Kwickie, Niki,.... anyone ? A little help here. by AURaptor

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Kwickie, Niki,.... anyone ? A little help here.

POSTED BY: AURAPTOR
UPDATED: Sunday, March 28, 2010 09:01
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Saturday, March 27, 2010 8:51 AM

Jack Cashill: Anatomy of a Racial Smear
American Thinker ^ | March 24, 2010 | Jack Cashill

For the last year, the media have been desperately trying to hang the "racist" tag around the Tea Party movement as a way to discredit it. This past weekend, they would seem to have finally succeeded.

The McClatchy newspaper chain, whose slogan is "truth to power," launched an opening salvo on Saturday, March 20 with the inflammatory headline -- its exact words -- "Tea party protesters scream 'nigger' at black congressman." That is "protesters" in the plural who "scream" a racial epithet, "nigger," at a particular "congressman."

This one headline contains one perilously uncorroborated accusation and three conscious fabrications, beginning with the identity of the "congressman" in question. So much for "truth to power."

To give the story poignancy, reporter William Douglas makes iconic civil rights veteran John Lewis the subject of the abuse. He is the "congressman" alluded to in the headline. The only problem is that Lewis never heard anything. This is the first of the fabrications.

According to the article, Lewis was walking from the Cannon Office Building to the Capitol when protesters started shouting. According to Lewis, however, what they shouted was not a racial slur, but "Kill the bill, kill the bill." If he heard anything more derogatory, he does not seem to have told Douglas about it.

Lewis, it should be noted, is no slouch when it comes to race-baiting. During the 2008 campaign, he compared the McCain-Palin campaign to that of "presidential candidate George Wallace," whose comparable "atmosphere of hate" led to the fatal church bombing in Birmingham. So egregious were Lewis's comments that McCain called on Obama to "condemn" them.

As Douglas reports, it was Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO), a Lewis colleague walking a few steps behind him, who actually claimed to have heard the slur. Note the way that Douglas runs these sentences together.

Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Mo., said he was a few yards behind Lewis and distinctly heard "nigger."

"It was a chorus," Cleaver said. "In a way, I feel sorry for those people who are doing this nasty stuff -- they're being whipped up. I decided I wouldn't be angry with any of them."

Douglas deliberately leaves the impression that Cleaver heard a "chorus" of people shouting racial slurs. The use of the plural in the headline is the second of the fabrications. The chorus was, in fact, shouting, "Kill the Bill."

It is unlikely that Cleaver misled Douglas. In the era of the ubiquitous camera, he would have known that such an accusation could be immediately refuted, as it certainly has been. The ample videotape evidence shows that there was no such chorus.

Cleaver does turn briefly to face the camera in one video, but regardless of what he might have heard or thought he heard, no one on the video is heard to "scream" anything racial. This is the third fabrication.

What is uncorroborated is whether Cleaver even heard a single person utter the slur in question. William Owens, a black Tea Party activist from Nevada who had joined in the protests, confirmed to FOXNews.com, "Never did I hear any type of racial slur."

House majority whip James CIyburn, who walked with the contingent from the Black Caucus, heard no racist remarks either. "I experienced some of [the anger]," Clyburn told Keith Olbermann on March 22. "I didn`t hear the slurs." Still, this was more than enough for the factually indifferent Olbermann to conclude, "If racism is not the whole of the Tea Party, it is in its heart."

Cleaver also claimed that the police arrested one of the Tea Party crowd for spitting on him, but he chose not to press charges. U.S. Capitol Police, however, said that no protester was arrested. One was, however, detained and quickly released.

"There were no elements of a crime, and the individual wasn't able to be positively identified," a spokeswoman for the Capitol Police told FoxNews.com. "[Cleaver] was unable to positively identify."

Despite the slightness of the evidence, the seemingly omniscient Yael T. Abouhalkah, the Editorial Page columnist in Cleaver's hometown Kansas City Star, a McClatchy paper, was able to conclude that "some Tea Party supporter spat on Cleaver Saturday on Capitol Hill because the U.S. congressman is black."

If there were a spitting incident, it is clear that the spitter had to be someone other than the shouter of racial slurs. That Abouhalkah can impute racism to someone he does not know, not even by name, who may or may not have spit, is testament to the shabby, subversive state of contemporary journalism.

