A little overly defensive?

February 8, 2006

This is probably too-clever-by-half, and I hesitate to put it in print, but there’s one thing that’s been nagging me about the criticism of Jimmy Carter’s remarks at Coretta Scott King’s funeral yesterday: the critics might be better off not being so defensive.

There were two specific things Carter said that raised the ire of the president’s supporters. The first was about Katrina.

“This commemorative ceremony this morning and this afternoon is not only to acknowledge the great contributions of Coretta and Martin, but to remind us that the struggle for equal rights is not over. We only have to recall the color of the faces of those in Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi, those who were most devastated by Katrina, to know that there are not yet equal opportunities for all Americans.”

Is this a partisan cheap-shot? I don’t see how. Carter was not only dealing with an issue about which Coretta Scott King felt strongly, Carter was also addressing a demonstrable fact about those affected by Katrina in the context of the racial divide in the United States. If this were so offensive, why did Bush respond to Carter’s comments with a standing ovation?

Maybe the right is upset about Carter’s other comment.

“[Mr. and Mrs. King] were not appreciated even at the highest levels of government. It was difficult for them, personally, with the civil liberties of both husband wife violated as they became the targets of secret government wiretapping and other surveillance.”

Kate O’Beirne droned on endlessly about this being “classless.” Why, exactly, was this over the top? The King family was the target of secret government wiretapping and other surveillance. It was not only an example of government abuse, it was also no doubt a strain on the family and was yet another hurdle for the Kings to overcome.

As I see it, if the conservative critics are going to complain, they should elaborate on why they were offended. It’s not as if they agree with the secret surveillance of the King family, right? Why, then, should they be so defensive about Carter’s criticisms of secret government wiretapping? Is there a certain legally-dubious surveillance program they’re defensive about?

Yes, I’m being coy about all of this, but I think we should accept the remarks at yesterday’s services at face value. The “Bush-bashing” comments never even mentioned the president. If the right wants to characterize Carter’s comments as partisan cheap shots, let them explain why.

CB wrote:

It’s not as if they agree with the secret surveillance of the King family, right?

Well, maybe they do.

  • They characterize it for this reason:

    A–Bush was there.

    B–Things were said that are marked disagreements with current administration policy (mostly by Lowery).

    Therefore, they are insults to Bush. What matters here, for them, is not whether someone had died, whether people had gathered to pay tribute to a woman who fought for those very things that were discussed, or what-have-you. To them, the only thing that matters is Bush. Dear Leader.

    And currently, the best thing anyone can do in America to display patriotism, according to this philosophy, is not to upset our Dear Leader.

  • You are exactly right about the Katrina part — he didn’t single out Dubya, because there was plenty of blame to go around there including Democratic Gov. Blanco and Democratic Mayor (and African American) Ray Nagin.

  • I can’t stomach Kate O’Beirne! That’s the same witch who blames every ill on feminisim. Unfortuately, Tweety has her on the show time and time again. Truly a person with no value.

  • Carter’s remarks struck me as entirely appropriate. Would Coretta Scott King have wanted Bush sitting there at her funeral as if he was her best friend without comment on things his administration is doing which we would expect her to very much disapprove of? I would guess that pretending that Coretta and George were best friends might have been more inappropriate and displeasing to her.

    But rather than have a bunch of political commentators adding their partisan two cents, the real people to ask about this is the family. They should know what she would have deemed appropriate and not appropriate. This funeral does not belong to the political commentators or the media. This funeral, as President Clinton said, is about a woman. If the media wants to film her funeral, fine — that’s their problem. But only her family can determine whether what was said at it was appropriate.

  • Kate O’Beirne’s comments were fantastic—for a vapid know-nothing spewing outright fabrications to preemptively tarnish a person in order to reject what he said. What’s critical here is the lack of a liberal alternative to this type of badgering.

    Do liberals have to stand up and duke it out with the same type of personal, baseless attacks? Of course not. One good reason they don’t have to go that far is because their not political hacks trying to justify year 6 of terrible incompetence. By contrast, liberals merely have the task of calling out the lies, the liars, and the damnable incompetence of said hacks. Not such a tall order, and yet, where is the response?

