Democrats won’t turn funerals into political rallies, and Republicans won’t bitch about them. I am not sure what planet people are from when they think it is appropriate to attack someone who is attending a service to honor someone. Even the NY Times picked up on this, so this is not some right wing spin machine thing:
But others did not confine their remarks to Mrs. King, nor did they temper them just because Mr. Bush was seated just a few feet behind. The Rev. Joseph Lowery, who spoke at times in rhyme, said, “We know now there were no weapons of mass destruction over there.”
Former President Jimmy Carter, in an apparent allusion to the current President Bush’s eavesdropping program, mentioned the difficulties that Mrs. King and her husband, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., endured as they became the target of secret government wiretapping.
Would it be appropriate, were you attending a ceremony, for the minister to stand up, point at you, and tell everyone in attendance that the deceased hated the way you run your restaurant? And the funny thing is that I didn’t see the funeral, but only saw the Lowery and Carter lowlights on cable news. Why were these showing? Because Republicans control the media? Or because some things are just objectively wrong? Like, say, political trash talk at the pulpit of a funeral.
I know which way I am leaning.
And John Aravosis earns extra slime points for trying to claim this is all about Republican ‘white men telling black leaders their place.’
unreasonable
Political speeches at a funeral for a very political lady. And you are shocked? Please, give me a break. Both these speakers were friends of Mrs. King and were speaking about things that were dear to her heart. I imagine she would want it no other way.
Lines
Shouldn’t this story be posted at Red State or Protein Wisdom so you don’t get lambasted for being an ass, John?
John Cole
Yeah, I remember the scorching stemwinders aimed at Democrats attending reagan’s funeral.
You people have no class.
yet another jeff
Should people change their eulogies because they might hurt the feelings of an attendee? Politics brought up at the funeral of an activist. I’m shocked, I tell you, shocked.
Would that they looked to Reagan’s funeral as an example of how non-political a funeral for the leader of a cause should be.
Marcos
A normal funeral is probably not the best place to get political, but Mrs. King was no normal person. She was highly political and was deeply opposed to many of the things that this administration is guilty of doing. The preacher gave an impassioned speech that Mrs. King would have been proud of.
yet another jeff
Jesus, man…the only thing that surprises me is that people are acting surprised. Hell, who couldn’t see the wiretapping thing being brought up a week in advance?
You can’t give Lowery points for making it all rhyme, at least?
Ancient Purple
CSK was a political figure. Every day of her life. She never shyed away from that position. Why should things change in death?
Despite the conventional wisdom that funerals are supposed to be somber, quiet, organ music filled events, I hope to God that my funeral is a celebration of my life, complete with lively music, laughter, heavy drinking, great food, and people telling all those embarassing, funny stories about me in life.
CSK’s funeral was a tribute to her and the politics would have pleased her well.
Faux News
Yeah, how DARE people speak about poverty, war, and racism at Mrs. King’s funeral? It’s not as if Mrs. King or her husband cared about those things…
John Cole
You folks remind me of this one at the ‘Straw Man of the Year Contest.’
CDB
In her husbands own words:
DJ
John, I usually find your comments to be well reasoned and grounded in reality. I thought your points on the Willy-Pete news made it clear what was really happening on the ground. I just can’t agree with you on this one. Coretta Scott King and Martin Luther King, Jr. were activist. They were stridently anti-war. They fought for years for equality among races and spoke out against poverty and injustice. This was a funeral to celebrate Coretta Scott King’s life, what her life meant and what she fought for. Would it have been appropriate for them to simply say she was a great woman, a great mother and that’s it?
On top of all of this, Bush wasn’t even planning to attend the funeral. He was scheduled to speak in New Hampshire yesterday and was planning to send his father in his stead. When he found out the Carters and the Clintons were going, he changed his plans. Coretta’s friends and family were supposed to change their words honoring her because someone she didn’t agree with was going to attend?
Martin Luther King, Jr. said himself what he’d like said at his funeral, “I’d like somebody to mention that day, that Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to give his life serving others. I’d like for somebody to say that day, that Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to love somebody. I want you to say that day, that I tried to be right on the war question. I want you to be able to say that day, that I did try, in my life, to clothe those who were naked. I want you to say, on that day, that I did try, in my life, to visit those who were in prison. I want you to say that I tried to love and serve humanity.Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice; say that I was a drum major for peace; I was a drum major for righteousness.” You think LBJ’s or Nixon’s attendance should have changed that?
Zifnab
Honestly, I remember Reagan’s funeral and the commemoration of “probably the greatest President in the history of evar!” being replayed for over a week. And when Bush was rolling tanks around Iraq and funneling tax cuts to the wealthy and talking about overhauling Social Security, I remember Reagan’s funeral being the rallying point for every heavy handed neo-con east of California.
That said, if Maya Angeleu wants to get political at Mrs. King’s funneral – she’s Maya freak’n Angeleu, let her speak. Honestly, I don’t see what Republicans are complaining about. This is the closest our President has ever come to an uncensored, unscripted audience. Perhaps our dear leader could learn that even when black people aren’t drowning in New Orleans, they’re actually worthy of our attention.
Par R
I’m not sure why Republicans bother with attending funerals of prominent Dems. More often than not some of the assembled loony Democrats prove yet again that liberalism is the philosophy of the ill-informed, the intemperate, the marginal, and worthless-as-shit.
Foobar
What the *hell* was William Shakespeare thinking when he had Mark Antony demolish Brutus at Caesar’s funeral?
So tasteless, so tacky. Or simply par for the course for many hundreds of years.
ppGaz
This is obviously a troll.
This is about Republicans finding, and exploiting, another opportunity to trash anyone who disagrees with their king.
It is exactly that and nothing more.
I’ve seen exactly one Republican show class about this “story”, and that was George Bush. He took it like a man, and acted bigger than the trash talk, which suprised me, but I give him his props.
His handlers and mouth-monkeys, of course, can’t rise to that level.
And then we have the standard John Cole “you DARE to disagree with me” fare here in the thread. In that case you will be chastened with adjectives: Classless! Idiotic, stupid, and the rest of the list, to follow, I’m sure.
searp
Um, maybe if the president gave his critics a little face time, like an ordinary politician, they wouldn’t have to tee off on him at a funeral.
Of course, I also think Coretta would have wanted the funeral she got. Not everything is about W’s image. She stood for peace, justice, poor people and people of color. Is that supposed to be ignored just because it offends someone who attends her funeral?
W knew what was going to happen, if he didn’t he is REALLY stupid. He wanted this, he got it.
CDB
Par R
Put that mirror down before you hurt yourself.
Mac Buckets
Ding-ding-ding! Correct! We have a winner! Being out-of-power has made segments (not all) of the Democratic Party sacrifice decorum, class, and propriety whenever they think they can score a political cheapshot against the hated GOP. Hatred is never pretty.
Stormy70
Class will tell in all things. This is Wellstone 2.0, and remember how well that turned out for the Democrats.
I can understand if the service was set up at as a political rally, but this was a funeral service. It was tacky and inappropriate.
Bob In Pacifica
This was an “emperor has no clothes” moment. This was the first time in years that the prick (to whom Cole still has some emotional allegiance) actually wasn’t standing in front of a hand-picked group of Republican fawners.
Yeah, John, talk about “class” at the funeral of Coretta Scott King. All about class for you. People scattered across the South because of the tremendous fuck-up over Katrina while Bush’s buddies thieve away, but let’s not talk about that. The President running a massive illegal spying program shows up at the funeral of people who felt the brunt of illegal government spying, but let’s not talk about it.
For patriachal bootlickers like John Cole, “class” has always been knowing your place when your betters show up.
CDB
Rev. Joseph Lowery was a friend of the family, and what Carter said was the truth. Other than that I didn’t see a whole lot of grandstanding. Perhaps you can inform the uninformed.
Davebo
It’s called “mooching off the hero”.
But I agree, I’d prefer that most of today’s republicans avoid the funerals of true American heroes.
Vladi G
This from the guy who wrote:
This is the stupidest fucking analogy I think I’ve ever heard. If the deceased had spent his/her entire life organizing rallies protesting the way I ran my restaurant, if the deceased had dedicated his/her life to fighting me over the way I ran my restaurant, then maybe, just maybe, I would see it coming.
ppGaz
You people are a joke. Pointing out that there were no WMDs is not “hatred.” It’s a fucking fact.
News flash: Bushmonkeys don’t get to decide where and when facts are “appropriate.”
I commend you to my first post to the thread. One Republican guy managed to act like a man over this. Try to emulate him.
Davebo
Vladi..
Ouch, that was painful over broadband…
ppGaz
This will surely go into the archives as the most amazing post ever to BJ.
Stormy talks about “class.”
Next, Darrell’s lecture on dialectical materialism.
Stormy70
Just another way for the Democrats to prove to the country how out of touch and completely tone deaf they are. Keep it coming.
Blue Neponset
I don’t have any sympathy for George Bush. It is quite clear to me that he is afraid to face an audience that isn’t full of brain stem Republicans. If he didn’t want to be critisized he should have sent a card instead of going to the funeral of a political activist who vehemently opposed his policies.
Fair warning to George Bush: If Dubya attends my funeral all my family and friends have my permission to tell him what an asshole they think he is.
Bob In Pacifica
ppGaz, “hatred” is now telling the truth. “Love” is lying to the citizens. “Protecting” is invading people’s privacy. “War” is peace.
Bob In Pacifica
Stormy, I hear your brother running up the stairs. 2.0.
p.lukasiak
What the hell was Bush doing at that funeral anyway? HE was involved in political grandstanding by being there. Christ, the guy is only in the white house because he went to the Supreme Court to prevent the votes of black people in Florida from being counted…..
Only racist scum would dare criticize those chosen by the King family to speak at Mrs King’s funeral because they happened to say what Mrs King would have wanted said at her funeral.
Andrew
You go to funerals with the facts you have, not the facts you want.
Hmmm. That was a stretch.
Steve
Unbelievable that anyone should try to tell the friends and family of the deceased what they can say at a funeral. Just unbelievable.
The Kings fought their whole lives for an end to racism, an end to poverty, an end to war. Because President Bush invited himself to the funeral, they are supposed to CHANGE THE EULOGY to not offend him?
The people in attendance at the funeral sure didn’t look offended. If you were offended, you know what, change the channel. Don’t sit there and demand they redo a great woman’s funeral to suit YOUR view of what’s appropriate.
This is all just a reminder that if MLK were alive today, he would be considered ten times the enemy of America that Michael Moore is. Since he’s not, conservatives whitewash his legacy, act like he was this noble bipartisan hero who only fought for values that all of us believe in, and misuse his name whenever convenient to support one of their causes, like opposition to affirmative action.
I don’t think I have ever seen anything so disgusting as the way conservatives have tried to score points by attacking the way this funeral was run. If they want to see a more “appropriate” funeral, they can go drop dead themselves.
Bob In Pacifica
Steve, don’t you get it? Funerals are supposed to be celebrations of the life and the accomplishments of George Bush.
ppGaz
Sounds vaguely familiar …….
Why is my brain filled with the voices of Kate O’Beirne and Bill Bennett and something called “Mehlman?”
Par R
My understanding is that the RNC has already put the first rough cut of a possible television spot together highlighting excerpts from the funeral to illustrate to Americans what utter fools dominate the Democratic party today. This should help bring about the same result as the infamous Wellstone fumeral, wherein the loons of the democratic party showed all of America what real scum looks like.
Bob In Pacifica
Now I get John’s umbrage here. When something happened at the funeral that John found inappropriate, like telling the truth, referees were supposed to come out and flag them.
Sorry, Cole, every once in a while the game isn’t fixed.
Alexandra
Yes, it’s true. Politicizing a funeral isn’t pretty.
HOWEVER, let’s look at your analogy, John. You say that it would be rude to tell someone their restaurant sucks at a funeral, right? But in the normal course of doing business, you’d be able to discuss whatever problems you had with the food and service at a restaurant you were visiting AT THAT restaurant. And the owner of the restaurant would normally listen to what yo say. Perhaps they wouldn’t agree with you, but they would be respectful. But what if you had a restaurant–the only restaurant in town–where the owner was incredibly disrespectful of more than half the clients who came to the restaurant, and would completely refuse to listen to them. What if they had no choice about where they ate, and were consistently treated like crap while they were there, given dirty food and bad service, while they were forced to watch a few of the owner’s friends being treated like kings? Then, say, what if they wrote letters to the editor of the local paper to complain about this service that were never published. Instead, they get to read glowing reviews of the owner’s wonderful food and service, sparkling personality, and glamorous lifestyle reported over and over again.
If by chance, they had a chance to meet with the owner of that restaurant in some kind of setting where his flacks weren’t protecting him, wouldn’t they be a little bit justified in complaining?
kelsey
Well of course the funeral service looks like a political rally to you, you only watched one minute out of the whole six hour service. Perhaps you should at least watch the whole speach of Rev. Lowery before jumping the gun. He used teh WMD reference to point out the many problems that America has back home, problems that Correta Scott King would most certainly want addressed at her own funeral. And if you didn’t care enough about the funeral to at least watch part of it, why should you care about what was said at the funeral?
Bob In Pacifica
Par R, tell us that things are swell in Katrinaland. Tell us that government spying is just okey dokey. Tell us how swell that Iraqi war is going, and all those WMDs that were found, and how the budget looks, and how we’re taking care of our own. Should be a great video.
Steve
Oh, that would sure make the point that a funeral shouldn’t be exploited for political purposes. I’m sure you’re just bullshitting though.
Conservatives sure are showing their true colors today.
Par R
Bob in Pacifica, please tell us what you learned at your last meeting of the local al Qaeda gathering.
John Cole
He wasn’t engaging in political grandstanding, as four of the five living Presidents were there to PAY THEIR RESPECTS to the woman.
Had Bush not been there, you jackasses would be claiming it was proof he was racist.
The fact that Lowery and one of the other presidents took the opportunity to lash out at someone there to pay their respects is a sign of simply haveing NO CLASS.
And Bob in Pacifica, GFY for these remarks, you petulant twit. I’d stick my boot up your ass if I had a chance, I am so tired of you internet cowboys coming in here and acting all tough and acting as if I am some sort of evil FREEPER. I don’t know what is funnier- the tough talk you 110lb when soaking wet weenies type out in the comments here, or the fact that you think my relatively mainstream, moderate politics are ‘right wing.’
carpeicthus
You’re being pwn3d, John. Hard.
yet another jeff
Yeah, that’ll show America. Friends of the family at a funeral. I think RNC has a winner here.
kelsey
At my last Al Qaeda meeting we all learned a new recipe for hummus. Now while I don’t want to give away the whole recipe I will say that the secret recipe is one cup of terror.
Stormy70
Bob – is this more of your conspiracy theory-type posting, because I don’t know what this means. But kudos for getting me to read one of your posts all the way through. I usually skip them.
The fact is that this funeral rally makes Dems look unhinged and hate-filled. Oh, wait…
Bob In Pacifica
At the last al Qaeda meeting? Oh, Osama warned us not to identify ourselves as the “number two guy in al Qaeda” when we used our home phones to call Kabul. Some of the guys keep forgetting.
And at the last Klan meeting you guys talk about that new fashion line of hoods and robes?
Vladi G
Anyone seen DougJ lately?
Mr. Grouchypants
The RNC won’t have to make any tv spots on the funeral. All they have to do is keep complaining enough to keep the story in the news for a while. If they can keep people arguing over the political remarks long enough, those remarks will be all that people remember about the funeral.
What I don’t understand is why the Democrats would want to politicize a funeral in a way that will probably prove to be politically damaging to them.
Vladi G
You’re not an evil Freeper, John. But you are an evil Freeper enabler.
I’m waiting for the “It’s things like the funeral of CSK that keep me voting Republican” post.
Olly McPherson
“The fact that Lowery and one of the other presidents took the opportunity to lash out at someone there to pay their respects is a sign of simply haveing NO CLASS.”
Someone? Give me a break. That someone is the President of the United States. I think it’s safe to say, given her history, that Mrs. King vehemently disagreed with the direction the nation’s taken in the past six yeasr. But God forbid anyone bring that up at the funeral of a POLITICAL ACTIVIST.
kelsey
“The fact that Lowery and one of the other presidents took the opportunity to lash out at someone there to pay their respects is a sign of simply haveing NO CLASS.” JC
I confused, is pointing out the fact that there were no WMD in Iraq lashing out? Is that why people in the media are scared to bring this up to the president?
Bob In Pacifica
Hey, John, stop thinking about sticking things up my ass and get back to the subject.
You’re right, though. If Bush hadn’t gone to the funeral people would have called him a racist. He went. People called him a racist. Guess what? When you and your buddies prevent people from voting because of the color of their skin you ARE a racist.
Steve
Oh, I get it, it’s rude to oppose the Iraq war in front of George Bush. What the fuck? Are we really more concerned about the feelings of a political figure than the feelings of a dead woman’s friends and family?
You seem to be assuming Rev. Lowery wouldn’t have said the exact same thing if Bush hadn’t shown up, which seems bizarre.
SmilingPolitely
Bush is the anti-thesis for everything Coreta King stood for. Him showing up was a fucking insult to her.
Pb
John Cole,
FYI. It’s her funeral. Not yours. No one has to consult Karl Rove to find out what’s appropriate language for one’s own funeral. Yet. Although apparently that’s what you voted for. Conservative, my ass.
John Cole
I am not voting Republican in 2006.
I am just not voting for you fucking idiots, either. You people don’t have your act together in the least, and you all think you are so different. You aren’t- you are mirror images. You would do everything the Republicans would do to win elections- it is just that your cause is ‘just,’ so that makes it acceptable.
I will probably vote for every third party candidate on the ballot.
Pb
John Cole,
Fuck you. Speak for yourself, asshole. I’d show you an essay I wrote about ends and means if I thought it would do you any good.
Blue Neponset
This wasn’t a Cindy Sheehan rally, it was the funeral of a political activist. Should the Democrats have ignored the main goals of Mrs. King’s life because talking about those goals might make Bush uncomfortable? Sometimes it is more politically damaging to roll over and play dead than it is to piss a few people off.
yet another jeff
Bob? You’re talking crazy…
Mr. Grouchypants
Maybe they just meant what they said…it’s a hypothesis…
Seems reasonable to think that the funeral would have had the same speeches with or without W.
Mr Furious
Thanks for starting this thread, John. It made for some entertaining reading.
For the record, you are way off base, but that’s as much as I’ll pile on.
Steve
John, just curious, did you actually watch the funeral? Or are you just reading the blogs and focusing on the 4 or 5 lines that touched on controversial political issues?
I say this because I think you have to completely ignore reality to say this funeral was like a “Democratic political rally.”
You have as much right to exercise a line-item veto over this funeral as you do to determine whether Terri Schiavo should live or die, which is to say, no right at all. When it comes to how a woman’s friends and family choose to mark her passing, that’s simply not anyone else’s business. And shame on the ghoulish Republicans for once again using a woman’s death to try and score political points.
kelsey
Heres a compromise, the next time a Republican activist dies that actually did some fucking good for the country, you can point out that there were no WMD in Iraq.
Jim Allen
I’m disappointed in you John Cole — not only are you surprised that all the activists at the funeral of a major activist would play nicey-nice just because Bush showed up, you’re surprised that so many people disagree with you.
That’s Malkin-level stupidity.
Doctor Gonzo
Last time I checked, funerals were supposed to be about celebrating the lives of the deceased. They aren’t about how they appear on TV. They aren’t about the attendees. They aren’t about not offending somebody. They are about the PERSON WHO DIED! That’s it.
If you don’t want to hear about a person’s politics, don’t go to their funeral. It’s that simple. I’m sick to death about Republicans telling people how to hold “proper” funerals. You know who decides what a proper funeral is? The person who is deceased and those closest to him/her. Not politicians.
It would be a huge insult to the deceased to not make a big deal out of their lives and what they stood for. Should funerals gloss over the lives of the deceased? Only if the deceased want that, I guess. But most people don’t. I know I wouldn’t. My funeral is about my life, not the lives of those that happen to show up.
Maybe all the funerals you have attended John were quiet, somber affairs, and you don’t see how anybody can have something different. But a lot of people don’t see it that way. When one of my closest friends died at 22, the funeral and memorial service weren’t somber affairs, because he wasn’t. To minimize his spirit would be to minimize his life.
p.lukasiak
He wasn’t engaging in political grandstanding, as four of the five living Presidents were there to PAY THEIR RESPECTS to the woman.
except that Bush never showed the slightest respect for those things which Mrs. King believed in…. he wasn’t there to pay his “respects”, it was political grandstanding.
What is up with your right-wing racist talking points? This is a President who has NOT gotten behind the reauthorization of the civil rights act. who has POLITICAL HACKS over-ruling the unanimous opinion of Civil Rights Division lawyers on black voting rigths decisions — and who then appoints the same hacks to the FEC.
Its people like you who demonstrate just how racist the GOP is, and how racism is at the heart of the conservative movement that you embrace.
Pb
I watched the eulogy, and it was a great speech. Everyone there seemed to enjoy it, including a one Mr. George W. Bush. The only thing that made the “weapons of mass destruction” line notable was the standing ovation it got from the crowd.
Then again, this wouldn’t be the first time that someone clapped for not finding weapons of mass destruction, now would it–I suggest you reprimand that joker as well. Apparently John and friends just want to throw a hissy fit to create a political issue over free speech where there should never be one–at a funeral. Sounds like something Fred Phelps would do.
Ancient Purple
I’m sorry. What did Lowery say that was untruthful? Did we find WMD’s after all? Anyone have a link?
Sorry, John, but you are not the arbitor of what is or is not appropriate at a funeral. CSK was a vocal, political activist. Vocal, political activism at her funeral seems pretty appropriate.
Look, if your family wants people to wear Steeler colors and cry bitter tears and listen to somber music when you die, then so be it. Those are their wishes and they should be honored.
Likewise, it was the wishes of CSK’s family and friends that Lowery speak his peace. I think they were in a better position of determining what would be appropriate at CSK’s funeral than you are.
Vladi G
Ya know, sometimes when a person actually IS a racist asshole, they’re damned if they do, damned if they don’t. It’s part of the territory. It’s one of the downsides to being a racist asshole. But hey, it’s something they have to deal with.
SmilingPolitely
When Cindy Sheehan dies, and you go to her funeral, John, I must warn you: people may say stuff that mind offend your sensibilities.
Mr. Grouchypants
And maybe they are just politically tone-deaf.
John Cole
My goodness- did the short bus not go to school today?
Bush was not engaging in political grandstanding, he was fulfilling a duty. He had to be there. As duly elected President, he is not only the Chief Executive Officer of the country and the Commander-In-Chief, he is also the titular figurehead of the country. He went there representing all of us, even if you hate him and did not vote for him.
That you knuckleheads can’t figure that out, and think it is appropriate to heap crap on George Bush the man for his policies, when he is simply there to pay his respects and serve as the figurehead for the nation, is astounding.
George Bush has no reason to grandstand. Particularly not with the black community, who have shown they are not going to vote for him. Regardless, BUSH IS NOT RUNNING FOR ANYTHING. HE IS DONE. HE IS ALMOST A LAME DUCK. HE WILL RETIRE A PERFECT 2-0 IN THE BIG GAME.
Someone earlier wrote that they are waiting for me to say this kind of stuff is why I vote Republican. It isn’t. But this kind of stuff is why I don’t vote more frequently for Democrats. You people are insane. You sound as hysterical and stupid as the Falwell people who were pushing tapes that Clinton had murdered dozens of people.
John Cole
So now Bush is racist?
You people. Are you all just TRYING to make Michelle Malkin and Powerline look sane? because they do, compared to some of you. And you all know what I thnk of their crazy politics.
p.lukasiak
They aren’t about not offending somebody. They are about the PERSON WHO DIED! That’s it.
precisely.
Given who Mrs King was, and what she believed in, I think that if anything she would be disappointed that the funeral was not more political — She would have wanted more of an effort made to energize and enlist people to get behind those causes in which Mrs. King believed.
Only a white racist would think that if Mrs. King had the opportunity to speak publicly to Bush that she would not have excorciated him in no uncertain terms. And only a white racist would object to those speaking at her funeral saying to Bush what she would have said herself.
yet another jeff
What is the tone they are deaf to in this case?
Jim Allen
Maybe next time a prominent activist dies, Congress can go into emergency session to pass legislation barring any political speechifying at the funeral. I’m sure Bush would even be willing to cut short his vacation to sign it.
I mean, they must know better than the family how end-of-life decisions should be made, right?
Armando
John:
Whether I agree with you or not, the fact is Republicans simply do not have the moral standing on civil rights issues to critique this.
This is one where you’ll just have to take the hit.
Bitching about it makes it worse – for Republicans.
John Cole
Lukasiak reading Coretta’s mind from the grave. I will remember this the next time you join me in mocking Malkin for her ‘Terri wants to LIVE!’ posts.
Olly McPherson
Somehow I don’t feel like we’re coming off as the insance ones here…
Vladi G
What do you call someone who’s political strategy is to purge eligible voters from the voter rolls in a way that will overwhelmingly impact black voters? What do you call someone who push polls in a Southern state claiming his opponent has fathered a black child out of wedlock? Is there a better term for it?
Bob In Pacifica
p.lukasiak, thank you. The GOP is racist. Being the party of plutocrats, racism is but one of their many tools which they use to screw over the 98.5% of Americans who get screwed over. But it is an effective tool for them.
I always am suspicious of people who toss around the word “class” but claim there’s no “class war” going on. It’s not that I’m poor, it’s that I haven’t learned how to behave in the presence of my betters.
Oh, and p.l., thanks for all the heavy lifting over in Tom Maguire’s fantasyland. If I ever come down with a painful disease I want to smoke whatever those folks are using. It must be mighty good weed.
Mr. Grouchypants
The tone caused by the feedback from the Wellstone funeral.
Olly McPherson
Oops–insane.
gratefulcub
Are her kids pissed by the statements? The rest of her family? If not, then whatever they said was fine. It was her funeral, and her family knew her best. If they think she would have wanted a political statement made, then it was fine. If they believe that someone hijacked the funeral for political purposes, then it was wrong.
If Bush doesn’t want to be beat up a little, he should know better than to show up at a civil rights leader’s funeral, and sit at center stage. I am not calling him a racist in any way, but his policies and beliefs are not compatible with hers.
It was her funeral, and if she and her family felt comfortable with it being used as a political tool against Bush, then that is exactly what should have happened. We don’t get to tell others how to use their funerals.
p.lukasiak
Bush was not engaging in political grandstanding, he was fulfilling a duty. He had to be there.
Really? I guess thats in the part of Article II of the constitution that they are keeping secret from us — the same part that authorizes warrantless domestic wiretaps, engaging in wars of agression, and appointing racists like Alito to the Supreme Court….
ChristieS
I watched quite a bit of the funeral, and I have to admit that my opinion on it is divided. I loved the speeches but on a personal level, I was uncomfortable watching 43 get smacked, however much I feel he deserved it. I would have preferred him not to have been there.
I felt embarrassed for him and sorry for him that his first venture into non-handpicked venues turned out to be such a painful one.
I have a high sympathy quotient, though.
srv
Yes, you are so right. I’m sure the last thing CSK would have wanted anyone to talk about was our leadership, the war and wiretapping. She must be spinning in her grave over that. She would have no doubt been offended that anyone would be offended.
John Cole
Jesus, Bob.
Class as in tact, not class as in actual social standing.
I was right. You are an idiot.
Matt
Sorry John, I disagree, Coretta and MLK would have wanted someone to say something controversial after all we’ve got a budget that the consoler in chief submitted that dramatically cuts social programs in favor of defense spending. They would have been against that and would not have sat quietly (oh and Laura Bush looked like a soul stealing robot during lowry’s speech).
