Clinton Supporter Rep. Charlie Rangel: "I can't believe Sen. Clinton would say anything that dumb"

[sabra]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2008/05/09/2008-05-09_hillary_clinton_misplays_race_card_while.html

<snip>

The star turn came after Clinton got slammed for suggesting in an interview with USA Today that she's the best candidate because blue-collar whites were fleeing Obama.

"Sen. Obama's support among working, hardworking Americans, white Americans, is weakening again," she told the paper, citing as evidence a recent Associated Press story on voting trends in Indiana and North Carolina. "I have a much broader base to build a winning coalition on."

Clinton defended her words as a common-sense analysis of exit poll data.

But some of her supporters - including Rep. Charles Rangel (D-Manhattan) - slammed the comments.

"I can't believe Sen. Clinton would say anything that dumb," Rangel told The News as he headed to the House floor, where earlier he had embraced Obama.

[mcctatas]

1. But isn't Charlie Rangel black himself?

:sarcasm:

[SoonerPride]

3. Well, he IS a Congressman, so we know he's not "hardworking"

:)

[cliffordu]

51. Lol.....

:rofl:

[Cha]

56. And ,coincidently,

dead to bilary, effective immediately.

Thank ya, Charlie..bout time!

[EffieBlack]

2. I do wonder what this is doing to her support among CBC members

They must be mortified that their support for her is being paid back in this way.

[blm]

6. How about all the black voters in NY who probably wouldn't pull a lever for her ever again.

I bet she WON'T run again. It was only a stop to the presidency and it's not like she used her time as senator courageously or to back up any other Senator opposing Bush.

[goclark]

8. Not just the Black voters in NY ~ the White voters there too

I'm African American and have a rainbow of colors for friends.

I love it.

My rainbow friends in New York tell me they would not vote for her for Senator again.
And, one of my friend shocked me and said, "Do you know that Bill Clinton rarely, if ever, goes to his Harlem office?"

I couldn't believe that ~ I thought it was such a great idea for him to have the office there.

Now I'm wondering if he did it to build inroads into Harlem for Hillary.

Pure gossip but that is what I heard.

In many ways, I would hope that just the gesture of him having an office in Harlem did great things for the Real Estate values there.

So I'm not being difficult.

[mamalone]

12. Well, I'm white..

and from NY and I can see no reasonably foreseeable circumstances where I would ever vote for again. I don't know anyone here who would... well except for the gal in the Walmart hair place that does my son's hair. I think she still likes Hillary, but hey, that was a couple of weeks ago, so even that one might be pushing things a bit.

I don't think you're being difficult...I think the Clintons have surprised and disappointed many of us.

[goclark]

37. ASnd the disappointment keeps on coming

It's like an Ali punch ~ just hurts like hell.

[blm]

13. When you add those stories to the undermining of Gore and Kerry, it all adds up

to form a very cynical picture of the Clintons that many Democrats are finally seeing and rejecting.

[cyndensco]

48. It seemed odd Gore didn't recruit Bill to campaign with/for him in 2000.

Many people I know felt Gore was avoiding him because of the whole impeachment thing. We were angry he had shunned him. Now, though, it seems Gore knew something we didn't....

[Kahuna]

54. Ding ding ding ding! nt

[EffieBlack]

24. Whoa - I hadn't thought of that

[FlyingSquirrel]

42. That probably deserves its own OP

Very good point.

[Tatiana]

44. You're probably right on that one. n/t

[Kahuna]

53. I agree. She won't run again. It was only a means to an end for her. nt

[Cha]

58. New York needs a real Senator not

someone who only used it like hilary did. I didn't pull the lever for her in 2006.

[PoliticalAmazon]

65. I'm concerned that there will be fall-out in the House, and Dems will lose seats...

...over the Clintons bigot-pandering and throwing-under-the-bus of Obama supporters.

[goclark]

26. For Rangel to make that statement is telling...

Flood gates are now open.

He is the absolute Boss of the CBC.

He and Bill were always close.

This is not to be believed.

Maybe he has wanted to go over to Obama and now he sees the opportunity.

[David Zephyr]

36. Charlie needs to make the switch. He owes the Clintons nada.

I am really beyond sick of the racist overtones coming from the other crowd.

[PoliticalAmazon]

63. Didn't Maxine Waters endorse Hillary? This will look REAL good in Waters' District...

come election time.

I can see the commercial now:

FOOTAGE OF THE CLINTONS AND THEIR BIGOT-PANDERING REMARKS.

Voice Over: This is the candidate that Maxine Waters endorsed for president, and Maxine Waters never once rebuked the Clintons remarks. Maxine Waters is clearly out of touch with her District's voters. Isn't it time we had a representative in Congress who realizes that blacks ALSO are hard-working, and blacks' votes ALSO are important?

[Occam Bandage]

4. There's a nice payback for Clinton supporters.

If you're black, she just said outright your votes are meaningless. If you're white, she just said outright that you're racist.

