Latest / Color Commentary / Ep 32 | The Voting Rights Act Is Gone in Everything but Name
Transcript
- Charles Cole: Welcome to Color Commentary, a podcast with a story shaping our world. Our tone in black and white first, and then we dig into the deeper meaning in full color. Each week I'll be bringing you the news like this. First, we'll start with what I like to call the black and white section, a clear straight shoot and rundown of the facts and the traditions of greats like Ed Bradley, Walter Cronkite, and the classic voices of journalism. Then we'll shift into color commentary section where I add my own personal opinions and insights. Sometimes it'll just be me. Sometimes we'll have guests. But let's figure out together exactly what this show can be, ⁓ with your feedback shaping the journey, of course. ⁓ So let's get into it. Today I wanna talk about something that does not always get the attention it deserves, but now it's in the public eye. And it's important in the public eye, so I wanna be able to walk us through it and explain it a little bit so you can be informed. ⁓ This topic affects who makes the laws on education. on housing, on healthcare, and on criminal justice. It affects whether your vote counts. It affects whether black communities or other communities have a voice in their own government at all. I'm talking about the Voting Rights Act, what it was, what has been done to it, and what is happening right now in real time across this country to strip black voters of their political power before the 2026 midterm elections. And then I'm gonna go deep on Memphis today. ⁓ But Memphis isn't alone, it's a national story, but I do a lot of work in Memphis. I have a lot of people in Memphis that I care about and I know, and this thing is moving fast. So I think I've teased you all enough. ⁓ So let's go ahead and get it going. Here are the facts, black and white. What is the Voting Rights Act? The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is one of the most consequential pieces of civil rights legislation in American history. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed it into law at the height of the civil rights movement just months after the brutal suppression of marchers at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama on what became known as Bloody Sunday. The law was built to dismantle the infrastructure of voter suppression that had kept black Americans from the ballot box for generations, despite the 15th Amendment guaranteeing their right to vote. There were poll taxes, there were literacy tests, there was intimidation at these polling places, and in many cases, just outright violence. It was brutal. The Voting Rights Act was the federal government's answer to all of it. So there were two provisions that matter most in this story. Section five required states with a documented history of racial discrimination and voting to get pre-clearance from the federal department of justice before making any changes to their election laws or their district maps. This will be very important coming up soon. This was the law's most powerful tool. It meant a state could, you know, not simply redraw lines overnight to hurt black voters without federal approval first. That protection was gutted in 2013 when the Supreme Court struck it down in Shelby County versus Holder, ruling that the formula identifying which states needed oversight was outdated. Then we get to section two. That provision was supposed to survive Shelby County, right? It was meant to prohibit racial discrimination in voting, and it's been used for decades to challenge redistricting maps that dilute black political power. That's the provision at the center of what just happened. On April 29th, This year, the Supreme Court issued a 6-3 ruling in Louisiana versus Calais. And you all forgive me if I'm saying that incorrectly, but C-A-L-L-A-I-S, okay? The decision continued what the Brenner Center for Justice described as more than a decade of the court's assault on the crown jewel of the civil rights movement. Here's the background. After the 2020 census, black voters in Louisiana sued the state. arguing that his congressional map packed the state's large black population into only one of the six congressional districts, diluting their political power. A federal court agreed and ordered Louisiana to redraw his map to include a second majority black district. Louisiana complied, drew a new map, and as a result, two black Louisianans were elected to Congress for the first time in the state's history. Then a group of voters who described themselves as non-African-American sued claiming the VRA compliant map was itself an illegal racial gerrymander. The Supreme Court along strict ideological lines, six very conservative justices against three liberal justices sided with them. The second majority black district was struck down. The court technically did not strike down section two entirely though. ⁓ Justice Samuel Alito's majority opinion rewrote the rules in ways that made it nearly impossible for black voters to win redistricting cases moving forward. Plaintiffs must now prove intentional discrimination, an extraordinarily high legal bar, and states can defend virtually any discriminatory maps simply by claiming it was drawn for partisan reasons rather than racial