Respect is all well and good but I don’t think GW has earned it from the black activist community.
gratefulcub
Someone that will do anything to win. If push polls claiming McCain was jewish, white, dressed in drag, whatever, they would have done it. It just so happens that racist talk works, so they use it.
kelsey
Perhaps the speakers at the service should not have also talked about poverty in America seeing as how GW is cutting down on government spending for lower income people. Or is that okay with you, John?
p.lukasiak
Class as in tact, not class as in actual social standing.
you have a lot of nerve, accusing bob of being stupid while making this statement.
Here’s a clue, John. The idea of “class” as “tact” is derived specifically from the concept of the “upper classes” having superior manners and breeding. And “breeding” is used deliberately in this context, because “class” has always had a racist component to it.
John Cole
I think he should be cutting spending on ALL people.
gratefulcub
Don’t you think that her kids has a hand in picking the speakers? Don’t you think that she has some influence in that decision as well? (she was elderly, and had been told she was terminal) Don’t you think that the content of the speeches may have been known to the family before the event?
Again, if you didn’t like what was said, fine, but it wasn’t someone hijacking CSK’s funeral to make a statement. She and her family used the funeral to make one last statement. If you want to be pissed and lay some blame, put the blame where it belongs, CSK and her family.
Personally, I won’t care what you think about any statement I use my funeral to make.
gratefulcub
Maybe she was just still pissed off by George hijacking MLK day in Memphis a few years back. When she was alive, she swallowed her pride and showed respect for the office. Why continue that charade now?
Doctor Gonzo
I also fail to see how this shows how crazy Democrats are. Was this a political rally? Was CSK a former Democratic Senator, President, Congresswoman? Was she at one point head of the party?
Or was this just a funeral where the people who are closest to the deceased get to decide how to celebrate her life? As far as I’m concerned, anything goes at a funeral. It’s the last big, community way to celebrate a person’s life.
Like I said, there are a lot of people who believe that funerals should be all wearing black and crying and being somber. Obviously, CSK’s friends and family aren’t those people. Neither am I. If anything other than a stereotypical funeral bothers you, don’t go! And don’t watch it on TV! And don’t tar people who want to celebrate and nitpick and pontificate and politic as “Democrats” just because you don’t think it’s proper.
Jill
The Kings have stood against almost everything this Administration stands for. Of course this would be pointed out at the funeral of the woman who carried on the work of her husband who happened to be a great force for change (for the better)in this country. Their whole lives were political. They were also illegally eavesdropped on and with Bush trying to again illegally eavesdrop on Americans it is very relevant to remember some of those inconvenient facts. As someone once said, the facts are biased against Bush, too bad.
Stormy70
As somene here in Texas supporting Katrina victims who are still in paid hotel rooms, and whose Republican friends are still donating and volunteering to help them, shut up about racism. It makes you look petty and stupid. Katrina is no longer a viable political issue in the rest of the country. But race pimps will try to keep it going so they can feed at the money trough. And ignorant Democrats will buy into it, since they can’t see beyond their own Bush Derangement Syndrome.
This makes Dems look bad politically once again, but I guess I am thankful that today’s Democrats are too stupid to see it.
kelsey
“I think he should be cutting spending on ALL people.”
I’m glad that is what you think, but you didn’t answer my question. I have another question for you. Corretta Scott King protested the aparteid government in South Africa. Would it have been wrong to bring this up at the service if say, Dick Cheney went in Bush’s place? Thank’s for not answering my question in advance.
Vladi G
Gonna answer my question, John?
Bob In Pacifica
John, in your world “class” is the tact of not telling the President his policies hurt poor Americans.
The informal meaning of “class” as proper behavior arises directly out of the meaning of “class” as someone of an upper class, one who has been schooled in etiquette and other social graces necessary to perform in the court of the nobility.
So, chump, when you talk about class out of one side of your mouth, ignore issues of class on the other, and don’t understand the derivation of the fucking word, YOU don’t get it.
By the way, wanting to stick a boot up my ass is class in the brown-shirt crowd, but it doesn’t advance your argument.
SmilingPolitely
*applause*
Bob In Pacifica
“I think he should be cutting spending on ALL people.”-John Cole.
You see, that’s how the ass-half of the Republican-Libertarian shell game works.
Rip off the country for the benefit of the rich, and then cut spending on everyone, whether they’re billionaires or starving.
Ah, Grover Norquist!
Pb
Stormy,
Racism isn’t just a political issue, and it didn’t start or end with Katrina. And no, people won’t “shut up about racism”, nor should they. However, thank you (and your friends) for helping the Katrina victims–I think far too many people who aren’t close to this don’t realize how much help they still need, five months later.
Krista
I agree with that completely. I’m not going to try to guess at Bush’s motives for going there. I don’t know the man. Maybe it was political posturing, maybe he thought it was the right thing to do, maybe he was there for the post-funeral buffet. I don’t know. But I presume that CSK’s family would have previewed the eulogy. So if they were cool with it, and felt that it was a fitting tribute, then that should be the end of it. It’s nobody else’s damned business to decide if it was appropriate or not.
John Cole
You really are a piece of work. Of course I understand that the colloquial term ‘class’ is derived from class standing, but that is not what the colloquial means. I was quite clearly talking about tact, decency, and manners, and you inject social standing into the discussion. No one is too poor or too uneducated to have manners, just as no one is too poor to pick up their yard.
And the boot reference was to your calling me a bootlicker, jackass.
Vladi- What question?
richard
My wife’s comment: “It was Coretta King, not Larry King. What did Bush think they were going to talk about?”
The Kings spent their lives opposing the kinds of divisive and destructive politics that Bush personifies. It would have been an insult to them not to have spoken out at an occasion that was a celebration of Coretta King’s beliefs and work. There’s no credible argument that propriety should be supreme at a public occasion like this, given that occasion’s subject. She spent her life in a defiant, oppositional, public role and the faux-outcry on the right is a transparent attempt to silence her in death.
John Cole
Umm. He is is the POTUS and the titular figurehead for the entire nation. We don’t have Prince Charles to dispatch to every funeral.
John
Stormy,
Exactly how done deaf do you have to be to call a group “petty and stupid” and immediately proceed to treat a large class of displaced Americans as counters in a cheap game?
Just sayin’ is all.
M. Scott Eiland
And the winner of the Most Idiotic Moonbat Meme of the Year for the FIFTH year running is. . .?
“You can’t tell us how to mourn!”
One has to be glad that the lunatics burning down embassies right now aren’t claiming to be mourning (Mohammed, presumably–Cindy Sheehan proves that there’s no time limit on the licensing of deranged behavior by the professioner lefty mourner), or they’d have a whole new group of overt supporters.
ET
It was her funereral and frankly she could have had it the way she and her family wanted it. If they wanted it political or not was their perrogative. When you die you and your family get it the way you want to. The funeral was about her and her life not about others and what they want.
Sure I think it was a little over the top and it would not have been the way I would have planned her funeral if I was a family member but I’m not, so I have no right at all to get worked up over it.
Heck many people would find the jazz funderals tacky. All that music and celebrating is quite dignified for such a “solemn” occasion.
kelsey
Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t Dick Cheney vote against the MLK holiday? If he did, then does that mean that the speakers at the service could not have brought up the day without offending Cheney?
John
I didn’t read the motive question as “I have no idea why he went” but instead as “It’s none of my business why he went there, plus it’s immaterial.”
Doctor Gonzo
Um, yes, because when religious fundamentalists burn embassies and kill people it is completely analogous to a funeral eulogy.
Just a heads up, M. Scott Eiland: you probably won’t like my funeral, so if talking about a deceased person’s true beliefs bothers you, please don’t attend.
Pb
M. Scott Eiland,
Are you serious? Either that was the worst spoof I’ve ever seen, or the dumbest comment I’ve ever seen, and I’d like to know which one it is.
Bob In Pacifica
Yeah, bootlicker: one who worships the powerful. That often seems to inform your opinions. One who threatens to stick a boot up someone else’s ass: loser of an argument.
And yes, you still don’t get it about class.
SeesThroughIt
Oh, they aren’t just trying to whitewash his legacy, Steve. Some are now trying to claim that MLK’s legacy is a conservative one. Seriously. Up is down, night is day, and MLK has a conservative legacy. It’s right up there with the recent attempts to claim that Hitler was a leftist.
Steve
Oh, he had to be there.
Did Lyndon Johnson go to MLK’s funeral? No, he sure didn’t.
But I have a feeling they would have talked about the Vietnam War whether he did or didn’t, because the anti-war cause was something MLK believed in very strongly.
I think John understands by now that he has no case on the merits, though, because he’s now turned to cherry-picking some of the more over-the-top comments and saying, “See! This is why I will never vote for you guys!” That’s always the last line of defense.
I’m glad John saw through all the BS with Terri Schiavo but I’m disappointed he doesn’t understand this is more of the same. A bunch of shameless conservatives pick a few lines out of a funeral service that went on for hours and had dozens of speakers, wave them around as evidence of how bad Democrats are, and he lets himself get sucked right into the faux outrage.
40 years ago conservatives used to attack the leaders of the civil rights movement for raising their issues in inappropriate ways. Not much has changed.
yet another jeff
“You can’t tell us how to mourn” has won for 5 years? Are you trying to win the coveted Straw Man award?
John is usually reasonable, even when wrong, but you’re just the flip side of Bob in Pacifica.
If the family is cool with it, then that’s that.
Blue Neponset
Uh oh, the funs over everyone M. Scott Eiland showed up.
ImJohnGalt
Given that his VP voted against making MLK day a national holiday, it doesn’t surprise me that those in attendance, many of whom had devoted their entire lives to advancing the cause of civil rights, might be a bit antagonistic to the current administration.
That said, didn’t former FBI director Sessions make a few comments about wiretapping? Why isn’t he being castigated? Because he’s white?
As I saw written elsewhere, Bush is looking for a purple heart from a self inflicted political wound, here.
srv
Since DougJ isn’t here:
Carter bringing up JFK/RFK’s wiretapping of MLK and CSK was completely classless and offensive to Kennedy family members present. After all they have done, to be reminded again of what happens when administrations have no oversight.
unreasonable
I’m curious, John Cole. If it turns out that Mrs. King wanted her funeral used as a vehicle for reinforcing her beliefs, and she asked her friends to speak out for what she saw as wrongs and injustices–would you think she had no class?
Bob In Pacifica
yet another Jeff, I’m sure the usually reasonable John appreciates your gratuitous shot. I’d like to stick around, but the sun is up here on the California coast, so I’m going to take a walk up in the hills.
kelsey
So John, if Cheney went could the speakers still have brought up King’s work to end the aparteid in South Africa and her husband’s holiday even though Cheney opposed her? Or are we just mad because current events came up that King worked against? I’m just asking.
John
John,
You called the comments “political trash talk”. Why?
MLK and CSK were political, yes? Did they or did they not spend their lives standing up for equality, the poor, the dowtrodden and against the abuses of government?
Could you imagine CSK herself talking about the “weapons of mass distraction” or discussing what it is like to be wiretapped by the government? I can. So why is it inappropriate for those close to her to talk about them? Is it because Bush was in attendance?
I thought he handled himself with dignity, in what must have been a profoundly uncomfortable situation for him, but the funeral was not about him. It was about CSK, and her life, and her beliefs. I heard nothing yesterday that struck me as anything I wouldn’t have her her say.
MI
Unbelievable that anyone should try to tell the friends and family of the deceased what they can say at a funeral. Just unbelievable.
The Kings fought their whole lives for an end to racism, an end to poverty, an end to war. Because President Bush invited himself to the funeral, they are supposed to CHANGE THE EULOGY to not offend him?
The people in attendance at the funeral sure didn’t look offended. If you were offended, you know what, change the channel. Don’t sit there and demand they redo a great woman’s funeral to suit YOUR view of what’s appropriate.
This is all just a reminder that if MLK were alive today, he would be considered ten times the enemy of America that Michael Moore is. Since he’s not, conservatives whitewash his legacy, act like he was this noble bipartisan hero who only fought for values that all of us believe in, and misuse his name whenever convenient to support one of their causes, like opposition to affirmative action.
I don’t think I have ever seen anything so disgusting as the way conservatives have tried to score points by attacking the way this funeral was run. If they want to see a more “appropriate” funeral, they can go drop dead themselves.
a-freakin-men. 98% of the time I make an effort to be civil and “moderate” in my tone here, not just because it’s polite but because (don’t laugh) I think it’s what’s good for the country. But since no one is perfect and we’re allowed to lose it once is a while, let me just say that goddamn I hate these fucking people.
Krista
You read it right. Don’t know the man’s inner workings. He might have wanted to go, he might have been told to go for his image. Don’t know. Don’t care. Doesn’t matter. If the family’s cool with what was said, then that’s all that matters to me. When I die, if my family decides that I would have wanted a naked midget to dance on a table while calling God a complete prick, then nobody else should have anything to say about it.
Actually…now that I think about it, I would like that.
t. jasper parnell
Mr Cole says:
Surely there is a difference between an American president, who represent everyone left right and center, and the political activist?
Surely as well, you cannot mean to suggest the occastion of President Reagan’s death was not used to remind all an sundry of his accomplishments in a manner complimentary to them and derogatory to those who rejected them.
Why the near-endless replaying of Mr. Reagan’s “Tutu? So So,” quote was in and of itself a reminder of his political position and the sosoness of those who stood opposite of him. Granted, it was paraded as evidence of his wit, but surely other non-partisan examples might have been selected.
I find it odd, as well, that Mr. Cole refers to some “you people” as having no class. Do you intend here commentators on this site who disagree with you? In which case, are you not equating class with agreement with your positions? Or are the “you people” those at the funeral who classlessly “politicized” the funeeral of a political activist? If the latter, can you provide an example of such a funeral that does not have politcal overtones, as I just mentioned, Mr. Reagan’s funeral did have political overtones, his son Ron’s remarks just leapt to mind.
yet another jeff
Gratuitous shot? Oh no, that was most essential to the plot, I assure you.
I saw nothing wrong with what was said, nor anything wrong with how W. handled himself. The new meme, however is rather classless. The classy thing to do if you find someone’s actions classless is to rise above it.
Vladi G
Well, the people who are too poor to own property are too poor to pick up their yard.
I want to know what you call someone who takes affirmative steps to purge legal voters from the voter rolls knowing that the manner in which it is done will have heavily disproportionate effect on black voters. I want to know what you call someone who push polls in a Southern state claiming their opponent has fathered an illegitimate black child.
You said Bush wasn’t racist. So I want to know what term you use to describe someone who does the above if “racist” isn’t it.
ImJohnGalt
If only the Republicans had stepped in and prevented Mrs. King from dying with an act of Congress, none of us would even be talking about this.
gratefulcub
HE HAD TO GO. Really, Bush had to go to the funeral. If he hadn’t, it would have been a huge story about his disrespect for the black community. He wasn’t grandstanding, or using it for politics. He had to go. He didn’t want to be there any more than they wanted him to be there. It was a bite the bullet moment for W. He had to go, and he had to be in a room where others were speaking and they weren’t hand picked for a ‘town hall format’. Unfortunate for him.
But, even though he was there, it was still her funeral. And she and her family used it just like they wanted to, as is their right. She was a woman that fought against all odds her entire life, and when things looked the darkest, she kept fighting. Why is anyone surprised that she kept fighting, even at her funeral.
p.lukasiak
Shorter John Cole….
That uppitty Negro Reverend Lowery didn’t know his place in front of important white folk like President Bush… Those black people just don’t know how to act when white people honor them with their presence.
Zifnab
The sad thing is when people get all huffed up after watching five minutes of excerpts on FOX News while listening to an hour of whining by “analysts”.
Perhaps if you sat through the full two hour eulogy on CSPAN or PBS you have room to talk. But so far, all I’ve seen is parroting of the party line with the old “how dare Democrats politize a civil rights leader’s funneral”, “how dare those black people forget what they owe the Republican party”, and my favorite “How dare Democrats claim to be pro-civil rights”.
So many “How dare you’s”, it would be nice if the talking heads channeled that furry into doing something productive.
Bob In Pacifica
Class act: illegal domestic spying, started BEFORE 9/11.
Judging from what I saw on the news, the new meme is “How dare they?”
gratefulcub
I’m embarrassed to be on your side.
Blue Neponset
p.lukasiak,
That comment is way out of line. If you believe John thinks like that why the hell do you participate on his blog?
Bob In Pacifica
“p.lukasiak Says:
Shorter John Cole….
That uppitty Negro Reverend Lowery didn’t know his place in front of important white folk like President Bush… Those black people just don’t know how to act when white people honor them with their presence.”
Ah, but p., that’s CLASS! ‘Scuse me, I gotta go pick up the yard Before Mr. Cole gets angry.
Doctor Gonzo
What about the flip side? What if it was a funeral for somebody who believed very strongly in the war in Iraq and their eulogy talked about John Doe strongly believed in the war and wanted to see its goals fulfilled? Would those comments be offensive to any anti-war people in the crowd? Would this be politicizing the funeral?
No, it wouldn’t. Like I said, anything goes at a funeral. People have just as much a right to make their funeral a big bash for Bush if they wanted to. I don’t care. It’s not my business.
M. Scott Eiland
“You can’t tell us how to mourn” has won for 5 years? Are you trying to win the coveted Straw Man award?
It’s a tenacious competitor, as well as being really, well, idiotic:
2002: “Republicans stole the election in MN by telling us how to mourn!”
2003-2004: Nostalgic whining by lefties in blog comments sections about how Republicans stole the 2002 Senate election in MN by “telling people how to mourn.” Even in diluted form, the meme remains deeply idiotic.
2005: CINDY! “She’s mourning–you don’t have a right to criticize her.”
2006: Five years and running strong! “Of course it’s appropriate to take shots at a sitting president when he’s there to pay respects to the life of a noted civil rights leader–it’s a shame we didn’t think of doing this when Rosa Parks passed on!”
Pb
gratefulcub,
I don’t see why he had to go. Heck, he isn’t even trying to get re-elected now, not that you’d know it from his recent SOTU/bad poll numbers tour. Couldn’t he just have had a scheduling conflict or something?
That having been said, I’m glad he showed up, and appeared to have a good time, unlike some people currently whining about it who weren’t even there.
Edmund Dantes
Rest of it is here
M. Scott Eiland
That comment is way out of line. If you believe John thinks like that why the hell do you participate on his blog?
I’m still trying to figure out why John participates in this blog these days. It’s a lot easier to understand why people take swings at a nice inviting pinata than why the pinata, when given a choice, wouldn’t pack up his paper mache and move on.
MI
p.lukasiak, obviously that’s not what John believes, but it is what he’s saying, he just doesn’t realize it. It’s kind of like his post a few days ago about how smokers don’t realize how much they stink. Guys like John don’t have any actual malice in their heart in regards to race/class issues, they just don’t….get it.
I didn’t get the WP in Fallujah shit, so I deferred to the experts and backed John as he rightfully called out ignorant people howling about chemical weapons and war crimes. Well this is a version of that, you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about, so shut the fuck up and let the people who knew Coretta Scott King conduct her funeral the way they see fit.
Edmund Dantes
Link failed for some reason.
Try here
http://thinkprogress.org/2006/02/08/video-lowery-responds/
Mr Furious
Didn’t Bush spend his MLK Day last year recess-appointing two racist judges to the federal bench?
Fuck him.
This was a lose/lose for him—if he attends, he might be exposed to some hostility, if he doesn’t he opens himself up for criticism—boo fucking hoo. That’s part of the job. Considering he spends the other 364 days of the year surrounded by nothing but yes-men and sycophants, he can suck it up for an hour or two.
yet another jeff
M Scott,
I think maybe you’re reaching just a tad.
John Cole
And thus it is with the left-wing race pimps. I have not been bashful about my contempt for the homophobes and the racists who do tend to vote Republican, but these folks like Lukasiak who use race for their own political gain are just as disgusting.
I discussed I think it was classless for Lowery and Carter to make political harangues at a funeral, and all of a sudden, to the race pimps, this is about me telling ‘uppity negroes’ what to do. I thought Clinton was the first black president, not Carter.
But the race hucksters like Lukasiak know they have to do this- if the African-American community leaves the Democratic, umm, plantation, if you will, the fragile coalition that has kept the Democrats hovering at around 49% of the electorate will be destroyed.
In order to do so, whenever race can be exploited, it is. And thus, degenerate scum like Lukasiak do their best to tar people like me as racist. And I have no way to defend myself, other than engaging in silly exercises like listing my black friends. How degrading for me and them.
Fuck you, P. Lukasiak.
MI
As far as the second tier argument going on about whether Bush should or shouldn’t have been there. Just my initial gut reaction tells me it’s appropriate he attended. I don’t think he was there as “President Bush” I think he was there as just a “President.” Kind of like acknowledging that her life’s work (you know, what they shouldn’t have brought up at her funeral) garnered the appearance of a President. That’s my take anyway.
Brian
Sure, John. You have a deal. We won’t bitch about opportunistic and tasteless grandstanding at funerals when it stops happening. No cause….no effect.
And Bob in Pacifica?….Go to hell, please. I don’t appreciate your “GOP is racist” comment. I doubt you care that I don’t appreciate it. But that sort of sweeping generalization and ad hominem is synonymous with the Left, so while I am not surprised you participate in that sort of lazy intellectualism, you won’t get away with it. If I saw you in person, I’d knock your teeth out.
Blue Neponset
LOL, have you ever said anything nice about anyone? Who besides M. Scott Eiland lives up to your high standards?
Lines
Ooooh, look at big man Brian.
Hey Brian, I’d take you up on that challenge. And I don’t particularly think you’d enjoy the experience.
So shut up and sit down
MI
John, you’re going to give me a heart attack here, seriously. She dedicated her life to being a social and political activist. How can her celebrate her life without talking about social and political activism? It’s what defined her public person.
Vladi G
Am I the only person who finds it hilarious that Brian makes a sweeping generalization about “the Left” in order to complain about their sweeping generalizations?
MI
Alright we’re getting way away from the point now, but..
But that sort of sweeping generalization and ad hominem is synonymous with the Left
This kind of thing makes me want to tear my hair out. On what planet do you live where sweeping generalizations and ad hominem attacks are unique to one political persuasion?
People on the right call us unpatriotic, terrorist sympathizes who hate America. We call you on the right, fascist, theocon racists who hate poor people. We’re all wrong, we’re all full of shit, we’re all hurting America. For the love of God in heaven, stop with this “the left” nonsense, even if for the sake of my hair!
ppGaz
Several days now of this. “You people” are idiots. Stupid. Classless. Clueless. Don’t have your act together. I’m misunderstood. How dare you disagree with me? etc etc etc etc etc etc etc etc
Honestly, all snark and kidding aside, you are in a rut of basically showing the majority of your commentariat no respect. News flash, John: People are not just a bunch of derogatory adjectives just because they don’t agree with you.
Would it fucking kill you to once in a while stand back from your favorite opinion and consider the possibility that there might be other viewpoints?
Ah, never mind. Waste of breath here.
Steve
I don’t think it’s fair to say the Republican Party is racist, any more than you could accurately say the Democratic Party is not racist. Both parties have a history, and if you’re going to generalize about the institution, you don’t get to ignore that history.
But the conservative movement has consistently been opposed to the cause of racial and economic equality. That’s a generalization I will gladly make. It doesn’t mean all conservatives are racist – when a white guy doesn’t want to lose his job to a black guy, it’s not necessarily because he believes the black guy is inferior, it’s more that he wants the job.
But it’s a fact that the conservative movement has always been on the opposite side of every issue Coretta Scott King spent her life fighting for. No wonder the movement conservatives are out in force trying to shout down her friends and family for bringing up those issues.
yet another jeff
Nope, Vladi…that was pretty funny.
Faux News
WOW! Now you are a the Miss Cleo of the blogs! You can predeict the future!
You are nothing but a shrill, pathetic, boot licking toady of the Republican Party. Stop hiding behind your so called “Libertarian” status. You are no libertarian.
You and Stormy should have a long water boarding session. It would make you both feel better and calm you down.
Bob In Pacifica
For Brian,
GOP: kicks African Americans off voter rolls to get Bush elected. Uses racist push polls to get Bush past the SC primary. Cuts government funds that proportionally aid poor people of color as well as poor white people. Bush DOJ appointees support the Delay reapportionment in Texas which adversely affects minorities. Katrina, both before and after. Bush DOJ appointees supporting the motor voter bill in Georgia which will further weed black people from the voter rolls. Cheney. And on.
I’m glad you don’t appreciate the “GOP is racist” comment. That suggests that you are not totally devoid of the most basic levels of human decency and are offended when your participation in a racist organization calls into question your beliefs. That’s good. Now do something about it, like wake up.
kelsey
John, I don’t think you are a racist, but I wish you would answer my question. If Cheney was there should the speakers have brought up King’s work against the apartheid in South Africa and her husband’s holiday even though he worked against her, or do you just care about current events? Like I said, I don’t think you are a racist, maybe just a hypocrite.
yet another jeff
Damn, but that “uppity” thing is horrifying and embarrassing. Do any people that matter still think that way, or are people just accused of it? P. Lukasiak won’t make me vote for Republican…but dude…don’t say shit like that. That ain’t right.
Laura
This is all that needs to be said.
Bob In Pacifica
Like I said earlier, John Cole likes his funerals going according to the script, just like his Super Bowls.
Blue Neponset
I think Professor Bainbridge got it right:
The blogosphere is buzzing with reactions to the criticisms Rev. Joseph Lowery and ex-President Jimmy Carter launched at President Bush during the Coretta Scott King funeral. My take? First off, it’s hardly surprising that the funeral of a political figure turns political. Second, it’s hardly surprising that a Republican President is criticized by far-left speakers at the funeral of a figure closely associated with the Democratic Party. Third, Bush should have known it was coming, since avoiding situations like this presumably is why he’s ducked appearing at NAACP conventions. Fourth, many of those bloggers criticizing Lowery and Carter for speaking truth to power were the same ones praising Powerline’s Paul Mirengoff for posing tough questions to Senators Kennedy and Durbin.
John Cole
I don’t think Cheney ‘supported’ Apartheid, so much as he was more concerned about the larger Communist issue of the time. Suffice it to say, I think we all would agree that he was on the wrong side of the issue, despite his weak, comedowns since and his justification of the position. I still don;t think he ‘supported’ apartheid, though.
Regardless, this is irrelevant. Cheney wasn’t at the funeral, they didn’t discuss apartheid, and it has nothing to do with the issue at hand.
jg
There are people who believe a first step in righting this country is to send the blacks back to africa and the mexicans back across the border then seal the border. These people see the republican party as the one that’ll accomplish this. These people are against welfare because it keeps lazy minorities lazy, its a waste of their tax dollars to support crack habits.
There are people who don’t like minorities, jews, muslims, europeans, japanese, hispanics or gays and trust me these people vote republican for the most part. They see like minded individuals in that party.
The republican party isn’t racist but it attracts them.
ppGaz
The greatest danger to democracy is that the President of the United States might have to go to a black funeral and listen to people say things he doesn’t want to hear.
God bless the Republican Party for standing up for what’s right, and standing up for the dignity of black funerals!
John Cole
A.) I don’t think I have ever praised Mirengoff regarding anything (or Kennedy, for that matter, although I have defended Durbin).
B.) What funeral was Mirengoff at when he used the lecturn to harangue Kennedy and Durbin from the lectern with ‘tough questions.’
John Cole
New strawman of the year contender.
p.lukasiak
p.lukasiak, obviously that’s not what John believes, but it is what he’s saying, he just doesn’t realize it. It’s kind of like his post a few days ago about how smokers don’t realize how much they stink. Guys like John don’t have any actual malice in their heart in regards to race/class issues, they just don’t….get it.
