Full Version: Is Rev Jesse Jackson an opportunist or
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Why in the world did Jesse Jackson insert himself into the Terri Schiavo death watch? Somebody explain it to me.
QUOTE(Paulie @ Mar 29 2005, 09:36 AM)
Why in the world did Jesse Jackson insert himself into the Terri Schiavo death watch? Somebody explain it to me.
Ralph Nader did too, although I don't think he went down there. They would appear to be not as progressive as I thought they were.
Jackson has frequently been a grandstander. Why he would want to get involved in the Schiavo matter is beyond me though. It sounds like most of the people down there are fanatical, unless he wants to calm things down and talk about true Christian values rather than the un-Christian "Kill Michael but keep Terri alive" values.
The people hanging around the death watch seem like fringe types to me. I'm sure Nader and Jackson are hoping for free press coverage. Don't they "get" it makes them look utterly dispicable?
Have they no shame?
Have they no shame?
They are both shamelessly despicable. They must feel that any opportunity to be in front of the camera is better than being totally ignored. They are just embarrassing. Too bad they don't seem to know it.
How do they rationalize their acts?
QUOTE(Paulie @ Mar 29 2005, 03:06 PM)
How do they rationalize their acts?
Jackson has always been and will always be an opportunist. I have NEVER seen him turn down a stroll in front of a camera or a mike.
I believe he has a "Messianic" streak and his ego is even bigger than his pride. Not good for a "preacher" in my opinion.
I leave the room when he arrives. :nod:
Jesse Jackson Jumps Into Florida Right-To-Die Case
ReutersReuters
Mar 29, 2005 — By Jane Sutton
PINELLAS PARK, Fla. (Reuters) - The parents of brain-damaged Terri Schiavo were joined by prominent civil rights campaigner the Rev. Jesse Jackson on Tuesday in an 11th-hour appeal to Florida lawmakers to prolong her life.
But it was unlikely the Florida legislature would change its mind and intervene 11 days after Schiavo's feeding tube was removed, thrusting a long and bitter family feud over her fate into a highly politicized national spotlight.
"She is being starved to death, she is being dehydrated to death. That's immoral and unnecessary," Jackson told reporters after meeting Schiavo's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, near the hospice in Pinellas Park where she is being cared for.
Supporters of the parents said Schiavo, 41, was still responding to them, had urinated overnight — a sign her kidneys continue to function — and could yet be saved.
Schiavo, severely brain damaged 15 years ago, was taken off her feeding tube on March 18 after a seven-year court battle between her parents and her husband and legal guardian, Michael Schiavo, who insists she would not want to be kept alive artificially.
"This is one of the profound moral issues of our time," said Jackson, long a leading Democratic voice on civil rights. "We ask today for some hard hearts to be softened up," he said, adding that he was in touch with members of the Florida legislature to try to get them to intervene.
Pressured by the Christian right and socially conservative activists, the Republican-led U.S. Congress passed a special law last week pushing the case into federal courts, and President Bush cut short a vacation to sign it.
The effort proved both unpopular with most Americans, according to polls, and in vain. Courts all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court refused to order the feeding tube be reinserted.
Bush's brother, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, has also intervened. In 2003, when Schiavo's feeding was previously stopped, he pushed the Florida legislature into passing a law allowing him to step in, but it was found to be unconstitutional.
ReutersReuters
Mar 29, 2005 — By Jane Sutton
PINELLAS PARK, Fla. (Reuters) - The parents of brain-damaged Terri Schiavo were joined by prominent civil rights campaigner the Rev. Jesse Jackson on Tuesday in an 11th-hour appeal to Florida lawmakers to prolong her life.
But it was unlikely the Florida legislature would change its mind and intervene 11 days after Schiavo's feeding tube was removed, thrusting a long and bitter family feud over her fate into a highly politicized national spotlight.
"She is being starved to death, she is being dehydrated to death. That's immoral and unnecessary," Jackson told reporters after meeting Schiavo's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, near the hospice in Pinellas Park where she is being cared for.
Supporters of the parents said Schiavo, 41, was still responding to them, had urinated overnight — a sign her kidneys continue to function — and could yet be saved.
Schiavo, severely brain damaged 15 years ago, was taken off her feeding tube on March 18 after a seven-year court battle between her parents and her husband and legal guardian, Michael Schiavo, who insists she would not want to be kept alive artificially.
"This is one of the profound moral issues of our time," said Jackson, long a leading Democratic voice on civil rights. "We ask today for some hard hearts to be softened up," he said, adding that he was in touch with members of the Florida legislature to try to get them to intervene.
