Presidents and Rap

WALL-E, WALE, and a furious love of everything.

2008-06-28T01:18:00.005-05:00

I realize that the Presidents constituency of my readership is running dry, so I'll start with a relation to the current presidential race.

Drew Magary recently posted an entry on sports blog Deadspin about the human need to experience history. Drew says, and I quote:

"The main reason that I’m voting for Obama is because he offers something that McCain does not: an opportunity for me to “be a part” of a historic moment. It’s an inescapable fact for both candidates that a black man winning the White House would be a far a greater milestone in American History than if another oldass white guy were to keep the streak alive... There’s something immensely appealing to me about the prospect of living through that sort of moment. I was born in 1976. I have lived through exactly one seminal moment in American history, and that was 9/11. I would very much like something to counterbalance it."

Now, the political scholar in me isn't really any more interested in trying to convince you that you should or should not vote a certain way, as I've adopted the "campaigns don't matter" viewpoint from my limited life experience - or at least, national campaigns don't. If you'll forgive my brief indulgence into the kind of cliche that's infected the rhetoric of Obama supporters everywhere, I'm excited to vote for Obama because of the new kind of politics he promises - but not only that, that he'll be the first president where race doesn't matter, who has experience in the Chicago slums, who doesn't have the Vietnam war as the formative moment of his adolescence. I think Drew is a little bit off - the expectation isn't just that he'll be remembered as the first black president, but it's also a new political era (I believe one of the Schlesingers recently suggested that 1932-1968 was the era of Roosevelt, and 1968-2008 is the era of Reagan, and we're about to enter a new one). I think Drew sold himself a little short - history isn't so one dimensional - who really cares that JFK was the first Catholic president? It'll be a historic presidency, but not for such bland reasons.

I'm not saying this as an endorsement, as I don't want to nitpick over policy. Rather, I'd like to use this as a parallel to my own view of pop culture. When my parents ask me for my opinion on a movie, they usually don't get too much - they say that I just "like everything." And I do, really. There are very few movies that I've seen and disliked. Whether that's because I pick good movies to see or because I'm not picky, or even because the quality of film has just been high over the last few years - I really don't know. But part of my affection for film is that I genuinely want to look back and say "this film that I saw, just because I wanted to see it, is something that's going to be appreciated for generations. This is art. This is a classic." Now, I've applied that to lesser films (I don't know anyone who likes Hollywood Homicide as much as I do) but I've got a conscious thing going on, where I like to see these films and think that this kind of media is going to influence who I am, the things I appreciate, when I'm old and dying.

I saw WALL-E last night. Pixar films, as I've said to friends, are quite possibly the closest thing to high art this decade has accomplished. I don't mean ahhhht art, where there's a conscious effort for every single symbol and idea in the movie to be so deep (did anyone see Me and You and Everyone We Know? that movie sucked) but that these are friggin' classics with the highest level of quality imaginable. It's iconic, rapturous entertainment, and as far as I'm concerned that's enough qualification for high art as I'll need. But I love this idea of popular media as art, that culture is something that's being so unassailably formed and re-formed, that this is a part of who we are as citizens of the world in this era.

Pitchfork, the oft-maligned music website, recently reviewed the new record by Girl Talk (which, if you didn't know, is a raving success on every level). The opening paragraph was particularly telling of the two contradictory approaches to pop culture that people take:

"As I was finishing an interview with Gregg Gillis in July 2006, he casually mentioned his desire to see M. Night Shyamalan's just-released fantasy movie Lady in the Water. Given the film's wretched reviews-- a pitiful 24% on Rotten Tomatoes-- and the train-wreck hype surrounding it, I thought he was kidding. He wasn't; Gillis liked some of Shyamalan's other flicks, so he wanted to check this one out. Simple. And it's this omnivorous, pleasure-seeking attitude toward pop culture that defines his work as Girl Talk. (Luckily, his taste in music is superior to his taste in film.)"

On the one side, you have Greg Gillis, who is "omnivorous" and "pleasure-seeking," free to appreciate all the glee in pop culture, that everything's got some value, that we're forming a culture here that should be celebrated. On the other hand, you've got Pitchfork, who sneers that he's got better taste in music than in film. I'm pretty sure they completely bulldozed their point in an effort to be a culture snob with that last parenthetical remark.

There are really two ways to approach culture - there's celebration, and there's refinement. This is rarely a conscious effort, I think, but just the way we are. I know a lot of people who come out of a film to take apart the different elements - what they did and didn't like. That's fine! For me, for the large majority of media, I'm happy to really lie back and say that this is something that's going to influence me as an individual, I've been told a story that I'm going to remember. It works for proficient music of any genre, and it works for any engaging video games with some real thought put into them.

This isn't to say I'm undiscerning, or that I've got some kind of enlightened taste, but rather that the range of what I like is grand and I like to bask in my enjoyment, to really spend some time appreciating it. What's this all got to do with either of the focuses of my blog? I started with Presidents, sure, but this is a flimsy premise, you say. Fuck you, I say, I'm getting to it.

The current CD in my car is Wale's 100 Miles and Running, his 2007 mixtape. On it, he repurposes Justice's D.A.N.C.E., Dirty Harry by Gorillaz, Rehab by Amy Winehouse, and Smile by Lily Allen. He repurposes each of these superbly, bringing them fantastic new context and at the same time paying tribute to the artists that are just on the cusp of whatever genres they inhabit (that Wale is signed to Mark Ronson's label certainly doesn't hurt. Spoiler alert: my favorite MCs are signed to Allido records). Unique, modern songs that established themselves immediately as classics to whatever their demographic might be just because of their sheer incomparability. And hip hop music, for what it's worth, has always been a cultural time-capsule - not just because of its tendency to reference, but also because of its attachment to trend. What genre is more regionally and chronologically dependent than hip hop?

My cultural awareness is admittedly just hitting its stride, and I can't speak to earlier hip hop as well as I can speak to the present day. But the tradition of collaboration, of repurposing, of improving has been such a positive one and makes hip hop the ideal art form for anyone who's an admirer of pop culture in general. The latest Wale mixtape is a tribute to Seinfeld - Seinfeld of all things. Rap, in general, is so well suited to the Wikipedia generation, ceaseless consumers of information and trivia that we are.

The last few decades have been notable as critics of American culture have criticized us for our materialism. But with the advent of the internet, especially, I think we're shifting toward informationalism. I spend a lot of my excess cash on books, movies, video games, and music. I love adding new things to my own repertoire. And I celebrate that. Rap has a unique opportunity to take part in that celebration, and I think that'll continue to be a key point of hip hop in the next few years. Mixtape culture, mashup culture, sampling, and even the hipster rap epidemic are going to help hip hop not be just any old genre, but another layer on the musical world that has an appreciation for just about everything. It's a good time to love hip hop.

Hipster Hop

2008-06-06T23:33:00.004-05:00

OK I had to pick up on this one. The Chicago Reader, which is the most terminally boring Chicago weekly paper for people who think they're smarter than you (sorry, StreetWise!) for some reason thinks that they should justify the "new media" by writing about what's happening on the blogs. Unfortunately, starting a flame war is usually the realm of xangas, not the fucking Chicago Reader. It should be obvious to all parties involved that because the original poster can't spell "Liberace" or "Douchebag" correctly, THERE AIN'T NO REASON YOU SHOULD EVEN BE GIVING A SHIT CHICAGO READER.

But fucking whatever. At least the Reader has Savage Love.

The flame war was about "Hipster Rap," which is a genre I have been referring to amongst friends as "Hipster Hop" because you know if you really think about it Hip Hop is a pretty stupid genre name anyhow and it's at least as clever as Hip Hopera, Beyonce. It points to the Cool Kids, Kid Sister, Kanye West, Lupe Fiasco, Kidz in the Hall, N.E.R.D., Lil Mama, and M.I.A. as prime examples of hipster hop, which the dude apparently categorizes as stylistically douchey hipsters.

Now, I'd describe myself as a fan of most of the aforementioned acts. I don't think M.I.A. counts, because she's from overseas and they're fucking classy or something, and Lil Mama falls more into the Avril Lavigney camp, a little too poppy to be necessarily hip. The rest are pretty good examples of the genre, and indeed, as the reader says, it lacks the "scary black people." No, this genre is full of black people who might be in your theater group, or your workplace. These black people are gentrified.

Nevermind that N.W.A. sold mostly to angry white teenagers in the suburbs.

I've always been disappointed at how many of my peers just dismiss hip hop in one fell swoop - a good friend dismissed R. Kelly - R. Friggin Kelly - as "talking fast." Another only listened to Kanye, because the rest of rap was just "misogyny," obviously taking the Hillary Clinton approach to rap. Look, I don't expect my dad to get it, but seriously, I've known some fairly hip individuals who don't know what they're missing.

Hipster hop tends to appeal to hipsters, as its name suggests. Or indie kids, or anyone who fancies themselves a music enthusiast. Your friend from high school who turned you onto some really good music before you realized she was a huge bitch? That's her. Just about anyone that goes to Columbia College? That's them too. They've got a cutting-edge taste in music that probably syncs fairly well with whatever Pitchfork thinks is hot. There's nothing wrong with that. But their interest in rap doesn't extend beyond these particularly hip acts.

Can it really just be that these acts are fashion-savvy, have a sense of style that is half the appeal? That it's more acceptable to love Kanye's teenager-like introspection, Lupe's affinity for skateboarding or Kid Sister's songs about painting her nails than Common's oldness, De La Soul's outcast sensibilities or ODB's eccentricities? Is that really so important? I mean, shit, De La sampled Schoolhouse Rock, that should at the very least buy them some hipster cred.

Maybe it's just that these are the new class, that all the old guys are, understandably, old. But show me a hipster without a 90s alt-rock band as their first true love, without Radiohead or Weezer at the top of their last.fm charts, and I'll show you a poseur. I'll admit - hip hop in general moves a lot faster, I think, and so it might seem a little more dated. It's a little more subject to trends, a little more of-the-moment. But a classic beat is a classic beat.

Digable Planets were the original "hipsters" of rap - back when it meant "jazz hipsters," like people who smoke cigarettes at jazz clubs. And now the term has taken on a whole different meaning, and Digable Planets are only good for a nostalgia act. Jazz Rap ended up being a flash in the pan - the era of Tribe and De La is long passed (though who the fuck is seeing them at Rock the Bells this summer? I am!). I won't say that it's because hip hop is a young man's game - it is, but if you can find an act that got subsequently higher scores for each album on Pitchfork, you're a ridiculous enthusiast.

Just like someone classy might altogether reject such testosterone-fueled cultural emptiness like the WWF, so is the 90s as an era in hip hop, known more for P. Diddy's extravagant videos and Tupac and Biggie getting shot. It's extravagance, sex, drugs, violence, all the bad things that appeal to the "lower classes," the dumb stuff. There's a lot of gold in there, though - Illmatic (fact: Nas wrote Illmatic when he was younger than I am. I'm past my prime!), Ready 2 Die, AmeriKKKa's Most Wanted. There's a lot of nihilism and a lot of it is kind of a bummer if you're used to The Pipettes.

A lot of it is that black people are scary. The 80s are a generation ago, and the 90s are more renowned for gangsta rap and Will Smith. Who really wants to venture that far? There was a festival down in Washington Park last year that featured Rhymefest as headliner. I was going to go, but I decided, in the end, that I didn't know the neighborhood and would be coming home probably around midnight, and was a bit too nervous to really hit the show. Sounds like I wasn't the only one - a friend told me the show was deserted.

Some of it's gotta be white guilt, though. Sure, a lot of hip hop is a bummer, but it's not that universal bummer, like this girl dumped me and my heart is broken. It's "Life's a bitch, and then you die, that's why we get high, cause you never know when you're gonna go." It's that existential nothingness.

In the end, I say that it's half the "world music" phenomenon, where it's so different and foreign that you never really like it but you pretend to like it so that you seem cultured. But the other half is that rap still has such a crass stigma that you'll impress no one by listening to it. That's where hipster hop has succeeded with white folks - it doesn't have that stigma, you can play it for someone and they'll instantly be able to latch on. "This song about cosmetics is so pleasant and non-offensive! I can listen to this!" It's new, it's quality, it's safe, what else could a white person ask for?

PP51DUDU

2008-05-22T03:22:00.005-05:00

Yeah so what if I ain't posted in a month and a half? I got problems.

It's a good thing it's time for a rap entry, because I've been thinking entirely too much about electoral politics recently. There's nothing to say in that field that hasn't already been said, and I've promised myself to never talk about it in this blog (at least not as a primary topic). I might have some things to say about historical campaigns, that might be interesting. But governance is so fucking boring in the twilight hours of the Bush presidency - I mean, do you remember a single thing Clinton did in 2000? 2000 was Bush's year, and 2008 is almost assuredly Obama's year.

Point is, I might have something interesting to say about that. For now: rap!