ones. Since in the South, race and party affiliation are deeply intertwined, that partisan defense is now essentially a blank check for racial gerrymandering. Justice Elena Kagan, writing in a dissent alongside Justices Sotomayor and Jackson, did not miss words. She wrote that the majority had rendered Section 2 all but a dead letter. She called it the majority's now completed demolition of the Voting Rights Act. The court then bypassed its own standard 32-day waiting period and finalized the ruling almost immediately. even as more than 100,000 Louisiana voters had already cast early ballots in a primary that the governor then suspended. The chaos that followed was intentional and it was immediate. States across the South began redrawing maps within days. So then there became this redistricting wave that we're starting to see right now is happening, right? The redistricting wave that followed this ruling did not start on April 29th. It began in 2025. when President Trump pressured Republican-led state legislators to redraw congressional maps before the 2026 midterms. With the explicit goal of locking in Republican House majorities, Tennessee, Louisiana, Alabama, Florida, South Carolina, Mississippi, Virginia, Texas, and North Carolina are all parts of this national effort to reorder political power before November. Here's where it currently stands. Texas was the starting point. Trump pressured the Texas Republican legislator to redraw his maps in 2025 ahead of any Supreme Court ruling. Texas has long documented history of courts finding his maps intentionally discriminatory against black and Latino voters. The new maps were challenged, but were allowed to stand after the Supreme Court declined to block them. Louisiana, which was ground zero for the ruling after the Supreme Court struck down a second majority black district that had finally sent two black reps. to Congress, the governor suspended the ongoing primary election to allow the legislature to redraw the map again. The state's May 16 primary was thrown into chaos. Alabama immediately used the ruling as a template to ask the Supreme Court to reinstate its own racially gerrymandered maps. And then there's a few. Like I said, we mentioned Alabama. We mentioned ⁓ just all these different states, right? Now, let's do a deep dive into Memphis, Tennessee. Tennessee is where the story is sharpest right now because it happened fast. It happened brazenly and it happened in a city that's 60 % black. It's a really interesting case. Memphis has had long, long ⁓ been the only democratic congressional seat left in Tennessee. It was the last majority minority district in the state. It's a district that gave black Memphians and the meaningful voice in Congress. and a representative who answered to their community. Eight days after the Supreme Court's ruling, the Tennessee Republican-controlled legislator called a special session. The explicit goal, as stated by ⁓ the Republicans, they dealt a nine-oh sweep of Tennessee's nine congressional seats, and President Trump had pressured Governor Bill Lee to call the session. The map they passed sliced Memphis into three separate congressional districts. near even thirds, each stretching in different directions deep into rural white conservative Tennessee. One new district runs 200 miles north from Memphis, up the western edge of the state, all the way to the Kentucky border before curving east. Another snakes across rural west Tennessee counties, and a third carves up the eastern portion of the city and its suburbs. The results, Memphis residents who live across the street from each other now vote in different congressional districts. The AP reported on two neighbors and longtime bandmates who have performed together on Beale Street for 21 years and live next to each other for a decade. As of the passage of this map, they cast ballots in different districts and their new representatives will be accountable to rural voters hundreds of miles away and not to the people of Memphis. Democratic State Senator Jeff Yarbrough of Nashville put it plainly on the floor of the legislature. Give me a break. It is the most blatant dilution of black voting power since the height of Jim Crow. Democratic state senator ⁓ Charlene Oliver stood on her desk and unfurled a sign that read, No Jim Crow 2.0, Stop the Tennessee Steal. Hundreds of protesters descended on the state Capitol in Nashville. Tequila Johnson, head of the Tennessee Equity Alliance, told the crowd, they don't want to see us win, so they cheat. Don't get it twisted. This is the same Tennessee where the Klan was born in Pulaski. Christmas Eve, 1865. the same Tennessee that wrote the first Jim Crow law in the country in 1881, the same Tennessee that tried to expel two black lawmakers in 2023. On May 9th, days after the map passed, protesters marched through downtown Memphis carrying signs that read, Memphis demands a voice and your racism will not stop us. Republican House Speaker Cameron Sexton's answer to the protest was the same line Republicans are using in every state. The maps are about politics and population, not race. The Supreme Court's ruling gave them exactly that cover. And as long as they claim a partisan motive, the maps are now nearly bulletproof in court. Democrats, ⁓ Democratic candidates, I'm gonna take