THE SEARCH FOR THE ACCEPTABLE NEGRO

(Part II: Return of The Dutchman)

So it was confirmed to me last week by a white woman sitting next to me at a bar. Introduced to her just moments before by a black male friend of mine, she asked: "So what do you think of Obama? Will you vote for him? I like him, but do you think he has enough experience? I mean I don't know where he stands on anything or what he's done," said the off-duty editor at The Economist.

"I'm not sure what he's done either," I said, "he needs to make that clearer. As for experience, he's smart. And George Bush has experience. What about Hillary?"

"Oh I like Hillary, she's great and she could win."

"So name five things she's done for New York state," I asked the Upper West Side resident.

She smiled. "You're right, I can't. But I think she'd be good on the main issues."

"She really pulled back on a women's right to choose to attract the red-staters," I said. "I used to work for Planned Parenthood, I don't see choice as a bargaining chip. And she voted for the war and Obama didn't. Are you going to vote for her?"

"Yeah."

That's why Obama won't win. The Hillary - Obama heavyweight match already being hyped in such major publications as the Washington Post, the NY Daily News and the NY Times -- and all over the network morning news shows -- will split the vote of the liberal Democratic party. White women will vote for Hillary. The 40-something soccer moms, the 30-something aspiring soccer moms, those who tolerate abortion only with tight restrictions, and the baby boomer white women who see Hillary as one of them -- a glass ceiling shatterer.

That leaves only a handful of white women who will either a) see deeply into Hillary's slithering around from popular position to popular position; b) can't forgive her for not leaving that nasty-ass Bill; c) are proud to be liberal and hip white girls.

A vanishing breed in this era where Katie Couric takes the venerable mantle of network news anchor and promptly puts on a prom dress and bleaches her hair even blonder than it was on "Today."

This morning "Good Morning America," had a group of current and former female senators, about 16 in all, who have been staying in touch over the years to share their thoughts, etc. about women in politics. Diane Sawyer (also blonde) was as thrilled to see them as they were to be seen. Bursting with pride she talked with them about all of their ground breaking accomplishments in furthering the progress of women in government.

Unless I was in the bathroom, I saw no Black woman. There was Carol Mosley Braun from Illinois, you'll recall. Nor was there any mention of the whiteness of this group. They spoke as if they were members of a downtrodden class, 'buked and scorned.

When I entered the corporate world in the mid 1970s, one would have thought (based on the rhetoric at least) that as more persons of color entered that arena, white women would at least be parallel allies with us. I thought that anyone who was not a white male would join the fray to tackle the all-boys club.

But the issues that Black people (both male and female) and white women faced were quite different. White women, after all were never socially discriminated against to the degree that Blacks were. They could date, marry and sit next to each other in the theater or the classroom. The well-to-do ones even had Blacks working for them. (Hey these things form perceptions!)

At a ceremony at a major university honoring NY state law enforcement agencies for their work in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, I stood next to two white women, one the head of Government Affairs for the school, the other a uniformed Sergeant. One turned to the other and said, "It's a shame that in a room of over 100 people there are only about six other women here. Sometimes you wonder how much things have changed! " I nodded and smiled and said, "Yep, I counted only one other Black and one Latino."

But they would have never noticed -- it wasn't their concern.

It going to be tough for Obama regardless, because he is Black. But to go up against a white women diminishes his potential base considerably. Maybe he'll capture the hearts (that's literally what he'll have to do) of young white females looking for a change. New voters. As a buddy of mine put it: "The new slogan is: 'Don't tell mama -- vote for Obama!"

Maybe. Or maybe he'll just energize them, but not enough to cast a vote his way. Like the girl who drinks and flirts with you at the bar all night and leaves you and goes home at closing time.

Watch your back Obama. They have to be very delicate how they come at you because of this race thing. They won't act like real enemies. Many will act as allies. Stop and count the number of white women in the room. And then count the Black folk.

And while you're at it, go to the library and check out a copy of Amiri Baraka's, play, "The Dutchman."

Isn't that the one where the white woman pushes the brother in front of the subway train?

A JAMES BROWN CHRISTMAS

Remembrances of Who He Was and Who We Were

It is always tougher to hear the news of a death near the holidays. My mother, two years ago, ten days before Christmas, not wholly unexpected, but devastating nonetheless.

This year, while lying in bed peacefully, ears focused on the early morning drizzle from the North Carolina skies, blurry eyes adjusting to the TV's glare, I saw his picture. At least I thought it was him, in the far right hand corner over ABC newsman Ron Claiborne's talking head. By the time my eyes realized who it was, I saw the two dates: 1933 - 2006, and heard the words, "James Brown the Godfather of Soul..." and started saying, "no, no, no!"

It was totally unexpected and as devastating as any loss of any person whom I have never met.

