Monday, January 8, 2018

Oprah for President, Wait Not So Fast


 
Last night Oprah made a moving and powerful acceptance speech as she was receiving her Cecile B, DeMille award at the 75th annual Golden Globes Awards.  Oprah has never failed us for she is a great orator and quite intelligent.  She did not become a billionaire by being mediocre.  Oprah has always been a force for just her mention or endorsement can move any of people mostly women to support simply on her word.  Several years ago there was a phrase, the Oprah effect that was coined to address this phenomenon.  With just one mention from Oprah could take a company from mere obscurity to global recognition.    Oprah can impact and make more changes to improve the world as a private citizen than as a president.
After her soul stirring speech last night, many people have been hinting that she should run for president of the United States in 2020.  While she is stating that is not her desire John/Jane Q. Public is not having it.  They want her to run.  This unyielding desire to have her on the 2020 ballot has a lot to do with this countries disheartening feeling about the man that currently sits in the White House today.  We have been inundated with daily craziness and the people of this country want to change that by soliciting someone very familiar, loved, intelligent and caring…Oprah.  While I simply love her and hang on to most words that come from her lips I do not feel that president of the United States should be in her future.  This country needs to have someone that know politics and the political structure and process.  A political background is needed to understand the process to be completely successful.  While many of you will say that she can surround herself with intelligent people.  However, lack of experience for herself would be deterrent to effectiveness. 
One thing that has not been mentioned is the issue of support from the Black community.  Now let’s be honest, some in the Black community will not support her because they do not like that fact that her base support is from Caucasian women.   I can hear it now….”I wouldn’t vote for Oprah because she thinks she is white”.  As a race of people we want to call you ours and that is not possible if you’re always with elbowing with white folks.  We always want to hold people to a litmus test to determine just how black you really are.   Yes this is some of the most asinine shit I have ever heard but some of us do it.    Let’s not forget how much we celebrated Barack Obama on November 4, 2008, however, that celebration did not last long for we wanted him to want into the oval office and fix the ills of the black communities across this nation.  Once we determined that we had to share him with the rest of the country we were a little pissed and he was not doing things to “fix us”.  Mind you these were issues that had been in these communities for many years.  His biggest critics were from those within the Black community.  While Oprah is loved today the winds of celebration will turn quickly.    
It is time for this country to get back to basics.  Get a candidate that has been shaped and molded by the experience of being a politician.  I do not mean any disrespect to Oprah but choosing her to be our 2020 candidate would be taking the easy way out.  Raise up a candidate that we all can believe in and get behind and our voices and actions can be strong enough to pull him/her over the finish line.  I have faith in us but we have to stop trying to do it the easy way.  As my father once told me “nothing worth having is easy”.

 

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