Rap and politics. The message is more than the music. Hip-hop heavyweights descend on Detroit

for the National Hip-hop Summit this morning. In 2003 Russell Simmons brought the National

Hip-hop Summit to Detroit. Its goal? Use Hip-hop to empower young black fans and mobilize them

at the ballot box. And Simmons chose Detroit for one particular reason.

The one great reason to come to Detroit is because Mayor Kilpatrick does point to what

young people can do when they're involved in the process. I think a J.Z. and Puffy and

some of the artists and I think that their voices are very, very powerful and they're drummed

into young people's heads all over the world. And Mayor Kilpatrick is the first example

of what they can elect.

Hip-hop was the theme music to my maturation process. I mean from Run DMC to Curtis Blow

to the Fat Boy, it's called Danny. You know, it was the way that I dressed, the way that

I moved.

Mayor Kilpatrick was a huge hip-hop fan. So when Russell Simmons came calling, he didn't

hesitate.

The J.Z. man, he started talking to me about getting young people to Detroit registered to vote.

And he had already had M&M on board and not us. And I said, I'm all right, we gotta do

it. And we just started marking it and pumping it up. And Hip-hop summit is in Detroit.

And it wasn't my hip-hop summit, it was my hour. Hip-hop summit.

Unopening night, more than 13,000 fans assembled at Kobo Arena for a star-studded kickoff.

We live hip-hop every day. Hip-hop is a lifestyle, it's our culture, it's something that we do

on a daily basis. We dress hip-hop. We talk hip-hop. We think hip-hop. We live hip-hop.

This is just the way that it is.

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