In the curious case of Shirley Sherrod, let’s see the whole tape
A couple of folks in comments yesterday brought up the case of USDA official Shirley Sherrod, a black woman caught on tape at an NAACP meeting here in Georgia apparently bragging about being less than diligent in helping a white farmer. The folks at Big Government posted a portion of her speech as part of the running feud between the NAACP and the Tea Party over which organization is more racist.
By the end of the day Monday, Sherrod had been forced to resign her post, and NAACP President Ben Jealous had released a statement agreeing with the forced resignation:
“Racism is about the abuse of power. Sherrod had it in her position at USDA. According to her remarks, she mistreated a white farmer in need of assistance because of his race.
We are appalled by her actions, just as we are with abuses of power against farmers of color and female farmers.
Her actions were shameful. While she went on to explain in the story that she ultimately realized her mistake, as well as the common predicament of working people of all races, she gave no indication she had attempted to right the wrong she had done to this man.”
(UPDATE: The NAACP has now pulled that statement from its website.)
After watching the video Monday evening, I wrote in comments that “what Sherrod says in that video — and what she apparently did — are deeply troubling… She might very well have earned a firing. But I’d like to see that rest of that video as well, because at the point it abruptly ends, she appears to be saying that it’s wrong to think in terms of black and white, that she came to see things as more accurately divided between poor and rich than by race.”
As I also noted, the folks at Big Government seem to have the whole video, since they also posted another segment, and it would be useful to see the rest of it.
Sherrod gets a chance to tell her side of the story in an AJC story by Marcus Garner:
“But Tuesday morning, Sherrod said what online viewers weren’t told in reports posted throughout the day Monday was that the tale she told at the banquet happened 24 years ago — before she got the USDA job — when she worked with the Georgia field office for the Federation of Southern Cooperative/Land Assistance Fund.
Sherrod said the short video clip excluded the breadth of the story about how she eventually worked with the man over a two-year period to help ward off foreclosure of his farm, and how she eventually became friends with the farmer and his wife.
“And I went on to work with many more white farmers,” she said. “The story helped me realize that race is not the issue, it’s about the people who have and the people who don’t. When I speak to groups, I try to speak about getting beyond the issue of race.”
So let’s see the rest of the tape, Big Government. Was Sherrod giggling among black folk about the time she put it to the white man, as the leaked excerpt suggests, or was the tape a deceptively edited excerpt of a longer story about getting beyond the issue of race, as she claims?
Let’s see the tape. The evidence apparently exists to settle the question. Cough it up.
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461 comments Add your comment
Jay
July 20th, 2010
9:02 am
md, to my knowledge, nobody, including the NAACP, has seen the whole video. That statement from Jealous came yesterday.
RW-(the original)
July 20th, 2010
9:02 am
USinUK,
I don’t have a side anymore. As of last night I’ve taken on the impartial position of being the one who decides what the best ideas from both sides are and developing the platform for the Fench Straddler Party.
/s
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
9:03 am
“Did Mr Jealous not get to see the whole video?? Or did he act without the full story??”
“Sherrod said Tuesday that it was “unfortunate that the NAACP would make a statement without even checking to see what happened. This was 24 years ago, and I’m telling a story to try to unite people.”"
http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/07/20/agriculture.employee.naacp/index.html?video=true&hpt=T2
stands for decibels
July 20th, 2010
9:03 am
And the media, if you are right wing nut, you believe everything post on Fox. If you are a left wing nut, you believe everything post on MSNB[C].
Perhaps, but I will point out (once again) that Fox News claims to be “fair and balanced.” MSNBC merely claims to be “the place for politics.”
Pretty huge difference in mission statements if you ax me.
mike
July 20th, 2010
9:04 am
“Let’s see the tape. The evidence apparently exists to settle the question. Cough it up.”
LOL. So says the man who still believes that John Lewis was called the N-word, despite four videotapes to the contrary.
Bookman is to hypocrisy what Saudi Arabia is to oil
mike
July 20th, 2010
9:05 am
“Pretty huge difference in mission statements if you ax me.”
Not to sane people. It is a pretty huge rationalization for a double standard..
Paul
July 20th, 2010
9:05 am
electrician
Maybe this will start a trend for such groups –
Doggone/GA
Sure. But it was her decision. The impression I got from her statement was she’d been cut adrift by her superiors and there was nothing else she could do. She had no other options and she was indirectly forced to resign. That strikes me as tilting towards the ‘poor me’ side and not enough on the “hey, I’m the subject of controversy, my superiors haven’t defended me, they haven’t condemned my, but I’ve had enough and I’ve made the decision to go.”
