Ooops, he did it, again! Yep, that’s POTUS, Pretendident of the good ol’ US of A, bowing nose down, ass up, to yet another foreign leader. What’s up with that, Obie?
Maybe somebody should pull his coat and let him know, in no uncertain terms, to cut that shit out. Predictably, the other side of the aisle is having a field day with this, while the Obapologists are…having a hard time coming up with a snappy comeback. The “sign of respect” shtick as an excuse is getting old. Besides, it’s bogus. Bowing is not a sign of respect, it’s a voluntary act of submission. It’s only done to those deemed “greater than” self; never among equals. Which is why the pious bow only before God, (and His Duly Appointed Messengers) and courtly men bow before women.
But if you’re an insecure world leader, worried that your grip is slipping among the Masses, never fear! For the price of a phone call and a photo-op, Baracus Hubris Maximus (Hail, Caesar!) will board the Peoples’ Plane between head-swiveling scripted speeches, at taxpayer’s expense, travel halfway ’round the globe to your little Bumfuckistan, then, at your cue, stand before cameras, grab your hand, and go from “kick me” to “spank me” pose as he gleefully kisses your ring from crotch-licking distance, all so that you may record it for posterity and properly impress your subjects with the spectacle of your power and magnificence, ad infinitum. I mean, let’s face it, pictorial proof of the guy who claims to have the most powerful job in the world with his ass in the air slobbering all over your God-given nose picker and ass-wiper has gotta be worth at least a few Brownie points in the nether reaches of the boonie dwellers and their progeny, right?
It’s kinda ironic that I should run across this story today. For some reason, yesterday, the thought came to me, unbidden, of whether Barack Obama could have been elected President of the United States with the support of black America in the sixties. Or, more to the point, given the reality of the times, (that he would never have been allowed to run, let alone be elected president back then, period) could he, or a guy like him, have even passed muster in the ‘hood well enough to get their support, if no one else’s?
No.
Hell to the naw.
The sixties were about everything Barack Obama isn’t, the opposite of everything that he is. An obsequious, ambivalent bridge-builder would have incurred the wrath of black people from sea to shining sea. Who the hell wanted to build bridges from where we were to where we wanted to go? On the contrary, we wanted to burn those mothers down and design new ones.
For those who are thinking, “but, wasn’t Martin Luther King cut from the same
kind of cloth as Barry O?”
No.
Bite your tongue.
The button-down mind and manner of BHO is more reminiscent of Bob Newhart than MLK. In fact, compared to Obie’s Mr. Rogers-esque slippers
and cardigan style, Dr. King was a Kunta Kinte cloth dashiki with a clenched fist medallion and Afro pick on a leather chain.
The sixties were about respect, dignity, empowerment. No black man would have been caught dead willingly bowing to any other man, for any reason, back then. In an era of rebellion against being subject to be forced to submit to lesser men at any time, simply on the basis of skin color, such an event would have caused a loss of face even among blood brothers. To think that his children, wife, parents, neighbors, anyone who knew him at all, might witness his humiliation at being made subservient at another man’s whim, would have been unbearable to most black men alive at that time.
Unlike the willingness to endure chastisement from the HNIC for their lack of “personal responsibility,” blacks in the sixties were desperate to exercise it. The first time I heard the phrase, “yes, I can,” it was the title of Sammy Davis, Jr.’s “autobiography,” and subsequent song detailing his struggle for acceptance and success on his own terms. “I don’t want nobody to give me nothin’, open up the door, I’ll get it myself,” were more than just lyrics to a James Brown song. It was every family’s mantra, the mindset I was raised under. Back then, black enterprise was more than a goal, or a magazine, it was a possibility.
