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MARK WILLIAMS AND MORRIS REID ON SHOWBIZ TONIGHT -- TRANSCRIPT |
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by ShowBiz Tonight, CNN September 8, 2005 (Transcribed from video by Tara Carreon, american-buddha.com)
FEMALE TV ANNOUNCER: And KARYN, AJ, experts today from both sides of the aisle warn, "Be careful when playing the race card." As Howard Dean, said, we just saw in the piece, economics and age also were a huge factor in who was left behind. So this is a discussion that you can be sure will continue in the days, weeks and even months ahead. Back to you. KARYN BRYANT: Showbiz Tonight live in Hollywood. Thank you. In fact, it's going to continue right now. Was race a factor in how the victims of Hurricane Katrina were treated? Tonight, in our ShowBiz in Depth, we take on that burning question. Joining us live from Sacramento, California, Mark Williams, Talkshow Host for KFBK Radio. And live from Washington, D.C., Morris Reid, Democratic strategist and business brand expert, and managing director of Weston Rhinehart, which is a public affairs firm. Thank you gentlemen both for joining me tonight. Mark, I want to start with you. The blunt question, "Was race a factor, either consciously or subconsciously, in the speed of the initial response?
WILLIAMS: Uh, no. I, I, I, fail to see how anybody can draw that conclusion against these idiots in Hollywood, like spouting off without knowing what they are talking about. What caused the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina was exactly what everybody has known for 40 years would cause the aftermath: the disastrous conditions that prevailed, that destroyed the infrastructure over an area the size of Great Britain. And a couple of hundred thousand people who have been so trained in being passive, expecting the government to do absolutely everything for them, that they didn't have the necessary brains and common sense to get out of the way of a Cat 5 Hurricane. And then after it hit them, stood on the sidewalk of a convention Center expiring, while reporters were coming and going, some of them, I understand, even in taxicabs.
MORRIS: Mark, that is just sickening. WILLIAMS: The problems in Hurricane Katrina have been predicted for more than 40 years. And when this is over, there is going to be no shortage of government officials and administrators and bureaucrats to put up against a pock-marked wall. But to drag race into this is not only disingenuous, but it is also is to say, and this is an incredibly racist remark I hear coming from these people ... KARYN: Well, Mark, I gotta be honest with you. Some of the ... WILLIAMS: ... that we're seeing the overwhelming majority of victims are black, because blacks are too stupid to get out of the way of a hurricane! I don't think so. MORRIS: Mark, who said that? I mean, Mark, that is atrocious what you are saying. First of all, these are Americans, fellow American citizens who pay their taxes. These people, their government should have been there. They should have had a plan in place. Yeah, we knew what was going on, but they didn't have a plan in place. And that's not just at the federal, but it's the local and state as well. I gotta tell you, I'm very proud of Kanye West. It took a 28-year-old rap artist, a pop culture figure, to get America talking about a real issue. If it wasn't for Kanye West, we wouldn't be talking about this. Jesse Jackson didn't do it. The Congressional Black Caucus didn't do it. He did a great job ... WILLIAMS: Kanye West is an idiot. KARYN: Mark! Mark! Mark! Please! A little respect. Mark! Thank you very much. A little respect. MORRIS: Kanye spoke his mind, and I am disappointed that you would call him an idiot. This is a man who is speaking his mind, is speaking the truth, is speaking passionately about what he has to say. WILLIAMS: He's worse than an idiot! He's worse than an idiot! KARYN: And by the way, that idiot has the number one selling record in the country right now. Mark, I will tell you that. WILLIAMS: Mark, you can't be dismissive of people like this. KARYN: Listen, guys, guys, guys! Obviously this is extremely heated. Morris, I want to give you a chance. I want to talk to you about this idea that some [WHITE] people are throwing around, that because the mayor is a black man, and because there are black politicians in New Orleans, that they should have done a better job. Morris, what do you think, do you think there is any truth to the idea that leadership has let down their own people? [1] MORRIS: Ray Nagin
represents black folks and white folks. The real issue here is we
don't understand classism in this society. If you have the means,
whether you are black or white, you got out of New Orleans. So we're
really talking from a class situation. It's uncomfortable to talk
about class, because race has to seep in there. So Ray Nagin, not only did
he and the governor and the President let down black people, he also let
down white people. So I think that there's enough blame to spread
around here. And it's not about idiots, it's about the fact that our
government did not do an adequate job. [2]
"They have M-16s and they're locked and loaded. These troops know how to shoot and kill, and they are more than willing to do so, and I expect they will." -- Gov. Kathleen Blanco WILLIAMS: Unfortunately, in this country, the Democrat party, the same party that fought a civil war to keep slaves, [3] filibustered a hundred years to prevent the implementation of civil rights, has now completed the re-enslavement of blacks by turning them into passive, totally dependent economically, and for the simple common sense to walk out of the way of a hurricane on the government. That's the only role that race ...