USinUK
July 20th, 2010
9:06 am
RW – is that French Straddler or Fence Straddler?
stands for decibels
July 20th, 2010
9:06 am
developing the platform for the Fench Straddler Party.
Is that a Wood Fench, a Golden Fench, or a House Fench? And why would you bother straddling them? They just fly away, right?
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
9:06 am
“but I’ve had enough and I’ve made the decision to go.””
Why is this any different from what I said? Maybe she just decided it wasn’t worth fighting for.
RW-(the original)
July 20th, 2010
9:06 am
RW – if it wasn’t for taking people’s comments out of context and/or selectively editing them to say the exact opposite of what they actually ARE saying, what WOULD your side do for fun???
Like this?
USinUK
July 20th, 2010
9:07 am
“Not to sane people.”
not that mike would have any firsthand knowledge …
T-Town
July 20th, 2010
9:07 am
USinUK, As an Independent I have no take on either the right or the left. Your “so, you were there? you know the context of what they were reacting to? care to share your video with us?” is just the same argument the right used when the left said they believed the N-word was used at the TP in Washington and no video was available. I was always told to be careful to practice what you preach.
md
July 20th, 2010
9:08 am
“If they’re really junior they’ll be fired in the usually thought-of sense, completely terminated with no benefits.”
If true, a good indication of what is wrong in gov’t. Do we actually recycle the elitist deadwood??
Paul
July 20th, 2010
9:08 am
SPQR
“Have you heard of anybody in the federal government losing their job? ”
Yes. As in terminated.
“Sherrod proves the mentallity of every loser worker in the public sector..scumbags all.”
Are you saying all public servants are scumbags, or just the ones who are ‘losers.’ If the latter, what are your criteria to be so labeled?
RW-(the original)
July 20th, 2010
9:08 am
I see the spelling NAZI’s have arrived but that USinUK line at 9:06 was funny, I don’t care who you are.
Guess I’ll go with French
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
9:09 am
“the left said they believed the N-word was used at the TP in Washington and no video was available”
And absence of proof is not proof of absence. No videos only means no one was taping that incidident at that time. There ARE eye-witnesses who backed up the claim.
stands for decibels
July 20th, 2010
9:09 am
not that mike would have any firsthand knowledge …
I almost owed you yet another Coke.
BTW, I doubt anyone posting here has managed to log as many hours viewing both FNC and MSNBC as I have in the past (oh, say) five years.
fl2007rn
July 20th, 2010
9:09 am
Racist bigots is what the NAACP is. Anything to get back the white man. There is still a big chip on their shoulders!
stands for decibels
July 20th, 2010
9:10 am
Guess I’ll go with French
Freedom Straddlers!
TaxPayer
July 20th, 2010
9:10 am
I hear the rightwing nuts also have been conned by folks like Beck, Thompson, Huckabee, et al, into buying gold coins for double their value. They’ll fall for anything.
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
9:11 am
“Anything to get back the white man”
And I take it that includes their white members? come on, you can do it…bring out the “white guilt” argument before someone else does.
Erie H
July 20th, 2010
9:12 am
Black people in the south are by and large, racists, period. In the northern and western states, where there is more assimilation, it’s a different story. I live in Texas, have toured the deep south and am of mixed race. I have also lives in the north and west. Yes, it is true, I can’t say that enough. I have heard more utterances against white people from blacks than the other way around, even against people of mixed-race like myself and native americans. This prevailing attitude will continue until black people in general and the NAACP in particular, come to the realization that it has a problem. My advice to the NAACP is don’t call out the Tea Party when the glass covering your house is pretty thin as it is.
Outhouse GoKart
July 20th, 2010
9:13 am
Some years ago, myself and some buddies were lucky enough to moon John Lewis.
We were crusing up I-20 toward Panola or some exit and this big ole caddy came flying by changing lanes and bascially driving like a maniac.
We gave pursuit.
Upon catching up to this crazy caddy we began taunting the occupant and much hilarity ensued. The caddy then exited from the interstate as did we. Upon catching the light this black fellow stepped from his vehicle and began cursing incoherently and then screamed at us…”SHOW ME SOME RESPECT” to which showed him our behinds and much more hilarity ensued.
I could swear I detected an ever so slight grin come across Mr Lewis face as he shook his head reentered his caddy and drove away.
When us white dudes got back into our car I told my friends…”Hey, that was that House member from GA…that John Lewis fellow”.