In Chicago, we had a newspaper, The Defender, Ebony/Jet magazines of Johnson Publishing, Johnson Beauty Products, Soft Sheen, Luster Silk, (all beauty product manufacturers undoubtedly influenced by the legendary Madame C. J. Walker) Parker House Sausages, Metropolitan Assurance Company, as well as a pretty thriving Black Muslim (Nation of Islam) business community. With all the other small neighborhood businesses fueled mostly by hope, pride, hard work and optimism that struggled to flourish in our midst, and guys like Curtis Mayfield daring to compete with music industry icon and shining beacon of the promise of possibility and the possibility of promise, soul sister-city Detroit’s Motown Records, we grew up fully invested in the American Dream, even when the American Dream seemed to refuse to be equally invested in us.
Then, there was Muhammad Ali, who, managed by Elijah Muhammad’s son, Herbert, once resided on Chicago’s South Side. Ali not only bowed to no man at a time when all black men were required to, he went a giant step past standing up for himself; he boldly threatened to beat them up if they dared try to make him. This threat was not limited to opponents in the ring, cheeky white interviewers, as well as supremacist-minded autograph seekers, often found themselves staring at his big, clenched fist thrust menacingly into their faces. Against the backdrop of Civil Rights marches and Black Power activism against Jim Crow laws and mentality, such brazen behavior was tantamount to a capital crime. In fact, Ali’s bold cockiness sometimes frightened even his staunchest supporters, who feared that the backlash engendered by his actions threatened them, too. “Oh, Lord, he gon’ get us all killed!” was probably a phrase heard in every black household, by every black child at the time. Yet, we all knew that what we were feeling was the excitement of hopeful fear in support for his bravado, not the shameful fear for perceived cowardice we were more accustomed to.
I simply cannot imagine that at a time when outspoken men like Martin Luther King, Muhammad Ali, Malcolm X, Thurgood Marshall, and any other black man who refused to submit, took his life in his hands by doing so, Barack Obama’s spineless waffling and propensity for concession would have made him any friends in my neighborhood. His public, Kabuki-for-white-folks’-benefit finger-waving in the face of other black men, especially without a brotherly commitment to the dedication to change the dynamic that caused the limitations imposed upon their reality, would have made him a sworn enemy of “the people” who chose as their champions men like the uncompromising Muhammad Ali, the courageous Dr. King.
Nope, clever, successful marketing of Ohbrotherplease as a black hero took a couple of generations of blaxploitation, minstrelcoms, “we sho is po’” films, books, and made-for-TV movies, and gangsta rap in praise of the ghetto to accomplish.
Maybe next time he can do like Chuck Norris and kick his ass.
Ah, Kid, howya been? Been a long time.
Now, who’s gonna kick whose ass?
Obie’d have to stand up straight to even try that, wouldn’t he?
But you know what? I admire your loyalty, even though I question your judgment.
I agree with you completely.
But it’s posterity, no prosperity.(…record it for prosperity…)
Thanks.
Great post Cin. I’ve been flat on my back for almost a week now with a terrible cold (that’s it – no H1N1 here) and haven’t read or written anything since. But luckily, since I have your feed on my blog, I at least know when you write somethin’ new so my Cinie Jones is at least partially fed!
And since we can’t fix the WordPress comment-notification thingy,
, it’s not until I come over that I see how previous conversations have been going (I know, I know – you don’t have a clue, but I’m gon’ treat you like my play-sister and say, “How ’bout looking into that, Kid?!?!” 
),
I hate missing the continuity of the convos, I really do. Whenever I’d get that follow-up comments email, I’d hop right on over and dive in!
Awww, Deb, I’m sorry you were sick, I’m sending retro- homemade cyber chicken soup vibes over the web to your soul, okay? Glad you’re feeling better, though.
And, I’m trying, really I am, to figure out the notification thingy; but a lot of weird stuff has being going on with my blog here lately. My PUMA widget disappeared, and my Vodpod account got canceled, in addition to the notice problem. I’ve been running anti-virus programs non-stop, and trying to contact folks for answers, but, bottom line, I’m jinxed and flummoxed.
On top of being majorly irritated by silly poli-shit.
(sigh)
A big, lip-smackin’ “Ah-h-h-h” on the soup Cin. Thanx! I’m in the final, cough-my guts-out-to clear-that-chest-congestion stage right now and the soup helps soothe the palate.