When the message moves out into the leftist blogosphere, the message gets progressively more unhinged. One fairly typical YouTube site I visited hoping to see evidence of the spitting, as implied in the video's listing, instead reviled the "teabaggers" as "homophobe, racists, bigots." There was no video verification of any of the charges.

For the last half-century, the Democrats have been able to count on the allegiance of black America to their program. They and their media allies know that the party -- in both senses -- ends when African Americans catch on to the ruin which that program has rained upon black America: unprecedented rates of homicide, homelessness, social disease, abortion, drug addiction, unemployment, poverty, and imprisonment.

With so many promises broken, all that Democrats have left to peddle are an elusive hope and a manufactured fear. Pretty soon, it will be just the fear. Expect more of this.

http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/03/anatomy_of_a_racial_smear_1.htm
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http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2479251/posts

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Saturday, March 27, 2010 9:02 AM

NIKI2

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

If that's true, Raptor, then kudos to you. I imagine it was true, since I could go back up and read all the threads. Please excuse me if I don't; I'm being forthright in saying I don't want to take the time to wend my way through it.

The accusations of whether this was real or not will continue to fly back and forth. Nobody cares, I don't think, in reality; they just want their side to be right. Personally, I find it quite possible things could be yelled, given the Republicans stood up and egged on those causing disturbance in the House, and politics certainly not being adverse to making the most of something.

I really don't care. No video will be coming, and I'm sure there will be other incidents to debate whether they happened or not, whether a Democrat did it to get sympathy, or whatever other arguments each side wants to make.

It's history, to me; the bricks were thrown, the propane was leaked (a far worse issue which hasn't been discussed at all) and each side will blame the other. This issue and those like it are taking up a number of threads at this point, I'd rather discuss other things until something happens that can be proven (if anything ever can, because unless it's crystal clear, it will be denied or the other side will be blamed).

The video that was posted had nothing to do with the initial intent of the thread and what it "shows" has been questioned, debated, and argued over, which is stupid IMHO. Again, "Best defense is a good offens", and I'm getting sick of the offensiveness of it ALL. There's so much else going on in the world...

p.s. OTB: coming from American Thinker (which shows a huge picture of an angry, ugly Obama with the text "I want your guns!!" and an online petition to sign) doesn't have a lot of credibility. The second cite is a duplicate of the first.

"I'm just right. Kinda like the sun rising in the east and the world being round...its not a need its just the way it is." The Delusional "Hero", 3/1/10

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Saturday, March 27, 2010 9:31 AM

AURAPTOR

America loves a winner!

Quote:
Originally posted by Niki2:If that's true, Raptor, then kudos to you. I imagine it was true, since I could go back up and read all the threads. Please excuse me if I don't; I'm being forthright in saying I don't want to take the time to wend my way through it.

The accusations of whether this was real or not will continue to fly back and forth. Nobody cares, I don't think, in reality; they just want their side to be right. Personally, I find it quite possible things could be yelled, given the Republicans stood up and egged on those causing disturbance in the House, and politics certainly not being adverse to making the most of something.

See, I care. I care if my political side has a very tiny fraction, or a larger number of degenerates in it. I care if the opposition is making shit up, to fan the flames of discord and political spin. And what ever the case, I want it out in the light, for all to see, so we an start dealing on a level ground , to debate the ISSUES on their merit alone, and not get caught up in needless, fabricated bullshit. Sure, it comes from both sides, and we're not naive enough to think emotion can't come into play here. Passion is unavoidable, but recklessness and thuggery can't be accepted.

Quote:

I really don't care. No video will be coming, and I'm sure there will be other incidents to debate whether they happened or not, whether a Democrat did it to get sympathy, or whatever other arguments each side wants to make.

On THIS matter, I have to say, from the video evidence we DO have, it's extremely unlikely that such an event took place. Not only do we see how the 'spitting' act was vastly exaggerated, but if such a crowd did start chanting slurs during their march, it would have cause at least SOME commotion among the Tea Part folks themselves. And where there's a ruckus, the video cams are sure to be pointed. It's just human nature.