What a fun day!
stands for decibels
July 20th, 2010
9:13 am
I hear the rightwing nuts also have been conned by folks like Beck, Thompson, Huckabee, et al, into buying gold coins for double their value.
eh, that company was an EOS (Equal Opportunity Swindler.) Pretty sure I’d heard Randi Rhodes hawking those wares as well.
One sponsor’s money is as green as another’s, generally.
USinUK
July 20th, 2010
9:13 am
RW – actually no. that example, if they are, indeed, NOT members of the Orange Pekoe Brigade (remember, RW, “Pajamas Media Sed” doesn’t make it so) is an example of people pretending to belong to a movement they do not.
I’m talking about editing someone’s words to say something it does not … like the Ginsberg “populations we don’t want any more of” smear
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/16/AR2009071603485.html
Paul
July 20th, 2010
9:13 am
Doggone/GA
I was referring more to her statement of ““She said she tried to explain to USDA officials, “but for some reason, the stuff Fox and the Tea Party does is scaring the administration. I told them to get the whole tape and look at the whole tape and see how I tell people we have to get beyond race and work together.”
Asked why did she resigned instead of fighting, Sherrod said, “I didn’t have any support from USDA. What would I do?””
not your statement.
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
9:14 am
“Black people in the south are by and large, racists, period”
and yet another person who doesn’t know the difference between “racist” and “bigot” – AND who has no problems painting ALL blacks in the South with the same broad brush.
md
July 20th, 2010
9:16 am
“md, to my knowledge, nobody, including the NAACP, has seen the whole video. That statement from Jealous came yesterday.”
Would it be in their best interest to offer a kneejerk reaction?? Perhaps, but something smells fishy to me. She decides not to fight it and he issues statement without full story.
Too many missing pieces…….it makes no sense. Someone accuese me of a wrong I did not commit, I’m jumping up and down and talking to anybody and everybody that will listen to my side of the story – I’m not going away quietly with my reputation tucked between my legs.
Paul
July 20th, 2010
9:17 am
sfd
“I doubt anyone posting here has managed to log as many hours viewing both FNC and MSNBC as I have in the past (oh, say) five years.”
So… what’re you doing for it now? Self help? Therapy? 12-step?
RW-(the original)
July 20th, 2010
9:17 am
(remember, RW, “Pajamas Media Sed” doesn’t make it so)
See the videos for yourself then
T-Town
July 20th, 2010
9:19 am
“And absence of proof is not proof of absence. No videos only means no one was taping that incident at that time. There ARE eye-witnesses who backed up the claim.”
I have been at incidents where there were 50 people of all walks of life and would get 50 different versions of what happened, including what colors of clothes were worn. Eye witnesses don’t always see the same thing until they get together and discuss what they saw. The right claims there were just as many witnesses that didn’t hear any words like that being said. Just like at any accident scene where witnesses give conflicting statements, who you believe is dependent on your perception by who the statement is being made by.
USinUK
July 20th, 2010
9:19 am
RW – again, just because PJM said they were “infiltrators” doesn’t mean that they were
Brian
July 20th, 2010
9:19 am
The moral outrage on both sides of the NAACP/Tea Party debate is pretty laughable. Mark Williams claims that the Tea Party has no racists? Come on. Get 20 people together at a neighborhood block party and you will have a racist in your presence. And the NAACP, while they have accomplished many good things for African Americans, they are hardly the last bastion of unadulterated racial tolerance.
Read this article: Token White Member of NAACP Calls Tea Party “Racist”; Lone Black Tea Partier “Outraged”.
Very FUNNY!
http://www.dailygoat.com/?p=1798
Bob
July 20th, 2010
9:20 am
In order to ensure that the farmer could report back that she was indeed helpful, she said she took him to see “one of his own” — a white lawyer.
“I figured that if I take him to one of them, that his own kind would take care of him,” she said.
Lets just let their kind take care of them and our side will take care of us ! She is so misunderstood. USinUK, what would the people in the crowd be listening to, their Ipods ?
stands for decibels
July 20th, 2010
9:20 am
If anyone cares, I think the White House should’ve stuck by Van Jones. And I think Barack Obama should’ve maintained his membership at TUCC even after he’d moved to the White House, if only to tell a lot of richly deserving people they could collectively kiss his n—–r ass if they didn’t like how he worshiped.
But I don’t have hundreds of millions of people whose livelihoods are influenced by my flights of fancy and pride; I don’t have to worry quite so much about when to cut my losses; the Administration does.
