This interview has to go into the How Dare You Hall of Fame. MSNBC Lawrence O’Donnell interviewed GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain last night and he took him to the “woodshed”. He asked Cain why did he not participate in the sit-ins going on in the 1960s. Cain references this in his book and tells how his father told them to behave and when asked to go to the back of the bus to go. he said they also steered clear of downtown where alot of the activity was going on. O’Donnell sitting safely on his high horse said what if his father had given this same advise to Rosa Parks where would black people be today? I was stunned watching this and i just have to say how dare you Mr. O’Donnell. he went on to challenge Cain when he said he was in high school during this time and says he was in fact a college student. Really you think he should have been active? Well that is not you call now Mr. O’Donnell nor was it your call then. I admire the college students that risked their lives during that turbulent time but sitting here comfortably in 2011 I would never criticize someone’s decison who grew up in the Jim Crow south decision to simply try to survive and if it were not pathetic this exchange would have been funny. Let’s look at Herman Cain now. To try to paint him as a coward in the 60′s is a poor way to criticize the philosopy he now espouses. We’ve got big problems now and that is what should have been discussed. does he have solutions? Not some hypothetical nonsense rooted in the past.
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I grew up in Chicago with a father who was a Baptist minister who never looked the other way. He was one of those dads that never said not to get involved. He was one of those dads that helped form Operation Push. He was one of those dads that would’ve been ashamed of Mr. Cain – as I am. He was from Texas, a business owner that didn’t go to high school. Came home from WWII and learned a trade. He and his friends were proud and always found it uplifting to help other African Americans. They sat in my living room when I was a little girl. Plotting and planning their politics. I went door to door with my dad, when he gathered signatures for his run for alderman.
But I also remembered the Herman Cains. He is so much like many of his kind that did little for others. I’ll admit that I’m a Lawrence fan. Yet last night – while I enjoyed the spirited exchange, I wondered why Lawrence bothered.
Mr. Cain’s contribution to the world are greasy pizzas sold in store fronts, in poor neighborhoods. His contribution is to the obese poor.
Just surviving is never enough.
My, my aren’t you a self righteous, pompous wisenheimer. Your dad would have been ashamed of Herman Cain as you are? So how is it that you are so pertinent to Cain that this matters? The way that you were reared is the way, the truth and the light. The only way I take it.
Cain’s contribution to society was greasy pizzas sold in store fronts to the obese poor, you say. A cursory search of Cains’ bio by anyone not to indolent to bother would have revealed that he was a ballistics expert for the U.S. Navy, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City and he held various executive level positions in the corporate world. Though I’m sure that resume pales in comparison to a community organizer. Why don’t you share with us your contributions which have changed the world?
Thanks for your insights about Mr. Cain. Though I’m sure his resume reflects a life filled with accomplishments. One thing I learned as a student doing clinical at the vet hospital in Chicago. I was majoring in Hemodialysis and had the opportunity of meeting the doctor that invented plate dialysis.
Every morning during rounds, he smiled and chatted with vets that were poor and sick. This doctor in all truth has saved millions of lives. He was humble and kind and I understood that intelligence does not always wear lots of letters behind the name.
And unless you can understand what a Harvard grad feels when he sits in an apartment in a run down project on Division Street in Chicago, you can’t judge what it takes to be a community organizer. I did my 15 years with Sickle Cell Anemia, I walked the streets with my baby son at dawn to do our part for others. My son serves his country now, placing his life in danger traveling the world in places most of us wouldn’t go. these are silent soldiers that fight for our rights. They deserve leaders that are fair and balanced.
There are millions of people who do millions of really important things. They don’t have time nor the need to comment on people like Mr. Cain. So pompous creatures like us do that. Cause we don’t mind taking the blows.
As one pundit said, if it weren’t for the community activists and those that fight when things are not right, Herman Cain would’ve been delivering pizzas until retirement.
Mr. Herman Cain is an accomplished American, I just don’t think that he’s presidentail material. I think Lawrence O’Donnell feels the same way. And I think people need to know and understand that.
Barb
Your, “self righteous, pompous wisenheimer”
LMAO! Never been called that before – incredible.
And as a side note, check out Mr. Huntsman. He’s, in my opinion, a worthy candidate and a good choice for a potential leader of our country.
As I tell my children and their children, don’t get hung up on “sides” – step back and actually see what is balanced and what is not.
Nothing but love for ya,
While it is commendable that your father was active in his community, it is deplorable that you think he would be “ashamed” in Mr. Cain because he did not take part in the activities YOU would have wanted him to have taken part in.
