Killer Mike Quotes

I've been a sinner and a saint. If you've been a saint all your life, it's pretty easy to sleep at night. If you've been a sinner, you're just as comfortable in it. I've walked both sides of the fence, and there are times I can't sleep and I wake the engineer up and get it out of me. But it usually doesn't pour all the way out. I have to come back and have the conversation that you usually try not to have with yourself. That's how it gets resolved.

I think the way the country has changed in part because of the presidency of Barack Obama, I think in part because of what we`ve - the violence that we have seen on our cell phones and our TV sets over the last couple of years. I think Black Lives Matter has helped to force these issues. Women like Sabrina Fulton. We`re having a different conversation in this country right now about race and what it means to really understand your experience is and my experience is.

My grandmother taught me, you believe in a politician, you get out there and work for them. So, that`s what I`ve been doing.

My family have always supported my rap - and they know I love them when I rap about them - but I'm just Michael Jackson to them. They care more about me. I express my love for them in a much more personal way on this record. It's about our conversations; my fear, and their advice. I know my sisters are gonna hear "Willie Burke Sherwood", which is named for my grandfather, and cry. I used to do music for me, because my ego needed it, but now I'm doing music for my family and friends who helped me become a rapper.

As an artist, that's our job - to be with you in times of celebration and when the world is kicking your ass.

Have you seen Bernie Sanders rallies? I haven`t seen that many white voters since the Oscars. You know - oh, we have some Hollywood fans here.

Saying I want to pay women a fair wage is doing something and saying young black people deserve not to be called super predators but to be engaged from an economic standpoint that gives them an equal opportunity says doing something.I`m tired of talking.

The older I get, the more of an anarchist I become, and I don't mean in a punk rock way.

My rap comes from a sociological standpoint rather than picking a particular side or dogma or ideology. I just want people to be free to do what they want, as long as they don't harm others.

I don't think I'm more politically-based as much as socially-based.

Most rappers are black men. If you're a black man, you owe something to the community that you came from. If you're rapping about the community that you came from, and you're romanticizing parts of it for the entertainment of people who don't look like you, you certainly owe something to the community.

I love art. It really changes my mood and wakes me up.

Being an adult, you've already suffered enough from your own mistakes, and the world, to come to this as a humble human being. So it's not like, "I'm going to do the right thing because it advances me," as much as it's like, "I'm going to do the right thing because this puts me closest to the dream I had as a 10-year-old kid."

I would just encourage everybody to just talk your opinion more, allow other people and fight for other people to [express theirs].

As a human being, as you go through the course of your day, you might wake up with the shittiest day, and by noon something f - king historically funny happens around the water cooler, and you're about to fart yourself you're laughing so hard. And then you might have to think about something seriously for a minute.

Ninety-eight percent of blacks voted for President Obama. That means these people are tied to that political party in a way that's different from other groups of people. Certain rappers always want to represent the Democratic side because they know that's safe and that's what represents their community. I tend to just do what I feel is right by all people.

When Bernie Sanders came along, and I liked his tweets and I read more about him, researched him more, I decided I like him and his policy, even more than just I like another guy in the Democratic Party, I really believed in it. And when you believe in something, you get out and work for it.

As entertainers, you're afraid [about] loss of income - but if other people start going to jail for free speech, then we've lost this great thing that America is, and I'd like to keep that.

I`ve never been a passive political supporter. My grandmother, Betty Kleitz , god bless her soul, was from Tuskegee, Alabama, took parts in the civil rights movement and after that became of course like a lot of blacks in the South a staunch Democrat.

I'm just seeing as I grow older, and hopefully wiser, that a lot of things I see from a race perspective are class problems too, so I should be advocating for all.

The motivation to me is to make money and not be dependent upon the shallow pool called the entertainment world or the rap world or the hip-hop world.

I would say is that kids know about Bernie Sanders and they`re off the radar.In the same way kids knew about Twitter before their parents did.

We travel the world, and our right to free speech is precious.

I feel worn down as a human being who has to constantly justify their existence to other human beings because I'm a minority

I reached the point in my life now that I understand as human beings we've all done some very horrible things to other human beings, and at some point, I came to grips with the fact that whoever murdered my friend is now an adult, and all I can truly hopefully pray for is that in murdering my friend it bettered their life. And I don't mean that they gained things, but just that they grew up, they regret their decision, they found a place of spirituality or God or whatever people call it.