Gomama!

[BattyDem]

5. She managed to offend two groups with one comment.

Nice job, Hillary! :eyes:

[ShortnFiery]

16. Hey, don't forget HRC also threw "LATINOS and HISPANICS" under the bus

because, they're not WHITE like her? :nuke:

[panAmerican]

33. Not all are offended. Many Hispanics check off the "White" box.

That's the unfortunate delusion of some Hispanics. Some consider themselves "White" even though "traditional" Whites would say they're not.

[PoliticalAmazon]

66. Well, I check "white" even though I'm Teutonic. n/t

[PoliticalAmazon]

64. She threw ALL Obama supporters under the bus. According to Hillary,

if we didn't vote for her, our votes aren't important, our states aren't important, and our demographics aren't important.

Fortunately most of my friends are under the bus with me, and we're starting up another chorus of Kumbaya even as I type.

[SoCalDem]

32. AND that as a hardworking white person, YOU would NEVER vote for a Black man

:eyes:

[formercia]

7. The problem is:

She said it without realizing it was a racist comment. The racism is so ingrained it's automatic and normal behavior for her.

Archie Bunker in a skirt.

[Onyx488]

19. I don't believe Rangel was slamming her, I think he doubts the quote.

I don't think he has heard the audio
think about it, hopefully our lawmakers don't have time to be glued to the T.V.

So he was defending her not slamming her. IMO

Bascially asserting that NO ONE would say anything that dumb, consider the political environment we are currently living in.

[Cha]

59. Well, if Charlie Rangel has been paying any

attention at all during these last months he'll know damn good and well she's more than capable of saying shit like that.

[IsItJustMe]

22. That's the way I saw it. It's amazing that it has taken this long to see her true colers.

[formercia]

29. What I find amazing

is that her staff would hand her copy with this kind of rhetoric. Either she has the most racially insensitive bunch of speech writers or Hillary is completely off the reservation and is just being a political loose cannon trying to polarize the electorate.

I've said some pretty wild shit in my day but I'm not running for public office or even would consider a job in Washington. If one of my staff handed me copy with anything resembling that kind of crap, they would be out the door in a NY minute.

[IsItJustMe]

34. Did you know that she made the exact same statement at one of her rallies in WV? Could you imagine

what a AA would have felt like, sitting there in the crowd, listening to Hillary say these things. Humiliation comes to my mind. This just isn't right, no matter how anyone tries to spin it.

[goclark]

38. Yes, no matter how they try to SPIN it

we know exactly what they mean because we've heard it all since forever.

[formercia]

41. The code words come through loud and clear.

I heard them in my family as well.

[PoliticalAmazon]

67. Oh, he saw her true colors awhile back. This is the first time he's acknowledged it...

though. That may be an indication that he is looking for a reason to switch to Obama.

[cliffordu]

52. Pantsuit. Archie bunker in a pantsuit....

[formercia]

72. I like that.

and the colors......

They look like they were made from old Lounge Lizard polyester suit material.

[highplainsdem]

9. Not racism - a jumbled sentence using standard political terminology for "working class" that was

not understood, and that was disastrouss as she clarified what the AP story on voter demographics said.

Please read this:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x5896190

As was pointed out in one of the replies, Al Gore and Tony Blair also use the words "hard working" when they're referring to "working class" voters. They shy away from those words, and so does Hillary, consistently, as I discovered when I checked her old speeches. I couldn't believe she'd said what she first appeared to say either. And she didn't. She's so in the habit of using the words "hard working" to mean "working class" that she thought she'd just said "working class voters, white voters" as she explained the AP story, and clarified that it was referring to white working-class voters after she realized she'd left out that detail.

It was a disastrous choice of words in this instance, but it was not racist.

[sandnsea]

10. Yeah, but they didn't add "white"

Unless you're saying "hard working" and "working class" has been code for white all along. Are you??

[elehhhhna]

11. okay. that settles it.

LMAO, delusio!

[ampad]

15. LOL

pathetic! We know you have your own post on this subject, lol, carry on.

[Tarheel_Dem]

18. you mean it was harmless, like "bitter"? The Clintonites ran with that

for weeks, labeling Obama as "elitist" to score political points. Karma is the "b" word.

[redstate_democrat]

43. Exactly

I'd rather be labeled an arugula eating elitist than a cold, hard, calculating, triangulating, racist, ball busting, testicular'd, bitch.

But that's just me.

[Tarheel_Dem]

71. LMAO.....

[genna]

27. Soft shoe racial code is justified, then?

Al Gore and Tony Blair also use the words "hard working" when they're referring to "working class" voters. They shy away from those words, and so does Hillary, consistently, as I discovered when I checked her old speeches.

So long as I say working class, I can bet I'm covered.

So long as I say Al Gore (the first guy to pull out Willie Horton before Bush I took hold of the issue) or Tony Blair (because he is so charming of course), then I can bet no one would impugn the statement itself or the underlying meaning beneath the code.