    What the comments at Mrs. King’s funeral really did was not duck the issues of the day. They pointed out simple truths that put the lie to this administration. They did exactly what I’d hope Mrs. (and Dr.!) King would have wanted.

    Liberals had a moment, and it was taken by force. JFK, King, RFK, Malcolm. How do you bounce back from that? Not with pansy politics and bowing to the pressure. You fight back.

  • Catherine, I totally agree; unfortunately even the support from the family and close non-political friends of Paul Wellstone did nothing to keep the right-wing smear machine from convincing a gullible public that the Dems were horrible, horrible people for how they behaved at his funeral. There is little reason to believe it would work any better this time.

  • No one should be surprised that Katie O’Beirne is upset — after all, Carter’s remarks about FBI phone-taps on MLK’s communications provide a reminder of the dangers of giving unchecked police powers to the Executive Branch.

  • There’s a pattern: The truth hurts and so it is labeled as “partisan attacks”. They don’t defend the “attacks”, they just label them as such so that those who are inclined to wish it (the truth) away can label it and file it as trash… Ans this is why PBS is struggling. They tell the truth, and it is labeled as liberal partisan attacks.

  • Remember, it is always about the Dear Leader. Always.

    Heaven forbid it be about the woman who just died.

  • I’m just going to re-post one of my comments from earlier today off of another thread:

    You see, most conservatives get easily confused when reality collides with their belief system.

    Therefore, any talk of civil rights or equality or justice is taken as a stab at their ideology or “their” president.

    The only politicking I saw yesterday was when Bush Sr. tried to float his old campaign slogan “kinder and gentler”. Of course, the wing-nuts are attacking Carter today like he ate a baby. Why? Because he mentioned wiretaps. Which apparently the righties don’t realize happened back in the 60’s and 70’s to the Kings. Most likely this is due to their disdain for “looking backwards” or what progressive-minded people would call “History”.

  • Reminds me of the hoopla after Wellstone’s funeral.

    Why is it that political figures who have dedicated their lives to politics and fighting oppression are supposed to be apolitically eulogized at their own funerals? Just so their enemies can pretend to be their allies now that they are dead?

  • Calling someone a partisan is the new “liberal.”

    Liberal has an academic, dictionary meaning, describing a political philosophy, and I’m sure we could have all kinds of linguistic fun arguing about what is and isn’t liberal.

    But forget that meaning. At some point, the word was used as an insult. Repeatedly. And the academic, dictionary meaning became less relevant.

    The same thing is happening with partisan.

    Got a point to make? I can ignore it if I call you a partisan, and if a third party adds that slam to his own judgement of what you are saying.

    “Hmmm. Poor people do have it tough. And maybe it wasn’t right to spy on King. But … consider the source. He IS partisan, after all.”

    It’s a way of belittling the messenger, and also the message.

    There’s a lot more to this (namely, race). But this is a part.

  • The “Bush-bashing” comments never even mentioned the president.

    What’s more and also needs to be said is they make perfect sense and still retain their meaning and importance outside of the context of today’s political climate, (say, in 1999.)

    If the hurricane hit in 1999 we would have had the same class division that resulted in many thousands of (mostly black) people being stranded without resources when their homes are washed and blown away. And honoring Corretta Scott King almost requires mentioning the Kings’ bravery in the face of not just government disinterest, but outright oppression in the form of wiretaps, surveillance, and FBI record-keeping.

  • To those on the right that take offense, I’d simply just say buggar off. I’m thankful that Bush was made to endure for a brief period life outside his bubble (not that I think it was enlightening in any way for him) and to see the crowd’s reaction to Clinton. It was a sad day because of Mrs. Kings departure from the living but a really great send off.

  • I have no doubt these were intentional barbs tossed out
    by Carter, but inappropritate? Were they not true statements?
    Did they not go to the heart of what the Kings stood for?
    They sure did. No apologies, please, from the spineless
    Dems who stand to the right of us liberals.

    We got their goat this time, and they just can’t stand it.
    The MSM couldn’t ignore the funeral, as they do the
    Dems and all the Bush scandals.