Pressured by the Christian right and socially conservative activists, the Republican-led U.S. Congress passed a special law last week pushing the case into federal courts, and President Bush cut short a vacation to sign it.
The effort proved both unpopular with most Americans, according to polls, and in vain. Courts all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court refused to order the feeding tube be reinserted.
Bush's brother, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, has also intervened. In 2003, when Schiavo's feeding was previously stopped, he pushed the Florida legislature into passing a law allowing him to step in, but it was found to be unconstitutional.
QUOTE
Is Rev Jesse Jackson an opportunist or, what?
Sometimes, yes. But in this case, the Schindlers' called and asked him to come down and join them in prayer for Terri. He obliged, rightfully.
Sorry for being cynical...a very much European trait. i must admit, but the Schindler family seems to enjoy the spot light very much themselve: they are every time in front of the camera: they really enjoy it!
QUOTE(Paulie @ Mar 29 2005, 12:36 PM)
Why in the world did Jesse Jackson insert himself into the Terri Schiavo death watch? Somebody explain it to me.
I have no idea how this whole mess is still alive and well. Terris'(listen at me, like I knew her personally) parents are at an emotional period that no parent would want to be. They are like a drowning man clinging to anything for hope. If these people would just shut up maybe they'd see it for the better and let this happen, as it is they doing nothing but tearing themselves and this country further apart. Wonder what our European friend are thinking about this mess.
Rev. Jesse Jackson is welcome to his opinion, I will say, he won't be making hate-based threats against judges and Schiavo's brother's family when Terri dies, or calling Jeb Bush Pontius Pilate or use kids 5-9 years old to be arrested.
Jessie Jackson may be trying to bring people together down there. Hell, he tried it in the Middle East!
I'm wondering though if some political alignments are shifting. If Black Democrats support connecting Terri's feeding tube, Democrats are even more in trouble. This Rev. Mahoney is praising Jackson and says he's going to call Nader next.
Jackson and Santorum visited Tuesday.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/30/national...artner=homepage
I'm wondering though if some political alignments are shifting. If Black Democrats support connecting Terri's feeding tube, Democrats are even more in trouble. This Rev. Mahoney is praising Jackson and says he's going to call Nader next.
Jackson and Santorum visited Tuesday.
QUOTE
March 30, 2005
Appeals Court to Consider New Petition in the Schiavo Case
By ABBY GOODNOUGH
PINELLAS PARK, Fla., Wednesday, March 31 - In a new legal twist in a case already marked by back-and-forth maneuverings, a federal appeals court agreed late Tuesday to consider a request for a new hearing on whether a feeding tube should be reconnected to the severely brain-damaged Terry Schiavo.
The United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit ruled without comment. The motion was being considered this morning by all 11 judges on the Atlanta panel, a court official said today.
The court ruled against the parents last week in their appeals of rulings by a judge in Federal District court, James D. Whittemore, denying their request to reconnect the tube.
The new ruling came a day after the Rev. Jesse Jackson visited Ms. Schiavo's parents outside her hospice Tuesday, joining the religious conservatives who have encircled them for weeks in calling for Ms. Schiavo's life to be preserved.
The parents, Robert and Mary Schindler, said they had invited Mr. Jackson to join their vigil after seeing him on television criticizing the court-ordered removal of Ms. Schiavo's feeding tube. Ms. Schiavo's husband, Michael, had the tube withdrawn on March 18, five years after winning a state judge's permission to do so. Now in her 13th day without nutrition or water, she may not survive the week.
Mr. Jackson, who arrived in a white limousine and met privately with the Schindlers before addressing the news media, called Ms. Schiavo's case "one of the profound moral and ethical issues of our time." He also phoned several black Democrats in the State Senate and pressed them to reconsider legislation, defeated in the Senate last week, that would require the feeding tube to be reinserted.
"We cannot hide behind the law and not have mercy," Mr. Jackson said, calling the withholding of food and water inhumane, immoral and unnecessary.
The decision by the civil rights leader to enter the Schiavo fray at the last minute surprised some fellow Democrats.
"I don't question the motivation - I question the timing," said Donna Brazile, who managed Al Gore's presidential campaign in 2000. "The parents are in a last-ditch effort at this moment and have run out of legal options."
Yet Ms. Brazile also noted that eight members of the Congressional Black Caucus, including Mr. Jackson's son Jesse Jr., had supported legislation that gave federal courts jurisdiction in the case.
