Politics

A documentary that will never air on US TV

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• Saturday 15th September 2007

Is America ready for a black president? Good question, right?

As my friend Eric points out regarding this pilot show for a prospective BBC series: “Too bad it will not air here in the USA because as you will see from his style and the whole tone of the piece, it is asking far more profound questions about our culture than our media does here on mainstream US television.”

Now, I don’t think much of Barack Obama at all. No potential presidential candidate who brags of selling himself to the highest bidder (32.5 million dollars raised last quarter! Whoopee!) has any worth at all in my opinion, no matter how “dynamic” his on-camera persona seems. However, his presence in the race brings up the question of racial acceptance; a question that no mainsream or cable correspondent will tackle with any intelkligence before, during, or after the election, no matter who wins. Why risk any angry mail? Why risk disagreeing with Bill O’Reilly?

The pilot presents a lot of superficial hit-and-run questions that are edited together to make a point, a la Michael Moore, but the real (and surprising) strength comes from the dissection by correspondent Gary Younger of the comments in the longer interviews. Quite entertaining and very on-point.

Well, if it does get produced, maybe someone will post the episodes on Youtube…