Charlie Rose

Adrian Burrough  04/28/2008 10:56 AM Report

The Clintons have just about turned my stomach upside down. To look back and know that Bill Clinton pulled the wool on the Black communities eyes, but no more Mr. President. The REAL BILL is standing up. Just another boy from the south who learned nothing but pure hate down here for what he was taught. Now he is trying to pull Obama to his level and he's not going. You can forget that. He's going to win the nomination and the election with dignity and the truth, something the Clintons know nothing about. I'm not voting at all if Senator Obama in not nominated, not for McCain and definitely not for the Clintons to go back to the White House and scare all of the interns away. I'm sure she will continue to run for the nomination long after the race between McCain and Senator Obama has ended and Senator Obama is President. Does the woman have a mental problem or going through the change of life? What his her problem saying she will continue to run until after the votes in Florida and Mich. are counted. Get a grip Hillary!!!!!

B.J. of Atlanta  04/28/2008 10:33 AM Report

I would like to see fair and proper reporting of the news. What the hell does Rev. Wright have to do with Senator Obama's thoughts and inspirations for President. You people h ave gone too far. The tactic that the news/Clintons used is so transparent!!! Who died and went to heaven and made you GOD. I totally agree w/ Rev. Wright. You don't know a thing about the bible, let along the Black Church. Report on Peter Paul/Clintons; all the suicides in Arkansas, the cocaine addiction of Bill Clinton (according to his brother in his biography) under the Clintons reign, how Hillary's hatred of the people/ town because she thought she was better than them. I never hear about these issues. Their association with Rezko and Rev. Wright. You are bias and you need to report all the news or none!!! I'm fed up with all the "hypocrisy!"

Christopher  01/16/2008 02:07 PM Report

Rep. James Clyburn correctly gave the US voter a blueprint on how to vote. Look at the program. That is how you vote. Not the personality, not appearances, not whether he/she believes in God, it is the program that counts.

Sam D  01/16/2008 02:03 AM Report

Relax folks. Charlie is still the consummate Republican and he is just following the party line of trying to get Clinton as the Democratic party candidate because they think they have the best chance to beat her.

Rep Clyburn is the one who made the most public outcry about Clinton using her little tale about Martin Luther King Jr's soaring speeches but it took LBJ to pass the law to actually get things done. The only surprising thing is how fast the Clintons got to Clyburn to make him spin this into attacking Obama and his people for trying to call the Clintons racist.

However, NO ONE has called the Clintons RACIST. What people (that are totally outside of the Obama campaign) have said is that SHE should not make insensitive allusions that offend many people.

Then the Clintons whine "they are attacking us for being racist; oh Obama's folks are horrible; oh, oh, they are using race; oh, oh, they are bad people; oh, oh, they are using the race card; oh, oh, I am the victim, and here we have been so good to the black people, oh, oh, oh.

Give me a break!

By the way, which Clinton is running for president again? I forget.

mary  01/15/2008 11:16 PM Report

I'm curious as to what happened to my comment made on Rep. Clyburn which I posted after last night's show?

Robert  01/15/2008 07:25 PM Report

Why was my post removed?

The point of my post was, that the real battle here is not race or gender.

Rather what it ought to be is about issues and who we trust to lead.

Thus, the campaigning has been bogged down in sly, dirty tactics -- which I can only describe as utterly Clintonian. And this, I think is at the heart of the anger among Obama supporters; a perception that the other side doesn't play fair.

Larry Arsenault  01/15/2008 03:58 PM Report

I have always respected the Charlie Rose Show as being some of the best television ever, but today for the first time, I just had to turn it off. Every time Rep Clyburn graciously tried to turn the conversation off race Charlie kept pounding this media inspired race side show. At first I hoped Charlie was just airing out the laundry to dry, but when he brought on a panel of media pundents to reinforce this circus - I had to turn it off.

Race has NOT been an issue. It was a very small, insignificant remark that seems to have caught the media's sensationalist, tabloid nature is trying to incite even as all sides actually involved have said it isn't an issue. And speaking of "issues," that's what the people want to hear but the media is absorbed in talking to itself with mundane questions such as: "Who has raised the most money? Who's ahead in the polls? Can a woman/ African American win?" that have no bearing on the quality or direction a candidate may take us. The media is so far off base that they are constantly getting it wrong. Hillary being promoted as the sho-in. Hillary loosing New Hamshire. Hillary makng racist remarks.

