Cornel West yanks Obama’s credentials as a black man
I just finished reading Princeton academic Cornel West’s diatribe against Barack Obama, in which West complains that “my dear brother Barack Obama has a certain fear of free black men” and calls Obama “a black mascot of Wall Street oligarchs and a black puppet of corporate plutocrats.”
West frames his disenchantment in terms of class struggle, and argues that Obama has chosen the wrong side, selling out less fortunate Americans in return for the favor of the powerful.
“The escalation of the class war against the poor and the working class is intense,” West writes. “More and more working people are beaten down. They are world-weary. They are into self-medication. They are turning on each other. They are scapegoating the most vulnerable rather than confronting the most powerful.”
“When you look at a society you look at it through the lens of the least of these, the weak and the vulnerable; you are committed to loving them first, not exclusively, but first, and therefore giving them priority,” West writes.
Many on the left do criticize Obama for being too mainstream and insufficiently aggressive on behalf of those less fortunate. While that debate is legitimate, I think those who make such claims are for the most part politically naive about Obama himself and about the political environment in which he operates. But again, it is a legitimate topic of discussion. The issue of whether Obama has been too gentle with Wall Street and its supporters is particularly pertinent, given their role in creating our current predicament.
But West does not discuss it legitimately.
In West’s account, Obama has sided with the rich and powerful in part because he “feels most comfortable with upper middle-class white and Jewish men who consider themselves very smart, very savvy and very effective in getting what they want.” But as in most rants, this one includes a tell, an unwitting revelation of its deeper motivation.
“I used to call my dear brother [Obama] every two weeks. I said a prayer on the phone for him, especially before a debate. And I never got a call back. And when I ran into him in the state Capitol in South Carolina when I was down there campaigning for him he was very kind. The first thing he told me was, ‘Brother West, I feel so bad. I haven’t called you back. You been calling me so much. You been giving me so much love, so much support and what have you.’ And I said, ‘I know you’re busy.’ But then a month and half later I would run into other people on the campaign and he’s calling them all the time. I said, wow, this is kind of strange. He doesn’t have time, even two seconds, to say thank you or I’m glad you’re pulling for me and praying for me, but he’s calling these other people. I said, this is very interesting. And then as it turns out with the inauguration I couldn’t get a ticket with my mother and my brother. I said this is very strange. We drive into the hotel and the guy who picks up my bags from the hotel has a ticket to the inauguration. My mom says, ‘That’s something that this dear brother can get a ticket and you can’t get one, honey, all the work you did for him from Iowa.’ Beginning in Iowa to Ohio. We had to watch the thing in the hotel.”
When you committed to “look at a society … through the lens of the least of these, the weak and the vulnerable,” when “you are committed to loving them first … and therefore giving them priority,” you do not whine that the lowly person picking up your bags for you in your very expensive DC hotel somehow wrangled a ticket to the inauguration, while you, the very well-paid Ivy League academic and cultural star who walks among the elite, did not. You cannot attack another for seeking the trappings of power while complaining that you yourself were not supplied the trappings to which you feel yourself entitled.
Or if you do, you give the game away.
As Adam Serwer points out in The American Prospect, West also claims the self-anointed power to confirm or withdraw Obama’s standing as an authentic black man. West withdraws it on the basis of Obama’s ability to feel “at home” “with upper middle-class white and Jewish men” while allegedly harboring “fear of free black men.”
Serwer concludes:
“This remark made me wonder: Which of these men do you think is actually free, and which afraid of who he truly is?”
– Jay Bookman
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846 comments Add your comment
Mick
May 19th, 2011
11:40 am
hd
So, there in no part of you that would like to be in the bright lights even if only for that paltry fifteen minutes?
O Brother Where Art Thou?
May 19th, 2011
11:41 am
Even scientists are racists. Gamma rays have no color, and yet, those event horizon creating, gamma ray emitting machines are called what? Black holes. Ridonculous.
Mary Elizabeth
May 19th, 2011
11:41 am
AmVet @ 11:18
“BHO is a corporate-owned politician who has NO plan for the bottom 100 millions Americans.”
—————————–
AmVet, on that I disagree. Obama wanted a public option within the healthcare plan. He should not have had to waste so much time just fighting for its passage against an intransigent Republican body in Congress, and waste as much political capital as he did. Between that healthcare bill’s passage (all that he could get) and his keeping us from a Depression helped the middle and working class in this nation. “Oh, ye of little faith.”
BTW, AmVet, see my link in my original post today on ALEC. (fourth post in) You will be very much interested in how corporations are buying this nation’s soul.
