NAACP president assails three candidates who skipped forum

NAACP President Kweisi Mfume criticized Democratic
presidential candidates Dick Gephardt, Joe Lieberman and
Dennis Kucinich on Monday for skipping the group's
presidential forum, saying the three have become "persona non
grata" among black voters.

Mfume lashed out at the three during a speech to the thousands
gathered for the NAACP's convention. Each time Mfume
mentioned their name an organmaster played a death knell
chord.

"In essence, you now have become persona non grata," he said.
"Your political capital is the equivalent of confederate dollars."

The crowd responded to his condemnation with applause and
then a chorus of "oooo" at the mention of confederate money.

source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2003/07/14/national1213EDT0543.DTL

Followup on an earlier thread. This is a big problem for Dems that needs to be addressed.

Oh well... The three don't have much of a chance anyway...

One might disagree with the NAACP's approach, but the political reality is that missing this forum was a boneheaded thing to do.

What's more, they were warned of the consequences (fair or not) a few days ago. Kerry and Edwards had considered not going but were smart enough to change their minds.

I'm part of a minority group too. I think that the NAACP might be going about this the wrong way. The Democrats have a limited amount of resources right now and I think that it might be better spent going after Republicans on their own turf. Provided that there is no cheating, I think that the Democrats can get a filibuster-proof Senate majority and a majority in the House too.

The Base has to be sufficiently aroused and the earlier the better. Granted blacks are probably going to vote Democratic on a 90%-10% split but we need people on the road to get more voters. Arouse more people to get more people to feel less apathetic. Then we try and change Republican minds. The more we get to carry the message the better.

An organmaster?

Confederate dollars?

How absolutely ridiculous. Someone is toking off the power pipe there.

It is important that candidates reach out to all communities, including African Americans, but for certain groups to dictate that they hold the key to every African American/Latino/Labor's vote, that's not only false, but it's delusional.

Every candidate will address each group of voters in his/her own way, and the voters will be able to judge for themselves whether they're sincere or not. They don't need herding by organmasters, for god's sake.

The last NAACP event I saw on C-Span had an organist who played a few chords whenever someone said something worthy of applause. I was quite startled the first couple of times I heard it.

Mfume needs a reality check. I never liked him.

but Mfume (according to the Miami Herald) said he thought the Dems who weren't attending were afraid of debating Dean and Sharpton. Not only is that divisive, but it's damn insulting to the other candidates who are attending. I think you're right about Mfume being on a power trip. He doesn't have the right to speak for all African-Americans or to discount three of the candidates who are running. What if one of them gets the nomination? He's burning bridges he may need.

I would ask why they do not assail Bush on his Africa tour of deciet and lies- why the fuck is he in Africa and ignoring african americans here? Condolezza lies every time her lips move and Powell has a white child named Michael that is poisoning via the media every fucked up image of minorities they can throw out there. There are more important issues concerning minorities then a debate forum that sounds kinda like a Joe Pyne show or Jerry Springer episode. My respect for NAACP just took a dive- Are they trying to get on massa bush's good side or what?

The candidates can't attend every single event. They have limited time to go these forums. Just because they didn't attend doesn't make them bad. It was politically stupid, but to try to connect them to the confederacy is just wrong. Maybe Kucinich, Lieberman and Gephardt were actually considering doing their jobs and voting in Congress. But, I guess he didn't think that they should do what they were elected and paid to do.

First of all, the NAACP does not report to the Democratic National Committee and has historically provided a forum for candidates of both major political parties for debates during the Presidential season.

The fact that these three could not adjust their schedules in respect to one of the nation's oldest and finest social/justice advocacy organizations is truly shocking.

Even Republican Presidential candidates have somehow found a way to address the NAACP which, as one can imagine, was not always a picnic for them to do so. They still showed respect for this sterling organization.