If the media would stop smearing the frosting and starting digging for the meat and potatoes we'd all be a lot better informed and able to a make better, and very crucial decision.

We've got our economy on the edge of a cliff, an endless war in the Middle East, China holds enough debt to influence policy, education in a straight jacket, we've lost our manufacturing base, our whole planet is facing radical climatic change that will affect everything - and Charlie Rose is doing his bit to stir up racism?

C'mon Charlie, I know you can do a whole lot better.

TABS  01/15/2008 02:35 PM Report

The cruel lash of slavery has so scared the psyche of African Americans that the mere whisper of race breaks open the wounds. Abraham Lincoln freed African Americans from slavery, allowing them to be men under the law. However he could not give them social equality even if he had wanted to. It was too much a leap of faith for white America to accept African Americans as equal when so short a time ago they had been considered to be mere property on the par with the family dog. Now 150 years has passed and Barack Obama has arrived on the scene. An African American running for the highest public office in the land. Barack Obama comes to you, aking to be considered for President based upon his merits, his ideas, his intellect, his good sense as a man and not on the colour of his skin. White America has given the nod of affirmation to Barack Obama with his victory in Iowa. Yet there are those in America who would throw the colour of his skin in his face to break open those wounds for their own narrow political gain.

TABS  01/15/2008 04:28 AM Report

Any endorsement by Rep Clyburn of any canidate would be a dimunation of his political power. The central premise of the entire C Rose show was that in 2 years time the American people might be wistfully nostaligic for the good ole days of GW Bush's presidency. The call was for the Democratic canidates to stick to the high road of the issues and not let it degenerate into petty name calling that will tear the Democratic Party apart just when it seems likely that their agenda of "change" might actually take place.The cynical might just conclude that the politics of "change" in reality is the same old politics of yore.

tishijo  01/15/2008 02:12 AM Report

Unfortunately I missed Congressman Clyburn's interview with Charlie, but I saw the discussion following, which could better be described as a public lynching of a black man right before our eyes.

I am a white feminist about the same age as Hillary Clinton and have watched the three front runners closely for months. The Clintons began attacking Obama in November when he began rising in the polls. Apologies or not, their camp has sent out false and damaging e-mail against Obama some racial, some misrepresenting his health care plan and his strong pro-choice history and all e-mails are still circulating. In every speech, Hillary herself has told voters lies about Obama. Our illustrious former President, Bill Clinton has joined her heartily in the lies about Obama's opposition to and voting on the funding of the Iraq war. Everything they have lied about is documented and disproves their rhetoric, but they rely on the press to keep it alive because once its out there some people will believe it.

The sympathetic vote from other women following Hillary's "real" moment in New Hampshire was followed by Steinham's attempt to pit gender vs. race, with inflammatory dialogue that of course, gender is at such a disadvantage, inciting women to unite.

Hillary was mocking Obama's message of hope with an insensitive analogy in regard to civil rights action that set off a backlash mainly in the Black community. To counteract the blunder Hillary, Bill and one of their campaign contributors went on TV and radio and proceeded to accuse Obama of causing the backlash. Our illustrious President Bill Clinton commented that Obama's campaign was a fairy tale. Following the backlash of that comment, Clinton went on TV and radio stating he was only referring to the idea that Obama spoke out against the Iraq war. The press followed all of this by reporting only the results, leaving out the facts about who incited the gender vs. race issue.

Since the beginning of the Clinton attacks, Senator Obama has been put on the defense, yet the press spins all of the above as a "fight." The Clintons deliberately promoted gender and race, and have attempted consistently to bait Obama into a fight. Senator Obama has never taken the bait, but simply responds forcefully and with the truth on http://factcheck.barackobama.com. The Clintons are shameful and contemptible in this effort and have seriously divided the Black community, and seriously harmed the Democratic Party! The most common comment I see in the blogs, is "if Hillary is nominated I will not vote, or vote Republican. I have lost all respect for the Clintons and for the Democratic leaders too cowardly to take a stand against this outrageous swift boating by the Clintons against Obama.

