It's good that she changed her attitude, but the role of a government official making decisions about people's lives is not to experience personal transformations and revelations. It was an abuse of power. It's good that she learned from it, and it's interesting that she was opening herself up and telling such a personal story now. It exposed her to criticism, and her understandably sensitive boss fired her. It's important to acknowledge that Sherrod not only admittedly discriminated against the farmer (years ago), but she saw fit today to speak as if she were proud of the story with its narrative arc of personal growth.
ADDED: The incident with the white farmer occurred when Sherrod worked for the Georgia field office for the Federation of Southern Cooperative/Land Assistance Fund, and I don't know the specifics of that work and how it might affect the extent of her duty not to discriminate based on race. I don't mean to express an opinion about whether Sherrod should have been fired. There is a lot going on in this story, and I'm interested to see how it unfolds. I'm holding a position of neutrality here, and I will make my observations as they come to me.
One thing I'm seeing that I don't think many people are talking about is that Sherrod brought religion into her work and her narrative. Her speech began with a genuinely moving story of her childhood. It brought me to tears when she spoke of the murder of her father. Because of that murder, she made a "commitment to stay in the South and devote my life to working for change." The commitment seems to have been a promise to God, as she continues:
God is good. I can tell you that. When I made that commitment, I was making that commitment to black people -- and to black people only. But you know God will show you things and he'll put things in your path so that you realize that the struggle is really about poor people...This ties to the line in the anecdote from the video clip: "That's when it was revealed to me that y'all, it's about poor versus those who have, and not so much about white -- it is about white and black, but it's not -- you know, it opened my eyes..." Toward the end, she repeats this idea: "Like I told, God helped me to see that its not just about black people, it's about poor people. And I've come a long way. I knew that I couldn't live with hate, you know. As my mother has said to so many, if we had tried to live with hate in our hearts, we'd probably be dead now."
That's a beautiful idea. It is impressive that she resisted hate, but a public servant has a duty not to discriminate based on race, whatever her personal background is and whether God revealed something to her or not.
Posts
206 comments:
1 – 200 of 206 Newer› Newest»I have no pity for her. I'm glad she learned and grew, but this is the type of thing you should learn when you are six years old.
And the point of the video was that the crowd approved of her racism before they learned of her "transformation."
I'm glad the first farmer came out of this with happy thoughts, but what will happen if other white farmers who lost their farms show up and say "she didn't help me."
it bothers me, however, that she repeats the BS about the health care debate and the "racist republicans", most likely referring to the defunked charges of spitting and n-word calling.
"You know, I haven’t seen such a mean-spirited people as I’ve seen lately over this issue of health care. Some of the racism we thought was buried. Didn’t it surface? Now, we endured eight years of the Bush’s and we didn’t do the stuff these Republicans are doing because you have a black President."
The fact, also that she claims "they" didn't do the things "republicans" are now doing.... Who is she kidding?
http://www.ringospictures.com/index.php?page=20090816
Let's face it- plenty of people got a 2nd chance. Like Jimmy the Greek, Al Campanis, Trent Lott.... what's that you say? These folks did not get a 2nd chance?
I have little sympathy for Sherrod, but I'm unclear about the details of this particular incident--wasn't she working for a non-profit at the time of the poor white farmer and only winding up at a government agency years later?
In which case she wasn't abusing her government mandate.
I haven't had time yet to watch the whole thing, but will do so this evening. Apparently from all the cross-talk today on the other thread, there's enough doubt as to the audience's reactions, so I'll reserve judgment until I see the whole thing.
The most surprising aspect of this entire story is the light speed move to fire her and the knee-jerk reaction from Jealous at the NAACP.
This speaks volumes to the maturity that resides in both the administration and the NAACP. You would think the administration would have learned from the Cambridge fiasco. Is there going to be a picture of the president strutting, head up and confident away from an aging Mr. Spooner helping this woman down the steps toward a beer-laden table?
Amer Girl:
Did you get that word "defunked" from Sarah Palin? Cause it works for me!
althouse is infuriating
The premise of your judgment is wrong. She was NOT a government official back in 1986. She started work for USDA in 2009. Working for a nonprofit she may have had a moral, but not a legal obligation to use her "full force" on Mr. Spooner's behalf. As she tells it, she sent him to a lawyer. What she failed to do immediately was to ensure the white lawyer was a good one.
Aren't we all proud of our personal growth?
It's good that she changed her attitude, but the role of a government official making decisions about people's lives is not to experience personal transformations and revelations.
She wasn't working for the government at the time.
Wrong lesson.
It's rich and poor against bureaucrats.
Rich and poor are on the same side.
Anyone who actually watches the full unedited video knows that Ms. Sherrod is a kind and gentle woman. A good public servant.
She is Hattie Carroll.
It is sad that Ann Althouse yesterday was so quick to hold Andrew "William Zanzinger" Breitbart coat while he took aim with his cane.
"what will happen if other white farmers who lost their farms show up and say "she didn't help me."
They will file a class action, settle for $100 million and no one will care when a white President and white Attorney General try to reopen the case and give them $1.25 billion?
No, could not happen.
The position of the NAACP is roughly that whites are withholding dignity from blacks.
But the only way to get dignity is to do something for somebody else.
If blacks, as a group, want dignity, they have to take up a collection for poor whites.
There's the message that she didn't press home, to those people who are exactly the ones that need it.
Individual dignity works the same way, but isn't politically blocked and so works itself out on its own.
Breitbart got it right, IMHO, when he said that the issue of that video was that the NAACP crowd "cheered" Sherrod's comments as through she was correct in her attitude towards "The Other!" Hannity tried to talk over Breitbart last night but Andrew stuck to his guns.
So, until the NAACP realizes its own problems with racism it should avoid telling the Tea Party folks how to behave; especially given that there's been no outright racism allowed by the TP folks.
Cheers!
What is lost in this whole mess was that she was part and parcel of a "reparations" lawsuit that she and her husband benifited from to tune of a hell of a lot of money. (We don't know all the crooked details because they are covering it up, not least by getting her out of town).
If "normal" everyday Americans learned about this they would know that a pay off was involved. The mainstream media will conspire to not look at this and they had to get her out of town before more questions are asked. She can play the victim now.
Any furher inquiry will be shut down by the Journolist cabal.
Maybe she can start another class action lawsuit for government employees who are unfairly fired because they were crooks or racists or child molestors or faked injuries to get workers comp.
Who the hell is the public to ask questions about government employees and the crooked revolving door from the racial greviance industry to the government.
SHUT UP! GO AWAY! NOTHING TO SEE HERE!BBBBUUUUUUUUSSSSSSSSHHHHHH!!!
Professor, thank you for your insights about Ms. Sherrod after having viewed the full video. I wonder whether you made any noteworthy observations concerning the audience? I know the original story about the video cast aspersions on Ms. Sherrod personally, and it is certainly a matter of interest whether those aspersions were warranted. But I understood the main claim to be that the video depicted racism on the part of the NAACP, which took the form of apparent audience approval in response to Ms. Sherrod's account of her past discriminatory conduct. The claims about the audience reaction don't seem to me to be negated by the new evidence relating to Ms. Sherrod's motive in describing her past conduct.
Ann .. She wasn't a government official when she was dealing with the Spooner family. She was in a nonprofit helping farmers who were facing foreclosure, as I read it.
So no. The USDA had no business firing her. Particularly without looking further into the tape and the story.
Correct me I am wrong but historically the practice of discrimination results in a illegal singling out a person and results in a negative affect to said person such as denying entry into college. But in this case Sherrod's discrimination seems more an attitude as her actions, other than referring him to a white lawyer, did not prevent the farmer from saving his farm, but actually went on to help him keep it. Further she was not a government official at the time, and frankly I think her story of personal transformation should not be dismissed, as Althouse seems willing to do, even if she were a government official at the time.
Ms. Sherrod's story was about over coming human frailty born by being raised under Jim Crow and having her father murdered by a white man when she was seventeen. Ms. Sherrod admitted she was wrong in seeing race and intellectually grew. That shows personal character.
Althouse, born in luxury and privilege got rolled by Breitbart but is unable to admit that she was wrong. Good personal character is something Althouse sorely lacks.
I agree completely with our hostesses take on this. From the CNN coverage you'd think the woman was a regular saint when what she is is a throwback and a grievance monger. "I sent him to one of his people".
Can you imagine what kind of fury would await a white man--no matter what good he had done in this world--if he used the same terms about a black client? Nobody gets to that that stuff any more.
I don't think that makes her the worst kind of racist but I'm not willing to canonize her just yet.
It is about rich and poor - not about races.
We need to say it over and over again.
I agree with Althouse. It was her job to give equal service to everyone, not toss aside white people looking for her help and let "their own kind" deal with them. That farmer was out months of legal fees and had months of anguish because of her.
She probably shouldn't have been fired without the full tape being reviewed, but now that it has, it's obvious she shouldn't be in any government position at all.
