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Books by Cornel West
Democracy Matters: The Fight Against Imperialism /
Race
Matters /
Cornel West Reader /
The Future of the Race
The American Evasion of Philosophy /
African
American Religious Thought /
The War Against Parents /
Hope on a Tightrope
The African American Century /
White on White / Black on Black /
Prophesy Deliverance /
The Soul Knows No Bars
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Kam Williams
Interviews Cornel West
"I was with Obama
from Iowa," says Cornel
Born in
Tulsa, Oklahoma on June 2, 1953,
Princeton Professor Cornel Ronald West
is one of America’s most gifted and
provocative public intellectuals. He is
the author of Race Matters, a seminal
classic credited with changing the
course of the country’s dialogue about
justice and equality along the color
line. A cultural icon, he is the
recipient of the American Book Award as
well as more than 20 honorary degrees.
Here, Dr. West talks about his new book,
Hope on a Tightrope, while weighing in
on everything from President-elect Obama
to the economy to affirmative action to
the controversial notion of a
“post-racial” America.
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KW:
Hey, Dr. West, thanks for the time. A
mutual friend, Ila Forster, asked me to
say hello for her. She was an undergrad
when you were a grad student at
Princeton. She says that back in the day
you would come to parties on campus
dressed in a black vest, black slacks,
and a white shirt, which is still your
uniform. She told me, “The brother has
not changed...and that is why I respect
him. He’s an intellectual but a down
brother just the same.” That has me
wondering why you always wear a
three-piece suit.
CW:
Wow! Well, first I want to say hello to
the dear sister. We go back years, but
my memories of her are quite fresh. Send
her my best regards. Secondly, as far as
my wardrobe, my role models are jazz
musicians and black preachers. The suit
connotes a kind of elegance and
commitment to excellence, as well as a
seriousness of purpose in your chosen
vocation. It also connects to a sense of
having a cheery disposition but a sad
soul due to the mourning of catching
hell because of the bigotry and
oppression operating in this nation. So,
it’s a uniform on the battlefield.
KW:
What is your general impression of
Princeton students and what do you enjoy
about teaching Princeton students, in
particular?
CW:
Princeton students are, in a way,
similar to Harvard students. They work
hard. They’re highly disciplined and
very intelligent. They spend a great
deal of time trying to read and write
well. It’s a joy just being in
conversation with them. It keeps me
young and keeps me humble.
KW:
I write an annual 10 Best and 10 Worst
Black Books List. Ironically, back in
2006, a book to which you contributed,
The Covenant, made my 10 best List,
while I named The Audacity of Hope the
worst book of the year. This was before
Obama had declared himself a candidate.
I indicted it as the transparent attempt
of a guileful politician to be all
things to all people.
CW:
That’s what it is. Strategic and
tactical, all the way down. It’s
speaking less to the truth as regards to
the election, which is to say white
moderates, the folks he was appealing to
for most of the campaign, because he
figured he had black folks in his back
pocket, which he did. And we did push
him over the top. But the truth still
has got to rise sooner or later.
KW:
What troubled me most during the
campaign was how he threw Reverend
Wright under the bus after that historic
speech in Philadelphia about how he
couldn’t abandon him any more than his
white grandmother. Since I agreed with
much of what Reverend Wright had to say,
that had me wondering whether Obama
would even want my endorsement, if I
were famous, or that of any celebrity
who shared my left of center leanings.
CW:
Well, that was the fear of my close
partners, including brother Tavis
[Smiley]. I was with Obama from Iowa,
from the very beginning. I spoke twice
on his behalf back then. But in the
middle of the campaign I also spoke at
Jeremiah Wright’s retirement, and
defended him in his church. I asked what
was wrong with his saying Goddamn a
nation that had killed innocent people.
There’s nothing controversial about that
whatsoever. It was interesting because
the Obama surrogates had to be OK’d by
the national headquarters in Chicago.
And they said “no” to most of the black
folks who were suggested. Yet, when my
name came up to speak in Ohio, they said
“yes,” according to one black brother
who was on staff there. He was
surprised, after all the stuff he’d
heard me saying. When he asked why I’d
been approved, they told him, “We really
believe, that, deep down, brother West
really loves Obama. He just speaks his
mind. And when he speaks his mind, he
actually brings more people.” And, of
course, they’re interested in votes. “He
brings more credibility, even though
Barack knows he’s going to be critiqued
when brother West’s there. But he’s also
going to get his support because he
criticizes in such a way that he’s not
going to be trashing our candidate,
because he really loves him.” And sho’
nuff, I was invited to Ohio in October
by the campaign, whereas there were a
number of other folks they rejected,
including some members of the
Congressional Black Caucus.