Yesterday, Obama spoke against giving oil corporations subsidies in tax credits and he mentioned the fact that 4 billion dollars had been given to oil corporations in tax credits last year alone. Of those (all Republicans and 4 Democrats) who would not vote yesterday to end subsidies to oil companies, 42 senators had received 21 million dollars for their campaigns. Of those senators who voted to end those subsidies, 52 had only received 5.4 million dollars for their campaigns. Who is bought by oil corporations? It appears Republican senators have been.
Again, Obama wanted those subsidies to end and said so. We give subsidies to these corporations who already are making huge profits and yet we want to end Medicare as we know it. Wrong values.
My source for info above is “The Last Word” or “Ed Show, ” May 18, MSNBC.
ty webb
May 19th, 2011
11:41 am
“Has it ever occurred to you by the way, Joe, that in this country the right to a free education – a free college education – the way you have in continental Europe, and used to have in the UK before the neolibs started trashing things, is NEVER even on the table here? You ever wonder about that, joe?”
update: it’s not “free” in Europe. Good grief!
Keep Up the Good Fight!
May 19th, 2011
11:41 am
The Dems give the poor just enough entitlements to keep them exactly where they are for fear of success or failure in exchange for their vote
And of course the collorary…The Republicans dont give the poor any safety net because they don’t get their vote. The Republicans say “fend for yourself and if you die, well that is the circle of life.” The Republicans are seeking to take away their vote because of their perceptions and false claims.
The plantation card has been played….how unsurprising.
stands for decibels
May 19th, 2011
11:41 am
West is apparently an anti-Semite…
jm, leveling a charge of anti-Semitism shouldn’t be done as casually as you’re doing right now. Unless you can back it up with something more than this teensy snippet you’ve focused on, that is.
(that all said, yeah, I certainly bristled a bit when I read that line, and thought “oh jeez, I’m sure THAT was really helpful…”)
BADA BING
May 19th, 2011
11:43 am
This new uprising of ‘Jilted Lovers’ reminds me of the so called Arab Spring. People have finally awakened out of their cultlike worship of the Kenyan Boy Wonder. Welcome to the real world, former zombies, smell the $5 coffee.
getalife
May 19th, 2011
11:43 am
“A mascot of Wall Street oligarchs and a puppet of corporate plutocrats.”
What is this type of government called?
We are still ranked low in corruption around the world so there are many people that might stand up.
DD
May 19th, 2011
11:43 am
@ joe
Joe, uh…. did you know that the Super Rich hates you as much as you hate the poor? The super rich would not give you a time or day because in their eyes…..YOU ARE PEASANT!
kayaker 71
May 19th, 2011
11:44 am
I am not sure who is worse, Bozo or West. Both have narcissistic complexes and egos that won’t fit into a room. Essentially West is saying that Bozo isn’t paying enough attention to Him and isn’t feeding his narcissism. Who gives a tinker’s damn about either one of them.
buck@gon
May 19th, 2011
11:45 am
Jay,
Your piece here is confusing. Do you really consider West a serious thinker, or are you worried that he might do your favored Presidential candidate some damage by alienating and ostracizing his base? Hasn’t West been a liberal crank his entire career–a very legitimate topic for discussion, don’t you think? I know people I work with who got tickets to the inauguration, and these Georgians are about as far from Barack Obama as I. My guess is that West wanted special treatment.
What is amusing is that you consider whether Obama being a black man, “a legitimate topic of discussion” by the act of discussing it in your column. What is also amusing is that you bring up West, a liberal, as you would a conservative very nearly, mentioning him only to criticize him. Otherwise, the goal is “nothing to see here.”
The big 800lb argument in the room, whether poor people ought to be “loved” first (my guess that you, Obama, West and most liberals agree with prima facie–West says it, I agree with it, that settles it) is not really debatable with you. Revealed your opinion is! There is then no limit to the number of apple carts that must be overturned to get what you think it is you want, the redistribution of wealth.
Tell me, if you can (& I don’t believe you can), what restrictions the constitution might put on this idea? Is THAT a legitimate discussion?
I think that in itself indicates at least your “intellectual” liberal roots, similar to West’s. I do not, for example, consider it at all possible that you would think my discussion of West (from a conservative perspective) at all legitimate if I were to elaborate on blackness, instead of you. It’s the same old condition West has. Some people are legitimate and should be admitted to the celebration or discussion while others just don’t matter–and this is just fine as long as you get what you want, isn’t it?
Same elitism different day. You yourself want special treatment and license to carry on your discussions, even as you constantly delegitimize ours, up to and including the very ideals that make America America.
jm
May 19th, 2011
11:45 am
sfd 11:41 – there’s a long history of tension between the black community and the jewish community. this is just one facet, or version, of that ugly theme.
