Urban Thought Collective

You’ve seen her before. She’s got her arm tattooed with her name, some gold fronts, freshly manicured fingernails with dollar bills spray-painted on each one while wearing “Apple Bottom Jeans” that are two sizes too small. She’s got a slightly stank attitude to fend off naysayers, but it only fools a few. Folks in the hood know she’s only there ‘cause she’s got a hood chick fantasy. Is it Fergie? Kim Kardashian? Paris Hilton? Please! They flaunt their hood chick passes. I’m talking about Hillary Clinton.

Hoping to get supporters behind seating the Florida and Michigan delegations, Clinton starts going off about how abolitionists fought hard and sacrificed so much to “end slavery and ensure freedom came with the full right of citizenship.”

In pure drama queen fashion, she races to Florida and talks to a crowd of people about the fraudulent election that recently took place in Zimbabwe, then compared it to the two states in question.

She said, “So we can never take for granted our precious right to vote. It is the single most important privilege and right any of us have, because in that ballot box we are all equal. You’re equal to a billionaire. You’re equal to the president, every single one of us.” For real? We’re equal to a billionaire? For me, this is where the pseudo hood chick has a white privilege relapse.

I don’t know any sista who can break herself off $6 million to keep some pipedream alive.

The thing about a fake hood chick is even though they befriend you, go to the same clubs, and have a black man as a baby daddy, they know that at any given time they can switch up their game. But Hillary doesn’t even do that. At least Bill hung out to give us the illusion that he was one of us (Toni Morrison called Bill Clinton the first black president). She’s like Michael Jackson. She ain’t trying to come to your hood and have a catfish dinner at the local spot. She doesn’t even want to be seen there except for the obligatory photo-op. Right now, as desperate as she is, I wouldn’t be surprised if she traded in secret service for the F.O.I. (Fruit of Islam) and started doing interviews with black press.

The crazy thing is, Hillary was singing a different tune last October when she was ahead by 20 points in national polls. After the Democratic National Committee said the dates Michigan and Florida scheduled for their primaries were too early, she and Obama agreed to refrain from campaigning there. Obama even removed his name from the ballot along with the other main contenders. Hillary left her name thinking it wouldn’t make a difference. She even said during a radio interview in New Hampshire, “It’s clear, this election [Michigan is] having is not going to count for anything.” Things have changed. She needs to close the gap between her and Obama. In order to get folks to buy into counting the votes, she’s pulling out the black card and drawing some ridiculous comparison between herself and slaves.

For the record, this is the same chick who brushed off Martin Luther King Jr.’s back-breaking efforts to get the civil rights bill passed by saying that Lyndon Johnson is the one who signed it. Damn! What about the work it took to get the bill on the table? The sit-ins, marches, countless arrests and police brutality? But, you know when the block gets hot those bamboo earrings come off real quick and the white privilege comes in mighty handy. But that was back in January, and she’s desperate to win the Democratic nomination. She’s got her hood swag back, at least for now.

I’m dreaming of a day when Hillary will revert back to the same math everybody uses, you know, the one where two plus two equals four. I want to see her realize that even if they count Michigan and Florida delegates, she’d still be behind Obama.

Envisioning you with much love, light and fulfillment. See you next week.

Yaminah Ahmad is editor-in-chief of The Atlanta Voice and contributing editor to Collective Voices, a newspaper published by the non-profit, SisterSong: Women of Color Reproductive Health Collective. She can be reached at missyaminah@gmail.com.