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NAACP Strikes a Nerve

14 Wednesday Jul 2010

Posted by in Conservatives, Obama, Politics, Racism, Republicans, Tea Party

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A wise man once told me, “When you throw a rock at a pack of dogs, the one that gets hit is the one that yells first and loudest.” Yesterday, the NAACP threw (emphasis added):

“Late this afternoon the NAACP passed a resolution calling on all people — including tea party leaders — to condemn racism within the tea party movement.

“We feel it’s very important that we educate our membership about the tea parties,” said Anita Russell, head of the Kansas City branch of the NAACP, as the debate on the resolution began. “We are concerned that there is a racist element within the tea parties.”

Delegates said they wanted to make it clear, however, that the resolution wasn’t indicting the entire tea party movement as racist.”

And immediately, without reading the entire statement, the St. Louis Tea Party yelled:

“Normally, we ignore childish hostility from belligerent people and groups. But the NAACP today intends to condemn 20 million tea party activists as racists.”

The St. Louis TPers also referred to  the NAACP as a “bigoted”  “partisan attack dog organization” Then the people that allegedly wants the government out of everyone’s lives called on the IRS to investigate the NAACP and consider taking away their tax-exempt status.

The TPers often claim that the racist signs on display at their rallies are just a few isolated incidents, and don’t reflect the sentiments of the tea party movement as a whole. Having attended local tea parties I don’t buy that, but for the sake of argument let’s imagine that’s true—it’s just a few random people scattered among the crowd. What about the leadership?

What about Dale Robertson, founder of teaparty.org who carried this sign at the Houston Tea Party last February:


What about Mark Williams, chairman of the Tea Party Express? Williams wrote on his blog last September that President Obama is “an Indonesian Muslim turned welfare thug, and a racist in chief.” Williams in May of this year called Muslims “animals of Allah” who “worship a monkey-god.”

What about Amy Kremer, national coordinator of the American Tea Party movement? Last July Ms. Kremer wrote in support of David McKalip who was forwarding this picture on a tea party mailing list:


“David, we all support you fully and are here for you. I can assure you of one thing and that is we will protect our own. We all have your back my friend!

Let me know what I can do to help. I am here for you if you need me David.”

That’s the leadership of the tea party movement, not just a few random nuts carrying a few random signs. I’d say the NAACP is being lenient, it’s not just a racist element within the tea party movement. This fish is rotting from the head.

“How Do You Write a Check for Something Like This?”

02 Wednesday Jun 2010

Posted by in BP, Deepwater Horizon, Environment, Gulf Oil Spill, oil exploration

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That question, asked by a BP contract worker who took reporters from the New York Daily News into areas BP wants to keep off-limits, and this accompanying photo of a decomposing dolphin on Queen Bess Island, put in a nutshell the unfolding environmental nightmare along the Gulf Coast.


How do you write a check for something like this?

“When we found this dolphin it was filled with oil. Oil was just pouring out of it. It was the saddest darn thing to look at,” said a BP contract worker who took the Daily News on a surreptitious tour of the wildlife disaster unfolding in Louisiana.

His motive: simple outrage.

“There is a lot of coverup for BP. They specifically informed us that they don’t want these pictures of the dead animals. They know the ocean will wipe away most of the evidence. It’s important to me that people know the truth about what’s going on here,” the contractor said.

“The things I’ve seen: They just aren’t right. All the life out here is just full of oil. I’m going to show you what BP never showed the President.”…The grasses by the shore were littered with tarred marine life, some dead and others struggling under a thick coating of crude.”When you see some of the things I’ve seen, it would make you sick,” the contractor said. “No living creature should endure that kind of suffering.”

[…]

“Those pelicans are supposed to have white heads. The black is from the oil. Most of them won’t survive,” the contractor said.

“They keep trying to clean themselves. They try and they try, but they can’t do it.”

The contractor has been attempting to save birds and turtles.

“I saw a pelican under water with only its wing sticking out,” he said. “I grabbed it and lifted it out of the water. It was just covered in oil. It was struggling so hard to survive. We did what we could for it.

How do you write a check for something like this?

“He said he recently found five turtles drowning in oil. “Three turtles were dead. Two were dying and not dead yet. They will be,” he said. As the boat headed back amid the choppy waves, a pod of dolphins showed up to swim with the vessel and guide it to land…”They know they are in trouble. We are all in trouble,” the contractor said.

How does BP write a check for something like this? They can’t.