West may, or may not, be a full fledged anti-semite. That’s not for me to decide. But those words came dangerously close to crossing the line into anti-semitic lines. I have no doubt if a right winger had said it, there would be sh-t raining down on him.
stands for decibels
May 19th, 2011
11:46 am
Obama wanted a public option within the healthcare plan. He should not have had to waste so much time just fighting for its passage against an intransigent Republican body in Congress
Mary, for the record, this DFH is among those who think he should’ve led with support for HR 676 (an embryonic single payer plan) and had a public option as the fallback.
That he didn’t do that speaks to me not that he’s a lousy negotiator, but rather that he probably didn’t care all that much about the public option in the first place; that it was a “nice-to-have”, not a “need-to-have.”
Which is what one would expect from, well, I won’t say “corporate owned” like AmVet, but rather a corporate-friendly, centrist Democrat, which is what I’ve *always* considered Obama to be.
BADA BING
May 19th, 2011
11:47 am
Doesn’t West have the right to change his mind? obama changed his mind about Jeramiah Wright.
Dave R.
May 19th, 2011
11:47 am
“Of those (all Republicans and 4 Democrats) who would not vote yesterday to end subsidies to oil companies”
Not intended to be a factual statement.
Mary Elizabeth, can you at least agree that the vote yesterday was to end subsidies on the top 5 oil companies ONLY, and not all? And if so, why are you in favor of government picking winners and losers?
If you don’t like subsidies, why not end them ALL? For everyone.
OSAMA
May 19th, 2011
11:48 am
@ bada bing
I HATE THAT KENYAN TOO…see what he did to my crib?
thomas
May 19th, 2011
11:48 am
Jay
May 19th, 2011
11:34 am
Kinda how you bash any and all things Reagan until you discover that Obama is implementing or doing something similar to Reagan, then You use Ronald Reagan as proof of a wonderful job by Obama.
Do you even attempt to see both sides anymore or has your hate for the other side grown so rabid that a mirror cannot even give you an accurate reflection any longer?
Dave R.
May 19th, 2011
11:48 am
I’m not saying that Cornel West is an anti-Semite . . .
. . . but I’ll bet he has a pin-up of Helen Thomas on his office wall.
OSAMA
May 19th, 2011
11:49 am
@jm
youre right, DEMS are anti sucess…just look at millionaire DEMS in the congress…lol..
jm
May 19th, 2011
11:49 am
Dave R – libs are anti-success. That’s the only explanation for why they would penalize the largest companies.
thomas
May 19th, 2011
11:50 am
BADA BING
May 19th, 2011
11:47 am
No, No, No
Remember Obama was not there or did not hear any of the negative remarks by Rev. Wright.
Therefore he didn’t change his mind he was fooled by Rev. Wright, once he found out the type of man the good Rev. was he immediately left the church. Or atleast as soon as he found out what kind of political weapon to be used against him the good Rev. was he left the church.
Themistocles (a.k.a. Left Wing Mgmt)
May 19th, 2011
11:50 am
Mary Elizabeth: “AmVet, on that I disagree. Obama wanted a public option within the healthcare plan. He should not have had to waste so much time just fighting for its passage against an intransigent Republican body in Congress, and waste as much political capital as he did. ”
But the public option idea was shot down by Rahm Emanuel (if I’m not mistaken) as well as the Nelson / Liebermann crew. But what does it say that Obama is unable/unwilling to work behind the scenes to bring people on board?
A passage from the Robert Kuttner article I cited above is enlightening here (sorry for long passage) :
As the political scientist Richard Neustadt observed in his classic work, Presidential Power, a book that had great influence on President John F. Kennedy, the essence of a president’s power is “the power to persuade.” Because our divided constitutional system does not allow the president to lead by commanding, presidents amass power by making strategic choices about when to use the latent authority of the presidency to move public and elite opinion and then use that added prestige as clout to move Congress. In one of Neustadt’s classic case studies, Harry Truman, a president widely considered a lame duck, nonetheless persuaded the broad public and a Republican Congress in 1947-1948 that the Marshall Plan was a worthy idea.
As Neustadt and Burns both observed, though an American chief executive is weak by constitutional design, a president possesses several points of leverage. He can play an effective outside game, motivating and shaping public sentiment, making clear the differences between his values and those of his opposition, and using popular support to box in his opponents and move them in his direction. He can complement the outside bully pulpit with a nimble inside game, uniting his legislative party, bestowing or withholding benefits on opposition legislators, forcing them to take awkward votes, and using the veto. He can also enlist the support of interest groups to pressure Congress, and use media to validate his framing of choices. Done well, all of this signals leadership that often moves the public agenda.
