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Ta-Nehisi Coates

Ta-Nehisi Coates - Ta-Nehisi Coates is a senior editor for The Atlantic, where he writes about culture, politics, and social issues for TheAtlantic.com and the magazine. He is the author of the memoir The Beautiful Struggle. More

Born in 1975, the product of two beautiful parents. Raised in West Baltimore—not quite The Wire, but sometimes ill all the same. Studied at the Mecca for some years in the mid-’90s. Emerged with a purpose, if not a degree. Slowly migrated up the East Coast with a baby and my beloved, until I reached the shores of Harlem. Wrote some stuff along the way.

Obama's Promise

By Ta-Nehisi Coates
Jan 22 2008, 2:38 PM ET Comment

Like a lot of folks, I spent yesterday watching the debate. I gotta say I was disappointed to see Obama go so hard at Hillary. Don't take that the wrong way. I know why he went after her, and I know he had to. But watching him go into the gutter with her went against everything that I love about him as a candidate. Barack has a cool, intellectual, above-the-fray sort of steez. This is not aloofness, but more like a sense that he can't be busied with petty bullshit. Furthermore, it's a thrill to see a brother exhibiting that sort of cool, not on the court or in a music video, but in the race for the presidency. I'm just not sure that presidential politics, as it currently exists, will mesh will with it. Anyway, courtesy of the Obama campaign, here's the sort of thing I'm talking about.



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