    Too bad this kind of feistiness shown by Carter and
    the Reverend Lowery has gone out of the Democratic
    Party as they fall over themselves slip-sliding to the
    right.

  • inappropriate, dammit. My New Year’s resolution
    was not to apologize for typos, but eadie knocked
    me off the wagon.

  • Hmm, very good comments …

    I think just as the president has certain rights, an ex-president
    should have certain rights.

    Ex-presidents of the US do not often say anything, let alone
    anything as strong as this … but, because he was an ex-president
    mr. carter’s comments should be given the weight, and some
    immunity from criticism, at least by political figures.

    It is not like our ex-presidents have been punching at each other,
    democrats have practically remained either completely quiet or
    completely unreported, so a moment like this is the time for
    them if they choose to make a statement, and by definition
    if should be listened to and at least be immune from being
    called classless. Carter whatever he is is not classless.

    Dispute the facts do not call an ex-president names.

  • I thought discussions of “class” were forbidden in the US…LMAO.

    Kate O’Beirne…talk about some tiresome faux-Irish lace…

  • To talk about violations of civil liberties at a civil rights leader’s funeral is not rude, but a necessary and fitting tribute. We will have thrown away all that Coretta and Martin stood for if out of fear, someone did not speak our truth . The Kings were peaceful warriors and now more than ever their example can lead us. They spoke out when it was dangerous to do so. Thank you Jimmy Carter for your words of courage.

  • Some people do not recall, or remember, but it is a long held belief that it was the Democrats in power at the time that ordered the wiretaps on the King family … Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy circa the early 60’s, is the name that comes up most often in certain circles.

  • Some people do not recall, or remember, but it is a long held belief that it was the Democrats in power at the time that ordered the wiretaps on the King family … Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy circa the early 60’s, is the name that comes up most often in certain circles.

    Your point being what, exactly? Carter is correct to point out that it still doesn’t make it right, regardless of whether it was RFK, J Edgar Hoover or Big Bird who ordered the wiretaps. The GOP parroting this point is just another attempt to take offense at comments that cut to the heart of certain problems in our country — it’s not all about them. This is about a woman’s life and what she believed in, not about your right to be “offended” at every last turn.

  • My comment above was not a GOP parroting point. In fact, it’s never mentioned. It was pointed out to me by a group that doesn’t especially like Carter (not my viewpoint) and who were annoyed by what they said was his “hypocrisy” vis-a-vis the outrage over the wiretapping of the Kings.

    And it was further pointed out when Reverand Lowrey was discussing helping the poor, his time, effort and money went more into building that aqauriam in Atlanta than for any programs that helped the “poor.”

    It has been many years since Martin died, and in the interim, people of color, espeically blacks, have been more than marginalized by the “moderate” views of corporate America and the all powerful dollar.

    Some viewed the speeches at the funeral innappropriate, not because they dug at the current Bush administration, but because, coming from the black community, they were disengenuous, and opportunistic.

    The black community in Atlanta is still asking Reverand Lowrey “what have you done for me lately.”

    But, the consensus was, if Mrs. King’s family was not offended by those that spoke at her funeral …

  • It was pointed out to me by a group that doesn’t especially like Carter (not my viewpoint) and who were annoyed by what they said was his “hypocrisy” vis-a-vis the outrage over the wiretapping of the Kings.

    Right. My point is that it’s only hypocrisy if you view it through the lens of party distinction to make every point you want to make. If Carter had wiretapped King, then it would be hypocritical to mention it; but he didn’t. The prism the idiots on TV seem to work through in most instances is the “Gop vs Dem” prism; if a Dem says it and another Dem did something similar in 50 years, then they’re hypocrites. And again, it ends up not being about a person’s funeral or her life, but the offense taken by a group who spends their every last waking moment trying to figure out how to be offended.

  • I can recall, though I’m too young to remember, that the Dems exorcised their racist, segregationist elements in the 60s (and consequently drove them into the welcoming arms of the previously very pro-abolitionist Republicans,) at much political cost (virtually completely losing the south as President Johnson predicted.) Who’s hypocritical, then? And who’s principled? And what does that say about the party that happily threw away its ideals for the votes of the racist segregationists?

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