Maybe its not what John wants to believe, and maybe its not “malice” in his heart, but lets face it. John is agressive in his “not getting it” especially on racial issues. This is a “class” issue — Bush is part of the white, male, political class that (in John’s world) blacks must suck-up to in public. To John, Bush was “honoring” Mrs. King, and when a important white man like Bush honors a black woman, well, that’s all that’s important.
Her life, her,/i> legacy, and her beliefs are secondary. The white man shows up, and the concerns of the black woman whose life was being honored no longer mattered.
Maybe its not malice — but it is ignorance arising out of bigotry.
Par R
Mr. Furious says: “Didn’t Bush spend his MLK Day last year recess-appointing two racist judges to the federal bench?
“Fuck him.”
Obviously, we have in Mr. Furious the very epitome of an individual with no class…no brains…no prospects…no hope whatsoever. One wonders why such a person doesn’t just overdose and be done with it. It’s quite clear that society would be better of without such useless scum.
Richard Bottoms
A political speech at the funeral of a political woman. What a shock. Bush had to go, to do otherwise would have damaged what little credibility Republicans have with the black community. (Hey 3% voting for you is better than 0%).
Having been black 51 years as of four days ago, this IS how we act at funerals. We wail, and cry and get all hyperbolic.
That’s just us.
If the smirking chimp had to get a little uncomfortable under the collar, well TFB.
As for John, no he is not a racist, and I am glad has the guts to acknoledge the homophobic and thinly veiled appeals made with the code words of the Republican party.
On this subject however, he is just wrong. When a political activist dies, their passing is used to further their beliefs. From Ghandi to Kennedy, it’s no surprise.
ppGaz
Who knew that George Bush had more class than his apologista spin-monkeys? The guy went in there, took his lumps, and acted like a gracious leader.
I didn’t know he had that in him. But I did know that that his blogmonkeys didn’t have it in them. I see them and their “work” every fucking day.
If I were George Bush, the first thing I would do today is fire all of my advisors and spinmonkeys and hire some people with class and balls. I’d say look, stop trying to protect me from the people. I’m the president of all the people, and I don’t want a bunch of hyenas working for me who will cry “foul” every time the people get to be heard in front of me.
With that attitude, he could have his approval rating back in the 60’s by this time next year.
ppGaz
Have you totally lost it? It was sarcasm, you moron.
Jesus, you need to shut this thing down for a week and get drunk and get laid.
MI
p.lukasiak, I don’t know how long you’ve been reading this site, but that’s not John at all. What you’re describing certainly exists, but not here IMO.
Doctor Gonzo
Was the “harangue” something besides the crack about not finding WMDs? Was Bush mentioned by name by anybody? I didn’t see the funeral so I don’t know.
p.lukasiak
Cole wrote:
I don’t think Cheney ‘supported’ Apartheid, so much as he was more concerned about the larger Communist issue of the time.
see? Christ, the guy is even acting as an apologist for supporters of apartheid now! Cheney voted against imposing sanctions on the apartheid regime of South Africa, and “fear of communism” doesn’t cut it as an excuse for refusing to sanctions the racist South African government.
ppGaz
No.
Didn’t see all of it, but no, he was not mentioned in regard to the WMDs.
Came pretty close though with the mention of wiretaps. That’s about as topical as it gets.
Now keep in mind that you are talking about a president who JOKED about not finding WMDs, even as people were getting their legs blown off over there in a war ginned up over WMDs. Joked about it. So, you want to consider that when you hear these fucking morons over here using the word “class.” They wouldn’t know “class” if you shoved it up their asses.
kelsey
“Regardless, this is irrelevant. Cheney wasn’t at the funeral, they didn’t discuss apartheid, and it has nothing to do with the issue at hand.”
I know Cheney wasn’t at the funeral, I was asking you to use you as a hypothetical. It is not uncommon for the VP to be sent to these things as the substitute figurehead. Use your imagination. Secondly, the fact that you think they didn’t discuss apartheid shows that you probably only watched one minute of the whole service. But thanks again for responding by not answering my question.
Stormy70
The rest of the Bainbridge quote. The Dems look stupid politically once again. Even the NY TImes sees the problem in the feckless Democratic party.
I do like Nancy Pelosi’s plan of continuing to offer “nothing” as the party platform. Go Nancy.
p.lukasiak
p.lukasiak, I don’t know how long you’ve been reading this site, but that’s not John at all. What you’re describing certainly exists, but not here IMO.
Check out the number of posts John has done about Al Sharpton. Compare it to the number of posts about Coretta Scott King, or Julian Bond, or Bill Grey or any number of mainstream black civil rights leaders.
….then get back to me.
Stormy70
Shouldn’t you be at the Kinkos with the next batch of conspiracy memos. Calling Dan Rather, stat.
ppGaz
Well, the beauty part is, he did take it. Took it like a man and acted leader-like and uncharacteristically big.
Unlike his groveling monkeys and monkettes.
jg
Poor Bush. He just can’t go anywhere in peace. Then again if you spend the first five years of your presidency avoiding having to face the people you’re fucking with it will blow up when they get a chance.
kelsey
BTW, Wasn’t “concern of communism” the reason Trent Lott gave after he praised the presidental run of Stromm Thurmond? I guess the fear of communsim made people do some pretty racist shit back in the day.
p.lukasiak
Well, the beauty part is, he did take it. Took it like a man and acted leader-like and uncharacteristically big.
uh, the fact that he sat there isn’t exactly a reason for high praise…. remember, this is the guy who couldn’t figure out what to do when he was told “America is under attack” on 9-11, so he just sat there.
In other words “not doing anything” isn’t a sign of “leadership” on Bush’s part, because he doesn’t know the difference between the right time to do something, and the right time to do nothing.
SeesThroughIt
A-fucking-men, Steve. That’s exactly it.
As for Bush, I don’t think he’s racist in the straightforward “I don’t like Black people” sort of way, but he is largely as Steve describes above. First of all, Black people are disproportionally poor in this country, and poor people do not matter to Bush, as he has proven at every opportunity with his policies. Second of all, even if they aren’t poor, Blacks generally don’t vote Republican, so that’s yet another reason for Bush to not care. It’s not that he’s an all-out racist, it’s just that he doesn’t care about people who aren’t going to vote for him and/or contribute to him monetarily.
Or, as Ice Cube put it more succinctly, “Blacks are too fuckin’ broke to be Republican.”
As for plukasiak…that was embarassing. There are real and very serious problems regarding racial inequality in this country today, and that sort of tripe only hurts the cause of trying to right those problems.
Steve
Well, no kidding. All this conservative hysteria kinda obscures the point that George W. Bush is a big enough man to hear a line about WMDs without bursting into tears. As far as dissent goes, as far as things Dr. and Mrs. King said while they were alive, this was positively mild. And yet, from the reaction, you’d think they dragged Bush into the church and then accused him of eating babies.
If there is one way we can be true to the memory of a great American like Mrs. King, it is to use her funeral as an opportunity to remind our political leaders of their obligations as men and as Christians. If you think George Bush is a good man, if you think he is a good Christian, if you think he cares about the poor, then it’s important to remind him of the power he has and urge him to reflect on whether he’s really doing all he can to help the plight of the downtrodden in this country. If he has any kind of Christian humility I hope he reflected on that issue last night. And I don’t see anything wrong with that at all.
And the message is for Democrats too, by the way. In case you missed it, Rev. Lowery didn’t get up there and urge everyone to vote for Democrats because they walk on water. Some Democrats, like Jimmy Carter, have truly dedicated themselves to helping people; others are simply politicians who just want the votes. And I think, when 90% of African-Americans consistently vote for Democrats, you can do two things. You can either take it for granted or you can understand the awesome responsibility that comes with a race of people basically placing their trust in you. I hope some Democrats reflected on these things last night as well.
John Cole
Hey- asshole. You are making this about race (and not in the way Coretta Scott or martin Luther king would be proud of). I thought Carter and Lowery were wrong, because it was the inappropriate forum to launch political attacks. Not because Lowery is black- note how you keep conveniently ignoring Carter’s race.
Stormy70
Actually, he took it like a man, doesn’t mean the rest of us can’t call a classless act what it is.
Jimmy Carter?! History’s greatest monster. He of all people should shut his effing piehole. Or do we have to bring up the fact that he enabled Iran to become the great theocracy it is today. Thank God for Reagan. Carter, never met a dictator that he didn’t suck up to. He makes people remember how great the Democrats were at combatting terrorism in the name of Islam. Kiss up to them a little more.
ppGaz
Well, people can try to watch the whole thing and judge for themselves. I imagine CSPAN will rebroadcast it.
He looked good. He was gracious.
Watch it and draw your own conclusions.
Krista
Fortunately, it’s not up to you to decide who’s useful to society. And that kind of talk is distinctly creepy…in a messianic, serial-killer kind of way. Just letting you know.
p.lukasiak
BTW, Wasn’t “concern of communism” the reason Trent Lott gave after he praised the presidental run of Stromm Thurmond? I guess the fear of communsim made people do some pretty racist shit back in the day.
yeah, in fact, it was “fear of communism” that motivated J Edgar Hoover to engage in illegal wiretaps aimed at the civil rights movement. It was “fear of communism” that was used by racists throughout the south as a reason for continued segegation (indeed, many of the leaders of the civil rights movement did have socialist impulses — and who could blame them, given how John’s wonderful “free markets” had sustained slavery and racism for two hundred years…..)
Richard Bottoms
Meanwhile at Redstate.org:
John
OK, now I know Stormy is a troll. Thanks for clearing that up. Just as a tip, try to keep the scenario plausible if you wish to be successful at trolling.
ppGaz
Unusual for you to be drunk so early in the day, isn’t it?
“Stormy: History’s greatest horse’s ass.”
Doctor Gonzo
If it was just the WMDs crack, that hardly qualifies as a “political attack.” Wow, some people are thin-skinned.
jg
Good Lord! Where the hell did you get your education? Carter caused the Iranian revolution? Are you mad? Is there anything in the world that can’t be spun to you as a way of showing the dems can’t handle terrorism? You are such a tool. Its easy to stay in power with folks like you as supporters. You believe everything they say. I bet you think the Soviet Union collapsed because Reagan bankrupted them via the arms race.
p.lukasiak
Hey- asshole. You are making this about race (and not in the way Coretta Scott or martin Luther king would be proud of).
excuse me, but someone whose primary expression of concern on “civil rights” issues is posting about what an idiot Al Sharpton is shouldn’t be lecturing anyone on what Dr. and Mrs King would be proud of….
Kate
Just happened to troll onto this site via realclearpoltics.com
I know now why we conservatives are winning.
You guys are crazy.
ppGaz
This thread is number 12 in a series: “C’Mon, you motherfuckers, I double dog dare you to call me a racist!” by John Cole.
Total troll from the get-go.
But I have to give the props, it gins up the page views.
And as we all know, it’s all about the page views!!
RIGHT, MAH BROTHERS AND SISTERS?
ROTFLMAO.
MI
Steve, you need your own blog, for real.
he doesn’t care about people who aren’t going to vote for him and/or contribute to him monetarily.
In fairness, that sounds like every politician ever.
jaime
All this talk about Racism…It’s not like Bush stumped for votes at Bob Jones University or had anyone in his administration who voted against a holiday for CSK’s husband or anything.
SmilingPolitely
Spot the Simpsons’s quote: “He’s History’s Greatest Monster(Jimmy Carter)”
Do I win anything?
Don Surber
We all grieve in our own way, John. Rev. Lowery was eloquent and in the context of Mrs. King, appropriate. You walk alone in knocking Lowery.
Otto Man
I’m sorry I came late to the discussion, and at the risk of piling on, I’ve got to agree with the others here that I think you’re wrong on this, John.
I already wrote a post about this last night at my place, but the upshot of my argument is:
Personally, I found the sight of Kate O’Beirne lecturing the Kings on how they should mourn their mother to be just repulsive. Especially since she’s a contributor for the National Review — a magazine that justified segregation and praised white southerners as the “advanced race” the same year that MLK and Lowery founded the SCLC. Yeah, I’m sure the Kings would love to get her input. She’s been on their side for so, so long.
MI
You know what this thread needs? DougJ. Otherwise we might all go mad.
ppGaz
“You guys are crazy”
Half of the country is bamboozled into declaring “culture war” on the other half … and you get this.
Well guess what? You got your war, and you are not winning it. You are just ahead in the first quarter. The game is not over.
You rightwing motherf__kers are going down! Count on it. Take it to the bank. You couldn’t defeat us with a million marching bighaired women from Texas plus another million Darrells and his King of the Hill alley-dwellers.
Richard Bottoms
Well said:
When somebody dies we negroes get sll out of pocket.
Word.
jaime
And I could have sworn I heard Tammy Bruce complain about “uppity black people who don’t know how to act right”. I have no idea how racism is even brought up in situations like these.
Seriously my favorite right wing tact is the swift boating of MLK himself. Jimmy Carter brings up the wiretapping of the Kings and the rightie pundits justify with “Did you know MLK had affairs?!?!?!” Disgusting.
Vladi G
This is the first, and probably last thing every written by Don Surber that I think isn’t complete nonsense.
Otto Man
In fairness to Stormy, that’s actually a Simpsons quote, which was used to mock the bad rep Carter’s gotten. Of course, much like “cheese-eating surrender monkeys” it seems to have been hijacked from the show’s intent.
Vladi G
And happy birthday, Richard.
ppGaz
It was hilarious. Even Matthews was just pulling her chain. She looked practically hysterical.
Steve
If this doesn’t cause John to pause for a moment and reflect, I’m not sure what will.
Stormy70
Yes, the Democrats do a great job running things for the poor. Just check all the inner cities who are governed by Democrats. Businesses and successful people cannot wait to flee to the suburbs where the living is actually good.
Most of the Katrina victims are not going back to New Orleans, because they have seen that they will have better opportunities in Texas. They like the fact that they can actually own a really nice home, and send their kids to a clean school. They also have a state government that won’t steal them blind. God bless the LA dem machine.
Richard Bottoms
GW just got a chance to see how we act when “y’all” aren’t around.
Stormy70
You win in the knowledge that you actually have a sense of humor, whereas most on here are too OUTRAGED to ever lighten up for half a minute.
It’s funny because it’s true. ;)
Otto Man
Typing those last two sentences back to back should’ve made your head explode, Stormy.
Have you ever thought that maybe there’s a connection between the white flight of middle-class folks to the suburbs and the decline of central cities that have been deprived of the bulk of their local tax revenues on the one hand and then have to spend more to deal with the poor left behind on the other?
yet another jeff
Stupid stubby fingers.
Pb
Yes, Stormy, it’s really distressing the way that poor cities can’t seem to provide for themselves. I wonder how that works, exactly. Property tax? Nah, must be Democrats. Anyhow, I hope they do get a warm welcome in Texas. Not too warm, though.
Mike S
If you don’t want to be called out for being on the opposite side of everything the deceased stood for, then don’t go to their funeral.
Stick to going places where anyone who disagrees with you is kicked out and/or arrested.
ppGaz
Most on here are never sure when you are drunk or sober. Serious or kidding. And just to make it more interesting, it’s not clear that you are sure either.
Fun for all!
Brian
Bob, and anyone else like him…..
Every time the GOP tries to reach out to the minority community, they get this kind of shit like Bush got yesterday. In 2000, Bush campaign tried to reach out to the NAACP, and all they got was an ad campaign that Bush was behind the killing of James Byrd, and all because Bush had the temerity to be against hate-crime laws. Well, the guys who committed that crime were tried and sentenced to life, which puts the lie to the necessity for hate-crime laws, but never mind, because Bush and the GOP are racists, right?
You’re wrong, Bob. Dead wrong. We’ve known for a long time that the rhetoric of the Left is empty, opportunistic, tactless, dishonest, and divisive, and now, thanks to the Internet and to public weariness with Leftist tactics, you’re being exposed for what you are. The old meme doesn’t work any more. The Left has always been about name calling and bumper-sticker politics. While it practiced such vacuous political sloganeering that panders to brain-dead minority elements ready to be led by loud-mouthed shakedown artists, the Right was honing ideas. Now, the ideas are winning out, and all you’re left with are your slogans and slurs.
You’re exposed.
jaime
Ya ever drive through Mississippi? How’re the Republicans treating the poor folk? You ever been to a dirt poor neighborhood in Alabama or Arkansas? I’d take South Central L.A. or the South Bronx any day.
Pb
Brian,
Hilarious. At least I know left from right.
Mac Buckets
The only certainty in life is that Democrats will whine like six-year-old girls at everything a Republican does. They’ll whine when he doesn’t go to funerals, except for the ones he goes to, in which case they’ll whine that he went. That’s their electoral strategy, in lieu of actual ideas, and it’s worked out pretty well for them so far.
SeesThroughIt
If you want to bring up that fact, I suppose you also want to have a long and detailed discussion about how Ollie North–you know, Reagan’s guy?–made sure Iran had plenty of weapons, hmmm? Maybe we should have Ollie come back to the government as an advisor–after all, few people know the inner workings of how to arm terrorists as well as Ollie does.
That redstate thread is disturbing in and of itself but also disturbing because it is not in the least bit surprising.
As for this:
Yes, it definitely sounds like every politician ever. No question about that. It’s just that this dynamic plays itself out in many different ways, and this is one way in which it plays out for Bush.
Joe
awwww come on John, dont fault Carter that much. I am sure he took advice to slam Bush at the funeral from his daughter Amy. After all she was an expert on nuclear proliferation in 1980, and look where that got him. Jimmy Carter remains a bitter man from his landslide defeat 25 years ago. He undoubtedly is the worst President in modern times and his goal now is to prove Bush is instead……Unfortunately for him, his verbal lashing at a funeral demonstrates his continued poor judgment and will only further establish his legacy as the worst……In many ways thanks to ole “Jimbo” the world is what it is today, a potential burning inferno. Due to his weakness and cowardice towards Iran in 1980, radical islamists have no fear……..Thanks for the memories Jimmy, shoo now!!!
Richard Bottoms
Hell, I wouldn’t even want to fly OVER Mississippi.
Yes, it certainly is preferable to live in a shack in Alabama than be in a city with mass transit, more than Wal-Mart wages, and the best libraries in the world.
Pooh
I’m beginning to think that John is contractually obligated to make one “hornet’s nest” post per day to fill his PJM traffic stats requirement.
jaime
In 2000 Bush reached out to Bob Jones University and their wonderful brand of segregation. He also reached out to the people who were appalled…APPALLED at John McCain’s illegitimate black baby.
The GOP reaches out to the black community with an empty hand. They make the somewhat truthful argument that Democrats take advantadge of their loyalty, but what do they offer in return? What do they see in the GOP “big tent”? A sea of white faces and a few strategically positioned blacks (see the 1996 and 2000 GOP convention).
Now in defending the President and his actions the right are actually going and attacking MLK himself. Wiretapping him was a good thing because he was a commie philanderer. Talk about zero class.
ImJohnGalt
You want to reach out to the minority community? Run and elect a few minorities. Or, try enacting some legislation that actually improves their lives. Then you can go have your photo-ops without them casually mentioning the things you’ve done that haven’t helped their cause.
I really don’t get it. Bush and his administration use their bully pulpit every time they get in front of the cameras to bash Democrats. They say we need to change our tone, and watch what we say, without fear of reprisal or the press running those clips and commenting how unfair it is for 4 days straight.
So when a preacher who has dedicated his life to civil rights, and who has known the deceased and her views for most of his life gets up in front of a real pulpit at the funeral of an activist, and points out a few things that Mrs. King was probably against, the bedwetters on the right fan themselves and can barely keep from fainting from the lack of manners?
Mrs. Alito cries on cue, and the press can’t stop talking about how mean the democrats are. What happened to Coulter saying that the NY Times should have been blown up? You keep saying that Democrats whine and bitch, but it seems to me that Republicans have perfected it, to the point that all they have to do is cry “foul!”, and the press will not only award 2 free throws, but T-up the Democrat and send him off the court.
Give me a break. I don’t get how you can be so incensed at these two comments out of 6 hours of remembrance. Get over yourself John – hasn’t Cindy Sheehan done something recently that can distract you from having to not vote Republican?
Richard Bottoms
I know. We’re just plain ungrateful. We all know the Republicans have such great respect and love for Martin Luther King.
The Other Steve
Let’s see…
A prominent leader of group struggling for political change dies, who happens to be the wife of one of the most prominent leaders of political change in the 20th century. And the word “Prominent” doesn’t even properly describe it. The King name will go down in history next to the names of Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, Lincoln, Roosevelt.
And you’re SHOCKED! SHOCKED! that something political was said.
Get a grip. I’m tired of fucking whiners.
I mean what did you fucking expect? It’s commendable that Bush went down there. That shows a certain level of bravery.
Whining does not. Whining shows your just a pussy who won’t stand behind all the bullshit you’ve spewed in the past when people confront you with it.
I’m tired of fucking whiners.
Mac Buckets
Funny how George HW Bush managed to get through his whole speech at Reagan’s funeral without noting what a disaster of lefty, mealy-mouthed impotence the presidency of attendee Jimmy Carter was, and how much Reagan aspired to be the anti-Carter. Gosh, that rant would’ve been perfectly appropriate at a funeral, too, according to the loony leftians!
The difference? One side has class and decorum, and knows when to shut their whine-holes, and the Donks have come unhinged by their loss of power.
Pb
Mac Buckets,
You’re projecting again. Hilarious, especially considering your past record here, and this very diary. You’ve got balls, Mac, I’ll give you that.
Mac Buckets
If they are still “struggling for political change” after 40 years, it should be clear that they’ve been betting on the wrong (Rich White Democrat) horse!
jaime
There are two routes the baby righties can take, attack the blacks as evidenced in the wonderful Red State Nugget:
or you can attack Jimmy Carter. The smarter ones are choosing the Carter path. You can do both as idiots like Tammy Bruce have proven.
Mac Buckets
Do you ever add anything of value, Pb, or is it all just vague, minor-league personal snark? I tell you what, when you add anything to a conversation, I’ll let you know.
Bob In Pacifica
Regarding Carter and the hostages, ask Judge Silberman about having a secret little lunch with the Iranians back in the summer of 1980. And ask Ollie and the boys about Iran-contra. In a Republican world, if you commit a crime for them, you are revered.
As for rhetoric, I believe Brian thinks some rhetoric, or at least talking points, are empty because he does not want to understand them. The concept of equal justice is empty rhetoric to those who don’t want to think about it, for example.
And who was the guy wanting to exterminate Mr. Furious because his life has no value? I find that rhetoric full of meaning.
ImJohnGalt
Rove: We need to distract from the NSA hearings, corporate-owned media and right-wing blogosphere!
Bedwetters: Yes Sir! We’re on it sir!
Bob In Pacifica
Mac Buckets, you’re a Republican, right? Or the States Rights Party?
jg
If Reagan had died while Clinton was in office are you saying no one would take a shot at Clinton?
Jane Finch
The President’s attendance itself was political. Do you really think that the remarks weren’t approved by the family beforehand?
Richard Bottoms
That right there is when Reagan lost the black vote for the Republican party. That is, any hope of gaining ground.
Bush did it again way before Katrina. It was the day he set foot at Bob Jones University..
See many of you think we aren’t making an irrational, child-like choice to dispise the Republican party, despite the fact that the Democratic party isn’t doing a lot better for us.
It’s a perfectly rational choice. We simply don’t believe your conversion to color blind, all men are equal, MLK’s our hero rhetoric.
We’ll just wait to see who is first to swing by old BJU and waffle on the Confederate flag in 2007-2008.
Ancient Purple
You mean the class and decorum Cheney showed on the floor of the Senate by telling a member of the Senate to go Cheney himself?
That class and decorum?
Hank
Are all these lefties who cling to the there-were-no-WMDs mantra going to apologize when it turns out there really were (even though that was only one of several justifications for the invasion)? I guess nobody’s been reading the bombshell (though hardly surprising) revelations about how Saddam smuggled planeloads of chemical weapons out of the country using civilian aircraft and hid them in Syria. Congress is reviewing the smoking-gun material right now (Saddam’s private documents recovered from Iraq), and this story is only going to grow, no matter how much the MSM would like it to go away. Look for it in the coming months to start getting real attention, instead of the occasional Investor’s Business Daily story or blog editorial.
Why do I expect no apology will be forthcoming, in any event?
SeesThroughIt
Oh, those strategically positioned Blacks are vastly important. Just ask Frank Luntz, the man behind Bush’s Potemkin Village “town hall meetings.” Samantha Bee did:
It must be gratifying for Blacks to know how important they are to the current Republican party…as window dressing.
And really, the GOP only got around to apologizing for the Southern Strategy–you know, the one where the GOP decided that pandering to white racist Southerners was more important than actually advocating equality for all like our country is supposed to offer–last year, and even then, it was a total non-apology of the “I’m sorry if my actions hurt anybody” type. All around right-wing blogs today, ‘wingers are completely distorting the message of Dr. and Mrs. King in an effort to cover up for the GOP’s lousy track record when it comes to minority relations. They’re claiming that now that Blacks can vote and the civil rights era is over, everything is hunky-dory for Blacks now. So it’s easy to see why these so-called attempts to “reach out” to Blacks is often seen by the target audience as not just an empty hand, but a fake one as well.
Mac Buckets
So the Dems can call them Uncle Toms and House N*****s, as they always do (talk to JC Watts — who in his short career achieved a higher place than any Democrat black Congressman — about this sometime, if you get the chance)? Now why on earth would more blacks Republicans choose not to run?
Like school vouchers? Tell us why Dems don’t want vouchers, which would greatly benefit inner city blacks, and which always poll highly among blacks?
Also, I was unaware that GOP legislation always includes “except for blacks” language. Thanks for the highly insightful post, you minor league race pimp!
Pb
Mac Buckets,
In your case, no. All the value I add to a conversation never gets past your reality filter, so where you are concerned, I generally choose not to waste my time. I assume you didn’t follow any of the three links in my previous posts on this thread alone, and I suggest that you don’t, lest you contract factococcus.
Please do, it’ll be a helpful check to let me know when I might be mistaken in my views.
Mac Buckets
Of course, they would not have.
Paddy O'Shea
So funny to hear the right whining up a big old storm this morning. Bush got the big fuck you he deserved, and the assholes are besides themselves with horror.
Too bad they never felt this level of concern for the victims of Katrina when the Hero of New Orleans turned his back.
Goodbye New Orleans. Hello New Branson.
Mac Buckets
Unmiked in a personal conversation vs. miked and televised at a funeral.
Yeah, those are the same, you straw-grasper.
Mr Furious
Stormy, even useless, brainless, classless, prospectless scum like me that is sooo angry I can’t see straight and should just overdose and die, got the joke there and appreciated it.
Thanks for getting my back, Krista, and Par R? No, fuck you.
ppGaz
The whole thread is a troll. Phony. It’s similar to the concept of setting fire to ants and watching them writhe.
There’s nothing here to get.
Mac Buckets
You don’t seem to links when posting to me — to me, it’s just, “you’re a poopyhead!” stuff. Unimpressive. I await our next valuable exchange.
ppGaz
Har! Italics, even. Wow. You are really full of it today. You guys are going to teach the world about class and decorum now?
Give it up Mac. You’re better than this bullshit thread.
csmats
You Bush-haters are really funny! So much hate and anger that you can’t even bring yourself to acknowledge proper, polite behavior at a funereal. Meanwhile you’ve lost the last three national elections in 00, 02, and 04 that by all rights you should have won, and things aren’t looking so good for you in 06. Stop the hate, America isn’t buying it. Thanks for the laughs though!
ppGaz
Gold.
