Mos Def's appearance on Real Time With Bill Maher last week was a thoroughly enjoyable event. As someone who is a fan of the show, I found Mos' comments about President Barack Obama, Osama Bin Laden, and the unlikely event of nuclear disarmament by third world nations to be entertaining. If anything, Mos was speaking in the cadence and manner as a man in an inner city barbershop and was eloquent at times when he needed to be by dropping the Ebonics and speaking in the Queen's English. At the center of an argument from the show is Mos' view that Osama Bin Laden's evil persona has been perpetuated by mainstream media to further the popular political aims popular during the time of Bin Laden's initial appearance. His opponent, Vanity Fair correspondent Christopher Hitchens who is openly drinking on air, strongly disagrees and says that he has no idea who Assata Shakur is when Mos uses her as an example of mainstream media vilifying someone with an unpopular opinion. Is Mos Def's opinion dangerous? Possibly to those who feel that they are uninformed, but before you make up your mind to disagree with him, watch the clip and remind yourself that this country was founded on a minority having opinions that did not coincide with the popular beliefs of that time.
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