Shirley Sherrod named Georgia Director of Rural Development
The cash award acknowledges racial discrimination on the part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture for the years 1981-85. (President Reagan abolished the USDA Office of Civil Rights when he became President in 1981.) New Communities is due to receive approximately $13 million ($8,247,560 for loss of land and $4,241,602 for loss of income; plus $150,000 each to Shirley and Charles for pain and suffering). There may also be an unspecified amount in forgiveness of debt. This is the largest award so far in the minority farmers law suit (Pigford vs Vilsack).
Sherrod and her husband were paid $150,000 each for the "pain and suffering" of having been discriminated against during the same timeframe that she was discriminating against white farmers.
Nice work if you can get it.
This thread reads like Geraldo breathlessly opening Capone's closet. Ann continually uses the word "later". Ok Ann. How much later? Years or in time to save the white farmer's farm?
She was NOT a government official -not some muckity-much but at the time something of a caseworker. Don't make her out to be something "job-wise" that she wasn't.
It is a good story she tells, one with a good ending - not one that says I did something wrong back then and when given a chance to change my ways I told the whites to stick it - NO. She got past it and to her credit and by all accounts has had a very good career being a good person doing a tough job.
And what of it that she underwent a transformation and had a revelation? You haven't ever? You have never changed? You are still the same person you were at 24? People change - those who interact with others that is - and it would be sad if people didn't become better people over time.
You haven't spent any time in a southern community (rural Cincinnati doesn't count nor does Austin) as you demonstrate little grasp of a southern black town meeting but frankly you are woefully out of touch with the setting that is pretty much as plain as the nose on your face on the tape.
As to the abuse of power - that is a load of crap. The abuse would have been if she didn't help at all but she did. But on a larger note, exactly how much power did a black woman in rural Georgia have 25 years ago? If you say "equal to any white" I've got a bridge to sell you.
You have made this much more than it is and much less than it is all at once.
This is kinda a load of crap Ann...
It's about the Pigford lawsuit. That's right Pigford.
She got $150,000 for her "pain and suffering."
I think she should get the same from the people that fired her.
That was the Big O by the way. Just sayn'
roesch-voltaire,
I give a lot of money to a charity called The Union Gospel Mission. A Christian organization that feeds, clothes and provides a place to sleep. The shit would hit the fan if they turned away someone of color, and told them to go somewhere where there were people of their own kind. Can't discriminate at a non-profit? I doubt it.
Let's ask--who looks worst here, Sherrod, Obama, Vilsack or Jealous?
Surely not Shirley.
Give me a break with the technicalities. That non profit was surely funded almost entirely by the govt.
Hell half of the non-profits in this country would probably go under without the govt largesse.
And Trooper is right - CNN and others will not look into Shirley's money grab lawsuit vs. Uncle Sam.
HD--when the hell did you attend a Southern Black Town Meeting? You are full of it.
..but she saw fit today to speak as if she were proud of the story with its narrative arc of personal growth.
Wrong lesson..
The lesson is if you are a government bureaucrat and you are asked to speak, you better greenlight the speech via the Interdepartmental Personnel Development Agency of Public Affairs and Public Speaking.. otherwise known as the Speech Czar ;)
And how did a onetime pal of Bill Ayers [Shirley's husband] become party to a lawsuit involving farmers?
Anyone who actually reads the full unedited blog knows that Ms. Althouse is a kind and gentle woman. A good public blogger.
She is Pearl Harbor.
It is sad that Phil yesterday was so quick to hold HD "Japanese Fleet" House's coat while he took aim with his torpedo bombers.
Those wishing to turn this incident into a character attack on Althouse are predictable, histrionic silly people.
It is about rich and poor - not about races.
Yeah. Only her words were "rich against poor".
Maybe she got hosed--I don't really care. Lots of people have been hosed with this "racist!" business. So what if one mid-level government parasite experiences unfairness? How many here would shed a tear if the same thing happened to some poor white guy stuck in the past?
We'd all be like "Well, he doesn't deserve it but he really should know better than to use terms like "his own people". And that's the last we'd think of it.
phil: Ms. Sherrod's story was about over coming human frailty born by being raised under Jim Crow and having her father murdered by a white man when she was seventeen.
I have my own story, so does that farmer, and in the farmer's story Sherrod was the monster. Sure, his family is defending her, but that's because they don't understand how she played with their lives because of the color of their skin.
Even if you put the worst interpretation on Ms. Sherrod's actions 24 years ago, it would appear to be pretty mild stuff compared to experiences I have had with public officials, local, State, and Federal - and my work has not had anything whatever to do with race or racial questions, and I have never even been to the Deep South.
The story is about the present day reactions to this incident on all sides, except Ms. Sherrod. She is somewhat like being hit on the head with a snowfall coming off a roof she passed by on a winter's day.
"What is lost in this whole mess was that she was part and parcel of a "reparations" lawsuit that she and her husband benefitted from to tune of a hell of a lot of money. (We don't know all the crooked details because they are covering it up, not least by getting her out of town).
If "normal" everyday Americans learned about this they would know that a pay off was involved. The mainstream media will conspire to not look at this and they had to get her out of town before more questions are asked. She can play the victim now."
THIS is the fascinating part of the story - she and her hubby got $150K each for "pain & suffering" AND administer a $13M trust of farmland - plus she somehow ends up in the USDA? How many ways can you say "payoff"?
There HAS to be MUCH more to this story, as quick as she went under the bus when the videotape surfaced. Hell, NO ONE working in the govt gets canned that fast - unless there are skeletons stacked so high in the closet that the powers that be don't DARE let that door be opened.
Or Holder. Mr. Pigford reopen himself.
Vilsack, Holder, Obama, Jealous and surely Shirly want to reopen a settled case and pay another $1 billion to their political cronies.
Surely Shirley is not going to be in charge of that in her new "special" job for Vilsack.
"She's got a ticket in the big game" now.
I do have some admiration for her. It's not often that pawns have such a sharp bite.
There used to be this fake church that would dress up these old ladies in nuns outfits like they were Catholic nuns and they would sit at the bottom of the stairs in the subway station. I remember there was always one at the Jay St Bourough Hall stop when you were going home from A&S.
They always picked older, dignified sweet looking ladies like Mrs. Sherrod.
They came to find out it was a scam run by a phony "reverend" who did really well out of the donations.
Just because they look like a sweet old lady doesn't mean they aren't grifters.
$150,000 for pain and suffering.
Just sayn.
Thank you Prof. Althouse for not letting this loser of a woman off the hook! I knew you would not buy all of her jive talk about her "pappa being murdered" and how hard she had it in the deep south and all of that jazz.
I predict Vilsack will re-hire her then the real scoop will come out about this lady's lawsuit and they will have to fire her again within two weeks.
David said...
HD--when the hell did you attend a Southern Black Town Meeting? You are full of it."
I worked summers in rural S. Carolina while in grad school doing work for the Councils on Aging - mostly in small towns with predominantly black participants. I also did the same thing in SE Kentucky coordinating public health informational meetings - I did that weekends for 3 years.
Now what was that you were saying?
I do not think her USDA job was a payoff. She had already been paid, and she already had a good job. Plus the original Pigford case settlement was approved by the judge way before she got the appointment. By the lights of the Obama administration, she was qualified.
Surely Shirley had experience in the rural farms get government help business.
It's the reopening of Pigford that's the scandal.
That's not over.
By the way, look for Vilsack to go back to Iowa after the November election.
And when was that, HD? And just where were these town meetings? I live in SC. I still think you bullshitting. It isn't Vermont. And they don't have "town meetings" especially on weekends.
I still call bullshit. My bullshit detector is very good and you are bullshitting.
"SHOW ME THE MONEY!!!!!"
Who got the dough from the Pigford settlement and why are they trying to reopen it and give out more dough?
Who benefits from that? Who is making that agreement? The court or someone that the Big O appointed?
Will the mainstream media be as interested as they were in Joe the Plumbers taxes and Sarah Palins Vagina?
Stay tuned. Same Bat Time. Same Bat Channel.
You went to some meetings where there were some old black people. BFD. You are spinning invisible cloth from air.
For the record, I've gotten quite a good sum of money from the Bureau of Indian Affairs. If this thread is still active tomorrow, I'll comment on this Pigford thing.
Trooper--do you think anyone is going to report on Pigford?
They will go for the appropriation after the November election. They will rework the settlement again.
Then the Judge must approve.
But once the money is appropriated, the fix is in.
Only if there is under the table corruption will "Pigford II" be derailed. Unlikely, because (1) hard to find and (2) completely unnecessary. The entire process is corrupt. These days that does not mean illegal.
Follow the money..
I'm with Trooper on this.
In this world of intense and never ceasing status competition it is really asking too much of a person to expect her to own up to her shortcomings, period. You have to accept as good enough "Yes, I was in the wrong once but look at how I've grown."
@TR: You don't know what the fuck you're talking about! What Ms Sherrod talked about, her family history, was something I saw directly, Ft. Bragg '57-58, Ft Benning 59-61. The Army was as intergrated as humans can be back then. But, offpost was another world. My black friends and I did not associate offpost; that would have risked life and limb. We worked together, got together at post housing and NCO clubs but offpost, went our own ways.