The NAACP deserves more than a snub by these three candidates. There is no single organization that parallels its near century of struggle for people of color, women, immigrants and even homosexuals. From the early days of the great W.E.B. DuBois, to the legal advocacy of the brilliant and fearless Thurgood Marshall to its roster of members whose very names makes one's heart swell with gratitude and devotion like Rosa Parks, Medgar Evers and Jesse Jackson, the NAACP has been there standing up to tyrany and injustice.

It's not the political stupidity of the noshow by these three candidates that upsests me, rather it is the insult and disrespect that takes my breath away.

I'm with Kweisi Mfume, who I also greatly admire. If he says they are "persona non grata", then that's what they are with me.

African Americans have been the Democratic party's most loyal constituents for decades, and the NAACP is one of their most cherished institutions.

All of the Democratic nominees should have paid their respects, IMO. An excuse of "scheduling conflicts" just doesn't cut it, with me.

Mfume's rhetoric might be a bit strong, but I definitely agree with his sentiment. This was an insult, and African Americans deserve better of their potential Democratic nominees.

Kudos to the Democratic nominees who did attend!

DTH

"Mfume's rhetoric might be a bit strong, but I definitely agree with his sentiment. This was an insult, and African Americans deserve better of their potential Democratic nominees."
I agree with your statement. Mfume will probably cool down later from now, but I totally understand his anger.
Dems need to be respectful of their greatest constituents...

I mean who has there been to vote for? Lieberman? Mfume?

I agree with everything you just said. I am very disapointed in DK.

because he is running for president. Quiet frankly, if it was between this and a vote, I would rather have him doing the job he was elected to do. Why don't you ask Edwards about showing up to vote?????

I'm tierd...

Did anyone bash Edwards for not showing up to the event Jesse Jackson hosted?

took priority over paying respectful acknowledgement of historically the key Afro-American organization?

Kuchinich can't be serious about his representation of the Afro-American base under his candidacy.

A pox on his house.

Look at all the Democrats that didn't show up to vote and got those overtime laws passed!

If I was a constiguint, and the man I voted for was missing votes, I'd be pissed as ALL HELL!

I simply said I was dispointed. He could miss a vote for something as important as this forum.

in his stead to read a prepared statement. Delegation, anyone? I, too, am disappointed.

"Gephardt said he had a prior family obligation, Lieberman said he had campaign events in New York and Kucinich said he wanted to be in Washington to make votes in the House."

Doing your elected job should be excusable. Not surprising that the other two are doing something else, but Kucinich has a 100% voting record. But Gephardt and Lieberman are pushing it here.

That is really dumb, and the blacks are rightly sensitive about snubbing since the Democrats refused to investigate the vote purge in 2000.

((See post 38)

Missing a poorly scheduled NAACP debate or voting against Medicare privatization, which passed by a single vote ?


For me, THAT action, THAT vote spoke louder than anything he could have said at the debates!

Action... words... speak... which one louder? :)

Peace

and Kucinich and the others should make amends. It is smart politics.

I think the NAACP should make amends for having made this stink. Were they not aware that such an important vote affecting so many Black-Americans was coming up? Could they not have considered rescheduling or re-timing to allow people to join in by satellite? Did they have to make such a huge and childish stink?

It would be awkward for them to issue an apology to Kucinich now (which would be the right thing to do in my book) so I think the best course of action would be for them to just drop the entire matter, schedule a new round of debates mentioning that scheduling conflicts with an important House vote and conflicting campaign committments had prevented full participation in the first one.

.

There would be no harm in doing that.

Peace

Mfume is stretching things a bit with his references, but nonetheless makes the point.

I can't blame African Americans for feeling slighted. The Black Congressional Caucus got hammered time after time for standing up against Selection 2000, standing against the PATRIOT Act, calling for investigations on 9/11, and a whole bunch of other shit I'm probably forgetting, and this is what they get?

This really irks me in that it is about showing allegiance to the organization rather then the people it supposedly represents. I think they will lose credibility for anyone who asks why they are not going after rice and powell.

or the Arab American groups, most of whom endorsed Bush last time out and are living to regret it, so why go after them specifically. Ab Foxman will vote for Bush if Dean is nominated, and nobody is nearly as outraged. I honestly doubt Mfuemi does.


