What the "Heckler" Happened To Obama?

Presumptive Democratic nominee, Senator Barack Obama, experienced a backlash during one of his speeches today when he was heckled at a town hall meeting in St. Petersburg, Florida by a group of young black men.

Actually, let me rephrase that because I think "heckled" is a strong word. Rather, The men held up a sign saying, "What about the black community Obama?" to get his attention. Then, the crowd began chanting in unison, which gained them an aknowledgement from him. Obama maintained his composure throughout the meeting and calmly answered their questions after his speech.

You may be wondering what questions the men had for the first viable African American presidential candidate. Well, they asked about Jena 6, Sean Bell, and other racial incidents over the past two years about which Obama quickly and eloquently responded.

Now, I am not to going to hype up this incident anymore than CNN and other mainstream media have managed to do. The truth of the matter is that presidential candidates get heckled ALL THE TIME. What I will say is that I think the media is playing this one up especially because it is a case of black men rising up to harass another black man, especially this particular black man.

The incident does give me a bit of pause. I think we, as Black Americans need to realize that Barack Obama is not the PANACEA for black people nor is he able to answer for years of oppression and injustice we have faced.

As president, he will not only have to focus on race relations in this country but he has to fix the jacked-up U.S. economy, and work on mending fences in the Middle East.

We, as black folk, won't be able to have him on speed dial whenever something goes wrong in our neighborhoods.

He will be a busy man, just as past presidents have been. What we can hope for is that he gives us a ring every once in a while, which is more than we have gotten during the last eight years of George W. Bush.

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