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POTUS On Ali: He was The Greatest Period

President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama released an official statement on the passing of boxing icon Muhammad Ali.

“Muhammad Ali was The Greatest. Period. If you just asked him, he’d tell you. He’d tell you he was the double greatest; that he’d “handcuffed lightning, thrown thunder into jail,” he wrote in his touching tribute.

He added, “Like everyone else on the planet, Michelle and I mourn his passing,” Obama said in a statement. “But we’re also grateful to God for how fortunate we are to have known him, if just for a while; for how fortunate we all are that The Greatest chose to grace our time.”

POTUS also reminisced about what the boxer meant to him and how he grew to understand Ali’s influence.

“I was too young when it was taken to understand who he was — still Cassius Clay, already an Olympic Gold Medal winner, yet to set out on a spiritual journey that would lead him to his Muslim faith, exile him at the peak of his power, and set the stage for his return to greatness with a name as familiar to the downtrodden in the slums of Southeast Asia and the villages of Africa as it was to cheering crowds in Madison Square Garden,” Obama said.

Producer Will Packer Responds To Snoop Dogg’s Criticism Of ‘Roots’ Remake

2016 Tribeca Film Festival - Portrait Studio - Day 8

Source: Larry Busacca / Getty

‘Roots’ producer Will Packard has some words for rapper Snoop Dogg who earlier this week urged folks to boycott the remake of the iconic miniseries.

Packard told local Florida news outlet Tallahassee Democrat that while he understands some people being uncomfortable revisiting the “reality of that time,” he “vehemently” disagrees with folks who think like Snoop when it comes to slave narratives.

“While I certainly don’t judge Snoop at all because I’m very flawed myself, I just think, the irony of having him saying and using the n-word, saying, ‘A real n-word like me wouldn’t watch this,’” Packer told the news outlet.

“I couldn’t help but think there’s a ghost of some horrendous slave owner that is smiling and smirking as he watches this Black man say that and call himself that … I think that slave owner probably said, ‘Preach. I agree.’”

Blooop.

Clearly not too many folks listened to Snoop, because “Roots” was the most watched miniseries in the past three years on television, The Huffington Post noted.

#BlackGirlMagic: Pearlena Igbokwe, Named Head of Universal Television

Pearlina Igbokwe has been recently named as the president of Universal Television.

According to the Los Angeles Times, she will replace Bela Bajaria, who abruptly stepped down earlier in the week after nearly five years of running the department.

Igbokwe who ran Universal’s drama department has been responsible for hit shows such as “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt,” “Brooklyn Nine-Nine,” “The Mindy Project,” “Master of None,” “Bates Motel,” and Dick Wolf’s popular programs, including “Chicago Fire” and “Chicago Med.” And has also helped bring Igbokwe helped shepherd many NBC prime-time programs to light, including “The Blacklist,” “Blindspot,” “Shades of Blue” and the upcoming series “This Is Us.”

“Pearlena’s remarkable track record in drama programming at NBC over the last few years made it clear that she was the ideal choice to lead the studio into its next phase of growth,”Jennifer Salke, president of NBC Entertainment, said in a statement.

We see you Pearlena! #BlackGirlMagic at its finest.

Evening Minute: President Obama Calls Muhammad Ali ‘The Greatest. Period.’  was originally published on hellobeautiful.com