Along with the recent movie “Welcome to Durham” about gang activity in Durham and the Court TV documentary on the same subject comes this Wall Street Journal snippet today:
PIMP MY CAMPAIGN: A 46-year-old former city councilwoman named Jackie Wagstaff (she calls herself “J-Dub”) is running on a “gangsta” platform in the Oct. 11 Durham, N.C., mayoral primary. She says her support comes mostly from disaffected 18- to 21-year-olds, some of whom are gang members. If elected, she pledges to form a “Hip-Hop Cabinet” of “streetwise teens” to advise her administration. Though Ms. Wagstaff herself has a checkered past–her campaign points to her “run-ins with the law” as evidence of authenticity–she hopes to direct her constituency to more honest pursuits. “If they’re out there selling drugs,” she notes, “then they already have some business skills.”
