Shirley Sherrod: Breitbart Is A Racist Who'd "Like To Get Us Stuck Back In The Time Of Slavery"

[Turborama]

Run time: 04:05 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwNBySVh5vU   Posted on YouTube: July 23, 2010 By YouTube Member: HotAirPundit Views on YouTube: 8   Posted on DU: July 23, 2010 By DU Member: Turborama Views on DU: 1884

 
Transcript to be added soon, CNN are quite good at posting them quickly.

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/acd.html

[guruoo]

1. k&r

Interesting to see how this plays out in regards to the administration's job offer.

[mucifer]

2. She is considering suing breitbart. Good for her!

[greenman3610]

3. God I hope she sues his ass off.

[Tansy_Gold]

4. If this whole incident is a "teachable" moment,

Shirley Sherrod is the master teacher.

"Someone" in the Administration needs to be following her example. Here is a woman who is not afraid to call out a racist for what he is. That kind of honesty, that kind of "the emperor's naked butt is hangin' out for all to see" honesty is sorely lacking in the Administration, but more important, that kind of honesty with regard to race is painfully lacking in our whole country.

I was talkin' to the BF the other night, before this whole story broke so not in that context, about how he can never never never, no matter how many Black people he works with, no matter how many Asian people he works with, no matter how many Latino people he works with, he can never never never know what it's like to walk in their skin. He is white, he is always gonna be white, and nothing can change that. But because white skin privilege is the default, those who don't have it can NEVER not be Black or Asian or Hispanic.

Shirley Sherrod knows this, and she's confronted it, and she's moved past it in her own life and her own experience. But she lives in a society that hasn't, and as she is so tragically aware, she has been working in an Administration that also has not confronted it, much less moved past it.

IMHO, Barack Obama missed the boat on this one. He should not have waited for Shirley Sherrod to say she wanted an apology from him. He should have been there IMMEDIATELY with an apology. Again, expecting an apology for those responsible for the lies is like waiting for Godot. Ain't never gonna happen. But Obama should not have waited to be asked for an apology. That he did wait shows he hasn't yet confronted the issue and is a long way from moving beyond it.



Tansy Gold, still angry

[EFerrari]

5. The hastiness of the decision makes me think it wasn't his.

It sounds more like another gem from a certain quarter. But regardless, I hope they make much of this lady for what they put her and her family through. They're lucky that she is who she is, that's for sure.

[Turborama]

7. Yeah, I'm withholding my judgement on that one, too.

It seems supremely ironic and hypocritical that, before all the facts are known, so many people have instantly jumped to the conclusion that President Obama himself called for her to resign.

(edited to clarify what I meant)

[guruoo]

8. Until we hear otherwise, Vilsack owns this one, IMHO...

Vilsack: I Accept 'Full Responsibility':
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/video/vilsack-accept-full-responsibility-11221129
Video, 3 min - 1 day ago
abcnews.go.com

[EFerrari]

12. She was asked about this directly by AC and it was her opinion

that the word came out of the White House. She did not say it was Obama and she explicitly said she did not need an apology from him.

[guruoo]

15. Would be interesting to know what has led her to that

Have you seen this?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=385&topic_id=488221&mesg_id=488241

[EFerrari]

16. Interesting. No, I hadn't. n/t

[pattmarty]

22. Haven't these "morons" learned to fucking verify a "story"? Especially.........

...............from that shitbag Breitbart. In this particular instance they are bordering on the stupidity of Bush.

[pattmarty]

21. I said in another post that he should resign, and I still believe that..........

......This was evil by the right and just plain laziness and stupidity by the "centrists". The "left" are screaming, but that goddamn "liberal" media won't cover "us". This "event" was just as racist as a lot of the shit that happened in the 60's. These ass holes have gotten quite sophisticated with their propaganda.

[EFerrari]

11. That doesn't even sound like what we know of him.

:shrug:

[Tansy_Gold]

19. Just to clarify -- I'm not saying Obama himself called for her to resign

What I AM saying is that regardless who was to blame within the Administration, this was a moment when an unasked-for apology from the president would have sent a very very very powerful message. What we got instead were Robert Gibbs and Tom Vilsack, two white guys who have never had to experience even one tiny speck of racial discrimination. They're white, they've always been white, they're always gonna be white.