Ms. Smith  01/15/2008 01:40 AM Report

HILLARY AND MARIAN WRIGHT EDLEMAN ARE NOT POLITICAL FRIENDS.

Obviously, this is the election of the century, when former Pres. Clinton is calling KISS-FM Radio, to try to keep the spotlight off of them,and place it on Barack. Connect the dots 2008 Voters. See the insert below from Democracy Now, go back in your mind and remember.

AMY GOODMAN: Marian Wright Edelman, we just heard Hillary Rodham Clinton. She used to be the head of the board of the Childrenâ??s Defense Fund, of the organization that you founded. But you were extremely critical of the Clintons. I mean, when President Clinton signed off on the, well, so-called welfare reform bill, you said, â??His signature on this pernicious bill makes a mockery of his pledge not to hurt children.â?? So what are your hopes right now for these Democrats? And what are your thoughts about Hillary Rodham Clinton?

MARIAN WRIGHT EDELMAN: Well, you know, Hillary Clinton is an old friend, but they are not friends in politics. We have to build a constituency, and you donâ??tâ??and we profoundly disagreed with the forms of the welfare reform bill, and we said so. We were for welfare reform, I am for welfare reform, but we need good jobs, we need adequate work incentives, we need minimum wage to be decent wage and livable wage, we need healthcare, we need transportation, we need to invest preventively in all of our children to prevent them ever having to be on welfare.

And yet, you know, many years after that, when many people are pronouncing welfare reform a great success, you know, weâ??ve got growing child poverty, we have more children in poverty and in extreme poverty over the last six years than we had earlier in the year. When an economy is down, and the real test of welfare reform is what happens to the poor when the economy is not booming. Well, the poor are suffering, the gap between rich and poor widening. We have what I consider one ofâ??a growing national catastrophe of what we call the cradle-to-prison pipeline. A black boy today has a one-in-three chance of going to prison in his lifetime, a black girl a one-in-seventeen chance. A Latino boy whoâ??s born in 2001 has a one-in-six chance of going to prison. We are seeing more and more children go into our child welfare systems, go dropping out of school, going into juvenile justice detention facilities. Many children are sitting upâ??15,000, according to a recent congressional GAO studyâ??are sitting up in juvenile institutions solely because their parents could not get mental health and healthcare in their community. This is an abomination.

And so, the plight of our children is very, very tenuous, and what weâ??ve got to do is to put togetherâ??and every Democratic candidate and every Republican candidate, whatever their views on the political spectrum, have got to come to a consensus that we are not going to let children be neglected or abused every thirty-six seconds in this country, be born into poverty every thirty-six seconds in this rich nation. And we ought to make a commitment to ending child poverty. Every single candidate should do that. We have got to see that we stop the absolute scandal of a child being born without health insurance every forty-seven seconds, 90% of whose parents liveâ??and working parents, the majority of those children. There are all kinds of children. They live in suburban and rural areas. Theyâ??re white, as well as Latino and black. Theyâ??re all of our children.

Weâ??ve got to stop the scandal of children being killed by guns, almost eight every day. We have a chronic, silent Virginia Tech massacre every four days among our children. And the candidates need to be forced to address how they are going to deal with this extraordinary deprivation of basic needs from our children and how do we come up with very concrete commitments beginning this year, by saying we are going to get healthcare for every child.

AMY GOODMAN: Marian Wright Edelman, the Democrats are in charge of Congress, are in charge of the House, as well as the Senate. Youâ??ve also spoken very forcefully about the lack of support for the people who suffered from Hurricane Katrina. The Democrats are in charge. Whatâ??s happening?

http://www.democracynow.org/2007/7/24/childrens_defense_funds_marian_wright_edelman

JS  01/15/2008 01:24 AM Report

I thought I was going to watch a balanced discussion but I was very disappointed. With the one Congressman clearly a Clinton apologist (he seemed to think his son's support of Obama somehow balanced things out),the others not even discussing Obama's side(even though they did not declare support for Clinton) there was no one to explain or defend Obama's position at all. I felt very frustrated.

