school was exactly like "Grease." Ah yes, the innocent Fifties, where virginal Bobby-Soxers abounded and life was "On the Beach" and survival was in a fallout shelter. I guess it's in my nature to remember adolescence a bit differently, so I present to you a different view of that Dick Clark decade, and wonder, do you...

Remember When
the first time your parents told you, "everybody dies?"

Remember When
Your pajamas with the built-in feet were recalled for lack of flame retardant?

Remember When
Every other commercial on television or ad in a magazine was for cigarettes, and they told you they were good for you? Now, 50 years later, and you can still recite tobacco slogans like, "LSMFT," "Winston Tastes Good Like A Cigarette Should," and "Call For Phillip Morris." You've come a long way, baby.

Remember When
You were taught in school to hide under your desk in case of a nuclear attack, and you figured out by age 7 that your ass was as good as fried and the human race could be obliterated at any moment, so what the hell?

Remember When
The air-raid sirens on top of public buildings went off every Saturday at noon, and you were never sure if it was a test or if the Russians figured out the best time to attack was noon, Saturday?

Remember When
Ike's government electrocuted Julius and Ethel Rosenberg for show, setting off a wave of anti-Semitism and orphaning two children, when the "atomic secrets" they passed to the Russians were the same "secrets" that the Soviet's Nazi scientists were only a few months behind our Nazi scientists in discovering in the first place; and no one said a thing about it.

Remember When
You were taught to believe that dropping two atomic weapons on a civilian population was justified, and saved lives?

Remember When
All your grade school and high school teachers were borderline senile Christian fanatics and they were allowed to beat you?


Remember When
You were taught that the police were your friends, until personal interaction proved they were liars, thugs, and racists?






Remember When
Hitching a ride was considered to be safe until that guy grabbed your inner thigh and you had to fight him to get out of the car?




Remember When
That first time you found your Dad's dirty books?

Remember When
If you dropped the phone, you could break your foot?

Remember When
Every family on your street had a maid that worked for wages so low, that if your parents tried to pay that today, they would be arrested. And since there were no retirement plans or Social Security, the maids worked until they died?

Remember When
The racist system threw Chuck Berry in prison because he drove across the state line with an underage girl in the car?

Remember When
The government drafted Elvis into the Army, when no one famous ever got drafted, effectively ending the rebellious age of Rock n' Roll and killing Gladys Presley in the process, and The Colonel let them do it and insisted that Elvis go along and be a grunt?

Remember When
Your city government started to tear down 100 year old palatial homes and historic buildings to make room for fast food restaurants, until every major city has turned into the exact same aesthetically offensive strip mall.


Remember When
Most of the public school Art and Music teachers were gay, but nobody made a big deal about it?




Remember When
Your Dad used to curse at the "women drivers?"



Remember When
You had to re-learn the silly, sing-song "Pledge of Allegiance" because the politicians voted to put the words "Under God" in there, and you couldn't understand why you were swearing personal loyalty to a piece of cloth in the first place? And finally.......

Remember When
You grew your hair long, and your parents kicked you out? Oops sorry, that was the 60s.

The Fifties; that grand decade right after the Forties.

Cohen's Big Win, Bigger for Memphis

The spirits were high at the Steve Cohen victory party tonight and the numbers were so astounding, the huge crowd of supporters seemed almost giddy. After all, these are people unaccustomed to political victory celebrations, but when Cohen's winning margin reached 80%, even those seasoned by years of disappointment had to marvel at this achievement. The majority African-American District 9 had rejected racial and divisive politics and voted in overwhelming numbers to re-elect Cohen, amidst the nastiest campaign by a congressional candidate since the race baiting days of the Fifties. Only the race baiting, and Jew-baiting, were put forth this time by the minority candidate, who's entire campaign could be summed up by the slogan, "Vote for me. I'm black,"

Cohen couldn't have scripted a better closing week to his campaign. First, every news camera in the city recorded him bodily ejecting the Armenian Stalker from his home, an incident so bizarre that a knowledge of the Ottoman Turks is necessary to understand what it was about. And then it was revealed that the Armenians were contributors to the Tinker campaign. But whoever dreamed up the two repugnant Tinker attack ads that were so inflammatory they drew national media condemnation, ought to be taken out and shot, just like Walter Bailey's credibility. The "Prayer" ad caused Keith Olbermann to declare Tinker his nightly "Worst Person in the World," (video above, click on title), and on the eve of the election, Tinker's tactics were publicly repudiated, not just by Barack Obama and her benefactors, Emily's List, but by her former mentor, Harold Ford, Jr. It was fitting that her election night reception should be in a place called "Ground Zero." That describes her political career after tonight.

Cohen's huge margin of victory should be examined carefully in future races because it sounds the death knell of dynastic politics in Memphis and proves that the old racial politics, whether practiced by a black or white candidate, will no longer be rewarded. It's greatly encouraging to see a district dominated by the Ford family for 30 years, decide that they are best represented by the middle-aged, bespectacled, Jewish guy who had proven his mettle in his Freshman term and deserved another. If Nikki Tinker is genuinely interested in public service, and not just a short-cut to Washington, she should run for Ophelia Ford's seat in the Tennessee Legislature and serve for a quarter century, like Cohen. Then she might have the foundation to run for national office, instead of the bile, gibberish, and venom she had to offer this time. Meanwhile, I'd keep my day job, if Pinnacle Airlines would still have me after that classless performance.

Great credit should go to Cohen's staff, in D.C. and in Memphis, for operating an efficient Congressional office and a near flawless campaign. This victory must be particularly sweet for them. But the lion's share of the credit should go to the candidate himself. The House's passage of Cohen's bill offering an apology for slavery may be meaningless to some and purely symbolic to many, but it is an issue that has been festering for a long time, and it took Cohen to accomplish it. His voting record, as well as his initiatives, show that he will fight for his beliefs, even when unpopular, and he has become that rarest of politicians; a conscientious and incorruptible public servant whose first duty is to his constituents. What a novelty in this age. I'm feeling a little like Michelle Obama tonight, and if I could paraphrase her; I'm proud of my city for the first time in a very long time. Well done Memphis and Congressman Cohen, and keep on keeping on.