Bob
July 20th, 2010
9:21 am
So let me get this straight, The Federation of Southern Cooperatives
Land Assistance Fund who has been Fighting To Save Black-Owned Land Since 1967 With Cooperatives, turned down a white farmer seeking help. BS!!!!! Why would a white farmer go to a black communist organization for help? Its like white kids applying to the United Negro College Fund, You might as well pound sand!!! She’s lying!!!!
Paul
July 20th, 2010
9:22 am
RW-(the original) 9:17
If a refuting link is posted and nobody refutes, does that mean the information in the link is true?
RW-(the original)
July 20th, 2010
9:23 am
USinUK,
Since there is no way you watched a six minute video and responded within two minutes of my posting them I’ll just chalk it up to willful blindness. Lot’s of that going around these days.
Anyway, I’ve got to go vote and head to the forest. I’ll let you know if I straddle anybody French while I’m at the polls.
UnPoliticallyCorrect
July 20th, 2010
9:24 am
AmVet? 400 years of understanding why the NAACP is racist? Are you kidding me? Let me refresh your memory on slavery, or the fact that tens-of-thousands of blacks participated in the murdering and enslaving of Native American Indians…..i would really hate for you to actually research history. The kicker to all of this hypocrisy is that of the real black Africans STILL TO THIS DAY enslaving their own people…..
Thomas Sowell: The history of slavery across the centuries and in many countries around the world is a painful history to read — not only in terms of how slaves have been treated, but because of what that says about the whole human species — because slaves and enslavers alike have been of every race, religion, and nationality.
If the history of slavery ought to teach us anything, it is that human beings cannot be trusted with unbridled power over other human beings — no matter what color or creed any of them are. The history of ancient despotism and modern totalitarianism practically shouts that same message from the blood-stained pages of history.
But that is not the message that is being taught in our schools and colleges, or dramatized on television and in the movies. The message that is pounded home again and again is that white people enslaved black people.
Just as Europeans enslaved Africans, North Africans enslaved Europeans — more Europeans than there were Africans enslaved in the United States or in the 13 colonies from which the nation was formed.
The treatment of white galley slaves was even worse than the treatment of black slaves who picked cotton. But there are no movies or television dramas about it comparable to Roots, and our schools and colleges don’t pound it into the heads of students.
The inhumanity of human beings toward other human beings is not a new story, much less a local story. There is no need to hide it, because there are lessons we can learn from it. But there is also no need to distort it, so that sins of the whole human species around the world are presented as special defects of “our society” or the sins of a particular race.
If American society and Western civilization are different from other societies and civilizations, it is in that they eventually turned against slavery, and stamped it out, at a time when non-Western societies around the world were still maintaining slavery and resisting Western pressures to end slavery — including, in some cases, by armed resistance.
Only the fact that the West had more firepower put an end to slavery in many non-Western societies during the age of Western imperialism. Yet today there are Americans who have gone to Africa to apologize for slavery — on a continent where slavery has still not been completely ended, to this very moment.
It is not just the history of slavery that gets distorted beyond recognition by the selective filtering of facts. Those who mine history in order to find everything they can to undermine American society or Western civilization have very little interest in the Bataan death march, the atrocities of the Ottoman Empire, or similar atrocities in other times and places.
Those who mine history for sins are not searching for truth but for opportunities to denigrate their own society, or for grievances that can be cashed in today at the expense of people who were not even born when the sins of the past were committed.
An ancient adage says: “Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof.” But apparently it is not sufficient for many among our educators, the intelligentsia, or the media. They are busy poisoning the present by the way they present the past.
TaxPayer
July 20th, 2010
9:24 am
Well, it’s easy to just cut off a video at a “convenient” point in order to give the wrong impression about someone telling an honest story about themselves. There’s no real editing skill required for such a scenario. The real test of one’s video editing prowess would be in taking, for example, enough Palin clips and piecing them together to make her appear intelligent without the resulting video looking like an old Max Headroom clip. My hat would be off to Hannity, for example, if he could pull that one off.
RW-(the original)
July 20th, 2010
9:25 am
If a refuting link is posted and nobody refutes, does that mean the information in the link is true?
Now my head hurts. Thanks, Paul.
stands for decibels
July 20th, 2010
9:25 am
So… what’re you doing for it now? Self help? Therapy? 12-step?
The only way I know: Cold turkey.
(seriously? I ingested a LOT of daytime FNC between two onsite client assignments. One had it squawking in a waiting area; the other had it available as a choice [they had CNN as well] at their in-house gym. This was not-that-long-ago so I feel like I have a pretty good feel for how FNC does what it likes to think of as down-the-middle “news” reporting. As for MSNBC, the only show I really care for is Rachel’s, although KO, Tweety and Big Ed are as entertaining as the next blowhard.)
