BET Founder Tries To Play Obama Out
Jonny_Paycheck
17,825 Posts
Wow...COLUMBIA, S.C. ??? Robert L. Johnson, the founder of Black Entertainment Television, who is campaigning today in South Carolina with Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, just raised the specter of Barack Obama???s past drug use. He also compared Mr. Obama to Sidney Poitier, the black actor, in ???Guess Who???s Coming to Dinner.???At a rally here for Mrs. Clinton at Columbia College, Mr. Johnson was defending recent comments that Mrs. Clinton made regarding Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. She did not mean to take any credit away from him, Mr. Johnson said, when she said that it took President Johnson to sign the civil rights legislation he fought for.Dr. King had led a ???moral crusade,??? Mr. Johnson said, but such crusades have to be ???written into law.??????That is the way the legislative process works in this nation and that takes political leadership,??? he said. ???That???s all Hillary was saying.???He then added: ???And to me, as an African-American, I am frankly insulted that the Obama campaign would imply that we are so stupid that we would think Hillary and Bill Clinton, who have been deeply and emotionally involved in black issues since Barack Obama was doing something in the neighborhood ????? and I won???t say what he was doing, but he said it in the book ????? when they have been involved.???Moments later, he added: ???That kind of campaign behavior does not resonate with me, for a guy who says, ???I want to be a reasonable, likable, Sidney Poitier ???Guess Who???s Coming to Dinner.??? And I???m thinking, I???m thinking to myself, this ain???t a movie, Sidney. This is real life.???A former Clinton campaign official in New Hampshire had to resign last month after he publicly suggested that Republicans would probably use Mr. Obama???s drug use in his youth, which he first wrote about in his memoirs, against him.
Comments
and damn, with this and B.E.T.'s video programming, Robert Johnson really just hates black people.
this sounds about right. the drug innuendo was stupid, but the way the obama camp, and the media, have been painting the clintons as racist is pathetic.
first, they took bill's comment about obama's record on the iraq war where he said obama was living a "fairytale" and just took the word "fairytale" out of its context and implied that bill meant it would be a fairytale for Obama, as a black man, to be elected president. pitiful. go read the transcript of his speech. bill went on al sharpton's radio show to clear this up, which was totally unnecessary.
second, the mlk/lyndon johnson comment has been taken so out of context, and even the nyt continues to edit out much of her statement to make it look controversial. she praised and endorsed mlk and then recounted what was obvious, that it took a president, lbj, to get the civil rights bill passed. it wasn't a dig on mlk. she was saying that you need a prez who can get sh*t past congress, and that she, rather than obama could be the lbj to the next mlk jr.
He sold bet to Viacom in '99 and that deal is usually cited with some distrust for the networks programming post his departure. I don't know how crucial his politics would be there now, but prob not a smear job, though I would never tell anyone to digest any political featurette without skepticism all around, no matter where from or who to.
pwnd
What would LBJ have been without MLK?
Hillary garnering bipartisan support? Yeah, right!
you can't have it both ways. if you're gonna ride for obama because he is the candidate for change, okay, but now you're saying hillary (the status quo candidate, right?) is unable to pass legislation...but the change guy is?
this is sorta off topic though, i'd like to hear more on how the BET guy is a racist for criticizing a conservative democratic (but black) presidential candidate.
Johnson gave an update today at 5pm:
"My comments today were referring to Barack Obama???s time spent as a community organizer, and nothing else. Any other suggestion is simply irresponsible and incorrect.
???When Hillary Clinton was in her twenties she worked to provide protections for abused and battered children and helped ensure that children with disabilities could attend public school.
That results oriented leadership ??? even as a young person ??? is the reason I am supporting Hillary Clinton.???
What does change vs. status quo have to do with passing legislation? I'm confused...
Awwwww shit. What is with all the naivete in this thread? Of course the dude is going to backpedal and make like he had no ill-intention. And with the threat of being labelled a racist, the Clinton campaign has to carefully doctor their attacks on Obama by getting some lowlife black entertainment mogul to shoot for them.
Exactly.
you're saying the guy who is gonna storm into the white house and shake things up is the unifier, but ms. status quo of the bush-clinton legacy is unable to reach across the table to her gop cronies to get bills passed.
he's a black entertainment mogul....but a lowlife?....because he supports hillary?
the f*ck are you talking about? go READ the comments made by Bill and Hillary in their full context and come back and report on who is playing "dirty politics".
You're not that naive.....the Clintons themselves aren't going to say shit...they get low end flunkies to make statements or "leak" info and then they make them resign from the campaign and distance themselves.....dirty politics 101.
Can we get an "Apologist" graemlin please.
what planet are you living on and have you picked up a newspaper from our world this week? there are two statements, one from bill and one from hillary, that led to the media and the obama camp to trump up this bullshit about racism. the comments Johnson made were primarily meant to criticize Obama for making it an issue, in the "you should have known better" statement he made, that may or may not have alluded to Obama's drug use (depending on whether you ask Johnson or the media people who are trying to create a story).
What's the world's record for Kool-Aid consumption???
What members of the GOP like her?
WOW.
OK, how much is she paying you? LOL. Why would the guy say he wasn't going to talk about what Obama was doing back then if he was referring to something as utterly non-controversial and praiseworthy as being a community organizer?
who cares? either he criticized obama for making up a fabricated racial issue....and then dropped a subtle dig on obama that intentionally related to his drug use....OR....he did the exact same thing, but unintentionally gave obama a dig that people have interpreted to relate to his drug use.
That's politics......and the Clinton's are good at it.
I'm sorry, but who in Obama's camp has fed this story?
I believe all Obama has said on the matter is that Clinton's comments were "ill-advised." Well, duh.
Please to provide quotes of Obama's camp stirring the pot. I've been unable to find anything other than quotes from his supporters.
Well, you could somewhat respect the guy if he just came out and said, yeah, I was talking about his drug use. To make up this transparently false cover story just makes him seem like a slimy little shill.
I know, right? Poor, poor Johnson couldn't bring himself to naming Barack Obama's public service: That would be scandalous!
What a joke...