I saw the Glow in the Dark tour about a week or so ago, and I have to say, it was fuck*ng fantastic. I've seen Lupe Fiasco four times now and his shit is starting to get old, N.E.R.D. and Rihanna are a lot of fun, but Kanye fucking stole the show, doing a one-man high-tech stage show unlike anything I've ever seen. But I've slathered all over Kanye enough for one blog (hey, Stereogum is self-conscious, so I can be self-conscious too). Directly surrounding the show, I listened to a lot of College Dropout, and I paid some attention to "Last Call." I wanted to ask this of my approximately four readers: what's the best non-track a rapper has ever released?

The two iconic examples from the last few years are the previously mentioned "Last Call," a thirteen minute track where Kanye tells a very long story about how he got signed, and Lupe Fiasco's extremely self-indulgent "Outro," where he feels the need to thank every person he's ever worked with. Both tracks aren't completely interminable. As someone who likes Kanye as much as he likes Grover Cleveland, I don't mind his story. Lupe's has some nice vocal work. Going further, Man in the Mirror has some hilarious skits courtesy of Rhymefest. But let's move beyond the patron saints of Chicago Rap, eh?

OK, I'll admit it - I'm cooling off on Chamillionaire. The novelty of "Industry Groupie" wore off as soon as I realized that the first line in Kanye's "Homecoming" was a knockoff of "I Used To Love H.E.R." and the more politically involved I get the less impressed I am with the mainstream nihilism of his political trio. I think he's heading in the right direction, but needs some more maturing. That said, he's got some really hilarious skits on Ultimate Victory that aren't as pointless as Broke Phi Broke. I think a successful skit has to have something more than a good joke - it has to have good actors, where their appeal lasts long after the "aha!" where you get the joke, however stupid and small. Cham pulls it off.

Digging further into my library, I put The Roots' "Waok (Ay) Rollcall" into the same category as "Industry Groupie." A bunch of beating off into the microphone. Look, I love the idea of hip hop as culture as much as the next guy, and as I've repeatedly insisted, hip hop is a great sociological phenomenon - posses, influences, shout outs, guests, rivalries and community. There's no medium in the world that does anything like that. Rappers are better role models than the media gives them credit for - I'm always impressed at the importance rappers tend to put on friendship, introducing new rappers, collaborating, always trying something new. Rap's unique - I mean, where would we be without "One, two, three and to the four, Snoop Doggy Dogg and Dr. Dre is at the door?"

Point is, you can track any number of artist relationships, beefs, and egos, but another track rattling off your influences is useless and uninformative just because the sense of community is so self-evident. The Roots, you were inspired by A Tribe Called Quest? Every white person's rapper, with the exception of Lupe Fiasco, also was. Leave it be.

On a totally different tack, Ohmega Watts' "Shorty Shouts" is a great piece of production backing some, well, shouting from his nephews. It's endearing and pleasant to listen to, without trying to be "funny." It's probably the best example of a track being pious without being sanctimonious, reminding the listeners that you can be a rapper and a family man.

I think my favorite non-track of all time is "I Got to Tell You" by Dr. Octagon. If you're not familiar, wikipedia says the following:

"Dr. Octagon is an extraterrestrial, time-traveling surgeon / obstetric gynecologist who has sex with his patients and nurses."

See, awesome already. The track is a 40 second "ad" for his "services" that directly precedes the iconic "Earth People." It runs over a recording of Pachelbel's Canon in D where he explains that he's available for "intestine surgery, rectal rebuilding, relocated saliva glands and chimpanzee acne, and of course moosebumps." Moosebumps, of course, receives about 5000 hits on Google and its only definition on Urbandictionary is "Something you DO NOT want on your nuts. Mom, i can't was the dishes i have moosebumps."

The phone number he offers is fantastic, if only for the crass disregard of the audience's intelligence, the gloriously immature use of euphemism. It's the most glorious middle finger the rap game has ever produced, and the beat behind Pachelbel and the scratches as the song fade out make it interminably catchy. I was kind of hoping it was a full track.

It seems pointless to overanalyze such a short skit, but for my money, it's well worth the price of the entire album. It's such a perfect nugget of dismissive irreverence that sets the tone for the whole album - which is a tone that rappers could pick up. You ever notice that rappers are so fucking serious? They're either macho posturing, being socially conscious, partying hard, or, in the case of Kanye West, having a little mini therapy session. But rap is a genre where you can be funny without being a novelty artist. How come it's only the Beasties that even bother ch-checking out that scene? There are plenty of punchlines, but there's always a purpose behind it. No one does irreverence like doc oc.

Pick up Dr. Octagonecologyst, if you haven't already. I think I'm gonna have that skit on repeat a few more times. Next entry's probably on the MTV hottest MCs list. Maybe.

Hair vs No Hair

2008-04-19T16:37:00.001-05:00

So, name the top five most legendary Americans of the latter half of the 19th century. I'll give you a minute.

So who'd you come up with?

It's kind of slim pickings, actually. Lincoln, obviously. Then maybe Thomas Edison, who gets entirely too much credit (seriously, if this blog were entitled "Inventors and Soul" the first entry would undoubtedly be about how Nikola Tesla and Otis Redding are the least fortunate people in American history). Perhaps you'd throw in John Rockefeller and Mark Twain, depending on your leanings. One could make more in-depth arguments for other characters - Booker T? Louis Sullivan? Grover F. Cleveland? - based on whatever perspective you want to take on the era. The last one should be, for all intensive purposes, be Ulysses S. Grant.

The list would be longer if I asked you to do the same for the period between World War II and the fall of the Berlin Wall. Almost every president, with the exception of Ford and Carter, could have a case made, for better or for worse. You could get into the technological moguls, the media icons, the scientists and the civic leaders and still end up with a list from which you'd like to cut no one. Unlike the corruption and general grime of the late 19th century, the Pax Americana produced more notables than any period since the founding fathers.

I suddenly would like to play a video game that pits Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Hamilton, Monroe, and Ben Franklin against FDR, JFK, LBJ, MLK, IKE and... Truman. There could be racing and perhaps baseball. I am convinced that these are the two toughest groups of motherfuckers in our national consciousness, even if the latter group had two sickly, sickly men (JFK would have snapped like a twig). It is obvious that I have been playing a lot of Super Smash Bros. Brawl. Shit's ridiculous.

But whatever.

Point is, Eisenhower would be somewhere among that list. If you were to list the top military minds of our nation's history, the top three would include Grant, Eisenhower, and Washington. Washington is an interesting enough guy - probably one of the most low-key guys to ever occupy the White House, but I'd instead like to compare Ike and Grant. Eisenhower was a president, and Grant was a general. How did that happen?

I believe it was Richard Neustadt who once said that in the history books, one-term presidents get paragraphs, and two-term presidents get chapters. There are a few exceptions to the rule - for instance, one-termer James K. Polk is certainly more influential than most of the two-termers that followed him. Conversely, Grant is a two-term president who didn't make much of a splash in the history books - he's routinely cast aside amongst the Hardings, Pierces and Buchanans in the lowest tier of presidents.

Grant and Ike were relatively similar presidents - both were relatively nonaligned, politically, and both were military geniuses presiding during peacetime. Both had some significant domestic accomplishments, as well - Eisenhower presided over a long period of economic prosperity and, while largely putting his faith in the free market, put fiscal responsibility in front of tax cuts, refusing to lower taxes without a balanced budget. Likewise, Grant reduced the federal debt enormously and vastly improved the nation's credit. Eisenhower championed the Interstate Highway System, Grant oversaw the completion of the first transcontinental railroad. Grant was a strong supporter of Civil Rights and attempted to annex the largely black Santo Domingo not only for militarily strategic reasons but also in an attempt to push Cuba to abandon slavery and to provide a place for former slaves to escape southern whites (thereby reminding southern whites how important former slaves are to the economy and de-racisting them). Likewise, Eisenhower used the National Guard to forcibly integrate an Arkansas school.

Eisenhower did have some seriously mixed legacies - the Interstate Highway System is generally hailed as a great civic infrastructure project, but one might wonder whether it'll be viewed as such as the climate change movement kicks up. The highways certainly made longer trips a lot more convenient, and that's doing CO2 emissions some favors. Eisenhower was a bit passive in his dealings with McCarthy, as well, and perhaps most damningly, allowed construction of nuclear weapons to skyrocket far beyond reasonable levels. While I understand the need for a sizable nuclear arsenal - MAD and all - it got a little crazy under Eisenhower. During his presidency, the number of nuclear weapons skyrocketed from under 1000 to over 20,000, a trend that continued until Lyndon Johnson was president and the number began to fall. If anyone can think of a scenario where we'd have any use for nuclear weapons after the first 500 were launched, you're a more brilliant political mind than I.

Grant, in his own right, had some other similarly poor showings - much like Harding, he was a trusting man whose faith in the inherent good nature of the human race was upset by his staff, as scandal after scandal interrupted his administration. Crédit Mobilier, the Whiskey Ring, the Sanborn Incident, Black Friday. Grant was largely uninvolved in all the scandals - he himself wrote to congress, "Failures have been errors of judgment, not of intent."

Grant and Eisenhower were actually pretty similar in this respect too - where Grant's largest failure was that he couldn't make the political alliances necessary to combat the scandals and didn't take a stand against the bad elements in his administration, Eisenhower was also limited in his effectiveness because he didn't want to take any political positions that might make him unpopular and avoided making a public stand against McCarthy. Neither of these men were politicians.

So why was Eisenhower such a rollicking success and Grant such a dismal failure?

There are a couple things you can point to. For one, it's a consequence of the era in which they lived. The Interstate system was championed primarily as a system of national defense for quick movement of supplies and troops in the event of an emergency - an eventuality that thankfully never has tested the highways. And until very recently, the boon to interstate commerce has far outweighed any carbon emissions downsides. Similarly, there hasn't yet been a nuclear attack anywhere - so for now, Mutual Assured Destruction succeeded and nuclear proliferation is a reluctant success. Ike presided over an era where the United States was increasingly prosperous (average family income rose by 20% during his presidency), mostly at peace, and globally dominant. Politically, he aimed low and hit.

Most of Grant's accomplishments, on the other hand, are regarded as eventual failures. Reconstruction was perhaps too heady a task for an inexperienced politician - he had to help defeat the secessionist sentiment of the South and prevent the inevitable postwar resentment while simultaneously trying to minimize the KKK and ensure civil rights. While Eisenhower had a few recessions in his term, Grant had two full-fledged panics - the Fisk-Gould scandal and the Panic of 1873. In the former, Fisk and Gould recruited Grant's brother in law and they successfully conned the executive branch; in the latter, Grant simply neglected to react effectively.

In the end, Grant and Eisenhower had very similar governing styles - few risky political strategies and an aim of postwar normalization. Both were noble men to different ends - Grant was honest and trusting enough that he was taken advantage of, Eisenhower was humble enough about his accomplishments that he sometimes appeared to be a do-nothing president. But Grant inherited a divided and unstable nation in crisis, while Eisenhower inherited a postwar boom in the world's most powerful nation. This isn't to say that Grant was unjustly screwed - just that the crises and tough decisions that Grant faced were more suited for a professional politician who could build coalitions and make compromises, while the opportunities presented to Eisenhower were perfectly suited to a military man concerned with getting things done.

The Video

2008-04-01T19:06:00.006-05:00

I'd like to start with a proposition that you must accept in order to continue with this entry (I mean, you can continue if you don't accept it, but that makes it all relatively hypothetical).

Popular media, with a few exceptions, is becoming hilariously decentralized.

It's easier to see in some media more than others. The movie industry is built on familiar franchises and require massive budgets to make a profit - although the only two sure things in the movies are Will Smith and Pixar. The music industry profits greatly from the internet - the wealth is spread around to more bands, but there's a grand shortage of megastars who go platinum in one day. Television, for all its faults, is going through a golden age of drama and comedy is back on the rise - thanks in no small part to cable and DVD (Shit, in an era where fans can revive Jericho, Firefly, Futurama, Family Guy and maybe even Arrested Development fingers crossed, you know that a network of niches is doing its thing).

All three media, for better or for worse, have become relatively decentralized by technology, and the trickle-down effect will be hitting more and more facets of the industry soon enough (How many 90s alt-rock headliners do we have to keep our destination festivals afloat? We're going to run out someday).

The one medium that's dying a slow, tragic death from the leveling of the music industry, though, is the music video. Once, the medium flourished as MTV was the most effective tastemaker in the industry. Now, the network has been supplanted by the internet. Solid videos, while they might make a splash on Stereogum or the part of Pitchfork nobody looks at, are becoming rarer and rarer - probably just for financial reasons, as unless your video is truly viral (think OK Go or Snoop Dogg) it's unlikely to make much of a splash. Would you invest millions in that?

