Jay-Z is proud to be an American.

Or at least REALLY PSYCHED about the inauguration.

You can fast-forward the video to the point where Jay starts rapping. But his verse is great.

Colin Powell Endorsement

Pretty awesome...

Ralph Stanley Endorses Obama

For all you old-timey bluegrass types out there, you'll enjoy this excerpt from the NY Times Sunday magazine story on Obama. It concerns a rally in Lebanon, VA...

The program opened with the validators. This is a critical part of Obama’s small-town strategy — getting respected surrogates to stand up and say that Obama is a guy you can trust. The first person on stage was Ralph Stanley, the 81-year-old legendary bluegrass musician, who was born in nearby Stratton and makes his home in Dickenson County. He unfolded a piece of paper and read, in a shaky voice: “I want to endorse Barack Obama as the next president of the United States. Thank you very much!” The gymnasium exploded. (When the candidate met Stanley backstage, Obama told him that he had some of Stanley’s banjo music on his iPod. Stanley nodded appreciatively, but a few minutes later he turned to a friend and asked, “What’s an iPod?”)

Rest of the story found here.

The Latest From Ralph Nader

I'm an unapologetic Ralph Nader supporter (yeah I voted for him in 2000) so was quite interested to see this interview with him in the AV Club.

Good read and most defintelyworth your time, but be warned - Ralph makes a pretty rational argument for why Obama is screwed, so it's not exactly happy fun time reading.

Thoughts?

Wilco and Obama

Continuing the political talk, check it out - here's Wilco (or a mini-Wilco) performing at an Obama fundraiser in Chicago earlier this summer. Nice little fluff piece:

Wow...

Last week's cover story for The Onion:

Obama's Hillbilly Half-Brother Threatening To Derail Campaign



Today's cover of the Sun Times:

Obama's half-brother to Vanity Fair: 'No one knows I exist'

Pitchfork vs. Obama

So thanks largely to Q I've become sucked in to reading Pitchfork reviews and sometimes gettuing angry about them. I contemplated posting about yesterday's Radiohead review, which was yet anolther in the LONG line of "rock is dead" stupid reviews (seriously, how long has that been going on? Drop it already), but decided against it. But now, here's something that really got my goat. From today's review of the new Erykah Badu:

"The American media and public have spent a fair bit of the past months being fascinated and appalled by various remarks from the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, of Chicago. Those months have also seen a fairly warm critical reception for Erykah Badu's terrific new album-- one whose notions and ideologies sometimes come from the same nexus as Wright's. Badu's theology is different, of course: more personal, more scattered, less Christian, laced with Five-Percenter notions. And Badu salutes Farrakhan explicitly, rather than just nodding politely across the South Side. But there's an odd echo in her wording on that one: "I salute you, Farrakhan/ Because you are me." Less than a month after this record's release, Wright's most notable acquaintance was describing the reverend as someone who "contains within him the contradictions-- the good and the bad-- of the community.... I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community." He is me? Until he hits the press club, anyway."

OK, so what the hell is going on here? It seems that what they are saying is that Badu is embracing the anger and tricky politics of men like Wright and Farrakhan, while Obama disowns them. That last line in particular (Until he hits the press club) really paints Obama as truly disowning these ideas. And yet, Obama's main speech about this issue - the speech that this review quotes directly from - refutes that point. They REPRINT the quote where Obama says that he can NOT disown Wright and disown his ideas, then they condemn Obama for doing just that? I mean, serioulsy, are they stupid? Can they not read? It seems crystal clear that Obama could have completely thrown Wright under the bus and saved himself a lot of headache, but he chose to talk about the feelings in the black community and to won those feelings. He chose to say, essentially, he is me. Just as Badu says. And yet, for some unknown reason, Pitchfork decides to skewer him.

And why? To what aim? Is it jsut that they think it's kewl to insult politicians? This whole thing leaves me baffled and angry.

And this doesn't even get into the final paragraph of their review where they rally against reviewers who say all black music must be about gund, violence, etc. Which is a good idea, but you know... Pot. Kettle. Black.

Coldplay Goes Political!