Perry Como
Mr. Cole is 100% correct on this. Funerals are no place to do political grandstanding. Mrs. King would be ashamed at the viscious and hateful speech that was bandied about at her memorial. Look at the kind of vitriol that Democrats spew at funerals:
What kind of disrespectful person would dare say something like that at a eulogy? Mrs. King would not approve.
Richard Bottoms
You mean this JC Watts?
Please, we’ll decide who speaks for us. However much it breaks your heart, JC Watts ain’t it. He is an Uncle Tom, saying what the right wants to hear and living off it.
I won’t tell Catholics who to pick as Pope and you don’t tell me who to pick as a black leader.
Joe
So funny to hear the right whining up a big old storm this morning. Bush got the big fuck you he deserved, and the assholes are besides themselves with horror.
Paddy dear, the big “fuck you was not from the majority of the black congregation who gave him a standing ovation and was totally gracious. It came from Jimmy Carter, peanut farmer and white boy…..who grew up to become a thorn in America’s side.
jaime
What happened to the GOP? They used to be the bid bad terror warriors who had liberals cowed. Super Macho men. In the last six months they’ve turned into a bunch of whiny cowards. “Waaaa. They’re saying mean things about my daddy. Waaaa”
Punch a bully in the nose…
Lines
And Nero Fiddles while Rome burns.
Stop this fucking faux-outrage and look around. As of yesterday, Congress has determined that Bush is King, that he has unfettered powers, and you people are busy getting taunted my the intellectual giants of Mac Buckets and Brian?
This whole hoopla is a Repuglican driven noise machine and the Democrats are playing right into their hands by creating a shouting match over it.
I can’t believe you people, will you still stand there arguing when your hair is afire?
Pb
ppGaz,
I agree, but I can’t take credit for ‘factococcus’–I saw it on The Colbert Report a while back.
Mac Buckets,
I even gave you a couple of links to read in our last discussion regarding “nation-building”. The fact that you apparently never noticed them only further reinforces my point. Poopyhead. :)
Ancient Purple
Lowery stating a fact regarding WMDs was so classless, but telling someone to f- himself is excusable because he wasn’t miked?
So, is the air on your planet pink or purple?
ToM
The point of this funeral ceremony was to honor CSK. When the DEMs use it as a opportunity to score cheap political points it detracts from the occasion. This solemn celebration in honor of CSK was pissed on by the DEMS. It was disrespectful to the King family.
Richard Bottoms
Because school vouchers are pushed by people who dispise the public school system and would be happy to see the fedral government spend $0 on education.
Get this through your head: We don’t trust Republicans and shows in %96 of us voting against your presidential candidate.
We aren’t stupid. We know you have focus grouped the words that sound all nice and soothing. But what you really want to do is eliminate the Department of Education HeadStart, and anything else the “Framers” didn’t intend.
Fuck that.
Pb
Lines,
Yep. The Bush administration isn’t expected to tell the Repbulican-controlled Congress the truth anymore, and Congress doesn’t want them to either. Apparently ‘checks and balances’ means less than ‘fair and balanced’ nowadays.
Also, Bush lied his ass off throughout the SOTU, proposing plans he never intended to back (actually doing something about foreign oil), and not mentioning the ones he wants to enact (stealing hundreds of billions from Social Security). And he’s still lying about it, on his STFU tour. Par for the course, really–I guess that’s why it isn’t considered news.
rilkefan
Everything in this thread since ppGaz‘s first comment has been a waste of time.
Jack
I’ll tell you, I watched the funeral at work with several coworkers and a great deal of them remember the great leadership and spirit of MLK and CSK and the numerous rallies they attended as children or heard their parents speak about. It was an overwhelming agreement that the Democratic Party really went too far once again when attending a funeral. Most of my coworkers left the room during some speakers because they were so upset with the script. I don’t know how this will affect anything in the future, but I do now, politics aside, a lot of people that day had a bad taste in their mouth after watching it.
Pb
ToM,
I wasn’t aware that “the DEMs” arranged her funeral. Get a clue, man.
mishu
Maybe I’m just a stupid “repuke” but how does admonishing Chimpy McHitlerbushburton for not making Ben Affleck cough up an extra million in taxes do that for Dr. or Mrs. King? How does King get honored by pointing out how evil Karl Rove is?
mishu
How does education get better when you send tax dollars all the way to Washington first? Why can’t dems get their heads around the concept of local government?
Ancient Purple
Who says a funeral has to be solemn?
Bob In Pacifica
Okay, okay, I’ll stop wasting my time here. See y’all over at the “Super Bowl wasn’t fixed” blog.
Lines
mishu = troll?
This is an occasion for her family and friends, so why should they have even allowed Bush in the door?
I would have been more proud of the liberals and King followers if they had demanded that the sour faced bitch and her pet monkey had been asked to leave, and then carried out if they refused.
ppGaz
I have to admit, it’s not that often that I get proven right so quickly and so completely.
I think after this thread, I’ll write my book about the experience, make a boatload of money, buy the Shelby GT500, throw my gear in the trunk and cruise the country doing a perpetual book tour, like William Least Heat Moon.
Richard Bottoms
Becaue it makes the armpit of the nation (Mississippi-Alabama-Georgia) meet some kind of standards about teaching children.
Even black ones.
Richard Bottoms
But.. but.. what about ‘no child left behind’!! You lefties hate it!!
Actually we hate that it isn’t fully funded. We know it’s just feel good rhetoric that chimpy doesn’t really believe in.
Richard Bottoms
My heart bleeds.
George Bush got the big Fuck You he deserved and has been avoiding with hand picked cheering sections for six years. My only surprise is someone didn’t call him a son of a bitch from the podium.
Lines
hey ppGaz, have you seen the film of the Chimpinator and his sour-faced wife? She sits there all pissed off and nasty, and he is so slouched over it more looks like they should be watching the Superbowl.
Thats not class, thats classless and juvenile bullshit by a man thats supposed to be respected.
Richard Bottoms
They don’t seem to think so. Only Republicans speaking for the King family seem to think so. Certainly the people who gave Lowery a standing ovation didn’t think so either.
Fuck George Bush. And the horse’s ass he rode in on.
ppGaz
I think it was gas. Some bean dip on Air Force One.
Laura was sour because Bushie said he needed a drink.
But he got up and made a fine speech and was cordial and gracious to the reverend.
And he wasn’t testy or defensive. And he didn’t try his usual frat-boy smart-alecky approach to dismissal of the criticisms. Unlike his sorry, groveling, cowardly, whipped, “I’m afeared of da turrists” apologista who hang around here.
But back to Laura, I think she was saying, “You cut one more of those and I am OUTTA HERE.”
Andrei
Early in the thread:
You folks remind me of this one at the ‘Straw Man of the Year Contest.’
John Cole then says later:
I have to disagree with Cole… the thing he said right there is the real ‘Straw Man of the Year Contest’ winner
Mike S
Al Maviva
I’m with you libs on this one. The Democrats are so lame, that yesterday’s snide remarks pass for an attack.
I was kind of hoping for some Democratic speaker to whirl around on Bush, and go after him with a cane, a la Preston Brooks. Now that was a Democrat who knew how to stand on his party’s principles, and fight for them.
mishu
Lines, I’m a poster like anyone else on this blog. Calling me a troll, well pot meet kettle. I’ve seen nothing but trolling since John posted his article. Your hope that the King children would carry ‘Chimpy McShrub’ out of the church makes me think that you not only condone Islamist thugs torching embassies over cartoons, you’d supply them with the gasoline. BTW. It’s John’s blog not yours.
Leave it to a guy with the name like ‘Bottoms’ to take a pot shot at the state where Coretta Scott King made her home. It’s all about honoring her so long as you call the President chimp.
Joe
to Rick Bottoms….
Keep it up guy, thats why Republican have nothing to fear….Its assholes like you who define the liberals of today, no one can eloquently address the problems with Bush, America or the world, but they can sure spew the cursing and hatred……….but hey keep it up, Republicans will love you forever, dumbass
ppGaz
So, Al AquaVelva has weighed in. Where’s Darrell? Surely he is not going to skip this thread?
Mike S
Yup. The GOP is whining because the funeral for an activist who was opposed to almost everything Bush is for continued her legacy.
The party that has 0 nationally elected black people surely isn’t trying to tell black people who to celebrate the life of one of their most visible people, are they?
ppGaz
Oh god, John’s lawyer is posting here now.
We forgot, we are only here to agree with John.
Doh!
Otto Man
The Republicans rush to every microphone and TV studio in the country to denounce eulogies made at a funeral, and it’s the Democrats who are whining like six-year-olds? Riiiight.
ppGaz
The GOP is whining because they exploit every opportunity to characterize their enemy — that’s us, the rest of America — in some shitty way to deflect attention from the fact that they are fucking up everything they touch and stealing the silver off the dining room table.
And because their trained whinemonkeys expect it.
And because they thought that their little emperor could safely go to at least ONE black funeral and get away with it, and they got busted, because somebody forgot to tell the colored people to behave themselves.
As for this thread, this is just John Cole being John Cole. It’s all part of a charade he goes through to make sure you think that he really doesn’t like the people with whom he agrees on almost every matter of policy. Because otherwise he’d just have another lefty blog and he couldn’t stand that.
Krista
Mr. Furious – no problem, hon. What he said was out of line and creepy as hell.
mishu
ppgaz, don’t be so dense. I could give a rat’s ass if Lines agrees with John or not. He shouldn’t label posters as trolls like he owns the damn place.
Tossing insults ‘Chimpy McShrub’ is not eulogizing the person in the box. Fuck. Even Clinton got that.
mishu
Yeah the dems shouldn’t really be doing that now should they?
ppGaz
Please send for my 215 page booklet, “Why Telling Intertron Posters What They “Should” Do Is Futile”.
Yours today for just $24.95 plus shipping and handling. If you order now, I’ll autograph your copy.
“Shouldn’t label posters.” Priceless.
Bill A.
Sieg Heil! Sieg Heil! Sieg Heil! Nuremburg, Wellstone Memorial, Coretta Scott King Memorial….
Mac Buckets
So, shorter: Better to be partisan against people you disagree with on other issues than to get a better education for your kids. Genius.
Your incorrect statistic aside, after 40 years of paying African-Americans nothing but lip service while not being able to win an election without 93%+ of “your” vote….. “you” trust the Democrats??
No, you just vote 95% for a group who expects you to carry their water for them, but they won’t let you drink. You’re not stupid, you’re exploited.
So let the Democrats oppose that stuff, but make them give inner city kids school vouchers. But you know they’d never do that, and we both know why. Democrats want to protect union teachers and bloated administrations more than they want to help inner city kids. And you are sucking it up like a Hoover Deluxe. Look, I don’t expect anyone to stop voting for the race pimps (it’s a tried and true winner for the rich, white Democrats with all the power, after all) if you want, just stop calling people like Rice and Watts those awful names.
mishu
Fine, gaz. If Lines tosses lables posters, he should expect to get some back in return. Gosh you’re so smart. Got any new simeon synonyms for the President? I want to use them. Don’t worry. I’ll cite you.
Davebo
EXACTLY!
Lets see, GOP questions the bravery of multiple amputee veteran. Then complain about a cartoon using a multiple amputee veteran as a metaphor and of course, John shows us his rightous indignity.
GOP infers that another GOP candidate committed treason as a POW, fathered a child of another race out of wedlock and claimed his wife was a drug addict. This firmly cements John’s place in the GOP.
Why? Well, because the dems are EVEN WORSE at it. Now he can’t provide any examples, but he has the COURAGE TO BELIEVE IT so shut the fuck up OK?
mishu
Fine, gaz. If Lines tosses lables at posters, he should expect to get some back in return. Gosh you’re so smart. Got any new simeon synonyms for the President? I want to use them. Don’t worry. I’ll cite you.
Bill A.
Censorship? Nevermind…
The Other Steve
Has anybody else had enough of GOP whining?
I think enough’s enough. Look, I’m sorry nobody likes you. You aren’t going to change that opinion about whining about how nobody likes you.
Show some self respect, for the love of God.
Mac Buckets
Keep on race-pimping, and carrying the Democrats’ bags. It makes you look like a genius.
mishu
Last election says otherwise.
Jesse
Supposedly some things rise about partisan politics.
Supposedly.
But this shows how thoroughly petty and vindictive and juvenile Dems are.
It’s no wonder people are placed in groups… we never allow them to rise above partisan labelling. The only way we get past this partisanship is to allow the dignity of honoring the things in someone’s life that united us, rather than spouting further divisions.
It’s cheap, and petty, and makes for good Democratic theater though.
Richard Bottoms
Mac Buckets
What a juvenile remark. “Nobody like you, everybody hates you.” These are the great minds of the left for you. 62 million votes for Bush, but “nobody likes you” because a funeral full of Democrats piss themselves in front of the President. Whatever.
Kimmitt
From President Bush’s statement:
You are right that the Republicans did a better job of merely insunuating that their opponents were weak, uninterested in liberty, and mendacious, rather than coming right out and saying it. But I suppose that’s the Republican definition of class; don’t say what you mean, but make sure everyone knows it.
Richard Bottoms
See how this works, you get in the racial insult (blacks=pimps) while also implying an inability to make a rational, grown-up decision about who best meets your political needs.
I am a Democrat. A Yellow Dog Democrat, which means I’d vote for a bloated yellow dog before I’d ever vote for a race baiting, fag hating, incompetent war fighting Republican.
Ever.
mishu
Vladi G
Shorter Mac Buckets:
Blacks should vote Republican because they won’t pretend to give a shit about black people.
Jesse
Bottoms, I know you criticized someone for saying you couldn’t make a rational decision but didn’t you just prove your inability to make a “rational, grown-up decision about who best meets your needs”? When you said you’d vote for a Democrat regardless of whether they’d meet your needs. That doesn’t show rational decision making. You think Republicans are “race baiting, fag hating, incompetent war fighting” people. Again showing ignorance through stereotyping. Your reply just made the point for what the other person was trying to say.
Richard Bottoms
ppGaz
Please send for my informative booklet, “24 Fun Ways to Say ‘Your Mother Wears Combat Boots’ on the Intertrons”.
Just $12.95 plus the customary S&H.
I can save you shipping costs if you order both booklets today.
mishu
Fuck the annotated rant.
Silvio Canto, Jr.
Can we have a funeral without attacks on Pres. Bush?
As I wrote before, Mrs. King was a very nice lady who spent her life doing good things. It was nice that Pres. & Mrs. Bush went to the funeral. I’m glad that the other former presidents were there too.
However, I am very disappointed with the partisan attacks. Watch Pres. Carter:
(http://www.exposetheleft.com/index.php)
Why didn’t Pres. Carter apologize to the King family? Why didn’t he say that it was Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy who ordered the wiretaps on Rev. King.?
Pres. Carter needs to read about it. Here is the link: http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/prem/200207/garrow
This is amazing. The Democrats can not go to a funeral and show their respect for a nice lady.
Regards
Silvio Canto, Jr.
Richard Bottoms
Race Baiting:
Fag Hating;
Incompetent War Fighting:
Next?
Tymbrimi
The Left can try to spin this all they want. But, like that liberal senator’s funeral up north in 2004, the Left’s inappropriate behavior at CSK’s funeral will cost them politically. Their stidity is a gift that never stops giving. Dear Lefties, please keep on justifying your inappropriate behavior, please don’t apologize, and thanks for your political gift to the Right. It helps that you never, never learn. :)
Mac Buckets
Try and follow.
Blacks = pimps, no.
Someone who calls black Republican leaders Uncle Toms and House N*****s because they won’t tow the race line = race pimps, yes.
Someone who says blacks should vote for Democrats regardless of whether they help blacks = race pimps, yes.
Faux News
The White Man’s (Woman’s) burden is not easy, is it?
ppGaz
You are a spoof, right?
jaime
Same old Republican bullshit. Why SHOULD Black voters trust this Republican party? What has the current GOP shown other than concealed contempt or indifference? What good will vouchers do when families STILL can’t afford to pay for the rest of tuition? Bush purposefully avoids the destroyed black New Orleans neighborhoods, but reports on T.V. that they’re doing a heckuva job with reconstruction.
Bush owes his entire presidency to race baiting due to his South Carolina tactics in 2000. His #2 actively fought against honoring the husband of the very woman’s funeral Bush attended. It’s not enough to say that Democrats aren’t doing enough when you’ve got no ideas…unless you consider the repeal of the estate tax a priority in Black communities. When the only reasons Republicans give for minorities to trust them over Democrats is Robert Byrd was in the KKK 50 years ago and Lincoln freed the slaves, you know you’ve got no standing.
Mac Buckets
Well, Republicans do care about some black people, but those are all Uncle Toms and House N*****s, right? If a Republican cares about you, you can’t be really black. Only people like Barack Obama and Bill Clinton are really black.
God forbid we stop playing race-identity politics. How would the Democrats ever win an election?
Steve
Later…
“Pure comedy gold” is a terribly overused cliche, but what other term fits so well?
ppGaz
Stormy, you are doing a heckuva job.
And BTW, claiming your vacationing relatives as “Katrina victims” is not going to go over well at the IRS, unless you have some documentation. I’m just saying.
Rev. Thomas E. Light, Jr.
As a clergyman who presides over funerals of many and various individuals, I was appalled at the political comments at Mrs. King’s funeral yesterday. Whether some writers care or not, it is not someone’s activist opinions or works that gets them into heaven. It is by God’s grace. There should have been more emphasis on Mrs. King’s faith in Christ than politicians taking some pot-shots at the President. Only a man of class would have sat there and listened to some of that nonsense. President Carter referred to “wiretapping” with the King Family. We might be reminded that was done by Democrats. The issue of the War on Terrorism is not something we know Dr. King automatically would have opposed. I think some writers need some manners and realize that whether you are a Democrat or Republican does not matter when you die. I also think that some of the language used in articles is ridiculous and surely some of the writers could do better than being just rude and arrogant. Perhaps some of them should worship in church, synagogue or mosque and learn to respect others and their opinions.
Ross
About this whole ‘polite at Reagan’s funeral’ nonsense
Margaret Thatcher’ eulogy for Reagan
source
btw, Gorby was in the audience
source
The Kings saw war as a terrible evil, Reagan saw Communism as a terrible evil, both eulogies have harsh words, even though someone in the audience might have been offended.
Brian
I promise never to whine again when Democrats act like this. After all, it’s predictable behavior from them. Even the comments here rationalize the behavior: “Bush should EXPECT to be treated like this”. Okay then, at least now we’ve been warned.
The Dem’s have got their moment again in the media spotlight, again by using overheated rhetoric that is base and meaningless, unless you’re some hippie still partying like it’s 1969 (or the unfortunate offspring of such). Yours is the party of represssion; the repression of speech, society, laws, and manners.
You simply have no class. You’re not liberals, at least not in the classical sense of the word. You’re children, plain and simple, and this thread can be printed and framed as proof of that. How you can get through this whole “conversation” without even acknowledging that Bobby Kennedy was the one who authorized wiretaps on MLK, only proves that you are unworthy political opponents, and unworthy citizens.
Richard Bottoms
No. Just some of them, of which JC Watts is one.
No. Colin Powel is a Republican. He is black. And he is wrong.
No Bill Clinton is white.
Barack Obama is black.
And so is JC Watts. JC is just a black Uncle Tom and so we don’t pay attention to him.
There’s that reading glasses thing again. I said ‘I’ would vote never, ever vote for a Republican. I am 51 years old and I have seen your party’s views on black inch forward enough to have Condeleeza Rice and Colin Powell at the highest reaches of government. Yay!!
But George Bush had to visit Bob Jones University to get there. So fuck him and the Republican party.
Cyrus
Ha! I agree with Al about this.
Well, not about Preston Brooks. Nearly killing a helpless opponent to defend the wrong principles in a fit of pique doesn’t deserve too much credit. But left unsaid in almost all of over three hundred comments here is the fact that these attacks were pretty civil, as attacks go. I mean, I didn’t watch it on TV, but unless there was cursing and death threats directed at Bush specifically that somehow didn’t make it into any stories I’ve read, it just doesn’t sound that bad. In keeping with the wishes and precedent of the deceased and her family, they talked about politics. How horrible. And unless they repeated any lies or slanderous urban legends about Katrina, why not relate the events of the Kings’ lives to current events? This rhetorical device is not new or limited to eulogies.
Unless there was something much worse that got left out of the New York Times piece John linked to, then this is just reactionaries making up something to be outraged about rather than conceding political ground.
ppGaz
Aw, shut up, for crissakes. At least if you come in at 400 posts, try to say something original.
mishu
Bottoms must be getting kickbacks from somebody. Probably Teddy K.
mishu
ppgaz has no class.
Lines
This is the most amazing thread evah! It just proves that Dumbocrats can’t be trusted with Funeral Security.
ppGaz
BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
Please send for my booklet, “I Have No Class — But I Got You, Babe”
Just $39.95 plus S&H.
dagon
i knew it would only be a matter of time before the whole blacks are ignorantly voting for a party that isn’t doing anything for them meme to pop up.
as a black man, i am always happy to clear up a few things for those who go through their with life with this perception unchallenged.
here goes:
generally, blacks are the ONLY group in the nation which as a rule votes ENTIRELY for it’s own self interest. it’s not that we ‘love’ or are ‘fans’ of the democrats like a stormy would be on the flip side. frankly, we don’t even trust the dems. we don’t trust anybody!!!
what is passed down mostly from generation to generation of black families is a personal history of the darkest shit that this country is capable of. we don’t see this nation through the same prism that most caucasians do, or even the way that most immigrant groups do.
we KNOW how wicked and corrupt motherfuckers can be. that being said, make no mistake, most blacks have their eyes wide open when it comes to the underlying currents behind politics. and while the black community contains individuals who are as divergent in opinions and philosophies as those in any group, we do know where our bread is being buttered.
…because for the most part, the party that most embodies the sense of priviledge, injustice and good old fashioned meanness, that we are genetically coded to recognize….is the republican party.
peace
Vladi G
Great, now some alleged wingnut preacher is going to roll in and tell us how we should all behave at funerals. Look, Padre, you run your funerals how you want to run them and leave the rest of us the hell alone.
Says the guy who just showed up to tell us how people should act at funerals.
Hey, ya know what, God probably already made his decision. before the funeral. I don’t think St. Peter was sitting at the Pearly Gates saying “Well, you’re on the short list, but I’m waiting to see if anyone acts rudely at your funeral before I let you in.”
jaime
So? It was bad then and it is now. Why can’t you be a man Brian and finish the talking points you’ve been hearing all morning of Wingnut radio: To mention this so they you mention what a philandering commie MLK was and how it was a good thing he was wiretapped or else we’d be living with a myth that the right has been good enough to bust.
Steve
It’s true that liberal rhetoric of today is pretty darn mellow compared to what MLK and his brethren in the civil rights movement were saying several decades ago. But the conservative attacks pretty much sound the same.
The conservatives gloating, “Hee hee, this will hurt you politically!” also evoke thoughts of the past for me. It makes me think of the conservatives who said voting for a liberal is like voting to put a bunch of angry blacks in power. It also makes me think of the moderates who used to tell Dr. King to tone it down because he’d just sound extreme and turn people off. Dr. King and his wife never listened to any of them, God bless them.
We all could use more leaders with that kind of courage today.
ppGaz
As recently as a few years ago, you could hear that right here in AZ, until the NFL decided that it couldn’t have a Super Bowl here unless we established a MLK day.
Richard Bottoms
Easy. Bobby, we forgive you because we know what you and your brother did for us. Nor are we unaware the J. Edgar Hoover was running the FBI.
Oh no?? Nuance. A knowledge of history and political reality from black folks????
Say it isn’t so.
jaime
His name is Paul Wellstone and he died in 2002, you ignorant numbnuts. The difference between CSK and that is that the election ain’t ten days away, and too many people have seen the King funeral for the right to lie and misrepresent it.
Is this what Republicans are going to run on? “Vote Republican because 3 people said bad things about Bush 9 months ago at a funeral”?
jg
How many steps does it take for a person to admit the only reason they vote republican is because they believe a democrat would screw the system up? Is there a republican plan or is it all a Intelligent Design style misdirection that exists solely by exxagerating the mistakes of the competition? All I ever here from Stormy, Darrell, MB and the like is why they hate democrats. Noothig about what is good about republicans. What they can do. Its always what the dems would do, grossly exagerated of course.
StupidityRules
Jimmy Carter made Laura Bush cry.
Al Maviva
Right on, Cyrus. I’d like to see some Democrats with real fight. They don’t have to maim any Republican legislators during debates like Preston did, just hurt them a bit. Y’know, blood waters the tree of liberty and all that other good Jeffersonian democracy stuff. I want to see Ted Kennedy throwing dogshit-filled flaming paper bags at Bill Frist, I’d like to see Nancy Pelosi throwing water balloons filled with blood at that raving warmonger Denny Hastert during debates, and so on. Hell, I’d settle for seeing Bottoms and ppGaz getting dragged out of the well of the senate after hitting Trent Lott with a rotten cantelope. C’mon, street fightin’ men. All this stupid jaw-jaw on the internet. Let your freak flags fly! Show us what you got! Y’all are pretty good at talkng and writing curse words on the innernerd, calling Republicans names and stuff. Wow, it sounds tough as nails, as if I’d stumbled into a fight between a bunch of pitbulls going after a pack of lions, but I don’t see a whole lot of action. Well, no action unless some pretty passive kinda things – losing, getting shafted, crying and moaning about it – count as actions.
Pussies.
Richard Bottoms
I had forgotten what shamed Arizona into supporting the MLK holiday.
And forgive us poor childlike negroes for hearing Reagan’s comments and thinking “He jes don’t believe Dr. King deserves a holiday.”
Thanks to Google every racist comment made duting the MLK holidat debate is quite easy to find.
Pretty cool when you can lovingly be quoted on a Neo-Nazi website.
This is the legacy of Republican politics you are still living down.
So kindly, fuck off.
jaime
I keep bringing it up, but I happened to turn over to Tammy Bruce this morning when she forgot to shut her lunatic button off.
She actually called the audience a bunch of “Uppity blacks who don’t know how to act right” and how if poor blacks don’t have any opportunities they should just join the military as well as the MLK commie/philanderer meme.
Most repun-dits are smarter than her though, they’ll take the easy target and go after Jimmy Carter. Although he’s done more for black people throughout the world than most people could ever dream of.
dagon
Richard Bottoms,
you’re doing good work.
peace
Richard Bottoms
Trent Lott:
Richard Bottoms
George Bush Sr.
mishu
And to think, Kennedy didn’t have the power to appoint a new FBI director or tell Hoover to “Fuck off”. No, he couldn’t do anything because it was Bush’s fault that he was banging Marilyn and Sam Giancana’s girlfriend…
Pb
Steve,
You know, they do that crap all the time–that line of argument doesn’t work on me, and I never quite understand where they’re coming from with it. Are they just admitting that they are complete opportunists with no values who will say or do anything to get elected, and then assuming that everyone else is just like them? Or does someone else have another theory?
chopper
how dare they speak about how the government should spend its money on poverty instead of war at the funeral of a woman who adamantly believed that the government should spend its money on poverty instead of war!
and in the presence of a guy who spends all that money on war instead of poverty! the nerve!
Richard Bottoms
Dick Cheney:
jg
Is there a point in there?
SeesThroughIt
Thank you, jaime. I keep seeing ‘wingers trying to run this argument up the flagpole, and they never seem to realize that it bursts their whole bubble. After all, if they’re so upset that Dear Georgie might have been offended at comments made during the funeral, shouldn’t they, by their own *ahem* “logic” have equal sympathy for Ted Kennedy? Yes, they should. But they don’t because, well, they worship Bush, and Kennedy is Evil Incarnate.
