Congress Member Sends Barack The Magic Negro Controversial Video As Gift

Rep. Saltsman was defending his actions after he sent Republican National Committee members a copy of the “Barack The Magic Negro” CD. He said it was intended as a joke. Saltsman is a candidate for the RNC chairmanship.

It started back in 2007 when Rush Limbaugh played the tune on his show and the Los Angeles Times published an op-ed piece on Barack Obama, calling the President elect, “The Magic Negro.” Since then, the controversial video is picking up momentum and is available on YouTube.

In the video, the song along with the LA Times piece make a mockery of Barack Obama’s universal appeal, bluntly stating that The Magic Negro is “a figure of postmodern folk culture, coined by snarky 20th century sociologists, to explain a cultural figure who emerged in the wake of Brown vs. Board of Education. "He has no past, he simply appears one day to help the white protagonist," reads the description on Wikipedia. (LA Times, March 19, 2007)

The article goes on to say that The Magic Negro is a fictional figure created to soothe some sort of white guilt over the role of slavery and racial segregation in America. The Magic Negro is supposed to be a replacement for the stereotypical images not seen with our President-elect, who is a non-confrontational, calmer black man.

However, the Magic Negro video which is widely popular lately, seeks to categorize black males as either in jail (an image of Rev. Jesse Jackson’s mug shot appears in the video) or as a rapper (Snoop Dogg’s image is shown). The Magic Negro video does not give credit for positive role models and accomplishments that these men have done, or of other great African American have done.

Even the LA Times piece seems to criticize Barack Obama for being “articulate.” The writer of this article actually wanted Barack Obama to do some kind of ‘street language name calling’ to his opponent John McCain. I guess that would have made Barack Obama not so much a Magic Negro.

The title of the CD sent to the members of congress is called, "We Hate the USA." Rep. Saltsman says the The Magic Negro CD was satire, yet it also contains songs referencing former presidential candidate John Edwards and the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, among other non-Republican targets.