USinUK
July 20th, 2010
9:26 am
RW – firewall no likeee videos … can only go by the text description on the page
md
July 20th, 2010
9:28 am
RW,
Out of curiosity, in reference to straddling, where would you say you fit into your party of choice??
Do you buy everything they are selling or do you pick and choose??
If you don’t believe all that they do, are you not straddling within those parameters??
No different than a centrist, but some choose the best ideas from both “sides”, without discounting the entire “side” as off limits.
MuDdLe
July 20th, 2010
9:29 am
Well, I watched the clip more than once. The first time through was with my jaw on my chest, stunned at such a brazen statement of racist policies by a government official. But then I listened more critically, and began to suspect that the excerpt made available was just the prelude to a much more noble point–just as you suggest here. That fits both her tone in the talk itself and her later explanation. (But, as someone here notes, the audience–NAACP members–seems a little too enthusiastic over the story she relates.) Her resignation may seem odd on this interpretation, but not if her department has decided that, whether innocent or guilty, too much damage has been done.
If this is right, then it is like excerpting only the juicy parts from a new convert’s public testimony of his past, sinful life. “He’s into all sorts of debauchery! Tar and feather him!”
USinUK
July 20th, 2010
9:30 am
“I’ll let you know if I straddle anybody French while I’m at the polls.”
dang. voting in GA has changed since I left!!
Outhouse GoKart
July 20th, 2010
9:31 am
This video is a good learning lesson for those not “in the know”.
Paul
July 20th, 2010
9:31 am
Anytme, RW-(the original). Anytime!
sfd
You mean… you actually went to source material to form your opinions?!!? Why… why… that’s soooo unblogger-like!
SPQR(laissez Faire)
July 20th, 2010
9:32 am
Thats awesome, OGK..mooning John Lewis
@paul, yes I am saying the vast majority of “public servants” are scumbags,,a few firemen and cops and the military excluded.
Its the same mentallity some of my family used to have about the phone company and the railroad , from the way they talk(all my great uncles worked for southern bell or southern railway) ..lifetime job, dont work too hard, never get fired or layed off.
Karen S
July 20th, 2010
9:32 am
“the tale she told at the banquet happened 24 years ago”
Openly admitting to being a racist on tape wasn’t very bright, confessing to a long life of bigotry doesn’t help her case at all.
Even the Obama administration fired her and the NAACP denounced for her racist words and deeds.
thomas
July 20th, 2010
9:35 am
Doggone,
not to single you out…. but…
I see you have issues with gotcha reporting.
However I frequently read this blog and cannot for the life of me remembering any timein which you complained of gotcha reporting or calling to see the whole tape in regards to the many stories and opinion pieces on this very blog. Even when an offer of i think 100k was offered to anyone with proof of the things accused of the tea party during the HC debate.
Why do you only seem to care about “gotcha” reporting or needing to see evidence of the video for people or groups on the so-called left?
Do you have any factual evidence to support your appeared bias or is it a matter as simple as your personal choice?
of course
July 20th, 2010
9:36 am
Well at least white people aren’t rioting and burning cars in the street over this piece of ugliness.
RW-(the original)
July 20th, 2010
9:38 am
Just how do you folks expect me to get out of here if you keep asking questions?
md,
I should probably give you a better answer and perhaps I’ll try if we cross paths later, but I’m mostly just having some fun with the whole centrist thing because it’s got such an amorphous definition. We all have vastly different ideas of the center and even within ourselves vastly different ideas of where the center might be from issue to issue. We also all straddle a fence or two depending on the issue. I’m also not of the opinion that every issue has a neat little compromise answer. Sometimes right is right and wrong is wrong. No sense getting in between in those cases.
Later!
Vinny
July 20th, 2010
9:38 am
Give it up Jay. The woman is a RACIST and a card carrying member of naacp.
Don’t hold your breath waiting for the naacp to denounce her – They are nothing but a bunch of illegitimate losers anyway.
In the curious case of Shirley Sherrod, let’s see the whole tape – Atlanta Journal Constitution (blog) | Sharansky
July 20th, 2010
9:38 am
[...] shirley sherrod – Google News [...]
Outhouse GoKart
July 20th, 2010
9:39 am
SPQR(laissez Faire)
July 20th, 2010
9:32 am
Ya!! We didnt know it was him until after the fact. Quite honestly, it was one of those crazy situations where both parties just begin laughing because its just so funny. I could almost guarantee he got a chuckle out of it.