The most effective presidents have worked all these levers. Think of Franklin Roosevelt, or Ronald Reagan, or Lyndon B. Johnson during the era of the War on Poverty and the civil-rights crusade. But except in the endgame of the battle for health care and his recent turnabout in defending Medicare, Obama has been relatively disengaged on all of these fronts. He left the details of his signature legislation and attendant bargaining to his staff. Says a senior Democrat who speaks frequently to Obama, “He is just not someone who enjoys what most of presidential politics entails.”
http://prospect.org/cs/articles?article=barack_obamas_theory_of_power
Between that healthcare bill’s passage (all that he could get) and his keeping us from a Depression helped the middle and working class in this nation. “Oh, ye of little faith.” “
Brosephus
May 19th, 2011
11:50 am
jm
Long history of what? There were Jewish people who gave their lives while helping the Black community work towards equality. Every coin has two sides.
Mary Elizabeth
May 19th, 2011
11:52 am
Paulo977 @ 11:27
“Mary Elizabeth: “One-dimensional thinking about Obama’s vision.”
Oh well, unfortunately some of us are quite comfortable with a one dimension …. covers us well for all our biases!”
————————————–
Friend Paulo, you see the light!
Interesting we are both teachers, huh? Keep your perceptions keen and your voice present, Paulo.
So needed!
buck@gon
May 19th, 2011
11:53 am
jm,
“full-fledged” or not, West’s comments are inexcusable, very nearly as bad as Billy McKinney’s when his dippy daughter was ousted for the brilliant mind of Hank Johnson, now in her seat. –”It was the J-E-W-S”
Now try and imagine if you can, me as a conservative, making similarly bigotted comments about ——- (pick your own grievance lobby). I think then you get a better understanding how out of place a kook like West is in America, and how he deserves nothing of the ridiculous accolades he gets from the pathetic and intellectually soft but wealthy and powerful academic monster in this country.
Listen to West, often as you like on Tavis Smiley’s show on Saturdays, when he spouts the same old crap about the guilt of all white people since the devil created them, and of the gentle oppressed nobility of black people since God formed them from gold and sunshine.
stands for decibels
May 19th, 2011
11:53 am
there’s a long history of tension between the black community and the jewish community.
Well, I’m neither black nor jewish, but FWIW (not much) I’d say “a history” of tension, and by some yardsticks it’s a longish one… but the two groups have a much longer history of common cause.
(And of course, there’s no one “black community” or “jewish community”; the world is a lot messier than that.)
jm
May 19th, 2011
11:54 am
sidebar – what’s wrong with Reid’s eye? boxing match?
thomas
May 19th, 2011
11:54 am
Themistocles (a.k.a. Left Wing Mgmt)
May 19th, 2011
11:50 am
Who was it that hired Rham Emmanuel again?
jm
May 19th, 2011
11:56 am
sfd 11:53 – I agree with 95% of that. They have often worked together to achieve much for the cause of civil rights.
Dave R.
May 19th, 2011
11:56 am
“Dave R – libs are anti-success. That’s the only explanation for why they would penalize the largest companies.”
jm, I would not paint with so broad a brush. I think that liberals by and large, and liberal politicians more so, are enamored with power and control over others. Control they never had in the private sector, because they either failed in the private sector, or never worked in it for very long. Boortz (cue the angry dismissals) had on his website today a re-run of a video from back in I believe 2006 showing Maxine Waters D-(SpaceCadet) telling oil executives that “this liberal’s (her) goal was to nationalize the oil companies.
It is about control, and ultimately the votes that get them re-elected to continue that control.
joe
May 19th, 2011
11:57 am
@ Mick, with today’s food stamps rate at 1 in every 7 americans, the system is broke. food stamps were meant to be a band aid, not a way of life. Just as with unemployment insurance, as soon as it expires, people suddenly have the fire under their rears they need to take a job they might not have wanted to take just to be working again. I have had to take lower paying jobs to keep afloat a couple times in my life, but those led to bigger and better things. Entitlements are necessary for some, but for others how give interviews on how bad they have it, with flat screen tv’s, x-box, cell phones ringing, etc should not be receiving aid. We are going bankrupt and these cuts are going to come one way or another. Best to get off of them now while you can instead of having them taken from you.