that, give you some space on that. Okay. Democratic candidates and voters have filed a federal challenge to the maps. Legal experts say the path to overturning them under the new rule that the Supreme Court has set is extremely narrow. It's gonna be a really, really, really tough task. Almost impossible, but that's the news. Now let's talk about it. You're listening to Color Commentary with Dr. Cole. I've been gone, Tommy and I have been, I've been out. Let me not put that on Tommy, it's been me. I had some traveling to do, got a little under the weather, but I'm back. And I was definitely wanting to do something to be more fun, but this all happened while we were away. And I'm more concerned with people really knowing and understanding why this stuff matters. ⁓ In my neighborhood and the people that I love and that I know and that I talk to, they know something. bad has happened and they know that the Voting Rights Act is really important, but they don't always, everybody doesn't always know why. So I wanted to just at least cover it. I'm gonna cover some other things too, you know, after we get through this part, but people need to know why that stuff is significant. I lived in Oakland, California, and when I lived in Oakland as a kid, there was a large black population. Over time, you start to see those black people get pushed out of Oakland and get moved around. And then they would recarve districts. And so the opposite kind of happened to us where there were a few stronghold districts in Oakland that were predominantly black. And you could kind of have that black voice. They would dilute them by breaking that up and putting them into other districts that with the majority of people don't have the same interests. And the city has kind of gone the way the city has gone since then. Oakland has changed significantly. Now I'm not saying that Oakland has solely changed because of this, but I will say definitely in large part. And so when I'm thinking about Memphis and watching the images of these protests felt a little different and watching people get testy, it felt like something out of a history book. It felt a little different. And this on my top line, because I've gotten criticism for why I was so critical of how we, the Democrats, ran our election in the last election and beforehand and leading up. this election was super consequential and we didn't put our best foot forward. And, you know, while Joe Biden not really getting out early or even in the middle in his second year, If they wanted Kamala Harris to be the person, they should have been propping her up and putting her out there so she could have won. Or just leave if you don't want to be unfair to whatever. you, want it. He should have kept his promise to be a transitional president and have this bench, this democratic bench that we always brag about. Let them duke it out ⁓ and may the best win because I do think with a real campaign, somebody put it, could have potentially won. ⁓ I'm always critical of my own side the same way I'm always critical of things that's happening in my house versus my neighbors, but that doesn't let these Republicans off. Like some of these people are, let's just say it's just blatantly racist. Black people have been getting on their nerves for a while. It's been disrupting stuff. It's been, you know, they wanted to do something about it. ⁓ And it just sucks. It just sucks, man. It sucks because it does take us back in a bunch of different ways. And the work that I do where I focus on awareness, navigation, and duty, that's what I felt I needed to do in this episode. I had a duty to kind of break this down. At least so you understand what was at stake, what happened. Now let's talk about the navigation part. Where do you go from here? Where do you go? Well, one, You do not play about these next elections. You don't play about the midterms and you don't play about ⁓ national. And now midterms are gonna be very, very difficult with all of these districts being redrawn. Now Democrats have tried to fight back. They have tried to redistrict in liberal places as well, right? Like, hey, cool, well, let's get our super majority going too. ⁓ And it's just. Short-sighted isn't the word. It just feels like when two factions know that there is mutual destruction and you think they'd stop, but it's not, right? Like the way we're going, can't, this is not sustainable. It's not sustainable. I don't know what we're on the precipice of and I'm not trying to be some alarmist or conspiracy theorist or whatever the case is, right? But. These things are reshaping American history right in front of us. And one thing as somebody who loves history and is a student of it, dynasties fall, empires fall. America is, you know, arguably, but I think I can say this, you know, is a sought after, at the top, first world country. ⁓ And there's a lot of cracks in our armor. and we're not slowing down to fix it. And I used to believe Tommy and viewer that if the health of the country as a whole became at stake, I used to think that there would be adults inside there from both of these sides that would be like, okay, the adults need to, people need to be quiet while the adults are working now to fix this. But people just dug in more. They just dug in more. And I don't know where they think this is gonna