Cory Booker on Krista Tippett show "On Being" gives an amazing interview

[ehrnst]

Last edited Tue Jul 31, 2018, 02:35 PM - Edit history (2)

KRISTA TIPPETT, HOST: I almost never interview politicians, not because I think they’re all evil, but because we don’t really reward or allow our politicians, good or bad, to be searching, to own their questions, or to change their minds and grow — to admit their human frailty. I’m intrigued by language Cory Booker uses about politics as work of “manifesting love.” On the surface, his life arc is as impressive as they come: Stanford graduate, Rhodes Scholar, mayor, United States senator. So it’s surprising to hear him say that the best thing that ever happened to him was “being broken, time and time again.” Especially in his formative years witnessing segregation and abandonment in New Jersey’s Harrington Park and Newark. Learning from people like Miss Virginia Jones, a tenant organizer in the building in which Cory Booker lived while a law student and in which her son had been murdered.

CORY BOOKER: What we say about other people says more about who we are than who they are. And it was that moment when I first started on Martin Luther King Boulevard, with Miss Jones, where she checked me, hard, and she said, “Describe the neighborhood.” And I described it like I did to you — the drug dealing, the projects, the abandoned building. And she just said to me in a very curt way, “Boy, you need to understand that the world you see outside of you is a reflection of what you have inside of you, and if you’re one of those people who only sees darkness, despair, that’s all there’s ever gonna be. But if you see hope, opportunity, if you’re stubborn enough to, every time you open your eyes, see love and the face of God, then you can be a change agent here. Then you can make a difference.” It was this monumental moment for me, at the beginning of my life: that you have choices.

Edited to add one very inspiring part of the interview:

It is so easy to love people who agree with you, but the real test comes, to love someone who you disagree with. And our political culture right now has become so toxic. Chris Christie, who is a friend of mine, my governor, who I disagree with vociferously — I could write a dissertation on our disagreements. And I remember telling him that I watched the presidential debates when he was standing with all these other Republicans, and they were castigating him for the sin of hugging Barack Obama. And that hug happened during our Hurricane Sandy, where Air Force One flew in. The governor, who’s wept with other residents, and here you have the president descending the steps, and the two guys hug. And I’m a hugger, and by the way, it wasn’t even a great hug. It was one of these awkward male hugs, where you’re not sure what to do with your hands. But they were castigating him for the sin of hugging someone.

So when I hugged John McCain when he came to the Senate floor, when we didn’t know how he was gonna vote on health care, and people’s lives were potentially in the balance, he had a cancer designation. He came back to the Senate floor, and I hugged him. And by the time I got home that night, I was getting pilloried on Twitter by fellow progressives for hugging a man they said was a baby-killer or things like that. If we have lost the point, where we can’t even see the humanity in someone else, we’ve so demonized them, that physical contact — then there’s no hope for us as a country, and there’s no way we can come together and work together and find common ground, but this country will be torn left or right and forget about the urgency of forward progress.

Full transcript:

https://onbeing.org/programs/cory-booker-civic-spiritual-evolution-jul2018/

[Wwcd]

1. Damn! Powerful moment of clarity Mr Booker

And it was that moment when I first started on Martin Luther King Boulevard, with Miss Jones, where she checked me, hard, and she said,

“Describe the neighborhood.” And I described it like I did to you — the drug dealing, the projects, the abandoned building.

And she just said to me in a very curt way, “Boy, you need to understand that the world you see outside of you is a reflection of what you have inside of you, and if you’re one of those people who only sees darkness, despair, that’s all there’s ever gonna be.
But if you see hope, opportunity, if you’re stubborn enough to, every time you open your eyes, see love and the face of God, then you can be a change agent here.
Then you can make a difference.”

It was this monumental moment for me, at the beginning of my life: that you have choices.


Thanks for this post ehrnst.

[ehrnst]

2. The fact that he dares to claim that he learns, and admits mistakes, and changes as a politician

even when he is trashed by the far left for doing so gives me that much more admiration for him.

That is what leadership looks like. Humility, heart, intellect and energy - and the ability to grow as you learn, instead of gripping the fallacy that being immobile in one's world view is equivalent to being "ethical."

[Wwcd]

7. This is the quality of great leaders vs all the others.

The greats posess, as stated,:

Humility, heart, intellect and energy - and the ability to grow as you learn, instead of gripping the fallacy that being immobile in one's world view is the equivalency of ethics.

The others who dare equate themselves without such qualities tells the obvious difference between Self & Selfless


Great post.
Thanks
K & R

[MariaCSR]

3. Corey Booker 2020

[NewJeffCT]

4. I like this guy

young-ish, very smart, charismatic speaker. Democrats do well with that type of candidate (JFK, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama)

Negatives he'll need to overcome:
1) the deceptive meme about him taking money from big pharma
2) His willingness to work with charter school advocates like Betsy DeVos

[ehrnst]

5. If willingness to work with charter schools is his worst feature

He's still far ahead of the crowd.

I think that Al Franken didn't consider running for POTUS many reasons, but among them that his daughter works for a charter school org.

He knew that it would be used against him by the rabid fringe left, no matter what his actual qualifications and positives were.

[NewJeffCT]

8. I just remember that right after he made that passionate speech

against Jeff Sessions, the Kushner run newspaper in NYC published a deceptive meme about Booker taking a lot of PAC money from Big Pharma.