Believe it or not their are still some Democrats who think it is good politics to snub blacks, and treat them as radical and beyond the pale of normal politics.

" Although the official line is still to winnow him out, I think his stock rose after his appearance on the
20th of June at the Democratic national Committee meeting. As far as
missing the NAACP meeting today, it is unfortunate, but he had a
legitimate reason. I think it was a knee jerk reaction and in Dennis's
case they may change their minds. He has a progressive agenda that
only Sharpton and Braun are close to. I am thinking also, there are
people that may go to bat for Dennis. Two of his main staff people at
National helped run Jesse Jackson's 1988 presidential campaign. It may
be more damning for Leiberman and Gephart who have less of a
relationship with the African American community. I personally prefer
to focus on Dennis's successes and the negative stuff will take care
of itself."

If he maintains such arrogance he is setting the NAACP up for another Sister Soljah moment.

the USA Today has a similar (nighly negative article on page 3 of the print edition

A google news search with "NAACP" generates 15 pages (or 150) articles on this todpic in the last 48 hours.

The missing candidates are probably Monday morning quarterbacking this right now with lots of agony.

Jesse Jackson got 35-38% in the VA 1988 primary against Dukakis (and Gore), so I knew Kerry would show up.

The VA primary is Februaury 10th

It was bad. But it's OK. DK lost the NAACP, but gained Ralphie - something tells me that there is a connection here - if nothing else the two are mutually exclusive.

.....at least a few of the candidates ACTUALLY HAVE ONGOING JOBS and had made previous committments. If the candidates in question had cancelled everything to be there - and missed an important vote or other important commitment - then there would no doubt be some grumbling about that too.

and are now saddled with the fallout. Right or wrong, all 3 hold-outs just became unelectable*.

*more so in some cases

...are known for shooting themselves in the feet, aren't they??? I'm sure Bush and thugs will be ABSOLUTELY DELIGHTED to find out that liberals now consider their field of candidates much narrowed.

Hello Bush 2005!!

It is just ABSOLUTELY STUPID to do ANYTHING that helps neo CONS in any way.

Yes, I was shouting because this just makes no sense to me at all.

When our black democrats can't vote, we lose.

group that gives your party 80 - 90 % of their vote has a forum and you choose to skip it. What does that say about your basic political skills? I think the Democratic party needs every bit of help in this next election. Getting out the base will be crucial.

Its the fact that ripping a congressman, for showing up to VOTE and doing the job he was ELECTED to do instead of coming to his event seems insanely arrogant and short sited.

The Star Trib has this quote:
"Jeff Cohen, a campaign spokesman for Kucinich, said that the congressman though it would be a mistake for him to leave Washington on a day when Congress was voting on important legislation, including expanding medicare to cover prescription drugs."

....have jobs representing us. Oh, and you know darn well, that if they had all cancelled everything to be at the NAACP meeting then they would be getting bashed about "how can they possibly ask that we vote for them when they can't even do the jobs they were already el;ected to do."

Thank you for saying this, I tried saying the same thing in an earlier reply was was told that those who didn't show up "just became unelectable". Now get ready for the bashing.
"Its the fact that ripping a congressman, for showing up to VOTE and doing the job he was ELECTED to do instead of coming to his event seems insanely arrogant and short sited."

and we shouldn't snub them and that is all there is to it.

Those who trivialize the seriousness of history for a photo-op moment probably deserve what they get.

I wonder how much Mfume really understands his own heritage and the reality of living in the neo-con fantasy land of today.

Most thinking African-Americans that I know are not going to let the NAACP tell them how to vote based on one convention forum, no matter how much respect they might have for the organization.