end. don't know if people thought beyond this moment, but how and what we do next is just really important. And so keep yourselves informed. I'm not gonna be, you know, the talking head that I've been seeing. I've been seeing a lot of talking heads a lot, like in the last few. few weeks. And a lot of those talking heads are doing really well in life and they're going to be okay in a lot of different ways. And my heart and my mind goes to the people like in my community. live in very, I live in Dalton, Illinois. It is a majority black South suburb of Chicago. It is a place where it's not super wealthy. There's a little bit of blight, we're a decent community. We look out for each other. We talk to each other. You know what I'm saying? We take care. when this happened, I would go, I help my neighbors out. I have a lot of elderly neighbors that live here. And I just talk and listen. And I was asking them about this. many of them were just, they were really just. figuring out what they need to do. They weren't really watching CNN or MSNBC or Fox or anything kind of going deep into it. They're trying to remain not in their bubble, but they're trying to make, they're trying to make shit crack. gas, gas right now is super high. It's super high. Groceries have taken a significant turn up. We watched Spirit Airlines just crumble like They're here today and they were gone tomorrow. The same Spirit Airlines that moves, and we can have our jokes about Frontier and Spirit. But a vast, vast amount of people in this country depend on that kind of cheap retail, you know, like those airlines to be able to get and see their families. That's something that is significant to me because again, when I moved from Kentucky to California, we did on a Greyhound, bro, that's six days. That's like Oregon trail shit. I'm glad we didn't die from dysentery. You know what saying? Like it's just, I'm trying to reconcile the privilege that I got and the knowledge that I have and access to this information and where I can focus on this stuff and I can be outraged. I'm trying to reconcile that with where I live, the people that I love, the people in my family, the people that are like. The type of work I do is probably not real work to those people. You know what I'm saying? Like these are people that work with their hands. These are people that's getting their hands dirty in mud and dirt. And they come home with their back hurting and they, it's just the Midwest, man. This is the Midwest. You can drive 25 minutes away from me to Gary, Indiana, which used to be a shining city. was supposed to, early in the fifties and sixties, like it was, projected to be like this place is, if you go there now, it's sad, man. Like even in the neighborhood, if you want to go see the Jackson house, I'm sure a lot of people are going to see it now with the movie out. But in that same community now, still, you would think that the most popular entertainer of all time, that that community would benefit from just that level of celebrity. And it's still a super impoverished community. It's still like a lot of things happening. And so how are these people responding and reacting to this? What happens to the people that already don't expect good things to happen? How do you rise up in the midst of that? And what does rising up even look like? So I'm not gonna pretend to have answers for you, ⁓ but I do think of something that you should be aware of. I think of something you should keep your eye on. And I think you should really pay attention to the politicians that are trying to court you for your vote. And I think you should hold their feet to the fire. But I also think you should, you gotta start asking for the things you want. You just have to. We can't continue to be placated with people kissing babies, man, and making false promises. Check these people's jacket. Check what they've done. Who's actually in that community helping them being with those people? I just... Listen, I think the other thing is you should be offended that these people were playing with your intelligence in your face. What do I mean by that? This whole partisan versus racial argument that they're making. Come on, man. It's not racial, this is about partisanship. This is about, you know, we gotta, come on. Like, we are living in a time where people and people in power are aware that we have short attention spans. ⁓ There's a lot more talking online and doing in real life to the point where they felt okay, the company line is that wasn't about race, that was about partisanship. Listen, man, your government works for you. And when that government stops working for you and starts to work for corporations or starts to work for foreign entities or things like that, you have a duty to fight for your country. You do. I am damn proud to be black. I'm to say very black, I am very black. I have a lot of black on today. But I'm proud to be black in a country where we're only 13 % of the population. The level of inroads we've made, the level of influence we have, the arbiters of cool for the planet, as some would say. Like the way we're able to entertain, the way that people want how you dress and how you talk and how you look, like we're in the middle of the NBA playoffs right now. It's very, very black dominated league, right? Although Tommy, the white