The biggest accomplishment that the New York Yankees can claim in their 27th World Series Championship is beyond winning it all. Past putting a team of potential Hall of Famers together to make a team, just ahead of carrying the expectations of New York City across the finish line.

It’s all of the drama that this squad suddenly and thoroughly made you forget about throughout the eight years since their last title; with emphasis on this year.

How long were we talking about Alex Rodriguez and steroids? How about Andy Pettite and his role in bringing down Roger Clemens?

How long did it take for the Mark Teixeira-goes-for-the-money headline to blow over? Or the Joba Chamberlain DUI?

Hank Steinbrenner’s whining and complaining (or lack thereof), George Steinbrenner’s health, Joe Girardi on the hot seat…all of that went out of the window this season as the Yankees kept hitting home runs and kept on winning.

Nothing less than a World Series title is acceptable in New York. Not to the ownership, not to the local or national media, and not to the fans. This team can barely lose a regular-season series without pundits and observers calling for a firing, a trade, or for raucous booing to erupt at anytime.

And they moved past all of that. Remember that next year when they don’t start 35-0, Yankee fans.

Dr. Calvin Jamison who is presently the Vice President for Business Affairs at the University of Texas at Dallas and is a Clinical Professor in the School of Economics, Political, and Policy Sciences. He has over 25 years of experience in higher education, corporate America, and local government. Prior to assuming his current position, he was the Senior Vice President and Chief Administrative Officer at Hampton University. He has also held faculty and administrative positions at Virginia Commonwealth University, an administrative position as city manager for the City of Richmond, Virginia, and as a director of human resource development at Ethyl Corporation, a Fortune 1,000 company. Dr. Jamison holds B.S., M.A. and Ed.D. degrees from Virginia Tech in education, student personnel/business, and higher education.

Dr. Carolyn Meyers who is presently president of Norfolk State University. She has over 40 years of experience in higher education, corporate America, and engineering organizations. Prior to assuming her current position, she was Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs at North Carolina A&T State University. She has also held faculty and administrative positions at North Carolina A&T State University, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta University Center Corporation, and National Science Foundation. In addition, she has held the position of steam generator and systems analyst for the General Electric Company. Dr. Meyers holds B.S in Mechanical Engineering from Howard University, M.S. in Mechanical Engineering and Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from Georgia Institute of Technology.

Dr. David Wilson who is chancellor of Wisconsin Colleges and University of Wisconsin Extension. He has over 31 years of experience in higher education. Prior to assuming his current position, he was Vice President for University Outreach and Associate Provost at Auburn University. He has also held faculty and administrative positions Rutgers University, Kentucky State University, Radcliffe College, and Tuskegee Institute. In addition, he has held research positions at the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation, and Massachusetts General Hospital, and the Research and Development Institute of Philadelphia and has worked with several of the nation’s leading foundations as a consultant, including the W. K. Kellogg Foundation, Ford Foundation, and Rockefeller Foundation. Dr. Wilson holds an Ed.D. in Administration, Planning, and Social Policy and a Ed.M. in Educational Planning and Administration from Harvard University, a Ed.M. in Student Personnel Administration and B.S. in Political Science from Tuskegee University.

The search committee did a tremendous job in narrowing the list to these three. Each has academic and institution-building credentials without compare, and would all likely be staunch defenders of Morgan’s mission in the face of certain pressure from the state and local media to pack it in and be an obedient little HBCU.

They each have experience with black college administration, which is important to have when you plan marketing and development strategies for an urban institution with a diverse slate of faculty and students.  Especially when much of their face time will be spent trying to convince racist white folks not to hate the university.

And, most importantly, the each have a background in being student-centered leaders. My hope for the next president is that they are completely motivated to equally inspire the student population to academic excellence, social consciousness, and school spirit – a characteristic that was often lost on Dr. Richardson throughout his tenure as president.

But there’s one person who stands out from the three as one who could usher MSU into a new era of growth, productivity and influence in the Baltimore metropolitan area. The candidate has lead their current institution with transparency, accountability, and a commitment to melding the mission with the futures of the students in their charge.

