Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean took direct aim at Fox News for its involvement in the Shirley Sherrod racism flap, calling their coverage “absolutely racist.”
Dean, the former Democratic National Committee chairman, offered his candid assessment in an appearance on “Fox News Sunday” in which he criticized the cable network for being complicit in the controversy.
“Fox News did something that was absolutely racist,” Dean said. “They had an obligation to find out what was really in the clip. They had been pushing a theme of black racism with this phony Black Panther crap and this business and this Sotomayor and all this other stuff.”
Host Chris Wallace countered that Fox had held off on broadcasting the footage in question until the Agriculture Department forced Sherrod out of her job there, but Dean was having none of it.
“It was about to go on Glenn Beck, which is what the administration was afraid of.”
He added later: “The Tea Party called out their racist fringe and I think the Republican Party’s got to stop appealing to its racist fringe. And Fox News is what did that. You put that on. Continuing to cater to this theme of minority racism and stressing comments like this — some of which are taken out of context — does not help the country knit itself together.”
The Shirley Sherrod story has become so big that it brought Keith Olbermann back from vacation. Olbermann came back for a segment on his own show in which he gives a “Special Comment” on what has now become a huge political story. A full video and summary of Olbermann’s “Special Comment” appears below.Olbermann blames a number of people for the mess behind the Sherrod story, including his own network and President Obama. Olbermann notes that the story was first pushed by the “scum” Breitbart and the “fraud” that is Fox News. However, he also blames his own network for not being forceful enough in refuting the story, and hosting Breitbart for an interview. Finally, Olbermann spends most of his time addressing the Obama administration and President Obama personally. He quotes the Deputy Chief of Staff within the Obama administration who stated they had to respond quickly “in this atmosphere.”
Faux-pression: Racism and the Cult of White Victimhood
by tim wise
Tue Jul 20, 2010
Here is Tim Wise’s response to the phony reverse racism claims made by the right, re: the New Black Panthers and the Shirley Sherrod/USDA story that broke yesterday.
To hear conservatives tell it, there’s a one-sided race war going on in America, and white folks are the targets. From President Obama’s secret plan to use health care reform as a way to procure backdoor “reparations” for slavery, to his equally secret plan to wreck the economy as a way to pay white people back for centuries of racial oppression, to his personal responsibility for a fight on a school bus in Belleville, Illinois, in which two black kids beat up a white kid, it’s open season on white America. And of course, in case you weren’t convinced, surely that tax on tanning bed customers that was part of the health care bill should suffice to make the case: after all, it’s a clear slap at white folks and the result of the President’s deep antipathy towards those of us lacking sufficient melanin. (more…)
