“The problem with the brother is he thinks he can talk to anybody,” said my old producer and friend, Robbie Jackson, who now runs his own record label out of Philadelphia, “You got him in Texas, talking ‘bout the Popeye’s chicken in a nigga’s fridge and he can do that, ain’t nobody in the black community going to do nothing but laugh and say, ‘that’s right.’ But this brother, Obama, he’s the kind who thinks he can turn it around, head up to San Francisco, whiffing chardonnay with the Zuni set and make an insightful, off hand comment about crackers out the steel mills in W. PA. Now, I can say that cause I ain’t running for shit, but that here is the crux of the matter.”
It is a little cool to be sitting poolside here at Robbie’s home in Wynnewood, an affluent suburb, but the sun was out, you know, and my man, he has got a thing about his pineal glands after the wintertime. “Got to work out the melatonin,” he says to me, offering iced tea which I longed to doctor.
“That’s why everybody was right with the Ferraro business,” he said, his right hand over his passion fruit tea in its highball glass, a thick finger bisecting the circumference. “She’s right for one; ain’t no way some white dude name Barry Smith, a one term Senator outta no Experienceville going to get ninety percent of the black vote just for ringing the doorbell. That’s just a fact, P-fitty [his affectionate name for me; an artifact of my days in Canadian Hip Hop]. But this craggy old honky broad, she don’t get to say it on the national goddamn TV and not expect to get her chips cashed. That’s just the way it is.
“Now, I hear the brother is confused, he don’t understand that shit like that can’t fall into the hands of the public, especially not with a general motherfucking election in front of you,” Bernie says with his left hand splayed wide and rising and falling in spasmodic chops. “That is just the kind of shit that is going to sink him if he ain’t ten motherfucking points ahead come 11/4! I’ll tell you right now, PBL, if that creaky old McCain is still standing in this fight come November, none of this has been anything but an exercise in noble futility. History has shown, you just look at the last two election cycles that, left to the undecided voter in this country, and you know who I’m talking bout; these 'bitter' comments, the stuff with his wackadoo pastor is, whatever color fear is being coded in, are just what it takes to put the Republicans back in the White House.”
“You speak of the Moms of Soccer, no?”
“And now he’s just waiting on Philadelphia, you see?” Robbie tossed his iced tea into the pool behind him in order to gesture with both hands. “He’s dipped below ten points and it might get worse than that. He was hoping for something close so he wouldn’t have to do what it is that he’s gonna have to do after Hillary whips him.”
“Ahhhhh, you are not the first to suggest this…”
“What’s he going to do? Brother has never faced the general. That shit ain’t simple; sure as hell he won’t get so lucky as he did in the state senate back in the Ill. Do you see Mac getting caught running his wife through swinger clubs? What the brother is going to need to get through the Republican Swift Boat machine is an instant impact player. He’s not going to help himself by bringing out somebody he’s got to reintroduce to the country, maybe Wes Clark, but can you see that lil white dude standing next to Obama? Anyway, I digress… Obama’s going to get the nom, but without PA; that means unless he can get Al Gore on the back end of the ticket, he’s got little in the way of choice. Dean? I think motherfucking not. He’s got to go Hillary. Watch it happen.”
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