"... and for the simple common sense to walk out of the way of a hurricane." -- Mark Williams "Could someone please break both of Mark Williams' legs?" -- Anonymous MORRIS: Mark, what you are saying, what you are saying ... WILLIAMS: ... and racists like this rap guy don't know the first thing about what George Bush thinks about anybody, black or otherwise. This guy is a klansman in black face.[4] KARYN: Well, I can tell you one thing, Mark: Kanye West, Kanye West knows what he feels. He sees these images on television, and he sees mostly black people looking in a bad situation. They happen to be mostly poor, and yes, that city is 70% black, and yes, many of those people are poor. But I think that what Kanye West is saying -- he was very emotional -- he's voicing what a lot of people are seeing. It looks like, had the people in the dome been white in twin sets and pearls, he kind of feels like they probably would have got a little help a little bit sooner. MORRIS: Listen, but more to the point is that ... WILLIAMS: [Interrupts] MORRIS: Wait, now. Hold on a second. The fact is, that it is un-American what you are saying. When people are in need, this is a basic thing: you help your neighbor. My grandmother at home in Akron, Ohio, was watching this and said, "I would step up and help my neighbor, because I was taught to do that." You are so outrageous, and so ... I'm afraid that you shouldn't be an American, because you are so outrageous. WILLIAMS: Now you're going to defend the looters, right? MORRIS: I'm not defending the looters. Let's talk about looters, let's talk about looters. WILLIAMS: What you and ... KARYN.: Hold on, Morris. Finish your thought, Morris. MORRIS: Mark, if you're looking for food, it is not looting. If you are taking a DVD, absolutely, that's looting. But if you're looking for food, just as a lot of white folks were doing, that is not looting, just like the African-Americans were looking for food. So the fact of the matter is, if you are stealing, yes, but if you are in a desperate situation, that company, that store, is going to write it off anyway. If you need food, you should be able to do that because of a desperate situation. So it's not about looting, it's about surviving. [5] KARYN: Guys, that is it for now. Obviously, this is going to continue to raise ... I do thank you both, though, for your opinions, for vocalizing them tonight. Morris Reid, democratic strategist, and Mark Williams, radio talkshow host for KFBK. MORRIS: Mark, you're just completely out of touch in Sacramento. [6] ________________ American Buddha Librarian's comments [1] WHAT A RACIST IDEA! Why isn't she asking him the same question she asked Mark. "Was race a factor in how the victims of Hurricane Katrina were treated?" That's the subject here, not whether black politicians are letting down their own people, so we could get a black man's view on white racism, for once, one that wasn't immediately cut off by the networks. For God's sake, let the black man speak, even if he's only a PR guy! [2] How sad that they got him to say something bad about Ray Nagin. See how beat down these people are, even when they are the managing director of a public affairs firm? That goes nowhere but to the White Man's Shame and the White Man's burden, centuries of black slavery! Ray Nagin is a hero who deserves NOTHING BUT PRAISE. HE DID EVERYTHING -- AND MORE -- THAT A LOWLY MAYOR COULD DO. Just how much power does anyone think a mayor has? I don't think our little mayor here in Ashland, Oregon has hardly any at all. [3] THIS GUY IS A FASCIST, RACIST PIG! WHAT IS HE TALKING ABOUT? The fact that the present-day Republican racists switched around the Republican and Democratic parties' names over the last century, so that now the anti-racists in the old days, the Republicans, are now called by the same name as the pro-racists in the present days? But this is not a democrat-republican issue. There are plenty of racist democrats. The issue is racism vs. non-racism. [4] Why doesn't someone tackle this guy, or throw something at him? HE'S DISGUSTING! [5] This mother-fucker would push Blacks one way and then the other. First, he accuses them of sitting around and not helping themselves, then, when they try to get food, he accuses them of being looters. I'm willing to bet he's the Grand Cyclops of his local KKK. [6] Let's talk about The Bush family history, here. Here's a tiny smidgen of evidence -- the whole of which would certainly exceed the size of Hurricane Katrina -- to support the claim of of Big-Time Bush Family Racism. Anyone catch Barbara Bush's racist remark at the Houston astrodome? George Bush, The Unauthorized Biography, by Webster G. Tarpley & Anton Chaitkin: A few weeks after ousting Pepper, Bush contributed one of his first public political statements as an op ed in the Houston Chronicle of 28 July 1963. Concerning the recent organizational problems, he whined that the county organization was "afflicted with some dry-martini critics who talk and don't work." Then, in