I have searched all night and day for new and better words that could express my feelings and fear for the people of this country. I found no new words. I only have no hope-filled insight to deliver. I only have this warning to all Americans: Whatever this country is willing to do to the least of us, it will one day do to us all.

I rap when I'm rich. I rap when I'm broke. I rap when I'm bullshit in the street. I rap about only having one woman now. If you can look at a continuum of my career, it's been an evolution of a real dude. So when I say I take my wife to the strip club, we're there, at the five-dollar joint. More than anything, I want people to take away that I'm not mainstream act.

What I am is an encourager. I encourage all who deserve freedom to fight for that. And if you can't win by yourself, then find other people to be in solidarity with.

I can't expect rappers to be politicized when Americans are not socially motivated enough to care about their own lives and public policy as much as they were even 20 years ago. But I'm compelled to make the music I make regardless.

When you say you want to talk about racial justice, that`s not the same as I want to do something about racial justice. Saying I want to hold police accountable is doing something. Saying that I want to take money out of politics, big money, is doing something.

She [Hillary Clinton] knows the people well. I think there is - you know, also talking about breaking down barriers and talking about that, whether we`re talking about that in economic terms. I mean, she`s the only person who has been out there talking about white privilege and talking about sort of the intersectionality of some of these issues.

My focus is always on the conditions that create social problems, not just a particular person.

People tend to think of gentrification in terms of race because it's presented that way, and I think it's presented that way because in poor cities that's what's really going on. Beyond that, I think it's presented that way as a way for the people who are really pushing it to make it just a black problem, so people don't care.

With each new album: I need to kill the last version of me.

I'll always push for what I believe in. That's what you're supposed to do. If you're an American, you're supposed to be part of the political process, especially if you've been denied it.

The freedom of speech and the freedom of press, it's just precious man, it really is.

Ronald Reagan was an actor. Not at all a factor, Just an employee of the country's real masters. Just like the Bushes, Clinton and Obama, Just another talkin' head tellin' lies on teleprompters. If you don't believe the theory, then argue with this logic: Why did Reagan and Obama both go after Gaddafi? We invaded sovereign soil, goin' after oil Takin' countries as a hobby paid for by the oil lobby, Same as Iraq and Afghanistan. And Ahmadinejad sayin' they comin' for Iran.

You'll always see me at a political rally and the black strip club; I'm gonna represent smoking weed and supporting Trayvon Martin on my record, because I'm a whole man.

I don't think I'm more politically-based as much as socially-based. My grandmother died on February 29th, and she kept all of my magazine and newspaper scraps, every interview. I've been in the newspapers since I was about 15 - not for rapping, but for real substantive stuff I was doing in the community, organizing around gang violence in the schools. So I had already made my grandma proud before I was on TV. I've always been who I am.

Bernie Sanders has done a great job of, social media black kids know about him. Young black people progressives know about him. Through barbershops and barbershop tour that we have been on, we hit three barbershops a day. People know about him.

The press has not done a fair job of exposing his [Bernie Sanders] policy. He has not had the television time that he deserves or that Hillary Clinton has. He has not had the ability to connect with black people in the mass way.

Our feelings can be hurt, but you can take a yoga class, you can pray, you can play some basketball - you can figure out things for your hurt feelings.

The futile and exhausting existence of a purgatory-like law enforcement system.

If I go all the way politicized, I become a zealot who's not allowed to have fun with the people and the community that raised me. But if I go the other way, I become an ignoramus who isn't properly qualified to speak on my community's behalf.

I would challenge more hip hop artists that are rapping about what it`s like to be real and the social ills that we face, if you aren`t backing Bernie Sanders, I have to question your credibility in terms of do you mean the songs you`re writing.

I have a 20-year-old son, I have a 12-year-old son and I'm so afraid for them.

I would rather have a candidate that`s cohesive in bringing people together from different ethnic backgrounds but around the same policy than I would a politician that jumps and stumps in different rooms and has a different story every time.

I like his consistency, because Bernie Sanders talk - it boils down to the American people. His one thing is the American people.