To recap: This wiretapping bullshit was wrong back then, and it’s wrong now. Doesn’t matter who’s doing it; it’s wrong. That, my dear neocons, is called “consistency of principles,” and it’s a concept I invite you to acquaint yourself with sometime.
Now let’s get on with butt-hurt Republicans whining about how Democrats are whiners.
Kent
Memo to Lowerey and Carter at Mrs. King’s funeral: You made the same mistake that Cindy Sheehan did at the State of the Union address. You failed to understand that it wasn’t about YOU!
Using the funeral and celebration of the life of Mrs. King to promote yourselves and your political views was simply a low-class thing to do. Shame.
Richard Bottoms
Are you sensing a pattern here?
Hmm, a national party tries to rewrite history, claiming it was always for something it loudly fought against, now claiming as cherished heroes the very people whose ideas they fought against. Very ingenous.
“I voted against the Marin Luther King holiday before I voted for it. Commie bastard.”
mishu
Yes, jg. The point is Dems are incompetent.
Lines
I think mishu’s point is that history is a point beyond he/she/it’s grasp.
Paddy O'Shea
Rush Limbaugh brought the rightwing position into crystal-clear focus with the follwoing remark:
“Take an office poll with me, how many women will be picked up at the funeral, how many babies will be born in nine months.”
I think it is pretty safe to say that your average Republican conservative hates blacks. The Republican Party is the heir to the racism of the Dixiecrats, and much of what we hear from that quarter on the topic is rehashed garbage from an ignoble past.
Why even dignify this crap by discussing it?
jg
Ok. I don’t see that point in there but whatever. I’m sure the wingnuts see it.
Richard Bottoms
What’s your point? Black folks read history books.
Oh, and MLK was screwing around on the side. And that changes what exactly?
jg
He probably just watched Wedding Crashers.
SeesThroughIt
Wait, I thought that’s what Clarence Thomas was/is? Remember when he called the hearings about his treatment of Anita Hill a “high-tech lynching for uppity Blacks?” Yeah.
Richard Bottoms
Word.
I love Google. I almost never make an argunment without a quote or sourced citation. Makes them go nuts.
Pb
Richard Bottoms,
Yep, they’re deathly allergic to facts. Watch them bob and weave, never acknowledging anything of substance. :)
Bob
Funny how Robert Byrd was a member of the KKK, and he gets a free pass from the Dems. You Dems are so hypercritical it is amusing.
I also find it totally amazing that the loony left uses such “big” four letter words all of the time. Your language represents who you are, and all of the vulgar swearing you all do makes you look like complete uneducated morons. You will never win the “family value” vote with a messgae as vulgar as yours. But keep it coming…the looney left will continue to keep Republicans in power.
rilkefan
Someone at TPM Cafe saying much the same thing as ppGaz‘s first comment above, after which everyone should, once again, have shut up.
chefrad
By all mean, let’s have the kind of all-Eunuch forum that Karl Rove organizes. Heaven forbid that Bush might out that most of the nation diasgrees with what he does.
Free speech for neocon Danish rabble-rousers, but silence in the august presence of the commander in chief.
BTW, I think it is for the KING family, not Michelle Malkin, to decide what they want said at their lady’s funeral.
Richard Bottoms
“Everything’s going so well!”
— Harry Ziedler, Moulin Rouge
Well the Deocrats would never fall for fighting Iran’s war with Iraq for them, pinning down 130,000 troops, kelling 2200 of them and wounding 15,000.
Nope, they wouldn’t $500,000,000,000 on a war and still be fighting it 3 years after declaring “Mission Acoomplished.”
And woe to any Democrat who would run up a natinal debt of $81,000,000,000,000 dollars on top of a budget defict of $500,000,000,000 erasing a budget surplus in the process.
And if there were some natural disaster, well you bet no Democrat president would respond slowly, not grasping the magnitude of the destruction day, after day, after day while people died. Hell no.
That would be just plain incompetent.
mishu
Google this. Hired truck scandal.
Bruce Moomaw
While King was alive, Republican conservatives were virtually unanimous in detesting him — and he returned the sentiment. As late as 1978, National Review was still running cute litle poems comparing him to Father Divine. Now that the Kings have shown them up in the eyes of both the general public and history, most conservatives are making a ludicrous habit of pretending that they ALWAYS admired the Great Man and his wife and so it’s foully unfair of liberals to point out that they are hypocrites on the subject.
The current President, of course, was an adult while King was alive. We don’t know what his feelings were on the subject at the time; but the fact that his father opposed the Civil Rights Bill at the time, and his own aggrieved compaint at the start of his 2000 Presidential campaign that while he was at Yale he was surrounded by people who “didn’t think they had anything better to do than assure equal opportunity for everybody and that sort of thing”, give us a strong hint. Given Bush’s lack of concern over elementary civil rights at this point, may we not suggest that it’s highly probable that he showed up at the funeral not because he’s sympathetic to the Kings, but as further surface camouflage, devised by his political handlers, to bolster his thoroughly fake “compassionate centrist conservative” image, which is such a central part of his political strategy?
I was a teenager when King was alive. He was nonviolent, but he was a fiery and constant verbal opponent of EVERYTHING that struck him (usually correctly) as unjust. He would not have objected to that rhetoric at his wife’s funeral in the slightest; he would have regarded her funeral as a crucial opportunity to reiterate attacks on injustice, and he would have regarded it as immoral to miss such an important opportunity to do so.
He was not alone. Let me quote one of G.K. Chesterton’s poems:
“Sonnet With the Compliments of the Season (To a Popular Leader Much to be Congratulated on the Avoidance of a Strike at Christmas)”:
I know you. You will hail the huge release,
Saying the sheathing of a thousand swords,
In silence and injustice, well accords
With Christmas bells. And you will gild with grease
The papers, the employers, the police,
And vomit up the void your windy words
To your New Christ; who bears no whip of cords
For them that traffic in the doves of peace.
The feast of friends, the candle-fruited tree,
I have not failed to honour. And I say
It would be better for such men as we,
And we be nearer Bethlehem, if we lay
Shot dead on scarlet snows for liberty,
Dead in the daylight upon Christmas Day.
King was an advocate of nonviolence in every situation where it is possible; but he was also an advocate of Justice — who, lest we forget, carries a sword rather than an olive branch.
One more point: the same rule applies to conservatives. If they honestly believe that a certain policy by liberals is seriously dangerous or unjust, and they are speaking at the funeral of a political figure who held the same belief, unless the family objects (or the person himself had stated before his death that he didn’t want it mentioned) they not only have the right to bring up that issue — they have the moral obligation to do so.
dagon
mishu:
i don’t get it. are you talking about the george ryan scanal and trial in Illinois?
peace
mishu
Well, if the democrat governor is any example, then competence is even further away from the dems grasp.
mishu
dagon, you’re wrong.
Richard Bottoms
Yes? Looks like Mayor Daley may be in trouble.
What’s that got to do with the price of tea in China?
Google this biatch: laura bush accident
Next.
Par R
Hmmm.
jg
At least the governor acted. Bush did nothing while you assholes sat around saying its a local problem. Laughing at how badly overwhelmed they were yet not getting the irony of it all.
jaime
Mishu, make sense or shut the fuck up.
dagon
mishu
–i’m wrong about what? i don’t even know what the hell kind of point it is that you’re trying to make. do you want to enlighten me?
peace
Lines
dagon, so there you big poopy headed retard
ppGaz
I’m still holding out for a book deal.
dagon
Lines, you’re killing me man!! :)
peace
D. Mason
Having read through most of the comments here I have to say that division among party lines is shameful here today. Rev. Joseph Lowery, a trusted ally and longtime friend to Mrs. King and her husband, can say whatever he feels like saying. This is a man who was there by the side of the King family as they were helping to change the entire culture of America for the better. Mr. Lowery has earned the right to not be criticized for what he says to honor Mrs. King in her passing. Jimmy Carter hasn’t. President Carter had no business talking politics at this womans funeral.
Evereyone who has been to a few large funerals knows that there are 2 kinds of speakers … There are the people who knew the deceased and who have something to say but they weren’t close and so their words should always remain more somber and formal…. An example I could give off the top of my head would be at my grandfathers(who owned a business in the small town where he lived and died) funeral some other local business people spoke about how they respected his character blah blah blah. But there is another kind of speaker, the ones who knew the deceased on a personal level. They know how the person they are honoring would want to be remembered and they have the floor. Noone can question their sincerity even if they don’t understand why they said what they said.
People who make and keep friends for a lifetime don’t dishonor them at their funerals, not for politics or anything else. To suggest that Rev. Lowery dishonored his passed friend by politicizing her funeral is ignorant at best.
ImJohnGalt
Thank goodness that Republicans didn’t politicize the tragic death of Pat Tillman.
Republicans: Pat Tillman died heroically in a war he volunteered for! He was a real American patriot, you cowardly dems! See how right we were?
His Brother (at his funeral): Pat thought Bush was an idiot, and that the war was wrong, but he fought it anyway.
Republicans: >!<
[crickets chirping]
martha
How many rich Democrats were at the funeral who benefitted from my tax cuts ($51,000 gross per year)? Including Mrs. King, her upper-middle class children and, especially those compassionate non-donors to charity, the Clintons.
Batfink
Wow, John, you sure have a lot of angry liberals who hang on your every word. You’d think they’d be too busy on Democratic Underground to wring out their spleens here, but whatever, I guess.
It was an amusing read. Signed,
A Hugh Hewitt reader
jaime
There are other speakers, Mason. Ones that don’t know what the hell they’re talking about.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060131/ap_on_re_us/obit_king
I guess Carter just had a passing acquaintance to CSK, right?
ppGaz
Who’s up for starting a new blog called
Open to righties and lefties, but to post there, you have be either (a) a poopy head or (b) a retard and (c) be able to prove it.
D. Mason
Passing acquaintance? No and I never suggested that, but he also wasn’t a lifelong friend, there are degrees of familiarity. This isn’t one of those either/or situations that political cheerleaders are so fond of. There is an OBVIOUS difference between the relationship Rev. Lowery had with the King family and that of Jimmy Carter.
Carter was someone important who held some similar values and who worked with Mrs. King in many ways for a few years, their work was mutually beneficial, that is why he spoke. Lowery watched their kids grow up… see the difference? If you can’t that’s sad.
Richard Bottoms
My spleen is just fine. I’m just a Democrat with a long memory and skill at finding what I want on Google.
This idea that Republicans loved MLK all along is just horseshit. Rev. Lowery knows it and I know it.
Nikki
Honestly, I don’t see the difference. You can only make this claim if you know exactly how much or how little a friend the Carters and the Lowreys have been to the Kings.
Jesse
Yeah, I’m shocked an elder of America’s civil rights and progressive activist community ceiticized Bush, the War, and the fact America still has so many poor and needy. It’s not like the woman they buried led a civil rights march of 50,000 the day before her husband of buried. It’s not like the woman spoke at an anti-war rally three weeks after her husband was murdured.
She was a woman who devoted her life to nonviolence.
Do any of ya’ honestly believe that Mrs. King would’ve said anything different if she had the oppurtunity to speak to Bush at this moment in time?
If Coretta, on the occasion of her husbands death, could launch and continue a generation long campaign for equality and justice in his name, we should only be so honored to do the same to mark her passing.
Oh – and as a side note. Standing ovation. Guess that two percent approval the Boy King has among African-Americans is resonating.
Steve
If everyone were as savvy about casting their vote as the African-American community, this country would be a much better place. And I don’t mean that in the sense that everyone would vote Democrat.
There are some people who just refuse to be bullshitted. That’s a rare quality in this bullshit-filled world.
The Disenfranchised Voter
I really wish I was here for this post this morning. I honestly don’t feel like reading through all the comments about this as the whole outrage over this is complete bullshit. The Republican party has mastered the art of condemning the politicizing of events by politicizing their outrage themselves. Someone should teach them the definition of the word hypocrite.
If the Republicans really gave two shits about keeping this non-political they would make a single statement about how it was unfortunate that the event was politicized and then leave it at that.
The fact that they are acting so outraged that a life-long political activist’s funeral was politicized–at the King family’s acceptance I might add–is ridiculous.
And guess what? They wouldn’t have been able to politicize it if Bush didn’t misled us about WMD, if he didn’t totally fuck up on Katrina, or if he OBEYED THE FUCKING LAW in regards to wiretaps.
dagon
actually mason
–what’s sad is your attempt to marginalize carter’s appearance. you don’t know what his relationship was with mrs. kiing or how deep. i’m glad you’re on board about Rev. Lowery’s comments but it is not up to YOU to decide what degree of involvement or how much time in acquaintance qualifies someone as a ‘personal friend’ who can make controversial comments at a funeral.
to even suggest so is laughable and sick. so please, let this one go and shut it about carter.
peace
ppGaz
No, no, no. In the GOP world all truth is politics and all politics is truth. People, relationships, personal expressions of anything …. fuck that. It’s about politics and the righty base. If they say that the darkies misbehaved at the funeral, and that the Democrats are disrespectful, then that’s all there is to it.
Who you gonna believe? Some black guy who is just race-baiting, or Kate O’Beirne?
You Democrats have no class. So say the final arbiters of class in our world, the Republicans.
dagon
steve
–thanks man. it took me a lot longer to try to say the exact same thing. :)
peace
Richard Bottoms
Uh-oh. Another politicized funeral:
jaime
You compared the relationship to that of your grandfather and some business folks in the neighborhood…a passing acquaintance. The truth is, I’ve never counted how many times Carter went to the King house for supper, and neither have you. He was invited to speak by the family and that is good enough for me.
Is there a difference in relationships between Lowery and Carter, maybe, but that isn’t for either of us to determine. Or have you coronated yourself the watchdog of Coretta Scott King friendships?
The Disenfranchised Voter
Does that include the outrageously huge so-called “defense” budget?
I didn’t think so…
The Disenfranchised Voter
HAHHAHAHA! Wow. Why does anyone even think of trying to talk some sense into Stormy. The woman is clearly delusional beyond any shadow of a doubt. And I’d say the same about someone who would call Reagan “history’s greatest monster”.
What a nutjob.
ppGaz
Well, how about “History’s greatest monster who couldn’t remember what happened 45 minutes ago … even when he was president?”
Stalking Horse
Bush should not have been there. She was just another enemy of american democracy, just like the people that got up to talk. The Kings have done nothing for the african americans in Atlanta over the last 2 decades. Lots of talk for lots of money (in their pockets) and no action.
Go libs.
Steve
Do you suppose the remarks about Vietnam at MLK’s funeral were less offensive because LBJ didn’t show up? I personally don’t think it matters either way, but I’m sure LBJ was smart enough to know that if he did show up, he was going to hear a lot worse than a single line about weapons of mass destruction.
Vince
John,
I agree with you completely. I wonder where these liberal asses get their news- oh yea, from their other liberal sources. No WMD’s? then what did Sadaam use on the Kurds, and what did that Iraqi general just say last week about them being shipped out to Syria while we were waffling around waiting to actually go in and take Sadaam out??
AWB
So let’s examine the Demos history of race, shall we?
The Republican Party was founded on the principles of anti-slavery, expressly to counter the Democrats defense of slavery (to the bitter end).
Senator Charles Sumner (R-MA) viciously beaten within an inch of his life on the floor of the Senate (in a most cowardly sneak-attack) by Representative Preston Brooks (D-SC). Why? Senator Sumner dared to question the right to own black slaves.
The Lincoln-Douglas Debates. Remember those, still run today? Senator Stephen Douglas (D-IL), quote, “For one, I am opposed to negro citizenship in any and every form. I believe this government was made on the white basis. I believe it was made by white men for the benefit of white men and their posterity forever, and I am in favor of confining citizenship to white men, men of European birth and descent, instead of conferring it upon negroes, Indians and other inferior races.” The Democraps proceeded to nominate Douglas for president in 1860. Hard to believe that most Democraps viewed Douglas as being too moderate on the slavery issue.
All the south’s “Jim Crow” laws were enacted by Democraps in state legislatures and governorships. The Ku Klux Klan (Robert C. Byrd, D-WV,
The Disenfranchised Voter
I know you were joking ppGaz, but Reagan’s got a long way to go before he ends up in any “history’s greatest monsters” countdown–a real long way.
And this is coming from someone who thinks Reagan’s presidency is vastly overrated.
trapeze
As a conservative Republican all I can say is “thank you, thank you, thank you!”
Jimmy Carter and the rest of you typical liberal Democrats are an absolute gift from heaven. Your indignation, anger, self-righteousness and out-and-out undisguised & unashamed hatred for all things conservative and Republican will guarantee that you stay in the minority for the forseeable future.
I am truly grateful that we on the right are not nearly as clever and insightful as you guys are.
There can be no greater testimony to your genius than the celebration of the dim-witted Jimmy Carter who deftly points out that Democrats wiretapped MLK and somehow interpret that as a swipe at GWB.
As James T. Kirk said (paraphrased), “Kahn, I’m laughing at the superior intelligence.”
ppGaz
Hardly
His hideous record in South America might tarnish the phony saintly image that some want to paint him with.
I always believed that he was a fake, and a cruel fanatic who would stop at nothing to tilt at the windmills of communism. I lived in California when he was governor, and I detested him then, and only more as the years went by.
And no, I wasn’t joking about the memory loss either. I think he was mentally useless for most of his second term.
AWB
Sorry, hit submit by mistake.
The Ku Klux Klan (Sen. Robert C. Byrd, D-WV, former Grand Wizard and still in the Senate today…also filibustered the 1964 Civil Rights Act for 14 straight hours) virtually an auxiliary arm of the Democratic Party. And as a matter of fact, the first gun control laws were enacted by Democraps in order to prevent blacks from defending themselves against the KKK. Chain gangs developed by Democraps to bring back a new version of slave labor.
President Woodrow Wilson, only the second Democrap elected president since the Civil War, reintroduced segregation throughout the federal government immediately upon his inauguration in 1913. Avowed racists were key members of his cabinet. Of course, as president of Princeton, he reused to admit blacks and refused to grant state jobs to blacks when he was governor of New Jersey (even though black votes provided his margin of victory…some thanks from the Democraps).
FDR’s first appointment to the SCOTUS was life member of th KKK Hugo Black (D-AL). He chose as his VP in 1944 Harry Truman (D-MO and proud member of the KKK since 1922). Throughout his tenure, he refused to address Republican efforts to criminalize lynching and integration of the armed forces.
I could go on, but I’ve made my point. The Democraps have taken the Afri-can-American community for granted for years and enacted policies to keep them in poverty. That time is coming to an end.
The Disenfranchised Voter
Reagan does not come close to being one of history’s greatest monsters.
The competition is just too strong. He pales in comparison to others.
Steve
Isn’t it obvious that Godzilla was history’s greatest monster? Seriously.
ppGaz
Your point is well taken.
ppGaz
After Godzilla vs. The Sea Monster …. I have to agree.
Greatest of all time.
dagon
trapeze
..seriously man, i’m not trying to start anything with you because i think that you HAVE to be a troll but really…..you can’t be fucking serious…right?
peace
dagon
AWB
–take a perusal through Richard Bottoms and my own post on this subject above and get back to me when you can prove that you actually have any clue as to what you’re talking about.
peace
ImJohnGalt
Thanks trapeze for making the case for. It’s not *us* that are claiming it’s a swipe at GWB, is the entire righty blogosphere who are all a-twitter and asking for smelling salts over what he said. I’m presuming that you are going on all the right-wing sites and correcting their misplaced umbrage.
Sine.Qua.Non
It seems to me, that the expression of and carrying forth the voice and actions of the person that died, in this case a well-known political and social activist, is the greatest compliment to their lives (i.e. see Jesus/prophet/etc. followers who spread the word as an example). Following in their footsteps? To express that persons viewpoints, at their funeral, or in any other manner is to carry on that person’s message and work or movement. We can all only wish for the same to occur to ourselves, upon our own deaths.
What I find tragic, is that anyone would sideline her unfortunate death by creating an issue over what was said about her or her activism, message, if you will, relayed by others, contriving to make a cheap political point on the other side. Thereby, reducing (there is a better word than reduce) Coretta Scott King’s contributions and “her” life. THAT is the problem here, that is the tragedy.
That Mrs. King was against the Iraq War and that her husband was spyed on by our government are well known facts. Positions which she was vehemenent about and fought against along side here husband and family, her friends, and after her husband’s assasination, carried on his work and made it her own.
There was nothing, absolutely nothing said at that funeral that did not match with her life, philosophy nor her message from the grave.
Richard Bottoms
And John Lindberg was a Nazi sympathizer. SO waht?
Yes we know Robert Byrd was in the Klan. He’s not only aplogized for it but made up for it as well in word and deed? We black folks forgave George Wallace too.
What the fuck do we care about an old geezer who’ll be dead in a few years.
Our objection is people who are members of the White Citizen Council TODAY.
AWB
dagon
I’ve read Bottoms…guy obviously is uneducated and crass, as he is incapable of reasoned speech without RESORTING TO PROFANITY! Sorry, not interested in getting into a battle of wits with an unarmed simpleton. As to having a clue, I do, witness your inability to counter the facts presented above. If you have an answer, please. I look forward to reading your comments, as they are made with thought and reason. Can’t say the same for Bottoms. The man lives down to his name.
Richard Bottoms
Blow me.
trapeze
You are batting 1.000 there, dagon…I AM a troll (so what?) and yes, I am “f*cking serious” as you so adroitly put it. You guys are your own worst enemy and we on the right couldn’t pay enough for the work that you are doing on our behalf.
You need look no further than Bill Clinton for a pristine example of how you should be acting (at least in public). I totally disagree with almost everything that comes out of his mouth but he IS a class act. He is charming. He is agreeable. As has been so often pointed out…a person that most people would enjoy sharing a beer with.
Jimmy Carter is an absolute embarrassment. A classless excuse for a human being. So keep holding him up. Elevate Cindy Sheehan, too. Whoopee!!
ppGaz
AWB is obviously a crude spoof.
“RESORTING TO PROFANITY” complete with caps.
Shit, has this guy read John Cole? Talk about “resorting to profanity!” Whew!
Steve
What a simpleminded view of history to present. Gee, the Republicans were opposed to our involvement in WWII, I guess they are the anti-war party!
It’s really instructive to talk about what Stephen Douglas said 150 years ago as compared to, say, how Jesse Helms ran his campaigns within the last decade. “You needed that job… but they had to give it to a minority.”
What amazes me is that conservatives continue to assume black people are stupid enough to fall for this crap.
Otto Man
Christ, it’s like pulling a string on a Chatty Cathy doll. Do they send young conservatives to education camps to learn these talking points?
AWB
Bottoms
Nice. You kiss your mother or wife with that mouth?
ppGAZ
Have you noticed any profanity in my postings? NO. Nor will you.
“Talking and eloquence are not the same; to speak, and to speak well are two things”-Ben Jonson
ppGaz
Like you, then?
Jeff Miller
Why does everyone care so damned much about this? Coretta Scott King has a funeral, Bush goes, and a community that he’s almost totally ignored and that is really pissed at him says some unkind things while he’s there.
Tasteful? Probably not. But Bush is a big boy. I think he can handle it.
Richard Bottoms
Yes. Yours, too.
ppGaz
Actually, yes, if they are upwardly mobile. WaMo had a piece on this late last year. The modus operandi is taught as a set of tactics.
The paradigm is basically deflection and misdirection, for the people who aren’t paying close attention, and legitimization for the base, who are paying attention.
They have it down to a science, literally.
trapeze
Hey, no trouble here, ppGaz!
Happy, happy, happy! That is my point. You guys BE angry. You guys be profane and vulgar. No argument from me. Keep sending Jimmy Carter out in public as your front man. I am delighted.
Political funerals? Heck, yeah! By all means, keep it up. I am with you all the way.
dagon
AWB,
fine, the point i was trying to make is that all of those transgressions against blacks that you were attempting to use as evidence that the democratic party somehow mistreated its black base took place over 40 years ago.
the fact is that ALL of those elements that you attempted to use to tar the democrats now reside within the republican party.
and my overriding point is that by and large, blacks know this. thus, given the history, it is patently insulting for people to go around insinuating that black people don’t know how to vote for what’s best for themselves.
insulting and completely untrue. most of us look at the modern working class republican and ask ourselves “WHY”?
we see it as nothing short of pure insanity.
peace
ppGaz
Oh, well then, fuck you very much.
You are in the wrong place if you think that that is going to get you any points around here. John Cole owns the blog and he swears like a sailor. So what?
jaime
This one’s not yet ready to graduate. He hasn’t mentioned how “Lincoln freed the slaves” yet. Once he does that he’ll get his honorary lifetime military deferrment, bowtie, khaki pants, and bowl cut from the young conservatives school.
Otto Man
So that makes you, what? The Average White Band?
Richard Bottoms
Terrible. Just terrible what he does with his free time:
Otto Man
Yeah, your comments have pretty much made that clear. Thanks!
ppGaz
Impressive. Alas, it was made for you in this thread about 400 posts ago.
Richard Bottoms
Ouucch!
Otto Man
Actually, the capper is “the Republicans passed the 1964 Civil Rights Act.”
jaime
I should catalogue every time some dickweed rightwinger says “That’s why you guys lose elections”, so when they get their assed kicked in the next election I can rub their faces in it like a dog that shit on the rug.
Richard Bottoms
Yeah, your comments have pretty much made that clear. Thanks!
Damn.
trapeze
Thanks again to all of you lefties.
We really, really appreciate the good work that you are doing. Just keep it up. Your strategery is working. If you can only do more of it or, somehow, do it with even MORE fervor and intensity you shall surely prevail and the White House & both houses of Congress will be yours!
As for me (troll), I am a happy puppy! I am going right down to GOP headquarters to get fresh programming from my master, Karl Rove.
Richard Bottoms
Don’t even start ‘the dozens’ with a black man. You aren’t equipped.
The dozens??? What’s that?
ppGaz
You need to keep working on that spoof. It’s got promise, but still rough around the edges.
Hold onto the day job, where you hop up and down in front of the donut shop in a possum costume wearing a $3/Dozen sign.
trapeze
Proud to be a “dickweed rightwinger!” and patiently waiting for your glorious victory in the next election.
(snicker)
ppGaz
Nothing for the possum costume? Nothing at all?
Damn.
SeesThroughIt
And then they wonder why Blacks don’t vote Republican. Seriously.
AWB: I suppose you can explain how the Republicans’ “Southern Strategy” was not racist, then? Actually, no you can’t, but it’ll be funny to see you try to do so.
trapeze
The funny thing is we own the donut shops and hire dork college kids that major in English Lit to to do the hopping. Need a job?
dagon
jaime:
tell me it about it. someone should clue these idiots in on what most of us here already know, There Is ALWAYS A Renaissance!
–these morons act as if time is going to stand still and we will forever be in some red state utopia. no wonder they’re so open to Bush’s Imperiousness: these people actually want a king.
peace
jaime
With a President at 38% approval, a Republican congress ar 30% approval, %60 of the country believing we are on the wrong track I’d quit snickering and start canvassing.
Be careful what you wish for.
The Disenfranchised Voter
Oh give me a break. Go fuck yourself.
The only people who take offense to “curse” words are immature little children trapped in adults bodies. There is no such thing as “bad” words. What “curse” words do is express passion and strong emotion. If you can’t handle passion and strong emotion you need to grow the hell up.