boys are making, they making a comeback, brother. They are, it didn't help the Lakers out a lot. I hate the Lakers, so I'm gonna revel in this. Didn't help the Lakers out a lot. They got swept, but I'm just saying all this to say. I played basketball in high school. I was pretty decent. I wasn't the greatest, but I had some recruitment, right? And I got into two schools in Hawaii, Hawaii Pacific and Hawaii Chaminade. I got into a school in Idaho to play, and there was another school. So I then get started getting the packets and the things like that. In Idaho's packet, I looked at the details. I'm going through with my parents, you know, all that stuff. And then I'm like, yo, like, well, What's the black population? The black population was miniscule. But the athletic department in Idaho and in that school was like 95 % black. Even at 17 years old, I was like, no, I think I'm good. I think I'm okay. I'm not taking this. And maybe I was, look, I still owe Six Fingers Tommy's or maybe I should have took the damn scholarship, sucked it up so I didn't owe Six Fingers today. But my point is, is that none of this is new. When you only serve a purpose for people and to that, that is the extent of your humanity to them. You gotta know when to turn down that offer. Now in this context, we live here, this is our government. It's hard to grab back power, but it's not impossible. And I think one of the first things we have to do is you gotta be more informed because if we were more informed, If we didn't placate and splinter out into all these other small factions as divide and conquer strategy that worked really, really well, you'd have some kind of wall of defense against this stuff. But we don't and we didn't. Some tried. And so how is this going to affect people? I think you kind of see any effects already. What is my advice to people? Like I said, stay vigilant, do the best you can to take care of your families and things like that. I people are going to live their lives. It's going to keep moving. And hopefully, you know, in these next elections, if it's just not completely cooked, I mean, they did a damn good job with this redistricting thing. It might be very difficult. for a Democrat, ⁓ especially a liberal one, to win in the next election. And I think what's gonna happen is that... in both the Democrat side and the Republican side, I think what's going to have to emerge slowly is that there's going to have to be this aggressive middle. I'm not saying you need to like it. I'm not saying that I agree with it. I'm not, whatever. I think it's going to be very difficult for an AOC to win. And I think she could. I think she's bright. think she has, she's surprised. She has the energy. And if she won, I'd congratulate her. But I just think, I do think, and I'm using my own neighborhood as the barometer here. So tainted data. But what the thing that they keep asking about is, can we just get somebody that's just cool? Can we get somebody that's just trying to make sure everybody's doing well? Can we get somebody that's not playing to the most fringe extreme conservatives or the most fringe extreme leftists? Can we do that? I don't know. I don't necessarily have the answers to these questions, but what I do have and what I do hope you got is an understanding of what the voting rights bill was, how it got dismantled and where we are now, so you can be more informed. Now, some quick hits. We are knee deep in the NBA playoffs. ⁓ I am a huge basketball fan. ⁓ And the future is here. The future is here. Ant-Man, Wimby, Cade Cunningham, the Knicks, the Knicks. Who thought the Knicks, right? Like they've been on a spree. There's no KD, there's no Steph, there's no LeBron at this stage. We are officially in the next generation of the NBA. And I used to be pretty worried about it. In some ways I still am. It's just so many threes and people not really hooping and, but these playoffs, I'm enjoying them. I am rather enjoying them. I'm, Wimby just got kicked out of a game. because they was trying to bully him and beat up on him because he's skinny and that's the good strategy. What you do is you test a gangster and he caught Nas read with a mean one. and I did moisturize my elbow before I did that by the way. But I liked seeing his spunk. I'm glad Nas is not hurt, you know what I'm saying? Like that's important. But I like that fight. I like seeing Ant Edwards and his cockiness. I like seeing him go at KD. I like seeing him go at Joker. I like it. I like it. So the Kumbaya era of the NBA may be getting back. to rivalries and grudges. And for you all that only joined from my political commentary or my smart shit, ⁓ that might sound very bad what I just said, but as a sports fan, it's actually a very, very good thing for competition. So there's that. ⁓ Another quick hit in the sports world that was interesting to me is Stephen A. Smith and Skip Bayless reuniting on ESPN first tape. and it was great TV. I know that they have become ubiquitous with terrible television, they ruined sports media, they did this, they did that. Listen, similar to this topic I'm gonna broach at the end, that's fun for me. I can tell people ain't never heard real AM sports radio before. I'm gonna talk about the Kevin Hart roast. The constant Kevin Hart roast levels of disrespect comes on AM sports talk