to my rbg, fist-in-the-air, radically black family

i love y'all.
i really do.
but y'all ain't runnin shit.

i understand where you're coming from, but until we have a multiple-party system in this country that reflects the actual diversity of opinion and politics in this country, your message will not be effectively heard.

we've been falling through the cracks too long, and these days counterculture is almost a joke.

don't get me wrong; largely, i agree with you. politically, i'm about as far left as you can get without falling off the continuum. i am a practitioner of traditional african spirituality. i was raised to trust and love my people above all else. i am anti-war, anti-capitalism, and try to remain cognizant of the role of all sentient beings i share the planet with.

but i am also aware that that is not the consciousness that founded, established, and/or runs this nation. and, since it is a nation founded on a european, judeo-christian foundation, it may never be.

i believed the cia put crack into our communities and that 9/11 was a fixed game long before either conspiracy theory became popular (y'all just wait on that 9/11 one...it'll take awhile...). i never supported this mess in iraq. i know my leaders often lie to, cheat, and steal from me--whether i vote for them or not.

but when we have a chance, even if it's a small one, to show the world what more liberal, inclusive, and equitable leadership looks like, we've gotta take it. even if it means taking one for the shitstem.

i know good and hell well obama is not the messiah, and never thought he was. i don't even believe in a messiah--but that's another post.

he doesn't share my history or even my bloodlines, although, presumably, his wife may.

besides, even if he's as different as we're hoping he is--and i'm starting to think he just might be--he's not gonna be able to fix this mess in 4-8 years, 'cause it wasn't made in 4-8 years.

...but neither would mccain.

that said, there are times where you recognize the need to compromise on the macro level in order to make it easier to do what you do on the micro level.

i am not an activist, and don't claim to be. i have love for all of you who feed the community, who raise money and run education campaigns for political prisoners, who tear down this system brick by brick, and who lose life and limb to do so.

but i do see this particular election as a real chance to finally, possibly, have efforts like yours see the light of day. it's already becoming clearer to the mainstream that mobilizing the grassroots is how you truly effect change and get things done.

that's why obama pisses them off--the energy behind his campaign, ideas and platform are reminding us ALL of that fact, and it's imploding reaganomics, the bush administration's lies, and everything in between.

...just like y'all knew it would.

have you noticed that they're finally paying attention? all the misunderstandings, rumor, and innuendo going around about obama that make it painfully obvious that they don't know black folk too well, even after 400-some-odd years?

it's finally sinking in: we're here, we're not going anywhere, and neither are all the other black, brown, yellow and red people they tried to keep under the heels of their boots.

and, horror of horrors, we might even rise up and wind up running their precious, lily white, city-on-a-hill nation.

brothers & sisters, i know you don't "believe" in this thing, but by the will of the universe, we've come to live in it, and most of us are uni-lingual, monocultural products of it, no matter how much marx, fanon, diop, and marimba ani we read.

that doesn't mean it's fair.
doesn't mean it's right.
doesn't mean that our ancestors don't deserve justice.

it just means that change comes in a multitude of manifestations, and sometimes you've gotta look beyond your usual horizon.

so, even if you've never voted before, i hope you vote(d) today.

all power to the people.

with love & in freedom,

~omi~