conformity with his family doctrine and his own dominant obsession, Bush turned to the issue of race. As a conservative, he had to lament that fact that "Negroes" "think that conservatism means segregation." Nothing could be further from the truth. This was rather the result of slanderous propaganda which Republican public relations men had not sufficiently refuted: "First, they attempt to present us as racists. The Republican party of Harris County is not a racist party. We have not presented our story to the Negroes in the county. Our failure to attract the Negro voter has not been because of a racist philosophy; rather, it has been a product of our not having had the organization to tackle all parts of the country." What then was the GOP line on the race question? "We believe in the basic premise that the individual Negro surrenders the very dignity and freedom he is struggling for when he accepts money for his vote or when he goes along with the block vote dictates of some Democratic boss who couldn't care less about the quality of the candidates he is pushing." So the GOP would try to separate the black voter from the Democrats. Bush conceded: "We have a tough row to hoe here." George Bush, The Unauthorized Biography, by Webster G. Tarpley & Anton Chaitkin: But as we review the profile of the Bush Senate campaign of 1964, what we see coming alive is the characteristic mentality that rules the Oval Office today. The main traits are all there: the overriding obsession with the race issue, exemplified in Bush's bitter rejection of the civil rights bill before the Congress during those months; the genocidal bluster in foreign affairs, with proposals for nuclear bombardment of Vietnam, an invasion of Cuba, and a rejection of negotiations for the return of the Panama Canal; the autonomic reflex for union-busting expressed in the rhetoric of "right to work"; the paean to free enterprise at the expense of farmers and the disadvantaged, with all of this packaged in a slick, demagogic television and advertising effort. This is who George Bush, Sr. fought in 1964, Senator Yarborough, one of the most distinguished politicians our country has ever had, distinguished by his voting record on civil rights. That's why George Bush targeted him, because he was FOR civil rights. George Bush, The Unauthorized Biography, by Webster G. Tarpley & Anton Chaitkin: Yarborough was distinguished first of all for his voting record on civil rights. Just months after he had entered the Senate, he was one of only five southern senators (including LBJ) to vote for the watershed Civil Rights Act of 1957. In 1960, Yarborough was one of four southern senators- again including LBJ- who cast votes in favor of the Civil Rights Act of 1960. Yarborough would be the lone senator from the eleven states formerly composing the Confederate States of America to vote for the 1964 civil rights bill, the most sweeping since Reconstruction. This is the bill which, as we will see, provided Bush with the ammunition for one of the principal themes of his 1964 election attacks. Later, Yarborough would be one of only three southern senators supporting the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and one of four supporting the 1968 open housing bill. [fn 5] After Yarborough had left the Senate, his bitter enemies at the Dallas Morning News felt obliged to concede that "his name is probably attached to more legislation than that of any other senator in Texas history." Yarborough had become the chairman of the Senate Committee on Labor and Public Welfare. Here his lodestar was infrastructure, infrastructure in the form of education and infrastructure in the form of physical improvements. In education, Yarborough was either the author or a leading supporter of virtually every important piece of legislation to become law between 1958 and 1971, including some nine major bills. As a freshman senator, Yarborough was the co-author of the National Defense Education Act of 1958, which was the basis for federal aid to education, particularly to higher education. Under the provisions of NDEA, a quarter of a million students were at any given time enabled to pursue undergraduate training with low-cost loans and other benefits. For graduate students, there were three-year fellowships that paid tuition and fees plus grants for living expenses in the amount of $2200, $2400, and $2600 over the three years--an ample sum in those days. Yarborough also sponsored bills for medical education, college classroom construction, vocational education, aid to the mentally retarded, and library facilities. Yarborough's Bilingual Education Bill provided special federal funding for schools with large numbers of students from non-English speaking backgrounds. Some of these points were outlined by Yarborough during a campaign speech of September 18, 1964, with the title "Higher Education as it relates to our national purpose." As chairman of the veterans' subcommittee, Yarborough authored the Cold War GI Bill of