@ liberallefty–I agree the Dems don’t actually keep poor people poor, but they sure do offer them incentives that take away their motivation to improve their life. You used the word “laziness” and that right there is the overwhelming majority of that problem…they want the easy way out and there is no easy way. We all work hard for our money and we can no longer afford to pay for these entitlements with that many on the “payroll.”
liberalefty
May 19th, 2011
11:57 am
the JEWS get blamed for everything…smh
Lord Help Us
May 19th, 2011
11:57 am
Bear with me as I don my Cornell West ‘arbiter of who is and who is not’ – fill in the blank:
As a white man, may I say that ‘Pistol Pete’ Maravich was not one of us…
As a (as some call me) redneck, may I say that Larry the Cable guy IS one of us…
As a married man, may I say that Ahnold is not one of us…
As a fisherman, may I say that George (I think they were perch) Bush is not one of us…
As a hunter, may I say that Dick (he looked like a Quail) Cheney is not one of us…
Any credibility bestowed on any of these charlatans is hereby revoked.
md
May 19th, 2011
11:57 am
“He should not have had to waste so much time just fighting for its passage against an intransigent Republican body in Congress, and waste as much political capital as he did. Between that healthcare bill’s passage (all that he could get)”
More revisionist history…………….he had the numbers without the other party………if one wants to be honest, it wasn’t just the republicans that stalled his vision……….as a matter of fact, it was folks within his own party that put the kabosh on the public option.
jm
May 19th, 2011
11:57 am
RE Reid’s eye. Apparently he fell down. If only he would “fall down on the job” instead
thomas
May 19th, 2011
11:58 am
Jay,
Is there any criticism of Obama that you would find to be legitimate?
Can’t bring up that more people than ever are on food stamps, cause according to you that was only meant as a racist slant by Newt. then this guy can’t have actual problems with Obama, he must just be mad and had his feeling hurt by Obama.
Thank Gawd we have you to speak the truth with no personal agenda????
O Brother Where Art Thou?
May 19th, 2011
11:59 am
Obama shafted me on the Golden Ticket. I am not amused.
Themistocles (a.k.a. Left Wing Mgmt)
May 19th, 2011
12:00 pm
Thomas: Dave R – libs are anti-success. That’s the only explanation for why they would penalize the largest companies
Yeah, that was my whole point.
The fact of the matter is that Barack Obama is not a particularly effective president. And it’s not a failure of intelligence. On the contrary, if anything the case of Barack Obama is the most intelligent president since Woodrow Wilson. His is the story of the failure of our culture to bridge raw encyclopedic intelligence and know-how at the level of leadership of a superstate. No one quite knows how to do that.
Jay
May 19th, 2011
12:00 pm
Thomas, it’s perfectly legitimate to bring up food stamps usage. That’s not what Gingrich did, though, is it? He used it as a label, as if it somehow defined Obama.
And I’m not claiming West did this for personal reasons. He acknowledges it himself. All I did was quote him.
jm
May 19th, 2011
12:01 pm
Obama making an mideast speech. You know Egypt is coming apart at the seams….
Obama Doctrine (not that there is one): um, failure to lead.
jm
May 19th, 2011
12:02 pm
Obama is starting to look more and more like Jimmy Carter….
stands for decibels
May 19th, 2011
12:02 pm
jm @ 11.56, and the connection pre-dates what we think of as the post-civil-war civil rights efforts, and goes back to their earliest churches, and their identification with the liberation theology components of the Old Testament, of course.
/capt. Obvious
Lord Help Us
May 19th, 2011
12:03 pm
As a person with a sense of humor, may I say that Peapuppy is not one of us…
ronald
May 19th, 2011
12:03 pm
Using the term “Academic” is pretty strong, when describing Cornel West. Is he still trying to cut it teaching Hip Hop 101 or does he teach real classes now? Keep in mind that he left Harvard, after the University President questioned his teaching style and curriculum. West, of course, screamed racism…Let’s stop pretending that he’s a real professor and move on..
jm
May 19th, 2011
12:04 pm
Jay 12 – if Newt’s statement about “Food Stamps” is racist, then we can put West in the category one step removed from people who have actually killed someone in a racist act.
Peadawg
May 19th, 2011
12:04 pm
West is an ass. President Obama is the greatest. Long live President Obama!!! Long live the Democrat Party!!!
jm
May 19th, 2011
12:05 pm
“President Obama plans to forgive up to $1 billion in debt Egypt owes to the U.S., aides say. |
Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0511/55265.html#ixzz1MoaevpzI
Cause they can’t pay it back anyway, and because Egypt is crumbling. Great, 80 million very p-ssed off people is not going to turn out well. I’m sure Israel is getting mighty nervous.
Themistocles (a.k.a. Left Wing Mgmt)
May 19th, 2011
12:05 pm
Thomas: sorry, my bad, I posted wrong passage for my reply.
The previous reply was in response to “Who was it that hired Rham Emmanuel again?”
Mary Elizabeth
May 19th, 2011
12:06 pm
Themistocles 11:50
But Obama did get the healthcare package through Congress into law – no president in 50 years had been able to do that and I again say that he got the best deal he could have. Remember his talking about his mother’s plight with insurance companies as she was dying was one of his motivating forces and his mother was not a wealthy woman – far from it – but she was a very educated woman.
