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Kid Rock owns and loves a multi-sectional manufactured home, seen several times next to his Rolls Royce in his new hit music video, Po-Dunk.
In one video – intentionally or not – multi-millionaire performer Kid Rock has taken aim at the stereotypes about manufactured homes, and the Americans who select this lifestyle.
By celebrating the people and their homes, he’s offering in-your-face respect.
Note to Parents. This is a family-friendly site. But on this music video, you may consider if you want young children to watch this. It has some salty language, and scantily clad women, among other things.
That said, the video is amazing story telling. It’s an in-your-face celebration of those “bitter clingers” to “their faith, flag, guns and bibles,” or the “irredeemable deplorables,” as candidates Senator Barack Obama, and Secretary Hillary Clinton each said during their respective campaigns.
Yes, that’s political. Kid Rock says at the end of his other new video, “are you scared yet?”
Po-Dunk
“I remember a small-town mayor telling me – ‘off the record’ of course – his perspective on inclusionary zoning in his city: “It ain’t the houses, son… It’s the people that live in them.” said JD Harper, with the Arkansas Manufactured Housing Association (AMHA).
That mayor must never have met Kid Rock, who’s sold some 35 million country, rock, rap albums in various formats, and is worth an estimated $80 million.
Kid Rock, whose given name is Robert James Richie, has talked about living in lavish mansions. But he’s decided that a more modest manufactured home is all he really needs for his residence.
“It comes in two weeks. I’m a very impatient person. It comes delivered to the door in two weeks. You can customize a few things in there as you go along. You can put a cool wrap on it. I wrapped mine in mossy oak. Very easy to clean. Simplicity at its finest,” Kid Rock told Dan Rather, on his show called “The Big Interview.”
“You see a lot of people in my business. You go to these houses and I go where do you start in this thing? Like, how many times do you use the movie theater? I’ve built one. I maybe went in there once,” he said.
“I live in a double-wide trailer [sic]. It’s not like I require a lot. You know, I’ve learned to downsize through the years and it really made me more happy. I’ll sell everything and live in that double-wide [sic], but I’m not givin’ up that airplane,” Rock said, referring to his private jet, which allows him to skip the congestion at the airport.
Senator Kid Rock?
Since launching his exploratory website, he’s had an outpouring of support, says Rock.
“I was beyond overwhelmed with the response I received from community leaders, D.C. pundits, and blue-collar folks that are just simply tired of the extreme left and right bulls**t,” the singer said.
In a way, Po-Dunk speaks to those voters who Secretary Hillary Clinton regrettably called a basket of irredeemable deplorables.
“He could be an ally for those who advocate for respect for millions of people and the hope offered by the manufactured home lifestyle if he wanted to be,” said the actively retired business man and minister, Donald Tye, Jr.
“LL Cool J, Snoop Dogg, Ice T, Ice Cube and a whole host of gang bangers turned movie stars were initially spokespeople for issues just like ours, before they ultimately moved into the mainstream,” and left those roots behind, he said.
Tye grew up in the days of the civil rights movement. He recalls that after the voting rights act was passed, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wanted to pull poor people of all backgrounds together.
In the Po-Dunk video, “Kid Rock is using poverty, faith, and the flags as backdrops,” Tye said.
He represents the rich like himself.
But Rock is also is delivering an ‘in your face’ message that calls for respect for the poor, Christians, and those who love their country. Older, single section manufactured homes are visible in several places throughout the video. So is an older, rugged looking site built house’s porch.
“Love us if you can, sorry if you can’t,” says part of the lyrics to Kid Rock’s hit, Po-Dunk.
“He’ll Win”
If Kid Rock runs for the U.S. Senate, “he’ll win,” said Tom Shillue, on Fox Business’ Mornings with Maria.
Democrat celebrities “don’t have the pulse of the people,” said Shillue – who has his own radio show – “but Kid Rock? I’m mean, He’s America.”
Former New York Governor George Pataki called Kid Rock “exactly the kind of candidate the GOP needs right now.”