Barack Obama, who may indeed never have experienced the intensity and depth of racism Shirley Sherrod has, still has at least some experience of it. HE KNOWS, in a way Gibbs and Vilsack never can, what it's like to live in that skin.

Not only did he owe her an apology on behalf of his administration -- of which she is part, it should be noted -- but I think he owes the nation an explanation.

Remember that in 1960, when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was arrested in Georgia, it was candidate Sen. John Kennedy who made the phone calls that led to King's release from jail. Whether JFK did so out of sincere support for King's mission or out of crass political expediency, the tactic worked to bring traditionally republican Black support to the Democrats, and perhaps ultimately to the Civil Rights act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and who knows? maybe even to the election of Barack Obama in 2008.

Obama owed Shirley Sherrod the apology on behalf of his administration, even if he wasn't personally involved or even personally aware of what was going on. That apology, expressed immediately and coming from the President, could have undone much of the damage and removed some ammunition from the RW attack.

Whether the administration will use this opportunity to begin a serious dialogue on race and discrimination remains to be seen, but this is an opportunity they'd better hope never comes again.




Tansy Gold

[MadMaddie]

6. Tansy I am still very angry about this incident

She was just a pawn in the Breitbarts attack against the NAACP for calling out the Teabaggers.

She is a role-model on how to deal with the dirtbags.

[Tansy_Gold]

20. "Role-model" -- exactly

And i think some somebodies oughta be lookin' at what Shirley did and rethinkin' their own responses to some of this rw shit.



TG, NTY

[dkf]

9. Why can't she just call him a self serving lying manipulator?

I don't get how she comes to the conclusion that breitbart wants blacks to be slaves again. I sure hope she preserves her credibility because she has a wonderful way of explaining things and she could do a lot of great things with this notoriety.

[DeSwiss]

10. K&R

Someone in the WH?



Why not start here?

[stlsaxman]

26. BINGO!!!! ding- ding- ding- ding- ding- ding- ding- ding- ding- ding!!!!!

[sabrina 1]

13. If she had not stood up for herself, insisted on

CNN on Tuesday that someone look at the full tape, she would still be thought a racist today. As she said, no one at the Dept. of Agriculture nor the WH wanted to listen to her. They just wanted it and her, to go away.

The way she handeled this herself is the way the ACORN situation needed to be handled as soon as it became apparent that lies were being told and tapes had been edited. Especially after the evidence was produced from the Philadelphia and San Diego Offices that ACORN workers had called the police.

But, just as happened with Shirley Sherrod, no one wanted to look at the truth. They just wanted to shut up the Fox News and Congress disgraced itself and has yet to offer ACORN and all the people who are now without their assistance, an apology.

If they want to permanently damage this rightwing noise machine, the best way would be to elevate Van Jones and ACORN once again. To start talking to the media about how what happened to Shirley Sherrod was the same thing that these thugs did to ACORN.

They have never reported on the number of investigations that have found ACORN not guilty of any wrong doing, including a Congressional investigation.

Until ACORN is vindicated, these criminals will not be quashed and will continue to do attack innocent people and organizations.

It is vitally important that they are completely destroyed now by doing what would simply drive them crazy, start talking about re-construction ACORN because a great injustice was done to them by the very same people.

And if this story just dies, expect to see another stunt in a few weeks or months from now. The goal should be to annihilate them, they are a threat to this country.

[Turborama]

14. TRANSCRIPT

COOPER: Ms. Sherrod, what did you and the president talk about in your conversation today? What did he say to you?

SHIRLEY SHERROD, FORMER USDA OFFICIAL: Well, he first wanted to assure me that he had been trying to -- he had attempted to reach me tonight before, but of course my phone has been so full that he couldn't get through.

And he wanted to assure me that the secretary was serious about ridding the department of discrimination and truly sorry, the secretary, for what had happened.

