Can you talk about how the National Hip Hop Political Convention was conceived, what its mission was and how it was organized?

It was conceived in March 2003 when 15 people from across the United States got together in Chicago. Many of us had been talking about how to use electoral politics as a tactic along with grassroots organizing. So we came together and decided the best thing is to think about creating our own political party. And with that obviously comes a convention and an agenda that needs to be set for the people that you are supposed to represent. Some of our goals are to deal with issues of education, economic development, media conglomeration, human rights, reparations (not as a separate issue apart from economic development, but put it out there that we are seeking reparations for the African people in the U.S.), criminal justice and the prison industrial complex, the criminalization of our communities and also the impending draft.

#file_2# Ras Baraka, son of Amini Baraka and Deputy Mayor of Newark, NJ, chaired the voting process.

Watching the agenda being discussed and amended on Saturday was a very interesting process, to see all these youths from around the country debate issues like whether or not to support the Dream Act, for example, or agree on whether the school voucher system is a trick or a treat. But I am curious about how it�s going to move on from here. You now have a political agenda that you have put out to the world and state delegates have returned to their communities. What happens from here?

Well first and foremost, we have already been asked to present our agenda at both the Democratic and the Republican national conventions. That is very important. Other established political organizations might say that is not enough, or they may critique it. But for the first time ever the hip hop generation is saying we are going to have a convention, we are going to be politically orientated and we are going to garner people�s attention. Because we don�t want to just be used, we don�t want to just [give the] Democrats our votes. Kerry can�t just slide in there. So in terms of what was on the floor, what we are doing is building an infrastructure so we can institutionalize the Hip Hop Convention. With that institutionalization comes state chapters and groups being those LOC's on the ground, who know the issues. And the agenda can be their map. That is how we look at the agenda, a map, a compass to guide you through your local issues, but also as a way for your local issues to fit into a national scene.

We probably wont impact the 2004 elections like we want to. I don�t see John Kerry changing reparations, although we are going to hit him as hard as we can with it and maybe he will. Because that is an issue that resounds across black communities across the board in the U.S. It is an issue that is uniting African Americans more than any other issue, I think, right now.

You said you were invited to present this agenda at both conventions?

Yes we got some calls. Not from higher-level officials or anything, not to be on television, I don�t think. I don�t know how these things work, whether we have a workshop or give it to them via a memo or what. But we will be there. Two of us will each be at each convention talking to people and pushing our agenda, seeing what the reaction is from both parties. We haven�t gotten a call from Nader. That is who should be calling us, but he hasn�t yet.

#file_3# Activist Marinieves Alba speaking next to her father and Young Lords Founder, Panama Alba.

Many people are calling this convention historic in that it brought together civil rights leaders and the younger political hip hop generation. Can you talk about those connections that were made there and how those will be carried forward?

I don�t think it was only civil rights leaders. I think that was a word that was overused. There were also black power movement folks and the Black Nationalists were there and black cultural arts folks from the 60�s like Haki Madhbuti, (Founder, Third World Press) and (Poet) Sonia Sanchez. It�s important to have inter-generational dialogue. Why? Because our community is inter-generational and often the older generation (particularly the civil rights older generation, not the black power nationalist, cultural arts folks) don�t understand the power of hip hop. They are only looking at one aspect of it and that is the musical element. They are not seeing that this is an entire generation where, yes, music is important, but there is poetry, there is politics, there is graf [graffiti], there is break dancing, there is a political nature.

And even the music now is beginning to turn because of the political movement within hip hop. So you have a lot of hip hop music now that is even �mainstream� on all the channels, like Jay da Kiss� �Why�. That is a very important song for our generation. In it he asks George Bush why he knocked down the twin towers. [That line] is edited but that it is still important. It�s important for elder folks to know that we are not just out here �bling blinging� and making stupid senseless music. That is coming more from the corporations and what they want to put out. To understand the culture of hip hop and to understand young people, you should know the work that we are doing.

#file_5# Amina Baraka, wife of Writer Amini Baraka. In 1967, the pair helped to organize a National Black Power Conference.

That is why I feel that the black power and Black Nationalist elders are more in tune with what we are saying and doing. They understand hip hop. They understand the culture. They respect it. They critique it. And they give us leadership tools for how we can use hip hop as a tool of resistance. It was important for them to see the work that we are doing and to let them know that we didn�t drop the ball. Its important to let our political prisoners on the inside know that one of our agenda items is the freedom of United States political prisoners across the board, that we are not going to forget you, like others have forgotten you.

Many of the issues you raise are domestic issues. But there was a lot of discussion as well about foreign policy and how the African American community feels about it. Can you talk about that, how the hip hop generation relates to the war in Iraq, in Viequez, etc.

