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Is Barack in Charge of Campaign Obama?
Albert Murray was the as-told-to author of Good Morning Blues: The Autobiography of Count Basie (1985). He first met Basie in the 1970s, though he’d followed Basie’s band since the 30s. In 1958, he wrote this about Basie to Ralph Ellison. (It was published in Trading Twelves: The Selected Letters of Ralph Ellison and Albert…
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Om, Sweet Om
Tuesday mornings, after the children are delivered to school, I lose the business-casual attire of a working, suburban mommy, in favor of: — Sweat pants. (Pale yellow, loose-fitting.) — A short sleeved T-shirt. (Either the black-and-gold Parliament Funkadelic throwback or one of the many I own that are emblazoned with school or sport-team logos.) —…
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Yes, 'Colored People' Still Need Advancement
CINCINNATI—The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People will be 100 years old next year, and judging from the 3,000 or so folks who showed up for the organization’s convention in Cincinnati last week, so will many of its members. Though the nation’s largest and most important civil rights organization now boasts about 35,000…
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Enough Already With Obama's 'Black Speech'
Maybe it was that we had just come through a humiliating week of watching a parade of white, male senators talk down to a highly accomplished Latina federal appellate court judge and nominee to the United States Supreme Court, but I wasn’t feeling President Obama’s “tough love” message to the NAACP national convention. Obama delivered…
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The Obama Man Crush
Most men have gotten used to observing their wives or significant others grin at the TV whenever Sen. Barack Obama graces the screen. The Democratic nominee does not even have to be delivering one of his historic speeches—which seems to be every other day—to elicit such an adoring response. What men might not be accustomed…
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Unpacking It In
I wish Brett Favre would go away. I don’t mean that in a bad way. He’s my mother’s favorite player. And as a Chicago Bears fan, I can say that beating the Packers won’t be as much fun without No. 4 to chase out of the pocket. I mean I wish Favre would go away…
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Celebrating a Centennial
Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated celebrated a century of service this week. The Root takes a look back in pictures. ********** Lay Off Soror Barbie! Don’t let outdated stereotypes about AKAs stop us from celebrating the new black Barbie. ********** A ComplAKAted Kind of Sisterhood I love my pink and green, but we need to…
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Mandela at 90
I sat there, day after day, week after week, listening to the ways and means of South African terror. How white security forces hacked, shot, burned, poisoned and blew up anti-apartheid activists. How they killed children and bombed churches and received congratulations from their superiors. How they battered Steve Biko to death and dismembered and…
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McCain in Obamaland
CINCINNATI—If any candidate for president ever demonstrated that he had guts, it was John McCain when he dared to appear before the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. It’s unlikely that the Arizona senator has faced a crowd so skeptical since he confronted his torturers in the Hanoi Hilton POW camp during the…
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Sketchy Imagery
Depending on whom you ask, the July 21 cover of The New Yorker has become cause for outrage, confusion and partisan glee. Given the flare-ups surrounding race and representation that have rocked the 2008 presidential race, it’s easy to treat the satirical cover—of a be-turbaned Barack and a be-afroed Michelle Obama—and other “racialist” images of…