Sen. Nelson is one of those 4 Democrats who sided with big oil subsidies yesterday in Congress, against what Obama wanted.
As far as Obama not persuading Republicans in the Congress today – in all due respect, LWM, you have got to be kidding.
Check out this link from Krugman: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/16/opinion/16krugman.html?_r=1
One of Krugman’s lines from that article is:
“What has changed? The answer is the radicalization of the Republican Party.”
The Republican Party has sold out to corporate interests in this nation (see my earlier posts today for links for the facts) and there is no way, as a result that they are going to compromise. They are “bought and sold” – doncha know?
I don’t know at what point Rahm Emanuel was just trying to save any part of the bill he could.
Gm
May 19th, 2011
12:06 pm
Jay:
This battles is deeper, West labeled Al Sharpton as a Puppet for Obama, the two are going at it, West expected Obama to do more for the black commmunity, unemployment is at a %18 in some communities.
What bothers me about West, Tavis Smiley they never held Clinton or Bush to these standards, poor Obama he gets it from every where this is why he has and will become the greatest President of our time.
William R. Castle
May 19th, 2011
12:07 pm
It’s only natural to pick up the loose ends of Dr. West’s discourse and run with them. But I think it would be a mistake to stop there, as so many commentators have done. I don’t want to focus on who’s blacker, who’s more ivy league, who’s more arrogant — West or Obama or this-or-that commentator. Let’s focus instead on the gravely abhorrent aspects of the Obama presidency, as West did: cover-up of war crimes (Bush torture), surrendering social justice to Wall Street (no relief on mortgage fraud), unconstitutional expansion of presidential war powers (Libya, surveillance, assassination of US citizens). Small wonder that West, as a prominent black progressive, is sorely disappointed. Is it reasonable to expect that he should be able to get beyond issues of race in criticizing our first black president? I think the rest of us should strive to get beyond issues of racial identity, personality, or vocabulary to share his outrage at the tragic disappointments of the Obama presidency.
Hillbilly Deluxe
May 19th, 2011
12:09 pm
Mick @ 11:40
Actually, no. I’ve spent a good deal of time, in the past, around people who were in the public eye, (to the point of them not be able to eat a meal in a restaurant without people asking for autographs) and I wouldn’t trade places with them, at all.
Keep Up the Good Fight!
May 19th, 2011
12:10 pm
pea…if you are going to provide some silly cheer or otehr childishness at least get the name of the party correct…its Democratic Party
getalife
May 19th, 2011
12:11 pm
Wonder what he thinks of justice thomas?
Don't Forget
May 19th, 2011
12:12 pm
The fact that almost nobody from the left is endorsing West shows an important distinction between the two parties. The dems are not controlled by the far left. The right, on the other hand, seems to embrace every extreme statement that comes from their side. When was the last time that the r’s condemned something as too conservative? I think you’d have to go back to when Pat Buchanon was a candidate.
md
May 19th, 2011
12:12 pm
“The right, on the other hand, seems to embrace every extreme statement that comes from their side.”
Wasn’t it just this week that Newt was blasted for his social engineering comment??
getalife
May 19th, 2011
12:13 pm
Hillary Clinton will be missed.
She is explaining the Obama doctrine for jm.
USMC
May 19th, 2011
12:13 pm
“By now, the Obama critic=racist meme is being repeated 1,000 times from conservatives for every one time it is uttered from the left.”
If the shoe fits… what’s good for the goose… etc.
I Know You Are But What Am I
May 19th, 2011
12:15 pm
The only people who submit that Obama is an arch-liberal are those who simply wish to displace him for political expediency purposes.
The man is a centrist in his governance.
He is the third term of George W.
True liberals such as Dr. West have been fed up with Obama for a couple of years. That’s what makes the cries of socialism from the right sound so forced and transparent.
DebbieDoRight
May 19th, 2011
12:15 pm
Adam: It seems that West took a story of what he viewed as a personal slight to him and extrapolated it out to a class war within the black community, and created something like a “No True Scotsman” argument. How annoying. How stupid.
The “Not Black Enough” argument is something that will always, unfortunately, be a part of Black America’s discussion. Cosby? No Black Enough. King? Not Black Enough. My sister? Not Black Enough, (too light skinned). And when you ask the person “why”, they always come up with something really stupid like, “Well, back in 1901 they didn’t know the NegroNational Anthem” or some such nonsense. I hear crap like that all the time, you learn to tune it out and listen to your own drummer and the morals your family instilled into you. The rest is just nonsense noise.