Mrs. Schindler said she and her husband had reached out to Mr. Jackson seeking moral support.
"He's very strong," she said. "He gives me strength."
The Rev. Patrick Mahoney of the Christian Defense Coalition, who has lobbied Congress and the Florida Legislature on behalf of the Schindlers, said he posed the idea last week of inviting Mr. Jackson to Pinellas Park. First, Mr. Mahoney said in a phone interview, he asked the Rev. Al Sharpton to get involved. When Mr. Sharpton refused, he said, he told Randall Terry, the anti-abortion activist who has served as a spokesman for the Schindlers, to reach out to Mr. Jackson.
"I suggested it to everyone I could see down there," said Mr. Mahoney, who left Pinellas Park this week to lobby lawmakers in Washington. "His coming says that it isn't a religious-right issue and it's O.K. for others to get involved, particularly in the African-American community."
Mr. Sharpton said in a phone interview that like Mr. Jackson, he supported resuming Ms. Schiavo's feeding, but that it would be hypocritical for him to advocate last-minute government intervention here after criticizing President Bush and Republicans in Congress for enacting the legislation that authorized the federal courts to step in.
"I do as a minister support her being reconnected," he said, "but I do not feel that I could respond to the request and at the same time criticize the president for intervening."
Pressed on why he had chosen to visit, Mr. Jackson spoke only in broad terms and said the Schiavo case should not be a partisan matter.
"This is a global issue, and oftentimes the big issues of life are reduced to a single person who brings clarity," he said. "Conservatives and liberals can find common ground. It's a transcendent moment and a transcendent opportunity."
As it turned out, Mr. Jackson was not the only political figure to visit on Tuesday. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, the No. 3 Republican in the United States Senate, arrived shortly after 9 p.m. and told Mr. Schindler and Suzanne Vitadamo, Ms. Schiavo's sister, that "it's not right what's happening here." Mr. Santorum told reporters that he had previously arranged to be in Florida for a conference on Social Security. Asked whether he was still trying to intervene in the Schiavo case, he said that "I've been making a lot of calls to a lot of people," but added that "I'm not particularly hopeful."
Mr. Jackson said that he had sought Mr. Schiavo's permission to visit the 41-year-old patient in her hospice room but that Mr. Schiavo, through his lawyer, had turned him down. Mr. Schindler, who made a morning visit to his daughter, described her as "failing."
Still, the Schindlers said they had not abandoned hope.
"We still have her," Mr. Schindler said. "It's not too late to save her."
Talking to reporters Tuesday evening, Mrs. Schindler referred to Mr. Schiavo's girlfriend and the two children they now have. "Michael, Jodi," she said, "you have your own children. Please, please, give my child back to me."
In another turn late Tuesday, the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office got a call around 4 p.m. from an anonymous man who said, "There was a bomb in the area, and it will go off if Terri dies," according to Sanfield Forseth, a Pinellas Park police captain. Dogs swept the area, though the police did not check inside the hospice, Captain Forseth said, because security there was already so high.
Mr. Mahoney said he would keep trying to expand the coalition rallying for the reinsertion of Ms. Schiavo's feeding tube. The next person on his call list, he said, is Ralph Nader.
"I wish I could have been there to see people who probably cursed the Rev. Jesse Jackson in the past suddenly cheering him," Mr. Mahoney said of protesters outside the hospice. "I wish there had been a broader coalition of spokespeople addressing this from the beginning."
Reporting for this article was contributed by Lynn Waddell and William Yardley from Pinellas Park; Adam Nagourney from Estero, Fla.; Christine Jordan Sexton from Tallahassee, Fla.; and David D. Kirkpatrick from New York.
Appeals Court to Consider New Petition in the Schiavo Case
By ABBY GOODNOUGH
PINELLAS PARK, Fla., Wednesday, March 31 - In a new legal twist in a case already marked by back-and-forth maneuverings, a federal appeals court agreed late Tuesday to consider a request for a new hearing on whether a feeding tube should be reconnected to the severely brain-damaged Terry Schiavo.
The United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit ruled without comment. The motion was being considered this morning by all 11 judges on the Atlanta panel, a court official said today.
The court ruled against the parents last week in their appeals of rulings by a judge in Federal District court, James D. Whittemore, denying their request to reconnect the tube.
The new ruling came a day after the Rev. Jesse Jackson visited Ms. Schiavo's parents outside her hospice Tuesday, joining the religious conservatives who have encircled them for weeks in calling for Ms. Schiavo's life to be preserved.