Furthermore, if you knew how certain words actually became “curse” words you wouldn’t even buy into such utter nonsense.
trapeze
Yippee! dagon (who is authoritative, after all) sez that the ’60s and ’70’s are a comin’ back! Flower Power and “stickin it to da man!” Yeah! Right on, Bro! I can hardly wait to turn back the clock on welfare reform and raise everybody’s taxes so we can have double digit inflation, double digit unemployment just like when….hmmm, oh yeah….just like when Jimmy Carter was president. Whoopee! Now that’s what I call a Renaissance!
Steve
Wow.
jaime
Trapeze, you need to reed Sun Tzu. If you believe those who disagree with you are granola eating hippie college kids, you are fuckin doomed.
There are about 50 Iraq war vets running as Democrats. You think calling them hippie is going to work? I’m trying to help you here trapeze. This permanent majority wet dream you have is just that…a dream. I wouldn’t want you committing suicide because you lost your country to evil fag loving/ America-Jesus hating God killing liberals.
Kimmitt
But he causes so many of them . . .
Anyways, I love reading conservatives crowing about how we’re helping them into power. It makes clear the fact that they don’t give a rat’s ass about anything but power.
jaime
You know that Bill Clinton passed welfare reform, right? And that inflation is happening, now…as we speak? Ignorant fuck.
trapeze
So, jaime…let me get this straight…
You think that someone like, say, Murtha is a shoo-in for prez? I guess that’s why President Kerry won in a landslide.
I do believe that there are those among whom I disagree with that, yes, are in fact granola eating hippie college kids. I also believe that group has its fair share of communists, commy symps, labor activists, abortion activists, environmental activists, etc. ect. So what?
Color me f*cking doomed.
trapeze
Yeah, Clinton passed welfare reform. Sure. He signed it into law but my memory is that a Republican House passed it. And yes, you are right inflation is (OH MY GOSH!)happening now. Duh, it’s always happening. Just not at the ridiculous levels that Carter subjected us to.
Steve
Seriously, friends, responding to this shit is beneath you. Are trapeze’s posts what JC’s blog used to look like back when he was a loyal Republican?
The Disenfranchised Voter
Oh snap!
Zing!
Richard Bottoms
Where did you learn to speak black. The Jeffersons?
trapeze
Seriously, Steve….I did own up to being a troll. But by all means keep reinforcing each other’s delusions. (Karl Rove has programmed me to write this stuff. I can’t help it.)
trapeze
Actually, I speak a variation of the blue dialect. Sometimes I speak orange with green.
ppGaz
trapeze, I don’t mind the ham-handed spoofed troll, but you are supposed to clear it with the committee AHEAD OF TIME. Otherwise you must be condemned to the fiery furnace of hell.
No offense.
The Disenfranchised Voter
We don’t think Karl Rove has programmed you. We just think you’re gullible enough to believe the bullshit the RNC spews.
I suggest you look at a poll of independent voters (as I am one of them). You will see that we think Bush and this current batch of Republicans are a fuck up as well.
trapeze
Okay, I won’t taunt you further.
But I mean it when I say, “Thank you.” You guys are truly a gift. I don’t hate you. I don’t hate Democrats or liberals. But I will admit that you are a great source of amusement for me.
Peace, love, understanding and all that. Light a candle for me.
ppGaz
That’s what we live for.
The Disenfranchised Voter
That’s right trapeze, ignore my statement that even independents think the Republicans are a train wreck while in power.
Have fun in your little delusional Us vs Them world.
tb
I love it. The party of the purple heart band aid is lecturing Democrats about “class”. It’s also very entertaining watching you all twist and turn trying to find a way to express your racism that doesn’t involve using the word “nigger” publicly. Seriously, you Republicans are the biggest bunch of crybaby assholes I’ve ever seen in my life. If you don’t like the way we honor our dead, you can stay the fuck away from our funerals.
Richard Bottoms
Now that one has been replaced with Civil Rights Pimp, Poverty Pimp.
I’ll take my Eldorado in black please.
Richard Bottoms
BTW, Superfly was released 34 years ago this summer.
Pb
Woo. Who let the loonies in? No, I mean, the *new* loonies…
GOP4Me
I wish you Democrats would stop accusing Republicans of racism. That’s a very ugly thing to say, especially since the only basis for doing so is tangential, indirect rumors and slurs against John McCain’s family- and even if there is some basis in fact for that assertion of racism by the Bush campaign in 2000, the source is far less likely George Bush himself than it is some overzealous Bush campaign staffer. If you haven’t met the man personally, how can you call him a racist? That’s like if I called all the peace demonstrators traitors. I’m sure some are, but the generalization would weaken my argument. Some Republicans are assuredly racist, but so are some Democrats.
So much for the party of tolerance. Check out http://www.godhatesfags.com sometime; the website is run by Fred Phelps- a registered Democrat.
And as far as decorum goes: You turn a funeral into a pep rally, yet you have the gall to hurl insults at Republicans. The party of Lincoln is racist. The party that fought the Civil War for the Union is racist. The party of Frederick Douglass and Colin Powell alike. I’m not too impressed by that argument.
Dodd
Al Gore.
Oh, sorry. I misread that. I thought you said “active duty military voters.”
GOP4Me
Good question. I honestly don’t know why John lets you lefties post so much around here…
DougJ
Why do the wingnuts like to sign their comments?
Richard Bottoms
My we do love our myths:
tb
Another crybaby. Maybe he likes debate.
GOP4Me
Bring it on.
But give me a couple hours, I have to sleep now. Post away, I’ll reply in the morning. Promise.
DougJ
It’s nuts over here, just nuts. I came here to get away from the madness of my new homes away from home — blogsforbush, rathergate (which I highly recommend, honestly can’t tell if it’s real or not), and scrutator — and I see it’s no better over here.
I can’t tell who is real and who isn’t in this thread. I’d like to think I’m responsible for that.
Richard Bottoms
>I can’t tell who is real and who isn’t in this thread. I’d like to think I’m responsible for that.
What a tangled web do we weave…
tb
OK, unleash hell after you’ve gotten your beauty rest. We’ll be hera.
ImJohnGalt
It’s so cute when a Republican comes and tries to impute Phelps to the Democratic party, as if your registration (how many decades ago did he register?) has anything to do with how you vote, or your current-day party affiliation (Zell Miller, anyone?).
Can we not just agree that Phelps is a complete whackjob who speaks only for himself, and not for either party? I’d have thought that was obvious, but no. Apparently Wade Churchill and Phelps speak for all Democrats.
Sheesh – you’d best come with better debating points after your night of shutabye than that, or you might as well not bother.
SeesThroughIt
Good recommendation with rathergate–that one’s a winner. B4B is great, too, mostly because Mark Noonan is freaking insane, and he’s getting more unhinged–openly unhinged–by the day.
DougJ
SeesThroughIt, this rathergate post is especially good.
Brian
Geez, I came back to the treasure trove of Leftist thumbsucking, and boy am I not disappointed. This site’s commenters, by and large a subset of the Kossacks, are a good barometer of what the oppostion party argues against, and the substance of those arguments.
Your opinions are empty calories. Cotton candy handed by a carny worker with Tourette’s Syndrome. Folks like ppGaz and Dick Bottoms have nothing to offer other than slurs and profanity. It’s simple just to skip over their posts now, because the responses are as predictable as the tides. pp’s “Fuck you very much” is representative of any and all of his posts. Dickie’s posts, for that matter, are short and profane when he has anything “original” to say, and long only when he’s co-opting material from someone with a brain who can form an actual thought. (Dickie: just give us the links from now on, and save us the disgusting side commentary.)
John Cole has good things to say, and he’s even-handed in his criticism. But the site’s unique in that it attracts a bad element (i.e. pp, Dick, et al) that is only comfortable swimming in a fever swamp made of its own waste. And where it can’t find one, it creates one so the fellow travelers can feel comfortable.
Youre’ reprehensible, but again, a great barometer on how well the GOP will do far into the future.
Richard Bottoms
While my comments may drive John to distraction, he knows they are mine and not a game to get his goat.
I actually like his blog. I switched from National Review Corner months ago.
It been interesting see him slowly come to realize that his one time party is being dragged down by religious intolerance, corruption, and incompetence.
It bothers him to see the president dissed, but deep down he has to know George Bush has earned this bitch slap.
I mean it quite completely when I say I have no need or desire to convert a single Republican to the Democratic side. I want the John Cole’s of the world to go vote Libertarian or stay home in 2006 & 2008.
Meanwhile the independent voters who thought they were getting compassion, fiscal responsibility, and competent government just have to swing a little bit our way.
We won’t make the mistake of believing our own echo chamber on the left. Netroots only goes so far. But wit Bush in the 30’s, all the incumbent Democrats ahead of their challengers and the debalce of the Medicare Prescription Plan just starting to sink in, it’s looking pretty good for the fall.
The Freepers can stick it in their asses, they have no where else to go.
We will not be Swiftvoted, our vote swindled. Nor will we neglect a single state this time around.
Terri Shiavo may have served a great purpose in her passing. The great slide started with that one Republican overreach.
A bridge too far indeed.
Richard Bottoms
Wow. I’ve never heard that one before.
Hey Beavis, he said Dick.
ppGaz
Mission Accomplished. As they say!
I think Brian is real, but he’s actually Charles Manson posting from Corcoran State Prison in California. While Charlie (Brian) has certainly made some strides with his ciphering, it’s clearn that he is still not a good candidate for parole, not ready to be reintroduced to society.
ppGaz
Richard, seriously, I agree with almost everything you say. I’m a fan, as you know. But John doesn’t give a rat’s ass about Bush being dissed. This entire thread is just a ballbust on his part. Trust me.
The Disenfranchised Voter
Nice post, Richard. Very well said.
The best indicator of Republicans losing votes, to me, is ImJohnGalt’s post.
By his handle, he is obviously a libertarian (rock on) and he is upset with the current GOP.
That should tell you guys something.
You’ve lost your way…
DougJ
Brian, check out this rathergate poem. I want to know what you think of it.
Sirkowski
Jesus fuck, is it so hard to understand??? She was an anti-war ACTIVIST! Think Cindy Sheenan, Malcom X, John Lennon, Rosa Parks, etc. Not meek bitches who will miss an opportuinity to throw rocks at the royalty. Who cares if it’s a funeral, it’s her funeral, not yours.
ppGaz
For a sane, rational, and most importantly, honest view of the King funeral …. this from WaMo. This is what good and serious blogging looks like, for those of you who hang around BJ all the time:
Amy Sullivan on King funeral
Otto Man
Sheesh, you should check out Polipundit. I haven’t seen that many wadded-up panties since the last time I went to Victoria’s Secret with the wife.
Steve
Wait, DougJ, that scrutator guy is for real? The one who said the only conceivable evidence of racism in the Republican Party was the McCain thing from South Carolina? No, seriously, you’re funning us again.
joe
Restaurant. Nice analogy. Way to trivialize the real-world impact that politics and the President can actually have — this apparently being the same thing as an order of chicken marsala. Now, if you hadn’t made such an absurdly reductive analogy, I probably would say that said restaurant owner has no fucking business being at the person’s funeral to begin with.
When I die, if I’ve dedicated my life to a cause the way Martin and Coretta King did, I’ll be bloody well offended if people DON’T talk about said cause. If President Bush et al are antithetical to the Kings’ cause, nothing is more proper than to mention, rather than ignore, that stunningly obvious fact.
Pooh
Dude, you know they have video cameras in those dressing rooms, right?
Brian
Clever, man. I’m free as a bird, and if you buy me a plane ticket to your town, I’ll be happy to show up and knock out your teeth then get on a return flight to L.A.
We have a website for people like you here in CA. You belong here, so best stay away.
Read a post from a fellow Democrat, who has the sanity and perspective to see what was wrong with the King funeral.
Brian
Is there a link?
The Disenfranchised Voter
After watching the Daily Show from Tonight, all I can do is laugh.
The Republican’s were owned. I kinda feel bad for them.
The Other Steve
You Republicans just never give up. 500 posts later, and you’re still whining about how nobody respects your authority.
The Disenfranchised Voter
It’s spelled authorita…
:)
JustCurious
Since so many are so sure what Mrs. King would have said to President Bush had she been able to attend her own memorial service, perhaps they also know what she might have said to Ted Kennedy whose brothers, no friends to her husband, authorized the wire taps on her and Dr. King. Or to the many politicians present who would fight to the (fetus’s) death for the right to choose an abortion, but would deny minority children the right to choose a school that isn’t failing them miserably. More than likely she would have understood that the President of the United States, whomever he might be, was an invited guest who was there to pay respects on behalf of the nation and would have behaved accordingly.
BTW, this is one of the most boring, boorish, worthless comments threads I have encountered. Are you all always like this? Because if so, there’s not much point in coming back.
4jkb4ia
I wonder if this story is a distraction from the NSA hearings. I will never know anything about whether this funeral was appropriate or not, because I didn’t see it and in my tradition funerals are very short. But I can read the transcript of the hearings, which I have not done yet because I wanted to know what John and Glenn Reynolds thought about this. Glenn’s point about Democrats hijacking the values of the civil rights movement when they are too riven among themselves to put forward a similar exalted purpose was good. I will now go back into hibernation.
4jkb4ia
Joe Theismann is OK, but Tirico and Kornheiser are clearly better.
4jkb4ia
All I know about the civil rights movement I learned from Taylor Branch.
Tag
First time vistor to this blog and I have some observations. I was a young man at the time of MLK’s greatest influence. The country was in a great struggle to find answers to the challenges it faced. MLK was able to get his voice heard above the din of all the hate speech on both sides. At the time of his death I was was greatly impressed by CSK’s firm dignity that she was able to maintain during those dark days and for the years since. When she had something to say she didn’t go “sheehan” and marginalize her views. She maintained a civil discourse. She was heard. Her message was given respect as she gave respect to those listening. Some of those who spoke at her funeral, in my view, went too far beyond this. The delivery and fracas that has ensued discounts their viewpoint and any reasonable dialogue becomes impossible.
I was not a great fan of our former President, but he was still my President and I afforded him the respect that he deserved. Even when I disaggreed with his actions and his policies. Had I ever had the opportunity to speak with him about areas in which we differed, I would certainly do so with my speech tempered in hopes to garner his consideration. Our current president deserves the same as should his successor.
We, as Americans should do the same between ourselves as well. Little good will come from viscious profanity laced attacks on one another. I dare say that most of our Moms would have washed our mouths out with soap if she heard us say some of the things posted here about our neighbors. We are talking to our neighbors aren’t we? I personally am passionate about my convictions and will defend them to the death, but your disagreement with my convictions does not marginalize your worth to me or to God who made us both. We can still live at peace with each other.
MLK dreamed of a day when we would be “judged not by the color of our skin but by the content of our character”. What does such hateful rhetoric say about our character? I wonder.
rilkefan
Brian, you’re sadly mistaken if you think Marshall Wittmann is a Democrat.
The Disenfranchised Voter
I’ll tell you this much. Pat Tillman is a true American hero. He didn’t blieve in the Iraq-War but he kept-on fighting for us!…
He was a true American Hero–May he rest in peace…
tb
Do you know something we don’t? Last time I checked, King was not a right-to-lifer or school vouchers advocate. If you have some evidence to the contrary please post it, otherwise stop projecting your right wing logic onto my leaders.
Kimmitt
Okay, you gave it away here.
druidbros
“….Every now and then I think about my own death, and I think about my own funeral. And I don’t think of it in a morbid sense. Every now and then I ask myself, “What is it that I would want said?” And I leave the word to you this morning….
I’d like somebody to mention that day, that Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to give his life serving others. I’d like for somebody to say that day, that Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to love somebody. I want you to say that day, that I tried to be right on the war question. I want you to be able to say that day, that I did try, in my life, to clothe those who were naked. I want you to say, on that day, that I did try, in my life, to visit those who were in prison. I want you to say that I tried to love and serve humanity.
Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice; say that I was a drum major for peace; I was a drum major for righteousness.”……MLK
And of course the Reagan funeral was totally devoid of political rhetoric. Yeah and pigs will soon fly.
Nuff Said.
Brian Astley
When Jimma’ Carter spoke of the “government ” illeagaly wiretapping the Kings, he neglected to represent the facts. This is not the first ,nor I expect the last time as the man is incompentant in every thing he has done.
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/prem/200207/garrow
“On October 10, 1963, U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy committed what is widely viewed as one of the most ignominious acts in modern American history: he authorized the Federal Bureau of Investigation to begin wiretapping the telephones of the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. Kennedy believed that one of King’s closest advisers was a top-level member of the American Communist Party, and that King had repeatedly misled Administration officials about his ongoing close ties with the man. Kennedy acted reluctantly, and his order remained secret until May of 1968, just a few weeks after King’s assassination and a few days before Kennedy’s own. But the FBI onslaught against King that followed Kennedy’s authorization remains notorious, and the stains on the reputations of everyone involved are indelible.”
Now is there one case, like this out of our current administration? No! BJ Clinton had peple harrassed by the IRS, and detained by the Secret Service frequently. Yet no outrage from the useful idiots.
For Democrats it is all about having the power, and keeping it. Not doing anything useful with it.
GOP4Me
You’re on scrutator?
Tell me who you are so I can IP ban you.
GOP4Me
“OK, unleash hell after you’ve gotten your beauty rest. We’ll be hera”
What’s it like sleeping with Zeus?
GOP4Me
I’m as real as you are, liberal. Why, are you going to start talking about the days when racism was really a problem in this country? You know, the days when liberals did it?
GOP4Me
For the record, he was fighting in Afghanistan. Not Iraq.
Get your facts straight. My great-granduncle probably didn’t support the war in Iraq either, or the war in Vietnam, since he was killed in the First World War and had no chance to form a political opinion on either conflict.
GOP4Me
???
Check our IPs. I’m not DougJ. I understand what he’s trying to do, discredit every conservative poster. I’m not him, I don’t like him, and I don’t appreciate him. To be fair, every once in a while he makes me laugh; but if he’s over on Scrutator and I figure out who he is, he’s getting banned.
BTW, I’ve been lurking here for over a year so I understand the dynamic that goes on around here: liberal wolfpacks ganging up on conservatives. Well, we’re not going to let you get away with it for too much longer.
unreasonable
Is this thread dead? Turns out the family played a video of Mrs. King speaking out against the war.
So sad that the republicans and the media are using Mrs. King in this way.
StupidityRules
GOP4Me uttered:
Actually, you need to straighten your facts… Pat Tillman did serve in Iraq.
Source
Jesse
Bottoms’ ramblings of: February 8th, 2006 at 4:29 pm
I have to give you credit, you post information even if it’s occasionally without a source. The point that you seemed to miss was that you stereotyped all Republicans. Your response was to pick debatable issues from individuals and again spread that across the group as though it indicated a problem of the whole. Since you asked what’s next, I’d suggest learning to see that people on both sides of the isle aren’t so easily labeled.
Jesse
Steve says February 8th, 2006 at 4:36 pm
that some of my points were pure comedy gold. He properly raps my knuckles for doing the very stereotyping that I’ve been criticizing. I’ll change my point to say that the Democrats who applauded the partisan ramblings of a forgotten hack preacher or a inept ex-President, given at a time when we should have been honoring a life that united the races rather than divided them, were petty, vindictive, and juvenile.
DougJ
Brian here’s the ling to the rathergate poem.
I’m pretty sure rathergate is for real. Not totally sure with scrutator or blogsforbush.
ppGaz
Actually, I’m a coyote by day, and a jackalope by night.
ppGaz
Now Charlie, you know that this kind of behavior is going to be used against you at your parole hearing next year.
Besides, I only put my teeth in when I’m eating corn on the cob or getting my picture taken.
Mikey
All the libs seem to think that Lowery and Carter told the “truth.”
If Carter were telling the whole truth about the wiretaps, he would have mentioned that the culprits were all Democrats (Bobby Kennedy and JFK included). And maybe he should have mentioned the evidence of MLK’s affairs that were contained in some of those tapes. If Carter really wanted to tell the truth, then he should have said the whole truth, not just the parts that made GWB look bad. Go ahead and make GWB take the heat for things he’s done. But why spare MLK and the Democrats. Only telling part of the story in this case was very DISHONEST on Carter’s part.
If Lowery were telling the truth he would have said THERE IS EQUAL OPPORTUNITY in this country, just not EQUAL EFFORT. You will never make me believe that a black man or woman that takes their education seriously will have any less of a chance to get into the college of their choice. And you will never make me believe that this black man or woman that gets into a good college and works hard will ever have less of an opportunity to get a good paying job. And you will never make me believe that a black man or woman who gets up everyday, goes to work, and looks for ways to do their job well will not be rewarded for their effort. And this black man or woman will be able to provide for his or her family just as well as any white person, any asian person, or any hispanic person who is willing to put forth the same effort.
The problem is not lack of OPPORTUNITY. The problem is lack of EFFORT. Too many black americans spend too much time feeding their grudges to take the time to achieve anything. Just like Bill Cosby said, the only people holding back black america is black america. If Joseph Lowery were telling the TRUTH, that is what he would have said.
The Disenfranchised Voter
He was moved from Afghanistan to Iraq after the war started.
Pat Tillman exemplifies the fact that we diverted our attention from Bin Laden to Saddam.
And lay off Brian guys. He’s not as close-minded as you think.
ppGaz
You got it wrong, of course. The mention was not about parties, it was about wiretapping. It’s the wiretapping that was the issue, and abuse of government power, no matter who does it.
But as long as people like you try to make it into a party thing, we won’t be able to fix the problem as easily. That makes you part of the problem.
The solution is to talk openly about it and treat as a matter of protection of liberties, not as a matter of party preference.
DougJ
Mikey, you’re a jackass.
Steve
Hahahaha! Oh no, please don’t “blogswarm” us!
Seriously, wow. Please, post more often, I can tell you would really liven up the joint.
4jkb4ia
JustCurious said:
>BTW, this is one of the most boring, boorish, worthless comments threads I have encountered. Are you all always like this? Because if so, there’s not much point in coming back.
Even though I came back, I second that.
Suppose, for five minutes, that, G-d forbid, Sharon were to die before the elections. Then we would certainly have a big to-do. Suppose that a speaker, with Bush or Rice or both in the audience, said that disengagement so far is not working.
Suppose that said speaker also said that Sharon’s legacy is damaged in part because of the USA’s failed policies, and the USA can do more in some kind of x-point plan. IMHO even LGF would be talking about the x-point plan, and anyone who even called the speaker ungrateful would get a lot of opposition from the (Israeli) right! I wish I could write the DovBear comments section on this hypothetical, but I am not that good. (The name of http://www.dovbear.blogspot.com is spreading far and wide) This controversy shows nothing more than that the parties can pick up any hammer to hit each other with, especially when the hammer involves race and the civil rights legacy, which can only be in flux when there are, pace Mikey, many frustrated, lost African Americans, and many who go to schools so dreadful that they are only partly to blame for being lost.
4jkb4ia
I will grant that Coretta Scott King had twice the moral stature of Sharon, and did not, even indirectly, kill anyone.
4jkb4ia
Let us even suppose that the speaker said two magic words: “Geneva Accord”. This unofficial agreement was absolutely discountenanced by the Bush administration, although Dore Gold mentioned in a speech that it is easy to put together these unofficial agreements in a European hotel and harder to sell them to the negotiators’ public. There is a lot of truth to this, because even official agreements have not been accepted without grumbling on either side.
ppGaz
Sorry, two minutes is all I can give you.
4jkb4ia
In the JPost today, Rice told Livni that the US would not be in favor of any more unilateral withdrawals! Hear, hear! (I am asking for anti-Semitic comments now)
4jkb4ia
I think it takes two minutes to read the post :)
ppGaz
Yes, I used up all your time. Try me again tomorrow.
Well, I had a Jewish girlfriend once and I really cared for her, but she wouldn’t put out.
Steve
There goes ppGaz, perpetuating hateful yet true stereotypes again.
A paradox of the Jewish community is that every Jewish girl wants to meet a Jewish guy, and every Jewish guy wants to meet a non-Jewish girl.
adk46er
I believe John is a reasonable person and I often agree with him, and even when I disagree I respect his opinion. None the less I haven’t visited his blog in months due to the cesspool his comments section has turned into… I recently removed BJ from my list of favorites, but today, clicked on the Hugh Hewitt link and discovered nothing has changed. As I’ve stated in the past were John to say the sun is hot many of the BJ regulars would argue that it isn’t.
To the specifics of this topic: lots of people here seem to believe anything that CSK stood for was fair game at her funeral. So I guess it would have been OK if either Bush 41 or 43, also took some political shots and talked about the filibusters led by democratic senators or by any number of local/state/national democratic politicians who belonged to the KKK.
ppGaz
What an ass you are. Really, I mean it. You have to be a spoof, nobody could actually be such an ass as you are.
You are DougJ, right?
Steve
Let me improve on your analogy. If Bush had gotten up and said how terrible it was that the Civil Rights Act was filibustered, I really doubt you would see any liberals say, “That’s a shot at Democrats! How dare you!”
If he had tried to say Democrats were the only ones against the Civil Rights Act, that would be cheap, yeah, mostly because it’s untrue. His dad might have had to get up and correct him.
Democrats don’t really spend much time defending shameless acts of decades past just because a Democrat may have committed them. It’s Republicans who are still obsessed with things like rehabilitating Joe McCarthy.
The Disenfranchised Voter
I’m glad morons like adk46er have left this blog.
Hopefully he/she won’t come back either.
Steve
I have no idea what I did to deserve this. All I did was agree that Jewish girls don’t put out!
Tongueboy
Jiminy Christmas, no wonder I rarely visit anymore. This place is infested with moral retards and playground blusterers, not to mention a platoon of Arthur Spooners who don’t possess an internal monitor to calibrate their behavior in a social setting. Good luck on that election thingy this fall.
4jkb4ia
Steve and ppGaz, cut!
Steve
What is with all the people who post here just to tell us they don’t post here?
Kate
Obviously Karl Rove planned the CSK funeral.
ImJohnGalt
Translation: We’ve laid in two months’ supply of twinkies and Mr. Pibbs. (+ Red vines=crazy delicious!), changed our underwear, and are ready to do binary battle on behalf of the 101st Keyboard Kommandos! Sure, we’ll miss our weekly D&D games (I have a particular Dark-Elf that I’m cultivating), but saving the universe from moonbats is so much more important than making sure the fries at our job are done to perfection.
ppGaz
Well, first of all, the sun isn’t hot in WV.
Second, he’d only say it in here if he thought it would troll up a lot of lefty churn. He’s on record posting things for the sole purpose of “pissing off” (his words) lefties here.
So, cut the crap.
ppGaz
There you go, advancing a cruel stereotype!
The Other Steve
I once had that same problem, except with a Catholic girl.
I think that makes me anti-catholic.
Tongueboy
What is with all the people who post here just to tell us they don’t post here?
Must be the lying posters who post lies.
Regards,
Stuart Smalley
Richard Bottoms
“Everthing’s Going So Well!”
— Harry Ziedler, Moulin Rouge
Barbara Jeanes
Perhaps someone should have pointed out to President Carter that the wiretapping of Martin Luther King, Jr. was authorized by Bobby Kennedy. I do believe he was a democrat.
Otto Man
Thanks for saving me the trouble of typing that.
Right-wingers seem to see everything as a matter of Us vs. Them and naturally saw Carter’s comments as yet another dirty liberal attack on conservatives. It’s the only way they see the world.
Anyone with a basic knowledge of American history would realize that if King were wiretapped during his heyday (1960-1968), it would’ve been done by a Democratic administration. And guess what? We agree that it was bad. Yes, the Democrats did something wrong. Republicans had nothing to do with the King wiretaps. Thanks for pointing that straw man out like a three year old at the farm.