She is far from perfect, but she is cut from the cloth that MSU should hope to swaddle it’s future in. Here’s hoping the Board selects Dr. Carolyn Meyers to be the next president of Morgan State University.

Over the course of my life, I’ve experienced most of the level one, latent racism; scared looks, clutched purses, surprised reactions upon speaking with proper diction, etc. I’ve only been called a nigger once or twice by someone who wasn’t black, and to my knowledge, the times I’ve been treated differently because of my race didn’t keep my from money or anything else I’ve worked for.

So I’m interested in knowing if racist people genuinely do invest thought into downputting the foods of people they dislike. Racism to me is a matter of trust and allowance; do I trust you to not keep me from having something I’m allowed to have. I don’t sit around dreaming up ways to lambaste racist people for their dining selections – I assumed they eat the same exact thing I do.

Granted, certain foods are associated with certain ethnic groups. But when I’m at Arundel Mills, the ratio of White, Latino and Asian peoples crowding the line at the Popeye’s is equally proportionate. Same thing at the Coldstone Creamery in White Marsh, and the Five Guys in Silver Spring.

Maybe I’m naive, but I would hope that if a person builds up a wall to block me out of their life or experience based on my race, that it wouldn’t be built upon what I eat. That’s just ridiculous.

Left the house and stopped by Burger King to grab breakfast, which immediately chopped and screwed my stomach. Praying  I’d make the five-minute shuttle ride to work without intestinal implosion, I attempted to take a seat when my right hand was introduced to some foreign liquid on the seat. Either someone enjoyed crab soup for an early morning dinner returning from Johns Hopkins, or had an accident similar to the one I was trying to avoid.

Disgusted, I made it to my job to hurry in, remove my sweater with the soiled sleeve, and wash my hands. Sitting down in my small, uncomfortable office chair, the familiar bulge in my back pocket was missing.

I left my wallet in the car this morning after getting the evil Burger King breakfast.

And did I mention that my chair is small and uncomfortable because I’m now employed as an office assistant at JHU?

Yeah, quite a bit of drama before 7:30 a.m. on a Friday. But let’s take it from the top with a happy face.

The fussy son? He looks just like me, and is healthy and strong as an ox. The pissed off mother? My wife and soulmate, who also made me lunch for the day.

The shuttle stop where my stomach betrayed me? A seven minute drive from my house, even in traffic. And from that stop to the office is five minutes, making my total daily commute on average less than 10 miles and 45 minutes from my home. This is a far cry from the one hour and 45 minutes I was doing on a daily basis for a year prior to starting my job at JHU last week.

The soiled sweater? It will likely provide me the excuse to break out early today and get back to my family. The wallet that was left behind has a bank card in it with a nice little last check from my previous job, ripe with payout from three weeks of work, unused leave and sick days.

And the secretary job I’m working at JHU? It gives me ample opportunity to work towards my goal of becoming the Isaac Hayes of blogging. And it also gives me a brief time to deliver this important message:

Never confuse the inconvenient with the bad. Inconvenience is the unexpected rendering less-than-desirable results. Bad is when the resolve of your heart and soul are tested. Inconvenient is the morning I’ve had thus far. Bad would be if I didn’t have the motivation to write it, because my marriage was failing, or my son was ill, or if I were unemployed and depressed.

Take advantage of the inconvenient, because you’ll need it for laughing material when bad shows up every now and then.

The classic albums of hip-hop music may be far behind us, but the best of hip-hop culture is so far ahead of us, it’s frighteningly incredible. I just watched Jay-Z and Alicia Keys serenade their city at the World Series. Yeah, the championship of a sport that black folks overwhelmingly don’t care about, and elderly white men keep close like war stories and bibles. Tonight, the two met for a wonderful exposition on diversity and tolerance; both conceding a part of their roots for a higher purpose.

This is what the rebellion that is rap music was intended to accomplish; all of the fussin’ and cussin’, all of our rage and confusion were exclusively penned for a moment such as this one. A chance to be heard, to be accepted for exactly who we are. We don’t want to change, we don’t need to explain ourselves. The hip-hop generation, in its new and full glory of social networking and cable television, deserved a moment to represent in a place where we aren’t overly welcome, even if we want to attend.

