I am so disillusioned with celebrities, political or otherwise. It turns out that Hillary Clinton wasn’t dodging bullets in Bosnia? John Kerry didn’t spend Christmas in Cambodia? The McCains’ website family recipes are lifted from The Food Network (I mean, this is the guy we’re going to have as Head Chef-in-Chief)? Ward Churchill’s not a Native American? And now this?
Akon’s ad nauseum claims about his criminal career and resulting prison time have been, to an overwhelming extent, exaggerated, embellished, or wholly fabricated, an investigation by The Smoking Gun has revealed. Police, court, and corrections records reveal that the entertainer has created a fictionalized backstory that serves as the narrative anchor for his recorded tales of isolation, violence, woe, and regret. Akon has overdubbed his biography with the kind of grit and menace that he apparently believes music consumers desire from their hip-hop stars.
While the performer’s rap sheet does include a half-dozen arrests, Akon has only been convicted of one felony, for gun possession. That 1998 New Jersey case ended with a guilty plea, for which the singer was sentenced to three years probation. Another 1998 bust, this one in suburban Atlanta, has been seized upon by Akon and transformed into the big case that purportedly sent him to prison (thanks to his snitching cohorts) for three fight-filled years. In reality, Akon was arrested for possession of a single stolen BMW and held in the DeKalb County jail for several months before prosecutors dropped all charges against him.
I can’t believe that someone would so cynically take undeserved credit for all that badness. If you don’t do the crime, you can’t bust the rhyme.
Fakon.
Comment by McGehee on 4/17 @ 6:16 am #
Next they’ll tell us nishtoon isn’t mentally retarded, and Gleenwald is actually Ron Jeremy.
Comment by DarthRove on 4/17 @ 6:27 am #
Gleenwald are actually Ron Jeremy, along with many others as well.
Comment by Carin on 4/17 @ 6:46 am #
I haven’t been this disillusioned since the Vanilla Ice kerfuffle.
Comment by McGehee on 4/17 @ 6:47 am #
“Is that a case of sockpuppets in your pants, or are you just happy to see me, NTTAWWT?”
Comment by Dan Collins on 4/17 @ 6:48 am #
Was that before or after Milli Vanilli?
Comment by Carin on 4/17 @ 6:49 am #
Well, as a hard-core rap fan I don’t pay much attention to other kerfuffles.
Comment by Patrick Carroll on 4/17 @ 7:09 am #
Huh. This happened at a time when Cynthia McKinney was my (non) Representative. One of her more infamous initiatives was a dialog between the “Hiop Hop Community” and the rest of the US. I’d love to know whether the charges got dropped due to an intervention.
Also, back in 2000, DeKalb County’s sheriff-elect, Derwin Brown, was murdered by Sidney Dorsey, the man he defeated in the election.
Man! When I look at it with 20/20 hindsight, I live in a pretty dangerous part of America.
Comment by Carin TWP/Bitter Hick who has read Marx on 4/17 @ 8:41 am #
Patrick, until you’re down with the 313, you don’t know dangerous.
Comment by Jeffersonian on 4/17 @ 11:43 am #
I’m thinking of launching a career in music. Can anyone provide guidance on which felonies will bootstrap me into the biz quickest?
Comment by Patrick Carroll on 4/17 @ 12:14 pm #
I accept that the 313 is a more dangerous area than the 404. Please don’t shoot.
As for crimes that bootstrap a music career, well, the bloodier the better. Only, commit them in Atlanta. The DA (Paul Howard) is so incompetent that even a trail of blood leading from a murder scene to your hotel room is not enough to even get you accused.
Pingback by Another Notable Debate Freak-Out [Dan Collins] on 4/17 @ 1:03 pm #
[...] yet a constituent. It is of a piece with the other jejune means by which Obama cultivated an aura of authenticity, of being both within and without, of being, as it were, a mole in the halls of power, just as he [...]
Trackback by music on 4/28 @ 2:49 am #
music
There was a time I get it, so I couldn’t say it’s too bad. It’s pretty nice.