It sounds to me that Mfume would be real impressed with rhetoric like we hear from the chimp in Africa:

"Bush admitted that while physical slavery is dead, the legacy is alive. "My nation's journey toward justice has not been easy, and it is not over," Bush said. "The racial bigotry fed by slavery did not end with slavery or with segregation."

I think that DERRICK Z. JACKSON made some excellent points in his opinion piece today. It can be found at http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/130787_jackson15.html.

African-Americans need to ask themselves who would be most likely to provide substance behind the rhetoric.

Kucinich is a man of integrity. When Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat, she showed courage and integrity. When Kucinich refused to vacate his seat in the US House of Representatives for the NAACP 2003 convention, he showed courage and integrity.

Doesn't the NAACP have a convention every year? If candidates attended every "important" special interest group convention, they would do nothing else. I mean no slight to the NAACP, and neither, I think, did Kucinich. Perhaps if they had especially invited Dennis last year, they would have had different results.

else can they go rhetoric of the dlc. Kucinich may have nothing to apologize for but he should understand their feelings, and react accordingly.

"A century and a half later, presidents are still calling slavery evil, but we endure the legacy partially because presidents do not hold Americans responsible for fully understanding it."

"There is a simple reason U.S. presidents will not apologize for slavery. An apology for the past means asking white Americans to take responsibility for the present. One hundred and forty years after the Emancipation Proclamation, that remains a task too heavy for presidents to perform. The truth remains too terrible for Americans to bear."

Of all the non-black candidates, no individual is more likely to use the bully pulpit of the presidency to address these issues than DK.

"If a white president of the United States were to apologize for slavery, it would say that the nation officially recognizes that white wealth before the Civil War came from what this nation did to black people (and Native Americans in the process)."

While an over-simplification of the US brand of capitalism and exploitation, there is some substance to the author's logic and claims.

The author rightly puts the chimp's plastic and superficial words in the historical context in which they belong. In doing so, he shows once again the photo-op mentality of the insincere goon. More meaningless, feel-good words and half-truths while everyday suffering in everyday reality goes on unabated.

Goody, goody two shoes catholic boy couldn't get a stain on his pure attendance record.

Did he inquire about rearranging the date like Edwards did? No? Just wasn't important enough to him, was it? There are ALREADY questions abuot shady racial divides in his political past-

"Washington - As a presidential candidate at the dawn of the 21st century, Dennis Kucinich says he wants to unite the nation behind peace.

But longtime Cleveland politicians and political advisers say that when civil rights still divided Cleveland during the 1970s, Kucinich got some of his first toeholds in local politics by exploiting the city's racial prejudices. They say that while he courted white, ethnic voters on the city's West Side, he vilified black politicians, attacked their white colleagues as puppets and opposed busing for school integration.

'It doesn't mean he was a racist. It means he played to the fears of constituents who might not - how shall I put this mildly - hold diversity near and dear to their hearts,' says Powell Caesar, a Cleveland public-relations and political counselor long active in civil-rights issues.

Friends and former enemies alike say the Democratic congressman and presidential aspirant was never a bigot. But they say he took political stands and circulated campaign literature during the 1970s that played on white voters' intolerance. They also say he long ago abandoned those tactics."


http://www.kucinich.com/Racist%20&%20Opportunist.htm

Just like he saw the light on choice.

and it make me sick, the bending over backwards to forgive him and excuse him - HE BLEW IT and now he will have to spin his wheels to answer for this along with the 180 on abortion rights.

A funny thing about debate and argument. There are two ways to engage.

Some like to sound off to be seen, to be recognized, possibly to be "politically correct."

Others engage to sway the opposing view point, to seek to elevate the discourse in search of truth, harmony, justice, etc.

Hypocrites are easily spotted when they are not satisfied even when their view is adopted by others. It stains their self-righteous, pompous purity in a way. Or perhaps, their lust for vengeance and capitulation is just that insatiable.

The resulting dyspepsia plays havoc with the constitution.

but the two Congressmen, Kucinich and Gephardt, have an obligation to do their job for their constituents first - and I'm almost positive there was some voting that had to be done that day.