Sherrod's tale is most believable except to fools like you.
Also, Breitbart got snuckered by whoever sent him a partial video. The full thing provides that explanation of Sherrod's actions and words and makes her less of a scamp. However, her behavior griftering off the government is another matter.
That said, Sherrod's politics come out fully and she shows herself to be a "post racial" racist. She's typical of the problem in the US today; IMHO.
Cheers.
Well I am sure you deserved every penny of it AllenS.
The Hekawi were really mistreated by Sgt O'Rourke. Those damn Irish are so freakin racist.
It is about rich and poor - not about races.
We need to say it over and over again.
It's about this arbitrarily defined collective, not that arbitrarily defined collective. Never mind about, you know, actual individuals.
David: Let's ask--who looks worst here, Sherrod, Obama, Vilsack or Jealous?
Surely not Shirley.
"At least she's not as bad as Obama."
Is that what you're trying to say?
And the point of the video was that the crowd approved of her racism before they learned of her "transformation."
___
You'll forgive Shirley Sherrod if she does not think that is the point of that video.
Bill - I was going to point that out too, but she does admit that probably either the USDA or Georgia Dept of Ag sent Mr Spooner to her. We'd obviously have to read the contract that nonprofit had with the USDA to see what her obligations were. They might not have been as stringent as if she were working directly for the USDA, but not far from it, I'd imagine.
It's true. She wasn't a government employee when she had her encounter with the white farmer. She was a government employee when she made the speech, in March of this year.
She only became a USDA employee, via an appointment by the Obama Administration, a few days after she agreed to a $13 million dollar settlement with the USDA (as a Pigford claimant).
http://www.ruraldevelopment.org/shirleydirector.html
And from what Vilsack said today, he wants to put her in charge of paying out the rest of the Pigford claims.
Doug Wright said:
"Breitbart got it right, IMHO, when he said that the issue of that video was that the NAACP crowd 'cheered' Sherrod's comments as through she was correct in her attitude towards 'The Other!'"
Not going to beat this to death this time; I will only ask once and drop it: Where in the video -- minute:second reference -- did the crowd "cheer" a comment about her attitude toward the "Other"?
Or, to head off remarks about "semantics," otherwise indicate "agreement" or "affirmation"?
At some point do we not need to acknowledge what this video actually depicts?
Hey will there be a video of the ATM when they pay out the dough from the new improved Pigford settlement? Will we know who got the money and why? Will anyone ask any questions or will everyone be attended the Mel Gibson trial?
Stay tuned. Same Bat Time. Same Bat Channel.
African-American "farmers" are a monumental hot-potato, and have been for a long time.
Back nearly fifteen years ago, when I was part of a group of agronomists working on contract with the USDA, it was proposed to change the official monetary definition of a "farmer" from $1,000 per year to $10,000 per year gross income. Gross, not net.
The $1,000 figure was established in 1948, and has not been changed since. In today's money that is over $9,000, so the change makes sense.
The idea, however, was quashed almost immediately because over one million of the 2.1 million official farmers in the US gross less than $10,000 per year.
More importantly, the crushing majority of African-American "farmers" would have lost that official status, had the change been allowed to stand. That, under the Clinton administration, was quite simply intolerable. We live with the results today.
No matter that the average net income of these one million "farms" is a net LOSS of 33% on operations -- year after year after year -- the disgusting politics of it all is that these folks are more than half the justification for the USDA's bloated budget. These farms are losing money consistently, and it really shouldn't matter what color skin the farmer has.
Now, quite bluntly, this time of year my skin is darker than that of many African-Americans. None of it should matter, but in post-Modern America, tragically, it does.
More importantly, why is the Forest Service part of the USDA instead of Interior? Why are Food Stamps handled through the USDA instead of Health and Human Services?
Politics, my friends. Raw politics. Forests, farms, and food stamps are a whores' coalition of different regions, all working together to maximise their own benefits, not at the expense of each other, but of other departments and the people at large.
USDA is one of the most rotten departments in the entire federal government.
Allen, I would like to hear your comments on Pigford. It's somewhat mysterious to me. I had a long comment on Pigford which I decided to delete. The whole Sherrod thing had become racially ugly and I really didn't want to pile on that. Partcularly since I thought what she said was pretty mild and had a possible benign explanation. (This was even before I learned the incident was 24 years ago.) Plus now she is A Hero of the Left, so let the Pigfords fly.
In that post I said I had no problem with the Pigford I settlement. Though the evidence (mainly a consulting report) in Pigford seemed dubious to me, a federal judge approved the consent order and Congress appropriated the money.
So far, so good.
But the reopening of the case fries my brain. That's just raw politics.
It also occurs to me that Pigford could have been just posturing by Holder, Obama et; al. How can 65,000 people who could not even get into the class even prove that they applied (or considered applying) for a loan between 1982 and 1996? That is--or at least was--a fact they needed to show to get the Track A $50,000 payout.
That "posture" may be a little uncomfortable now.
(For you non Pigford fans, sorry for the Inside Baseball.) Google "Pigford" and "Congressional Research Service" and you can find a case summary.)
I was kidding when I said maybe she will be put in charge of Pigford.
Is Vilsack suicidal?
Won't it be fun when people like Sherrod, Vilsack and Jealous are leading the health and financial sectors of the USA?
We'll find out very very soon.
Expect the complete politicization of medicine and banking. Payoffs, corruption, forced hirings, forced firings, union thuggery.
All this and much much more coming to hospitals and S&Ls near you.
God bless America.
Because we need it, bad.
My first thought was that Sherrod quit quickly to avoid "shining a light" on Pigford.
Boy, was that wrong.
They are proud of it!
This all fits together. The corrupt racial grievance industry. The nexus between non-profits and government setting up payoffs for both the left and right. I am sure you could find defense or oil industry bullshit in the last Republican administration. It is just the time for the Dems to get the government payoffs and crooked back door deals. They won the election after all.
The mainstream media will play along. They will go back and forth about the “tape” and FOX News and whatever bullshit they can come up with and never once look at all the money that is going to be paid out in a crooked deal. They are just as culpable as the government bureaucrats temporarily working in government in the revolving door between non-profits and government sinecures.
THEY ALL HAVE TO GO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What if she were a white accused of racism, who had "seen the light" and reformed after the fact? What do you think the chances of Vilsack's offering her reinstatement would be? 1 in a trillion? never in this universe? Remember "niggardly", and what happened to that poor sod? She and her husband collected enough in their management of that litigation to keep them for an eternity -- she doesn't need a job at the USDA where she can pump lots of other time-servers into the system to clog it up for forever, as she was advertising in that second video. No. Loss.
How about a video of former VP Al Gore?
In Flagrante delicto.
Yes Megaera, if a white guy said it, he should be given just as much leeway as Sherrod. Yes, yes, yes.
(1) She wasn't a government official.
(2) The point of the story was that that sort of behavior was wrong.
So, for her past racism, I do not condemn Sherrod.
I do, however, absolutely condemn her comments about rich against poor. I also condemn her encouragement for others to join on the government teat. And I condemn the approval of the crowd toward the racism in her story.
Wrong lesson.
It's rich and poor against bureaucrats.
Rich and poor are on the same side.
Rhhardin is right.
Fear of government should drive the people to make the government fear them. To ignore the danger government poses to the people is to ignore history.
Trooper @ 4:22
Yes. There is dirty laundry under that pile of peanuts.
AC245 4:28
Nice catch And here it is!
AJ Lynch @ 4:34
Boy, I like this bunch. A regular army of david journalists (with the A) at heart.
And with all due respect, she may have seen the light about the Spooners (after she sent him to his kind of lawyer) but there were some snarky racist comments at the end.
And what is edited out at ~21:00?
Something is missing from the video that makes the audience laugh.
Oh ... and you can get 100% loans with no mortgage insurance? Isn't that what helped create our housing problems?
And then of course, the typical racist red meat: Now, we endured eight years of the Bush’s and we didn’t do the stuff these Republicans are doing because you have a black President.
Any clue what she endured with the Bush Administration?
Bill Harshaw said...
The premise of your judgment is wrong. She was NOT a government official back in 1986. She started work for USDA in 2009. Working for a nonprofit she may have had a moral, but not a legal obligation to use her "full force" on Mr. Spooner's behalf.
Most of these "nonprofits" (like ACORN) receive govt money and are subject to very strict rules on nondiscrimination applied to race and other protected classes that attach to their funding source.
Never mind the antidiscrimination laws of general application.
Remember the Commerce Clause? It ain't just for breakfast counters.
Wait a minute! This is about racial discrimination?
I though this was about Ms. Sherrod's bureaucratic epiphany that class warfare trumps race warfare.
I thought she was fired for mangling the Administration's strategy that race warfare transcends all else.
Besides, Obots and Democrats aren't supposed to acknowledge class warfare. They're just supposed to engage in it and line their pockets from it.