Another big cause for the death of the video is something people have been talking about for ages - that we don't listen to our music actively anymore. Music is cheap, so we hoard it and devalue it. And maybe we do value our favorite artists as much as ever - but putting Winamp on shuffle or sitting with our iPods on the train are a much more efficient way to experience music than sitting around watching videos - especially given that there's no good way to watch videos anymore. You can click around YouTube, but you'd think that someone would come up with a good way to create a last.fm-esque video network that just plays a constant stream consistent with your tastes (actually, wasn't last.fm supposed to do that? when CBS bought them?). The death of the video is as much a symptom of how we listen to our music as it is a result of the lower amount of money a label might be willing to throw around.

The video, as much as it is a medium I've always appreciated, is simply a by-product of the corporate excess that used to define mainstream music. Unless something really revolutionary happens with it in the next few years, it's likely headed toward history's dustbin.

The direction I was heading, though, was rap. As far as I'm concerned, the last great moment the medium will ever have is this one:

But what's most prescient about that video is that the only artist left who seems to dedicate as much effort to the videos as he does to the songs is Kanye West. I know, I've slathered all over Kanye a few times over, most likely because we are perfect for each other, but beyond that. He's worked with Spike Jonze, So Me, Hype Williams four times over, Michel Gondry, Bill Plympton - he's got all the really big ones covered. Sure, most of it is where he comes from, that he's got a more middle-class background - but look at what he has going for him. He's got cred among people who don't listen to hip hop, he's got an enormous budget for whatever he wants to do, and he's got impeccable taste. I can't come up with another rapper who's got all three of those - Snoop Dogg comes close, but Kanye remains the man.

If you don't want to bother going through his videos, easily locatable on YouTube, let's compare his influences to any other rapper.

Another Rapper	Kanye West
The hood	Japan
Shooting people	Riding a motorcycle over a canyon
Video girls	Pin-up girls
Violence	Animation
Liquor	Polaroid photographs
Being fantastically wealthy	Child labor
Smoking a lot of weed and phoning in your entire performance	Pop-up video! (This one doesn't count as much because it's The Game and Kanye together)

My take? As the rap industry struggles out of adolescence, its expanding range of interests might catch up to its propensity for fantastic wealth. The last great video genre.

Now watch this retardedly good new Kanye video.

HOMECOMING from kwest on Vimeo.

Reprinting Content, part 2.

2008-03-16T04:22:00.004-05:00

So while I finish writing my incredibly long entry on Grant and Eisenhower, which I've actually written some of, I figured I'd throw over something else I wrote for the paper a few weeks ago. It's... sort of serious. I'm not sure whether or not I'm kidding. I'm almost certain I use the word "deconstructivism" incorrectly, but my intent was to make it sound like what I want it to say, rather than to have it be technically correct. I also throw Gestalt in there, with the right meaning but a hilariously wrong context, and top it off by missing Alan Sokal's point altogether. But I'm semi-serious about my intent.

Anyhow, the article is entitled "The new face of deconstructivism in music." I'll be back some time.

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Though he is only seventeen years old, I would like to submit Soulja Boy as the greatest musical deconstructivist of our generation.

You scoff.

Perhaps you’ve only heard “Crank That,” the song famous for introducing “Youuuuu!” into the popular lexicon, as well as a few crass terms for sex acts. You would be forgiven for dismissing this as the latest in a series of increasingly deteriorating appeals to the lowest common denominator. There is a dance to learn, there is an infectious beat, there are non-sequitur lyrics that want nothing more than to get you on the dance floor. Taken alone, Crank That is a tepid dance hit, wanting only to be discarded.

If you are a student of Gestalt, however, you will realize that this is not the entire picture.

No, to get the entire picture, one would have to view the video for his latest single, “Yahhh!” The video is a narrative – there is no dance. At the video’s introduction, Soulja Boy and his friend Arab are playing video games on a sunny morning. An unknown adult calls him up, asking him why he’s not at school. Soulja Boy replies: “YAHHH!”

Following this, Soulja Boy and Arab decide to go to school. They are accosted by a number of obnoxious people who want an autograph, including Dog the Bounty Hunter. Every time someone accosts him, he shouts at them, “YAHHH!” or on occasion, if he’s really angry, “Biggeteh-bah! Biggeteh-Bah!” He arrives at school and is accosted by a nerd who purports to be his biggest fan. Soulja boy screams at him pretty loudly and incoherently.

Following this, Soulja Boy does a rap about his report card.

Is this inanity, or the apex of musical deconstructivism? I would argue the latter. Soulja presents the most overused rap cliché – the angry song. You have heard it more times than 50 Cent got shot, from “Eff the Police” to “Party Up” to “What U Know.” What are these songs if not macho posturing? Is this nothing more than a more literate attempt to climb to the top of a cave and shout, to prove that you are the alpha dog, that you are not to be effed with? At the heart of it, isn’t all we’re trying to say “Yahhh!”

In two songs, Soulja Boy has taken the two strongest standbys of modern rap and broken them down to their essence. With the revelation of “Yahhh!” as nothing more than a commentary on the modern rap game, “Crank That” takes on new significance. Could the discord within “Crank That” be intentional?

It’s not hard to imagine he could just be commenting on the inanity of our topics of choice. Where once, sex was only discussed discreetly among friends, in modern times the most inane sex acts are in the common lexicon – even the ones that have no sexual attraction under the most obscure of fetishes. There’s something underwhelming about the standard practices, that to become a number one hit, all anyone has to do is talk about dancing and sex, put his song on myspace, and let it roll downhill. Perhaps Soulja realized this, realized that there’s a formula for success, and with an accurate enough satire, he too could make millions. And so, Soulja Boy has pockets full of cash because his song ringing from every cell phone – because he has broken down the other urban standard that has carried the career of everyone from R. Kelly to T-Pain to R. Kelly featuring T-Pain. Where these elder statesmen of the game have injected a little tenderness into their lyrics in an attempt to capture both sexes, engendering a larger market share (pun not intended), Soulja has torn back the curtains and exposed the primal desires: let’s have sex and dance.

There’s a sort of bizarre brilliance to his lyrics – it’s hard to imagine this man as some sort of mental slowpoke when you take into account his earnest working-man’s demeanor and his keen business sense that took him from myspace to MTV in a period of 6 months, Grammy nominated before he can buy a lotto ticket. Soulja wasn’t “discovered,” he made himself into a phenomenon. True, he might only be seventeen years old. But it’s hard to take all these factors into account and write him off as a fluke. My guess? We’ll be hearing a lot more from Soulja Boy in the future. He’ll be there, putting out material that reminds the rest of the rap game how stupid they sound. I’m reminded of Alan Sokal’s sabotage of postmodernist thought when I say the slyest satire can become indistinguishable from the real thing when imposed on a public that has gotten, frankly, a little lazy.

Opiate of the Masses.

2008-02-23T02:00:00.003-06:00

Hey guys, I know I promised what I was gonna write about next. Truth be told, I think that might hold me back because both those entries will take some doing, and I just had a thought I think I have to share. So bear with me for a while, I'll talk about Ike and Grant and Wale eventually, but I had a bit of a philosophical thought on rap. So don't be too disappointed.

A good hip hop beat is the most democratic kind of music there is. A lot of us internet types, I think, tend to be very gung-ho about this democracy thing politically and a bit meritocratic musically. That hip hop songs are the ones that get stuck inside your head so often says something about their universal appeal. They're able to appeal to the lowest common denominator without being a total void. I find that hip hop tends to be a lot more accessible - a good, periodic beat or a clever play on words can latch to your brain faster than the most intricate of melodies. And that might be where a little of the pretentiousness comes from, that because hip hop, with its catchphrases, cross-referencing, signatures (by which I mean when a rapper says his own name, the most iconic of which starts with "One, two, three and to the four") appeals to our basest instincts - repetition and familiarity - it's somehow less worthy. But I think a rapper's job is to catch you and keep you, and that's where the biggest talents really show off. The best kind of hip hop song catches you, and might appeal to the casual listener who only needs one anchor point to latch onto, but offers something substantial to a more pretentious listener as well. Now, if only people weren't so up their asses with "Everything except rap and country!" and could realize that the catching is an important part.

Also, I think hip hop is more substantial because they're saying what they mean instead of what sounds good. This whole post might just be me romanticizing the genre, but my view of rap is that it's easy for anyone to access and feels so inclusive, and that my old stronghold of indie rock is getting more pretentious and elitist by the day. A lot of that indie rock culture is just a series of pats on the back, reminding us that we're so cultured to be able to dig this, that we're so much less bound by the conglomerations telling us what to listen to. We don't associate with the lesser folks, oh no. Not good enough.

Am I really the only one who is just constantly impressed at how good rappers are at writing? I can write obtuse lyrics for some song any day, but I'm not sure I could ever write a passable rap. Nothing's more intellectually stimulating to me, aurally, and yet I don't feel like it would go over any of my friends' heads. Perhaps under it, with their sneers, but never over it.

Rap!

The best of the goddamn best.

2008-02-15T05:00:00.003-06:00

Motherfuckers, I am going to try to be BACK. I know I've been ignoring this shit, but you gotta understand my pain and whatever. I've been drowning in presidential primaries. That stuff is like heroin, but there is absolutely no upside. I am hooked on the depression it gives me. I haven't picked up any good hip hop this year (anything good come out in January?) so I think it's time enough to give you my rundown of the best in hip hop of 2007, about a month late. "Any later, and it would be annoying." I'm pretty sure it's annoying now, actually.

9 Ghostface Killah - The Big Doe Rehab
I've told you my opinion on Ghostface before. I think this is a great record. His delivery is usually panicked, and he adds a layer of intensity to almost every verse he raps, and on tracks like Yapp the production really complements his delivery. This album is like a good action movie - fast, haphazard but precisely choreographed, and satisfying, but ultimately one where style overwhelms substance. And I won't fault it for that, but at least for me, the casual Ghostface listener who came late to the party, it makes the learning curve a bit steeper. I know the album is good, but it hasn't yet "clicked" with me. It's an album full of good tracks, I think, but no great moments.

8 Rhymefest & Mark Ronson - Man in the Mirror
I went over this one at length as well, but it's a mixtape. A fantastic mixtape, but ultimately there's so little material that I can't put it much higher than this.

7 Ohmega Watts - Watts Happening
This is probably the most hip-hop album on the whole album. I'd argue that a lot of the records on this list are this or that type of rap, some ever crossing over into pop territory, but Ohmega sounds the most like a classic hip hop act, like he could have been pulled from Brooklyn in the mid-80s. If pressed, I'd issue Rhymefest as the rapper with some of the best producers working with him - Kanye and Mark Ronson are easily my two favorite producers. Ohmega at one point worked with Shawn Lee, but on this album most of the production appears to be self-generated, and he's easily climbing the ranks. He's got a really good world-music sound, is positive without being preachy, and is simply generating some of the best chill-out rap in the universe. That he's not getting more press is a crime.

6 Wu-Tang Clan - 8 Diagrams
Again, I'm new to the Wu-Tang fold. Most any review of this album inevitably centers around the background, the fights, the division, the death of ODB and the release dates and how this might be their last album ever because they can't stand each other anymore. I can't speak to that. What I can speak to is the experience of listening to my first Wu-Tang album. My first introduction to any of the... Wus? Wu-Tangs? Clansmen? Oh god.

My first introduction to any member of the Wu-Tang Clan was Method Man's turn on N2Gether Now by Limp Bizkit.

Oh god.

The point is, since that introduction, I've heard just about every one of them individually - the ODB at the end of Blue Collar, Ghostface on Fishscale, the GZA when he hit Pitchfork, et alii. I pledge very little allegiance to any of them, but I recognize all of them distinctly. So to listen to this album all at once gives an instant sense of familiarity I don't get from a lot of albums. It's entirely composed of voices I know, but that I don't know well, so it feels like all these songs have been so embedded in me as a consumer of culture. It's not the kind of record where I pick it up and feel like I'm comparing it to a past body of work from a favorite artist, and it's not anonymous. It's an ideal listening experience, and the beats are massive. The track that gave them their press is "The Heart Gently Weeps," with it's Beatles interpolation, but I think I like the feel of "Wolves" the best here. The whole vibe of the album... it barely feels like hip hop, it feels like straight up Americana. An excellent introduction.

5 Jay-Z - American Gangster
Full disclosure. American Gangster is a great album. American Gangster is a great movie. It is entirely reasonable to see a film and be inspired to write an album, and it's clear that the album had an influence on the movie.

That said: Jay-Z, saying that you saw American Gangster and were subsequently inspired to make this album is the gayest thing in the world. It is gayer than gay. I hate that you said that. I hate that I have to sit down and think that you had to see a movie about a drug lord/businessman who is a hero at the end of the movie who everyone loves, and thought "man that is a good idea for an album!" THAT IS EVERY ALBUM YOU WRITE JAY-Z. YOU USED TO SELL DRUGS. YOU ARE A TERRIFIC BUSINESSMAN. EVERYONE LOVES YOU. YOU DID NOT NEED TO SEE A MOVIE TO FIGURE THIS OUT.