The parents, Robert and Mary Schindler, said they had invited Mr. Jackson to join their vigil after seeing him on television criticizing the court-ordered removal of Ms. Schiavo's feeding tube. Ms. Schiavo's husband, Michael, had the tube withdrawn on March 18, five years after winning a state judge's permission to do so. Now in her 13th day without nutrition or water, she may not survive the week.
Mr. Jackson, who arrived in a white limousine and met privately with the Schindlers before addressing the news media, called Ms. Schiavo's case "one of the profound moral and ethical issues of our time." He also phoned several black Democrats in the State Senate and pressed them to reconsider legislation, defeated in the Senate last week, that would require the feeding tube to be reinserted.
"We cannot hide behind the law and not have mercy," Mr. Jackson said, calling the withholding of food and water inhumane, immoral and unnecessary.
The decision by the civil rights leader to enter the Schiavo fray at the last minute surprised some fellow Democrats.
"I don't question the motivation - I question the timing," said Donna Brazile, who managed Al Gore's presidential campaign in 2000. "The parents are in a last-ditch effort at this moment and have run out of legal options."
Yet Ms. Brazile also noted that eight members of the Congressional Black Caucus, including Mr. Jackson's son Jesse Jr., had supported legislation that gave federal courts jurisdiction in the case.
Mrs. Schindler said she and her husband had reached out to Mr. Jackson seeking moral support.
"He's very strong," she said. "He gives me strength."
The Rev. Patrick Mahoney of the Christian Defense Coalition, who has lobbied Congress and the Florida Legislature on behalf of the Schindlers, said he posed the idea last week of inviting Mr. Jackson to Pinellas Park. First, Mr. Mahoney said in a phone interview, he asked the Rev. Al Sharpton to get involved. When Mr. Sharpton refused, he said, he told Randall Terry, the anti-abortion activist who has served as a spokesman for the Schindlers, to reach out to Mr. Jackson.
"I suggested it to everyone I could see down there," said Mr. Mahoney, who left Pinellas Park this week to lobby lawmakers in Washington. "His coming says that it isn't a religious-right issue and it's O.K. for others to get involved, particularly in the African-American community."
Mr. Sharpton said in a phone interview that like Mr. Jackson, he supported resuming Ms. Schiavo's feeding, but that it would be hypocritical for him to advocate last-minute government intervention here after criticizing President Bush and Republicans in Congress for enacting the legislation that authorized the federal courts to step in.
"I do as a minister support her being reconnected," he said, "but I do not feel that I could respond to the request and at the same time criticize the president for intervening."
Pressed on why he had chosen to visit, Mr. Jackson spoke only in broad terms and said the Schiavo case should not be a partisan matter.
"This is a global issue, and oftentimes the big issues of life are reduced to a single person who brings clarity," he said. "Conservatives and liberals can find common ground. It's a transcendent moment and a transcendent opportunity."
As it turned out, Mr. Jackson was not the only political figure to visit on Tuesday. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, the No. 3 Republican in the United States Senate, arrived shortly after 9 p.m. and told Mr. Schindler and Suzanne Vitadamo, Ms. Schiavo's sister, that "it's not right what's happening here." Mr. Santorum told reporters that he had previously arranged to be in Florida for a conference on Social Security. Asked whether he was still trying to intervene in the Schiavo case, he said that "I've been making a lot of calls to a lot of people," but added that "I'm not particularly hopeful."
Mr. Jackson said that he had sought Mr. Schiavo's permission to visit the 41-year-old patient in her hospice room but that Mr. Schiavo, through his lawyer, had turned him down. Mr. Schindler, who made a morning visit to his daughter, described her as "failing."
Still, the Schindlers said they had not abandoned hope.
"We still have her," Mr. Schindler said. "It's not too late to save her."
Talking to reporters Tuesday evening, Mrs. Schindler referred to Mr. Schiavo's girlfriend and the two children they now have. "Michael, Jodi," she said, "you have your own children. Please, please, give my child back to me."
In another turn late Tuesday, the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office got a call around 4 p.m. from an anonymous man who said, "There was a bomb in the area, and it will go off if Terri dies," according to Sanfield Forseth, a Pinellas Park police captain. Dogs swept the area, though the police did not check inside the hospice, Captain Forseth said, because security there was already so high.
Mr. Mahoney said he would keep trying to expand the coalition rallying for the reinsertion of Ms. Schiavo's feeding tube. The next person on his call list, he said, is Ralph Nader.