As for Liebrman, I'm a bit confused, since Kerry was able to show up.

it shows he takes the people he represents seriously. Does anyone know if he had the option of speaking at the convention by phone or video conference? Certainly that would have been better than nothing.

DENNIS AND THE NAACP EVENT

Kucinich supporters have asked why the Congressman didn't attend the NAACP candidates' forum in Miami on Monday afternoon. He couldn't attend because the forum conflicted with his responsibilities as a voting member of Congress, and there were key Medicare votes late yesterday in the House.

When there have not been conflicts with Capitol Hill duties, Dennis has repeatedly attended candidates' forums held by civil rights and equal rights groups, including ones organized by the NAACP and the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. (The Rainbow forum was on a Sunday.) Dennis has shined at these events, because he is a fighter for civil rights - - as he's shown year after year on Capitol Hill through his leadership role in the Congressional Progressive Caucus. It's Dennis who is leading the fight to abolish the racially-biased death penalty.

Due to conflicts with his Congressional duties, Rep. Kucinich recently had to miss a candidates' forum on the environment in Los Angeles and a "Democracy Rising" rally in Baltimore -- when Dennis stayed in Washington to vote against Medicare privatization, which passed by a single vote. Unlike other presidential candidates, he is a fulltime Congressperson who has not missed a vote so far this session.

Yesterday afternoon, our campaign released this statement to the media:
"Congressman Kucinich has the utmost respect for the NAACP, its leadership, its members and its mission. He regrets his absence from this afternoon's candidates' forum. His duties as a member of the United States House of Representatives required that he be in Washington today for votes. Important votes are scheduled on Medicare prescription drugs and agriculture spending. Congressman Kucinich strongly believes that it is wrong to campaign across the country on the issue of expanding healthcare coverage and then miss one of the most important healthcare votes in years."

--
Learn more about the Kucinich campaign: http://www.kucinich.us

Please donate to keep our campaign expanding:
https://www.kucinich.us/contribute.php "

Ingnoring the vote purge hurt alot of feelings in the black community, and rightly so. The smearing of McKinney didn't help either.s The NAACP is just flexing it's muscles like the more republican leaning civil rights organizations, that organized defeat McKinney.s Quite frankly those organizations are more respected by dems, and they often favor republicans.

I'd venture to say that Tavis Smiley carries more weight with the average Black voter than the NAACP and he did appear on that.

He did appear on the Presidential Candidates' Forum sponsored by the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition and do a great job debating with Dean, Sharpton, Braun, etc...

I'd like to see this entire stink just go away. I agree it was an insult to skip out of the debates for no/weak reasons but he did have a good one and Black Americans will understand that if the NAACP does the right thing.

I don't understand what you mean in your last sentence? Is that directed at the NAACP? I think they're like a traffic cop on valium, and getting a little too out of touch with the people.

I think Kucinich will be speaking to Black Americans an awful lot in the future and gaining a lot of respect for it. Your point is valid but I will be angry at the NAACP if they don't clear this up. They should never had made such a huge stink in the first place. People watching the debates would have drawn their own conclusions without all the noise. Peace

Mfume is from my home state, and Gephardt and Kucinich are my favorite candidates. Boy, this one is turning out badly for me :)

Deal? :evilgrin:

And Kucinich wins by a land-slide! :)

Kucinich and Gephardt have no chance of winning and Lieberman is probably the least palatable of the bunch. They were stupid for not going. The difference between the NAACP and some other "liberals" is that when it comes down to the election, they will endorse the dem candidate (even if its one of these 3) becasue we want Bush gone.

their cousins and Aunties and Uncles and sisters and brothers and grandmas and grandpas just aren't as excited as they *could* be about voting *for* a candidate that decides blacks aren't worthy of discourse. If there is a cross-reference to Senators that sat on their hands while comfirming 2000 election results *cough,Lieberman,cough* the resultant lack of depth in support could cost one an election or 2, now couldn't it?