This might partially be because I read an interview with Frank Lucas and Nicky Barnes after seeing this movie, which contained this passage:

MJ: Did you ever think there’d be this whole hip-hop thing? You guys are both mentioned in a million rap songs.

FL: Call them songs? When I came along, we had singing. They might make up songs about me, but I don’t have to like them.

MJ: What about you, Nick? You’re like a hip-hop folk hero.

NB: I never thought anything like this would happen. When hip-hop first started, everybody—I mean the music entrepreneurs—predicted that hip-hop would be dead in five years. They said, “Those motherfuckers ain’t gonna make no money.” But hip-hop rolled along, and look what they’re doing now. They got Jay-Z, Damon Dash, Kanye West, 50 Cent. These guys are doing something legitimate.

FL: At least Nick knows the names. I don’t know none of them. I know Puffy Combs, because of his father.

NB: Oh, Melvin! Melvin Combs.

FL: Melvin used to be at my house a couple of times a week. I’m proud to see Melvin’s son like that.

It's really funny they know Puff Daddy's dad. I mean P. Diddy I mean Diddy I mean Sean John I mean whatever.

You know what? I'm sorry this section is so long but I'm just too pissed at Jay-Z now. It's a really good album, but it's the fucking principle, so here's what I'm going to do.

6 Jay-Z - American Gangster
5 Wu-Tang Clan - 8 Diagrams

There, everyone happy? Goddammit Jay-Z.

4 Lupe Fiasco - The Cool
I've mentioned before on this BLOG that I don't give Food & Liquor enough credit. I don't give Lupe enough credit in general, though my opinion of him dipped entirely too low after his ATCQ blunder and his political debate with Rhymefest. There's no revisionist Jay-Z shit here, though, I really think he deserves this #4. I think there are no tracks as good as "I Gotcha" or "Kick Push" on this album, and I don't think he was aiming for that (Though Paris, Tokyo is a close 3rd on the all-time Lupe Tracks List). This was an interesting one - I hated the singles. I could not stand listening to Superstar or Dumb It Down when I thought about how good the first singles off Food & Liquor were, but this album was the opposite of Food & Liquor - where some stellar singles and bitchin' album art got me pumped for F&L and I ended up disappointed by a smattering of weak, repetitive and ultimately unmemorable while not necessarily bad tracks, The Cool snuck up on me - even Superstar and Dumb It Down, preachy and trite as they might be, sound a lot better in the context of the album. The number of great albums from end to end in my library are extremely low. Beulah's The Coast Is Never Clear, Camper van Beethoven's New Roman Times... never a rap album before. There's always a few anchor tracks, this offers a really rare full-album experience. The idea of the album is perhaps past its prime, but I can't recommend this record enough.

3 Chamillionaire - Ultimate Victory
This is the most underrated album of the year. This is the most underrated album of the year. This is the most underrated album of the year.

I'm sorry, this album has been so... so... ignored. No one talked about it, no one listened to it, you have one of the biggest rap smashes in recent memory with Ridin', and his incredibly good follow-up album is completely overlooked. No one touched it. I have no idea why. I don't listen to a whole hell of a lot of Southern rap, to my own handicap. And I've expressed my love for Chamillionaire in the past, but this album just shouts it.

The real kicker is his three-song trilogy, "The Morning News," "Hip Hop Police," and "The Evening News," which you can listen to back to back to back. These three songs are all explicitly political commentary - not social commentary, but political commentary. Which is different. There's a frustration here, that he wants to be taken seriously. He's a smart guy, but you need a good beat and some solid controversy to get anyone to listen to you - what do you see on the news, Chamillionaire's rapid-fire list of political opinions, or Cam'ron not snitching on the serial murderer next door? Shit, I'd be pissed too. Seems like no one takes you seriously as a rapper with a message unless you know Kanye. Sucks.

Then there's his opinions on the hip hop industry (where he half-assedly tries to
piss off people, but I think he's not enough of an asshole to really stir up shit), on "Industry Groupie", the classic chill-out track "The Ultimate Vacation," some actually very funny skits, and the incredibly gracious and flat-out nice track, "The Ultimate Victory." This record is an example of where Kanye would be if he didn't have the ego: broke.

2 Kanye West - Graduation
But while we're on Kanye, god DAMN. I think this is my favorite Kanye record, this is his victory lap, this is the one where he has nothing left to prove, this is still not an Album of the Year winner WHAT ELSE DO YOU WANT THE GRAMMYS.

Kanye is a better MC than he was, a more interesting producer than he was. Just about every song on this album seems like an event, even the ones that I don't dig as much.

Whenever I hear Will Wright speak, whenever I read something Chris Onstad wrote, whenever I listen to a Girl Talk song, I get the same impression as I'm starting to get from Kanye. This is true for a lot of rap, lyrically, but Kanye is getting there sonically. That impression is that you're getting something from someone who is a frantic consumer of all that's new in the world. I think Onstad put it best:

"Creative work is from a lifetime of constant influences. You can't help but be affected by Mark Twain books, Lay's Potato Chip ads, a fat lady who is yelling outside, David Letterman, etc."

I think the really genius creative forces are the ones who manage to put everything - lowbrow to highbrow, genius to inane, on the same plane and know how to keep that perfect balance. That's what makes a creative lyricist in the rap game so appealing, that they have such a rich palette from which to draw, but I think that's what makes Kanye's production work so perfect. The irrepressible Kanye style cannot be contained, and it's not so amazing that he crammed so much into 13 tracks as that he crammed so little - It feels like Kanye is such a unending well of creativity that I wonder what we're missing out on. Anyhow, Good Life is the best song of the year.

1 The Hood Internet - The Collected Works Of
I'm real sorry.

I know this doesn't count, but I couldn't in good faith put this anywhere other than #1.

It feels like a weight has been lifted from my shoulders. A lot of mainstream hip hop is boring, just like a lot of any other genre is boring. Indie Rock, by nature of being the critical darlings of the medium, is supposed to be better - but it too bores me fantastically, perhaps because it's trended so... white. There's no soul left in Indie rock. My musical taste, outside of hip hop, falls largely in the realm of what Pitchfork Media considers a "6.8."

The Hood has done something brilliant in the last year, that I've thought too much about and have very little left to say. But for anyone to say "If more hip hop sounded like this, more people would listen to hip hop," it's kind of telling about the state of the genre. It's too insular. For all that Kanye can do, I think that hip hop spends a lot of time looking in on itself, for all the talk about bringing "real hip hop" back, they look backwards when they should be looking outwards. There's a reason people say they listen to "anything but rap and country."

I lied last time around - the best song of the year is "I'm a Flirt (Shoreline)," but that doesn't count because it's a mashup. I've listened to it hundreds of times and never get sick of it. I hate Broken Social Scene and I think some of R. Kelly's less experimental stuff gets a little bland.

I think that there are two approaches for hip hop. The first is trying to start a revolution, trying to make the argument that so many in the past have tried to make, trying to affect social change. The second is a more passive method - get more people listening. Don't get the people listening now to act more than they have been, you, anonymous rapper, are not Martin Luther King. Get more people listening. This does not mean selling out. This does not mean watering down. This means experimenting, this means getting away from the insular shit that put the industry in the toilet this year. This is what just about every artist on this list has been doing, but this is what the Hood Internet has demonstrated so brilliantly - that the current bar for hip hop is set too low. Congratulations on going Internet Platinum, guys. I'll be on the Hood for all of 2008. This is a window into where hip hop could be some day, if they ever get their shit together. To think we have to wait for it is discouraging. Maybe two dudes on laptops doing mashups aren't influential enough to change shit, but until shit changes on its own, I'll be listening to them.

A final announcement, now that my list is done. In an effort to make my updates more regular, I am going to announce my upcoming topics in advance, so that I stick to it. It's a bit like announcing a lecture series or something. It took me forever and a half to write this entry because I had to listen to all these albums again. So here are the next two topics.

Presidents: Why Eisenhower is a President and Grant is a General
Rap: Wale, and why content doesn't matter.

Stay fresh like stay fresh guys. I am finally done with this one.

I am a-goin' for to tell you here to-day; yes, I'm a-goin for to tell you all, that I'm a plebian!

2008-02-07T02:17:00.000-06:00

OK Guys This is the new shit. This is an all-president article. You're excited.

This is #2 in my series on redeeming terrible presidents in hopes of illustrating the absolute horribility of George Bush. Plenty has been made of Bush's cronyism, ineptitude, deceit, and there's even some shit coming out now that rejects conservatism as a governing philosophy (sit down with a libertarian some time and have them try to explain to you why it is a good thing the FDA is trimmed down, how the free market will take care of salmonella and e. coli, why you shouldn't be paying taxes to run FEMA, which failed in New Orleans because it's severely understaffed and underfunded, not because of rote cronyism. You'll have fun). But for some to argue he's the worst president in history, well, I'm sure Andrew Johnson has something to say about that.

So how can we redeem a drunkard who nearly was impeached twice? I'm trying to defend a man who once said, and I quote, "This is a country for white men, and by God, as long as I am President, it shall be a government for white men."

Oh boy.

Well, let's start with the good. Johnson ended up doing a good job in terms of foreign policy, forcing the French from Mexico and purchasing Alaska from the Russians - perhaps a baffling move at the time, but with the discovery of gold, oil, and the strategic importance of the region during the Cold War, it ended up being a valuable purchase. It's debatable how much credit that gives him - you could say it was just dumb luck that the territory ended up paying off, or you could just say he knew a good investment when he saw it.

Johnson was a man of compromise. He was the only Southern senator to remain in Washington D.C. when the South seceded from the Union, and Lincoln rewarded him for his loyalty. He freed his slaves and supported black suffrage, arguing that "a loyal negro is more worthy than a disloyal white man." He favored quickly readmitting southern states to the Union, a matter on which he clashed with congress but borrowed from Lincoln. He had grown up poor and uneducated, and resented the rich. He wished to punish the leaders of the confederacy and rob them of their social power, but at the same time offer reconciliation to the masses which they misled. He let them have elections in 1865 - a number of prominent former Confederates were elected, but congress would not seat them.

Then there was his opposition to a civil rights bill. He opposed it, at the time, because it infringed upon state's rights, and because it was trying to give blacks citizenship when the southern states were still without representation. Now, you know me. I'm all for centralization and civil rights and all that other big-government crap, but I think Johnson should be judged by the era he lived in. He was given the unique legislative task of reconstructing a nation, legislatively. His goal from the outset was to maintain the stability of the Union - it might be sad to say, but at the time, slavery had been outlawed, the big one was taken care of, and the law wasn't going to out-and-out de-racist the backwards-ass southerners who started this shit in the first place. The biggest concern was to try to get the Union back together and keep it together. Johnson did follow Lincoln's admirable policy of leniency and forgiveness, which was a smart one (hey, we all saw how that victor's quest for vengeance post WWI worked out. Hint: WWII). But leaders are a product of the people they represent and the eras in which they lived. He aligned with the Democrats for most of his time in office, but maybe that was for the best - I suspect that had Lincoln survived, he might have taken a similar stance and taken a little bit of flak - though perhaps he would have handled it more astutely. Johnson was not a good President, but he was an uneducated man faced with a monumental task. Let's not forget why he was picked as Lincoln's running mate in the first place - he was a pro-Union Democrat and symbolized a certain unity, showing whatever your party was, the most important part was the stability of the Union.

Johnson's goal was to be a Uniter, not a divider. Lincoln was the master, and Johnson tried to live up to his ideals. Lincoln was a Republican who empathized with the south, Johnson was a Democrat whose main goal was that of the north. Sure, maybe he was largely ineffective as a politician, but he was faced with extraordinary circumstances. So he was an average president, not much more harmful than any other small-government politician. I wouldn't say he fucked things up more than Bush. He improved things, albeit slightly. But he wasn't Lincoln, and that's what hurt him.

Man in the Mirror: A P&R Review

2007-12-31T00:00:00.000-06:00

So normally I don't review records on this BLOG, but I had some special circumstances. Rhymefest, via a MySpace Bulletin, offered an advance copy of his new mixtape to anyone who promised to write a review of it. Well, here's that review.

Anyone who knows me knows that my 2007, musically, was dominated by The Hood Internet, just like Rhymefest's Blue Collar heated up my 2006. And one thing I heard someone say about the Hood that I think is really indicative of where hip hop is right now is "More people would listen to hip hop if it sounded more like this." Which is perhaps an indicator that rap is in a lot of ways really insular as a genre. Why do people say they listen to "everything but rap and country?" This isn't some snotty attempt to push some pro-indie rock agenda. No, it's a reflection on a genre that's still in its adolescence. What's been exciting on the rap scene in the last couple of years? Kanye sampling Daft Punk. Ohmega Watts working with Mr. Scruff. Rhymefest and Mark Ronson repurposing the Strokes. Hip Hop has to start looking outward instead of inward for ideas, work toward a musical revolution to complement the societal revolution. It might sound like mainstreaming the sound, "selling out," but with hip hop, you can change the sound and keep the message - the same way the Hood recontextualizes some of these tracks. Maybe change the attitude, maybe change the intensity or the delivery, but never the message.