radio. It is wild. Whatever Stephen A and Skip Bayless and these people do, I promise you, it ain't got nothing on some fringe. Sports talk show in New York somewhere. It's brutal, it's crazy. And they always talk about in these sports town, if you're in Boston, if you're in Philly, if you're in New York, if you're in Chicago, these people do not let up. They love you one day and then they hate you. So watching Skip and Stephen A return, and I don't think they should do it again every day. I think they should, it was just seeing their chemistry and seeing them back together. Skip Bayless makes some crazy, crazy claims, but he comes prepared to back them up. And I don't agree with none of the claims that that dude made, LeBron James being ninth overall, but he made a cogent argument. And that's the show. Here's my prediction. And I think Stephen A. Smith is a very polarizing figure. Obviously, I think he's a pretty successful guy. know about him getting fired. I've read his books. I'm somebody that's rooted for Stephen A. early on, ⁓ just because I just like seeing that black man win and the way that he's doing it. And I see somebody who fumbled the bag the first time, got fired, got ostracized. came back and took over the building, right? Like, so there's a part of me, even when I hate some of his takes at times, ⁓ I'm always, I'm just, I'm a root for that. I'm a root for him. I'm a root for that. I'm not always that offended by, somebody's opinions don't always offend me. If we continue to just constantly get offended by people's opinions, man, it's just not setting us up to fight properly. Don't yell, make a better argument. And I think that's where we kind of have to move to. But my prediction is as a flex of Stephen A. Smith's power. There will be a show on ESPN. There will be an episode, a first take. If it's first take, maybe it'll have evolved into something else where it will be Stephen A. Smith, Skip Bayless, and Shannon Sharp. And I'm telling you right now, that show is gonna do stupid numbers. Because even though people are loud on the internet about not liking them, about hating them, about hating those takes or whatever the case is, numbers talk. And there's a lot more people that love that kind of sports talk, that barbershop talk in that way, they just don't go on the internet and evangelize about So I think it's gonna be very interesting. ⁓ Congratulations to both of them. And looking out for each other, Skip Bayless brought Stephen A. Smith back into ESPN, out the ESPN, fired him. He fought for Stephen A. Smith to get his job back and fought for Stephen A. to be his permanent ⁓ co-host, to which Stephen A. took over and grew it. And Skip seems to be proud of it. So Stephen A. has returned the favor to get Skip Bayless back into the building. Regardless how you feel about sports taste sports in general color commentary, whatever That type of bond between two men and looking out for each other I thought I think on some level is refreshing and if they got to be hated and then go ahead and be hated together But moving on to our last topic, and Tommy and I, I mean, we let you behind the curtain a little bit. were, I mean, actually, I probably should have recorded this then, but I just, it just probably wouldn't have been wise. But I was talking about the Kevin Hart roast. I watched it in its entirety. I watched it live. Here's what I'm gonna say to people out there watching. If you like roast comedy, if you like risque, trans-worthy comedy, if you wanna see a roast where people really get at each other's neck and it's offensive and people gasp and hold their pearls, clutch their pearls, so to speak. Don't go to social media and just watch the roast and just form your own opinion. One thing about comedy that bothers me is when the day after, after everybody in the place has laughed or not laughed or booed or whatever, see I believe in the crowd and crowd justice, meaning the crowd will let you know, they will boo your ass off them stages. It will happen. But then this thing, this over-intellectualization of a joke out of context, written and read, ⁓ not giving a full story, but using it to paint somebody in certain ways, I've never liked that. I've gotten heat for supporting Chappelle. But I feel like I understood where Chappelle was coming from. I feel like he believes that comedy is an important pillar in American society around free thought. freedom of speech. And once you start to parse out those things, he feels like many other people, Lenny Bruce, Ben, one of the originators who went to jail a bunch of times for this cause. Once you start sparsing, you're cooked because, why is this topic off limits, but the rest of these ain't? So it's not okay to talk about topic A. But laughing at, you know, somebody going to jail or dying or in another context or whatever the case is, that's completely fine. And I think it's just really the hypocrisy of it. My point is I watched the roast. I enjoyed it. And there was a bunch of times I was like, ⁓ shit, like, or like cringe from it, right? I can't say I hate these new terms like the egg and all that. mean, yo, y'all young people, you get to have your stuff, right? I ain't mad at you, man. Do your thing. I'm saying I'm just too old to be saying this shit. But that's the point, right? The point is some of