Carter’s point was that government arguments to support wiretaps are often, in retrospect, wrong. King was wiretapped ostensibly because he was a suspected communist, but it was really done to get dirt on him and his private life. Now we’re told that people are getting spied on because they’re suspected terrorists, but who knows what the real goals are. (I’m not convinced there’s blackmail going on now, but Paul Craig Roberts — a former Reagan official who writes for the WSJ and National Review — sure seems to think so.)
Carter was arguing that government intrusion into our private lives must always be looked at with a skeptical eye. And only the most hyperpartisan conservatives would be able to lambast a former president for making what traditionally would’ve been a very conservative argument.
I guess now that Bush is in charge, all those principles went out the window.
ppGaz
Exactly. The only principle that applies under Bush is, what does Bush want? It’s all about him.
He’ll stamp his feet and claim that it’s about “protecting Americans” but of course that’s what power abusers always do, they claim that they’re doing it for you.
Listen to the slimeball Tom DeLay with Matthews the other day ….. what he “regrets” about the “unwarranted prosecution” against him is that it keeps him from doing all that important work ….. for you. It’s you he’s worried about.
And politicians wonder why we hate them. Bunch of lying cocksuckers, all of them.
Otto Man
When Robert Byrd finally retires, will all you conservatives have to go back to the factory to get new talking points?
Will there be an oldies station where we can tune in and hear the classics when we get nostalgic? You know, classic conservative talking points like “Crossburnin’ Byrd” and “Chappaquiddick!”
If not, perhaps one of the brainwashers can come out and explain why so many conservatives think that dredging up the past sins of individual Democrats does anything to improve the current state of incompetence, greed, and corruption that is the Republican Party. Is it because you’re incapable of reasoned argument? Or because your party’s own actions are simply indefensible?
Because everytime you say “Byrd was a Klansman” and “Kennedy was a drunk” all I hear is “Republicans have nothing to say.”
Mikey
How imbecilic can you get, DougJ? If that’s the intelligence level you operate on then here’s a response you can understand:
Oh yeah? So’s your old man DougJ.
Steve I.
Did Jacque Chirac use the Pope’s funeral to bash Bush?
Liberals, buy a clue.
Mac Buckets
Except that every newscast, including CBS and CNN (noted right-wingers?), also assumed that the comments were thinly-veiled attacks on Bush. Not one of them seemed to catch that it was really an unintended attack on a Democratic administration and a Kennedy in particular.
The Ace
The comments from the left are hilarious and astounding.
These kiddies will say anything to justify their behavior.
I’m quite certain had Alexander Haig stood up and pointed out how many on the left were moral equavilizers and communist appeasers and apologists during the Cold War, this current crop of dupes would be still saying:
“It was a funeral for a political person, of course there will be political speeches,” etc.
Yep, I’m positive.
Hypocrisy is a virtue for today’s left.
SeesThroughIt
Whatever, ppGaz. We know you’re a liger because it’s pretty much your favorite animal.
ppGaz
This is why we know that right-wingers are lying sonsoabitches. Nobody could BE THAT STUPID.
It was an attack on wiretapping.
Not a party, an act.
If the wiretapping shoe fits, then wear it, and shut the FUCK UP.
ppGaz
Meow.
Mikey
ppGaz – you say Carter’s wiretapping comment wasn’t about parties? That’s pretty naive of you (and hypocritical considering all of the conspiracies you’ve created in your mind about republicans).
There were a 100 other things Carter could have brought up regarding the hardships the Kings faced. That comment was a shot a the current administration, plain and simple, and not a very well thought out one at that.
Nikki
I think they’re trying to justify Bush’s wiretapping by saying the Kennedys did it, too. They just can’t seem to grasp that spying on Americans via wiretapping is NOT A GOOD THING NO MATTER WHO DOES IT!!!!
Otto Man
You mean the same networks that live in constant fear of the Brent Bozells of the world and take their cues from the right-wing outrage on talk radio and the pundit shows? I’m so surprised they once again saw things through the perspective of the right.
Nikki
Exactly Mikey! Not at Republicans, but at this administration. If Bush hadn’t done it, Carter couldn’t/wouldn’t have brought it up. Get it now?
Mikey
Not a “good” thing? Are you trying to claim the high moral ground here, Nikki? What makes it “bad” to wiretap people suspected have talking with terrorists?
Otto Man
Conservatives, buy a decent comparison.
Steve
First of all, both sides spend way too much time prattling on about “hypocrisy.”
Second, I really enjoy when these arguments take the form of “well, liberals aren’t actually BEING hypocrites, but I’m quite certain that if this ridiculous hypothetical situation were to occur, then they would be hypocrites!”
Third, if someone had stood up at Reagan’s funeral and made some Coulter-like rant against liberals, I would think he was an ass, but I doubt I would get all sanctimonious about how awful it was to do that at a funeral. And really, equating the few “offensive” lines that were delivered at Mrs. King’s funeral with a speech “pointing out how many on the left were moral equavilizers and communist appeasers and apologists during the Cold War” really shows how desperate some people are to make this issue into a political rallying point for Republicans.
Mikey
You know old Slick Willy would have gotten a pass if he were in office. That makes it a “party” thing.
Steve
Yeah, and if you had actually watched the funeral, rather than assuming the entire thing was the 4 or 5 snippets you heard about from OUTRAGED! right-wing bloggers, maybe you would have heard about some of those hardships.
ppGaz
Nope, it was a shot at the current wiretapping activities.
It’s clearly too obvious for you to get it.
Otto Man
Exactly when did conservatives morph into Gladys Kravitz, the nosy neighbor from “Bewitched”?
All they want to do these days is stick their noses into other people’s business. First, with Terri Schiavo, they decided they’d tell other people how to die, and now with CSK, they’ve decided to tell other people how to mourn.
And yet they still think of themselves as “small-government” conservatives. Cute.
realist
Another example of Republican grand-standing
Terri Schiavo
An heck, she wasn’t even dead yet….
Otto Man
Only in your fevered imagination. Everything is a partisan thing to you, it seems.
This was a critique of government wiretapping, and one that invoked a specific instance that had been authorized by Democrats and done so 40 years ago. Only a paranoid narcissist could read those words as an attack on Republicans of today.
I knew that Republicans had a 14th century view of science that placed the earth at the center of the universe. But I guess Bush is now the true center, and everything moves in relation to His Glory.
jg
If Bush didn’t always hide from opposition he wouldn’t get hit with this stuff when he does finally show up in an environment not peopled with synophants.
Mikey
Heard ’em, Steve-o. Doesn’t change the fact that Jimmy the Peanut is still dishonest and that he included that particular comment just to stick it to GWB.
ppGaz – If it’s so obvious, why can’t you convince anybody? Even the liberal pundits agree with me. Apparently it’s only obvious to you. Lonely?
Otto Man
Amen. If all the people here who are insisting a funeral was the wrong forum for confronting the president could please point to a single other place where citizens can speak to Dear Leader without being pre-screened, pre-approved, and patriotically-sanitized, maybe the critics could use that instead.
Otto Man
Dishonest? How? Are you saying the Kings weren’t wiretapped?
Nikki
Ok, the next time Clinton’s in office, get him to do some wiretapping, find a liberal activist whose wiretapping was authorized by a Democratic administration, get that activist to die and then, at the funeral, get Carter to mention the wiretapping in front of Clinton.
Will that satisfy you?
Mac Buckets
Again, notice how GHW Bush gave a long speech at Reagan’s funeral and never felt it was necessary to take shots at Carter and Clinton. One side knows what is proper and civil, the other doesn’t.
Nonsense, they can mourn how they want — they just can’t expect people to give their classless displays a free pass.
Mikey
Heck no! The last thing I want is for any Clinton to be back in the White House. Think about the cleaning bill!!
Mac Buckets
Hilarious. As if I could’ve called up Clinton for a meeting in 1998. You guys are utterly divorced from reality. You live in Ted Rall land now.
Nikki
So are you now willing to admit that Carter’s wiretapping statements were not partisan? Because even you must realize that that Clinton argument was really weak.
Steve
If by “people” you mean “right-wing pundits,” you might be hovering closer to reality there. But those right-wing pundits weren’t trying to score political points, they were just genuinely outraged, right?
Mikey
Hardly.
Otto Man
Christ, that’s a pathetic comparison.
The whole point of criticism of current policies — say, Iraq and Katrina — was that they’re current policies. Speaking out on those matters now, with the most powerful man in the world present, might get something done about those matters now. What would the point of GHWB criticizing Carter or Clinton in 2004? To get them to travel back in time and correct their mistakes?
Now, when they were in power, sure, criticizing them would’ve made sense because such criticism could have good effects. As it did when Elie Weisel used the somber stage of the opening of the Holocaust Museum in 1993 to turn around and lecture President Clinton about the need to intervene in Bosnia. That’s a proper comparison.
Let me ask the conservatives this: If a soldier dies in Iraq, and he was someone who passionately believed in the cause and hoped it would continue even after his death, would it be appropriate for his loved ones to mention that at his memorial service?
ppGaz
I’m not out to convince anybody.
Otto Man
Nice straw man. Clinton appeared at countless town hall meetings, public events, and other fora where he came into contact with common people.
Bush lives in a hermetically sealed bubble, where every public appearance is treated like a Republican campaign event, even if it’s paid for by the taxpayers. He’s the Ziploc President.
tb
So, you’re saying niggers are lazy. How do you know this? Did your daddy tell it to you?
Richard Bottoms
Snap!
srv
It is good that we wiretap Americans who are suspected of talking with suspected terrorists. It’s good that we don’t know the criteria used, or the number of Americans monitored. It’s even better that the AG doesn’t want to provide any information on how many Americans have been incorrectly monitored, and how long that data is maintained and by whom. It’s good that they’re all just assumed to be terrorists.
We can be sure we’ll win this battle, only so long as we trust our president, don’t ask questions, and submit as necessary.
Steve
Wasn’t there a Rose Garden ceremony once where Clinton was receiving the Olympic team, or something of the sort, and one of the honorees suddenly confronted Clinton about something or another? I just remember him handling it very smoothly – although I thought Bush was good at the funeral, as well, and probably didn’t take 1/10000th of the offense that others are manufacturing on his behalf.
Mikey
First of all, I find the n-word offensive. Other than that, I would say, yes, as a culture, I would characterize them as being lazier than other cultures in general.
Brian
Doug,
I read the poem. Got a chuckle from it, although as a piece of poetry, it lacks talent. I can appreciate the poet’s intent and understand his anger at WaPo/Toles.
Rathergate is definitely for real. It came out of the Rather/60 Minutes/Mary Mapes hit piece on Bush before the election. I read the blog daily, but wondered what its purpose would be after the controversy was over. After Rather was gone from the Newscast, I dropped the blog from my favorites. Glad to see that its still there, and posting with enthusiasm.
Pooh
I can’t believe this thread is still going.
Well played John. Best. Troll. Ever.
Your corporate overlords are pleased.
tb
You’d also have to get Clinton and the entire Democratic party to systematically ignore or thwart the needs of the black community for 140 years or so. And you’d have to cap it with some Katrina-like situation where Clinton plays his saxophone while blacks are dying in the streets.
tb
You must not be racist then.
How do you know this? Did your daddy tell you, or did you do a study, or what?
Mikey
tb – sounds like you’re spending a lot of time nursing your grudge.
tb
No, I’m just asking you a question. You said blacks are lazy. How do you know this?
Derrick
First of all tb, I’m guessing from your post that your not black so you have no idea what has thwarted the black community for the past 140 years. What has thwarted the black community are conservatives like GWB who told us that we shouldn’t rush the whole getting out of slavery thing, conservatives who said that the gov’t would be wasting federal dollars providing black people with 40 acres and a mule, conservatives who felt that states should have the right to treat black people anyway that they wanted because it was their “states right”, that we should have to pay to vote in an election, conservatives who felt that poof all of sudden that we live in some color-blind utopia, so just forget about that whole racisim, Jim Crow, not allowing you to attend our schools thing. Look at the numbers, African-Americans did much better financially under the first 4 years of Clinton than we will under the full 8 of GW.
Mikey
Let’s just say that’s my opinion based on experience, and based off of well-known statistics regarding drop-out rates, crime rates, percentages of people getting government assistance, homeownership, etc.
SeesThroughIt
Awesome. This is the perfect punchline to this weirdo thread,
tb
They’re not well-known to me. What is your source for these statistics? And how do you extrapolate from them that “blacks” are lazier than “whites”?
ppGaz
This kind of thing is made for John’s trolling … and look, he got himself a troll troll, mikey, the spoofed troll who says that blacks are a “lazier” culture!
He and Mac Buckets just can’t quit each other.
You can’t invent this kind of entertainment.
Steve
The perfect punchline, and the perfect slogan for modern conservatism.
dagon
mikey:
i rest my case
peace
Mikey
tb – When education is free, why is there such a large percentage of blacks that don’t graduate when compared to other cultures?
'eathen
Bush was there as the President — representing the people of the US — to honor a woman who’s moral integrity transcended partisan politics.
The speakers should have confined their remarks to honoring her memory, legacy and ideals. Using the occasion to try to score cheap political points off another attendee is classless.
ppGaz
DougJ — this thread proves the power of the spoof.
Mikey is the textbook spoofed troll, and the perfect foil for John’s tiresome (and overused) bathos-based troll (Oh, the humanity! Politics at a {gasp} funeral!)
It’s perfect.
ppGaz
Wow, 600 posts too late. That’s the longest “me too” I’ve ever seen in here.
dagon
mikey:
–mikey, i hope you are aware that you are demonstrating either some severely racist tendencies or a staggeringly limited knowledge of american history in regards to the government sanctioned DENIAL of equal educational opportunites.
it’s probably both.
peace
tb
Come on, don’t insult my intelligence. Everybody knows it’s because they’re stupid.
Mikey
If blacks are so divergent, then why did 88% of blacks vote democrat in 2004? That’s a higher % than evangelicals voting republican (78%), or gays voting democrat (77%).
I’d like to know what the republicans ever did to deserve the animosity the black community bestows on them. Republicans didn’t create “Jim Crow” laws. Democrats did. Republicans didn’t filibuster the Civil Rights Act. Democrates did. So, what have Democrats ever done to deserve such lock-step support?
dagon
mikey:
did you even bother to read my post?
peace
Mikey
You may think that’s funny, tb, but I don’t. I don’t believe that blacks are stupid. I believe they have just as much God-given ability as any other culture. I just don’t think they try as hard to use that potential.
Kimmitt
Seriously, mayonnaise on breakfast cereal.
dagon
mikey:
man, you’re killing me:
try looking into the mirror. you are a what?……D, I, L or R.
peace
Steve
Remember, when your guy gets 51% of the vote, it’s a mandate proving the country agrees with your values. When the other guy gets 88% of the black vote, it just goes to show you black people aren’t smart enough to know their own interests. Maybe if they weren’t so lazy and showed up to school once in a while, they’d understand that Lincoln was a Republican.
The Disenfranchised Voter
Straight up fucking bullshit. Take your head out of your ass.
Russ
As a conservative, if a cycical one, I thoroughly enjoy this.
80% of the nation knows how it will vote – nothing is going to change the vote of either side’s base.
The challenge is to get the middle 20%. I really think the democrats could get that if they could turn off their loonier fringe from speaking so loudly. However, the extreme left wants to shout from rooftops about how Chimpy McBushHitler is an evil Nazi. Here’s some news for you guys – whether you like it or not, that middle 20% doesn’t agree with you that he is blatantly evil, no matter how much you wish they believed it.
You might not like that your rhetoric turns off the middle voter, but it’s reality. Yes, there are fruit loops on the right as well, but they have been easily dismissed for the last 25 years or so, and the loud ones do not hold major positions inside the vocal party. In other words, those in power know how to be quiet.
Think back to the Wellstone funeral. That sham likely cost Mondale the elction, simply because it turned others off. I know you might think that’s unfair, or people are reacting stupidly, but it doesn’t change reality. If you want to continue to shout about this stuff, go right ahead, but don’t then get pissed when you are out of power for a generation.
I, for one, want people like Bottoms, Pacifica, Steve, and Mr. Furious to keep talking and getting their message out. The Republicans will laugh all the way to a 60 seat, filibuster proof majority. At that point, all the screeching in the world won’t help you.
Mikey
dagon – I read your post. Where does it say anything objective? I read about “darkest shit,” “wicked and corrupt motherfuckers,” “underlying currents behind politics,” and “we do know where our bread is being buttered.” All of those statements say a bunch of nothing. And based on all that nothing-ness, the conclusion is:
I don’t see where you’ve shown/said anything that answers the questions as to WHY SO MUCH HATRED TOWARDS REPUBLICAN?
DougJ
Can’t you all see what hypocrites you are? Both sides equally. This is the kind of hypocrisy that turns voters off. It’s why most Americans don’t even vote. They look around blogs like this and they say “both sides are hypocrites, both sides are mud slingers”. Why can’t we have a reasoned debate on the facts in this blog? That’s what the voters want.
dagon
mikey, have you ever heard of the Southern Strategy?
–and you are aware that the mindset and the architects that created all of that ‘wicked shit’ that i was talking about all migrated to the republican party almost 50 years ago over the issue of segregation?
for the love of the ‘invisible cloud being’ man! take a class.
peace
The Disenfranchised Voter
God I love irony.
Is this Mikey guy for real?
tb
You look at the statistics and say “blacks are lazy”, I look at the statistics and say “blacks are stupid”. What’s the difference?
ppGaz
I dunno, Dougie. Judging by today’s political climate, it appears to be the only thing that turns them on.
The Ace
Straight up fucking bullshit. Take your head out of your ass
Liberal dupe:
Not only did Clinton do the exact same things, his Administration made more radical legal arguments.
Your ignorance of such matters is not an argument, nor is it persuasive.
Pooh
Him being 137 years old and largely incoherent had nothing to do with it, you’re right.
Steve
But my friend, why don’t people like Rush Limbaugh, who say liberals should be stuffed and mounted in museums, turn off the moderate middle?
Oh. Well, the Vice-President of the United States appears regularly on Rush’s show, if that’s any evidence of how marginalized he is.
I know you’re just trying to offer some good-faith advice to help Democrats get elected, friend, but I really don’t understand how you think you have a valid case.
The Disenfranchised Voter
Find me someone from the “left” who called Bush either Hitler or a Nazi in the comments. You’re projecting.
Dude, you’re obviously not one of the 20% in the middle you speak of. I am, and I think you’re talking out of your ass. The radical right are in power, in all areas of the government, and have much more influence than the radical left.
DougJ
That’s right, ace. Clinton did many things that were much worse than anything Bush has been accused of: Travelgate, Filegate, Firebombgate, Socksgate. They all involved truly egregious abuses of power. But we don’t hear about them because of the librul MSM.
Mikey
Stupid means incapable. Lazy means unwilling. Big difference.
The Ace
Carter was arguing that government intrusion into our private lives must always be looked at with a skeptical eye.
Really?
You mean except for taking my money and giving it to others via entitlements, right?
So my overseas telephone calls (international by defintion) are “private” but my bank account isn’t nor are my wages?
Makes sense.
Why don’t you intellectual cowards on the left admit you do not believe this country is worth defending rather than making silly “limited government” claims which given your public policy positions over the last 60 years do not stand scrutiny?
Steve
Did you happen to see Mondale at the Democratic convention, proudly casting Minnesota’s votes for Kerry? So jovial, so full of life, so confused that the other delegates practically had to remind him who they were voting for. Love that man.
I love Dan Fouts too, mind you, but I wouldn’t like my team’s chances if we had to bring him off the bench in the 4th quarter!
Steve
Ooh, ooh! Tell us again how Jamie Gorelick, the architect of 9/11, had the audacity to argue that physical searches weren’t covered under FISA!
The Disenfranchised Voter
I’m not a liberal you stupid shit. I’m a libertarian. And you incorrect. Clinton did not authorized the NSA to conduct warrantless wiretaps on American Citizens. His Executive order explicitly forbade warrentless wiretaps if an American citizen was involved. If you actually fucking read the executive order you would know this. Instead you are just a gullible fucking moron who believes anything that backs up Lord Bush’s policies.
You shouldn’t be lecturing anyone on ignorance, fuckhead.
DougJ
Potato, potahtuh. What is irrefutable is that George Bush has done more for African-Americans of all races than Clinton ever did.
DougJ
Osama bin Gorelick is the government official most responsible for 911. She might as well have flown the planes into the towers herself.
DougJ
Ace, Mikey: where my dawgs at? I’m fighting off the moonbats alone here.
The Ace
Ooh, ooh! Tell us again how Jamie Gorelick, the architect of 9/11, had the audacity to argue that physical searches weren’t covered under FISA!
Yo don’t know the topic, so why are you opining?
Here is some information you are obviously unaware of:
SHARING TITLE III ELECTRONIC SURVEILLANCE MATERIAL WITH THE INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY (2000)
Clinton’s OLC First established that policy in 1994.
Hint: The Congress had not declared war at that point.
The Ace
I’m not a liberal you stupid shit. I’m a libertarian
Disinfranchised Moron:
I wasn’t speaking to you.
You shouldn’t be lecturing anyone on ignorance, fuckhead
To say you are ignorant is being kind.
You don’t have the slightest clue on these topics, moron.
The Ace
Clinton did not authorized the NSA to conduct warrantless wiretaps on American Citizens
Neither did President Bush, “fuckhead”
Nikki
They begat a party that included you.
And this is me speaking from the perspective of a black woman.
The Ace
Gee, who authored this?
The Disenfranchised Voter
Oh you weren’t? That’s odd because you quoted me in your post.
Nice try, you stupid shit.
Please. Do yourself a favor and actually go read both Clinton and Carter’s Executive orders for yourself instead of eating the bullshit you’ve been fed by the Republican spin machine.
DougJ
Ace: shock and awe baby, shock and awe. You blasted these moonbats out of the water.
Bring it on, moonbats.
Let’s roll.
The Ace
Please. Do yourself a favor and actually go read both Clinton and Carter’s Executive orders for yourself instead of eating the bullshit you’ve been fed by the Republican spin machine.
Moron:
Unlike you, I’ve actually worked in these areas.
I don’t need to “go read” anything.
Your silly diatribes are not fact.
They are silly diatribes.
Please see SHARING TITLE III ELECTRONIC SURVEILLANCE MATERIAL WITH THE INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY (2000)
and get back to me.
Tongueboy
I am not sure what planet people are from when they think it is appropriate to attack someone who is attending a service to honor someone.
Planet Balloon Juice, it appears. The personal is political. Politics trumps common decency.
Mikey
dagon – don’t give me that “southern strategy” crap. If you study the history of that concept, it’s about states’ rights, not disenfranchising blacks or any other minority. You’re just being paranoid.
The “architects” of segregation were the Democrats. It was the Democrats that passed segregation laws, as well as laws disenfranchising blacks (and sometimes poor whites) politically.
Take a class yourself.
Peace.
The Disenfranchised Voter
The Ace.
You are indeed one stupid mofo. Go ahead moron. Argue that FISA is unconstitutional. Be my guest.
I’ll be more than happy to take this debate to the 4th Amendment of the Constitution.
Lines
Mikey = Rick
Cordially = Peace.
And its neither cordial nor peaceful. Discuss.
The Disenfranchised Voter
Hmm. Interesting theory, Lines. I think you may be on to something.
The Ace
You are indeed one stupid mofo. Go ahead moron. Argue that FISA is unconstitutional. Be my guest.
I’ll be more than happy to take this debate to the 4th Amendment of the Constitution
Proving your stupidity.
Every court which has ruled on the matter has recognized an exception to the general warrant requirement for the gathering of foreign intelligence.
Not open for debate, the opinions on the matter have been unanimous, no court has concluded otherwise.
FISA is probably unconstitutional, however, the Administration is not arguing so.
For the record, Attorney General Griffen Bell unambiguously testified that Carter was in no way renouncing his inherent authority by acceding to FISA.
The Ace
Also for the record:
The Clinton OLC asserted that even though the criminal wiretap statute (18 USC Sec 2510 et seq.) purports to limit the executive branch’s ability to disclose wiretap information, the President was free to ignore those statutory provisions where limiting “the access of the President and his aides to information critical to national security or foreign relations . . . would be unconstitutional as applied in those circumstances.”
But hey, it’s a naked “power grab” by King George dammit!!
The left is represented by, and wallows in ignorance.
ppGaz
Too nasty for Rick. And the racist crap? I don’t think that Rick would do that. Just my 2 cents worth.
The Disenfranchised Voter
Not when gathering that foreign intelligence involves an American citizen.
dagon
mikey:
oh my bad…err..what was i thinking? of course there was no ‘southern strategy’. how dare i propose that there ever could be such a thing. i defer to your obviously superior grasp of history.
umm, so strom thurman DIDN’T lead the racist dixiecrat wing of the democratic party to the republicans in 1964, where they still reside today. my bad.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strom_Thurmond
like i said. take a fucking class
peace
The Disenfranchised Voter
*involves evasdropping on an
The Ace
Not when gathering that foreign intelligence involves an American citizen
Whatever.
Why don’t you just repeat your silly mantra’s over & over and maybe they will be true.
For the record that statement is false.
The courts have spoken in unanimity on the matter regardless of whether or not the person was a US Citizen.
(Only a complete and utter idiot would think that courts would create a exception to the general warrant requirement for non US Citizens) But hey, “libertarian” these days means you’re young, stupid, and take drugs, so who is surprised…
SeesThroughIt
Yeah, I agree. Rick could be quite the curmudgeon, but there was no indication that he held any of the racist opinions mikey espouses. I think Rick was well above that.
The Disenfranchised Voter
Hey Ace, since you claim I’m wrong, how about you back up your claims with some evidence?
Oh wait, that’s right. You’re just talking out of your ass.
Go fuck yourself buddy. You’re obviously a gullible retard.
The Ace
Hey Ace, since you claim I’m wrong, how about you back up your claims with some evidence?
Why bother? You think it will change your silly, ignorant mind?
I’ve already provided you with the previous administration’s claims to the legal authority in this area, and you keep repeating nonsense.
United States v. Duggan, 743 F.2d 59 (2nd Cir. 1984)
and
United States v. Butenko, 494 F.2d 593 (3rd Cir. 1974)
Refute everything you’re trying to claim.
You are a liar and a fool.
Nothing more
Mikey
dagon – so one convert who could only muster 39 electoral votes is representative of the republican party? Hardly. And was Strom Thurmond the originator of the “Southern Strategy?” No, he wasn’t.
And your response still doesn’t prove anything about today’s republican party being racist. Takes tough nipples to nurse that grudge, doesn’t it?
Wikipedia isn’t school, dimwit. Use your brain.
Take several classes.
Peace.
The Ace
For the record, United States v. [Cassius] Clay, 430 F.2d 165 (5th Cir. 1970).
Specifically involved US Citizens.
The Ace
sorry forgot to close the tag
Otto Man
First of all, everything you said about southern Democrats opposing civil rights measures in the 1960s is true. But you’re forgetting that starting in 1964, when the Republican presidential candidate ran on a platform opposing the Civil Rights Act and the Democratic president was pushing for it, those southern Democrats started jumping ship and moving over to the Republicans — Strom Thurmond led the way, and his aide Harry Dent brought more on board in the coming years.
As late as 1960, blacks still supported the GOP because it seemed to still have remnants of the party of Lincoln. About a quarter of black Americans voted for Nixon that year, but once the GOP made its opposition to the CRA clear with Goldwater in 1964, that was erased. Do you know the percentage of blacks that voted Republican in 1964? 0.00%
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the Republicans realized that they’d lost the black vote for good and so played up the appeal to white southerners through the “southern strategy” designed to win over the segregationists who supported George Wallace in the ’64 Democratic primaries and his ’68 independent run. Nixon instituted a program of what he called “benign neglect” of the civil rights community, and his Department of Justice sided with segregationists in school desegregation cases and tried to block renewal of the Voting Rights Act.
