I really feel bad for the King Family and legacy...

The view that a funeral is open season for political commentary is just sad. Why the f@uck attend one and try to show respect, then, if you're going to be the target of pot shots? Absolutely stupid, I don't care if you're an activist or a war hero, a funeral is a time to show respect, not grandstand and promote your cause. If you think differently don't ask me to your funeral, you might not like what I have to say in remembrance.

 

I agree. While it might make sense to discuss the deceased's politicals and goals, and even mention that there is work left to be done, it is not the appropriate time to lambast or heckle anyone paying their respects, no matter hypocritical it may seem for them to be there.

I don't think Coretta would have been amused at the behavior of few who attended.

 

Yes, but. . . see my post above.

 

Are you off meds agian?

 

(this is not really directed at you Rodger just quoting you)

Why do people keep saying it is hypocritical or solely political for the President to be present? If it was a democrat would you say the same thing? He was not necessarily there representing himself, he was there as the President and representing that office and the entire nation. It really isn't any different then when he goes to international summits or does he do that strictly for politics?

Oh and a funeral is a time to remember the person that passed not an opportunity to push a political agenda. How does trying to blast the current administration help remember a women who did great things in her life?

 

It's still an honor to have the prez attend your funeral. What political future does Bush have today? I'm betting he is not going to be re-elected.

David

 

No but his party will have a canidate running. His presence was a political gesture. It's not like the Kings and Bush are family friends.

I guess you guys would have a point if there wasn't any political shenanigans at Reagan's funeral.

 

No his presence was a gesture from a country grateful for King's contribution. That is why all former Presidents able to attend did so.

 

I hope all of you bastards come to my funeral... especially casby. He has to sit as close to the alter as possible and everyone has to bet on how close he can get before he bursts into flame.


Rodger, u hold all bets, ur a lawyer, ur trust wothy...

 

i'd hate to hear WTF the clowns would say if president bush dared not to go.

 

Yea cuz all those southern Dems were great supporters of him, right?

 

Nicely worded, Frank. RESPECT is a two-way street.

 

Werd and true dat.

 

You mean the Dixiecrats? Those ultra conservative right wing cross burning, sheet wearing, racists who threatened to kill little black children trying to enter a white school and hated the Democratic party for supporting civil rights so much they abandoned it to become the heart of the Republican Party? Those Democrats?

 

I suspect neo-con TV wouldn't devote hours of programming to this.

 

Please, enlighten us.

 

Maybe you can tell us what moderately conservative Republican president started the modern civil rights movement in the United states with the The Civil Rights Act of 1957 and The Civil Rights Act of 1960.

 

This is just for Jay....

Well the story goes, back in 1983 there was a bill in congress to make MLK day. It sailed through house with even Newt Gingrich’s support. It looked like it would pass easily in the Senate until Jesse Helms decided to get all Ann Coulter.

He claimed that MLK was a communist. He cited all of the FBI wire tap info back from the sixties.

Sen. Helms delivered his speech on King on October 3 and later supplemented it with a document of some 300 pages consisting mainly of declassified FBI and other government reports about King's connections with communists and communist-influenced groups that the speech recounted. That document, distributed on the desks of all senators, was promptly characterized as "a packet of filth" by New York's Democratic Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who threw it to the floor of the Senate and stomped on it (he later repeated his stomping off the Senate floor for the benefit of the evening news), while Sen. Edward Kennedy denounced the Helms speech as "Red smear tactics" that should be "shunned by the American people."

A few days later, columnist Edwin M. Yoder, Jr. in the Washington Post sneered that Jesse Helms "is a stopped clock if ever American politics had one" who could be depended on to "contaminate a serious argument with debating points from the gutter," while he described Kings as "a prophet, a man of good works, a thoroughly wholesome influence in American life." Writing in the Washington Times, conservative Aram Bakshian held that Sen. Helms was simply politically motivated: "He has nothing to lose and everything to gain by heaping scorn on the memory of Martin Luther King and thereby titillating the great white trash." Leftist Richard Cohen wrote of Helms in the Post, "His sincerity is not in question. Only his decency."

Meanwhile, Sen. Helms, with legal assistance from the Conservative Caucus, filed suit in federal court to obtain the release of FBI surveillance tapes on King that had been sealed by court order until the year 2027. Their argument was that senators could not fairly evaluate King's character and beliefs anc ast an informed vote on the holiday measure until they had gained access to this sealed material and had an opportunity to examine it. The Reagan Justice Department opposed this action, and on October 18, U.S. District Judge John Lewis Smith, Jr. refused to release the King files, which remain sealed to this day.

 

You mean George Wallace? He was never a Republican, check the books.

 

Okay, Jesse Helms was an idiot. Most people know that. That still doesn't tell me a thing about the "hijinks" during the Reagan funeral service. Also, your source for the Helms C&P, please.