Today’s blog/update was originally intended to highlight some great news about our upcoming screenings in Buffalo NY on Wednesday October 26th, Thursday October 27th and Friday October 28th. Then late Friday, we got the word from the West Coast that we will make our Pacific Premiere at Portland State University in Portland, OR on Thursday, November 17th. Both of these screening events took a lot of work, hope, persistence and guts. Particularly our Portland State screening, which we’ll write about soon. Instead, events of this morning will have to take precedence over our great news.
Republican Presidential Candidate Herman Cain appeared on two of the major news networks this morning. Watching Mr. Cain on Fox News Sunday and This Week on ABC this morning was inspiring. He did a great job in the Chris Wallace interview and in the Christiane Amanpour interview, handled the detailed, “ginsu-knife” (my phrase) questions on her note cards very well. We can all be proud of this man and what he represents for the Republican Party. Not just diversity, but competency, integrity, honesty, gutsiness and leadership. In late 2006, we were in the Atlanta area to follow and shoot the campaign of Catherine Davis for the U.S. Congress seat in the 4th District. Many, many people would ask… “Have you ever heard of Herman Cain?” or whether we were going to interview him for the film. Unfortunately, we had to say “no” at the time because we hadn’t heard of him yet and our Atlanta story was centered around Catherine. However, it was obvious that Herman Cain was someone to learn more about and follow since that time. All we can say is that Mr. Cain was a legend in the Atlanta area and this legend was told to us by both Black people and White people. It didn’t matter, he was going to be an important player in the Party someday. Little did we know back in 2006!
Waking up to hear about another Presidential Candidate, Governor Rick Perry, and his hunting trips on a ranch with a rock painted with the word N*****head on it was deflating as heck. Obviously, someone held onto this story for a long time and waited for the right moment to leak or push it to the Washington Post in order to nail Perry bad. It is easy to suspect who might want to do this and why they would do this. Politics can be a dirty, dirty business if people want it to be. It can also be an inspiring, uplifting business if the player(s) involved do the right thing. No matter if or when the rock in question was there, Perry should have been removed the rock as soon as he learned of it and made sure it was gone for good. The bottom of a creek bed was probably the best place for this Rock of Prejudice. Now, we are all probably in for a week of the media going crazy with this and for so-called (read irrelevant) leaders making sure we know where they stand on the issue. But, outside of probably putting a fatal torpedo or two into Perry’s 2012 Presidential chances… what will the Rock of Prejudice really mean two weeks from now? Unfortunately, not much.
But another man, this one from Atlanta (not Texas) will be inching ever closer to the nomination of his Party for President of the United States. Whether he makes it there or not, won’t likely be up to him. It will be up to the army of researchers, reporters, bloggers and media-types on both sides of the aisle. Will they try to bring him down with old report cards? Will they try to make him look like the Ebonics-spouting fool they play him for on Saturday Night Live? (Funny, the same cast member played Michael Steele too… hmmm.) Let’s hope not… because whether Herman Cain wins or loses his Party’s nomination – we’ll all be the losers in the end if people other than the Voters decide.NOTE: Herman Cain Photo by Gage Skidmore at CPAC 2011; Governor Rick Perry Photo Courtesy of Rick Perry.org