Rights, which sought to extend the benefits accorded veterans of World War II and Korea, and which was to apply to servicemen on duty between January, 1955 and July 1, 1965. For these veterans Yarborough proposed readjustment assistance, educational and vocational training, and loan assistance to allow veterans to purchase homes and farms at a maximum interest rate of 5.25% per annum. This bill was finally passed after years of dogged effort by Yarborough against the opposition of Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson. Yarborough was instrumental in obtaining a five year extension of the Hill-Burton act, which provided 4,000 additional beds in Veterans Administration Hospitals. In physical improvements, Yarborough supported appropriations for coastal navigation. He fought for $29 million for the Rural Electrification Administration for counties in the Corpus Christi area alone. In eleven counties in that part of Texas, Yarborough had helped obtain federal grants for $4.5 million and loans of $.64 million under the Kennedy Administration accelerated public works projects program to provide clean water and sewers for towns and cities that could not otherwise afford them. Concerning his commitment to this type of infrastructure, Yarborough commented to a dinner in Corpus Christi: "These are the projects, along with the ship channels, dams and reservoirs, water research programs, hurricane and flood control programs that bring delegations of city officials, members of county court, members of river and watershed authorities, co-op delegations, into my office literally by the thousands year after year for aid, which is always given, never refused." Yarborough went on: "While our efforts and achievements are largely unpublicized...there is satisfaction beyond acclaim when a small town without a water system is enabled to provide its people for the first time with water and sewerage...when the course of a river is shored up a little to save a farmer's crops, when a freeway opens up new avenues of commerce." [fn 6] In the area of oil policy, always vital in Texas, Yarborough strained to give the industry everything it could reasonably expect, and more. Despite this, he was implacably hated by many business circles. In short, Ralph Yarborough had a real commitment to racial and economic justice, and was, all in all, among the best that the post-New Deal Democratic Party had to offer. Certainly there were weaknesses: one of the principal ones was to veer in the direction of environmentalism. Here Yarborough was the prime mover behind the Endangered Species Act. George Bush, The Unauthorized Biography, by Webster G. Tarpley & Anton Chaitkin: Beyond these attempts to smear Yarborough, it is once again characteristic that the principal issue around which Bush built his campaign was racism, expressed this time as opposition to the civil rights bill that was before the Congress during 1964. Bush did this certainly in order to conform to his pro-Goldwater ideological profile, and in order to garner votes (especially in the Republican primary) using racist and states' rights backlash, but most of all in order to express the deepest tenets of the philosophical world-outlook of himself and his oligarchical family.
Very early in the campaign Bush
issued a statement saying: "I am opposed to the Civil Rights bill now
before the Senate." Not content with that, Bush proceeded immediately to
tap the wellsprings of nullification and interposition: "Texas has a
comparably good record in civil rights," he argued, "and I'm opposed to
the Federal Government intervening further into State affairs and
individual rights." At this point Bush claimed that his quarrel was not
with the entire bill, but rather with two specific provisions, which he
claimed had not been a part of the original draft, but which he hinted had
been added to placate violent black extremists. According to his statement
of March 17, "Bush pointed out that the original Kennedy Civil Rights bill
in 1962 did not contain provisions either for a public accommodations
section or a Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC) section." "Then,
after the hot, turbulent summer of 1962, when it became apparent that in
order to get the Civil Rights leaders' support and votes in the 1964
election something more must be done, these two bad sections were added to
the bill," according to Bush. "I suggest that these two provisions of the
bill-- which I most heatedly oppose -- were politically motivated and are
cynical in their approach to a most serious problem." But soon abandoned
this hair-splitting approach, and on March 25 he told the Jaycees of Tyler
"I oppose the entire bill." Bush explained later that beyond the public
accommodations section and the Fair Employment Practices Committee, he
found that "the most dangerous portions of the bill are those which make
the Department of Justice the most powerful police force in the Nation and
the Attorney General the Nation's most powerful police chief." |