Well, why don't political pundits, reporters, and CLINTON figure out how to talk to people in complex ways and be straight shooters across all the divides in American society?

Why must we, the people, accept this b.s.

If Clinton were a Republican, would you be asking me to give her a pass while she yelled Farrakahn, Farrakahn, Farrakahn at Obama.

What do you think this is and who should be fooled by these sophisms?

Hillary said she would never been in that church with Wright. She was above these racial politics that demean America and scare people.

[Abacus]

28. I'm also inclined to think she flubbed the line

but that isn't much better imo; "working class, white voters" would have been innocuous.

[marcus3xw]

14. This is ridiculous

i am black and i see nothing wrong with hillary citing a fact that is repeated after caucases and primaries.

the media has done a wonderful job of making a lot of noise over nothing

[ampad]

17. LOL

Please do all us black folks a favor with the capitalization and such. We were just told we are not hard working; I would hate for Clinton to add uneducated in the mix.

[mcctatas]

21. ...

:spray:

[goclark]

35. LOL

That's a cool response.

[AspenRose]

50. !

:rofl:

[Cha]

60. YOu

bad.

[Bullet1987]

20. The MSM will ignore his comments...only Obama can be attacked on race

Not somebody else who openly race-baits from their owns lips.

[IsItJustMe]

23. I was watching some news last night, MSNBC. and someone mentioned it. It was immediatly smacked

down by one of the other analysts saying that these are the cards that Hillary has been dealt, and that you can't blame her for playing her last cards.

That was all that was said.

BTW I can blame her.

[Cha]

61. The mediawhores are nausea inducing...

and wouldn't it be great if they were all up there pontificating and shit and nobody heard them?

[Terri S]

25. You need to listen more, Charlie

She's been saying pretty 'dumb' things for awhile now. This was just blatent in-you-face 'what-the-hell-I've-already-lost-the-black-vote-anyway' appealing to racist appalachia stuff for the next election.

I'm at a loss to understand her continued support by anyone, honestly. If a Republican had said what she's said, everyone would be up in arms about it.

[Cha]

62. Somebody, quick, send that man

a video clip.

[AllentownJake]

30. Translation

I'm about to leave.

[BklynChick]

31. i've lost a lot of respect for Charles Rangel of late. he is clueless.

[JVS]

39. Smooth move Hill. You've given SDs a PR gaffe to help justify abandoning your already leaky ship!

[Renaissance Man]

40. Charlie's Problem

Charlie's problem is that he can't abandon Sen. Clinton now. He was the huge spearhead in organizing the "African-American Men for Hillary" group, and to leave now would make him look even sillier than he is already.

[goclark]

47. Charlie needs to step up to the plate

for him to allow her to continue to say these things without calling her out on it is a horror.

[bagimin]

45. Has Sheila Jackson Lee

tried to defend the indefensible?

[Kahuna]

57. Not yet. But I'm sure she will. nt

[CakeGrrl]

46. Believe it, Charlie. And check out Larry King Live tonight while you're at it.

Reality check on yer girl...

[Major Hogwash]

70. No shit, let's see how he reacts to those clowns' version of "what's my lying?"

I'd really like to see ol' Carole bump into Charlie and mouth off like that.

[Guaranteed]

49. If Rangel doesn't believe it, I don't either. nt

[Hippo_Tron]

55. Rangel is correct, her comments weren't racist, they were dumb

[ShadowLiberal]

68. The replies here show the danger of politicians saying what a pollster should

I do find what Hillary said somewhat offensive (I'm white), but what Hillary said is generally based on facts (except I'm not sure about the "whites moving farther" from Obama comment, I don't think he's gotten worse with them), but a politician shouldn't be the one to bring it up as a way to 'attack' their opponent's weaknesses.

If Obama wasn't black then some things the Clintons have done to cause racial tension just wouldn't be quite the same. If Obama was white then Hillary saying "I win white working class voters" would be like a candidate bragging about their core base of supporters. But she should have know better then to brag about it when race has been an issue before that's burned her campaign when she and Bill talk like pollsters.

A better example though of how the Clinton's haven't been too smart in discussing race to 'discredit' Obama's wins is South Carolina, after they voted Bill Clinton said "oh well, Jesse Jackson won South Carolina to". If Obama was white then the comment would make people go "so what, that makes no sense". But since Obama was black it was clearly Bill saying "well Obama only won because he's black, so the victory he got here mostly on black votes doesn't count", and causing more controversy.

While going for certain groups of people, like certain races can be a winning strategy, it's not if you're so open about it to the point of sounding like you feel that only one race matters and the others should just bow down to the will of the voters of the superior race. That's basically what Clinton is implying right now with her recent comments.

[Major Hogwash]

69. What do you think of her now, Charlie? Not the type of person you want in the White House?

Let's hope so, because I don't.