Guess ya had to be there.
Hootinanny Yum Yum
July 20th, 2010
9:39 am
A mind-boggling double standard.
Shameful…
Utterly amazing…
thomas
July 20th, 2010
9:39 am
Jay and others needing the entire tape to see this woman was wrong in here beliefs and actions…. btw her admitted actions made it an act of racism.
But why are any of you taking her at her word it was 24 years ago and that she was friends with the man for 2 years……
Have you been gien evidence to prove this to be true? It could have been a week before the speech that she did this, she may have continued to give the white farmer less than full help?
Why no need for proof from her?
has she proven herself to be an honorable person worthy of unquestioned trust?
SPQR(laissez Faire)
July 20th, 2010
9:40 am
Thats why there are no good retail options in the ghetto…shoplifting , looting, shrinkage…it’s not worth the effort.
getalife
July 20th, 2010
9:42 am
Tit for tat racism.
Obama did say he wanted it discussed and a good distraction from the bad economic numbers.
thomas
July 20th, 2010
9:44 am
getalife
July 20th, 2010
9:42 am
easy with the language so early in the morning…. half the people on here are distracted now looking around their offices..
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
9:44 am
“But why are any of you taking her at her word it was 24 years ago and that she was friends with the man for 2 years”
Read it again…she said she worked with him for 2 years, AND was friends with him and his family. She put no time limit on how long the friendship has lasted.
“has she proven herself to be an honorable person worthy of unquestioned trust?”
No, not yet…which is why it’s necessary to see the WHOLE video. To see if it backs up her statements.
USinUK
July 20th, 2010
9:45 am
OGK – are you in this group?
http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/834791-california-train-mooning-event-is-great-crack-for-participants
jimboster
July 20th, 2010
9:47 am
“So I figured if I take him to one of them, that his own kind would take care of him.”
His own kind? That alone should get her fired.
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
9:48 am
“His own kind? That alone should get her fired.”
So, she should be fired NOW for something she did 24 years ago, while working for an entirely different organization?
Anthony George
July 20th, 2010
9:49 am
I have said this for years now; it is the fault of the white man and no one else! We gave too much and still give too much. There is racism in every one of us and if you think otherwise you must be living on a different planet. You reap what you saw .Therefore we should stop the hypocrisy and deal with it.
jm
July 20th, 2010
9:50 am
Don’t care when / where it was. She was apparently open to the abuse of authority based on race earlier in life. That’s a disgusting practice no matter when it was. Someone with this set of beliefs shouldn’t be running anything.
I’m glad she’s reformed apparently. But I wouldn’t want a reformed former KKK member running part of the USDA either. Some things approach being unforgivable. This lady has no business being in government.
UnPoliticallyCorrect
July 20th, 2010
9:51 am
Her words, whether yesterday or 24-years-ago are CLEARLY racist in their very nature. With this being said, had this been a white man making this statement, yesterday or 24-years-ago there would be calls for his termination/firing ASAP.
Those who claim that “Faux News” and/or “Right-Wing Nuts” are editing the video to fit their agenda…..well, duh? I mean, “Left-Wing Nuts” play the same game, no?
I am not claiming either are correct in their behavior, but call a spade a spade and for what it is– a friggin game of political manuevering and who is better at it.
My disgust? The fact that there are these double standards in this country that it is some how okay for blacks to make racist comments and not be held accountable but whites must be.
Again, let’s just take a look at the Cambridge incident, the Black Panthers incident and now this-all of which have taken place in less than 18 months.
Double standards? YES!
I am not some “right-wing nut” and am in now way-shape-or-form validating any “white racist” behavior, rather my point is to point out the double standards and hypocrisy.
I will leave you with this: I am half Native American Indian and Half Irish. My son comes home from school this past May and tells me the following:
Mommy, there were two black boys at the bus stop calling me a cracker. When I told them they were being racist and to stop calling me that, they told me that black people can’t be racist and that I had better shut my honnkey a$$ up.
I proceeded to inform him that all races can equally behave in racist manner and that regardless of their skin color, comments like that clearly make them racist.
From that point forward, any and all racist comments of this nature from those two boys were forwarded as a complaint of a hate crime to our local police department.
Why?
Bcause in the process of calling him a cracker and a honkey, they threaten to cause physical harm.
So, with some of these comments, like those from AmVet-I suppose my son should just sit back and take the racism because somehow he must pay for the past indescretions of others?