Reagan? Started his 1980 campaign in the tiny town of Philadelphia, Mississippi, with a speech praising “states rights”. Why Philadelphia, MS? It was where three civil rights activists had been killed in 1964 — later seen in the movie “Mississippi Burning.” Reagan’s administration and the civil rights policies under William Braford Reynolds tried to turn the clock back on civil rights gains of the 1960s. Heck, they even opposed the creation of the national holiday to honor MLK.
The 1990s? GHW Bush followed Lee Atwater’s own southern strategy with the highly racist Willie Horton ads, and proved he didn’t care with the inept response to the LA riots. Meanwhile, congressional Republicans like Senators Trent Lott, Jesse Helms, and Strom Thurmond — all of whom got their start in explicitly segregationist politics — were keeping close ties with racist groups like the Council of Conservative Citizens (heir to the polite Klan of the White Citizens Councils).
Gee, why would blacks consider the Republican Party to be the home of racists? (No, I’m not saying that all Republicans are racists. But, gee, it sure does seem clear that all the racists are Republicans.)
Otto Man
No, Republican strategist Kevin Phillips was the originator. He wrote a best-selling 1969 book about it, called “The Emerging Republican Majority” and he and other Nixon aides bragged about the plan in the press constantly.
The Ace
Hey Ace, since you claim I’m wrong, how about you back up your claims with some evidence?
How about you cite me a single court ruling which says the President must obtain a warrant to gather foreign intelligence.
United States v. Truong, 629 F.2d 908 (4th Cir. 1980)
Now stop with your moronic diatribes.
The argument has been engaged and you have been crushed.
dagon
mikey,
*sigh* it wasn’t one convert. it was a movement. and i never said that thurman was the originator of the ‘souther strategy’. that came much later. during thurman’s time there wasn’t much need for a ‘southern strategy’ because the entire nation was lagely comprised of racial statists.
the ‘southern strategy’ gets its modern coinage from the 1980 presidential run by reagan.
–actually man, i don’t think that today’s republican party is racist. but it’s that fact that the bastards they continue to put up for national office still have a tendency to court white racist, by using thinly veiled ‘states right’ code, making speaches at bob jones university and giving a wink and a nudge to far-right religious wackos (teri schiavo) and other socially intolerant scum.
that’s how these clowns get elected.
peace
Otto Man
Yeah, noted hardcore leftists like Grover Norquist, Paul Weyrich, David Keene, Bob Barr, and others have all argued that the president has gone too far here. Moonbats all of them.
Pb
I look at statistics, and I see that blacks are poorer. Incidentally, poverty is on the rise, and has been for the past 5 years or so, go figure…
Steve
I guess I’ve been called upon to give a legal opinion.
My legal opinion is that “The Ace” is another one of these guys who likes to cut and paste legal arguments from places like Powerline, where they give you only half the story, and he does a lot of yelling and calling people “fuckhead” a lot so they’ll assume he must know what he’s talking about.
As for the actual law, “The Ace” challenges us to find even ONE CASE which says the President must obtain a warrant to gather foreign intelligence, citing for support the case of United States v. Truong.
Okay, I will give you such a case: United States v. Truong.
In plain English, Truong says that foreign intelligence surveillance by the President must be conducted in accordance with FISA’s warrant requirements. Mr. Truong, who was a Vietnamese spy, didn’t get the benefit of that ruling because he was spied on before FISA was enacted.
Since real lawyers don’t typically conclude their briefs by saying things like “you have been crushed,” I will resist the temptation to add a closing taunt.
Pooh
My those are some obese trolls.
Mikey
Well, I’m glad to hear you say that you don’t think the party is racist. At least that’s a step. However, your caveat about republicans courting white racists is ignorant. Let’s see, if I can show you that Democrats court criminals, will you then agree that Democrats are criminals?
Just because some wacko votes republican or democrat doesn’t make it reasonable to impune that exception to be the intention of the entire party.
I still don’t see any solid reason for blacks to reject the republican party in such vast numbers.
Otto – your conspiracy theories regarding Reagan and “Mississippi Burning” and GHWB and the “Willie Horton” ads are just that – conspiracy theories (aka, paranoia). The Willie Horton ad was not intended to be racist. It was intended to ridicule Dukakis and create an impression that he was soft on crime and had poor judgment. If Dukakis had released a white murderer who then killed someone, I have no doubt that Willie Whiteguy would have been in the ads. To say those ads are racist are just as paranoid as the black women who filed a complaint about a police officer eating a banana, claiming that just by eating it, he was comparing blacks to monkeys. Needless to say, that complaint was dismissed as frivolous.
The Ace
I guess I’ve been called upon to give a legal opinion
By whom?
My legal opinion is that “The Ace” is another one of these guys who likes to cut and paste legal arguments from places like Powerline, where they give you only half the story, and he does a lot of yelling and calling people “fuckhead” a lot so they’ll assume he must know what he’s talking about.
Re-read the postings, moron, I was referred to that first.
Anyway to your “point,” as a someone who feels entitled to give legal “opinions” (which nobody has asked for) you surely recognize that in Truong nobody was arguing that it was unconstitutional.
You repeating an argument nobody is making isn’t persuasive.
Further, you should be able to see such distinctions as a “lawyer” who issues “legal opinions” and such.
The Truong decision is not saying what you are saying it is, which is what I find most comical.
Since real lawyers don’t typically conclude their briefs by saying things like “you have been crushed,” I will resist the temptation to add a closing taunt.
Um, since you didn’t “crush” anything, nor refute anything I’ve said, you certainly can not make that statement.
The Ace
Yeah, noted hardcore leftists like Grover Norquist, Paul Weyrich, David Keene, Bob Barr, and others have all argued that the president has gone too far here. Moonbats all of them.
Um, does that mean the left isn’t in hysterics over this?
Where were these people in 1994 when the Clinton Admin was saying such things to Congress?
Steve
Exactly, my foul-mouthed friend. Truong says that the President needs a warrant when FISA says he does, and that he doesn’t need a warrant when one of FISA’s exceptions applies. This is distinct from a garden-variety case of criminal investigation, where a “blanket warrant requirement” applies.
These statements from Truong are the polar opposite of your assertion that the President never needs a warrant for foreign intelligence surveillance.
The Ace
While the Act suggests that it is possible for the executive branch to conduct at least some types of foreign intelligence surveillance while being subject to a warrant requirement, the complexity of the statute also suggests that the imposition of a warrant requirement, beyond the constitutional minimum described in this opinion, should be left to the intricate balancing performed in the course of the legislative process by Congress and the President.
Arguing that this case requires the Executive to get a warrant is silly & absurd.
Nothing you have posted on the matter refutes my original excerpts from the decision.
Your posting indicates that these judges:
Don’t know the law and do not know what Truong said.
That is not a contention on your part which can be taken seriously.
SeesThroughIt
You probably also don’t see the point of this juxtaposition. Hell, you can’t even see the obvious when it’s right in front of you.
Steve
Wow. Lee Atwater apologized to Dukakis on his deathbed for exploiting the race issue in that campaign. The guy who created the Willie Horton ad called Horton’s picture “every suburban mother’s greatest fear.” It’s really amazing the lengths to which modern conservatives will go to claim that racism is some historical oddity that died out in the 1960s.
The Disenfranchised Voter
I read about the court pre-FISA and the only two decisions were the two you cited. While they did rule for warrantless wiretaps, that doesn’t mean they are right. Furthermore, there is no SC decision on the matter. It was only two lower court decisions. With that said, FISA was enacted shortly after, likely in response to these ridiculous rulings (one by a court that had 2 ex-KKK members on it I might add), and FISA strictly forbids against warrantless wiretaps if it involves evasdropping on an American Citizen.
Otto Man
No, it means that the people in hysterics over this aren’t just on the left. Bush has crossed the line so far that even people on his own side are alarmed.
The Ace
Truong says that the President needs a warrant when FISA says he does, and that he doesn’t need a warrant when one of FISA’s exceptions applies.
The former Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court disagrees with you.
He sat on that court.
The Ace
No, it means that the people in hysterics over this aren’t just on the left. Bush has crossed the line so far that even people on his own side are alarmed
Actually, it means you found 4 Republicans.
You have no answer for the Clinton Admin’s actions, which followed the same legal standards.
The Ace
FISA strictly forbids against warrantless wiretaps if it involves evasdropping on an American Citizen.
Wrong.
It says no such thing.
Please
Just
Stop
Mike
When the clinton’s were taking money from the chinese to get re-elected, and giving away rocket technology to make their icbm’s more accurate to hit our nation, where were all the protests then? These same leftists who constantly bash bush will eventually be the ones crying when their children are blown up by terrorists or nation’s like China who were coddled by Clinton. Just sickening to see the conduct at this funeral, and how the MSM tried to downplay it.
dagon
mikey:
of course you don’t. you’re too busy trying to tell us how much lazier we are than other cultures to give us the benefit of the doubt on whether we can decipher racist code or not.
the sad thing is that you probably don’t think that your remarks about blacks and laziness are racist in the slightest. THAT’S the problem with you and your blinders about the modern republican party. they sure aint ‘conservative’
frankly, i have more respect for the thugs over at stormfront.
peace
Steve
For the third time, Truong does not say the President needs a warrant in every case. That would be a “blanket warrant requirement.”
Truong simply says that, because the President has inherent power to conduct warrantless foreign intelligence surveillance, it would be improper to require him to get a warrant in ALL cases. Accordingly – and this is straight from the language I cited – the President needs a warrant where FISA requires it, and he doesn’t need one where FISA grants him an exception.
Your misreading of In re Sealed Case to claim that the President can never, ever be required to get a warrant because of his “inherent power” is common in the conservative blogosphere, but again, this is what I mean about being a Powerline disciple without an independent understanding of the law. The President’s “inherent power” is sufficient to avoid the blanket warrant requirement, nothing more.
If the In re Sealed Case court had meant to say that FISA’s warrant requirements are unconstitutional in all cases because the President’s power to conduct warrantless foreign intelligence surveillance is completely unlimited, they certainly would not have buried that conclusion in an offhanded, “we take for granted” paragraph.
dagon
mike,
so are you saying that china hasn’t been coddled by the bush administration?
peace
Otto Man
I’d like to thank Mikey for making the strongest case for why blacks still consider the Republican Party to be racist.
Despite all the evidence — up to and including admissions by former GOP strategists like Dent, Phillips, Atwater, etc. that they specifically sought to tap white voters’ racial fears — people like Mikey continue to insist that the Republican Party has made no effort to capitalize on racism.
You think blacks are stupid (or in your words, of a lower culture) and won’t believe their lyin’ eyes over the words you speak. Insisting that none of this history ever happened only makes them distrust you more.
GOP4Me
They’re called Drow elves, you moran maroon moron. And no, I haven’t played AD&D since I was 12. 15 years ago. You? I know your idea of a perfect evening is to snuggle up with a copy of Playgirl and whisper sweet nothings to yourself, but stop projecting onto the rest of us and live outside of your head for a while. Get over your BDS symptoms, leave the “reality-based community” and come back to live with real Americans for a while. Not your latte-slurping Commie friends from Sweden.
Well, if this thread has taught us anything, Steve, it’s that you’ve had time to eat those words. Conservatives are the silent majority on the Internet, and we’re not going to take it up the keister from you lefty homosexuals any longer!
Decent french fries voter: sorry about messing up Tillman’s record a little bit. I guess he was in Iraq for a stint. But so what? Isn’t reading his mind a bit like channeling Casey Sheehan’s? Isn’t it fair to say that he supported the war enough not to desert from it? Can I please see a source that came straight from his mouth about his opposition to the war? Until then, I’m going to have to assume by accounts of his actions that Tillman supported the war much more than those surrender-monkey-AWOL Canadian wannabes from the Vietnam era.
The Ace
Steve,
again, you are confusing 2 issues, and what I’m saying.
dagon
err GOP4Me guy,
you guys aint exactly swarming anything! this thread has been dead for a while, and i think our ‘side’, whatever that means, long ago carried the day.
i’m just here foolin’ around right now cause mikey amuses me.
peace
The Disenfranchised Voter
No, you’re wrong.
Give it up.
The Disenfranchised Voter
GOP4Me
Tillman’s family and fellow soldiers all say he did not support the Iraq war.
When his brother gave his eulogy he explicitly stated that Tillman did not agree with Bush.
Tillman was also supposed to meet with none other than Noam Chomsky–his favorite author–when he returned from Iraq.
GOP4Me
Now you liberals don’t stop at using dead people as pulpits of indigntion, but use the dying too? Shameless, sir. A man’s final days are a sacred time. Yet you try to score political points off of something he said while he was presumably in extreme pain and under the influence of drugs.
Any criticism I could hurl at you would only be redundant, echoed by the manifest disgracefulness of your conduct itself.
Have you no shame, sir?
Otto Man
You don’t have to read his mind. You just have to listen to his friends, family, and fellow soldiers related what he said:
Otto Man
Yeah, GOP4Me is definitely Doug J spoofing us. If the moronic handle didn’t give it away, that post did. A deathbed apology from Atwater is somehow our shame. Priceless.
dagon
otto man:
–actually, i think it was the ‘Shameless, sir.’ that did it for me. don’t think it’s dougj though. he’s better than that.
peace
GOP4Me
Nonsense. Ace parries Steve, mikey parries you, I do battle with 3 or 4 Frenchmen, and the thread goes on.
War.
GOP4Me
Wasn’t that just grief at losing a loved one to the war? And doesn’t grief make us all say and do thins we regret later, like lie and put words into the mouth of the dead, projecting our own emotions onto them?
Same thing.
He’s my favorite author, too. That man is a laugh riot. Every time he speaks, I bust out laughing.
F-ck you, Steve, I am NOT DougJ. And I didn’t say the apology was shameful, I said that your use of it for political purposes was. And it still is, even if you are too conceited and self-satisfied o take stock of your own actions and your personal honor.
I ask, again, have you no shame, sir?
dagon:
Lovecraft died a long time ago.
War.
Steve
Hahaha. I don’t think it’s DougJ. I think it’s BETTER than DougJ.
jg
What an avalanche of talking points. That Truong case thing was debunked the second it appeared in a chicago newspaper. Its ruling was completely misrepresented but the right wing just can’t let it go. To paraphrase Inigo Montoya: it does not mean what you think it means.
SeesThroughIt
I think it’s better than DougJ by being worse than DougJ, if you take my meaning. DougJ was so good because he could push extreme positions while still maintaining a shred of credibility that, yes, he really did think this way. GOP4Me just goes blasting past that line: More outrageous, less believable, still quite funny.
The Ace
plain English, Truong says that foreign intelligence surveillance by the President must be conducted in accordance with FISA’s warrant requirements. Mr. Truong, who was a Vietnamese spy, didn’t get the benefit of that ruling because he was spied on before FISA was enacted.
Please refer to the court’s footnote by Winter, J. on the matter.
hat Truong case thing was debunked the second it appeared in a chicago newspaper. Its ruling was completely misrepresented but the right wing just can’t let it go. To paraphrase Inigo Montoya: it does not mean what you think it means.
Um, because you, ignorant liberal say so, right?
Your misreading of In re Sealed Case to claim that the President can never, ever be required to get a warrant because of his “inherent power” is common in the conservative blogosphere, but again, this is what I mean about being a Powerline disciple without an independent understanding of the law. The President’s “inherent power” is sufficient to avoid the blanket warrant requirement, nothing more.
Steve, is John Schmidt, Clinton Assoc Attorney General a “Powerline disciple”?
Is the AG? NSA General Counsel?
———–
The Disenfranchised Voter:
You can’t read the statute correctly.
You are clearly wrong.
jg
What makes you think I’m a liberal? Disagreement with you?
I’ve voted for one democrat in my whole life.
GOP4Me
F-ck you again, Steve. I’m not DougJ, I’m not a DougJ wannabe. I’m a conservative Republican. Why can’t you at least give me the respect you’d show the drunkest liberal jackass?
.
F-ck you too, Pees through it. Someday the other conservative lurkers on this site will rise up and defend me. My positions are more grounded in fact than yours, but I work for a living and don’t have time to go fishing for the truth through the morass of leftist media outlets. Someday I will have time. Then I’ll take you all down.
GOP4Me
And his name was Kennedy Johnson Humphrey McGovern Carter Mondale Dukakis Clinton Gore Kerry, right?
I know that guy, and he’s a traitor.
Prince Willy
Oh deary me, one more emerges from cover…
LAAAAAAAA-TENT!!!!!!!
One of Kenny-boy Mehlman’s stable, no DOUBT!
The Ace
Bush has crossed the line so far that even people on his own side are alarmed
Can you point me to which elected Democrat has called for the end of the NSA terrorist surveillance program.
What makes you think I’m a liberal? Disagreement with you?
No, the fact you’re lying and taking the liberal position.
jg
Wow. As the South Park kids say, this is pretty fucked up right here.
You are one angry mofo. I don’t think there’s any chance in hell you’d see these issues clearly. Or could argue them rationally. The fact that you just keep repeating th esame excerpts over an over without explaining why you think they say what you contend shows you aren’t interested in debate. Just telling us how you’re so right and the left is dihonest about how they want to sell the country out to minorities.
StupidityRules
About politicizing someone’s death.
I’ll give you Samuel “CAP” Alito paying tribute to Rosa Parks.
jg
Lying? Where?
Liberal position being the position in opposition to you? So any disagreement with you is liberal?
GOP4Me
This, coming from someone who calls himself “Prince Willy”?
Priceless moonbattery. Classless hypocrisy. Unles, of course, you actually ARE gay. In which case, I want you to stay away from me. I have to go scrub my eyes now. I don’t even want to THINK about you people.
Missed Manners
Goodness, such name-calling all around. Why? How does it help advance either side’s points?
Feels like a playground argument.
Okay, carry on.
The Ace
Lying? Where?
It was already pointed out to you:
Truong case thing was debunked
—————————-
The fact that you just keep repeating th esame excerpts over an over without explaining why you think they say what you contend shows you aren’t interested in debate. Just telling us how you’re so right and the left is dihonest about how they want to sell the country out to minorities.
Note:
This isn’t an answer.
The Ace
You are one angry mofo. I don’t think there’s any chance in hell you’d see these issues clearly
Actually I do.
Your silly lack of substantive reply not withstanding.
GOP4Me
Thank you for defending me. The other conservatives and I were having a tough time of it with all this abuse. I don’t know how much more taunting I could take from these ravening packs of rabid moonbat wolf-apemen liberals before I’d have to leave or retaliate in kind. I wish they’d listen to your words of rebuke, but history tells me not to get my hopes up.
jg
You think I’m lying by saying it was debunked? Are you saying I never read a debunking and am completely making it up?
Its either that or you don’t share my opinon that it was debunked. But then I’m not lying if I’m stating my opinion right?
I think you’re just a prick who thinks he can put down dissent by insulting others and seeming to sound intelligent while doing it. Unless you can demonstrate where I said something I knew to be false (not an opnion you don’t agree with) I’m going with the opinion you’re just a prick who talks loudly. You repeat talking points without expanding on them in any way and call all those who argue with you, liars. Typical right wing nutbag.
jg
There was substance. You ignored it.
Bye Darrel.
The Ace
You think I’m lying by saying it was debunked?
Yes.
You are
There was substance. You ignored it.
Actually, I repasted it to illustrate the lack of substance.
You repeat talking points without expanding on them in any way
From the author of:
Truong case thing was debunked
Not terribly persuasive…
GOP4Me
Looks like we won this thread, Ace. All the liberals driven away.
Good work.
SeesThroughIt
Okie-dokie. In the meantime, I hope some guy doesn’t bump up against you at work, causing you to catch a case of “teh ghey.”
If anybody wants to have a chuckle, read GOP4Me’s comments as though he’s the “God Warrior!” woman from Trading Spouses. It fits like a glove. A funny, funny glove.
GOP4Me
Oh, no. Sorry, Ace, looks like I spoke too soon. Not all the rats have fled this sinking ship yet.
I can’t stop you from peeing on my leg, Pees through it; but please don’t tell me it’s raining while you do so.
Why do liberals have to sexualize every substantive debate they come within 200 yards of?
tb
Um, when you’re such a douchebag that people stop talking to you, it’s not what most people would consider to be a victory.
SeesThroughIt
Awwww, man. You had a decent thing going, GOP4Me, but then you blew it. DougJ would be ashamed of you. ANd if you really are DougJ…you started off OK, but this character fell apart too quickly.
GOP4Me
Not having to listen to you kooks anymore is the epitome of success.
I used to think you kooks were spoofs, too, but the more I read of you the more I start to realize you people are serious…
ppGaz
Kiss my ass.
The Ace
Can someone tell me what Harry Reid knew and when did he know it?
*sigh* another silly, ignorant liberal lie exposed…
druidbros
Would you please give a link?
Mikey
Well, I can see who’s got the blinders on. Tell you what, if blacks consider republicans to be racist in general, then that’s their prerogative. Blame it on Atwater, or Thurmond, or Bush, or whoever. I asked, I got an answer. The answers were weak, and there are certainly examples of racist remarks from Democrats within the last 40 years. Oh well. If 90% of blacks continue to want to be dependent on the Democrat party, then all I can say is you get what you pay for. The Democrat party sure hasn’t seemed to help the “plight” of black americans in recent history. In fact, I believe the Democrat party has it’s own “Southern Strategy” to keep blacks dependent on their failed policies.
Maybe someday, black america will be truly “divergent” and challenge the status quo. For their sake, I hope so. In the meantime, you can call me racist or whatever, you can distort my comments (an honest reader can distinguish between lazy and stupid), but my opinion remains that black america, in general, spends too much time nursing grudges and waiting for handouts and way too little time using their God-given abilities.
EQUAL OPPORTUNITY exists, EQUAL EFFORT does not. That’s my story, and I’m stickin’ to it.
Right on. Peace.
tb
Right, it would be racist to say that black people are stupid. I can’t say I understand how you think it’s not also racist to say that they’re lazy.
druidbros
Man where do I start..
Oh how about here. Mikey? Please go read this article.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/29/AR2006012900642_pf.html
Its about the biases of BOTH political parties. BOTH.
But there is a statement in the middle of the article…
That study found that supporters of President Bush and other conservatives had stronger self-admitted and implicit biases against blacks than liberals did.
And by the way Mikey, African-Americans do not have equal opportunity. Its way too complicated to explain fully but the gist of it is this. From 1890 to 1980’s there were ‘Sundown towns’ where minorities were not welcome/allowed to live. They were called ‘Sundown Towns’ because they would have some kind of signal (or a whistle on top of the town watertower) which sounded to let the minorities know when to get out of town. Because minorities were not allowed to live in these towns the property values rose very quickly. More quickly than integrated towns. This obviously affected the fiscal resources of minorities. And living in better cities means better opportunities. This is also why minorities settled in the large cities.
Recommened Book: Suntown Towns by James Loewen
Mikey
I guess it depends how you define racist. I don’t believe that blacks are less capable. I believe they are equally capable as any other culture. I hope you understand that I don’t think blacks are inherently less capable than any other culture.
If you define racist as simply making a generalization about a particular race, then I’m definitely racist. I’ve often made generalizations (negative and positive) about whites, jews, hispanics, and asians. I’ve also made generalizations (negative and positive) about people with certain political persuasions, people from certain parts of the country, people from certain christian denominations, and on and on. In some peoples minds, that would make me a bigot as well.
We all make judgments about people and groups of people. The question should be, is it a fair judgment or not? Is it based in fact? You asked me why I thought that blacks were lazier than others and I gave you an answer based on graduation rates. I realize it’s not just that simple, but I think you can see where I’m going and why I think the way I think. There are other reasons I believe that. I’m not twisting anybody’s arm to agree with me.
tb
How about: is it even fair to judge people based on their skin color in the first place? Maybe judging people you don’t know based on arbitrary things like skin color is wrong.
ppGaz
Alright, dammit. Which one of you is Mikey?
Mikey
The color of someones skin does not CAUSE any problem. The problems I have relate to choices human beings make. It is my opinion that there is a tendency of a particular culture (black americans) to generally and collectively make some poor choices. And as I’ve said, I have problems with many other cultures/subcultures, not just black americans. If a pattern exists among a certain group, why is it racist or bigoted to state it?
How about: is it fair to judge anyone? To me, there is a difference between judging and having contempt. I have no contempt for black americans, but I do think they’re making bad choices, I don’t like it, and I would love it if they would make different choices.
druidbros
What pattern is that Mikey?
The Disenfranchised Voter
That isn’t a rebuttal unless you want to show me how I read it wrong.
However, I didn’t…I posted the FISA law itself. You were owned. Just admit it.
GOP4Me
F-ck you, pee-peegas.
ImJohnGalt
Best…thread…ever. All we need is Floyd Alvis Cooper to make an appearance, and we’d have a hat trick.
W.B. Reeves
Guys, what Mikey is claiming is that black folks are not racially inferior to white folks, just morally inferior to white folks. The real mystery is why he thinks that this is a difference that makes a difference.
Bigotry sounds like precisely the right word to me.
Jess
Otto Man,
Just a quick thank you for your summary of the Dixicrat shift to the GOP–I’m saving it for future reference the next time a conservative dishes out that distorted crap about the Democrats being the racist party. Parties change, sometimes 180 degrees–remember when the GOP stood for fiscal responsibility? It was a long time ago, of course…everything changes.
druidbros
Hmmm,funny how Mikey hasnt responded to a post with reason and links! You too spACE (cadet).
Jack Hamilton
Well I guess the Dems are right on this. I dont see why they did not pull out a fiddle player and have some break dancers to. lolol then a food fight. Pathetic
Michael
Hey all you sick leftys…given all your responses here do you ever why you keep losing at the ballot….do you really believe Americans would ever vote for
such classless behaviour and stupid beliefs? Get a clue and get used to being out of power.
Mikey
If you want to really be accurate, I’m saying they’re morally inferior to whites AND morally inferior to SEVERAL other cultures. On the other hand, I haven’t cast the net so wide as to make the generalization that they are morally inferior in all areas, just some.
And, WB, if it doesn’t make a difference, then don’t join the conversation.
Druidbros – For starters, how about the pattern of dropping out of high school that’s higher than in higher proportion than other american cultures, or the pattern of choosing criminal activity that’s in higher proportion than other americian cultures, or the pattern of single parent families that’s higher than other american cultures? Is that enough for you to get my drift?
tb
IF a pattern exists. You haven’t shown that one does. Show me the study that concludes that African-American underperformance is due to laziness.
Mikey
You can find your own studies regarding drop out rates, crime, etc. They’re not hard to find if you want to. As far as the link to laziness, that’s my own conclusion. You want to try to prove me wrong?
The Disenfranchised Voter
LOL. What a piece of shit.
Dude, it’s obvious that you’re a racist bastard.
GOP4Me
I don’t agree with everything Mikey says, but he’s the only person here still making ANY sense. The rest of you are truly insane.
If the Democrats are immune from corruption charges, how do you explain this?
GOP4Me
Michael’s making sense, too.
GOP4Me
How can anyone argue with this?
Or this?
I don’t agree that black people are lazier than white people, but who can argue that Democrats have been worse to black people than Republicans? Study American history, you might learn something.
Another thing. Blame Willie Horton on Duakkis, not Atwater. Dukakis is the one that paroled him. If Dukakis hadn’t paroled him, he wouldn’t have killed, and Atwater never would’ve heard of him. Why does a Republian always get blamed for a Democrat’s mistake?
annie
Heroes still beats every other show out there.
nathan
One tree hill has so much drama – i’d rather watch cheers
nathan
One tree hill has so much drama – i’d rather watch cheers