"I wish I could have been there to see people who probably cursed the Rev. Jesse Jackson in the past suddenly cheering him," Mr. Mahoney said of protesters outside the hospice. "I wish there had been a broader coalition of spokespeople addressing this from the beginning."
Reporting for this article was contributed by Lynn Waddell and William Yardley from Pinellas Park; Adam Nagourney from Estero, Fla.; Christine Jordan Sexton from Tallahassee, Fla.; and David D. Kirkpatrick from New York.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/30/national...artner=homepage
'I'm here because I care,' Jackson tells crowd
PINELLAS PARK - Police turned away the white limousine a few blocks before it reached the Hospice House Woodside entrance Tuesday. Only the media, people with hospice business or those who work nearby are allowed to drive cars in.
The Rev. Jesse Jackson would have to hoof it.
The civil rights leader from Chicago had received a call Monday from Mary Schindler, inviting him to Florida in a last-ditch attempt to keep her daughter, Terri Schiavo, alive.
"I'm here because I care. I'm here because I'm passionate about this," Jackson told a clutch of reporters. "It is so cold not to even allow ice cubes for her parched lips. We can do better than that."
Schiavo, whose end-of-life travails have attracted international attention, has gone without food or water for 12 days since her feeding tube was removed under court order. A daily protest vigil outside the hospice has been grist for round-the-clock news coverage. Jackson's star power temporarily energized the familiar scene.
"Pray with us, pray with us, Rev. Jackson!" shouted protesters. Jackson approached, extended his arms, bowed his head and murmured soft words. Three or four hands clutched each of his arms.
Upon arrival Jackson ducked inside a gift shop, across 102nd Avenue N from the hospice, which serves as unofficial headquarters for Schiavo's parents and siblings. Randall Terry, who works with the Schindler family, said Jackson had hoped to visit Terri, but was denied permission by her husband's attorney, George Felos.
Instead, Jackson spent about 90 minutes in the gift shop, praying with the family and telephoning Florida senators, trying to persuade them to resurrect a defunct bill intended to keep her alive. Reports from Tallahassee indicated his efforts met with little success.
About 11:20 a.m., Jackson emerged and made the rounds of the makeshift tents, where local television stations, networks and cable shows beam out their signals.
Withholding life support might be appropriate for a cancer victim, hooked to a machine, Jackson said. "But without food and water for 12 days, and she's still alive? It's starvation to death. It's dehydration to death," he said. "It's inhumane."
Twice a Democratic presidential candidate, Jackson was asked why he aligned with people like Randall Terry, who earned political stripes by encouraging people to blockade abortion clinic doors.
"This is where blacks and whites find common ground. Conservatives and liberals," Jackson said. "We watch her struggle. We see her on TV. She is now part of our lives. We are all potentially Terris."
Jackson tried to broaden his message, saying Schiavo is a symbol that many people are starving, that the country needs better health care and that "nobody should be left behind."
Mary Schindler, who frequently clasped Jackson's arm or hand, thanked him for his support and prayers.
"It was wonderful," she said. "I appeal to the Florida Senate to please, please pass this new bill."
But Sen. Gary Siplin, D-Orlando, told Jackson he wouldn't get involved. "He's a pastor, and I'm a Christian, too," Siplin said. "I believe in miracles. But if the Lord wanted to do something, he would do it."
Jackson also talked to Sen. Les Miller, D-Tampa, the Senate minority leader. "We've voted on it," Miller said. "The issue is out of the hands of the Legislature. We have to move on."
A quick reconsideration of the Senate vote would require 27 of the 40 members. No one thought that would be possible in a chamber where the measure failed 21-18 less than a week ago.
"Right now, even if somebody changes their position, I would say it's not enough to win the vote," said Sen. Dan Webster, R-Winter Garden, the legislation's sponsor.
Gov. Jeb Bush was skeptical of Jackson's efforts. The Legislature "would have to start all over again and there wouldn't be time for that," Bush said.
These political nuances were lost on protesters at the hospice. For four hours, they had a hero.
"Jesse for president! Jesse for president!" someone yelled as Jackson walked back to his limo, with Mary Schindler on one arm and Schiavo's sister, Suzanne Vitadamo, on the other.
"Tell the Bush brothers we voted them in and we'll vote them out if they don't protect our rights!" yelled someone else. One man rushed to Jackson and pressed a "pro-life" sticker in his hand and asked him to wear it. Jackson took one look, kept walking and curled the sticker up in his palm.
Times staff writers Carrie Johnson and Joni James contributed to this report.
