for minorities in america, it's one step forward in the 21st century, and a little two step soft shoe back to the 50's.

with obama in office it has been hard for people to say that anyone is keeping the black man down these days, although some have speculated that mr o tends to keep himself down by being such a stickler for bipartisanship.

sadly, for every obama, there must be a michael steele.

michael steele is not helping to progress any part of our society. he degrades himself, and distills any redeeming leadership qualities, charisma, or intelligence he may have, down to nothing more than a mustached old man in a wallpaper-bland suit spouting dated "black" lingo in regards to no topic of any great political import. he helps the cause of the african american culture, the republican party, the american people, and the federal government the same way sarah palin does (swap african american culture with gender equality): he doesn't.

he is more hurtful to progress on any cultural or political front than helpful.

a note to michael steele on his role as the ty pennington of the GOP: the american people didn't want to elect a "black" man, they wanted to elect the best candidate for the job. turns out he was darker than usual, this time.

it doesn't matter if you have an innie or an outtie between your legs, but whether you have the gonads to lead the most powerful government in the world. the thing between your ears that is most important is not the color of your face, but the content of your mind. and when you open your mouth, we don't want you to talk like that hilarious guy down at the corner bar, or the popular kid at our highschool, or the album we keep on repeat. we don't need a cool president, we need intelligent, reasonable, world wise, progressive thinkers (if we didn't want progress, there would really be no point to term limits, would there?).

so in an attempt to slap some sense into michael steele, and disable his reign as the GOPs token black guy, i offer a quick introduction to michael steele, the world's greatest sambo, and the new man keeping the black man down:

1. the man once offered to hook bobby jindal up with some "slum love", yet grew up in what he himself admits was a sheltered suburb of DC, and went to catholic school, where he was a member of the glee club. so if steele isn't qualified to give love from the slums, then perhaps he was offering some love for the slums.

then again, (piyush) "bobby" jindal was a privileged child of an upper class white collar family.

so the only conclusion i can come to here is that michael steele is putting on airs to make himself as black as he thinks white people want him to be, and he is doing double duty with this quote, because americans had recently been introduced to the idea that india is a cesspool thanks to the movie slumdog millionaire. so what i hear when steele says something like this is, "americans like their black people ghetto, and their indian people poor. hey everybody, i'm "black" michael steele, and this is my "indian" friend, "bobby"!"

2. said he wanted to diversify the republican party by luring people with "fried chicken and potato salad".

fuzzy zoeller once requested that tiger woods not serve fried chicken and collard greens at his championship dinner. zoeller became a pariah of the golf world, and was labeled a racist.

i get it. collard greens are a much more offensive side dish than potato salad.

3. steele claims to have brought some "hip-hop" to the GOP.

yeah, glee club is straight hip-hop.

does steele think that just because he is black, that he is associated with hip-hop? secondly, does he think that anybody in their right mind wants their politicians to be "hip-hop"?

if we wanted rapping politicians we would have voted for the mckinney/clemente ticket in '08.

ok, nobody got that joke.

let's say, if we wanted rapping politicians we would have voted for the -z/west ticket in '08 (bonus: secretary of state, fergilicious. auto czar, xzibit. plus, gaffin' kanye west as vice. "yo. yo, gaddafi. yo... yo, ima letchu finish, but i just gotta say, jigga is throwin' the greatest UN general assembly of all time!" and if you think michelle obama's arms look great in sleeveless, i'm willing to bet that even pillbox hats, flowered brooches, and sensible pumps make beyoncé's south lawn look good. her farmer's market too bootylicious).

then again, blackalicious already declared himself the paragraph president, and there has yet to be a movement to impeach.

the long and the short of this point is, if michael steele thinks he's so hip-hop, why isn't he using the suffix -ilicious more often?

he's just trying to make the GOP more conservalicious. the right to bear gats, and bust caps. freedom of religion, freedom of assembly, and freestyle, and in the process making a joke of american politics.

but he's not street. he very well might not even have any grounded political beliefs. he just does what he's paid to do. with his mind on his money and his money on his mind.

4. he uses the phrase "bling bling".

if you can't take the concept of monetary wealth seriously during a global economic meltdown then how can you be taken seriously as a politician?

5. the oreo scandal. steele waffles back and forth on the issue of having oreo cookies thrown at him during a gubernatorial debate in aught-2. there were no reported incidents at the time of the debate, and steele himself made statements like, "maybe it was just someone having their snack", and "if it happened..." but later saying "it was raining oreos. they were thick in the air like locusts" (how biblical). those present at the debate are on both sides of the fence, but the debate moderator states that nothing of the sort happened at all.

so what to make of this? chocolate and creme cookies as a symbol of uncle tomiliciousness. if it did happen, then, as inappropriate as it may be, it is a pretty solid comment on a person like michael steele, who's knack for media friendly sound bytes is nothing more than a parroting back of his white overlords' ideals with a sterotypical and self deprecating "ghetto" vocabulary.

if it didn't happen, then steele himself is admitting to being, at the very least, close enough to oreo, that people might mistake him for one, and attempting to fabricate an incident in which he may come across as being hated by whitey.

6. steele's new blog, what up?

the first post, which of course bears a hip-hop themed title, "changing the game" (word.), asks of us readers (under the assumption that we are all republicans) "why are you a republican?" "how did you make your [decision about who to vote for]?" "how can we better serve you so you can help propel the republican movement?" (not a good way to revamp a party with a flagging public image, "tell us why you like being a part of a sinking ship, because we want to place more emphasis on those points")

steele claims to respond to each posted answer personally, though he didn't use the phrase "hitchu back on yo celly, boo" or "i'll holla!" or "i'ma get atchu later" so i really don't understand what he's talking about.

but since he does say in plain white english that he will respond to each posted comment personally, i urge you all, don't comment just to call him an oreo, but respond to him, telling him what party you support, or don't support, and why.

this stupid country of ours shouldn't be about party lines, and which side is winning, because when it's about competition, the people lose. this country is about getting our voices heard so that our representation truly represents the will of the people. so if republican puppet, chairman michael steele wants to be a real american leader, he will read, and consider every last voice, not just the one behind the curtain; every last voice, even if it isn't in 4/4 time with an 808 drum break and an auto-tune hook by t-pain.

if there are enough voices in his ear, he has to listen right?

how could he be so heartless?

homework: go to what up? and tell michael steele what your political beliefs are, and why you believe in them, and don't be afraid to write passionately, just don't get so passionate that you start dropping n-bombs, or calling him uncle tom.

extra credit: have fun refreshing the page and counting how many faces in the GOP logo at the top left are not young white people. then count how many of the black faces were born in the 20th (or 21st) century.