Bart Hall--
One of the main findings of the court's (plaintif's?) consultant in Pigford was that the median loan for an African American farmer was considerably less than that for a white farmer from 1982-96. And that loans sought by African Americans took longer to process.
Lacking direct evidence of discrimination, these two findings were important in the court's ratifying the consent degree.
I wondered if those facts could be explained by the fact that African American farms in the rural south were much smaller than those owned by whites.
You have confirmed that this was the right question.
I live in the part of SC that was part of Sherman's "Special Field Order" setting aside a reserve for African Americans. Eventually this lead to the 40 acres and a mule concept that never really flew either. But the result still was a considerable number of places owned by African Americans for generations.
I would not trade places with most of these black farmers. They have relatively small holdings, inadequate equipment and capital and labor is farm hard to find.
But to say that their problems are a result of USDA discrimination from 1982-96 is quite another thing. Still, a court found for this class. They had their day.
Now another billion plus dollars.
If we are to have reparations, have them. But this is a strange way to do it.
Maybe I am missing something.
Someone tell me what--without calling me a bigot, please.
Also, if you are or become a member of the Pigford class, you can't be foreclosed.
Congress did that in 2008.
Bush signed that law.
David why are you asking these silly questions? Nobody cares about all the billions they want to pay out in reperations under the radar.
Now if you have any questions about Sarah Palins vagina we will be good for another 200 comment thread.
Pigford is just another one of the crooked deals that these crooks deal out each and every day. They just don't want to shine a light on it because normal everyday Americans might start to ask questions. So they have to shut this down quick. Mrs. Sherrod is going to get paid even more for her "pain and suffering" but mostly to go away so they can get back to the important business.
Spending our fucking money on bullshit.
Not going to beat this to death this time; I will only ask once and drop it: Where in the video -- minute:second reference -- did the crowd "cheer" a comment about her attitude toward the "Other"?
Rich, enough with this red herring. Take it up with the NAACP:
"The reaction from many in the audience is disturbing. We will be looking into the behavior of NAACP representatives at this local event and take any appropriate action."
"Remember 'niggardly', and what happened to that poor sod?"
I do! A guy on mayor of DC's staff used the word "niggardly", there was a mild controversy, and that guy resigned.
Then people were like, "That's a bunch of bullshit!"
And the mayor that the guy worked agreed and he offered him his old job back. The guy rejected the offer, and then the mayor offered him a better job.
Or are you talking about that one that happened at that college (was it the University of Wisconsin?), where a professor used the word "niggardly" and then... well... nothing happened.
She wasn't working for the government at the time.
Thanks for the insight, Garage. And I'm sure her "non-profit" agency wasn't receiving federal funding accompanied by a non- discrimination mandate. LOL
I can't believe nobody seems to be picking up on the sheer genius morsel from Bretbart: That the two 80 yr olds telling us Sherrod helped saved their farm, and our lifelong friends, might actually be liberal plants.
Sherrod did the right thing in 1986 when she was tempted to do less. That is all that happened here. The daily grind of interractions puts us into contact with three common types: the ones with no power to help us 1) and the ones with power to help us but no will to do so 2) and the ones who have power to help us and freely give us that help. Sherrod's speech recounts her decision to be a #3 despite of Black/White dividing walls. That is about all we can hope for in this world folks. Idealists demand to live in a world surrounded by pure people never even tempted to be a #2. Let me know where it is when you find it.
It would have been good, Hombre, if Ann could have acknowledged that technically Shirley Sherrod was not working for the USDA. She leaves the impression that she was working there. I'm not saying that the nonprofit exonerates her of any and all wrong-doing, but if she could have been more specific, we could have been spared all this text.
A couple followups: I don't know for sure, but I doubt that President Reagan would have approved any money for the Federation of Southern Cooperatives.
As for Pigford, again I don't know but it appears the award must have been under Track B of Pigford I, which is the individualized determination. Although I've some problems with Pigford, Track B seems the best justified. And while I don't know how awards are computed, 6,000 acres of Georgia farmland would be worth more than the reported award.
Race is so strange. Is racism ever understandable to the point where we don't need to hate someone for it. If your family is killed by people of another race for racial reasons, is your discrimination against them understandable, forgivable?
If they were killed by Communists or Nazis, would we accept and forgive a person for an unfair fear and hatred toward those groups?
Methadras said...
Bigotry and racism from a black woman who acting as an agent the capacity as a qausi government official, towards a white man who is/was a farmer looking for help and her department has an epiphany on her bigotry and racism and somewhat changes her tune. If you looked at the video and listened to her language, you would and could clearly see that when she referenced helping this man, who is white, by sending him 'to his own kind' and not getting the help 'from his own kind' presented her with the quandary of who is the greater victim not based on color, but on socio-economics. Anyone seeing the deeper problem with this?
As far as the larger issue goes, Breitbart shit the bed on this one. He either maliciously edited a video clip to smear Shirley Sherrod or he let himself be used by someone who maliciously edited it.
And lots of people got taken for a ride.
As a great man once said:
"Trust, but verify."
I like how, after like a decade of attacking the Left for its tactic of defending its lies and smears as "fake but accurate", the Right is doing the same in this case.
AC 245 said:
"Rich, enough with this red herring. Take it up with the NAACP...."
I do not agree that the accuracy of descriptions of what the video depicts, when the response of the crowd as depicted on the video is supposed to be the whole point, is a red herring.
I think the NAACP comment you quote is misguided.
But you will be pleased to know I am dropping it, as I said I would. If you want to base an entire discussion on an incorrect understanding of what the video actually depicts, go ahead.
Enjoy your outrage at the "cheers."
Jason (the commenter) said...
David: Let's ask--who looks worst here, Sherrod, Obama, Vilsack or Jealous?
Surely not Shirley.
"At least she's not as bad as Obama."
Is that what you're trying to say?
Jason--
I'm saying that people who fire other people without checking the facts are idiots. So Vilsack is clearly an idiot. And a wimp. He was so terrified he had to get rid or her without knowing what he was doing.
So Vilsack is worst.
Jealous is second worst for issuing his panicked press release at midnight before checking the facts. He's second to Vilsack because he did not fire her.
Holder is third. On general principles and also because he is--along with Obama--behind reopening the Pigford case.
Obama is fourth worst. He gets points for keeping personally distant from it and letting his minions do the dirty work and the apologizing. But remember: Sherrod said she had been fired by the White House. Smart Lady. She knows where the buck stops.
Youngblood--
You are right about Breibart.
In the old days, when men wore hats, it was "he crapped in his hat."
TradGuy, thank you for being an honest conservative. Many on the left and right could learn from you. Including Ann Althouse.
traditionalguy: Sherrod did the right thing in 1986 when she was tempted to do less. That is all that happened here.
She did less than what she could have because of the color of a farmer's skin. A farmer who came to her asking for help. It was months later, when he happened to contact her again, that she tried to make amends for her previous injustice. Did she pay the farmer's wasted lawyer fees, or compensate him for his months of needless worrying? No. She just finally did her job. And she doesn't sound remorseful for it either.
Her story still doesn't wash.
As a child, she suffered hard core racism at the hands of whites that she uses to justify her own racism, and we're to believe that one day BAMN! she had an epiphany that turned her around 180 degrees?
If the farmer had saved her from drowning, maybe then. And what was the life-altering catalyst that transformed her to a non-racist? The fact that the white lawyer she sent the farmers too was incompetent?
I think sympathy for Sherrod is clouding judegment. There's still more to this than we're being told.
I do, however, absolutely condemn her comments about rich against poor. I also condemn her encouragement for others to join on the government teat.
I've said my piece (or is it "peace") on the racism aspects but I'm glad we've mentioned the class warrior and "Republican's are racists" attitudes demonstrated in the speech.
I will give Ms. Sherrod much less slack on those accounts. And it was in those aspects that I saw the nexus between this affair and the jornolist affair.
I have no compunction with correcting a conservative friend if they claim President Obama is a "muslim" or a "communist" etc. I sure hope those to the left of center are equally vocal in squashing the contention that Republicans are "racist" etc.
(Garage, HD.......hmmmm?)
" Is racism ever understandable to the point where we don't need to hate someone for it."
Dr. King was trying to separate the racism from the racist.
That did not work out well for him in Memphis, or for the country.
I think it depends on the overt acts. I will shun a racist, or denounce him. I will try not to hate him. But that's easy for a white person to say, as in this country we have not been on the receiving end of racism very much. We get pretty indignant when we are.
This summer I read and reread Primo Levi quiet a bit. Some other Holocaust survivors called him "The Forgiver." That was not true, but he tried not to hate. He ended up a suicide, brilliant and thoughtful man that he was.
I also discovered through Levi and read the memoir of Hoess, the commandant of Auschwitz 1940-43. He was ordered to write a memoir by the allies, and he was very good at following orders.
