The Other Swing Voter
We needed some air. The room’s high ceilings had been stuffed with roping hugs and raining tears, with eyes and smiles wider than the television announcing the impossible, with raised arms and shouts of “Thank ya, Jeesus-aaa!”
The storefront office of the Black United Front was full in so many ways. We seemed to feel it all at once on the evening of November 4, 2008. And hear it.
We poured out onto the sidewalk of North Broad Street, the main artery of North Philadelphia. The entirety of this sprawling and struggling black community, blocks from Temple University, where I was a doctoral student, seemed to be out there that night, amassing on the sidewalks, or joining the parade of waving and honking older black people.
Black youth were just as jubilant in their rimmed-out cars. Subwoofers in trunks thumped bodies full of hip-hop that swung our heads up and down. Beats and lyrics fluctuated. Young Jeezy hadn’t yet dropped the young black anthem of the moment, “My President,” with the hook:
My president is black, my Lambo’s blue
And I’ll be goddamned if my rims ain’t too
But the song was coming like the parade of cars down North Broad Street. A worn-out pickup truck approached, slowly. I stared into its open cargo area. I gaped at three young black males clutching a huge pole and waving a gigantic American flag. Others saw and cheered. I blinked—hard. Same sight. All real, like the stunning election results.
The ethereal flag-bearers smiled at their sidewalk audience and rolled on by. My most vivid