Ignorance must be bliss AmVet!
getalife
July 20th, 2010
9:52 am
Will do thomas.
“Earnings fell 83 percent in the second quarter, making it the worst quarter for Goldman Sachs since the depths of the financial crisis in late 2008″NY Times.
Uh, oh.
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
9:53 am
“She was apparently open to the abuse of authority based on race earlier in life. That’s a disgusting practice no matter when it was. Someone with this set of beliefs shouldn’t be running anything.”
And what if she was, as she states, using it to illustrate that such beliefs are NOT good and need to be changed? Or do you not believe in the ability of people TO change their beliefs and actions?
SPQR(laissez Faire)
July 20th, 2010
9:55 am
Best quote o’ the day, and surprisingly, in cynthia Tuckers blog post
“I was a pastor on crack cocaine”
Explaining further would dilute the greatness of the quote.
thomas
July 20th, 2010
9:58 am
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
9:44 am
So why did you not feel this way about the claims made against tea party members during HC debate?
We never saw actual evidence of people making bigoted statements to any congressmen or women. Only those congresspeople’s word.
Are accusations with No proof now more reliable to you than actual video evidence and a person’s own words, just because the whole video is not there?
Why do you require more proof and allow for more justification from one group than another?
Granny Godzilla
July 20th, 2010
9:58 am
Unpolitically Correct
Sorry to hear that your child was hassled.
Did you report it to the authorities?
It’s a difficult process, I have had to defend my girls – I understand.
USinUK
July 20th, 2010
9:59 am
getalife – 2 words: European. Sovereigns.
Kyle Robinson
July 20th, 2010
9:59 am
Jay, do you think White people are stupid and can’t see the double standard? You want a color blind world free from racism then the Blacks have to do their part and stop being slaves on the Democratic Party Plantation and take care of themselves instead of being wards and property of the state. That is the truth, don’t like too bad cause nothing will change until the Blacks take care of themselves. We have done all we could since the 60s and they have blown it big time.
Normal
July 20th, 2010
9:59 am
Come on folks, just sit back and listen….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sssqBjaTzOU
thomas
July 20th, 2010
9:59 am
getalife
July 20th, 2010
9:52 am
Thanks….. now I’m depressed, not shocked but depressed. i would rather still be looking for a tat to give.
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
10:00 am
“So why did you not feel this way about the claims made against tea party members during HC debate?”
Because I had no opinion on that particular incident.
thomas
July 20th, 2010
10:01 am
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
10:00 am
So you only have a problem with gotcha reporting when it is against a group, organization or a person you like or agree with?
How very honorable of you!
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
10:03 am
“So you only have a problem with gotcha reporting when it is against a group, organization or a person you like or agree with?”
I see no need to defend YOUR words. I never said anything like this.
USinUK
July 20th, 2010
10:05 am
Normal – thought you’d get a kick out of this:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/gallery/2010/jul/18/chap-olympiad-fashion-london#/?picture=364980311&index=0
(by the by … anyone seen Bosch?)
whity south
July 20th, 2010
10:06 am
Maybe she can get a job pick’n cotten from the poor kracker farmer
Normal
July 20th, 2010
10:06 am
So, with some of these comments, like those from AmVet-I suppose my son should just sit back and take the racism because somehow he must pay for the past indescretions of others?
No, but what you can do is teach your boys to be color blind. Tell them that while they can’t control how others think, feel, or say, they can be the ones to let it stop there. Tell them that in The Creators eyes people are people and all should be treated with respect.
Teach them to look beyond a persons looks. Teach them tolerance and they will teach their kids the same and eventually there will be no more racism. But never, never, under any circumstances teach them to hate. There has to be a special place in Hades for parents that teach innocent children how to hate.
UnPoliticallyCorrect
July 20th, 2010
10:07 am
Granny- yes, the behavior displayed from these two boys has been reported to the local PD, now twice. For now, the bes they can do is keep taking in the reports, but for an actual criminal prosecution to take place, one of them has to either physically assault him or commit some other criminal act.
Because they are 11-years-old, the most either will receive for threatening to commit physical violence is a slap on the wrist and the parents scolded.
Problem-this behavior they are displaying is “mroe than likely” a result of their parents behavior-but I digress.
Paul
July 20th, 2010
10:10 am
Normal
“Tell them that in The Creators eyes people are people and all should be treated with respect.”
Once heard a minister say “the lesson of the story of Adam is this: no one can say to another “I am better than you because of who my ancestors were, because we all come from the same source.”
