The Story behind the video
John O'Connor didn't set out for the Tea Party rally intending to expose Champaign Mayor Jerry Schweighart as a Birther. Honest. The grad student at the U of I Center for Writing Studies was hoping to get some insight into the movement for his research into web-mediated political discourse, and was collecting video for that purpose.
"It started that I walked up and introduced myself, and he politely said, 'How are you doing?'" O'Connor said in a phone interview with Joel Gillespie yesterday. "The first question I asked was, 'Do you support the Tea Party?' And he kind of laughed and said something to the effect of, 'Yeah, that's why I'm here.'" And then the immortal Q&A in the video clip ensued.
O'Connor explained, "I was expecting him to say something about the federal grants, the broadband grant... the economy, unemployment, anything that would relate to a local issue. But then of course the first words out of his mouth were thinking that he wasn't an American."
"Then, immediately after that ― I wasn't really intending to ask him this, but his response to that first question of what he thinks about Obama was so off the wall ― I followed up with, 'Do you think he's a socialist?' At which point the Mayor paused, and said, 'Oh, you're trying to bait me.' At that point, someone else nearby started talking and made it clear that the Mayor was done talking with me."
O'Connor shared his personal views about what Schweighart's statements say about his fitness to hold public office. "In my view, it's disqualifying for holding any office including dogcatcher. It just shows a willful and deliberate denial of facts. And I think it's blatant racism. Most of the Birthers are either gullible and easily manipulated, or more likely, they can't handle the fact that we have a person with some African heritage as our president and they're grasping at any straws they can."
He continued, "I realize the racism charge might seem inflammatory, and that some people are going to call me the racist for saying that the Birthers are motivated by racism, but I think that just is what it is. We should just put that out in the open."
"It started that I walked up and introduced myself, and he politely said, 'How are you doing?'" O'Connor said in a phone interview with Joel Gillespie yesterday. "The first question I asked was, 'Do you support the Tea Party?' And he kind of laughed and said something to the effect of, 'Yeah, that's why I'm here.'" And then the immortal Q&A in the video clip ensued.
O'Connor explained, "I was expecting him to say something about the federal grants, the broadband grant... the economy, unemployment, anything that would relate to a local issue. But then of course the first words out of his mouth were thinking that he wasn't an American."
"Then, immediately after that ― I wasn't really intending to ask him this, but his response to that first question of what he thinks about Obama was so off the wall ― I followed up with, 'Do you think he's a socialist?' At which point the Mayor paused, and said, 'Oh, you're trying to bait me.' At that point, someone else nearby started talking and made it clear that the Mayor was done talking with me."
O'Connor shared his personal views about what Schweighart's statements say about his fitness to hold public office. "In my view, it's disqualifying for holding any office including dogcatcher. It just shows a willful and deliberate denial of facts. And I think it's blatant racism. Most of the Birthers are either gullible and easily manipulated, or more likely, they can't handle the fact that we have a person with some African heritage as our president and they're grasping at any straws they can."
He continued, "I realize the racism charge might seem inflammatory, and that some people are going to call me the racist for saying that the Birthers are motivated by racism, but I think that just is what it is. We should just put that out in the open."
3 comments:
Willfully ignorant, for sure, and possibly racist. The underlying premise of the birthers seems to be not only "not an American" but also "not fit to be an American."
"A child is automatically granted citizenship in the following cases:
1. Both parents were U.S. citizens at the time of the child's birth
2. At least one parent lived in the United States prior to the child's birth.
INA 301(c) and INA 301(a)(3) state, "and please one of whom has had a residence." The FAM (Foreign Affairs Manual) states "no amount of time specified.""
I don't care where he was born... His mother was a US citizen... so he is.
Do you think some of these people believe that Hawaii is still a foreign country? Ha! I'm inclined to believe the same of Alaska.
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