Obama Verbal Hennessy

By Walter L. Hilliard III –

Black people, the young and the old, love Hennessy like they love Cadillacs, reality TV (especially “The Real Housewives of Atlanta”), and fried fish with buttered bread.

But my question is can somebody drive Black people home, to the Promised Land after they’ve had one too many of Barack Obama’s shots of Verbal Hennessy? And on top of that, Obama done slipped em a Mickey and stole dey damn self-esteem, dey common sense, dey vote, and dey wallet!!!

You see, this love Black people have for Barack Obama is similar to the un-reciprocated love they have for Tiger Woods. The only difference between them is Tiger doesn’t say much, if anything, to or about Black people because he doesn’t need their vote. But I have no doubt that if a Black person happened to drive by Tiger’s house, Lindsey Vonn, his White girlfriend, would probably be the one to stop him from calling the Po Po. In fact, Tiger even told me (well, I was watching him on Oprah’s show) and Oprah he doesn’t like being identified as Black.

Still we love him, even if he doesn’t claim us.  The Black side of his family, his father’s side, of course, knows Tiger don’t mess wit’ no Black folks, either, unless your name is Charles Barkley or Michael Jordan. In fact, his brother, Earl Woods Jr., named after Tiger’s father, said Tiger ignores him and their sick brother Kevin, who happens to have multiple sclerosis.  But Obama claims us, at least in name/race, even though he’s all political floss and phony Black Swag gloss. Barack also likes to sang Al Green and take da-rock to da hole on the basketball court in his free time. So it’s probably just a case of the athlete and entertainer part of Barack “begging” him to claim us and not totally “let my people (Black people) go.”

I remember a Black female college student once told me she drank 28 shots of Hennessy . . . but some of her friends did even more shots. I can’t quite remember what I said other than “I don’t believe that . . . Nah, no way,” because my mind went numb after I was overwhelmed, having blacked out after I heard “28 shots,” after I came to “understand the words that were comin’ out of her mouth.”

And so it is that Obama, starting out as a community organizer, state senator, and eventually a presidential candidate, has been able to blend, ferment, mix, and create the perfect brand of Obama Verbal Hennessy: Black body language, preacher-like voice inflections, a pimp-like smile, and all this to alter the mood and mindset of Black America.

But the funny thing is that he sobers up when he’s talking to White folks, he has all his faculties together, kinda like how you’d be if you stopped at the store for some munchies and ran into your boss — you sober up quick, stand up straight, and clear you’re throat so you can speak clearly.

And, yes, White mainstream America is his boss, in his mind. This is indisputable.

And how else do we know Black America is high, high off of Obama Verbal Hennessy? Because what other people do you know that ain’t got no damn job (double and triple Black unemployment), are homeless (lost more of our homes than any other race during the financial/foreclosure crisis), are broke (Black wealth suffered its biggest drop, ever, under Obama), have just been hit in the head (police brutality), kicked in the ass (400 years of racial discrimination), and locked up (one and half million Black people in prison) would vote for a man that has basically said to Black people, based on his behavior towards us:  “Who Gives A Shit about your problems? Just get your dumb Black ass out there, stay in line, and vote for me!!!” And, oh, he actually did mean tell Black America at the Black Caucus annual dinner: “Stop Cryin’ . . . take off your bedroom slippers . . . .”

Yes, that’s exactly what he said — and we still went out and voted him into office for a second term.

So you know we gotta be high!

I would use Rodney Dangerfield’s line about we “don’t get no respect, no respect at all,” but this is worse — we’ve been abused by America, and now Obama and his Obama Verbal Hennessy.

You know, Black people, you can’t fly if you high. Yaw’ll jus’ can’t go ’round so down on yourself, beat up by 400 years of racism, and then pick up a bottle of Obama Verbal Hennessy, thinking you can drink away your problems, wake up in a drunken stupor, and everything is fine.

Why not?

Because:  “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress.” Frederick Douglass