As the Huffington Post reported, last week resident flame thrower and so-called "tea partier" Rep. Joe Walsh made these remarks attacking the Rev. Jesse Jackson: Joe Walsh: Jesse Jackson Trying To 'Keep African Americans Down On Some Plantation':
Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Ill.) isn't backing down from controversial comments he made last week about Rev. Jesse Jackson -- instead, he's ramping them up.
"All Jesse Jackson is trying to do is to keep African Americans down on some plantation," he said on the "Big John & Amy" radio show Friday, as reported by Chicagoist.
Walsh came under fire from Democrats earlier this week for telling constituents that the party wants Hispanics and African Americans to be dependent on government. He said Jackson, a civil rights leader, wants the same thing.
"Jesse Jackson would be out of work if [African Americans] weren't dependent on government," he said at a town hall meeting last week. [...]
Jackson also responded, telling the Associated Press that Walsh seemed to be attempting to "incite and polarize" voters. The reverend said that the majority of Americans receiving aid for the government are not non-whites and added that he has devoted his life to gaining equal protection under the law for "all vulnerable Americans." [...]
Walsh disagreed, although he conceded that he does not know Jackson personally:
Amy, I know enough of the man to know that if African Americans -- how come Jesse Jackson opposes school choice for inner city African American parents? How come he won't give that ability to low-income black parents? Because he doesn't want blacks, African Americans to escape miserable public schools.He won't give them that opportunity. Why? Because he wants them dependent and imprisoned in terrible public schools in the inner city.
He went on to say "this really has nothing to do with race," but repeated his comments from last week that Democrats "want people dependent on government."
As Mediaite reported this Friday, Walsh decided to double down on his statements again during an interview with Bill O'Reilly on Fox: GOP Rep. Joe Walsh Calls Jesse Jackson ‘A Race Hustler’ In Tense O’Reilly Interview:
Bill O’Reilly hosted Republican congressman Joe Walsh on his show today to talk about Walsh’s recent comments that people like Jesse Jackson are brainwashing African-Americans to make sure they stay reliant on the government. O’Reilly called out Walsh for his accusation that Jackson is conspiring to keep black Americans “in virtual slavery to the federal government.” [...]
O’Reilly asked Walsh if he honestly believes that Democrats are gathering in secret to plot how to win over certain groups like Hispanics and African-Americans by creating government programs specifically for those purposes. Walsh agreed, comparing Democratic policies of expanded government to an addiction that he would like to wean people off. Of course, since Walsh contended that people have not woken up to the Democrats’ strategy, O’Reilly asked him if that insinuation comes off as offensive.
“Is it insulting for you and other Republicans to say, ‘Hey, you know, you guys are just not smart enough to realize what the Democrats are doing’?”
Walsh countered that if he was insulting anyone with his remarks, it was the Democrats. He accused liberal African-American leaders like Jackson of “being complicit in this thing” because they “want blacks dependent upon government” and doesn’t want them to have “opportunity.”
As they noted, Walsh got a small amount of push back from O'Reilly with the "virtual slavery" arguments with Walsh responding by calling Jackson "a race hustler."
About all I can say about this is that it's pretty bad when your racism is so overt that even Bill O'Reilly starts to be uncomfortable with it given his long record of throwing gasoline on the problems with racism in the United States himself.
I just hope to hell that if we're lucky enough to see Walsh lose his seat in the next election, that Fox doesn't hire him, because I'm really tired of seeing this hate monger get air time.