these jokes are like, they're really, really, really too far. We talked a long time about Shera Underwood, I think it Shera Underwood, about her husband committing suicide by throwing himself off of a bridge. And she told her fellow comedians, go do it, because I'm coming for you. I like Tony Hinchcliffe and Shera Underwood's exchanges with and against each other. And it looked, and when they sat down next to each other, it's like they was having a good time. I think cutting out pieces without the context of it, you know, if you want to be offended, it's very, easy. Anybody could leave offended from that roast. That roast was wild. It was outrageous. But there were some moments in that roast that I really loved. I loved Kat Williams coming out. and Cat Williams and Stephen and Kevin Hart having ⁓ like Cat Williams lit Kevin Hart up and Kevin Hart at the end got to have his leg back. I think they both landed some blows and for them to kind of say, yo, moving forward, you're going to see us being more friends than enemies. I thought that was big. I thought that was a real moment. ⁓ I really didn't think the rock was coming. It was like kind of publicly stated that he wouldn't be there. There was a lot of jokes in the, the roast about how you know, DJ did not show up for Kevin and wouldn't, you know, a lot of jokes at his, at their expense. And ⁓ his was, his thing was very over the top too. He dug into his WWE bag. If you like the rock, if you like the smell, what the rock is cooking candy ass that every, well, candy ass is Steve Austin, but you get my point. If you like the K-Fabe of like wrestling, you get to see a performance from the rock that you might not have seen. be at peak in about 10 to 15 years. You know, so I think it was interesting, man. Shout out to Kevin Hart though. Kevin Hart is rich as shit. And he showed, he made, I've never seen The Roast be that large of a spectacle before. I mean, they did a lot. I think he elevated some things there and we'll see if it continues. But I'm a person that does like comedy. I'm a person that I like raw comics. I don't laugh at everything. Sometimes I'm offended. Sometimes says don't work for me. And some of the says didn't work for me at this role. So I'm be very honest with you. Like I love all the friends that came out. Some people just not comedians. One of my favorites was Regina Hall. As I was telling Tommy before, I'm in love with Regina Hall. So everything that I say from here on out about Regina Hall needs to kind of be viewed during that lens. ⁓ Maybe she was terrible. I thought she was the greatest thing ever. I loved her standing character of being a medium that is in communication with Kevin's mom. ⁓ The jokes she had for Kevin were very, very hard-hitting jokes and very hard jokes to tell in front of Kevin's wife. I think all of those people had some conversations with his wife beforehand. And... ⁓ But listen, man, I thought it was a great evening in comedy. There are people that were really, really offended. I'm not mad at those people. I just think that it's, I just don't like just playing out the way that it's starting to play out. But anyway. I'm back. I've been a little ill. I've been away. We missed two weeks, but we're back, Tommy. I'm back. I will get my cadence and my rhythm back, you all. You know, I'm looking forward to getting back to the kind of conversations that we've been having before. Let me get my sea legs back under me. But I thoroughly, thoroughly enjoy and have missed doing this show, man. I really have. So in closing, man, today we covered a few different things. ⁓ You all got to hear a little bit more about the Voting Rights Act and the redistricting that's happening across the country. We dove a little deeper into Memphis redistricting so you can kind of get a sense of what's happening everywhere else. I touched on some things that I care about because I love hoop. I love sports and ⁓ I think we have officially crossed it to the next era of basketball. I think we're there now. I mean not to say that LeBron or or Steph or Katie that they won't have a credible years next year or that they can't still win the championship. I'm not saying that, but I am saying that we are officially in the new generation of NBA ball. ⁓ Then, you know, we visited some things and talked about Kevin Hart's roast, which was a huge, huge spectacle. And my shout out to Kevin, am much more impressed. And I like his comedy. do. really do like his comedy. I've seen every single special. I am so much more impressed by his business acumen though and how he's able to do what he's able to do and his vision. Like seeing his vision come into fruition, I couldn't be happier for him. I just really couldn't. And I think similar to Chappelle, Kevin Hart is intentionally trying to do this thing for standup comedy. that keeps it pure in their eyes and their mind. And I know other people are gonna get mad about it, but I can't be mad at him for it. So much success to him. with that being said, thank you so, so much for listening to Color Commentary. We love to hear from you. So drop us an email at colorcommentarypod at Gmail. And if you like what you hear, please subscribe to the show, leave us a five-star rating, share it on social media, and join us every Thursday for more Color Commentary with Dr. Cole. Peace.