I like that.
Russ555
July 20th, 2010
10:10 am
So where’s the tape?
thomas
July 20th, 2010
10:12 am
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
10:03 am
You didn’t have to.
You have used as verification for your disagreement with people condemning her qand her words because …… you have not seen the whole video and you hate gotcha reporting.
That is fine!
But then you fall silent on the same types of gotcha reporting used to describe the tea party members as racist and bigots.
Your excuse was you didn’t have any interest in that issue.
Again, Thats fine!
But you were engaged in dialog the days the tea party has came up and did not defend the tea party or give them the excuse of you need to see the whole tape or see ANY tape. Yet also never claimed they were the victims of gotcha reporting.
I never put any words into your mouth there was a question mark at the end of the statement therefor making it a shorthand question, which you dodged.
I was simply trying to gain insight into your mind and opinion of when is it ok for gotcha reporting and when is it not?
There is no need to place words in your mouth the contradiction of your own words speaks volumes.
Elephant Whip
July 20th, 2010
10:12 am
Simple question: if her resignation is appropriate, why shouldn’t McCain resign over his opposition to the MLK holiday?
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
10:13 am
“I was simply trying to gain insight into your mind and opinion of when is it ok for gotcha reporting and when is it not?”
Ok, to answer your question: gotcha reporting is never ok. I don’t always feel any need to comment one way or another. I only comment when I have something to say on the subject.
Paul
July 20th, 2010
10:15 am
Elephant Whip
How are they comparable?
RW-(the original)
July 20th, 2010
10:16 am
Just back from the polls and headed to the forest but what incredibly fortuitous timing. You have got to click on that 10:09 trackback to this story. My guess is it was translated into some other language and back to English, but it’s hysterical.
Doggone/GA
July 20th, 2010
10:17 am
“How are they comparable?”
I’m trying to figure that one out too. Maybe she opposed a “white farmers day”?
Paul
July 20th, 2010
10:19 am
Doggone/GA
If a news organization had a report an official committed unsavory acts, yet the official’s organization stonewalled releasing information or refused to follow up, and the official refused to schedule a press conference or speak with the press, are you saying it’s not okay for the news organization to approach the person in a public place and at least get them on the record refusing to address the allegations?
Michael
July 20th, 2010
10:19 am
Well, if you listen to the video, you hear the members of the GA NAACP gleefully giving positive support to her actions. Clearly they thought this white farmer deserved what he got from this woman.
Marie
July 20th, 2010
10:21 am
Jay and members of the main stream media accepted the accounts of Barney Frank, John Lewis and other members of the Congressional Black Caucas they they were verbally assaulted with offensive racial or sexual language and even spat upon without ANY shred of evidence to support their claims against Tea Party protestors. It is reported that members of the CBC either had video cameras themselves or some of their staffers did. The same Breitbart that Jay wants to now demand release the entire video of Sherrod has also requested that John Lewis, Barney Frank, and other black Congressmen please RELEASE ANY AND ALL evidence of racism they encountered on that fatal weekend when ObamaCare was passed.
They have not and members of the media have never pressed them. But now Jay wants a full release of a tape in which regardless of what this woman says today clearly indicates her intolerant views. Congratulations to Ms. Sherrod if she now feels differently about white Americans and has learned not to judge a person’s attitude based on her own insecurities. However, people like her and Jay DO NOT want to give individuals of a different political persuasion the same benefit of the doubt and will forever accuse Republicans without any evidence of being racists.
gthog61
July 20th, 2010
10:21 am
doesn’t matter when she said it, liberals made the rules, if she were a conservative you wouldn’t be contorting yourself like a pretzel to defend her
How many white people on the Right in the past have been slurred with specious charges to promote the leftist agenda? Where were you then?
Paul
July 20th, 2010
10:21 am
RW-(the original)
Sounds like some owners manuals I have -
Doggone/GA
That’s gotta be it.
Big Ike
July 20th, 2010
10:22 am
Let me get this straight! The NAACP is racist? Well…someone forgot to tell the WHITE GIRL THAT LED THE GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY CHAPTER OF THE NAACP IN 2007 that the NAACP is racist!
All you bigots, racist, kkk, and skin heads should do your fact checking before typing your ignorance on blogs.
Paul
July 20th, 2010
10:23 am
Doggone/GA
Not sure this qualifies as ‘gotcha’ journalism but it’s ‘gotcha’ nonetheless.
And police and prosecutors want to send people to prison for it.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/TheLaw/videotaping-cops-arrest/story?id=11179076