He did not seem to hate Jews in any active, visceral way. He was in some ways a thoughtful and literate man. None of this prevented Hoess from exterminating Jews by the hundreds of thousands. He was sometimes very directly involved, at the chambers and the ovens.
I do not have an answer to your question. I do know that it stuns me when people casually throw around the epithet racist.
I do not recommend the Hoess book. It made me literally depressed for weeks. Do not read it. Levi deserves any time you can spare.
David,
It's unfortunate, too. I'll admit that, before this, I really liked Breitbart for both his tactics and his theatricality.
As much as I'd really like to believe that the guy was duped, I can't discount the possibility that he was race baiting. Especially now that he's claiming his intent was to highlight the audience reaction, and that the white farmers who have spoke on Sherrod's behalf are liberal plants.
The Left pulled that shit all during the Bush years. They maliciously twisted the facts, and when called on it, they handed out talking points like candy.
It really sucks to see the Right doing the same thing here.
Yeah I felt really bad for Angelica Houston at the end of that movie too!
Sherrod did the right thing in 1986 when she was tempted to do less. That is all that happened here.
You sound like the Elizabeth Edwards of the world. You think its the first time he's cheated on you.
Breitbart shit the bed on this one. He either maliciously edited a video clip to smear Shirley Sherrod or he let himself be used by someone who maliciously edited it.
How were the edits malicious? The context of "i was wrong to be a racist" is preserved in the Breitbart clip.
And why do believe it was intended to "smear" Sherrod? The target was the NAACP, not Sherrod.
Its interesting that some will take Sherrod at her word, but not Breitbart. Is he the wrong skin color?
And lots of people got taken for a ride.
Looks like some never got off the ride...
Trooper calls it "the racial grievance industry."
Not a path to reconciliation, is it?
It was bad enough when people were fooled by an edited video, but if you continue after learning the truth, that's no longer just getting fooled. You are putting on the uniform and marching in the parade.
It's disappointing when conservatives adopt rules for radicals. You either have better values or you don't. A lot of this picking at the wound is a silly attempt to avoid admitting the obvious.
Breitbart's goal could be easily accomplished, but for whatever reason he picked the wrong evidence and witness to present his case. There is no fixing that.
David it's just like the abortion industry.
Nobody wants to call it by it's right name.
@sixtygrit...
and you were off burning crosses where?
Trooper--I don't think the Breibart edits were malicious. But my thought was "is this all he has?"
Shirley is now A Hero of the Left.
Will they really put her in charge of Pigford?
I think that would be a mistake.
But I also thought they were trying to hide Pigford. Maybe they want to flaunt it?
Maybe Pigford is too complicated or just too much business as usual for people to get upset about.
now that he's claiming ...that the white farmers who have spoke on Sherrod's behalf are liberal plants.
Here's the actual quote:
"You tell me as a reporter how CNN put on a person today who purported to be the farmer’s wife?
What did you do to find out whether or not that was the actual farmer’s wife?
I mean, if you’re going to accuse me of a falsehood, tell me where you’ve confirmed that had this incident happened 24 years ago. [...] "
Where's the beef? Because you sound like a moby.
HDHouse said...
"@sixtygrit...
and you were off burning crosses where?"
HD, that's disgusting. To play the race card, you have to earn it a little bit. Your weekends in school don't count.
David, they got caught in the switchs. They made two visits to the mound in the same inning by mistake and they have to take the pitcher out. They Don Mattinglyied it.
Hey I created a new word. Cool.
Of course it is business as usual in Barack Obama's America. Another billion dollar deal that flys under the radar with mininal discussion. Just like the payoffs we are going to see from BP in the Gulf. Follow the money.
Oh wait a minute. Mel Gibson made another phone call. Never mind.
Trooper, I was shocked when I heard young women calling aborted fetuses "blobs." Or something like that. You are right. It's a grievance industry. Which makes it all the more corrupt, because there are still real grievances, like our urban education systems.
Troop my point was I'm out of touch. Blobs!
You’re going off of her word that the farmer’s wife is the farmer’s wife?
Hang in there Champ. LOL.
Off to dinner.
This is a depressing thread.
Post racial America my ass.
Yeah me too. That garage always brings me down.
Thank you Bagoh20 for your comments. Too much of this shit happens on both the Left and the Right.
I was actually hoping that Althouse would take the high road on this one. I am bummed to be disappointed.
It was the LOL wasn't it. Sorry buddy/
Well Libtard, provide the quote where Breitbart claims the farmers are "liberal plants". Because all I see is him asking CNN to provide evidence they confirmed Sherrod's story.
I agree with those who think Brietbart's mistake was an honest one. It's embarassing, but nowhere near the level of 'fake but accurate'.
Similar to what I said in the previous thread, Ms. Sherrod's epiphany was not, contrary to the Lefties and a few misguided souls on the Right, that all men are brothers. She merely switched her hatred for "The Man" from Whitey to J Wellington Gotrocks III, like so many of our regular small c communists.
I was unaware of the Ayers connection, but it certainly explains a lot.
If the Spooners weren't actually the Spooners, who are they besides plants? If the story was never about Sherrod, why in the hell did he ask if the Spooners were really the Spooners in the first place?
The only thing that matters id that the audience was laughing about it, while calling the tea party racists. Its not about her.
To be clear, this was 24 years ago and she wasn't a government official at that time, correct? Working for a non-profit agency isn't the same as being a government official.
If the story was never about Sherrod, why in the hell did he ask if the Spooners were really the Spooners in the first place?
Maybe it was Lysander Spooner! Has anyone seen him around lately?
SteveR please give the time point in the video were the "audience was laughing about it". It did not happen.
At some point the truth has to be the basis of this conversation.
I agree with Garage's earlier comment [gag] that she wasn't working for the government when she discriminated against the farmer.
Still, that hardly makes her Mother Theresa.
"It's good that she changed her attitude, but the role of a government official making decisions about people's lives is not to experience personal transformations and revelations."
What part of "This is the NewAge" doesn't anyone understand?
"It is sad that Ann Althouse yesterday was so quick to hold Andrew "William Zanzinger" Breitbart coat while he took aim with his cane."
Really?
I figured that the "under the bus" comment indicated some sympathy.
And didn't even Breitbart mention the redemptive element of what she said that was overshadowed by what seemed to be the approval of the audience?
Instapundit today:
IT JUST GETS BETTER: Breaking: NAACP President Was In Attendance at Sherrod Speech!
UPDATE: Tom Maguire emails that it may have been the state NAACP President, not national NAACP President Ben Jealous. Well, stay tuned.
Well, okay then! Maybe we should just stay tuned to your updates.
"How were the edits malicious? The context of 'i was wrong to be a racist' is preserved in the Breitbart clip."
This is from the beginning of the clip:
On July 25, 2009 Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack appointed Shirley Sherrod as Georgia Director of Rural Development.
USDA Rural Development spends over $1.2 Billion in the State of Georgia each year.
On March 27, 2010, while speaking at the NAACP Freedom Fund Banquet, Ms. Sherrod admits that in her federally appointed position, overseeing a billion dollars, she discriminates against people due to their race.
This is a bald-faced motherfucking lie.
"And why do believe it was intended to 'smear' Sherrod? The target was the NAACP, not Sherrod."
Because Breitbart said as much in the article in which he dropped his bomb:
"We are in possession of a video from in which Shirley Sherrod, USDA Georgia Director of Rural Development, speaks at the NAACP Freedom Fund dinner in Georgia. In her meandering speech to what appears to be an all-black audience, this federally appointed executive bureaucrat lays out in stark detail, that her federal duties are managed through the prism of race and class distinctions."
Here he clearly reinforces the bullshit claim made in the video.
"Its interesting that some will take Sherrod at her word, but not Breitbart. Is he the wrong skin color?"
Wait, what?
Breitbart's video contains a huge fucking lie, and that is that Ms. Sherrod is admitting to discriminating (present tense) on the basis of race at her job the USDA.
In his introduction to the video, Breitbart reinforced that lie. It's right there in his own words!
"Looks like some never got off the ride..."
Damn straight. You're still spinning away on the Tilt-A-Whirl.
My read on the alleged discrimination. Mrs. Sherrod is approached for help by the white farmer, Mr. Spooner. Her back is up becasue she had seen so many black farmers financially ruined and worse by white people. She struggles and decides (I'm paraphrasing) not to provide the farmer with the full force of what she could do, but to do "enough" (her word). Apparently she did, because the farmer raves about all that she did to help. So at the decision point during the first meeting she decides to do enough, but not to break her back. Is that discrimination, maybe. Racism, not even close in my book given the facts and history as I understand them.
Youngblood's comment is one worth looking at. Does Ms. Sherrod still live in Georgia? Because it looks like that state still has the old tort of false light as part of its state law. That might be something she'd want to look into. She may not win the case (no one can predict that), but she might be able to survive summary judgment on that claim.
Bill Harshaw said...
"As she tells it, she sent him to a lawyer. What she failed to do immediately was to ensure the white lawyer was a good one."