USMC
May 19th, 2011
12:15 pm
Yes sirree,
THE WICK IS BURNING FROM BOTH ENDS…
Tick Tock, Tick Tock, Tick Tock…
Obama Loses in 2012
Don't Forget
May 19th, 2011
12:15 pm
md, lol, Newt was blasted for condemning the extremism of Ryan’s plan. Proves my point perfectly.
Goldie
May 19th, 2011
12:16 pm
Our President can never please everyone about everything, and for Cornel West to be whining about watching the inauguration in a hotel is so telling… so very sad for brother Cornel!
THE TRUTH
May 19th, 2011
12:17 pm
It is common knowledge that Obama only cares about Obama.
NOBAMA 2012 !
USMC
May 19th, 2011
12:17 pm
Peter Fonda calls Obama ‘traitor’ at Cannes…
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110518/ennew_afp/entertainmentfilmfestivalcannesusobamafonda_20110518154556
RB from Gwinnett
May 19th, 2011
12:17 pm
Sounds like the man is cut from the same cloth as Rev. Wright.
USMC
May 19th, 2011
12:17 pm
Jewish Donors Warn Obama on Israel
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703509104576331661918527154.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
Tick Tock, Tick Tock, Tick Tock…
Goldie
May 19th, 2011
12:17 pm
So let’s see — who’s being offered up by the Repub Party for 2012? The Mitt, Ole Newt, Rick Sanitarium, Grandpa Paul, et al… President Obama wins in a landslide!
TG
May 19th, 2011
12:18 pm
Jay Bookman, sorry. You are not in a position to speak on what Dr. West spoke on. As a White man, you just aren’t. (Sorry)
West told the truth and a lot of people are afraid of the truth–that like West, you TOO were “misled in a very deep way.”
Truth hurts folks.
Mick
May 19th, 2011
12:18 pm
**libs are anti-success. That’s the only explanation for why they would penalize the largest companies.**
Idiotic post of the day…
Scooter (The Original)
May 19th, 2011
12:18 pm
Credentials as a “black man”? Come on, he may check black on his census records but he has been mostly groomed by white liberals and thirteen of his chromosomes are white.
USMC
May 19th, 2011
12:19 pm
Obama’s campaign song for Election 2012
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtndOhSMpHs
MiltonMan
May 19th, 2011
12:22 pm
Leave it up to AmWay to spin this one around & point fingers back to the “cons”. Man up Amway! This is nothing more than two Liberals taking pot shots at one another. As one of your despised “cons”, I think I will grab some popcorn & sit back & enjoy this “I am better liberal than you are brother”.
Mick
May 19th, 2011
12:23 pm
hd
I agree almost 99.9% about the spotlight. The .1% that hits me is that when you take the measure of human existence, did you take and or rather miss the opportunity to leave a mark on it? I guess the answer my friend is blowin in the wind…
Don't Forget
May 19th, 2011
12:23 pm
A black president should be no more obligated to black people than a white president should be toward white people. Mr West is fundamentally wrong.
stands for decibels
May 19th, 2011
12:23 pm
And when you ask the person “why”, they always come up with something really stupid like, “Well, back in 1901 they didn’t know the NegroNational Anthem” or some such nonsense
Ok, this made me laugh.
Mick
May 19th, 2011
12:25 pm
It just goes to show that, you can please some of the people some of the time but you can never please all the people all the time…
THE TRUTH
May 19th, 2011
12:25 pm
TG
May 19th, 2011
12:18 pm
Jay Bookman, sorry. You are not in a position to speak on what Dr. West spoke on. As a White man, you just aren’t. (Sorry)
West told the truth and a lot of people are afraid of the truth–that like West, you TOO were “misled in a very deep way.”
Truth hurts folks.
HOPE AND CHANGE, words alone with no action, so sad.
NOBAMA 2012 !
jm
May 19th, 2011
12:26 pm
The only person I “love” in the Obama administration: Austan Goolsbee. He’s hilarious and awesome.
http://www.colbertnation.com/full-episodes/wed-may-18-2011-austan-goolsbee
It helps that he’s plain spoken and a southerner (if you count TX)
Sevananda
May 19th, 2011
12:26 pm
What with all the hand wringing and later anger from Cornel West, perhaps Mr. West can now accept the strong possibility that the President really does not like nor respect him.
Mr. West, although in a refined manner as compared to Mr. Jesse Jackson, has intellectually terrorized thousands of students and the media with his useless literary slop.
MiltonMan
May 19th, 2011
12:27 pm
Funny to see the libs on here thinking that they are Nostradamus by predicting Obozo in a landslide.
TG
May 19th, 2011
12:27 pm
And Bookman, shame on you for exploiting a piece of West’s overall point to play the race card. Neo-liberals are as bad as right-wingers with not EVER being able to see past race.
