And perhaps we should no longer be giving a "pass" to people like Breitbart and Drudge who masquerade as journalists but are nothing more than marketing whores willing to put anything in print if it drives their web traffic up.
I want to caution the liberals on this thread, in the leftstream media, in the democratic party and in the black community to be careful about casting too many stones over this case.
Doing so puts you in the position of being exposed as hypocrites.
That's because there is little difference between this case and the case where the tea party (and specific tea party members) were castigated as racists based
solely on unsubstantiated allegations made by some black congressmen who clearly tried to provoke an incident by walking through protestors during the Health Care debate.
In that case,
within minutes of that walk, the congressmen were being filmed talking about the alleged racism of the protestors, their staff members were twittering the claim to liberal bloggers, and those bloggers then began to immediatedly attack the tea party on the internet as racists. Then very quickly the leftist mainstream media (ABC, NBC, CBS, etc) picked up on that and made that the #1 issue on their airways. And then that was picked up by liberal members of this forum (many of whom are on this thread and now acting self-righteous about Breitbart and Fox News), who quickly started threads attacking the teaparty as racist. And all of those accusations were based on very sketchy information and very unreliable sources, at best.
Need I remind you that all of that was based on an accusation that was
totally unsubstantiated and still is unsubstantiated
in any way. Not one of the many video cameras that were in the crowd (and even in use by the congressmen's staff as they traversed of the crowd) captured ANY racist comment, whatsoever. And note that despite requests they do so, the congressmen never released any portion of the video their aids shot of that walk. What was on their tapes?
Nor did a single witness in the crowd, the police or among the journalists who were there (most of whom would jump at the chance to prove the tea party is racist) come forward to corroborate the claims made by the congressmen. Not one. Even a congressman who was in the group and standing right next to those who made the accusations said he didn't hear any slurs (despite the claim that the N-word was reportedly "shouted" 15 times at them). No witnesses came forward, despite the fact that Breitbart offered to donate a $100,000 to the United Negro College Fund if anyone provided proof of the allegations. In fact, Breitbart even offered to donate money to the UNCF if John Lewis, one of the prime accusing congressmen, would just take and pass a lie detector test about the incident. He refused. (And remember, Lewis was the same congressman who a few years ago compared Republicans to Nazis. Who said McCain and Palin were "sowing the seeds of hatred and division" during the Presidential campaign and then linked them with George Wallace, clearly race-baiting).
Nor was the allegation of deliberate spitting on one Congressman proven. The video clearly showed that if any drops of spittle landed on the congressman, it was nothing more than an accident due to the fact the congressman walked too close to a man in the crowd who was shouting about health care at the time (and when people shout they sometimes spray). The man did not hork up something and deliberately spit it, as the allegation was intended to make people visualize.
Furthermore, the congressmen making the allegations have a sorted history themselves. Some have been caught lying in past events. Some were caught lying during this case. For example, congressman Cleaver clearly lied when he later claimed he'd not "talked about the incident on TV or anywhere" or "report anything, never a single thing in Washington, not one thing". His office made a press release with the accusations the day of the incident. And that press release itself contained lies (it said, for example, "the man who spat on the Congressman was arrested" when the Capital Police have stated *no one* was arrested that day).
And some of these congressmen were known to be racebaiters. I already noted an example from congressman Lewis' past. Congressman Clyburn called Joe Wilson a racist for opposing ObamaCare and even accused Hillary Clinton of being a racist during the Presidential primary. Even leftist media, like the Huffington Post, acknowledged he was a racebaiter saying Clyburn was "happy to play his by now familiar part". And does ANYONE on this thread really believe the congressmen when when they claim they had no plan to instigate a reaction in the crowd that day … that it was just the first day of spring and they felt like taking a walk in the sun? Can't we at least be honest about the facts and with ourselves?
And despite all that, there has been absolutely no apology to the tea party or those specific individuals in the crowd who were singled out as racists over this. By anyone on the other side of this case. So beware of casting too many stones. It might backfire. And remember that this isn't the only countervailing example of hypocricy from your side of this debate that I could mention and discuss in detail. My suggestion is do what I did … acknowledge
the facts and move on.