KW:
Why were they rejected, because they had
supported Hillary in the primaries?
CW:
Yes, and because they thought they
couldn’t bring big enough crowds, and
they didn’t think they would speak with
enough passion. They didn’t just want
technocrats out there and have only 75
people show up. They wanted somebody who
speaks with passion who was going to
connect. That’s the only way you get
people to the polls.
KW:
What do you think of Obama’s
appointments of Hillary and so many
folks from the Clinton administration?
CW:
We now live in the Age of Obama. It’s
such a profoundly overwhelming and in
some ways unprecedented moment. I fear
that my dear brother Obama might be
reluctant to step into his own age. So,
he’s falling back on them and recycling
them to have some sense of connection to
what was before and for their savvy and
experience. But I think the crisis is so
deep that we’re going to need a much
deeper break from the Age of Ronald
Reagan. It is understandable that Obama
would be hesitant to step into his own
age, because if he makes his own break
he could be accused of bringing in
radicals or inexperienced people. He
thinks he needs to make the
Establishment feel comfortable.
Consequently, the Establishment’s crazy
about all the people he’s picked so far.
KW:
Even the Republicans. And that’s scary
to me.
CW:
Absolutely! That’s very scary. That
would make me have grounds for
suspicion. However, I do want to give
him time. If he really does aspire to
what I believe and hope he aspires to,
namely, to be a progressive Lincoln,
then we have to be like Frederick
Douglass to help push him. If he has his
own vision, then he could use these
folks to push it through. But he has to
be bold enough, strong enough and
visionary enough to step into his own
Age. When he chose Rahm Emmanuel as his
Chief of Staff, I wasn’t excited at all.
But I do want to give him time, because
Emmanuel is such a bulldog maybe he can
push progressive legislation through,
the way he pushed through NAFTA and the
Welfare bill, both of which were
disasters for the working people and
poor people. So, I’m just being honest
about our skepticism.
KW:
What do you think about Obama’s tapping
Larry Summers, another former
Clintonista? When he was president of
Harvard, his racism and sexism led to a
mass exodus of professors, including
you.
CW:
Summers, we know, is just socially
challenged. He cannot treat certain
people with decency and empathy, and I’m
one of them. I don’t like the fact that
he could be so explicitly sexist, and
that he could trash the black man, and
yet all that baggage can now be brushed
aside as if it’s completely irrelevant.
There’s a double-standard here, because
when it comes to considering prominent
black figures who constitute any kind of
threat to the white mainstream, they’re
dropped like a hot potato. Politically,
my critique of Summers is the same as my
critique of Robert Rubin, Timothy
Geithner and Jason Furman. They’re all
deregulators who helped contribute to
the catastrophe. And now, all of a
sudden, they’re supposed to come to the
rescue.
KW:
Why hasn’t he tapped some of the
brilliant, progressive economists who
aren’t Clintonistas or already part of
the corporatocracy?
CW:
I was on the radio calling for folks
like William Greider, Paul Krugman,
James Galbraith, William Julius Wilson,
Sylvia Ann Hewlett and Joseph Stieglitz.
All these are progressive economists.
Nobel Prize-winner Paul Krugman, my dear
brother and colleague at Princeton, is
very important. Of course, the Obama
people won’t touch him with a ten-foot
pole yet. They will eventually. I think
Brother Obama is wise enough to be
pushed by events, even if he’s not going
to be pushed by his advisors. Those
folks are a little too anemic.
KW:
I have a question for you from Reverend
Florine Thompson who asks, “What are
three key ways in which President-elect
Obama can, as you say, move from symbol
to substance? And how does Black America
hold him accountable?”
CW:
Well, for one, I think he’s already made
a move towards substance in terms of his
stimulus packages. He’s putting a focus
on the financial Katrina and the two
million distressed homeowners. He’s
dispersing funds directly to them. Plus,
he’s planning public spending on job
creation. And those same people need
healthcare independent of their
employment, because they’re going under.
I’m glad that he’s letting us know that
that is the first order of business.
This is crucial, because everyday people
on the ground level aren’t benefiting at
all from Treasury Secretary Paulson’s
recapitalization of the banks. A second
key is for him to let the world know
that America is not going to be behaving
unilaterally like a policeman, but
cooperating with other countries and the
United Nations to achieve a multilateral
vision. It’s important that we have a
different public face, one that is not
consistent with dominating and
manipulating, but with listening to the
rest of the world. The third key I’d
like to see Obama focus on is the plight
of children, and to say, “We’re going to
wipe out child poverty,” because they
are our future, 100%.