So I've been babbling on for however many damn words about a perceived creative crossroads in hip hop. What's this have to do with Man in the Mirror, the new Rhymefest mixtape? Man in the Mirror is the Rhymefest & Mark Ronson tribute album to Michael Jackson. And who changed the game more than Michael Jackson? They're calling it a mixtape, and it does seem to go by pretty quickly, especially given how many tracks are just extended skits, but the tracks are high quality from front to back - if this is how El Che ends up sounding, I'll be a happy man.

The two are an interesting pair - Fest does some creative editing on a few audio tracks, creating "conversations" with MJ. You've got two interesting characters there - Michael, an embattled musical icon, one of the all-time greats but a few steps over the line of weird. And you've got Rhymefest, critically acclaimed, accomplished, responsible for Jesus Walks, one of the most ambitious and exciting figures in hip hop today, but he still hasn't broken through commercially. Michael practically invented modern pop music, transforming the Motown sound that the Jackson 5 embodied into the biggest selling album of all time. I get the impression that Rhymefest wants to do the same thing for Rap.

On "Breakadawn," one of the album's highlights, Fest paints both he and Michael as trailblazers - a pretty big boast for a rapper whose first album peaked at #61 on the Billboard 200. Fest won a Grammy before his album dropped, Michael sold 50 mil. Fest spoke on hip hop affairs with David Cameron in British Parliament, MJ got knighted. Fest cheerfully concedes defeat as only he can.

What's great about anything Rhymefest puts out is that he radiates personality and charisma. He's a funny dude - the skits are hilarious, especially when he edits himself into accusing Michael of passing gas in the studio. He's got a magnetism to him that is present in just about every track - the same earnest humor that made Blue Collar so refreshing.

Rhymefest is the perfect hip hop everyman, a down-to-earth guy who doesn't let his ego overshadow every track. So it's ironic that this album is as much about him as it is about Michael Jackson. It's a portrait of where Rhymefest has been and where he's going. There's some reflection on where he's been, all he's done - for a rapper whose audience isn't as big as it ought to be, he's accomplished a lot. But there's a lot to get done.

Rhymefest is perhaps the most ambitious rapper in the game. I'm not talking about the Jay-Z sort, a financial ambition, or the Kanye West sort, who's always struggling to top himself, or even the Public Enemy sort, seeking to change the world. Rhymefest could aspire to any one of those things. But his goal seems to be somehow reinventing hip hop - he derides ringtone rap and worries about being taken seriously in the hood without talking about shooting people and selling dope. On Blue Collar, he declared to the world that he wanted to tell a different story, the real story of the urban experience, that more people are waiting at the bus stop to go to work than selling drugs on any given corner. He's got one criminally overlooked classic album under his belt and now a mixtape where he meets the master and tells him, "I'm next."

The whole album feels like an event, more than just a mixtape that Rhymefest dropped to hold over fans waiting for El Che. While it's primarily an album about Fest, his update of a classic Ghostface track and his collaboration with Talib Kweli both bring solid verses that keep the album flowing. The disk never feels like a tribute to Michael Jackson as hosted by Rhymefest, but the guest contributions take the album on a different route if only briefly. I'm not complaining, though: who doesn't love Ghostface?

It'd be stupid to try to cover all the highlights, but I did want to throw some attention real quick to his almost child-like triumph at the end of "No Sunshine," where he boasts that he could give this record to the "biggest dope dealer in world, and he'd LOVE it!" There's the goal: Fest wants to be everything to everyone, he wants to stay positive but stay hood at the same time, to be a crossover icon but not branded as a sellout, and he's what really carries it through. I'm not sure anyone but him could do it this well (then again, what do I know about hood?).

I'm going to end this on the same point as I began - the beats. For my money, Mark Ronson is one of the best producers around today, and he shines on Man in the Mirror. The album could have easily been Rhymefest rapping over "Beat It," but it ends up being so much more ambitious than that - there's some solid use of some MJ interview tracks on Mike the Mentor, what starts as a skit but turns into a song about what it is to be black. Among the most inspired beats is "Foolin' Around", a classic Fest song that could be a sequel to "All Girls Cheat." Another is the title track, "Man in the Mirror" - fairly unchanged from the original MJ track, but the contrast between Fest's verses and the original MJ chorus is really effective as a closer to the album. It seems like Michael Jackson is mostly forgotten but for Thriller and for being Kind of Weird, but he does have a bit of a laid back jazzy quality to him in a lot of the tracks on this record. Maybe with Kanye sampling PYT on Graduation we're due for a resurgence of MJ in hip hop, and Rhymefest proves that you can't get a much better sample.

The only real problem is that the album was probably shorter than this review. I mean, who gives a shit, no complaints here. If it was much longer, he'd probably have to sell it. But the album reminds us that Fest can deliver. And it did it's job - J Records can't get its shit together soon enough.

Now, if Jay-Z were running...

2007-12-23T14:14:00.000-06:00

It should come as no surprise that I, as a person who is a fan of Smart People, endorse Barack Obama for president in 2008. I'm confident he's significantly smarter than anyone else running. Enough has been made of his vague promises to change the Washington atmosphere, but his specific plans on just standard governmental business is just fascinating.

I have, however, pledged not to make this a politics blog so much as a political history blog. About Presidents.

With that in mind, I'd like to direct you to the following piece Nightline did on Barack Obama.

There's a moment at the end where the anchor mentions that the Clinton campaign has already released a rebuttal to the interview, which they hadn't yet seen in full. The precise quote was "Considering that Senator Obama was a state senator just three years ago, he is the last person to be questioning anyone's experience. If he is elected, he would have less experience than any American President of the 20th Century."

Hold the fuck on.

The first thing I thought when I heard that was "Woodrow Fucking Wilson" and I immediately darted off to Wikipedia to confirm my suspicion. Now, Obama has talked a lot about how he has the "right kind" of experience, even if it's not necessarily enough. But let's see if we can talk about the experience question - in the modern, dominant, and embattled presidency of the 20th Century, how much experience does an aspiring President traditionally have?

Well, first, what counts as experience? Barack is keen to point out that he has more time in elected office than either of his chief competitors - Hillary Clinton will have eight years of Senate experience by the time the 2008 election rolls around, John Edwards will have had six. Barack will have had four, but eight years in state government before that. Of course, Hillary spent twenty years as the first lady of somewhere or other, but are we counting that? I don't think that's a position in the constitution.

If we're to play against Barack, we'll say that a position in national government, whether it means you're in the legislative branch, appointed by the president, or, what the hell, married to the president counts. Let's also say that having an executive position over any other government institution is also a reasonable way to have experience - say, Mayor, Governor, or if we're feeling salty, the Chairperson of the County Board (Just a few more years, Todd Stroger, and we'll elect you president!). And let's not count anything in state government, because that is obviously riding with training wheels.

The first President we'll look at is Teddy Roosevelt. War hero, right? He started as a state assemblyman and was on the United States Civil Service Commission from 1888 to 1895. Does that count? I'm not sure how important that was. Kind of a low level appointment, let's put that on the same level as State Senator, along with his experience as the president of the board of the New York City Police Commissioners for the two years after that.

T.R. was appointed Secretary of the Navy in 1897, and promptly resigned it in 1898 to serve in the Volunteer Cavalry in the Spanish-American War. He was in the military for less than a year, and was elected as Governor of New York in 1898. In 1900 he was forced upon McKinley as a running mate by Thomas C. Platt, became Vice President, served as VP for six months and then McKinley was shot and he inherited the Presidency.

So Teddy had, by our standards, about... four years of experience in National Government? Are we counting Military experience? Shit, why not.

William Howard Taft! Mediocre president, superb Chief Justice. Two years as the Governor-General of the Phillipines, and four as the Secretary of War. Filipinos loved him, though.

Next up was Woodrow Wilson, who I mentioned previously. He was the President of Princeton University for eight years, and then the governor of New Jersey for two. And while I respect his time as the president of a university, doesn't count. Two years. Didn't he lead us through World War I or something? I hear he was a racist. Fucking Wilson.

Harding had six years in the Senate, and two years as the Lieutenant Governor of Ohio. Silent Cal Coolidge was mayor for two years, Lieutenant Governor for three, Real Governor for two more, and Vice President for two before becoming president on accident. Hoover was head of the Food Administration for four years and Secretary of Commerce for eight. FDR was Assistant Secretary of the Navy for seven years and Governor for four. Truman was a Senator for ten years and VP for four months. Eisenhower had a bunch of important military positions for about eleven years that I don't really want to list. Kennedy spent fourteen years in congress, LBJ for 12 with two as VP. Nixon had four in the house, two in the Senate, and eight as VP. Ford spent an uneventful 24 years in the House of Representatives, including eight years as minority leader, and then less than one as VP. Carter spent four years as Governor, Reagan eight. Bush I was a representative for four years, ambassador to the UN for 2, head of the RNC for 1, head of the CIA for 1, and VP for eight. Clinton was governor for 12 years, GWB for 6.

What a lovely list! Now, I'm not entirely sure how we're sorting this list. What better prepares you for the presidency? Being President of a University? Serving in the Military? But one could argue that Wilson's greatest triumphs were leading the US through war and his postwar efforts at a new world order, or that Eisenhower's greatest legacy was his effective management of a nation in peacetime, with the Space Race, Social Security, the Interstate Highways and the nearly unrivaled prosperity. Is legislative experience less effective than executive? Truman and Kennedy did pretty well for themselves. Does a long, illustrious career make a glorious president? Nixon and Ford seem to be the exception to that rule. And of course, Wilson and Roosevelt, routinely ranked in the Near Great category of presidents (around #5 or #6) had less experience than Obama.

So what's the point? It's hard to tell what experience an effective President needs; it often seems to be associated with the historical circumstances of the era - General Wesley Clark could have been the spiritual successor to Ike had he run in a different era. Eisenhower and Wilson embraced their roles as outsiders in their successful presidencies. George Bush Sr. did a pretty good job in the early 90s despite being a longtime government insider (admittedly in a time where something like that was more of an asset - he handled the Gulf War and the breakup of the USSR well). One could pretty easily argue that now is the time for an outsider, given the rampant power abuses and corruption of this administration, while led by a supposed outsider but infested with longtime political institutions.

Does Barack Obama have the experience to be President?

No, he needs to be appointed Assistant Secretary of the Navy. But maybe after that.

More Rap.

2007-11-06T01:46:00.000-06:00

I haven't done a straight up presidents entry in quite a while. And I'll definitely trot one out one of these days. For now, though...

Collide You A Drank has the perfect vibe for this time of Fall. I've been in a bit of a mood, and the slow build really is doing wonders for me.

Speaking of, I contend that T-Pain is the artist of the year, appearing on "Buy U A Drank," "I'm A Flirt (remix)," "Kiss Kiss," and "Good Life." He's like the universal condiment - if your song is missing something, throw in T-Pain and you've got one of the best songs of the year. Hip Hop soon will have five elements - MCing, graffiti, DJing, breakdancing, and T-Pain.

Now for Lupe Fiasco news...

I submit that for "The Cool," "Dumb it Down" is the new "Kick Push"

And "Superstar" is the new "Daydreamin'"

So I'll feel more comfortable about "The Cool" if he puts out another "I Gotcha"

I don't give Food & Liquor enough credit.

Reprinting Content

2007-10-31T03:20:00.000-05:00

So in lieu of coming up with something original, here's an article I wrote for the paper a few weeks back, entitled "Rap is like History Volume 1: Presidents and Rap." The worst part is that I implied it would be a series, which means I'm probably going to end up writing "Roman military campaigns are like seminal rap albums" or something stupid like that in the next few weeks. For now, here's what is effectively the mixtape of this blog so far. Enjoy!

Did you know that real history is a lot like rap? It’s true! For example, here are some presidents, and here is some rap. Think about how they are the same!

The O.D.B. is the Andrew Jackson of Rap
There are two anecdotes that corroborate this. First, in 1835 Richard Lawrence tried to assassinate Andrew Jackson. Lawrence was a mentally deranged man who believed that only Jackson stood in the way of Lawrence’s ascenscion to become the king of England. Lawrence approached Jackson in the Capitol Rotunda and fired two pistols at him. Incredibly, both misfired. President Jackson promptly proceeded to start beating Lawrence with his cane as his aides restrained Lawrence. Similarly, when a would-be mugger attempted to stick-up ODB and his Wu-Tang compatriot, RZA, ODB grabbed the shotgun from him and turned it back at the robber.

