At the end of the 2015-2016 football season, Cam Newton could have run uncontested for president of the African Americans. Newton had just finished dominating the NFL regular season, in which he walked away with the MVP and almost dabbed his team to an undefeated season. In the Super Bowl, Superman turned back into…

The best thing about going to my barbershop as a little kid in the mid-1970s was the Muhammad Ali pinball machine. Black power had faded, to be replaced by Afro Sheen. This was the period when Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye, Isaac Hayes, and Earth, Wind & Fire were pushing the boundaries of spirit, social…