Clinton to NAACP: "I think I was the first black president"

[Chris Kromm]

But didn't Toni Morrison write a gushing piece (in The Nation? elsewhere?)
claiming Bill was our first black prez -- without humor? It's an ongoing
theme...
CK

----- Original Message -----
From: "Nathan Newman" <nathan at newman.org>
To: <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com>
Sent: Monday, March 05, 2001 7:39 AM
Subject: Re: Clinton to NAACP: "I think I was the first black president"


> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Michael Pollak" <mpollak at panix.com>
>
> On Sun, 4 Mar 2001, Chris Kromm wrote:
>
> > During one segment, Tucker sat beside Clinton in the audience and
> > joked that the former commander in chief is so popular among
> > minorities that some consider him the first black president.
>
> -I think this line first had its origin in a Chris Rock routine, which was
> -actually pretty funny at the time.
>
> I remember the routine- it started with Rock noting that Clinton doesn't
> have Presidential problems, he has regular people problems- "his wife's a
> b-----, he can't pay his bills" etc.  The final punchline was, "I know
Bill
> Clinton.  I AM BILL CLINTON."  I don't think it was explicitly identifying
> Clinton as black at that point, but the subtext was there.  Or at least
the
> working class aspect of it, which give our racialization of class,
> inevitably got narrowed to that sense.
>
> -- Nathan Newman
>
> .
>
>