© Copyright 2003 St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved
http://stpetetimes.com/2005/03/30/news_pf/...cause_I_c.shtml
Thanks Pie.
I think a politician ought to be able to listen to his own conscience when it diverges from his platform every once in a while.
I'm on Michael Schiavo's side in all of this, but I think Jackson is probably doing what he thinks is right. If anything, it's probably going to hurt his political career, and I think he knows it.
I'm on Michael Schiavo's side in all of this, but I think Jackson is probably doing what he thinks is right. If anything, it's probably going to hurt his political career, and I think he knows it.
QUOTE(GoIllini @ Mar 30 2005, 11:57 AM)
If anything, it's probably going to hurt his political career, and I think he knows it.
Maybe not. He's winning some friends on the religious right.
QUOTE(D103486 @ Mar 29 2005, 07:15 PM)
Sometimes, yes. But in this case, the Schindlers' called and asked him to come down and join them in prayer for Terri. He obliged, rightfully.
Which begs the question why they suddenly asked him to come down and join them. Sorry, it seems to be a publicity oriented action, as opposed to a sincere act, by both Jackson and the Schindlers. The latter of which courted Randall Terry to create the media event and probably courted Jackson because of the criticism of all this concern for one white woman in limbo in comparison to the lack of concern shown for the predominantly minority children wh really are starving to death.
I don't get it. And I like Jesse (and am proud to say I voted for him in the NY Primary for President all those years ago.)
But I don't get it. I thought when I heard he was going down there, he would be on the husband's side.
Since Al Sharpton became the voice of the party in 2004, is it just hurt feelings or pride?
It sure seems late in the day for him to do it, and reeks of opportunism.
If it indeed is the start of a trend, democrats are in for some trouble to a base democrats cannot in any way afford to lose.
So again, I am at a loss for why he just did not stay home on this one,
and maybe come down and try to heal next week, or later this week, without taking sides.
But I don't get it. I thought when I heard he was going down there, he would be on the husband's side.
Since Al Sharpton became the voice of the party in 2004, is it just hurt feelings or pride?
It sure seems late in the day for him to do it, and reeks of opportunism.
If it indeed is the start of a trend, democrats are in for some trouble to a base democrats cannot in any way afford to lose.
So again, I am at a loss for why he just did not stay home on this one,
and maybe come down and try to heal next week, or later this week, without taking sides.
QUOTE(mommadona @ Mar 29 2005, 07:49 PM)
Jackson has always been and will always be an opportunist. I have NEVER seen him turn down a stroll in front of a camera or a mike.
I believe he has a "Messianic" streak and his ego is even bigger than his pride. Not good for a "preacher" in my opinion.
I leave the room when he arrives. :nod:
I believe he has a "Messianic" streak and his ego is even bigger than his pride. Not good for a "preacher" in my opinion.
I leave the room when he arrives. :nod:
I remember a comment by Marion Barry when he was mayor of DC and there were rumors about Jackson seeking that job: "The only thing that Jesse knows how to run is his mouth!"
That said I would guess that, in his own mind, Jackson thinks that he is doing the right thing. That doesn't mean that I agree with him, or that I discount the probabaility that he has opportunistic motives as well.
QUOTE(beamer619 @ Mar 30 2005, 02:14 PM)
Maybe not. He's winning some friends on the religious right.
And man, they're so going to vote for him over the next crazy Republican that comes along, calling abortion murder and advocating the OT death penalty for gays.
I don't see how this is some sort of power play by Jackson- or how he expects to gain politically from this at all.
QUOTE
Jackson has always been and will always be an opportunist. I have NEVER seen him turn down a stroll in front of a camera or a mike.
I believe he has a "Messianic" streak and his ego is even bigger than his pride. Not good for a "preacher" in my opinion.
I leave the room when he arrives.
I believe he has a "Messianic" streak and his ego is even bigger than his pride. Not good for a "preacher" in my opinion.
I leave the room when he arrives.
It seems like you just pulled a Karl Rove, here, momma. I thought Jesse was a good Democrat, but now the second that he's siding with the Christian Right, we get all over him.
Sometimes, peoples' consciences speak louder than their brains. And don't you worry- Jackson's gonna suffer politically for this. Personally, I'll even be less inclined to vote for him- just because I'll be worried that his brain might turn off when it comes to other important issues with the environment and crazy right-wing judges.
Attacking peoples' character when they do something we don't like is something that I hope we can leave to the Republicans.
There's more than just two sides in most issues.
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