But my strongest feeling is horror at the prospect of years more of Clinton tricks, drama,disingenousness and conflict (with each other and everyone else). None of us in this country deserve it. What we need is an administration that will not be paralyzed by personalities! Many of the Democratic candidates could have given us that. We have three left now who still can. Hillary Clinton cannot. Everyone knows that. Why is she still here and Joe Biden and others are not? Our country has too many problems. We need Obama or Edwards..Obama being first choice in our large, white, Texas family!

Tim Everett  01/15/2008 01:19 AM Report

Most of the news agencies questioned the race issue that was raised by Tim Russert on Meet the Press as If the race issue was the most important question that Tim Russert asked on Sunday. I beg to differ with the CNN, Fox News, ABC, NBC, CBS, and MSNBC by choosing the race issue as news worthy event that deals with the democratic election.

The most important question I think that was asked by Tim Russert was the one about whether Sen. Clinton was involved in the pardon of Mark Rich, AKA Mark David Reich? Sen. Clinton response was â??No I didnâ??t know anything about that.â?? This is a blatant fabrication to the American people by Sen. Clinton. How could she not know about Mark Rich? Mark Rich was pardon by President Clinton on his last day in power creating a firestorm of controversy in both houses of Congress, causing both houses to issue a rash of subpoenas calling for witnesses as well financial records. When the Indictments came about for his tax evasion of 48 million dollars, fraud, trading with the enemy, Mark Rich escaped to Switzerland where he started a new business with no fear of the American legal system. The worst thing Mark Rich was involved in was buying oil from the Ayatollah Khomeini while Iran held American hostages. Why did President Clinton pardoned Mark Rich? Mark Richâ??s wife donated 1 million dollars to the Democratic Party, and gave Bill Clinton $17300 for his defense fund. And who was Mark Rich Lawyer? Lewis "Scooter" Libby. Now, how could Sen. Clinton say she didnâ??t know anything about Mark Rich pardon by her husband, when it was on front page news when Clinton was leaving office?

Hillary has participated in a fabrication that is obvious by anyone who hasnâ??t forgotten about her husband controversies before he left office. The news agencies have ignored this important question purposefully. The news agencies know this is an issue that the Republicans are waiting to expose Hillary hypocritical past; therefore they want her to win the democratic nomination. And it appears CNN, FOX, MSNBC, ABC, CBS and NBC are in partnership with the Republicans to destroy Obama and Hillary thereby open the way to the white house for the Republicans so they continue with their war in Iraq, and to ignite a war with Iran just like they never asked any questions concerning the lies that lead up the Iraqi war.

Tim Russert on Meet the Press with Sen. Clinton:

â??MR. RUSSERT: You say you've been deeply involved in the eight years of the Clinton administration. One of the powers given to a president is the power of pardon. At the end of the president's second term, he granted 140 pardons, including one to Marc Rich, someone who had been convicted of tax evasion, fraud and making illegal oil deals with Iran. Were you involved in that pardon?

SEN. CLINTON: No. I didn't know anything about that.

MR. RUSSERT: No one talked to you whatsoever?

SEN. CLINTON: No. No. Unh-unh.

MR. RUSSERT: His ex-wife gave $109,000 to your campaign.â??

61 year old   01/15/2008 12:56 AM Report

This whole thing reminds me of other contentious primaries I have been involved in. The most charitable interpretation is the poster I once saw in a school that the message sent is not always the message received. Whatever the intent, the words hit a sour note apparently for some in the audience. Not the first time that has happened. Not a virtue by anyone! It sounds to me like Clintonites treating Obama as a young whippersnapper usurping their candidate's "earned" right to be president--and anyone who is my age ought to know that a younger generation has the right to challenge the politics of their elders!

OF COURSE it takes elected officals to actually get legislation passed. But could they do it alone without outside agitation?

More importantly, what is wrong with hope?

I have seen candidates win or nearly win "impossible" races and in once case it was because a candidate gave cynical veterans hope that maybe politics could make government do something important after all.

When I was roughly the age Sen. Obama is now, there were a lot of things which have happened which could not yet be imagined. A Democratic president being re-elected was one of them.

That doesn't mean I am a Clinton fan. Actually, there is a lot to like about Edwards--he talks about people who work hard but are not rich, about people without health care, for that matter about families who need to hope. I've been laid off, survived a serious illness, lost friends who died too young, learned the importance of mobility when I sprained an ankle. But I should vote for the "experience" candidate over the "hope" candidate because Hillary says so?

