Sunday, October 7, 2012

Twisting Obama's words

As the political campaign heats up, we see both sides doing their best to twist the words of the opposition while apologizing for their own side.  I found a recent case in point in a recent post by Roger L. Simon in PJ Media entitled Barack Obama, Segregationist.

Calling Mr. Obama is rather a strong statement.  So what is the basis of this statement?  Mr. Simon says its a recently released 2007 speech to a black audience by Mr. Obama.  And what is the damning statement?

How else do you explain a statement like “We don’t need to build more highways out in the suburbs. We should be investing in minority-owned business, in our neighborhoods”?
What can we conclude from this statement?  First, after listening to the full speech, Mr. Simon edited the quote - it isn't even accurate.  And in the context, Mr. Obama is saying that the poor (largely minority) have trouble holding jobs because they have trouble getting to and from those jobs.  People without a car can end up spending 2 hours walking or taking busses to a job because there are too few jobs in the places the poor live.

I've been hearing politicians of both parties making statements in favor of neighborhood jobs for decades and none of them have been called segregationist.  Mr. Simon seems to think that by acknowledging that inner city neighborhoods are largely minority and thus wanting to increase the number of jobs there, plus encourage the minorities who live in those neighborhoods to start businesses, Mr. Obama is encouraging segregation.

I certainly didn't agree with all of Mr. Obama's speech, and I'm sure I'd disagree with the methods he proposed to encourage minority owned businesses, but arguing that this statement is somehow meant to encourage or sanction segregation is too much of a stretch.

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