I didn’t know cholera affected speech

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Obviously, I’m in Mexico, so as I’ve noted elsewhere on this blog, I don’t exactly get the creme de la creme of American television. As such, I didn’t get to see last night’s telethon hosted by NBC’s Matt Lauer for the American Red Cross to raise money for Katrina victms. Lots of celebrities appeared, such as jazz greats and NO natives Harry Connick, Jr. and Wynton Marsalis, among many other musicians and actors.

One of those “musicians” was rapper Kanye West, on last week’s Time Magazine cover dubbed, “The smartest man in rap.” Apparently, the threshold for what passes as intelligent is about the freezing point of water, because West had such bad diarrhea of the mouth, saying that “they’re giving [the Army] permission to shoot us,” and “George Bush hates Black people,” all with Mike Meyers delivering an Emmy-winning performance holding it together (punctuated by moments of incredulity). This is ridiculously stupid on so many levels. Isn’t Condy Rice Black? As much as I abhor most of Bush’s politics, I don’t think for one second he’s racist. Dim-witted, yes. A bigot, no. The issue is responsibility and leadership, and while race and class are very much factors in this crisis, it’s more a crime of apathy than racism or “genocide,” as the more wacky, fringe groups claim. And speaking of conspiracy wacky, in his lyrics and interviews, Kayne says the government intentionally spread AIDS and implicates Ronald Reagan in bringing down the Black Panthers, specifically by the government’s creation of crack and subversive planting in Black ghettos. Right. Is that a chip in your neck?

As crazy as all of this is, what’s sad are those conservatives who have a stick so far up their ass, they called their local affiliates and self-righteously announced that they’d be donating to the Salvation Army or another agency, blaming both NBC and the Red Cross for allowing this to happen. Well, at least they gave, I suppose, but to me, allowing this to affect one’s decision to give to Red Cross is more reactionary and short-sighted than West himself.