And thanx for trying to fix the notification thingy. I appreciate it. (Just an observation: when it started happening to me, I noticed the blanks under the comment box had changed. I thought it odd, but ignored it. If you look there, you’ll see that NAME, E-MAIL and WEBSITE are no longer bold blue like the word “required” by the NAME blank, which is now black as if IT is the only thing that can be “selected.” It wasn’t like that before. Dunno why, but hope that helps. Hang in there, you’ll figure it out. Thx for workin’ on it.
Deb, I tried subscribing to the notify me…thingy, was required to provide name and email, and got an automated WordPress notification asking me to verify. What happens next?
Hey, took a little nap! See that’s it, before, one would just fill in the required blanks (and the 3rd if you wanted to include you site) , check the “Notify me of follow-up comments via email” box and that was it! Each time somebody commented on the post to which you’d subscribed, you’d automatically get an email like this (I saved this one because I loved what you had to say) that included the whole comment from the person:
There is a new comment on the post “There Ain’t No Kumbayah”.
http://cinie.wordpress.com/2009/10/28/there-aint-no-kumbayah/
Author: Cinie
Comment:
But, see Deb, …
Then, you could just jump right back into the conversation! That’s what’s SUPPOSED to happen.
But now, I get that generic “Howdy, This is an automated message sent by the WordPress.com subscription service” message asking me to verify I want to subscribe by clicking on a link that’s apparently broken! Argh-h-h-h!!! OCD me’s gon’ keep losin’ her damn mind til she figures this out!
But I think you’re right, it may be a wordpress issue because I got the same message when I responded to another wordpresser’s post a few minutes ago. Hope that helps.
Sorry to hear you were under the weather, and glad you’re back in fine form. Take care of yourself!
Thanks HT!! I’m workin’ on it!
Obama is full of shit when he claims to be our “first Pacific President.”
Nixon was born and raised in California withing spitting distance of the Pacific. He served in the Navy during WWII in the Pacific. He practice law in California, and ran for Congress and the Senate from here. He spent a big chunk of his time as President dealing with Vietnam and China. While he was POTUS he had the “Western White House” in San Clemente.
He’s buried in California too, at the site of his Presidential Library.
Obama needs to study history and geography.
http://riverdaughter.wordpress.com/2009/11/15/our-first-pacific-president/
Cinie, so well done! I was but a twinkle in two never-met’s eyes until 1967, so this evocative reminiscence of the amazing Black Power movement was absolutely wonderful for me to drink in.
Yesterday at brunch with an Obama-supporting friend, my husband wondered what the h#ll Obama was doing in Asia at a time like this. Withot realizing that Obama had committed yet another international faux pas, I replied, “He should have sent Hillary.” She is Secretary of State, after all, and shouldn’t he be at home dealing with the economy and the healthcare disaster?
I don’t think she would have bowed. Like the 60’s Black Power radicals, Our Girl is too proud of how far she’s come.
Maybe Larry Sinclair is secretly telling obami about protocol.
This is one of your best posts ever, Cinie. I came to America in 1968 from a third world country and my family settled in Brooklyn. The Black Power movement was at it’s height. I went to public school here in Brooklyn and I remember every November we had Black Solidarity Day which was celebrated with concerts and poetry with the theme of Black empowerment. Everyone wore dashikis and had the big ‘fro. It was the only time I hated my hair. Being of mixed race, my hair was too soft and wouldn’t stand up; so no Afro for me. Nonetheless, the times were exhilerating. The possibilites seemed endless. We fought a bloodless revolution to go from being Negro to Black. It’s for this reason that I never use the phrase “African-American.” This revolution inspired Blacks around the world to fight for empowerment in their own countries. It’s no accident that many of the African and Caribbean former colonies finally gained their indepencence in the sixties.
Now forty years later, the Black community by and large is in a state of learned helplessness. The sense of entitlement has been ingrained in two generations. We venerate and reward ignorance and foolishness. But what to do? I don’t have any answers. Only sadness.
