Kanye West spilled all the juicy details about the rift between him and former President Barack Obama in an interview with TV personality Charlemagne that lasted over an hour.
“Obama came to me before he ran for office and he met with me and my mother to let me know he was going to run for office because I am his favorite artist of all time,” he said. West detailed that Obama asked him for his support and he agreed.
But after West interrupted Taylor Swift on stage at the MTV Video Music Awards in 2009 — which he apologized for immediately – Obama cut off support and was even caught on film calling West a “jackass.”
“He never called me to apologize,” said West. “The same person that sat down with me and my mom I think should have communicated to me directly.”
He went on to troll the former president in a subtle but shocking way: “I love Obama! I’m sure we’ll hang out, go to Richard Branson’s island…. [It’ll] be cool,” said West, conjuring images of Obama frolicking in the surf with Branson. Anyone following the news recently knows that Branson’s private island has been implicated in the underage sex trafficking scandal that Hollywood star Allison Mack is facing indictment for. It is highly doubtful anyone, except investigators, will be visiting Branson’s island soon. Surely, West knows that.
“I think we were just in a period where he had so much stuff to deal with,” admitted West. He went on to criticize Obama’s fickle friendship. “You played Touch the Sky at your inauguration but all of a sudden Kendrick and Dre and all the people you invite to the White House, now these [are] your favorite rappers? I ain’t got no problem with these rappers, but you know I’m your favorite. But I’m not safe. But that’s why you love me!” he smiled. “So just tell me you love me and tell the world you love me. Don’t tell the world I’m a jackass. I’m fighting hard enough.” West seemed genuinely hurt remembering that time.
Perhaps unknowingly, West was describing the “guilty by association culture” that has overtaken everything. It has infected every social and political circle from SJWs to National Review Never Trumpers who want people to strongly disavow anyone who has thoughts that don’t line up perfectly with their own. You have all been told you can’t listen to white nationalists speak or you will be painted as a white nationalist and tainted by the association. You have been told you cannot listen to Black Lives Matter or agree on some issues but not others without being negatively associated with an unpopular movement. You have been told that if you love Hillary you must hate Trump and all his deplorable supporters. It’s all or nothing lately.
West rejects that philosophy and has made a point to retweet those he agrees with when they say things he likes, whether they’re BLM or Thomas Sowell… and he’s breaking through barriers most of us thought couldn’t be broken. To anyone who is really listening, Kanye West is reminding us what it means to live in a free society where all speech matters.
West then dropped another bomb on Obama: “I also had a problem that Obama is from Chicago and Chicago is the murder capital of the world,” he said.
“We did a fundraiser for a midterm for them [the Obamas] in San Francisco,” remembered West. “Right before I went onstage someone let me know that he had left. I felt away, bruh! I got feelins’, bro,” teased West. “Nobody owes me anything but I’m still going to feel what I feel.”
West covered topics from the fashion industry to the music industry’s ownership of artists, saying that a career in music is like boxing. “More people end up retarded than rich,” he said.
West may be unmanageable and unpredictable, but he’s smart and he’s driven by a need to help people in places like Chicago. After comparing himself to Howard Hughes and Henry Ford, he ended the interview with one intriguing sentence: “We’re going to develop cities,” he said.
President Trump made big promises on the campaign trail about bringing prosperity to the inner cities. The fact that Kanye West—another unconventional, self-made billionaire—is not only echoing those ideas but meeting with the man himself and hinting about building factories and innovating new technology for housing should get most of us up out of our seats to cheer on this next phase of Making America Great Again. Something big is coming, and I’m not tired of winning.
Watch the interview below [LANGUAGE WARNING]
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