Obamarama Time (Part 2)

This deserves its own blog post. I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you earlier. As one of the SLC girls nicely put it, “a 5-foot Sarah Lawrence graduate” is Obama’s Chief of Staff. One of my best friends from Germany, Teresa, told me the good news the last time I logged online but then my internet card ran out.

Obamarama time Part 2:

This excerpt is from the article, “The Death of a Red State” by Matt Taibbi from Rolling Stone magazine. I know, it feels a bit weird quoting from a rock magazine but I thought this writer could really identify with what Cubans here are saying right now but in, you’ll find very quickly, a more radical way. Maybe America forgot about the Civil Rights Movement for a little bit until Obama came along but Cuba didn’t.

If you can, look for the Cuban documentary on the Civil Rights Movement, now!, narrated by Lena Horne. This not may sound like a familiar name to some of you, since Ella Fitzgerald and Etta James are better known than Horne but they are for a good reason. When Horne was trying to move up in her theatrical career in the States after becoming a famous jazz singer, she, one day, refused to take a role as just another African-American stereotype. Subsequently, she was essentially banned from Hollywood, music industries and Broadway. So, she moved on to Paris, where her career skyrocketed with the help of her songwriter husband. There is a great PBS documentary out there on her and I highly recommend that you try to find it. Her performance of “Stormy Weather” at the end of this film will make this search worthwhile. Go to pbs.org right now! Well, after you read this:

“All across America, if you scratch the surface of the current political jousting between the blues and reds, you’ll find race underneath. In America it’s always about race. Vietnam ended decades ago, but the civil rights movement never had a declared end—at least not according to conservatives, who have been running against it for 40 years, camouflaged in dog-whistle catchphrases like “law and order (Nixon), “welfare queen” (Reagan) and “border security” (every Republican today). There isn’t a half-literate white person alive who doesn’t know what Palin is talking about when she says about Obama, “This is not a man who sees American as you and I do.”

“And that, folks, is why Obama’s candidacy is so important. He is a living referendum on the civil rights movement—one might even say he is calling the bluff of the civil rights movement. He has been everything white American said it wanted from black America: Stay positive, work hard, go to Harvard, be more Martin and less Malcolm, and all obstacles will be cleared.”

“It’s happening because on college campuses like the University of Northern Colorado and every other place where progress has been allowed to penetrate, there now lives a whole generation who have been raised to believe implicitly in the virtue of a multicultural society. The election of Obama will prove once and for all the futility of using racism, camouflaged or not, to win elections. If Obama pulls this thing off, it might be a long time before you see a white candidate making transparent, panic-stricken appeals to “you and I” in weeks before Election Day.”

P.S. Rumors that need to be clarified: I’ve heard that Obama is going to try to put Cuba at the top of his priority list (from Wall Street Journal) and that he is going to shut down Guantánamo Bay (German source…aka one of my friends from Germany). What is going on over there?! Is any of this (even slightly) true?! If so, tell me! I haven’t heard about any of this here (surprisingly)!
P.P.S. I’m coming home in essentially a month. What? Oh, and let me know whether or not any of you are going to be in the Massachusetts/New York/Vermont/D.C. area this winter break. If so, let’s get together. ☺