Many media organizations are rushing to seek repudiations of Shirley Sherrod from African-American leaders such as the NAACP’s Ben Jealous who quickly renounced Sherrod.
Before throwing Ms. Sherrod completely “under a bus,” I hope that they will consider the following remarks from the wife of the farmer whom Sherrod was supposedly “half-heartedly” helping.
The video in question originally shown on Fox turns out to be a FRAUD.
In case you want to see the videos in the Shirley Sharrod scam/fraud.
whiterosebuddy had a suggestion:
Here's Tom Vilsack's phone number at the USDA. Perhaps we should politely call and tell him what we think:
202-720-3631
Dept. of Agriculture: (202) 720-2791
I called, pressed 8, and then left a voicemail.
some more phone numbers suggested by WordSmith:
White House Ph. #s:
Comments: 202-456-1111
Switchboard: 202-456-1414
FAX: 202-456-2461
Get the entire Sherrod speech, hear comments from the White farmer, and see other videos under the fold.
hat tips- Prometheus 6
The ENTIRE video
From the White farmers, in their own words:
Rachel Maddow did a pretty good introduction on this, relating it back to the falsified attack on ACORN.
Maddow's interview with Ben Jealous.
Countdown on this topic:
Of course, Ron Christie cooning on The Ed Show as only he can:
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9 comments:
It's simple for me the Dems need to grow a spine!
No Big, Obama is a punk and he hates confrontation.
What I don't understand is that this White House can play hard ball with other Democrats ( bribe Stestak to stay out of the primary fight against Spector and do the same with Romanoff in Colorado but when a big psuedo-jounalist like Breitbart farts they run for cover.
This is an incredible story. Breathtaking really.
It reveals two things.
1. It shows the power of the Repub/right wing media, which I explain & complain about in my sidebar (written a couple of years back). The Republican playbook is an open secret.
Repub/right wing media is so powerful that they can make the White House scream uncle before even being touched.... they can make them run like rats with just the mere threat that they will stir up trouble. They can make Progressives/Dems run scared even before anyone bothers to look at the facts. It's really unbelievable.
2. It reveals a certain level of incompetence within the Obama Administration and shows just how bad a PR disaster this President and this Administration really are. I have mentioned the PR problems many times... but incidents like this allow everyone to see just what I was referring to. It shows how fearful and weak this Administration is. They are so eager to comply with Right wing media and so afraid of their media machine...that they will do just about anything. They are more responsive to Faux News and the rest of right wing media inc. than they are to their own base.
And Gibbs had the nerve to say that the "facts changed". The facts changed? My ass. The facts didn't change... they simply didn't look for the facts before firing this woman.
And the mainstream media is on the wrong track... saying this is an issue primarily about race...and we need a race discussion. No... that's not what this is about. It may, in part, have something to do with the WH fear to stand up to the right when race is involved. But this is really about the structure of media in this Country... specifically the disproportionate power of Republican/right wing media. As I have been saying for years... Republican right wing media is allowed to control the national discussion/narrative - this should be the focus of the MSM discussion right now...and how we fix this imbalance. This is a perfect example of why Progressives need their own robust media infrastructure, which is what I have been screaming about for years. It's also about sloppy journalism that has become endemic in America today.
We are living in an era where the crazy, the ignorant, and the hysterical are driving the discussion and drowning out intelligence and reason. Misinformation and sloppy journalism are the rules of the day. Faux News (Radio Rwanda) sets the pace & standard...and other networks pick up their narrative and they run with it, time & time again. This makes the confusion and misinformation among the electorate even worse...and fuels the nuts in the Tea Party, etc. Now we are dealing with an epidemic of irrationality. It creates an electorate that has been convinced to vote against their own interests.
This is why I tout fixing the media or at least bringing it into balance... it is the source of so many of the problems right now. I strongly believe that a well informed electorate is the antidote to the kind of madness we are seeing.
And we need to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine ASAP.
Political leaders half a century ago foresaw the craziness and hysteria we are seeing now. But their vision was ignored.
Hint: There is a reason why the Right is vehemently against the reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine or similar policy.
Agree with Big and Rod... This President and White House are spineless and scared.
preach it, AI.
PREACH IT.
America doesn't need "the Fairness Doctrine". The issue isn't a so-called "Right Wing Media Conspiracy" -- the issue is the Progressives need to do a better job of articulating why their ideas are better. Air America didn't die because of lack of funding; it died because it didn't "sell" the Progressive ideas well. If you truly believe in the "justness" of your viewpoint, you don't need to suppress the opposition. If you are afraid that your ideas aren't marketable, then you agitate to suppress the opposition.
Furthermore, the Sherrod "story" served it purpose(s). (a) it got the Fox news base all riled up as "proof" of racism within the NAACP. The issue wasn't so much Sherrod's statements as it was the reaction of those in the crowd who were murmuring their assent when she described discriminating against a white farmer based on his race. (b) it got the black community all riled up... just read through any of the comments on any black blog to see this ...but most importantly, it got other things pushed off the headlines ... like the financial reform bill Obama signed today which will basically destroy small community and/or state banks, because the amount of regulation will put them out of business... those same banks that are the lifeblood of many underserved markets -- black AND white...and also little notice was given to the fact that Obama plans to strip away community lending, doing the dirty work of destroying any vestige of minority lending ...stating that homeownership shouldn't be attainable by everyone, and that the focus should be on affordable rentals ...when everyone knows that homeownership and the opportunity to build equity is one of the paths to building generational wealth ....
But, yeah, y'all should continue to chase shiny things and obsess about the latest campaign in the escalating and completely manufactured race war (by both sides) while the real skulduggery gets accomplished without a peep
Agawa,
Did you not read my comments? I stated...this was more about problems in media/structure of media than race.
Have you followed my comments on Twitter?
I'm well aware of what Breitbart & his cohorts in the Right media were trying to do.
And Conservatives have been pushing this narrative regarding community banks... but there's no evidence at the moment that there is much to that argument. Makes no sense. Most of the financial reform regs are targeted towards behemoth banks and brokerage houses.... not community banks.
Sounds like Conservative hysteria to me.
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