The Clinton folks are making a mistake when they downgrade hope as not solving problems. Yes, I know it takes elected officials to pass and sign legislation (not just a president but also those in the legislative branch). One of my reactions when seeing the film clip of Hillary Clinton praising LBJ (does she realize those of us with friends who are disabled Vietnam vets don't necessarily see him as a hero?) was to think she chose her words poorly.

Another was to hear the famous LBJ speech in my mind in LBJ's voice--something like "...and we shall overcome it". Without Martin Luther King Jr. leading a crusade which inspired people and gave them hope, would that LBJ speech ever have been given? There are those of us who recall the LBJ folks and their reaction to the 1964 Miss. Freedom Democrats and that whole delegate credential fight--was that not part of the civil rights struggle? What about those of us white kids who had black friends, white churches hiring black soloists, that sort of thing?

If there are people so eager to win by insulting their opponent, how do they intend to win the general election if they win the nomination? Or haven't they thought that far?

People without hope that one candidate will make this country a better place than the other candidate might just stay home, no matter what LBJ did for civil rights!

Ms.Smith  01/15/2008 12:40 AM Report

Clinton recently said that it took President Lyndon Johnson to bring King's dream to reality with the signing of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

Obama told ABC's Political Radar blog that what Clinton said was:

Revealing about her political character. "I do think it was indicative of the perspective that she brings, which is that what happens in Washington is more important than what happens outside of Washington," he said.

He said he believes the quote betrays a belief on her part, "that the intricacies of the legislative process were somehow more significant than when ordinary people rise up and march and go to jail and fight for justice."

Obama also said he isn't offended by former president Clinton's remark that much of the Obama campaign is built on a "fairy tale" about where he -- Obama -- has stood on the Iraq War.

Then he tossed a bit of a jab at the former president:

"Both he and Sen. Clinton have been spending a lot of time over the past month trying to run down my record," Obama said. "What particularly distresses me is this notion that I wasn't against the war from the start.

"This is coming from a former president who suggests that he was and nobody can find any record of it," he said.

Ms. Smith  01/15/2008 12:33 AM Report

HILLARY AND MARIAN WRIGHT EDLEMAN ARE NOT POLITICAL FRIENDS.

Obviously, this is the election of the century, when former Pres. Clinton is calling KISS-FM Radio, to try to keep the spotlight off of them,and place it on Barack. Connect the dots 2008 Voters. See the insert below from Democracy Now, go back in your mind and remember.

AMY GOODMAN: Marian Wright Edelman, we just heard Hillary Rodham Clinton. She used to be the head of the board of the Childrenâ??s Defense Fund, of the organization that you founded. But you were extremely critical of the Clintons. I mean, when President Clinton signed off on the, well, so-called welfare reform bill, you said, â??His signature on this pernicious bill makes a mockery of his pledge not to hurt children.â?? So what are your hopes right now for these Democrats? And what are your thoughts about Hillary Rodham Clinton?

MARIAN WRIGHT EDELMAN: Well, you know, Hillary Clinton is an old friend, but they are not friends in politics. We have to build a constituency, and you donâ??tâ??and we profoundly disagreed with the forms of the welfare reform bill, and we said so. We were for welfare reform, I am for welfare reform, but we need good jobs, we need adequate work incentives, we need minimum wage to be decent wage and livable wage, we need healthcare, we need transportation, we need to invest preventively in all of our children to prevent them ever having to be on welfare.

And yet, you know, many years after that, when many people are pronouncing welfare reform a great success, you know, weâ??ve got growing child poverty, we have more children in poverty and in extreme poverty over the last six years than we had earlier in the year. When an economy is down, and the real test of welfare reform is what happens to the poor when the economy is not booming. Well, the poor are suffering, the gap between rich and poor widening. We have what I consider one ofâ??a growing national catastrophe of what we call the cradle-to-prison pipeline. A black boy today has a one-in-three chance of going to prison in his lifetime, a black girl a one-in-seventeen chance. A Latino boy whoâ??s born in 2001 has a one-in-six chance of going to prison. We are seeing more and more children go into our child welfare systems, go dropping out of school, going into juvenile justice detention facilities. Many children are sitting upâ??15,000, according to a recent congressional GAO studyâ??are sitting up in juvenile institutions solely because their parents could not get mental health and healthcare in their community. This is an abomination.