However, the actual statistics behind his donors say otherwise. 91% was from individual donors and 9% was from PACs, and almost all the PAC money was from the Legal Industry and the Entertainment Industry, two reliably Democratic industries. The "Big Pharma" money was from individuals who donated to Booker who checked the box for Pharmaceutical Industry when making their individual donation to Booker. (you're asked what industry you're employed in when donating). In the tri state area (NY, NJ and CT) plus eastern PA, there are several hundred thousand individuals employed in the pharmaceutical industry. I did the math at the time and it was somewhere around $1.50 in industry donations for the total number of industry employees in the region.(Though, I'm sure the actual number of pharma employees that donated to Booker was far less than the total number of pharma employees in the region, but I thought it was absurd that he'd be the pawn of the pharma industry over such small donations)

[brer cat]

11. He has been bashed by both the right and left.

I would like to think that Democrats are too savvy for fall for that, but apparently not.

[NewJeffCT]

12. no, they're not always too savvy

the meme made its way around here on DU, as well as on Facebook and Twitter, often shared by people I knew were Democrats

[George II]

18. He gets money from "big pharma" (actually, more from their employees than directly from PACs)...

...mostly because some of the biggest pharmaceutical companies are headquartered in New Jersey, as you point out. You give a very good explanation of that.

Just as New York politicians get money from "Wall Street" (encompassing the financial industry as a whole) because Wall Street itself is in NYC and most of the big financial institutions are based there.

If the janitor of a bank branch contributes to a candidate in NY, it's lumped into all contributions from "big banks".

It drives me crazy that people who throw out those accusations don't even bother to understand what they're talking about. I was raised in NYC, and remember in 2016 when I posted here that of the eight in my direct family (parents and six children), five of us at one time in our careers had low-level jobs with banks (two in IT, one in bookkeeping and two tellers) I was attacked by someone as being from a family of banksters. Thankfully that person isn't here anymore.

[Gothmog]

6. K&R

[LakeArenal]

9. Yes one of his choices was to railroad Al Franken

This is for the Gilli lovers. Because it was not just her.

[NurseJackie]

10. I really REALLY like him...

I really REALLY like him! I like his calm and relaxing demeanor. I like his humility and his willingness to self-reflect, learn and grow.

I like that he listens to others and doesn't interrupt. I like that he sits calmly and doesn't make faces or overly-gesticulate (as politicians often do) to the point of distraction.

I like that he's thoughtful and that he answers in complete sentences. He's respectful of others. He's respectful of their "personal space". He respects women and never mansplains or talks-down to us.

I like that he's realistic and that he lives in the REAL WORLD... and that he has no magical expectations. Anyone can complain and point out the problems, it takes someone special and someone intelligent to come up with a realistic roadmap on how to get from here to there.

And, I also think he's very photogenic. What a handsome man! He knows how to dress, he has excellent taste in clothes and colors. He's definitely easy on the eyes... he has a nice warm smile... and his hair is always meticulously neat!

[SharonClark]

13. He was impressive

I missed the introduction and was casually listening to this interview. When I figured out it was Booker my immediate impression was how unusual it was for a political person to have a heartfelt and revealing discussion like that. It reminded me of the time President Obama called Marilyn Robinson his good friend. It speaks volumes of the quality of these men.

[ehrnst]

15. Especially when he talks about the part where he was pilloried for hugging John McCain:

It is so easy to love people who agree with you, but the real test comes, to love someone who you disagree with. And our political culture right now has become so toxic. Chris Christie, who is a friend of mine, my governor, who I disagree with vociferously — I could write a dissertation on our disagreements. And I remember telling him that I watched the presidential debates when he was standing with all these other Republicans, and they were castigating him for the sin of hugging Barack Obama. And that hug happened during our Hurricane Sandy, where Air Force One flew in. The governor, who’s wept with other residents, and here you have the president descending the steps, and the two guys hug. And I’m a hugger, and by the way, it wasn’t even a great hug. It was one of these awkward male hugs, where you’re not sure what to do with your hands. But they were castigating him for the sin of hugging someone.

So when I hugged John McCain when he came to the Senate floor, when we didn’t know how he was gonna vote on health care, and people’s lives were potentially in the balance, he had a cancer designation. He came back to the Senate floor, and I hugged him. And by the time I got home that night, I was getting pilloried on Twitter by fellow progressives for hugging a man they said was a baby-killer or things like that. If we have lost the point, where we can’t even see the humanity in someone else, we’ve so demonized them, that physical contact — then there’s no hope for us as a country, and there’s no way we can come together and work together and find common ground, but this country will be torn left or right and forget about the urgency of forward progress.

[sheshe2]

14. Thank you.

That was a wonderful interview, a chance to see inside the man's heart and soul.

[philly_bob]

16. Corey is great, but I followed him back when he was just starting out

and he experimented with a lot of ideas and approaches to attract allies and support. I lived in Staten Island and listened to the great Newark jazz station. This must have been around 2002 when he ran against Sharpe James.

He's smart enough to adjust his speeches and positions based on feedback, but I remember when he was mouthing Libertarian free-market B.S. to oust the long-standing black establishment mayor.

We're glad you're on our side, Corey, and you've learned a lot. You've definitely got a place here. But I'd rather have someone with a lifetime commitment to a set of ideas, not just the currently popular ones.

This means I don't want him at the top of the ticket, but there's plenty of room for him elsewhere. He's an impressive person and campaigner.

[brer cat]

17. To each his own, I guess.

But I think only a very stubborn narcissist would cling to the same ideas for a lifetime. Times change, attitudes change, and a mature individual reflects and learns from those changes and adjusts their expectations accordingly. If no one changed during my lifetime, Black people would still be living under Jim Crow laws, gays would be in the closet, and women would be barefoot and in the kitchen.