Barack Obama in Harlem this Thursday Night

[AK]

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i150/askhoop/BOapollo.jpg

Obama: Live at the Apollo!!
by CYRIL ''JOSH'' BARKER
Amsterdam News Staff
Originally posted 11/26/2007

Sen. Barack Obama’s stop in Harlem next week has local political figures pumped up about him visiting an area some say is already secured for votes. Especially Sen. Bill Perkins, who says that the Black presidential candidate’s visit is an “immeasurable historic moment.”

Obama will be making a stop at the Apollo Theater November 29 and Perkins said that Obama is going to be welcomed with open arms. Perkins said he’s always been behind the presidential hopeful, citing that he was the first elected official to announce his endorsement of the Democratic candidate.
“Here we have a leading Black candidate coming to the Mecca of the Black community,” Perkins said. “Everybody knows that the way to the White House is through Harlem. We know that his vision of change is not just the right one for the country, but the world.”

Perkins added that while many people have criticized Obama for not reaching out to the Harlem community sooner, he feels that his presence in Iowa during the primaries is more important. But Perkins doesn’t shy away from the fact that Obama’s visit is one that will make an impression on the Black vote.

And with those votes, comes the possibility for change for all Black Americans, according to Perkins. He sides with Obama’s views on providing universal health care, improvements to the criminal justice system and less money spent on war and more for things like affordable housing.
“We love Obama, but we love even more the message and the movement,” Perkins said. “He’s the continuation of a movement that followed Jessie Jackson and Shirley Chisholm.”

[Bill Blake]

Ha ha, dag Alan, didn't you read Fletch's post, posted earlier this day?

[AK]

Ha ha, dag Alan, didn't you read Fletch's post, posted earlier this day?

I did. I guess B.O. figured the coast was clear. :)

[AK]

Obama Deplores 'Jena Six,' Nooses
By BETH FOUHY – 1 hour ago
NEW YORK (AP) — Invoking a racially charged controversy, Democrat Barack Obama told a Harlem fundraiser Thursday that he deplored the fact that hanging nooses and "Jena Six" cases are still found in America and that if elected president he could be counted on to enforce civil rights laws.
Obama's reference to the Jena Six incident, in which six black teenagers were arrested for beating a white teen after white students allegedly hung nooses at their Jena, La., high school, came at a fundraiser at the historic Apollo Theater in Harlem.

The Illinois senator, who is running to be the first black president, touched on several themes of racial justice before the largely black audience. He said he was tired of seeing young black men "languishing" on city streets and that he dreaded the thought of living through another administration that appeared to care little for the concerns of minority citizens.
"I don't want to wake up in four years and find out we still have more black men in prison than in college," he said to cheers.

Hundreds of supporters paid $50 apiece to attend the fundraiser, which marked Obama's first visit to Harlem since launching his presidential bid. He was introduced by comedian Chris Rock, who cracked up the audience with the evening's only direct reference to Hillary Rodham Clinton, Obama's chief rival for the Democratic nomination.
He told the audience they'd be "real embarrassed" if Obama won and they had been backing Clinton instead. "You'd say, 'I had that white lady! What was I thinking?'"

Cornel West, a longtime black history professor at universities including Harvard and Princeton, also appeared onstage to welcome Obama. He called Obama "an eloquent brother, a good brother, a decent brother," and appeared to address concerns voiced by some black leaders that Obama was a relative newcomer to the civil rights movement.

"Barack Obama comes at an incredibly powerful moment in the year 2007, and we don't expect him to be Marcus Garvey ... or Martin Luther King," West said of the two famed civil rights icons.

Before the fundraiser Obama dined with Al Sharpton, a national civil rights leader and Harlem denizen who ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004.

The two men ate fried chicken and cornbread at Sylvia's, a popular Harlem restaurant. But Sharpton said the visit shouldn't be construed as an endorsement of Obama's candidacy.