Dishonoring Mrs. King
In Atlanta this weekend, thousands braved unusually cold weather to pay their final respects to Coretta Scott King, who lay in state at the Georgia Capitol.
That honor, withheld from her slain husband in 1968 by the legendary racist Governor Lester Maddox, comes as a bitter irony. For it was in the same Georgia Capitol only days before that the GOP-controlled legislature passed and Republican Governor Sonny Perdue signed a restrictive new voter ID card program designed to suppress minority turnout in the state.
As I wrote last month ("Plantation Politics"), the Georgia GOP passed the equivalent of a 21st century poll tax to hold down the black vote, a bloc that votes overwhelmingly for Democrats. Career civil servants in the Justice Departments's Civil Rights Division voted 4-1 to withhold "pre-clearance" for the law under the requirements of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. President Bush's Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, however, reversed their ruling and paved the way for the new system of pay-to-play voter ID cards, which due to cost and limited availability in Georgia's counties could have disenfranchised over 150,000 primarily black voters. When a federal judge blocked implementation of the law in October, the Georgia legislature responded by passing a modified version in January within days of its commemoration of Martin Luther King Day.
On Saturday, the hypocritical Governor Perdue added to the indignity, saying of Mrs. King, "This lady and her husband and many others fought for equality all of her life." And on Tuesday, President Bush will complete the insult during his scheduled remarks at Mrs. King's funeral.
I am sitting here listening to the hypocritical President Dumbya speaking at the funeral of Mrs. King and I'm laughing at his words...a man who has done so little for all people and especially, blacks. When will everyone including that whole audience have the courage to walk out
on the almost complete drownding in bulls__t this nation embraces? From tv/media advertising
to all who are in politics from the local smallest level to the federal level. If there is a god, what happened?
It is so hard to listen to these b.s.ers. thankfully I have cable tv so I can find even a "B" movie in preference to the ugly people who
supposedly deliver the news. I also, have my laptop to read this and many other great blogs
I am sitting here listening to the hypocritical President Dumbya speaking at the funeral of Mrs. King and I'm laughing at his words...a man who has done so little for all people and especially, blacks. When will everyone including that whole audience have the courage to walk out
on the almost complete drownding in the flimflam this nation embraces? From tv/media advertising
to all who are in politics from the local smallest level to the federal level. If there is a god, what happened?
It is so hard to listen to these bloviators thankfully, I have cable tv so I can find even a "B" movie in preference to the ugly people who
supposedly deliver the news. I also, have my laptop to read this and many other great blogs
I loved seeing W sitting there so totally out of place, stupid grin on his face, while having no choice but listen to the great speakers who totally dissed him. I hope his ears were open, but I expect all he was doing was thinking, God, how soon will this end? Jimmy Carter nailed him good, so did the preacher with the great poem, and Mrs. Kings daughter also got some good comments in that he had to have heard.
It was interesting during the very long applause for President Clinton, to see the reaction of George and Laura Bush, in which they exchanged several comments back and forth to each other. What I wouldn't have given to know what they said to each other! It was quite plain to all who watched that black America trully knows who their friends are. I think now a majority of the rest of America does too. Just remember that on election day, if you don't show up, your opinion doesn't count! If you want to change the direction this country is headed, show up and vote!
This was a memorial for Mrs. King, for her not anyone else. This wasnt for President Bush nor the pastor or President Clinton. You can hate the president or you can love the president but this wasnt the place or the time. We have lost all civility, zero respect for the office of the United states of america.
It was interesting during the very long applause for President Clinton, to see the reaction of George and Laura Bush, in which they exchanged several comments back and forth to each other. What I wouldn't have given to know what they said to each other! It was quite plain to all who watched that black America truly knows who their friends are. I think now a majority of the rest of America does too. Just remember that on election day, if you don't show up, your opinion doesn't count! If you want to change the direction this country is headed, show up and vote!
" wasnt the place or the time"
Mr. Buchan, do you have the faintest idea who the Kings were or why they were so famous?
Read Dr. King's speeches and get a clue.
Mr. Buchan,
The emperor has no clothes! the audience at Mrs. King's funeral knows that. We know that Mrs. King and Dr. King are the antithesis of what President George W. Bush and the powers that put him in office stand for.
Considering how this administration handled the Katrina disaster, they were more than civil. otherwise they would have gotten up and headed for the door when he stood to speak.
Jim Buchan is a product of our horribly ill-informed population. If he, and others like him, took the time to inform themselves, they would know that Mrs. King invited all living presidents to attend her funeral with a purpose in mind. And what happened at her funeral was exactly what she had planned. She knew that Bush would arrive hoping to grab some good photo ops of himself with African Americans, but his plan was forseen far ahead of the moment, and backfired on him in a most delicious way. From Mrs. King's vantage point, whatever that is, I feel confident that she was enjoying the poetic justice of seeing Bush faced with his own misguided policies.
I hope he was moved in some way, but I doubt that any of it got through his hardened skull. Remember, this is a man who believes that he is the last word on all things in this country, and the rest of the world. A man who thinks he does not have to obey the laws of our land, and certainly has no respect for any laws of any other land. This is also the man who wants to introduce a new class of batttlefield nuclear weapons to an already precarious world already on the edge of worldwide disaster as it is. He is the worst kind of cowboy. I only wish that some of the speakers would have turned around and faced Bush head on, and spoke directly to him. And George Senior made such a pitiful attempt at defending his son. It was sad, I almost felt sorry for him, but just almost. G.W. deserves all the disrespect people can muster, he needs to here the truth in any way possible. The office of this president deserves no exalted stature.