Sees No Double-Standard in Senator's Remarks About Obama; GOP's Hoekstra Says Dems Should Decide if Reid Keeps Post
Reid's Obama apology: Post-racial land?
by Mark Silva, on Saturday, updated noon EST Sunday
We suppose it's sadly inevitable, in the land that is not quite post-racial America, that we're learning, in retrospect, about how some of the white powers of the nation viewed the ascendant, some-say meteoric, political career of President Barack Obama.
Sen. Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, apologizing siwftly for freshly reported remarks which he made during the bid of the junior senator from Illinois for the Democratic Party's nomination for president. And the president has swiftly accepted the apology.
Reid's Republican challenger is making some hay today. Noting that Reid once spoke of "vaporizing" her, Republican Sue Lowden suggested on the FOX News Channel today that he "start on my hips.''
Reid, a Nevada Democrat facing political problems back home these days, had once described Obama in a private conversation as "light skinned''and one who spoke "with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one.''
"I deeply regret using such a poor choice of words. I sincerely apologize for offending any and all Americans, especially African-Americans for my improper comments," Reid said in a statement released after his remarks were reported on the Web site of The Atlantic on Saturday. "I was a proud and enthusiastic supporter of Barack Obama during the campaign and have worked as hard as I can to advance President Obama's legislative agenda."
The White House released this statement from the president:
"Harry Reid called me today and apologized for an unfortunate comment reported today. I accepted Harry's apology without question because I've known him for years, I've seen the passionate leadership he's shown on issues of social justice and I know what's in his heart. As far as I am concerned, the book is closed."
The book has barely been opened, however. Reid's regretted remarks come from a book that will be released Monday, Game Change, by political writers Mark Halperin of Time magazine and John Heilemann of New York magazine.
Tim Kaine, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, was asked if Reid should step down over this flap. "I do not believe he should,'' Kaine said in an appearance on FOX News Sunday. "And I think Sen. Reid did a very big thing yesterday by saying, you know, 'I used language that, looking back on it, wasn't the right language.'
"I don't think this is an issue that's going to affect his leadership at all,'' Kaine said. "In fact, he's doing some very heavy lifting, wonderful lifting right now, to get this health care bill over the goal line, and... I think he will continue."
With Reid fighting for reelection back home, Kaine also confronted a question about how much trouble the Democrats are in during the midterm elections:
"We know we're running up a hill,'' Kaine said. "If you actually go back to 1900, the average president in their first mid-term loses 28 House seats, four Senate seats and governors' races. So we're running up a hill.
"But the great thing about the Obama team is we don't mind running up a hill.,'' Kaine said. "We climbed Everest in 2008 and we're going to climb Pike's Peak this year."
Lowden, a Republican candidate for Senate Candidate and former Nevada Republican Party chairwoman, appeared on FOX's America's News HQ today (photo here courtesy of FOX) and said that Reid faces a difficult, "ugly'' campagn of his own.
"It's not about this comment; it's about the next comment and the comment after that,'' Lowden said. "I don't think that Harry Reid is going to step down, there is no chance of that...I think he is looking forward to a very difficult campaign, it's going to be a very ugly campaign. And, he is in for the long haul....
"It's a pattern with Sen. Reid -- he has very offensive comments throughout the years, this is not the first time this has happened,'' Lowden maintained. "He has said that the TEA Party protestors, especially here in Nevada, were 'evil mongers' because they they want to protest the policies of Washington... He called our former president a 'loser' in a high school class here in Nevada.... He told the public that they smelled when they visited the capital...last summer...and it goes on and on."
Lowden added of Reid: "He said he was going to "vaporize" me...Words are very, very important and I think he is going to try to do that in with a very negative campaign... When I heard that he said he was going to vaporize me, I said, 'Start on my hips.'''
Reid had been neutral during the divisive Democratic primary campaign in 2008. Someone else had been a lot less neutral in that protracted contest between Obama and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New YorkBill Clinton, the former president of the United States known in some circles as "the first black president.''
And Bill Clinton, we're also learnng now, had once irked the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, an early supporter of Obama, with his own reference to the junior senator from Illinois.
Politco, which also has gotten its hands on the forthcoming Game Change, reports that Halperin and Heilemann write:
"Bill's handling of Ted was even worse. The day after Iowa, he phoned Kennedy and pressed for an endorsement, making the case for his wife. But Bill then went on, belittling Obama in a manner that deeply offended Kennedy. Recounting the conversation later to a friend, Teddy fumed that Clinton had said, A few years ago, this guy would have been getting us coffee.''
In the nation that is not quite post-racial America, there is at least one publication which is proud of what Obama has achieved with election as the first African American president: City News, a weekly publication for the African American community in southern Cook County and Kankakee, Ill., for some time now has been running promotional ads featuring Obama, then a candidate for president, holding a copy of the paper with a broad smile.
At a time when the president's image is gracing billboards in Times Square and the Long Island Expresswaywith an ad that the Weatherproof coat company has promised to take downthis is one ad that the publishers haven't heard a peep about, and say they'll continue to run. (See the photo above, printed with permission.)
"He was visiting here, and I was doing a story,'' publisher James Taylor Sr., told The Swamp this weekend. "I asked him if we could take the picture of him to promote the paper, and he said, 'No problem.'''
The picture promoting the weekly paper with a reported circulation of about 50,000 was taken at Kankakee Community College, the publisher says.
"This is the first black president,'' Taylor explains of his paper's pride in the promotional photograph of the 48-year-old president, "and we've got a 42-year-old black newspaper.''
Sizing Up Obama's Measured Response To Terrorism
The fallout from the failed attack on a Detroit-bound airliner Christmas Day continued throughout the past week. Host Liane Hansen talks with NPR news analyst Juan Williams about the Obama administration's moves on terrorism prevention and national security.
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