Somebody, an older white guy perhaps, deemed it a respectable (and profitable) idea to put a reformed thug and a prodigious R&B activist in the infield of the American sports cathedral. We broke in Yankee Stadium; every college kid, every inmate, every single mother, every lonely child were right there with them. The music may be diluted and the message lost, but the translation was as clear tonight as it has ever been in the history of hip-hop culture;

People who make and listen to rap music are as important and as likeable as those who don’t.

No Grammy award, no amount of record sales, no seat on Oprah’s couch has ever been as meaningful as what we watched tonight. Those other instances were examples of America’s arm-length beckoning towards our culture; an opportunity to fact-gather to either inflame or assuage existing fears.

It was as important as the election of Barack Obama, because unlike with politics, there was no political correctness to be forced on our moment under the big lights. Money and morals didn’t matter tonight as they did on November 4th; it was just about having a good time and being ourselves. No points to prove, no lives to save, no barriers to break down.

A rap concert in the Bronx; just like the good old days.

Thanks for inviting us in America. Sure, we’ll stay a while.

Seriously, just look at the parallels between these two guys. Aside from the Dark and Lovely swoon they seem to hold over black women, the career arc is pretty much synonymous.

Both Elba and Snipes broke onto the scene with roles as ruthless criminals. Snipes as the unintentionally hilarious Nino Brown in “New Jack City,” Elba as the fantastically evil Stringer Bell in the HBO drama “The Wire.”

Snipes put in some work with Spike Lee for the people, Elba has put in work with Tyler Perry for the people.

Snipes rose to box office fame running on the roofs of office buildings in films like “Demolition Man” and “U.S. Marshals,” Elba is hilarious on “The Office.”

They both have done films for the ladies, spend much of their time outside of the United States, and are fascinated with culture outside of the film industry; Elba with DJing, Snipes with trying memorize the Book of Coming Forth by Day.

And I’m not mad at the reintroduction of the Chocolate Hero in black culture. Obama can only shoulder but so much, and after him, who do we really have? Jamie Foxx?

That being said, have a little more class than the runners-up at the Miss Hampton pageant. At least pretend like you aren’t bitter, racist, stuck-up individuals who lost fair and square on the vote of their peers.

It’s just not sexy, you know?

I’m really hoping that one of the most celebrated racists in contemporary American media has a chance to stir black athletes to use their fame and resources for something that will benefit generations of minority athletes.

It’s encouraging to hear black players going on record saying that they would not play for Limbaugh as an owner. They would not sign as free agents, they would not re-up with the team. And one of the good things about the culture of sports, is that teammates stick together. Which means, that if one bruh is not willing to go, several others won’t just to back him up.

Or at least, to avoid being publicly denounced as sellouts.

Besides, many of the old school black activists have long called for the younger generation to take up the mantle of social progress and public agenda setting. By and large, the time for that kind of activism has passed, because it can cost you money from both sides of the spending spectrum. Black kids can be turned off by too much political rhetoric just as easily as white parents can shield their children from consuming it.

But there is room for more activism that isn’t directly linked to the “black power” movement. I do believe that athletes could be much stronger advocates for improved education systems. They can speak on health care reform, faith-based community initiatives and foreign relations.

They can use their influence to engage their fans to have a voice about political awareness and activity, no matter the party affiliation. They can give voice to the linkage between mental health disparities and the crises of homelessness and crime in urban areas.

They can encourage greater understanding of how minorities think and feel, considering that they are among the few minorities in the world that can instantly command an audience bigger than a barbershop or a front stoop.

They don’t have to stomp and scream for black people to get help, because we all need help. They just have to be a little more vocal about the things that people at large require and deserve. Their own skin color will provide an appropriate subtext to what their culture is in need of.

So, yeah. I’m hoping Rush Limbaugh gets the Rams. That way, it will be cool once again for black athletes to have an opinion more than once or twice a year.

And among those opinions, I hope, will be a mass sentiment for Limbaugh to fail miserably at the task.

Thank you Hampton University and Kentucky State University, for showing us that black college students are indeed more progressive and thoughtful than Facebook and BET would have us believe.

And by the way, I completely dig HCJ as a Southern baptist preacher.