Secondly, Jackson owned a parrot named Poll. Poll was brought to attend Jackson’s funeral in 1845. To date, Poll has been the only parrot on record to have been ejected from a Presidential funeral, as Poll would not stop swearing.

If teaching a parrot to swear does not embody the O.D.B., I don’t know what does.

The D.O.C. is the William Henry Harrison of Rap
The D.O.C. released one classic album, “No One Can Do It Better.” It received widespread acclaim from just about everyone, including 5 Mics from the Source. Shortly after that, he got into a car accident that crushed his larynx, forever altering his voice. He never achieved the same level of success. Similarly, William Henry Harrison, the hero of the Battle of Tippecanoe, was responsible for the legendary campaign song, “Tippecanoe and Tyler Too.” After being elected and delivering a two-hour long inaugural address on a cold, wet day, he caught a cold, could not find any place to rest, developed pneumonia, and died 30 days into his term. They are easily one and the same.

Dr. Dre is the Grover Cleveland of Rap
1884: Grover Cleveland is elected to office, ending twenty-four years of postwar weak Republican rule during which time the nations powers primarily lay in the hands of the Senate. With a reputation for being incredibly honest, he uses his vetoes more than all previous presidents combined.
1992: Dr. Dre releases The Chronic, a seminal album famous for popularizing gangsta rap. It features a bunch of disses to Eazy-E, which are kind of like veto power over Eazy-E.
1888: Grover Cleveland wins the popular vote but loses the Electoral College in his re-election campaign.
1996: Dr. Dre leaves Death Row Records and gets off to a rocky start with his new label, Aftermath.
1892: Cleveland wins re-election because of something about tariffs and gold reserves, thereby giving context to the word “nonconsecutive.” He continues being effective.
1999: Dr. Dre releases “2001,” which is also a good album.
1896: “Nowadays everybody wanna talk, like they got something to say. But nothing comes out when they move their lips, just a bunch of gibberish! The agrarians and silverites act like they forgot about Cleveland.”
2007: “Detox is comin’, y’all.” Or something.

Kanye West is the Woodrow Wilson of Rap
Haters often ignore Woodrow Wilson’s visionary diplomatic policy, plans for a New World Order, leadership through World War I and the Versailles conference, and his molding of the United States into a benevolent imperial power. Instead, haters like to focus on how he was quoted in “Birth of a Nation.” Even though he was quoted on the KKK: “...no more obnoxious or harmful organization has ever shown itself in our affairs.” Likewise, haters like to ignore that Kanye West has released three albums essential to any hip hop library and instead focus on how he’s got a bit of an ego, as opposed to every other rapper who is incredibly modest.

Aesop Rock is the Warren G. Harding of Rap
If someone tells you they love rap and when you ask them who their favorite rapper is they say “Aesop Rock,” that’s kind of like someone saying that they’re really politically active and you ask them what their political leanings are and they say “Libertarian.” It just doesn’t count. That’s not to say Harding was a bad president or Aesop Rock is a bad rapper. It just doesn’t count. Harding wasn’t technically a libertarian, but he’s the closest those chumps have.

LL Cool J is the Lyndon Johnson of Rap
LL Baines J

Eazy-E is the Richard M. Nixon of Rap
Eazy-E was a member of the highly successful N.W.A., just as Richard Nixon was part of the highly successful Eisenhower administration. Both of their solo projects started out highly successful, with Eazy’s album “Eazy-Duz-It” going double platinum and Nixon being elected to a second term. However, toward the end of Eazy’s term with N.W.A., it was revealed that he and N.W.A. manager Jerry Heller had been skimming money off the top from N.W.A., just as Nixon was revealed to be involved with the Watergate burglaries. Following this, Nixon resigned in disgrace, and Eazy-E got AIDS and died.

Sisqo is the Gerald Ford of Rap
Sisqo, the highly successful lead singer of Dru Hill, bust onto the scene in 1999 with his hit “Thong Song.” While Thong Song made him a whole mess of money, years later everyone agreed that it was a corny novelty song and Sisqo was actually a huge tool, with his bleached hair and all that. Likewise, Gerald Ford was the Minority Leader of the House of Representatives from 1965 to 1973 where he was a fair leader and an inoffensive personality. Richard Nixon picked him as Vice President after Spiro Agnew resigned in 1973; the next year, Nixon resigned and Ford became president. He was not a very good president, and he lost a lot of popularity when he pardoned Nixon. Everyone now agrees he was a much better congressman than a President.

Suge Knight is the Ronald Reagan of Rap
Suge Knight, the co-founder of Death Row Records, entered the unfortunate situation of running a rap label in the 1990s while simultaneously feuding with every rapper working in the 1990s. I am surprised he is still alive. Reagan, on the other hand, was a crazy neocon who had Alzheimer’s for probably half of his term, refused to talk about AIDS until someone famous died from it, quadrupled the deficit, and was involved in the Iran-Contra affair. The point I’m trying to make is that both of them are incredibly powerful chumps.

Cam’ron is the George W. Bush of Rap
Cam’ron has beef with a whole bunch of folks and insists on starting trouble with people like Jay-Z, 50 Cent, and Ma$e. He was once shot in the arm three times after someone tried to carjack him, then drove around flashing his lights and going the wrong way on streets trying to get a cop’s attention because he didn’t know where the nearest hospital was. He says he doesn’t know who shot him and he’s “not a snitch” and wouldn’t help the police find out who it was. When he was asked if he would tell the police if there was a serial killer living next door to him, he said he wouldn’t tell the police, because helping the police violates his code of ethics, but he would “probably move.” Apparently, though, he did cooperate with the police when 15 guys beat him up in 1999. Among people who I would want to raise my theoretical children, this puts him at the bottom of the list, right next to George W. Bush.

Fuck Nerdcore

2007-10-13T21:15:00.000-05:00

Sometimes I feel a little bit self-conscious, like I've thrown myself too fully into this rap thing. But it seems like by the nature of the rap game, it's by default the most interesting thing on the market. Oh, it's just talking fast to music, or oh, it's so violent and misogynistic.

The thing about hip hop is that it's the only genre that is so persistently bizarre, where there's a culture surrounding it in which fucking weird things happen all the time. I mean, beyond the previously mentioned Snoop Dogg moving to Australia, 50 Cent getting caught in an embarrassing display of lipsyncing, anything R. Kelly does (it sort of counts), the T.I. show at MSG, MIMS in general, and the absurd Graduation vs Curtis showdown, not to mention Lupe Fiasco, Paul Wall, and Twista's inexplicable appearance in this:

Then there's Chamillionaire's sampling of The Final Countdown on Ultimate Victory and how his song "Hip Hop Police" is the first song about Crime to appear on Radio Disney (he says "Heck Yeah" instead of "Hell Yeah," if you believe Wikipedia and I do believe wikipedia).

Then there's this classic from 1983:

Actually, this might continue with the Chamillionaire theme for a while, as he's starting to get funnier and funnier:

And then there's Kanye's Old-Ass Cousin

To love the genre, to love the culture, is to embrace the ridiculousness of it all. Maybe it is just because it is still in its adolescence as a genre, artistically. Rappers, paradoxically, seem to take themselves a lot less seriously this decade. Maybe it's reactionary to the Suge Knight era, but I think it's a turning point for the genre. It's not joke rap, but it's to the point where rappers can goof off, and I find no end to the enjoyment.

BONUS INSIGHT

2007-09-30T04:26:00.001-05:00

I will continue this blog with a thought.

If Grover Cleveland is the Dr. Dre of Presidents, then you can almost assuredly say that the rap world's answer to William Henry Harrison is the D.O.C.

Isn't this true?

Medium Shit Poppin'

2007-08-29T03:35:00.000-05:00

I'd like to be able to say that my absence was, say, to let some rap news pile up. Truth is, end of the summer burnout hit me hard.

But there are a few things I would like to mention here before I take my leave for the evening.

I'm anxiously awaiting more news on the Kanye/Lupe/Pharrell supergroup, and somewhat distraught over Lupe's desire to leave the rap game.

Unfortunately, out of the big Chicago releases this year, I find myself with little interest in Common's new effort, especially considering the lukewarm reception and the shitty video for "Drivin' Me Wild". Though Rhymefest garnered my best album of 2006 nod and my Lupe Fiasco enthusiasm was unrivaled last summer, Kanye's album is the one that sounds most promising. It's a little unfortunate, really. I'd hoped that Kanye would be the old standard that I underestimate and sneaks up on me, while the Rhymefest and Lupe efforts are the standouts that I look forward to with bated breath all through the fall months. That's not so much the case - Food & Liquor was a disappointment. Don't get me wrong, it was a great album, but I expected it to be my 2006 soundtrack. There weren't enough fantastic tracks on the record, it was a bit too laid back for me. It was thoroughly outdone on all counts by Blue Collar. Rhymefest's next album, on the other hand, well. The stuff he's been releasing on his myspace hasn't been my cup of tea thusfar. But alternately, he got me pretty fuckin' excited at his Lollapalooza show, and Wikipedia is claiming (without sources) that he's got Kanye rapping on three tracks, one featuring Lupe an done featuring Common, and producing four more. Lupe similarly excited at the Lollapalooza gig. But for now, the Presidents and Rap offices are continuously abuzz over Graduation - how good will it be? Will it be perfect?

Meanwhile, you might have heard 50 Cent is retiring?

I hope not. He's a tool and a huge douchebag, but I still like the guy. He's a talented rapper, and I think the Kanye/50 rivalry is going to sell a LOT of records. Until they inevitably do a record together. Or one shoots the other.

And speaking of, y'all hear about this Madison Square Garden show? Holy heck, what I would have given to be there. 50 Cent, Kanye, Diddy, Jay-Z, T.I., and Ciara on one stage at the same time. I think the best take comes from whudat

Of course the chorus line. T.I. was somewhere on that stage

There he is

Excellent.

Clintonian Idealism

2007-08-07T22:14:00.000-05:00

So I saw "The Hunting of the President" again recently. Now, I've got some strong feelings on impeachment, especially with what's being bandied about recently. Has George W. Bush committed impeachable offenses? I don't doubt it. Should he be impeached? I don't think so. I'm worried that with the debacle that was the Clinton impeachment trial in so recent memory, impeachment might just turn into another political ploy that gets thrown out every time a president is doing something the opposition dislikes with passion and briefly exposes a vulnerability. I would like nothing more than to see GWB thrown out on his ass, but I think that the neocon era would do much better if it sputters to a halt rather than ignite a vengeful spark in the hearts of hard-line conservatives. My entire political maturity has been in the GWB presidency, and I think the young folks in such revolt are either in the same position as I, or are just old enough to have been able to comprehend the details of Clinton impeachment while it was still in motion, which helps matters none.

So like I was saying.

The movie makes its points excellently, but I wanted to turn to a bonus feature on the DVD - the talk that Clinton gave directly following the premiere of the movie. While the entirety of the talk is rewarding, as Clinton is an engaging speaker who I love, it's when he turns his view toward the historical presidency that things get interesting.

He says that the personal animosity he engendered had the most parallels to 18th century America, when the main issues were whether we'd have a national economy and whether we'd have a national legal system, how the federalists and antifederalists were so hateful toward one another until everything was settled, followed by the Era of Good Feelings. The next battle was whether you could secede from the Union, slavery and all that, then following Lincoln's death and Johnson's impeachment what the reconstruction would look like, until that was settled with the election of Ulysses Grant, followed by several more decades of stability. The next sea change was in the early 20th century, regarding industrialism and government regulation of the corporations within. Roosevelt carried the flag of big government (zounds!) until Taft deviated from his policies and then Woodrow Wilson picked up where Roosevelt left off in the field of big government and the Democrats became the progressives. Clinton says that issue wasn't resolved until after the second World War, because following Wilson, Harding, Coolidge and Hoover played the role of reactionaries, the Depression set in, and FDR and Truman's policies established the US Government not only as the leader in the world but domestically a mediator for capitalism, to protect natural resources and competition and promote social justice.

Still with me? I know that was a long paragraph.

Clinton says that the main issue facing the United States today would be the definition of the role of government in a postindustrial era, in an era of unprecedented diversity, and asks what it means to define, defend, and expand the union. He argues that the Democrats are on the right side because throughout history at every crossroads we have elected to expand the union further - broader freedoms, community, and opportunities, that we've always gone forward. He also touches on the 2000 election and the even split, which can mostly be attributed to a discussion on tax cuts that didn't address the problems if taxes were cut, as well as social issues (god guns and gays).

I like that approach to the election, because it seems like historically the weakest presidents have not so much failed in their promises but rather deliver on promises that in the long run end up being the incorrect ones. The ones who promise the right things and don't deliver are generally ranked highly.