And how, pray tell, are you supposed to do that? When it emerged that the white lawyer wasn't going to do anything to help his client she went into emergency mode and got him a black one who saved his farm.
Commenters on this site seem to be trying to cover their ass. Either that or there is a lot more latent hostility -- whether racial, partisan, or both it is hard to tell -- than there ought to be among Ann Althouse's fans.
I think Ann is wrong too. The woman did not discriminate in any meaningful sense of the word, even though she said she was tempted to.
Really, Ann, you need to reconsider. You are basically saying she committed a thought crime when really she was revealing the intimate details of her personal story, decades ago in a racist county in rural Georgia where, apparently, her father was murdered and her family was threatened by cross-burning bigots.
Old Dad,
You've just described Chapter 1 of that story. A white farmer comes to her, looking down on her, and she does just enough to help him to fulfill her minimum requirements in her position.
Did you happen to get to Chapter 2?
That's when it was revealed to me that, ya'll, it's about poor versus those who have, and not so much about white -- it is about white and black, but it's not -- you know, it opened my eyes, 'cause I took him to one of his own and I put him in his hand, and felt okay, I've done my job. But, during that time we would have these injunctions against the Department of Agriculture and -- so, they couldn't foreclose on him. And I want you to know that the county supervisor had done something to him that I have not seen yet that they've done to any other farmer, black or white. And what they did to him caused him to not be able to file Chapter 12 bankruptcy.
So, everything was going along fine -- I'm thinking he's being taken care of by the white lawyer and then they lifted the injunction against USDA in May of '87 for two weeks and he was one of 13 farmers in Georgia who received a foreclosure notice. He called me. I said, "Well, go on and make an appointment at the lawyer. Let me know when it is and I'll meet you there."
So we met at the lawyer's office on -- on the day they had given him. And this lawyer sat there -- he had been paying this lawyer, y'all. That's what got me. He had been paying the lawyer since November, and this was May. And the lawyer sat there and looked at him and said, "Well, y'all are getting old. Why don't you just let the farm go?" I could not believe he said that, so I said to the lawyer -- I told him, "I can't believe you said that." I said, "It's obvious to me if he cannot file a Chapter 12 bankruptcy to -- to stop this foreclose, you have to file an 11. And the lawyer said to me, "I'll do whatever you say" -- "whatever you think" -- that's the way he put it. But he's paying him. He wasn't paying me any money, you know. So he said -- the lawyer said he would work on it.
And then, about seven days before that man would have been sold at the courthouse steps, the farmer called me and said the lawyer wasn't doing anything. And that's when I spent time there in my office calling everybody I could think of to try to see -- help me find the lawyer who would handle this. And finally, I remembered that I had gone to see one just 40 miles away in Americus with the black farmers. So, I --
(There's an interruption in the video and audio here, but it's clear from the context that she went and found a lawyer who could better serve this white farmer.)
Well, working with him made me see that it's really about those who have versus those who don't, you know. And they could be black; they could be white; they could be Hispanic. And it made me realize then that I needed to work to help poor people -- those who don't have access the way others have.
Is it really necessary for this woman to be either a racist or a perfected angel of colorblindness? Can't she be like the rest of us somewhere in the middle. Everybody sometimes thinks in racial terms, it's not the end of the world, requiring a burning at the stake.
This is how we are imperfect, but trying to rise above it. She simply admitted her struggle publicly. I doubt that if my father was murdered by a bunch of racists that I would get over it as well.
This goes for how we handle our responsibilities too. We don't always do it with perfect colorblindness. You may not admit it, or you may not realize it, but the chance that you are perfect in this regard is as slim as the chances that the NAACP never has a racist speech, but this wasn't one of them.
Breibart was careless. He assumed that she was talking about her now job, not 24 years ago.
Being careful and precise is crucial for someone like Breibart. He blew it.
The elections are 40 weeks from now, and the President's political guys just showed the respect the Obama guys hold for their own loyal soldiers by firing one instanter instead of wasting any political capital in a rescue operation for her. Breitbart won this storyline exchange big time.
Seriously, people, if you actually listen to her speech, it's not what Breitbart spoonfed you, and it's not what dipshits are claiming today, which is that she only helped the farmer minimally by sending him to one of his "own kind".
She realized her mistake, visited that lawyer with the farmer, discovered that the lawyer wasn't doing right by the white farmer, and then she busted her ass to help him keep his farm, finally finding him a lawyer she respected and who did good work.
I have no doubt that if I met Sherrod, she and I would have some heated political and philosophical arguments.
But I'm not going to stand by while people continue to flat out lie about what she said.
It's fucking wrong when Lefties lie or distort the truth to call people on the Right racists, and it's just as wrong when Righties do the same in the other direction.
bagoh20 said...
Is it really necessary for this woman to be either a racist or a perfected angel of colorblindness? Can't she be like the rest of us somewhere in the middle. Everybody sometimes thinks in racial terms, it's not the end of the world, requiring a burning at the stake.
Amen! Praise Be! You betcha! Right on, bro!
The woman did not discriminate in any meaningful sense of the word, even though she said she was tempted to.
Bullshit. She admits she didn't help the farmer because he was white.
And I'm still asking: what was the catalyst that turned a life-long racist around? Her story doesn't add up.
Racism, not even close in my book given the facts and history as I understand them.
The amount of help she gave farmers was dependent on their skin color.
Whats next? A blowjob is not sex?
Fen wrote:
"Because you sound like a moby."
You're the one who's spinning and lying to the point that you look like an absurd Liberal caricature of a lying scumbag Wingnut.
He who fights with Mobys should look to it that he himself does not become a Moby.
And when you gaze long enough into the partisan spin machine, the partisan spin machine also gazes into you.
After watching the video a few minutes before and after the edited portion, it clearly does NOT contain any evidence of racism, by anybody.
It does make someone look bad - a certain white lawyer. I wonder if he is out there somewhere, the slacker SOB.
Ann, how hard can it possibly be to check your post to make sure you get even the most basic facts of the case correct? As Bill Harshaw (and countless others who have written about this) points out, Sherrod was relating an anecdote that occurred in 1986. Sherrod, as you can probably guess, was not employed by the USDA during the Reagan administration. She was not a public servant. She was not acting as a government official, and her actions were not an abuse of governmental power.
You may dismiss these points as technicalities, as you do the points that Sherrod actually helped the couple and that they have been lifelong friends since, but they reveal your sloppiness and carelessness with the facts when they do not fit your political agenda (see: everything you have written in the past month trying to convince yourself that Ezra Klein is plotting world domination via a listserv). Between yourself, Glenn Reynolds, and William Jacobson, I'm left to wonder how low the standard is to become a law professor at a major institution.
These are basic facts. They are not difficult to check. I know that your time is valuable, but perhaps in the future you can spend a little less of your time taking pictures of flowers and cafes and a little more time making sure you are presenting the basic facts of your posts accurately.
Fen wrote:
"Bullshit. She admits she didn't help the farmer because he was white."
That's a bald-faced lie.
She said that she gave the farmer the minimum amount of help that she was required to. And then she said that when the situation came to her attention later, she realized what she did was wrong, and she busted her ass to help the farmer.
Fen wrote:
"And I'm still asking: what was the catalyst that turned a life-long racist around? Her story doesn't add up."
Oh, I forgot this part when responding:
The catalyst was when that farmer contacted her, and she went with him to meet the lawyer she'd sent him to, and she realized that the lawyer wasn't doing right by the farmer.
That was when she realized that she was wrong, and she worked to correct it.
There's no need to call Scooby Doo and the Mystery Machine Crew here.
@sixtygrit..
I'm not sure but I think it is Sarah running for village idiot and breitbart is running the campaign.
film at 11.
AM Daly: You might try reading the Althouse post again. She makes it clear the woman did not work for the USDA. She makes it clear she worked for a nonprofit, she makes it clear that she doesn't know what, if any, obligations for racial fairness were required of the non profit position. How can you have come to the conclusion you have without troubling to read what you presume to correct?
Bullshit Michael. Ann Althouse added that after being called out on it.
"I'm not sure but I think it is Sarah running for village idiot and breitbart is running the campaign."
So the term limits finally got you. She is gonna have some big shoes to fill. Thanks for your service all these years.
@Phil at 4:24pm -
I live right near where Althouse grew up and I can promise you she was not born into luxury and privilege. She lived in a working class neighborhood of tract houses. Not that it would make any difference, but I thought I would set the record straight and eliminate any shred of credibility your personal attack might contain.
"She lived in a working class neighborhood of tract houses."
Her hotness is again enhanced.
No offense, Meade.
Umm, no, Mr. Trooper person, Sherrod has not been paid her $13M yet. The $1+ billion appropriated for the Pigford claimants is contained in the latest "war/stimulus" bill that the House approved and is pending in the Senate.
Problem is, the bill in its current form takes $800M away from Obama's "Race to the Top" school program. So he's threatening to veto the very legislation that would get Ms. Sherrod paid.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20100715/pl_nm/us_usa_states_education
Awkward.
