Comments don't appear to be hurting Kanye West

[FreedomAngel82]

Link: http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0908kanye-comments08-ON.html

Snip: <Geoff Boucher
Los Angeles Times
Sept. 8, 2005 03:11 PM

Controversy is a tricky current for celebrities to navigate, and sometimes it can push their career plans off course. The Dixie Chicks, for example, took a political swipe at President Bush in 2003 and were punished by a nasty backlash from fans and country radio. Or take Madonna and rapper Ludacris, music stars who lost lucrative pitch deals with Pepsi when their music was deemed too edgy to sell soda.

So how can Kanye West go on national television and passionately accuse Bush of not caring about blacks one week and still be riding high the next as a bestselling rapper and corporate pitchman?

The rapper, it turns out, appears to be the right man in the right place at the right time. West has the No. 1 album in the United States, his famous face is promoting Pepsi and the National Football League, and a Time magazine cover story recently declared him nothing less than "Hip-Hop's Class Act." But he is getting just as much attention for a startling rant against Bush delivered in the middle of an otherwise staid NBC telethon for Hurricane Katrina.

Jimmy Steal, program director for KPWR-FM, the high-rated Los Angeles hip-hop and R&B outlet, said West can walk the edge politically because his young fans see him as an independent-minded artist and, unlike the Dixie Chicks, his provocative words weren't viewed by his fan base as a betrayal of their sentiments.

"This is not a guy who is known just for making some hit music; this is someone who has value and credibility culturally," Steal said. "One of the reasons he has value to sponsors and fans -- and even to society -- is because he has an opinion and is willing to share it."

The response to the opinions he expressed last Friday was quick and furious from some quarters. Some viewers watching the NBC telecast said they phoned back and demanded their donations be returned. Conservative pundits mocked or attacked West.

West's condemnation of the media coverage of Katrina ("If you see a black family, it says they're looting. See a white family, it says they're looking for food") and Bush's view of the calamity ("George Bush doesn't care about black people") have also found support.

On the Internet, there are already T-shirts being sold with the accusation of Bush's apathy, a line that West Coast viewers of the telethon did not hear because NBC excised it from the region's tape-delayed program.>

[texpatriot2004]

1. "George Bush doesn't care about Black people." Kanye West

AND HE'S RIGHT! Go Kanye.

George Bush don't like black people...
George Bush don't like black people...

It's really a great song.

[BlueEyedSon]

2. The fact is, GWB doesn't care about anyone but his base:

the "haves" and "have mores"....