From Fox News - Obama, in 2001 Interview, Lamented Failure of Civil Rights Movement to Redistribute Wealth
Obama A History of Socialist Policies/Beliefs
A 7-year-old radio interview in which Barack Obama discussed the failure of the Supreme Court to rule on redistributing wealth in its civil rights rulings has given fresh ammunition to critics who say the Democratic presidential candidate has a socialist agenda.
The interview -- conducted by Chicago Public Radio in 2001, while Obama was an Illinois state senator and a law professor at the University of Chicago -- delves into whether the civil rights movement should have gone further than it did, so that when "dispossessed peoples" appealed to the high court on the right to sit at the lunch counter, they should have also appealed for the right to have someone else pay for the meal.
In the interview, Obama said the civil rights movement was victorious in some regards, but failed to create a "redistributive change" in its appeals to the Supreme Court, led at the time by Chief Justice Earl Warren. He suggested that such change should occur at the state legislature level, since the courts did not interpret the U.S. Constitution to permit such change.
"The Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth and sort of basic issues of political and economic justice in this society, and to that extent as radical as people try to characterize the Warren Court, it wasn't that radical," Obama said in the interview, a recording of which surfaced on the Internet over the weekend.
"It didn't break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution, at least as it has been interpreted.
"And the Warren court interpreted it generally in the same way -- that the Constitution is a document of negative liberties, says what the states can't do to you, says what the federal government can't do to you, but it doesn't say what the federal government or state government must do on your behalf, and that hasn't shifted.
"And I think one of the tragedies of the civil rights movement was that the civil rights movement became so court-focused, I think there was a tendency to lose track of the political and organizing activities on the ground that are able to bring about the coalitions of power through which you bring about redistributive change, and in some ways we still suffer from that," Obama said.
Obama A History of Socialist Policies/Beliefs
1 comment:
i must say this interview ought to be much more than a wake up call to undecided voters , more like alarm sirens.
i have spend the last several weeks trying to convince family, friends and associates that neither is an exceptional choice. Senator McCain campaign has been a disastrous jumble of talking points. Senator Obama has been quite clear in finding a message to the centre despite his record of the past.
I have railed for persons whom live states where the electoral vote is a given to cast their ballot for any candidate from a third party. This lobbying was not about seeing a third party choice elected ( there is little chance that will happen in our lifetime) but more to send a very important message to the two major parties.
The message is simple- Continue to ignore the voice of the american people at your own political risk.
My rational has been that if 10-20% swing of the overall vote total were to go the independent tickets way to would send shock waves on up to the heads of the two major parties and they would wise to start to address their constituents concerns.
The response i have been met with has been at best Why vote for a definite loser mentality to this is important of a time to be trying such an approach to downright lies and accusations of bigotry . i am sure you could figure on your own the leanings of each statement.
So blog comes as a very refreshing interlude to rest my batter self. I am thankful there is a Purple People Vote blog.
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