Clinton Resorts to Using Her House Negro Extraordinaire to Win Black Votes

January 13, 2008, 2:39 pm
BET Founder Slams Obama in South Carolina
By Katharine Q. Seelye

COLUMBIA, S.C. — Robert L. Johnson, the founder of Black Entertainment Television, who is campaigning today in South Carolina with Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, just raised the specter of Barack Obama’s past drug use. He also compared Mr. Obama to Sidney Poitier, the black actor, in “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.” At a rally here for Mrs. Clinton at Columbia College, Mr. Johnson was defending recent comments that Mrs. Clinton made regarding Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. She did not mean to take any credit away from him, Mr. Johnson said, when she said that it took President Johnson to sign the civil rights legislation he fought for. Dr. King had led a “moral crusade,” Mr. Johnson said, but such crusades have to be “written into law.”

“That is the way the legislative process works in this nation and that takes political leadership,” he said. “That’s all Hillary was saying.” He then added: “And to me, as an African-American, I am frankly insulted that the Obama campaign would imply that we are so stupid that we would think Hillary and Bill Clinton, who have been deeply and emotionally involved in black issues since Barack Obama was doing something in the neighborhood –­ and I won’t say what he was doing, but he said it in the book –­ when they have been involved.” Moments later, he added: “That kind of campaign behavior does not resonate with me, for a guy who says, ‘I want to be a reasonable, likable, Sidney Poitier ‘Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.’ And I’m thinking, I’m thinking to myself, this ain’t a movie, Sidney. This is real life.”

Side bar: Hillary, this advice is free: An endorsement from a man who literally and figuratively made billions of dollars off the backs of black folk by promulgating negative, misogynistic and despicable images of black women is not helpful to your campaign. Next weekend, you will have to focus on obtaining the black female vote and according to media pundits this vote will be the decisive factor in determining the victor in the South Carolina democratic primary.

That said, you will have to go to churches, and according to these pundits beauty shops (because according to them it is the only place where we debate issues of the day) and tell Sister Plunkett of the Morningside Baptist Church (fictional name and church) that you are the best candidate for the job and Bob Johnson says so. Most black women know that Johnson is the man who brought us such thought-provoking programming as "B.E.T. Uncut" which featured scantily-clad black women gryating to rap music for the pleasure of men. Sister Plunkett will be reminded of what Johnson represents because she unsuccessfully tried to stop her grand-children from watching B.E.T; a channel that is arguably a factor in the overall complanceny amongst black youth.

An endorsement from Johnson would be the equivalent to PetCo being endorsed by Michael Vick. It just doesn't make sense. Hillary, this is an endorsment that I would have passed on. Just my two cents.