Hip hop is not just an African American community, and that is something even the independent media is not doing a good job of recognizing. It as a culture of black and brown people, African American and Latino. There were just as many Latinos as African Americans there. It is important for me as a Puerto Rican with American citizenship who understands the historical relationship and historical movement building amongst African Americans and Latinos. We have to be very careful in the media when we talk about the hip hop generation. It also includes Asian and Native Americans. The Native American community is amazing for what it is doing in hip hop. Artists like Lite Foot that are calling for Native American reparations, going to pow wow�s using hip hop culture, Chicanos, etc. it is just amazing. And that follows into the question of internationalism and militarism and war.

#file_4# Dozens of workshops on everything from the globalization of hip hop to U.S. foreign policy were held on Friday.

Obviously we are dead set against the occupation and the war in Iraq and in Afghanistan and the occupation that continues in Puerto Rico. We are dead set against the draft. That is one of our agenda action items, that we oppose any hip hop entity that supports the draft. We are not down with magazines or any hip hop organizations taking money from the military to help recruit young men. And we are beginning to oppose the draft now before they implement it. So those are issues that are in the agenda under the human rights platform.

I think its important too for the young people that were there, for some of them it may have been their first time really getting a broad spectrum of issues, including international ones. It is sometimes very hard to organize and do solidarity work, and go to a rally against the [Israeli] occupation in Palestine or the [U.S.] occupation in Iraq, when you have to deal the issue of police brutality in New York. Our communities are in a constant stage of siege. Terrorism money has now been funneled to the NYPD for Operation Impact, which are basically occupations in certain areas of NYC that are considered high crime. So we often don�t have the luxury of dealing with the next international issue. But as activists and organizers we do. We know it is important.

Hip hop is a global phenomenon. You are going to find hip hop from New Zealand to the Australian Outback to East Harlem, NY to Uruguay. It�s everywhere. It�s global. What we don�t want to happen is an exportation of our culture and the force-feeding of the bad hip-hop. You know, the bling bling, the capitalistic hip hop into the other societies. You already see that a little in Ghana and Africa, with them thinking that everyone here is making money and driving cars and that we are living a life in which we don�t care about the rest of the world, while the rest of the world is dying for running water and clean sewage treatment. So its important for us to keep our voice out there and say, yes, we are dealing with international issues here. And hip hop is like the Internet, as Chuck D says; it is the CNN for black and brown America. It�s important that we keep control of it. Through the criminalization of hip hop and through media conglomeration they are really trying to water down what the culture is supposed to be about.

#file_6# Hip Hop Artists Dead Prez performed for Convention delegates on Saturday.

You mentioned Hip hop institutions. How does the Hip Hop Convention relate, if at all, to Russell Simmons�s Hop Hop Summit Action Network.

In full disclosure, I have had my personal critique on Russell Simmons for a while, and I will continue to critique him. I think he does not humble himself to the grassroots leaders. You see that with the Rockefeller drug laws and him not humbling himself to the work that people have done for five or seven years. Now we are in a situation where we are more behind than we were in eradicating those laws.

But in a spirit of unity, at the end of the day, Russell says the same thing, that everything is political. It's good to hear him say that. I think if he just had the right people around him, hip hop would be so powerful because he has the resources. He has the media. He has the savvy. He has the entrepreneurship for us to get our economic platform out. So it�s an issue of how can we finally come together.

But we are also not just about registering people to vote. Registering 50,000 people to vote is phenomenal, but who are they voting for? As Charles Barron said, a lesser of two evils? Do we have to vote that way? Or do we withhold our vote? Essentially Russell is helping the Democratic Party because no one in their right mind, I would hope, in our generation is going to vote for Bush. So the Democrats know they don�t have to do anything, because our vote is already a given to them.

That is why I'm thinking, how can [Simmons] seize power? How can he say, �Look, I�m going to tell the 200,000 people we already got registered to vote to withhold their vote?� We understand how much 200,000 votes are going to mean in this election. So in that sense, he needs to hear that type of vision, and then we need him because of all his connections and his savvy, and his willingness, out of all the entrepreneurs in hip hop, to do something. So I don�t take anything away from him in that sense, but we are about more about than registering people to vote. We have people within our organizations that don�t believe in voting, but understand that it as a tactic, and we are going to use it. That is how we differ from the Hip Hop Summit Action Network.

#file_7# NYC Councilman Charles Barron, who is running for Mayor of New York City, advocated for a new category on the ballot: "None of the Above."

Charles Barron also said when you present the political agenda to the Democrats, if they don�t endorse it, then the Hip Hop Convention should officially hold its votes as a block. Is that being discussed?