Joanie, I was in the middle of posting a diatribe about current policies, then I stopped. You don’t want to hear that. You want a solution to a very huge problem. I wish I could give you one. I am just thankful that people like you are still working to find one. Thank you.
Joanie…I’m with you – ” It’s for this reason that I never use the phrase “African-American.” – at least when it comes to me and mine anyway. That others choose to is on them. Hell “Say It Loud, I’m Black and I’m Proud!” meant everything to my chocolate, Black ass growing up in the Jim Crow South!! Nor do I use a small “B” when I’m writing about Black folks. It’s been edited in my columns and editorials to meet “journalistic standards” (whatever the hell they are!!) and while in school last year, I lost many an “A” because I refused to small-letter it. Doesn’t matter to me, I keep doin it my way because it means more to me than it does to those who have to go behind me and change it.
Thanks for your comment, it is all I feel and have felt about my people for 53 years. Like you and Cin, I grew up during those times (in the Deep South) and I mourn their passing deeply as I look around and hear the stupid shit people keep saying as they conflate the Changeling with MLK. What to do? Resist – in whatever way – big or small – that you can. And please know, you’re not alone in your sadness.
Oh HT! You hurt me immensely by your different attitudes on different websites! Oh the agony! Oh the heartbreak! Now over at TW, you were kinda intimating that we of the good ole USA were still looked up to and stuff, yadda, yadda, yadda. And now this. Woe is me.
Regarding Obie…I dunno. A lesson with a protocol officer will probably yield nothing since Obie feels he is sui generis and is therefore unique amongst Presidents. That old “not bowing to sovereignty won’t mean squat to him. The next thing you know he’ll be ordering that the U.S. flag will dip at the Olympics. http://www.ushistory.org/betsy/news/mc080608.htm
Fredster, you know I love the American people and have infinite faith that you folks will rebound from this because you are who you are! Never fear, I haven’t lost one iota of respect – however, I do not represent the foreign press.
“Obie feels he is sui generis …”
Fredster…I’d never heard that phrase until Tom Schaller over at Salon.com used it to describe the Changeling:
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/06/03/roundtable/index.html
From that piece:
“Can I just say one thing about Obama and his post-racial identity, which I talk about at all public events that I do. The other thing that is the crazy wild card here, we just talk about him as a black candidate and her as the white candidate, and is America ready? But obviously, he’s just not your average black candidate, and not just because his middle name is Hussein and so forth, but the fact that he’s half-black and his black half is continental African. And that matters. And we don’t talk about that that much. But I think it’s [important]. There are so many things that are different about Obama from historical black leaders. He doesn’t come from a clerical background, which produced leaders over the years, whether it was Martin Luther King or Jesse Jackson or more recently Al Sharpton. He is half-black and so he’s not full-blooded black, so to speak, and whether you believe in one-drop racism or whatever, it does matter. He’s literally lighter-skinned. And that’s something that’s talked about in the black community and is going to have to be talked about in the white community. And that his black half is continental. It is different when your family is recently emigrated as opposed to being a slave descendant. And I think what’s going to be really interesting about all this Rorschach notion of how white America sees itself and how white America sees black America is about how it views Barack Obama as a sort of sui generis black candidate. He is not Al Sharpton, and I think that’s clear on so many different levels. But I think the question is, how much does his difference from Al Sharpton really matter?” (emphasis mne)
And I still find it absolutely hilarious!
And very telling how Schaller (the bold part) conveniently leaves out – how Black America sees itself and how Black America sees white America – no?
Hell, I had to look it up!
And, Obie’s Axeltriloquist was very clever to put the “not black enough” thing out there first, hold it up to ridicule and then get “black enough” black folks to publicly shoot it down. That way, it diffused all the noise around it without really changing the dynamic of it for black people, or deflecting the power of it for folks who felt he was more than black enough without going over, for their comfort.
But, compared to Harold Washington, supposedly the man who brought him to Chicago, Obie’s the last glass of chocolate milk you can get away with making for the kids with what’s left in the bottom of the Nestle’s Quick box.