Sixty grit...The secret elections for the Illuminati....sorry wrong MemberList. I meant 14 weeks.
Sorry to harp on this, but even this "FULL" video has been edited. Haven't we learned that we can't fill in what we think is there without seeing what is really there? At the edit point, she was saying something about black lawyers when her words changed abruptly and she morphed into another stance in front of the crowd.
I too love that Sherrod brings God into her life story. I also love that but for the Second Amendment, her family may have been hurt more than having a burning cross in their yard. Because her mother and their neighbors had guns, they were able to chase away those that threatened them (and because of the particular law enforcement in that county, they probably never would have been protected from them).
On another note, Sherrod never mentioned the white farmer by name in her speech, so how did it come out that the Spooners were the people she was actually talking about?
@AM Daly, Just as a thread is converging on some semblance of reasonability, you leave this stinking fart of a comment:
"Sherrod, as you can probably guess, was not employed by the USDA during the Reagan administration."
Are you-- the grand demanded of complete factual accuracy--claiming that no blacks were employed by the USDA under Reagan? Are you insinuating that the Reagan administration engaged in bigoted hiring practices? Are you so detached from reality that you actually think that the top level of any president's administration pays any attention at all to who gets hired into mid-level jobs at the USDA?
That's a lot of stupid to pack into a single sentence. Good work.
The notion that the phrase "one of your own" is something awful is a major stretch. It's a commonplace phrase in the south, and can mean family, race, football team, fraternity, etc. It's any natural or passionate attraction to a group. I understand that the Race Police would jump on a white person who said something similar in a a similar content, but do we need more Race Police?
There's no high ground here. They all look bad. NAACP, Obama, Vilsack, Breibart, etc. Sherrod too, once she began to bring the tea party and Fox News into it. The Administration cowered in one direction, and now it's cowering in another. Breibart was wrong on some important facts in his own narrative and has not corrected it.
There is a real issue here, and it's the Pigford case. There is, as Trooper said, a Grievance Industry. It's big business, and I think it's bread and circuses to a large degree. Pigford is paying about $37,500 net of tax to about 65,000 different people, if they can show that they actually sought a USDA loan. It's a completed case, a done deal. You may not like it but it's done.
Now Obama-Vilsack-Holder want to increase the total from $100 million to $1.25 billion (or so.) There has been no change in law or facts. Can not be compelled to do this--the time for that is long gone. They just want to, because they can.
This kind of thing is repeated over and over again, usually not involving discrimination claims or race or lawsuits. They just spend it because it brings political advantage. Republicans do it too.
If you wonder why people are mad, why the tea party has some appeal, this is why.
If you wonder why Obama has made race matters worse, it's because he encourages and permits his supporters to use race as a way to discredit his opponents. He could lead us in the other direction. He hasn't and from all evidence he won't.
The notion that the phrase "one of your own" is something awful is a major stretch. It's a commonplace phrase in the south, and can mean family, race, football team, fraternity, etc. It's any natural or passionate attraction to a group. I understand that the Race Police would jump on a white person who said something similar in a a similar content, but do we need more Race Police?
There's no high ground here. They all look bad. NAACP, Obama, Vilsack, Breibart, etc. Sherrod too, once she began to bring the tea party and Fox News into it. The Administration cowered in one direction, and now it's cowering in another. Breibart was wrong on some important facts in his own narrative and has not corrected it.
There is a real issue here, and it's the Pigford case. There is, as Trooper said, a Grievance Industry. It's big business, and I think it's bread and circuses to a large degree. Pigford is paying about $37,500 net of tax to about 65,000 different people, if they can show that they actually sought a USDA loan. It's a completed case, a done deal. You may not like it but it's done.
Now Obama-Vilsack-Holder want to increase the total from $100 million to $1.25 billion (or so.) There has been no change in law or facts. Can not be compelled to do this--the time for that is long gone. They just want to, because they can.
This kind of thing is repeated over and over again, usually not involving discrimination claims or race or lawsuits. They just spend it because it brings political advantage. Republicans do it too.
If you wonder why people are mad, why the tea party has some appeal, this is why.
If you wonder why Obama has made race matters worse, it's because he encourages and permits his supporters to use race as a way to discredit his opponents. He could lead us in the other direction. He hasn't and from all evidence he won't.
Two things, althouse. As of today, that cooperative is a 503(c) charity. if it was back then, that means she had a legal obligation to avoid discrimination or else they would lose their tax exempt status. See the Bob Jones University case.
Second, it seems she did make up for her discriminatory act, but her bit about him being better served by "his kind" is racist.
I don't think she deserves her job back. she isn't the point of this story, but i don't want an unreconstructed bigot in government work.
Of course i said that about sotomayor, too.
"Two things, althouse. As of today, that cooperative is a 503(c) charity. if it was back then, that means she had a legal obligation to avoid discrimination or else they would lose their tax exempt status. See the Bob Jones University case."
She covered this when she said that she gave him the bare minimum of help that the law required.
"Second, it seems she did make up for her discriminatory act, but her bit about him being better served by 'his kind' is racist."
It is absolutely racist! That was Ms. Sherrod's whole point.
Then, when the case came to her attention again, she discovered that her belief that the farmer would be better served by his kind was incorrect.
She found out that the white lawyer that she sent him do wasn't doing right by his client!
"I don't think she deserves her job back. she isn't the point of this story, but i don't want an unreconstructed bigot in government work."
She's not an "unreconstructed bigot".
That's the whole point...
She was telling the story of her reconstruction!
The facsinating part of this story is the sliver of light shined upon the reparations money pits that government agencies have become.
White liberals will continue to be the enablers of this taxpayer ripoff, and the black race hustlers will continue to pretend that "real" reparations have yet to begin.
Then, when the case came to her attention again, she discovered that her belief that the farmer would be better served by his kind was incorrect.
She found out that the white lawyer that she sent him do wasn't doing right by his client!
So you believe, after enduring a youth filled with overt violent racism from whites, the catalyst for her complete overnight reformation was... whitey wasn't helping the whitey she pawned off on him.
Really?
I have a bridge for sale. Interested?
Young
> She covered this when she said that she gave him the bare minimum of help that the law required.
Lol, if the law requires non-discrimination the “bare minimum” is what you would do for a person of any other race, you nitwit. She did enough to keep out of trouble.
She did discriminate at first. She admitted to that. then she came back and apparently fixed it.
> That was Ms. Sherrod's whole point.
She didn’t repudiate that attitude. She didn’t even address it.
She just decided that she should help people who are not “her kind.” And only if they were poor. It’s a racist attitude.
Paddy O at 4:35: Well played, sir, well played.
Doug Wright at 4:53: Please don't waste time on TR. He's a Moby -- a liberal posing as a racist conservative, and revealing his own ugly streak of racism in the process.
Bart Hall at 5:04: Holy shit, my Obama Post-apocalypse Garden might qualify as a farm! Where do I sign up for those payments for not growing soybeans?
"phil" and "Rich", about 50 times each: Maybe if you two keep posting it over and over, it will become true that the NAACP crowd didn't make approving noises when Sherrod regaled them with her tales of sticking it to the white farmer. I'm going to miss you two when this topic is no longer being discussed here -- it seems to be a specialty of the two of you. Maybe you're filling in for AlphaLiberal while he's on vacation.
Ugly all around.
wv "droption" or is it "dr option"?
I'm exercising my droption.
"but the role of a government official making decisions about people's lives is not to experience personal transformations and revelations".
But wait: I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life.
To Adam, who interpreted from my comment that I "Are you-- the grand demanded of complete factual accuracy--claiming that no blacks were employed by the USDA under Reagan? Are you insinuating that the Reagan administration engaged in bigoted hiring practices?" you missed my point by quite a wide margin. Nowhere in my post did I insinuate racism on behalf of the Reagan administration. My point was that she was relaying a story that occurred 24 years ago - that's four presidential administrations ago. My point was that Sherrod was not employed by the United States Department of Agriculture when the anecdote took place, as Althouse neglected to mention in her original post. Her update, after several comments pointed out her mistake, corrected this, but my point was that Shirley Sherrod was NOT a USDA employee at the time. Althouse's original post implied that she used a governmental position to discriminate against white farmers, which was inaccurate and deceitful. Any other subtext you may have extrapolated from my post has no relation to my intention.
A.W.
She's a hero.
"She didn’t repudiate that attitude. She didn’t even address it."
Are you insane?
I am generally one to resist making character assessments based on this or that isolated opinion however distasteful. We all have our moments as it were.
I must say though that
Althouse's post is so frigidly ungenerous; so crassly opporunistictic; so disregarding of the magnitude Sherrod's experiences against the utter lack of anything remotely comparable in her own; and so clearly intended as sneering, self-elevating schoolmarm reprove as to call her character - hell, her basic decency - into serious question.
I have no doubt whatsoever that Ann Althouse not only would not but could not engage in anything like Sherrod's humble self-reflection to say nothing of brave self-correction. To sit behind a desk and taking advantage of a large audience slice in this 'but she's not perfect' way at someone who not only can but has been within mere days severely and unfairly punished for the effort speaks to a rather incredible ugliness of spirit, a spiteful glee in trying to harm others simply because you can.