On Christmas morning, how cruel I thought, until Rev. Al Sharpton remarked that "Mr. Brown himself "would have picked the biggest day of the year to take his final bow. But small comfort to a generation (or two or three) who felt his death as a personal loss and a loss to the culture (as we define it) never to be replaced.

How many more Black male bona-fide music icons from that R&B/Soul/Rock&Roll era are left standing?

Smokey Robinson.

Stevie Wonder.

Jerry Butler.

Isaac Hayes.

Al Green.

And of course the old heads: Bo Diddley, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, B.B. King and Johnny Mathis.

There are also the groups: The Dells (remarkably in tact with original members after 50 years), two remaining original members of the Four Tops and one last original Temptations member.

Lost already in the past year, Lou Rawls and Wilson Pickett. Not long before them Barry White and Luther Vandross.

James Brown. Mr. Brown. The Godfather.

Everybody has a James Brown story -- whether you actually met him or even seen him perform live, somehow he played a role in our existence. We all share a memory about him like we would a family member.

When I returned to New York City a few days later, the impact was deep. The radio tributes from the Black and Black-oriented stations was a constant drumbeat of his music, his words, his philosophy and the way James Brown lived his life, warts and all.

Who else could get radio (especially in today's canned, formulaic, corporate radio) to play his music nearly non-stop? And how few, if any, artists had that much good music over more than five decades?

Felix Hernandez, who hosts the "Rhythm Revue" for non-commercial WBGO-FM specializes in classic and the more obscure, "classic soul" in his shows. Hernandez dedicated his entire show to Brown's music. He came on the air somberly and said: "I really hadn't planned to do this show today. Didn't plan to do a James Brown tribute..." He added "[Someone] asked me how I could squeeze all of his music into four hours, and I said, 'I can't.'"

During his twenty-year run of "Rhythm Revue," now available on line and on commercial WRKS-FM radio, Hernandez said he doesn't believe he has ever had a show without playing at least one James Brown record.

Other stations played interviews of Brown from the past, including one from WBLS-FM in 1996 hosted by the late Frankie Crocker, an icon in his own right in the development of FM radio music formats. WRKS played interviews from people lined up outside the Apollo Theater in Harlem, where he took the stage for the last time, lying in state like the royalty he was to many. I walked past there myself, just feeling the energy of the crowd. I ran into many folks I knew, most in their 50s, but saw all ages in the crowd. As I walked by a subway exit I saw three teenaged girls (who I will assume are not candidates for Rhodes scholarship) and overheard one say: "All this is for James Brown?" I turned to her and said, "It ain't for Gerald Ford!"

People flooded radio stations with calls about their remembrances of Brown -- celebrities, former staff people, persons who even the briefest of encounters with him. Longtime radio personality Gary Byrd, who brought Black history and Black pride along with music in the late 1960s, talked of meeting James Brown when he first worked as a DJ at WWRL. Brown, touring in NYC at the time, asked the fledging DJ if he had found a place to live yet. Byrd laughed and, said, "Yes, now I've got to furnish it!" Brown liked that Byrd was bringing a message of Black pride to his shows. After they talked, Brown squeezed, as Byrd put it, "enough money in my hand to furnish two apartments!" Brown said that, "If you don't have to worry about money, you won't ever have to compromise yourself."

James Brown was truly an original. Who else would get this kind of outpouring of love and attention by even the national mainstream media? Few among even the very best who have gone on.

James Brown was rapping before rap. He was speaking out unabashedly against drugs ("King Heroin") and for education ("Don't be a dropout"), and for racial pride and independence ("Say it Loud!") and ("I Don't Want Nobody To Give Me Nothing, Open Up the Door -- I'll Get It Myself"). He could care less what the radio stations and record companies wanted to hear -- his message was for the people.

Not always the most successful businessman, Brown made several significant inroads into Black self-determination by buying several radio stations and even one TV station. He also had several other business ventures with varying degrees of success. But one thing he never sold was James Brown. You couldn't buy him.

His well deserved tributes poured in from all over -- except of course, from our Rapper friends. All of this praise seemed to be lost on them. Yet they have sampled his music to death -- and probably beyond. Brown's music is the most sampled of any artist among rappers, and Brown has appeared on stage with many and in many videos despite the fact that he had major issues with some of the content he found offensive.

Not one peep from them. Where were they? Did even one show up at any of the tributes? Did one speak? Even Michael Jackson came out of hiding long enough to show up and speak about him at his funeral. Where were all the tough guys?

I have always said that in life it matters not who the tough guys are -- but rather -- who shows up for the fight!

It took a long time to start this piece and even longer to finish. In a way that is good. Because there have been several significant developments since I began it: Sen. Barack Obama has all but officially announced that he wants to be head of the free world. And "Dreamgirls" racked up several Golden Globe Awards, paving the road for similar success in the Oscar nominations.

If you don't understand the connection, you haven't been paying attention -- not for a few decades.