So I suppose the Clintonian view of Executive American History is that Democrats bring us forward, and Republicans slow us down. That's not to marginalize the role of Republicans, as progress can only happen so fast and normalcy is a good thing every once in a while. Think of the great post-Wilson Democrat leaders and their policies - a New World Order, the New Deal, Communist containment, the Great Society, Kennedy idealism, and then think of the responses from the Republican leaders that followed. We stayed out of the League of Nations (perhaps we weren't quite ready to lead the world) and pulled out of Korea and Vietnam. In the long view of it, Democrats are progress and Republicans are restraint.

A bold individual, probably my mom, once said that Republicans cut taxes so much that Democrats are forced to raise them to compensate, and then the Republicans win power again by capitalizing on that. Republicans have been in power way more frequently than Democrats - Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan and GWB all got their second terms (and Reagan got a third, sort of) while only Clinton and LBJ get that honor. 12 years of Democrat rule since '68? Bogus. But I would argue that when Republicans sneak in they're only allowed to be in power for as long as it takes to start regressing, and then Democrat progress prevails.

Of course, the cold war tainted all that, and since I think it's not long before we all recognize the War on Terror as a sham, I look forward to the political scene of the 21st century. This is gonna be fun.

Meet Mr. Me Too

2007-07-29T22:44:00.000-05:00

Greetings! Life is busy.

Anyhow, about two weeks ago I was at the Pitchfork Fest. I wasn't there for very long. On Friday, we got there toward the end of GZA's set, decided "why are we here" and ten minutes into Sonic Youth, left.

Saturday, the only full set I saw was Clipse. It was an excellent set, no doubt. Clipse has very much grown on me. It's hard to explain why I like them so much - their beats are very sparse and I do not connect with their lyrics. For someone whose favorite rap song is "Devil's Pie" by Rhymefest, a song that has an incredible hook and a great topic, it's odd. I tend to think the beats are very important - check The Hood Internet, and you'll see what I mean. Rap that I generally wrote off as tacky or music I ignored as dull is fused to create something wonderful. I don't much like I'm A Flirt, but I'm A Flirt (Shoreline) is musical divinity.

I have struggled recently with what I think is so enduring about the genre of rap - you could argue that the art of the mashup demonstrates a few things, how important a good beat is and how interchangeable a vocal track is. Even in the process of creating a mashup, I found that the primary link between the two, other than general song structure and the organization of thoughts into couplets and so on, is the rhythm. And of course, a good rap song relies on a beat and a vocal track to work - as I pointed out re: "Tooken Back" by Ghostface, a good beat can change the entire mood of the song.

And I think the whole idea of it as poetry is a sack of shit. I ain't no poetry buff.

I think what's great about hip hop as a genre is that it allows a rapper to take different attitudes toward his work. Other music relies on crafting a song, but I think that you can really get a feel on a good rapper's personality by listening to him rhyme. You can like the music a group makes, and like them from getting a feel on their live personality or media personality, but much more often you actually get to like a rapper as a person not just because of their verbal acuity. Rappers and comedians, moreso than how Dave Chappelle linked them together in his film, are very similar to one another - out of all media personalities, they're the only ones who really give you a piece of their mind.

So yeah, that's the je ne se quois on why I love Clipse. De La Soul was there too, and damn, I love me some Jazz Rap. We skipped out early to avoid traffic. Finally, Girl Talk = disaster. Why put him on a small stage? Totally disappointed I missed it.

Here's my self-promotion - my video for I'm a Flirt (Shoreline), mentioned earlier.

I am not fit for this office and never should have been here

2007-07-13T17:10:00.000-05:00

It's been a busy week!

But you're not here for excuses. You're here for Presidents. Let's do it.

One time when I told someone I am a political science major they asked me if George Bush is really the worst president ever, and I responded with a nonanswer. I haven't done any work ranking the presidents, and I'm done with outrage over the Bush administration. I am just waiting them out at this point. He is a lame duck now, the worst is over. The beauty of the American system, especially following the 22nd Amendment, is that there is a time limit.

There are two ways to illustrate the relative poorness of this administration compared to others. The first is to illustrate their failings. That has been done ad nauseam. The other is to redeem other reviled presidents. So, first in a series.

Let's start at the bottom of the barrel. The president ranked, on average, as the worst ever. Warren G. Harding. Ranked the worst president in history in Schlesinger's 1948 poll of Presidential Historians, in his 1962 poll, in Murray-Blessing's 1982 Poll, and in Siena's polls in 1982, 1990, and 1994.

Why do we hate Harding so? He is largely reviled for his corrupt administration. Few will defend his administration against those charges - his Secretary of the Interior Albert Fall was the first member of the Cabinet to ever go to jail (peculiarly, the only illegal thing Fall did was accept bribes. The leases he issued were perfectly legal). Several other high-level government officials were involved in similar bribery and fraud. Harding, however, appeared to be completely uninvolved, other than appointing a completely corrupt cabinet.

No one knows how much Harding knew about the corruption in his administration, but we do know he received a lengthy message directly preceding his death detailing illegal activities that he likely did not previously know about. When he died, the corruption charges had not yet come to light.

Harding knew he was unqualified for the job, he knew he had lost control on his cabinet. But what can we blame him for? Being a poor judge of character? Dying before having a chance to redeem himself? It seems very hard to fault him too much for this.

What did Harding do that should give him more historical credit? Here are several things:

He held the first disarmament conference in history, the Washington Naval Conference, despite the US being outside the League of Nations, and it was largely a success, maintaining peace throughout the 1920s and establishing China's sovereignty.
He pardoned Eugene V. Debs.
He established the Bureau of Veterans' Affairs
He compensated Colombia for the loss of Panama
He made peace with the Central Powers to end World War I.

Great things? Hardly. Good things? Good enough. Good enough that Warren G. Harding should not be ranked as a necessarily bad president. Just a mediocre one.

How we do it in the Chi

2007-07-10T18:18:00.000-05:00

Over the weekend I re-watched Dave Chappelle's Block Party on DVD. I caught it in the theater when it first dropped - it was really a good portrait of DC's frame of mind in the time between his signing a 50 million dollar contract and ditching the same contract. As there were no Presidents in this movie (except for the song "If I Was President" this entry is about the rap in the movie.

Almost every musician in the film were from either NYC, Chicago, or Philadelphia. And while the old woman from Broken Angel wasn't a fan of how negative hip-hop is, how much cussin' there is, it was an overwhelmingly positive lineup. Very soul based. What would you call that style? Socially conscious rap, since everyone had a message?

It's peculiar that rap is so localized. I'd like to explain, but I'll let MIMS do it.

I represent New York
I got it on my back
Niggas say that we lost it
So I'm gonna bring it back
I love the dirty, dirty
'Cause niggas show me love
The ladies start to bounce
As soon as I hit the club
But in the Midwest
They love to take it slow
So when I hit the H
I watch you get it on the floor
And if you needed it hyphy
I take it to the Bay
Frisco to Sac-town
They do it everyday
Compton to Hollywood
As soon as I hit L.A.
I'm in that low, low
I do it the Cali way
And when I hit Chi
People say that I'm fly
They love the way I dress they like my attire
They love how I move crowds from side to side
They ask me how I do it and simply I reply...

Etc.

The West Coast is still the home of Gangsta, the Yay Area is the home of hyphy, dirty south, etc. Why's the northeastern quadrant of the country so synonymous with socially-conscious, well-intentioned rap?

Don't get me wrong, it doesn't matter to me whether or not a rap song says something - I think T.I. has some great shit out there that says absolutely nothing (What You Know About That?). But what is it about the northeast that compels rappers to make a point?

What's great about the film, though, or perhaps about the genre of rap we're talking about, is how easy it is to tell that everyone really cares about the music, that the art of it is the most important part. Perhaps it's showing the divide - someone like 50 Cent, whose flaws I addressed previously, seems to be primarily a performer. A half-assed one, but he's a businessman, a character, a performer. What's more important - image, lifestyle, business, or the poetry of it? Can you describe it as poetry to a beat? I think that's what really sets these goddamn northeasterners apart.

Side note: dead prez was in this movie. Last time I saw them, they got a whole bunch of white people to yell "REPARATIONS NOW." fucking white people.

Woodrow Wilson Defense Fund

2007-07-06T17:47:00.000-05:00

Until recently, I took it for granted that Woodrow Wilson was one of our most influential and respected presidents. And then I found that he has nearly as many detractors as he has supporters.

So it's time to teach you motherfuckers a lesson.

I am going to go through every criticism of Woodrow Wilson that I can think of and explain to you why it is wrong. OK? Let's do this shit.

1. He was a racist. He had KKK ties. He reinstituted segregation. He was quoted extensively in "Birth of a Nation."

Far be it for me to ever endorse racism, imply that racism was ever socially acceptable, or to defend a racist president. Instead, let's break down Wilson's positions on race.

For instance, regarding the KKK: "...no more obnoxious or harmful organization has ever shown itself in our affairs."

Sounds like a big fan of lynching, there. He, in fact, disliked Birth of a Nation and had it banned during wartime. Even funnier, his quotes largely related to the reasons the KKK was founded - that because southern racist whites were not represented during reconstruction, they instead elected to try to accomplish what they wanted via intimidation. So, yeah. Big racist, that Wilson. Always trying to offer different perspectives on slavery.

What of the segregation thing?

Well, what of it? Plessy v Ferguson was decided in 1896, a mere 16 years before he took office. Brown v Board of Education was decided in 1954, 34 years after he left. Wilson himself said there were benefits to segregation - "If the colored people made a mistake in voting for me, they ought to correct it." Blacks attacked him for instituting segregation at all, and southern racists attacked him for not going far enough. It is very easy to look back with some perspective and say everything ought to have been integrated, but a president reflects the people who elected him.

In any case, Wilson's alleged racism is such a non-issue, that he segregated government jobs, compared to his impact on American history that it seems pointless to even dwell on it.

2. Espionage Act of 1917? Worse than the Patriot Act.

Before we start, I'd like to say Fuck the Patriot Act.

First and foremost: Congress passes acts, not the President. He signed it, but it needed the support of Congress first. Thought I'd throw that out there.

You know what else happened? Lincoln suspended Habeas Corpus, FDR set up Japanese internment camps, and Truman took loyalty oaths from government officials, firing many and letting more resign. What is it about national crises that make presidents need to exert a greater degree of control at home?

In each of these cases, the Union was threatened like never prior. First, by civil war, then by the largest war to date including a certain Zimmerman Telegram, then by a war even greater than that, then the threat of Soviet nuclear annihilation. Presidents take more power during wartime. Was it unconstitutional? Not according to 1919's Schenck v. United States (validated by three branches! You owe me a quarter), but it probably was unconstitutional. Great presidents expand the power of the office to the point where it can be considered unconstitutional, though the converse doesn't necessarily hold true (see: Nixon). The powers of the act were undoubtedly abused (Eugene Debs). However, I don't think that something like this is enough to condemn Wilson entirely. No deduction.

PS: Fuck the Patriot Act, because the War on Terror? Not a national crisis.

3. Because Wilson elected to enter World War I, the Treaty of Versailles was signed, leading to Germany's post-war crippling and humiliation. Because of this, Hitler could come to power and kill all the Jews.

This is the dumbest fucking one.

To start, I'll play in your space logic world and pretend like Hitler would have never risen and whatever. Let's say that the conditions did not exist for Hitler to come to power and Germany remains a fantasy paradise.

Do you know who else was in Europe around that time? Stalin. Think he'd be on our side?

Anyone who has played Red Alert knows that with no Hitler, Stalin proceeds to sweep through Europe. BAM! Things are more fucked up than before. Do you know how many fucking people Stalin killed? So very many.

OK, let's say you disagree with my version of history and believe that post-WWI Europe, after a long and bloody stalemate, would have turned into a bunny-infested paradise.

Wilson's Fourteen Points hardly have anything to do with humiliating the losers. He was clearly the only true statesman present for the negotiation of the treaty, and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for spearheading the League of Nations. But beyond that - if one is to argue that Wilson should have somehow known the result of the war would be the rise of fascism, it is either to suggest that a) Wilson ought to have had supernatural powers or that b) no one should ever do anything, because of unforseen consequences. James Watt, you asshole. You invented the steam engine which led to rapid industrialization of the Western World which haphazardly produced loads and loads of pollution which caused global warming which will destroy the planet, you ASS.

Perhaps one of the stupidest things you can do is blame World War II on Woodrow Wilson. If the rest of the world wasn't ready to hear him, perhaps that's his fault.

4. Sure, he proposed the 14 points, but they were mostly ignored and we didn't even join the League of Nations.

He had a fucking stroke. He was out campaigning for the League so hard that he had a stroke and became bitterly uncompromising. Republicans were strongly opposed to the League in the Senate, and Wilson had a stroke and was unwilling to compromise. So we never joined. It's unfortunate, and if we would have joined, Wilson would be undoubtedly even more highly regarded. These don't really count as points against Wilson, but aren't exactly points for him.

Anything else? I'm glad to continue to defend WW with whatever you wish to throw out there.