Quote:

The video that was posted had nothing to do with the initial intent of the thread and what it "shows" has been questioned, debated, and argued over, which is stupid IMHO. Again, "Best defense is a good offens", and I'm getting sick of the offensiveness of it ALL. There's so much else going on in the world...

It has everything to do w/ the original intent of the thread. Claims were made, and accusation have been levied. If those things are true, I want it exposed, so the Right can fall back, take stock in what really matters, and make sure none of that crap ever happens again. ( or, if it does, some folks get a serious ass kicking ) What better fun for the Left to see Right wingers duking it out,among themselves? Tell me you wouldn't enjoy that, if only for a moment or two!

And if it didn't happen ? Well, that would be very telling indeed, and I'd want that exposed just as much.

Summer Glau can simply walk into Mordor

Bones: "Don't 'rawr' her!"
Booth: "What? she'rawred' me first."

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Sunday, March 28, 2010 9:01 AM

NIKI2

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Well said, Raptor! I agree in general, but would disagree in part:

If the truth of any of these incidents were proven, it would just be another thing to argue about...if either side were proven wrong, it would give the other side the excuse to call them on it; if either side were proven right, it would give the other side reason to say "it was just a few", "they deserved it", or ignore it completely.

Note that Boehner and Cantor came out immediately with their "spin". Boehner said talking about all of tis doesn't go to the issues; Cantor said it was the Dems who were fomenting violence. There hasn't been, in my estimation, any desire to address the issues on the part of the right; if they had wanted to, they would have, rather than encouraging groups to disrupt, send out memos instructing how to distrust, applauded the disruption in the House by protesters, and they wouldn't have been throwing around the lies they did IN the House (death panels, etc.). They would have addressed the actual problems in the bill, but I've seen no evidence they want to discuss issues at all, just overblown rhetoric and visceral buzz words which play on their base's fears. NOW they're saying all the talk of violence avoids discussion on the issues...so it looks more like trying to turn the topic than as if they were serious.

I don't believe "many" called out the N word. I don't believe it was a group chanting...I hadn't actually heard that anyway. I heard it was one guy...but I also heard it was one bullet in Cantor's office and later it was said that his office was "sprayed" with bullets; this may show how things get blown out of proportion. I admit I wouldn't have any problem believing some of this happened. I think tempers have been driven SO high on the right that it can't help but make people more easily act out of emotion rather than reason, and/or figure they had good reason to do violence or hurl slurs.

Equally, because of that it would be easier for people to believe it was people on the right and not look as hard at the possibility that it was fabricated/overblown and/or done by someone on the left for political purposes.

By saying "not get caught up in needless, fabricated bullshit", you already show your bias. I may believe it's quite possible for someone to get head up enough to hurl slurs or bricks, but, I can't be sure whether or not they actually DID, it just seems quite plausable. But your saying "fabricated" shows both that you don't believe any of it happened, and that you believe it's all bullshit (thereby denying the seriousness of it, whoever did it). So none of it is actually important...not the bricks, the loosening of the propane, the slurs??? It's ALL fabricated, you're already saying.

I'm not in your mind, so I can't speak to the original intent of the thread. But the title and first post READ quite clearly like a snark, like a "neener, neener, you can't prove it", and it was directly aimed and Mike and I. That's why I say the video was irrelevant; it does not address the initial challenge, it addresses a different incident entirely. Just as I've been told the photos I put up were irrelevant. Both show the possibility of the slurs having taken place or NOT haven taken place, but neither addresses the question of that particular incident.

Additionally, the "baby killer" hollered out WAS caught on tape, but nobody to this day knows for sure whether he actually hollered "IT'S a baby killer" or just "Baby killer"--and there's a huge difference. Ergo, a video of someone hollering "nigger" in the midst of all the other hollering might well not prove anything either way unless it was hollered clearly and loudly. I'd bet money anyone hollering it wouldn't do so clearly and loudly, especially if they were close to the Congressman. They'd want him alone to hear it.

It's all a moot point; there is no video, it's obvious, and if it did, it might prove nothing. End of story. We'll see what happens from here on.

"I'm just right. Kinda like the sun rising in the east and the world being round...its not a need its just the way it is." The Delusional "Hero", 3/1/10

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