And so, the plight of our children is very, very tenuous, and what weâ??ve got to do is to put togetherâ??and every Democratic candidate and every Republican candidate, whatever their views on the political spectrum, have got to come to a consensus that we are not going to let children be neglected or abused every thirty-six seconds in this country, be born into poverty every thirty-six seconds in this rich nation. And we ought to make a commitment to ending child poverty. Every single candidate should do that. We have got to see that we stop the absolute scandal of a child being born without health insurance every forty-seven seconds, 90% of whose parents liveâ??and working parents, the majority of those children. There are all kinds of children. They live in suburban and rural areas. Theyâ??re white, as well as Latino and black. Theyâ??re all of our children.

Weâ??ve got to stop the scandal of children being killed by guns, almost eight every day. We have a chronic, silent Virginia Tech massacre every four days among our children. And the candidates need to be forced to address how they are going to deal with this extraordinary deprivation of basic needs from our children and how do we come up with very concrete commitments beginning this year, by saying we are going to get healthcare for every child.

AMY GOODMAN: Marian Wright Edelman, the Democrats are in charge of Congress, are in charge of the House, as well as the Senate. Youâ??ve also spoken very forcefully about the lack of support for the people who suffered from Hurricane Katrina. The Democrats are in charge. Whatâ??s happening?

http://www.democracynow.org/2007/7/24/childrens_defense_funds_marian_wright_edelman

suzanne  01/14/2008 11:57 PM Report

Although I generally think the Charlie Rose Show is fair in its presentation of conversations about controversial issues, I am very concerned that tonight's show (1/14)is heavily weighted toward supporters of Senator Clinton. Both Rep. Smith and Rep.Clyburn are clearly supporters who are spouting the same Clinton spin message. This is not appropriate for a discussion that is supposed to be analyzing and untangling the narrative that has gotten the campaign into this morass. Thank goodness for Patricia Williams

Liddell Brooks  01/14/2008 07:10 PM Report

It is refreshing to see a positive, inclusive and inspiring young politician succeed so far without having to resort to aggressive negative messages, in contrast to what the Clintons now seem inclined to do. At least, from what we know so far, Obama knows what IS is. ...And there is no hint that he is about to look straight into any camera, finger wagging for emphasis, in any attempt to mislead his wife, people who have put their trust in him, or his beloved country, like some experienced politician, just to hide the number of times he has rolled the dice for some gratification on the side. Also, there is no hint that we will have to deal with bimbo eruptions or little blue dresses during his presidency should the voters choose to elect him. It is perfectly fine to raise questions about Obama who is not as well known to Americans as the Clintons. Increasingly though, it seems the Clintons are more inclined to try using inflammatory negative metaphors and fists in velvet gloves in their attempts to take down Obama. Only a naïve fool would take seriously this self-serving attempt at belittling a presidential candidate. It reeks of an overweening sense of entitlement. It is the same sort of entitlement that this otherwise exceptional fellow was railing against when Bush the son was running for the presidency - Clinton used to deride Bush saying "Elect me because my Daddy was President." Now we are being asked to elect another Clinton because one was President. The irony of it has not escaped many. The drive-by smears of Obama merely reminded one of the less than savoury aspects of the Clintons and their legendary cut-throat political artistry - I mean, how is one able to defy the laws of biology and physics by actually smoking without inhaling? Fairy tales indeed... Give me a break! At least Obama has leveled with the American people and not tried linguistic contortions to deny facts that are fairly plain for any intelligent observer to see. At one level, Obama should thank the Clintons; if he can successfully handle these attacks, then it will toughen him up for the far worse looming GOP post-primary onslaught, should he be the nominee. He should defend himself while trying by all means to accentuate the positive and not let himself get dragged down to their level. He should focus on the issues, particularly the economy, health care, the war, energy independence, climate change, social security, education, etc. There is panic in the Clinton camp and they are resorting to desperate tactics to save the day. The prospect of defeat and a dream slipping through one's fingers can lead to tears and desperate measures indeed. It really looks increasingly like it is more about dynastic power for the Clintons than lifting the nation up to be at its best.