He -- we talked some about the fact that he said some of the things I had been saying over the last few days, he sort of covered some of them in the book that he wrote. And he wanted to assure me that, if I had issues I wanted to share with him in the future, he told me the person who texted me when they couldn't get me earlier by phone was one way to get that to him.

COOPER: Did the president himself say he was sorry, or was he saying that Secretary Vilsack was sorry?

SHERROD: The president didn't say the words, "I'm sorry."

But I felt everything he said was saying to me that he was. I really didn't -- I didn't really want the secretary -- to president to say, "I'm sorry." He is the president of the -- of the United States of America, and I really didn't feel I needed to hear him say he was sorry to me. I didn't -- I didn't have to have that.

COOPER: Now that you have talked to the president, I mean, do you still think somebody in the White House was behind your ouster?

SHERROD: Yes, I still think someone in the White House. He said he didn't know. They briefed him, he said, yesterday. I'm not sure whether he meant yesterday or Tuesday, but he said he did not know until he was briefed on it.

I can accept that. But I firmly believe that someone in the White House was telling them that the White House wanted me to resign. You know, I have known the person who was on the phone with me. I knew her before she -- before I came to the agency. And I believe, if the decision had been hers, this never would have happened.

COOPER: Have you made any decisions about the job that Secretary Vilsack offered you yesterday?

SHERROD: No, I haven't. I really haven't been able to see that decision in writing yet. I haven't been able to get to my e-mail to actually look at it, if they have sent it.

COOPER: I want to ask you about the -- the man who first posted this edited clip of you, Andrew Breitbart.

He said today -- and I'm quoting him -- he said -- quote -- "If anybody reads the sainted, martyred Sherrod's entire speech, this person has not gotten past black vs. white."

Do you think you have gotten past black vs. white?

SHERROD: I know I have gotten past black vs. white.

He's probably the person who has never gotten past it and never attempted to get past it. So, he can't see -- because he has never tried and because he hasn't, he can't see what I have done to get past it. And he's not interested in what I have done to get past it. I don't think he's interested in seeing anyone get past it, because I think he would like to get us stuck back in the times of slavery. That's where I think he would like to see all black people end up again. And that's why...

COOPER: You think -- you think he's racist?

SHERROD: ... I think he's so vicious. Yes, I do.

And I think that's why he's so vicious against a black president, you know. He would go after me. I don't think it was even the NAACP he was totally after. I think he was after a black president.

COOPER: So, when he says this wasn't about you, that this was just about the NAACP and what he says is their racist -- or their bias, you say you don't buy that?

SHERROD: I don't buy it at all.

What has he done to -- to promote unity among the races? Tell me. Let me -- tell him to come forward and tell us what he has done. I haven't seen him do anything but try to divide us, you know. Where does he think this will take us? What -- what does he think this will accomplish -- accomplish?

I would like to hear him answer that.

COOPER: Are you...

SHERROD: And I would like him to show me how he's not a racist.

COOPER: Are you thinking of pursuing any kind of legal action against him?

SHERROD: I'm certainly not going to turn, you know, away from that, if that's a possibility. I'm certainly going to look at it.

COOPER: Have you come to terms at all with what's happened? Or have you been able to step back from it and kind of look at this in perspective at all?

SHERROD: Not totally.

But, you know, Anderson, I have been through tough times dating back many, many years. And I can't let even this knock me down. I know that there's lots more to be done. I'm a fighter. I am a fighter. And I will continue to fight.

COOPER: Shirley Sherrod, I appreciate you being on tonight. Thank you.

SHERROD: Thank you.

[roguevalley]

17. I really like her, she's good folks.

[florida08]

18. Rahm Emanuel

really needs to go.

[pattmarty]

23. Get fucking real. It is MORE than Emanuel. He is a convenient............

.........target for a lot of "lazy lefties", kind of like hating Karl Rove. It's the administration's policies in general from healthcare, EFCA, the Gulf spill and on and on.

[ProfessorPlum]

24. Andrew DimBulb has created his own self-fulfilling prophecy

"The black people are coming for your money!"

Yes, they are Andrew. Yes, they are.

[Boudica the Lyoness]

25. I would say Breitbart picked on the wrong person

Shirley doesn't put up with shit. She's my kind of person! :)