KW:
Reverend Thompson also asks, “How should
President elect Obama deal with
affirmative action in the 21st century?
And have you noticed a racial backlash
since Barack Obama won the presidential
election?”
CW:
Well, there is definitely a white
backlash, and I’m sure it’s escalating.
The good thing is that those racists
don’t speak on behalf of the vast
majority of whites. That’s a sign of
progress. Of course, the press calls it
post-racial. It’s not post-racial, just
less racist.
KW:
Since the election of Barack Obama, it's
been said from the pulpit of many black
churches that African-Americans are now
without excuse regarding their lack of
responsibility, high school drop-outs,
high crime, illegal drug usage, and
other social ills. Reverend Thompson
wonders whether you find any truth to
this statement.
CW:
Not at all. It’s just right-wing jargon
which suggests that somehow we’ve never
wanted to be responsible. And those
folks who haven’t been responsible,
should have been. They didn’t need to
wait for Obama to win. The greatest
critics in terms of black responsibility
has always been the black community
itself. So, I think we’ve always had
black responsibility. One election
doesn’t make a difference in that
regard. Besides, a black face in the
White House doesn’t mean that the fight
against racism is over. There’s still
white supremacy, police brutality, and
discrimination in the workplace, in
housing and so forth to deal with.
KW:
Some have said that President-elect
Obama was "God's candidate" and that he
was divinely appointed. Do you believe
that?
CW:
I don’t think God is in the business of
selecting candidates. God is a God of
justice. All of us stand under divine
judgment. So does Barack. Where Barack
is on the side of justice, God is for
him. Where Barack is lukewarm towards
justice, God is suspicious. And where
he’s against justice, God is critical.
That’s true for all of us.
KW:
Anthony Noel, a Muslim brother says,
“You, as a person of faith, have made it
a point to criticize those of us who
condemn homosexuality and its behavior,
as being homophobic. What is your basis
for such a criticism?”
CW:
As a Christian, I’m Christ-centric, and
Jesus did talk about the quality of love
and the quality of relations, and I
think that it is possible for there to
be mature love between same-sex brothers
and sisters.
KW:
Tony also asks, what is your
impression, thus far, of Obama’s
appointing so few blacks to positions in
his administration?
CW:
Give him time, but their color is not as
important as what they stand for.
KW:
Yeah, look at Clarence Thomas.
CW:
Exactly!
KW:
And Tony asks, does Obama's support of
Planned Parenthood, an abortion advocacy
group, in your view, put him in
contradiction to his claims of being a
person of faith.
CW:
No.
KW:
Marianne Ilaw asks whether you think
that Obama is more palatable to whites
because he doesn't carry the legacy of
slavery and all its uncomfortable
baggage, and whether his election will
usher in a new era where whites opt for
exotic-looking blacks, African and
Caribbean immigrants and biracials, over
those folks whose ancestors toiled in
the fields?
CW:
No, Obama is a gentle brother with a
sweet disposition that doesn’t
constitute a threat to white brothers
and sisters. Malcolm X was full of rage
and righteous indignation. I’m with him,
too. I love all different kind of black
folks. Malcolm X was a different type of
black man from Obama. That doesn’t mean
Barack is not honorable. We can
appreciate them both.
KW:
The Columbus Short question: Are you
happy?
CW:
I do have a joy in my soul for my
faith, and friends and family.
KW:
The Tasha Smith question: Are you ever
afraid?
CW:
Sure.
KW:
The bookworm Troy Johnson question: What
was the last book you read?
CW:
Shadow and Act by Ralph Ellison. I read
all 330 pages of it last night.
KW:
Is there any question no one ever asks
you, that you wish someone would?
CW:
No.
KW:
The music maven Heather Covington
question: What’s music are you listening
to nowadays?
CW:
Thelonious Monk.
KW:
My
mom grew up with Monk and was lifelong
friends with his sister. During my brief
stint as a jazz musician back in the
Seventies, I played on an album with Bob
Northern, aka Brother Ahh, who had
played with Monk in the Fifties. Also in
our group was saxophonist Pat Patrick
who is the father of Deval Patrick, the
Governor of Massachusetts.
CW:
I didn’t know Deval’s father played.
KW:
Yeah, Pat Patrick’s a giant. He
played baritone with Sun Ra for years.
He was the cat with the dark glasses. He
also played with Monk, Coltrane and Duke
Ellington.
CW:
Is that Deval’s father? Wow!
KW:
Yep, well, thanks again for the
interview and I hope to chat with you
again soon about your memoirs which I
understand you’ll be publishing next
year.
CW:
Thank you. You’re welcome to come
right on in anytime.
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posted
2 December 2008
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