West’s point was NOT “yanking Obama’s credentials as a Black man.” He questions his credentials as a supposed PROGRESSIVE. His net was MUCH bigger than you relyaed Bookaman. Shame, shame on you.
Gm
May 19th, 2011
12:29 pm
THE TRUTH
yea he really does not care, thats why he is fighting to keep senior medicaid, health care, oh by the way America safe.
The problem with the right they are looking for a Rep version of Obama one that sells out to big Oil companies, what a idiot of party voting to keep tax breaks for big oil making billions.
Thank you Obama for standing up to big Oil and not taking kick backs like Rep, and keeping family values.
stands for decibels
May 19th, 2011
12:29 pm
A black president should be no more obligated to black people than a white president should be toward white people. Mr West is fundamentally wrong.
yes. well. about that. I think Marc Maron put it best, way back in May 2008:
“I like Obama. I’m excited about . . . the way he looks just over the audience into the distance at something good and right for all just out on the horizon. I think this is a historic opportunity for black people to be misrepresented by one of their own. We’ve been misrepresented by ours since the beginning. I say pass the baton, brother.”
whocares
May 19th, 2011
12:29 pm
I think citizens, whether R or D, don’t totally understand the political process. There are a lot more things that go on behind the scenes that we will never know.
I say that to say that for all the knowledge that Dr. West has, he should know better. To question President Obama’s blackness is an insult. He may as well question his sexuality to boot…
getalife
May 19th, 2011
12:30 pm
HD,
“Actually, no. I’ve spent a good deal of time, in the past, around people who were in the public eye, (to the point of them not be able to eat a meal in a restaurant without people asking for autographs) and I wouldn’t trade places with them, at all.”
Give us some TMZ dirt .
USMC
May 19th, 2011
12:30 pm
The Hypocrisy of the Left-wing Liberal (Marxist/Socialist) is Laughable:
I guess when you can’t win with logic, you start making up stories of “King Ronald” or you(Cornel West) attack a man’s “skin color” and judge everyone by their religion (jewish) & RACE.
Maybe someone needs to send “Brutha” Cornel West to this link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEMXaTktUfA
(…judge NOT on the COLOR of skin but on the CONTENT of character…)
Joe Mama
May 19th, 2011
12:30 pm
Don’t Forget — “A black president should be no more obligated to black people than a white president should be toward white people. Mr West is fundamentally wrong.”
This.
larry
May 19th, 2011
12:31 pm
Cornel West, Kanye West …………………………………Adam West.
Maybe we should head east?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vwNcNOTVzY
Jimmy62
May 19th, 2011
12:32 pm
West is realizing what Obama already knew. West is irrelevant and everyone but West himself and Jay knows it.
Grasshopper
May 19th, 2011
12:32 pm
West sounds like a spurned lover.
Dave R.
May 19th, 2011
12:33 pm
“To question President Obama’s blackness is an insult. He may as well question his sexuality to boot…”
Oh, no! Don’t tell me he’s one of “those” people.
Does josef nix know this?
Davidtoo
May 19th, 2011
12:33 pm
So is obama an authentic black man or an authentic white man ?
By the way, why does obama claim to be black when he is everybit as much white ?
Or would a 50/50 man offend blacks if he called himself white ? Would he offend whites ?
I think not.
liberalefty
May 19th, 2011
12:34 pm
@davidtoo
because he looks black..he was always considered himself black because to the average person he looks black…
Tracy
May 19th, 2011
12:34 pm
Tons of people on the left have bailed on Obama, claiming he’s sold out his “liberal” ideology. I know countless college liberals who acted like they won the lottery when Obama won. Absolutely every single one of them calls him a fraud now. They just view him as W Bush except he gave out a hooky healthcare plan that won’t help anyone get healthcare.
Meanwhile the right wing media and politicans continue to paint him as “the most socialist left-winged” President we’ve ever had.
How can he be such a raging liberal is the liberals are all turning against him for “selling out” ???
BADA BING
May 19th, 2011
12:34 pm
West should start an org. for recovering obamaholics. Like AA, OA would focus on returning addicts to real life. West has taken his own first step and admitted he had a problem. What step is the one about Apology? Make sure all members stress that one to the rest of the country.
White House-Black Market
May 19th, 2011
12:35 pm
We don’t prefer gray.
USMC
May 19th, 2011
12:36 pm
I do though applaud Jay Bookman for even writing a column on this ridiculousness from the Left.
(don’t think Cornel is the only Racial Marxist who spouts this trash)
You all remember Obama’s friend here, don’t you?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hPR5jnjtLo
Black Man Credentialist
May 19th, 2011
12:36 pm
No 1/2 white man can be black.
jm
May 19th, 2011
12:37 pm
USMC 12:36 – common theme: defending Obama….