Yes, it is. Personally I will do that. I have been thinking about it on a very personal level, and I can�t allow the democrats to use us. They are using us. Even the Green Party will use us, if given the opportunity to. Nader�s camp, they have never addressed criminal justice issues. This is the whole problem with white liberalism at this point. John Kerry, a so-called white liberal, which to me he is not, but if that is what a liberal looks like, that is why we are in the situation we are in as people of color. We need white progressives that are going to allow us to develop our own platform, our own agenda, to have our own Howard Zinn�s and Chomsky�s. They are not the be-all-end-all of philosophy. There are so many brilliant people in the hip hop generation that are never asked what their analysis is, what their public policy is, what their vision is, what their moral standards and values are.

That is why I think about withholding my vote because I want to be treated at the same level as a white liberal. I want to be just as respected. I don�t want to hear that reparations are divisive. Or affirmative action: �don�t end it mend it.� We are tired of that stuff. Our communities are dying. So if it means we have to withhold our vote to get the Democrats (black and Latino Democrats too) to finally listen to our generation, then that is what we are going to have to do. Because we can�t be used in this election. If we don�t make some power moves now and in 2008, we aren�t going anywhere as a generation.

Speaking about the white community, I was disappointed to see that there weren�t many white activists at the convention. I wanted to see what your thoughts were on that and how we can build some bridges between radical communities across racial lines.

I don�t think anything of it. To me that is the norm. I think our agenda is too radical. We are talking about some real economic justice issues, health issues, criminal justice, human rights, etc and I think white progressives might not agree with some of these issues. They might not agree with reparations. They have their own views on hip hop culture.

I would say in terms of bridging the gap, I try to do that work all the time. But to me, once you pass a certain age whether you are white, black, whatever, you are just not going to stand up for certain things. We can put the call out there but we are not going to especially invite people. We are not going to hold people�s hands. I think sometimes the white progressive community expects us to say, �Can you please be at this event�, or �We need money from you,� or whatever. This was a self-sufficient event. I don�t think white progressives see the black and Latino community as having the ability of putting on their own amazing event. It is a lot of young people, using a culture they might not understand, and that when you come here, you are not coming here to be a leader. You are coming here to learn about our issues and take leadership from us.

At the end of the day that is the problem. Are white progressives able to take leadership from people of color? We can look at our own radio station, WBAI, and see that playing out. And that is an issue that young people of color are beginning to raise. That is why we have to fight to even get 24-hour hip hop marathon on WBAI. And that is supposed to be the most progressive station? So it�s a constant. But being honest is important and being able to debate issues and being able to disagree and agree in a human way. I think we in the hip hop generation are able to debate the issue until we get across what we want. We are not going to stop fighting. And Hip hop culture has its bad things too. But for the most part it is a phenomenal culture that started with two or three or five people in the Bronx in a park.

Lastly, at the convention, I saw many Newark high school students who attended, but sort of by accident. They saw it going on and peaked their heads in. But I got goose bumps when some of them would come up to the microphone to say, �This event has changed my life. I now know what I want to do with my life and what I want to dedicate it to.� They had one big criticism and that is how come they didn�t even know any of these organizations existed before this event just showed up in their community. They wanted to know how to bring this information to other youths of color.

Yes, well we had a skeletal staff of ten people in the nation. So we couldn�t do street teams and such. So I don�t think we were effective in letting folks know in the most needed communities that this event was happening. But what was amazing was that people found out, through word of mouth, or they saw something and came. When you have a skeletal staff, it�s just what it is. You can�t put yourself out there as much and in as many outlets as you want to.

At the very end, the mainstream media started picking up on it. The independent media had been talking about it from the beginning. So, yes, I think we could have done a better job at recruiting the streets and going to more high schools. But with limited staff and limited funding, you can only do so much. But all in all people still found out and I think that is a great thing. I think if someone in Flatbush found out and went all the way to Newark, and their life was changed, that is important, because I do believe that one person can really effect change. I met a lot of especially young brothers. I was happy to see young men who said they read about it on our website, or saw a sign and wanted to come. I was happy to see women there who were mostly the leaders. If that was not reflected it was because they were working. They were all in the back doing something in the back, answering phones and doing all that needed to get done.

I didn�t mean that so much as a criticism but mostly to hear, not just about big events and conventions, but how already overtaxed day to day organizing can make outreaching to youth who really want to get involved a priority.

Right, well I think it is important to critique it. That is one thing about the hip hop generation; we are able to critique things and find a better solution. I think it still takes a lot of one-on-one conversations. Our communities are still oral tradition communities where word of mouth is really important. Mainstream media is also important right now because a lot of our folks don�t know about these independent media sources. So we have to use all our tactics. Mainstream media, independent media, word of mouth, the churches, etc.

For the 2006 convention that will take place in Chicago, (there is a reason we have announced it: so people start getting a buzz), when we begin to organize again for that we really need to hit churches because that is where the majority of our people are and families are. So I think next time there will be more people from the hood.