Yeah when I first read that Schaller piece I had to look it up too! Then it pissed me off and I had to write a post. I’m so tired of all the twisting and turfing and shit going on. I’m even more tired that I “see” it so clearly – wears me out almost as much as it saddens me.
“Obie’s the last glass of chocolate milk you can get away with making for the kids with what’s left in the bottom of the Nestle’s Quick box.”
Too funny, Sister !!!!!
I have a theory that Obama himself is conspiracey against black people. History will look back and wonder is this the best blacks can offer? He was hailed as the smartest capable black person around so where does that leave the rest. There are so many reasons to dislike him but the most hurtful part that I couldn’t get over is that he ruined it for me; the first black pres. An event I dreamt about and I was a fraid that I may not make it long enough to see, he just had to come and ruin it for me
WOW!!
I stumbled on this post & I’m SOoooo glad I did!!!
The “Yes I can” from Sammy D was spot-on. I always felt like it ringed a bell.
The clip of Mary Mitchell was a perfect find.
Excellent Job!!
Thank you.
He’s supposed to have a protocol officer. Whether he has a protocol officer of any competence is also a question.
There’s one simple rule here: No American citizen is supposed to bow, curtsey, prostrate herself, bob, kowtow to, or get on one or both of his knees to, any foreign ruler.
On the other hand, maybe Barackus Hibiscus is just prone to sudden gas cramps.
Baracus Hibiscus?
The Pretendident and Delicate Flower?
Tee hee.
I have a soft spot for Ali. He was up here for the preliminaries to a bout, and was staying at a motel on the Lakeshore. I was there to arrange for my reception. He was playing with kids in the parking lot, and I fell in love. He was huge – I hadn’t realized how big he was. And he was so tender with those kids – encouraging them, playing with them. He was and is a giant (and he still is a very attractive man) – “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee”. And I’m not a fight fan.
You are correct, he would have bowed to no man regardless of their so called prestige. He was proud in his self, in his accomplishments. He would have bowed to no one, and rightly so.
Sammy Davis – another talented giant (despite his height) did not bow to anyone.
Martin Luther King – what can one say?
Obama – he bows to the Saudi Prince, he bows to the Japanese Emperor…..
Isn’t there a protocol that proscribes bowing? Doesn’t Obama have a protocol office that advises him? Why does he feel the need – He is on an equal playing field with other ruling entities, so why should he indulge in a form of submission? This is so wrong.
Ah, HT, who doesn’t love Ali? How could you not? No matter what race, religion, sexual persuasion or affinity for the squared circle, ya gotta love him.
And, as for Obie’s propensity to bow, aren’t most narcissists insecure at heart?
I am so glad to hear that. He was (and is) a King, and as mentioned I was not a fight fan. My father loved him for his skill – he watched every fight. My mother loved him for his way with words. That one day, in september, I loved him for his kindness and gentleness with kids. He was a GIANT, not for his size, but because he took the time to play with the local kids and teach them. Tears come to my eyes thinking of that time.
Obama – forget about holding a candle, he’s not even worthy of lighting the thing.
Also, perhaps that is where Obie knows he belongs, in a subservient position. It’s just unfortunate that he has to discover this while he is the leader of a country that used to be the major power in the world. Used to be..
P.S. I had some hope that despite my reservations (Hillary should have been president) he would grow into the job. So far, all he has done has in my humble opinion embarrassed the U.S. and weakened their position. JMHO of course.
It’ll take more than Obie to do us in, HT!
(She said, ironically with sincerity and typical all-American chutzpah)
If you say so, so shall it be. I have no doubts about the courage and stamina of the American people, however this last election cycle badly bruised my belief in their collective intelligence. I come here because you are intelligent, and you give me hope. You have one helluva gift – a functioning mind, fed by an insatiable need for facts, salted by the double gift of irony and satire.
“(She said, ironically with sincerity and typical all-American chutzpah)”
I know right???? I tell you girl, we are more alike than we are different!!