With President Obama's Birth Certificate, Klansman Trump Reminds Blacks They Will Never Be American

As I walked to work this morning, I got a text message from the @jjpolitics account on Twitter announcing that President Obama would release his long form birth certificate. I stopped in my tracks as my immediate thought became, "It's happening again. This White House is caving in to extremism." (I recalled how Green Jobs Czar Van Jones was dismissed, essentiall at the behest of conspiracy theorist, plagiarist and fear-monger Glenn Beck). Along with my surprise, however, I felt a deep sadness, especially once I read the coverage of the President's remarks and most especially when I saw this disgusting video of Donald Trump.

It was during my viewing of this video that I began to cry. I thought of my ancestors, both direct and collective, who had fought and died so that I might be treated as an American. I then thought of this fetid, smug, hate-filled, wealthy white man taking credit for the release and yet still not being satisfied. It does not matter how long we've been in these United States. We will never be American.

So, tears in my eyes, pain in my heart and rage in my soul, I composed this video message. More than written text, it comes close to expressing my full pain at witnessing a white man who was handed everything call the President of the United States (and me) a nigger.

BaratunDispatch: Before reaching downtown Austin, I had to stop at a warehouse. #SxBaratunde

BREAKING: Blackout in my Sydney hotel. (video) #TravelTunde #Baratundispatch

First thing I noticed was the TV cut off. Then I realized my laptop was no longer charging. Then I noticed the lights had gone down. Inside this well-lit room at the Shangri-La hotel in Sydney Australia, that latter point was easy to miss, but when I opened the door to the hallway only the emergency exit lights were active. It wasn't just my room. The entire hotel was dark.

Before I headed out to see how far things had spread, I made sure my room key still worked. It's an electronic keycard, and I wasn't about the get stranded with nothing but socks and a bathrobe on. The card worked, but still I propped the door open with a hanger. 

Then I realized I had an LED light in my backpack. This is the Victorinox backpack that goes everywhere and is always loaded with toothbrush, toothpaste, deodorant, multiple macbook pro video adapters and, apparently, an LED flashlight. 

So off I wandered around the 15th floor. I ran into some maintenance people and asked if it was just the building or the entire neighborhood. They didn't know. I checked the elevators: dead. I found the fire stairs in case this lasted a while and I needed to head out. Worrying observation: there are no emergency lights in the fire stairs! Back in my room, the phone still worked as did my fully charged Nexus One and iPhone.

That's when I decided to make this short video. Overall, low drama but a bit of fun. I'm off to shower up and head out for some radio interviews. Oh yeah, I'm in town until Monday for the Digital Directions conference. Might become analog directions if the power situation remains uncertain.