Thursday, May 10, 2007

The N Word

Rush Limbaugh has been tossing around the N word, negro that is, in what he calls a musical parody. I call it racist. Limbaugh calls Obama "Halfrican African" and has written a song the "Barack the Magic Negro" set to the tune of "Puff the Magic Dragon."

So Don Imus creates national rage for "Nappy-headed Negro" but it's different with Rush Limbaugh?! I don't see how the two are different and there is not more outrage over Limbaugh's comments. And Obama's response is that the song is dumb. I suppose he is trying to downplay the song to make it go away.

The shock jock legitimizes his use of the phrase "magic negro" by noting he plucked it came from an Op-Ed by commentator David Ehrenstein that ran in the L.A. Times. Ehrenstein wrote, in a nuanced argument, that Obama fulfills the classic Hollywood role of a "noble, healing Negro" who assuages white guilt over slavery and segregation....

"while replacing stereotypes of a dangerous, highly sexualized black man with a benign figure for whom interracial sexual congress holds no interest. As might be expected, this figure is chiefly cinematic—embodied by such noted performers as Sidney Poitier, Morgan Freeman, Scatman Crothers, Michael Clarke Duncan, Will Smith and, most recently, Don Cheadle. And that's not to mention a certain basketball player whose very nickname is "Magic."


Questions over Obama's race should have long ago been laid to rest. What is the obsession and who cares about his ethnic make-up. A candidate should be judged by their opinions and how they will act as president, not race or genetics.

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