Russell Simmons Interview

via mediaoutrage.com CGG: Do you think the Bradley effect can have any impact on the election? Russell Simmons: I think we’re accounting for a lot of it already. See the idea is that young people have such vision to put him in the place he is today. If you remember that most of the Congressman, the black caucus members and Senators, they didn’t have this vision. Or just other progressive voices, they just thought, well America hasn’t evolved to this place yet. But then the young hip-hop community, they shifted a lot and they believed in this opportunity. So I think that we’re in a really good place right now. CGG: What do you have to say about Colin Powell? Do you think he really did have an effect swing states? RS: Yeah, I think it does. I think Colin Powell’s statements are very relevant and very helpful for the campaign. CGG: What’s the most important human rights issue that the next president is going to have to face? RS: There’s so many. I think that it’s a human right to have clean water. We talk about things like the 3,000 people—I live across from the World Trade Center so people are still out there every day. But we never mention the 15,000 people that die from lack of clean water in Africa every single day. They deserve clean water and it’s a tragedy. It’s unbelievable how the media is so unconscious. They don’t report on it, but that’s front page news every single day. And also the nine billion farm animals; that’s the biggest cause of global warming. The #1 cause of global warming and we could eat one less hamburger, and no one ever mentions it. CGG: You’re a vegan, aren’t you? RS: I’m a vegan, but I don’t expect everybody to do that. But I do expect that we can be conscious enough to know that the greatest cause of global warming is the abuse of animals. And also it makes people sick.