What pitiable behavior for a grown woman.
Gregory Griffith
Gregory, another Libtard out of nowhere, who thinks racism is no biggie when its from his side.
Hi Libtard. Welcome.
Phil, maybe you need to listen again, because Ben Jealous and I agree with Breitbart about what the audience was doing.
Youngblood said...
As far as the larger issue goes, Breitbart shit the bed on this one. He either maliciously edited a video clip to smear Shirley Sherrod or he let himself be used by someone who maliciously edited it.
And lots of people got taken for a ride.
As a great man once said:
"Trust, but verify."
I like how, after like a decade of attacking the Left for its tactic of defending its lies and smears as "fake but accurate", the Right is doing the same in this case.
Yup, Breitbart did fuck this up with that horrible editing or accepting this video with that type of editing. He stupidly stepped in it and I wouldn't be surprised to find out that he got this video from a leftard plant.
I'll try to make this as brief as I can. I'll answer any other questions.
My grandmother applied for and received an Indian allotment of land on the White Earth Indian Reservation (MN). In 1915 she lost her land. She was 17 years old.
The White Earth Land Settlement Act (WELSA) was passed in 1986. My grandmother was under age when she lost her land, thus she qualified for the settlement.
All claims went through a probate process. All names of recipients were published in the Federal Register. They were also published in the St. Paul Pioneer Press and Dispatch on Oct. 19, 1986.
She had two children my father and a daughter. My grandmother died in 1969, so the money was to go to her children. My aunt died about 1955 and had one child. My father died in 1985 and had three children. So myself, my brother and sister each received 1/3 of 1/2% of the award. My aunt's son was never located so the tribe kept the other 1/2.
As far as the allotment of land, let me say this, back then there also was the Minnesota Homestead Act, where you could apply for 160 acres and after you developed it, you got a title for the land. That's the reason why my great, great grandparents left Canada and settled in MN.
Pigford.
There doesn't seem to be the same due diligence with this settlement. What started out as 2,000 farmers who may have been discriminated against, has turned into 13,348 people getting $50,000, and another 70,000 petitioners who filed late and were not allowed to proceed. You just wait, they'll get their money too. Mr. and Mrs. Sherrod each received $150,000 for pain and suffering says it all. This is a money grab, and there'll be no stopping it.
AJ Lynch said...
Amer Girl:
Did you get that word "defunked" from Sarah Palin? Cause it works for me!
LOL! No, I didn't even realize I wrote that. typo! Although, I like it! Refudiated, Defunked!
Another thing about Pigford was this everyone got the same amount of money settlement unless you went Track B and very few did. Surely, all the claimants didn't have the same loan requests and the same amount of farm land.
Looking at my grandmothers compensation, she had 160 acres. The settlement was based on the worth of the cultivated, upland timber, lake and marsh acres. All of different value.
Pigford is a money free for all.
The notion that the phrase "one of your own" is something awful is a major stretch. It's a commonplace phrase in the south, and can mean family, race, football team, fraternity, etc. It's any natural or passionate attraction to a group.
I'm sorry, but this is simply not true. I'm a Southern transplant (moved from NJ to GA, then TN in my childhood), so I find myself to be pretty sensitive to "southernisms" (as they were at one time foreign to me). Own kind is used in the sense that "You have your kind, and I have mine, and your kind does not belong with my kind." In the racial context (which is the normal context for that phrase), it is the same as starting a sentence with "I'm not racist, but . . ."- it means that the person may proclaim that there is nothing *wrong* with the other group, but they do not belong in the speaker's life. It is absolutely racist.
And now I have "A Boy Like That" (The song from West Side Story where Anita advises Maria to "stick to your own kind") stuck in my head.
- Lyssa
"That's a beautiful idea. It is impressive that she resisted hate, but a public servant has a duty not to discriminate based on race, whatever her personal background is and whether God revealed something to her or not."
A rigidity most unbecoming to you, Ann. This was the first time Sherrod helped a white farmer. She started off wrong, saw her error, and corrected it. How much more can we reasonably expect from human beings? Your standard of perfection in this instance just baffles me.
The woman spoke plainly, clearly, telling her story of personal change in an area that is tough for most, including Mr.and Mrs. Obama. Her audience was perfect for such a soul baring story of change.
Her story is simple, magnificent, certainly not unusual, her bravery long overdue in general.
The point has been missed.
What a surprise the media had the most to do with -that-. No surprise the pajamas media told the *whole* story.
A rigidity most unbecoming to you, Ann. This was the first time Sherrod helped a white farmer. She started off wrong, saw her error, and corrected it. How much more can we reasonably expect from human beings? Your standard of perfection in this instance just baffles me.
Elizabeth Edwards: I forgive you John. You started off wrong, saw your error, and corrected it. And I'm sutpid enough to beleive this is the first and only time you've ever done it.
John: Thats sweet dear. Gotta run, have an 11pm er appointment out at the Kennedy compound...
"I watched the full video... but must have missed the part where Sherrod claims opposition to Obamacare is based on racism"
Yah, Sherrod's still a racist.
Lyssalovelyredhead:
I have lived in the South much of my long life. The phrase "your own kind" is an underclass expression that is never used as an endearment. It is not, as David suggested, a widely used term to refer to everything from team mates to oil changes.
On the topic at hand I am appalled at the lack of viewing skills of the Obama administration, the NAACP, most commenters on this blog and the media in general. The original so-called "edited" tape of Briebart's clearly shows this woman telling the tale of how her experience led her to conclude that class or economic status had as much to do with reasons for downtrodden-ness as race. It is quite odd that this bit of the tape, at the very end, was not seen by any intelligent, sentient, person as the reason behind her speech. The focus on the racial bit at the start by left and right, MSM and blogosphere, telling, appalling and discouraging.
It is certainly true that a government official has a duty to not discriminate.
However, my sense is, "let him who is without sin cast the first stone."
Part of the human condition is to make mistakes, duty or not, government official or not.
It is to her credit that she recognized her error, did something about it, and then was willing to use her story to encourage others (who might have a tendency to make the same mistake) to not repeat her error.
If we limited government service to those who never made a mistake, we wouldn't have many government employees. Why that prospect has a certain attraction to me, it isn't a realistic option.
Bob
It just seems to me that Ms. Sherrod is saying race is important, but not as important as class, so the bias is okay.
Rebecca, thats meant as satire... right?
However, my sense is, "let him who is without sin cast the first stone."
M'kay. Line starts behind me.
However, my sense is, "let him who is without sin cast the first stone."
The problem with that argument is that most of us ARE free from the "sin" of racial discrimination.
Some of you commenters who are ultra-sympathetic to Sherrod should examine whether you are being patronizing. Hattie Carroll? This is an intelligent, educated, powerful woman. You are seeing her as Hattie Carroll because she is black. You should be embarrassed... at the very least. Yes, she comes across on camera as a nice, warm person, but she wields power and she is proud of her work doing just that, even as it includes an incident of blatant race discrimination, which she relates to an adoring crowd as part of a story of her personal growth. She speaks of a revelation, apparently from God. If she were not black, how would all of this sound? Test yourself for racism, people. Do you not think that she knows she can manipulate audiences with her storytelling? Do you not consider the possibility that you are being manipulated? Please treat her as you would treat anyone else -- accurately and on the merits.
Does that make me "frigid" in your view? Answers of yes must be tested for sexism. And racism.
That's what you've taken away from this whole episode? That anyone who feels sympathy for a woman who (temporarily) lost her job after being railroaded by a race-baiting fraud is themselves a racist? That no white person should come to the defense of a black person who has been treated unfairly to avoid coming off as patronizing? That stories of personal growth and epiphanies should be avoided at all costs, lest they shed light on past views and character flaws that underline the importance of personal growth?
The real story should be about how a government bureaucrat can decide the fate of each of us for whatever reason or prejudice they may have.
A.M.Daly: The Obama administration and the NAACP pushed each other out of the way to get the chance to push this woman under the bus. Thank God righteous white guys like you exist to save the poor black woman. Yes, I would say that is pretty patronizing indeed and should be avoided. If the woman giving the speech had been white and the identical speech given the outcome would not have bee the same. The woman would not have been given the benefit of "context" (which by the way was in the original "edited" version for all to see).
It is a good idea, especially for a young white person, to be careful about mounting the high horse in matters of race.
"That anyone who feels sympathy for a woman who (temporarily) lost her job after being railroaded by a race-baiting fraud is themselves a racist?"
How many flaws are there in that question? Start with these 2:
1. You say "anyone who "feels sympathy" when I have limited the category to those who feel "ultra-sympathetic."
2. You say I've accused people of being racist when I have only said that people who are being so sympathetic ought to examine their own thoughts and feelings on a deeper level. Demanding self-reflection isn't an accusation by me. It is me saying before you accuse, look to your own possible faults.
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