Senator Elizabeth Warren was also quoted in an interview as stating, “Well, maybe this is all a joke — but we all thought Donald Trump was joking when he rode down the escalator at Trump Tower and announced his campaign, too. And sure, maybe this is just a marketing gimmick for a new album or tour — but we all thought Donald Trump was just promoting his reality TV show, too.”
Rock pushed back on Warren’s comments, which may also be a sign of what’s to come for Democrats that oppose him.
Indeed, the early polling shows that Kid Rock leads the Democratic Senator Debbie Stabenow by 3 points, and has a double digit lead over any other GOP challenger.
“It would make a hell of a combination to have a Conservative Black Preacher and a Po-Dunk, throw down and dirty, Kid Rock pushing a campaign” to raise the opportunity and dignity that come with affordable manufactured home ownership, said Tye.
Affordable Housing, Opportunity, Respect – Hot Button Issues for 2018
“Affordable home ownership is Human Capital Investing as opposed to warehousing humans like cattle in a corral,” said Tye, whose parents sold factory-built homes like the one in the black and white photo on this page.
Those homes created opportunities for dozens of other families, until local and national politics stopped their successful project.
Tye and his wife still live in that home, which has quadrupled in value since it was first sold in the early 1970s.
Tye notes that affordable home ownership is one of the central issues of our time.
He’s also said, what else can a person afford to own if they are making $15 an hour or less, other than a manufactured home?
So, while it’s been years since he was personally involved in the business, Tye understands the good that manufactured homes have, does and could do – if politicians got out of the way.
Billions Wasted on Federal Housing Projects
Donald Tye Jr. has described how billions of dollars were largely wasted on high rise tenements. He said he saw firsthand the social impact of how that subsidized housing turned into dens of crime, drugs, and despair (see bottom right photo in the collage, below).
Tye worked with the drug and alcohol addicted for many years. He still volunteers time for those causes. He believes that the lack of hope for a better future are among the contributing factors to substance abuse.
His thoughts are like an echo from HUD Secretary Dr. Ben’s Carson’s recent video, which called for “housing crusaders.”
Carson has said that home ownership is a key, because households that own have a net worth of $200,000. By contrast, renting households have an average net worth of only $5000. Carson has signaled support for manufactured homes in rural areas, but has not yet addressed the issue in an urban or suburban setting.
If Kid Rock applied the principles found in the undertones of his own video – and combined it with what Tye, Harper, and others see as ways of advancing Americans of all backgrounds – the retired minister believes he’d win the U.S. Senate seat in 2018 too.
After that – given the non-politician Donald J. Trump’s success – who knows?
Either Way, Kid Rock is Elevating The Manufactured Home Option
Whether he runs or not, Kid Rock is doing a favor for the roughly 22 million Americans who live in a manufactured home. Many are like him, millionaires and stars. But that’s not the common perception, and thus JD Harper’s point are telling.
“I’ve repeatedly questioned why HUD and the administrator’s Office of Manufactured Housing Programs hasn’t acknowledged that preemption was significantly enhanced by the Manufactured Housing Improvement Act of 2000 (MHIA of 2000),” said Harper, who explains that preemption over local zoning is the law, even though HUD isn’t enforcing it.
“I believe many in our society view manufactured housing as some sort of ‘housing of last resort’ for:
- poor people,
- illegal immigrants,
- rednecks,
- divorcees on public assistance and
- other undesirable elements of the population.
It’s a stereotype/stigma perpetuated by the media which creates and/or re-enforces barriers to the acceptance, and highest use, of manufactured homes as an affordable housing resource.”
MHLivingNews has routinely spotlighted celebrity’s manufactured homes – including the Saw movie series star Betty Russell’s manufactured home in Malibu beach, and other million-dollar plus manufactured homes.
Harper, Tye and others believe that Kid Rock could help upend several perceptions, and what Harper said a black Illinois state representative called, “economic racism.”
Tye and Harper get it. Kid Rock is spotlighting it. Will this catch on? Kid Rock makes this emerging issue fun to watch. ##
(Image credits are as shown above, and when provided by third parties, are shared under fair use guidelines.)
Submitted by Julia Granowicz to MHLivingNews.com.
