Move Over Daddy Yankee, Make Way for the Obamistas

Podemos con Obama, is a will.i.am inspired musical video directed by Yerba Buena's Andres Levin urging Latinos from all walks of life to vote for Obama this coming November.

The video features reggaetoneros Don Omar and Julio Voltio along side a cast of Latino/a heavy hitters including: Alejandro Sanz, Paulina Rubio, John Leguizamo, Jessica Alba, Kate del Castillo, Cucu Diamantes (Yerba Buena), Pedro Martinez (Yerba Buena), Andres Levin (Yerba Buena), George Lopez, Luis Guzman, Lila Downs, Lin Manuel Miranda, Frankie Needles, Huey Dunbar, Nydia Caro, Ivonne Caro Caro, Brazilian Girls, Carlos Marín and family, Carola Gonzalez, Viva Nativa, Jose Alberti.

Lets see McCain pull that off...

*tip of the fitted to Lossip

“Quedate Callao!”

Reggaetonero SieteNueve has released a tiraera pa Daddy Yankee due to his endorsement of John McCain. The song called "Quedate Callao" asks how much money Daddy Yankee got to sell his people out and lead them into war over "gasolina." The chorus say "Mejor quedate callao si vas a hablar por los otros" (roughly:"it's better that you stay quiet if you're going to speak for us").

The hook uses a line from a voting campaign that Daddy Yankee was part of in January 2008 called "Voto o Quedate Callao" which translates to vote or shut up, or vote or be quiet.

Raquel Rivera, has written about the campaign and what it says to try and get the youth vote, so I urge people to look at her take over at Reggaetonica.

I think that SieteNueve's track is great and points to alot of the political reasons why people are bugging outover Daddy Yankee's endorsement of McCain. What I think is interesting is the use of the slogan "Voto o Quedate Callao" that Daddy helped popularize now being used to silence his (non) vote. The whole voto or quedate callao campaign basically said if you're not going to vote, or in this case you can't vote because of neocolonial law, then you have no right to voice your opinion. I think it is interesting and telling that SieteNueve's video ends with him saying "I endorse Don Pedro Albizu Campos," alluding to the fact the Daddy Yankee has no business voting for Obama or McCain, because the issue is still Puerto Rican independence and neither candidate is going to provide that.

*tip of the fitted cap to Angry Brown Butch and Vivir Latino

Los Republicanos: part duex

Okay, so I've had some time to think about this whole Daddy Yankee endorsing John McCain fiasco and my take is McCain might have just shot himself in the foot and here is why...

McCain is obviously trying to appeal to the Latino/a vote by appearing with El Cangri and accepting his endorsement, but chances are DY's endorsement will actually turn off some Latino/a voters, particularly the kind of Latino/a voter McCain wants to reach

Reggaeton is an extremely contested genre within the Latino/a community. More than any other musical genre, reggaeton truly highlights the the complexities of nationality, race, class, gender and generational division within the Latino/a community. Reggaeton is very often seen as something that is either strictly Puerto Rican, or more broadly Caribbean. Already there has been push back to having DY be the supposed voice of the Latino/a community because he is seen as representing Puerto Rican interests. Many people have also pointed out that DY can't even vote for McCain so his endorsement is irrelevant (which is true but it's bogus that people aren't talking about the fact that that's because Puerto Rico is a colony).

The reason why DY's endorsement might really hurt McCain is because of people's perceptions of El Cangri and reggaeton. Although claims over reggaeton's ownership are now fought over, during the 1990's reggaeton sparked a culture war in Puerto Rico over issues of race, sex, taste, and class. Reggaeton was seen as cafre, a term which is highly racialized and classed and denotes low culture. Reggaeton was seen as too Black and too American because of its close association to hip-hop, and therefore inauthentically Latino/a. It was seen as music that was devoid of culture and little more than a copycat of hip-hop when it first came out. It was also highly sexualized and suggestive with its visible trademarks being aggressive lyrics and perreo dancing. Not to mention, reggaeton was born out of the caserios (projects) and was initially funded by the drug game, which only added to the moral outcry against the genre. Reggaeton culture was immediately and vehemently denounced by the conservative and Christian segments of Puerto Rican society as crass and indecent. Although, it is extremely popular and much more sanitized today, reggaeton still maintains its association (real and imagined) to money, drugs, violence, and sex in the minds of many Latinos/as and Americans alike. It is that association that many Latinos/as, particularly those who tend to vote republican, are trying to distance themselves from. That is where McCain's plan backfires.