Now, let's look at why one should consider Wilson among our upper echelon of presidents.

The League of Nations was effectively the model for the UN three decades later, and shit like the War Industries Board were models for the New Deal. He was the architect for the plans that would end up so widely revered by the Second World War. Wilsonian Idealism has been the primary influence for foreign policy throughout the Western World throughout the 20th century. Self-determination, collective security, democratic government, international law. We take these things for granted by now, but Wilson was the perhaps the most brilliant and influential foreign policymaker of the century, if not more. Before the USA got the poor reputation it enjoys today, we were the shining example of a benevolent empire, the superpower that can end the dopey territory wars, that can settle issues with diplomacy rather than militarism. Wilson set that example. He expanded the role of the president to include the diplomat to the world, and embraced a New World Order. We now have that order, and it is described as Wilsonian Idealism.

Think about what the Constitution means. Ignore our current administration, the politics, all of that, and think of what it means. It's a pretty fucking good American ideal to try to live up to. The document might not be perfect, but we all know exactly what it's trying to live up to - a perfect fusion of freedom and order, of safety and expression. Where we are welcome to live our life to the fullest under our own control, with a government to ensure it stays that way. Where everybody gets a shot. Imagine the rest of the world given that kind of liberty. I don't mean the imposing democracy that's so trendy, I mean what a true, kindly American empire could be. Making the world more perfect by example.

That's what Wilson means to me.

Don't fuck with Wilson. I might be more of a Tru-Man, but Wilson waits in the wings.

Sydney and Long Beach Together

2007-07-05T17:42:00.000-05:00

You heard that Snoop Dogg is moving to Australia?

For real.

This from a country that when I type "Australia Rap" into the Firefox Google Search-Guess-Thing it predicts I will be searching for "Australia Rape."

If you want to learn more about Australian hip-hop, check the Wikipedia.

So Snoop could become for Australia what Michael Jackson is for Bahrain.

I really don't have any great insight on this right now. Snoop is moving there to "slow it down [and] enjoy the women."

This is like the Cavs getting LeBron James. Culturally speaking, Australia = Canada, rap scenes included. Right now, the biggest rap star between the two is Tom Green. But now? Snoop owns the South Pacific.

Maybe this'll help him get into England.

Check out That's That Shit for evidence on why the flyest girls are from the Chi.

You forgot...

2007-07-04T13:16:00.000-05:00

Check this shit out.

If you're done (or don't want to take it) click for the jump.

You went behind a tree and peed

2007-07-03T23:58:00.000-05:00

As much rap as I like to listen to, I do not listen to much associated with the Wu-Tang Clan. There's a Rhymefest track that features the ODB and I've got a copy of Fishscale that I've not listened to very much, but that's about it. I'm pretty well versed in most other areas of the rap world, but I'm behind the times on the Wu-Tang. I don't know my RZA from my GZA.

There's a track by the Hood Internet, though, that features "Tooken Back" by Ghostface. The mashup really brings a new dimension to the song, that makes it sound a whole lot more desperate and vulnerable. But Ghostface had the balls to record a song like that in the first place.

It's a rap love song.

I don't think I've ever heard anything like that before. I've heard plenty of rap songs about moms - it's cool to do that, everyone almost respects their mom. But no love songs. Not the probably-bisexual Kanye West, with his "We all self-conscious, I'm just the first to admit it" (I'm OK with bisexuals! Kanye is the man!). Lupe Fiasco, for all the credit his album got, still maintains a relative distance from his subject matter. Even if you take, for instance, anything Jay-Z does with Beyonce, you still have the context that Beyonce is among the hottest women alive and that Jigga is allowed to brag. Is there another major rap act that could get away with "you know I always love you, never meant to hurt you"?

Shit, I gotta start listening to more Ghostface. Dude's got balls.

JFK was a handsome man

2007-07-03T16:54:00.000-05:00

This week's edition of Time Magazine is "The 6th Annual Making of America Issue." Previous MoAs have focused on Lewis & Clark, Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Abe Lincoln, and Teddy Roosevelt. So which American History great did they focus on this week? King Andrew Jackson? Diplomat to the world Woodrow Wilson? I hear FDR did some notable things. Perhaps James K. Polk, Napoleon of the Stump?

Oh, fuck everybody. It's JFK.

I am not a huge JFK fan. He's on average ranked our 6th best president of the 20th century in a field of 17. It's hard to say he should be much further down. It's hard to say that his abbreviated presidency makes him less influential by default than, say, Carter or Hoover. But I've always been more of an LBJ man, Think that among assassinated Presidents Kennedy was only marginally more attractive than Bill McKinley, and, I mean, come on. Grover Fucking Cleveland (Benjamin Harrison was notorious for his promiscuity).

After reading this article, my rankings remain unchanged. However, the article offers a perspective on JFK I wasn't aware of - namely, his commitment to peace that could have easily improved that status of the Cold War. Apparently, Khrushchev broke down in tears upon learning of his assassination, and was immobilized for days. Despite the Bay of Pigs, Castro never blamed the Kennedys for the assassination plots against him. JFK opened a peace channel to Castro to ward the end of his administration.

I can imagine that had JFK lived out the rest of his term, perhaps we would have avoided a big chunk of Vietnam, maybe even the latter half of the Cold War. I could even believe that his extended presidency could have stunted the neocon movement that's been decimating the country for the last quarter century (isn't that what it is, Star Wars and all this post-Soviet fearmongering?)

It's to the point where it's sort of trite to have an opinion on JFK. I'm coming around on him. I don't think he was a great president, but he could have been. After all, two-term presidents get chapters, and one-term presidents get paragraphs.

Also in that issue: a decent article about JFK and Civil Rights, and a bunch of fluff bullshit on Kennedy and religion, golf, assassination conspiracy theories, public service, and the part about his presidency that pisses me off the most - his "effortless American style." In short, everything I expected to read.

GRANT QUOTE TUESDAYS:

I know only two tunes: one of them is 'Yankee Doodle', and the other one isn't.

G U-not

2007-06-29T01:58:00.000-05:00

I bet you think it'd be keen to see 50 Cent get caught in an embarrassing display of lip syncing. I won't keep you.

I will be truthful with you. I like 50 Cent, but I don't respect him. He's pretty much a huge schmuck. He is great to listen to and he got shot a whole bunch of times, which is pretty awesome. He's a great bragger except when it comes to sexual exploits. He'd do best to stick to generalized bragging. I think Hate It or Love It is a fantastic song (great video too), and I think his ridiculous feud with The Game is ridiculous.

A lot of it is the fun of listening to someone with a horrible speech impediment rap and knowing that it is not because he has cerebral palsy but because he got shot in the face. That is about 50% of the enjoyability of his raps.

He just doesn't seem like he gives a fuck anymore. Dude wants to get at that cash, fuck everybody else.

"I got shot a whole bunch of times and am also a millionaire, I can do whatever the fuck I want guys and I don't even care"

He will probably pretend it never happened and just continue not giving a fuck. God bless you 50.

What U Know About Executive Privilege

2007-06-28T14:25:00.000-05:00

There is something going on with Dick Cheney, about what part of the government he is in, whether he has executive privilege or not, something like that. It is very confusing, because he's saying all sorts of stupid shit. I stopped trying to "get" this administration just like I stopped trying to "get" my ex-girlfriend. Neither of them makes any sense, so you just wait until the time is right and cut off all ties with them altogether.

Also in the news: Bush rejected a subpoena about firing all those attorneys, citing executive privilege. "We didn't do anything wrong! You just have to trust us!"

So I will talk further about Executive Privilege. THATS RIGHT ITS CLEVELAND AGAIN MOTHERFUCKERS

Washington established the precedent just like every other thing he did, and said that since the Senate makes treaties only they were allowed to read the pertinent documents, not the House. Then John Marshall pulled it back from Jefferson, and said that it's the court's decision what is and is not pertinent. Some privilege.

So it's fucking Cleveland time woo

So the other day I mentioned that Cleveland employed similar executive privilege. What I didn't mention is the circumstances. Cleveland was the first Democrat to enter office since Andrew-Johnson-Sort-Of (aj - lowercase cause he sucked - technically had no party in office, but was a Democrat before and after). Here's how it went down:

Cleveland: I'm removing your guys from office
Congress: Your files, let us see them
Cleveland: FUCK YOU

Sound like anyone we know?

The law that got aj impeached was the Tenure of Office Act, which said that if a President appointed someone and Congress approved it, when the President elected to remove said official the Senate would have to approve the removal. aj defied it, because he thought it was unconstitutional, and he paid for it in spades. It was repealed halfway through Cleveland's first term. In fact, where Johnson had faltered, Cleveland succeeded, mostly due to his severe popularity. In his 1904 book, "Presidential Problems," Cleveland said:

"I am not responsible to the Senate, and I am unwilling to submit my actions and official conduct to them for judgment."

Cleveland argued that the President was directly responsible to the people, not the Senate, and the Senate backed off him - Cleveland was so popular at the time, and was removing the officials because they had been appointed for patronage reasons so that he could replace them with more "deserving" individuals. There wasn't a question of Cleveland's integrity - check out one newspaper's endorsement for him:

"Four Good Reasons for Electing Cleveland: 1. He is honest. 2. He is honest. 3. He is honest. 4. He is honest."

It was a pretty universal sentiment.

The difference between the two, I think, is that in Cleveland's case there wasn't the mounting evidence of wrongdoing. Nixon claimed executive privilege regarding the tapes of conversations regarding criminal charges against some in his administration and was denied - the the Supreme Court said that the importance of finding the truth in a criminal investigation was more important to the public than some generalized confidentiality. This isn't quite a criminal investigation yet, but the evidence of wrongdoing here is much stronger than it was against Cleveland.

But, like in Cleveland's time, this will play out as a power struggle. Few know what will come out of this case, but Congress is certainly justified in asking.

Next time: Not Cleveland!

Since Prince was on Apollonia

2007-06-27T10:55:00.000-05:00

New Kanye!

Props all around for the video, but what's with the eyegear lately? First R. Kelly's weird bejeweled eyemask from the "I'm A Flirt" video, and now this? OK guys, I know you both have the right to do what you want, double up because you're from Chicago, but YOU CAN'T SEE OUT THAT SHIT.

The Era of Good Mustaches

2007-06-26T16:45:00.000-05:00

Directly after what Historians widely refer to as the "ugliest Presidents," Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan, the United States had a long line of bearded or mustachioed presidents, as well as a few who were, for lack of a better word, rotund. With Woodrow Wilson's election over Teddy Roosevelt and William Howard Taft in 1912, however, the US ceased its practice of electing Presidents that were round-n-fuzzy. Sure, Herbert Hoover and Calvin Coolidge both had very soft features, but even our jowlier presidents like Nixon were fairly lanky from then on out. Eisenhower himself seemed to be a rebellion against all things hairy (and in some respects, Harry, har har).

Every directly elected president from Lincoln's assassination until Cleveland wore a beard. Ulysses Grant, Rutherford Hayes, and James Garfield all had formidable facial hair. Hell, throw Benjamin Harrison in there, too. Chester Arthur, though president by happenstance, had some not-to-be-tussled-with muttonchops, as well. What do all these men have in common?

They were weak leaders in an era in which American politics was dominated by the Senate.

It wasn't until Cleveland's first term that the Presidency gained some real power again. He used his veto more than twice as much as all previous presidents combined in his first term alone. He established the presidency as an autonomous branch of government that reports directly to the people. Employing executive privilege regarding congressional approval of his nominees was a huge boon to the executive.

So naturally, Cleveland only had a mustache. It signaled the end of the post-Civil War era that had been mired in mediocrity and helped to usher in the Modern presidency that grew so powerful during Teddy Roosevelt's turn in office.

Wilson, then, likely brought an end to the rotund-with-facial-hair era because he entered as a quiet intellectual who advocated peace like none other, focused almost exclusively on domestic issues but still managed to become one of our greatest presidents, setting the US on a path of morality on the global stage - he was the most inspiring leader in the world by leaps and bounds in that era. Perhaps being a dignified intellectual suddenly seemed like better qualification for the gig than the rough-and-tumble mustache and an imposing round figure.

Taft Anecdote Tuesdays:

Taft's girth once prompted New York Sen. Chauncey Depew to survey his protruding belly and joke to a crowd of supporters that the president was "pregnant with courage ... pregnant with integrity." To which Taft is said to have retorted: "If I give birth to a girl, I shall name her Courage. If it is a boy, I shall name him Integrity. But if, as I suspect, nothing but a great bag of wind, then I shall name it Chauncey Depew."

(courtesy of sfgate.com)

Taft++

First Things First

2007-06-26T03:42:00.000-05:00

I know you are here to hear about Presidents and Rap. You will hear about them soon.

I have to fix a few things in the layout. Little things.

I will kick it off, though, with something to think about. Isn't Dr. Dre the Grover Cleveland of Rap?

I will talk more about Cleveland later.