For the record, please tell me how you know that Mr. Cain has done “little for others”? What charities has he supported? How much has he given in time, charity and guidance to worthwhile organizations? Has he mentored any young people? How many? Do you know the answers to any of these questions, or do you just “assume” that he’s done “little” for people because he didn’t have the background you and your father had? Without evidence to support your statement that he had done “little” to help others, your charge borders on arrogance, and causes me to wonder if your actions were done to help others, or to impress others.
Herman Cain’s father, to the best of my knowledge, is not running for any office. For Lawrence O’Donnell to suggest that Cain’s father gave him errant advice was insulting and disrespectful to both Cain and the memory of his father.
I have long maintained and reiterate here that you can never find more blatant displays of racism than when white liberals wade into the discussion of race. It is absolutely incomprehensible and befuddling to O’Donnell how Cain can possibly be a conservative Republican. How can a man who appears otherwise so intelligent be so inane as to wander off the plantation and become associated with a political party that every thinking human being knows is racist?
In fairness to O’Donnell, I should point out that many of us Black folks have that same viewpoint. In fact, if you really want to stir up a ruckus, inform Black folks that Martin Luther King was a member of the Republican Party. Now you’ve got a controversy.
Barbara, I appreciate your admiration for your father, and i was born and raised in Chicago not the south. I don’t know how I would be in a Jim Crow world, so I admire the Rosa Parks, the Martin Luther Kings and the Freedom Riders made, but i will not deingrate those that did not take an active role in the civil disobedience. I salute Cain’s dad for trying to keep his family safe, and although I don’t share many of Cain’s positions I do salute him as a modern success story. He started from the bottom and worked his way to top and that should be applauded. So until we have walked in the shoes of his father or Cain for that matter we can not and should not take potshots at his life choices. We can debate his politics, but we should not crucify him for not dying for the cause, and that is what O’Donnell attempted to do last night.
Point well made.
One thought…are any of the other candidates being asked what their family espoused durning the civil rights movement? I don’t know if it is ‘equally right’ to only ask the black candidate this and not the others? I understand he wrote about this, but it seems a little one-sided to apply certain questions to only one candidate. Interviewers may ask Mitt Romney about Mormonism, but eventually, all candidates are asked about their faith.
Barbara I guess I misunderstood your original post. I interpreted your saying “Mr. Cain’s contribution to the world are greasy pizzas sold in store fronts, in poor neighborhoods” and “His contribution is to the obese poor” as your assessment of his accomplishment in his life.
But your clarified in your subsequent post that your are in fact “sure his resume reflects a life filled with accomplishments”. Sounds a bit conflicting but, whatever.
Your having some other candidate as your preference and the freedom to
express that is what our electoral process is about. But because you don’t believe
that Herman Cain chose a pathway for his life that you find acceptable and
because he didn’t engage in the battles that you feel that he should have do make what he
has accomplished any less laudable.
The interview was down right disgusting. Its so purpose is to pit black americans against each other. This is a new kind of racism. Despicable.
You are right in pointing out that this too is racism. But there is nothing new about it. This is the brand that is practiced by white liberals when they encounter a Black who has the temerity to stray from the plantation.
The video you provided is Part 1 of O’Donnell’s interview with Cain. In the second video (Part 2) O’Donnell attacks Cain’s patriotism because Cain did not go to Vietnam, even though Cain worked for the Department of the Navy during those years. O’Donnell is like a dog with a bone… He just won’t let it go even after Cain’s explanation.
At the 5:36 minute mark in this second video, O’Donnell escalates his attack on Cain because Cain chose to work for the Navy as a ballistics expert on rocket assisted projectiles instead of joining the military to fight in Vietnam:
I find it interesting that–as usual– a conservative willingly entered the den of an unabashed liberal and weathered the anticipated onslaught. Why is it that Liberals like O’Donnell and Maher and even Obama do everything they can to avoid going on with the likes of Medved, Hewett, Elder, etc? In order to face Fox News, Obama had to have “assurances” from the network that he would “be treated fairly”. I doubt Cain bothered to ask for similar assurances. Such is the life of a conservative in America.
I can’t stand to watch MSNBC even “Morning Joe”, except when Michael Steel and Dylan Ratigan are on. The likes of the O’Donnells(all three)Chris Matthews, Big Ed, Mika, and Maddow just shows that they will stoop to every unearthed malicious detail to demean conservatives. They don’t interview – they terrorize, except if the guest is in agreement with them. Funny, but I saw Belafonte visiting with Castro and Hugo Chavez and promoting their system of government…socialism! Is that what Martin Luther King advocated? Don’t think so. How about all the support for the protesters against Wall St? Not one negative word but the TEA Party was racist, devisive and anti-Obama. There are lots of eloquent and informed minorities that MSNBC has left out of their interviews….David Webb (Sirius Radio) comes to mind as well as Star Jones, Ms. McGowan and several other TV and radio personalities.
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