Daddy Yankee does not represent a performance of Latinidad, that many conservative Latinos/as feel comfortable with. I think the unease around Daddy Yankee's endorsement has to do with the fact that he actively and aggressively markets himself as de la calle and as a gangsta. Reggaeton and Daddy Yankee represent a version of Latinidad which is raced and classed that some Latinos/as want to distance themselves from. Rather than addressing the social realties that reggaeton speaks to and represents, it remains easier for certain segments of the Latino/a community to dismiss reggaeton and the culture around it as an abberation of Latinidad. It's crazy because in a way this whole Daddy Yankee - McCain thing made me think about the way's in which Latinos/as are climbing over each other for a piece of that Americano Dream. At whose cost are Latinos/as representing themselves as idealized American citizens?

Crazy as it may sound McCain is right Daddy Yankee is "an American success story" (ugh), but he may not represent "an American success story" that conservative Latino/a voters are ready to embrace. Guess McCain should have studied Leslie Sanchez's cringe-inducing Los Republicanos: Why Hispanics and Republicans Need Each Other a little closer because now he has a "Reggaeton Problem".

Why Puerto Ricans Need to Support Obama

I am pro Puerto Rican independence. A number of family members still live on the island, including my father and my brother and sister, and as a Nuyorican I am keenly aware of the way that policy here affect the lives of those on the island. All Puerto Ricans on the island and in the diaspora are living under the effects of a neo-colonial system, and we need to deploy a variety of strategies to ensure that boricuas are able to fight for self-determination (however differently we might define that term). While we will always need los independistas and los macheteros, we also need to support Barack Obama as contradictory as that sounds.

While I have no illusions that a vote for Barack Obama is a vote for Puerto Rican independence, I feel that it is important for Puerto Ricans to vote for Obama to ensure that we are able to move forward and not backwards. Recently, the Puerto Rican community has suffered under the Bush administration’s “terrorist” witch-hunts. Anyone who speaks up against the inhumane conditions in Puerto Rico or in the Puerto Rican community in the states is branded a terrorist. The Bush Administration is trying to breed fear in our community and prevent us from mobilizing. The grand jury hearings this past year were reminiscent of the 1950s on the island, a time when even speaking about Puerto Rican independence would land you in jail, a time when the very notion of Puerto Rican pride was treasonous.

We need a change. We need Puerto Ricans to stop dying in Iraq (actually we need everyone to stop dying in Iraq). We need better conditions in barrios in the U.S. and on the island. We need the surveillance and COUNTERINTELPRO shit to stop. While Obama is no political savior (and I think we all need to recognize that he has steadily become more centrist in his rhetoric) he can provide the Puerto Rican community and People of Color more broadly with the political climate necessary to organize and mobilize our communities. McCain represents more of the same: war, repression, cronyism, and a disregard for queer communities and communities of color.

I recently came across this YouTube clip of Miguel Luciano endorsing Barack Obama in the primaries and I think he does a excellent job talking about the political contractions that U.S.-based Puerto Ricans face in this election.



We can’t afford to throw away this election. Please register to vote at Voto Latino

Los Republicanos: Daddy Yankee & John McCain

In what I’m guessing is a attempt to look young and hip John McCain, 71, continued his efforts to reach out to the Latina/o community by inviting reggaetonero Daddy Yankee to his campaign headquarters on Saturday afternoon.

Considering El Cangri’s sometimes raunchy lyrics and hustlin’ past it seems like a weird political coupling. "I don't know anything about Daddy Yankee," said McCain spokeswoman Nicolle Wallace. Great.

Supposedly McCain and Daddy Yankee first met when they were both named two of the 100 most influential people of 2006 by Time magazine.

According to Yankee “He invited me to have a brief conversation on how we can improve the living conditions in Hispanic communities.” The two were said to have discussed issues such as im/migration, education, and Latino/a youth. Yankee says he is not ready to endorse McCain yet hopefully because he will meet with Obama to hear him out on Latino/a issues.

This meeting is funny considering that McCain just put out a political attack ad against Obama accusing him of being a media whore. McCain is really trying to tap in to popular personalities to get his message out instead of actually just talking. I guess we’ll have to wait and see if DY is going to hop on the “Straight Talk Express.”

Source: LA Times