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applegrove

(118,006 posts)
Sat Jul 4, 2020, 01:58 AM Jul 2020

Looking for a quote. I don't know who wrote it but Cornell West said

it on AC 360 "america is the only country that could go from innocence to complete corruption with nothing in between". Something like that. I think the George Floyd protests are about a loss of innocence for white privilege and growth that will come from that for the country.

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Looking for a quote. I don't know who wrote it but Cornell West said (Original Post) applegrove Jul 2020 OP
I don't care what West has to say. sheshe2 Jul 2020 #1
I'm not a fan of West's, either. Definitely not. highplainsdem Jul 2020 #3
West's statement is characteristically dishonest. He dishonors Hortensis Jul 2020 #6
+1 betsuni Jul 2020 #7
I too was angry at West's treatment of Obama but it was idealogical applegrove Jul 2020 #5
West's treatment of Obama wasn't ideological. It was personal StarfishSaver Jul 2020 #9
Hmm. Really? Kid Berwyn Jul 2020 #11
Yes, really. StarfishSaver Jul 2020 #12
Okay that is a bit much. applegrove Jul 2020 #13
That's a variation of a well-known Oscar Wilde quote: highplainsdem Jul 2020 #2
That is it high plains. Thank you. He repeated it on AC 360. applegrove Jul 2020 #4
Thank you for actually answering the question ms liberty Jul 2020 #8
+1 dalton99a Jul 2020 #10
Nice quote, but I'm not sure about the "innocence" starting point. JustABozoOnThisBus Jul 2020 #14

sheshe2

(83,319 posts)
1. I don't care what West has to say.
Sat Jul 4, 2020, 02:21 AM
Jul 2020

Sorry applegrove, he trashed Obama.

Cornel West and Tavis Smiley do a disservice to African Americans

This article is more than 6 years old

David Dennis

I used to revere these two prominent black intellectuals. But lately, their critical voices have turned to crude Obama-bashing

snip

West has called Obama a "Rockefeller Republican in blackface" and both recently criticized Al Sharpton's support of the president as an example of him being "on the Obama's plantation". These inflammatory remarks only discredit whatever valid criticisms Smiley and West may have about how President Obama has conducted himself over the past five years. And that's a shame because the two men would otherwise have so much to offer the country as true intellectuals.

snip

Last week, President Obama delivered a landmark speech in reaction to the George Zimmerman verdict. In his 17-minute speech, he broke down the problems facing black men in this country and articulated many of the vexed issues that explain why the Zimmerman verdict hit close to home for Americans like myself. The speech was widely celebrated in the black community and, from a personal aspect, was one of those pivotal moments I'll never forget.

Smiley and West didn't see it that way. West responded by pointing out how drone strikes make Obama a "global George Zimmerman", while Smiley said the speech was "weak as pre-sweetened Kool-Aid" (whatever that means).

snip

These comments are made only more disappointing because they seem to come from a place of personal disdain, more than any desire to push an intelligent discussion. West has gone on record saying his initial rift with President Obama came from the fact that he couldn't get tickets for his family to go to the inauguration. Smiley threw a tantrum in 2008 when President Obama couldn't make his State of the Black Union event (also saying "no thanks" to a proposal to have Michelle Obama come in his place).

These two shots at the Smiley and West egos inform their rhetoric about the president, thrusting their "criticism" into the territory of "bashing". Seriously, one of the foremost philosophers of our time has been insulting the leader of the free world because he didn't get a "hook-up"? Is that what's really important here?

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/jul/26/cornel-west-tavis-smiley-disservice-african-americans

highplainsdem

(48,718 posts)
3. I'm not a fan of West's, either. Definitely not.
Sat Jul 4, 2020, 02:29 AM
Jul 2020

But I still couldn't resist a quick search of Twitter and Google to answer the question about the quote.

Hortensis

(58,785 posts)
6. West's statement is characteristically dishonest. He dishonors
Sat Jul 4, 2020, 03:29 AM
Jul 2020

intellectualism the way Trump dishonors democracy. Like too many of his sort, West earned his reputation as a thinker with self-aggrandizing work that hid his true feelings but once prominent started indulging personality flaws over intellect.

The truth is that many peoples have been overwhelmed when their worst elements, present wherever humans are, got control.

That it would happen here was our founders' greatest fear.

Our national conceit was that American exceptionalism meant it couldn't happen here.

So many assumed they didn't have to vote. Others thought they could safely enable the right out of the kind of anti-Democratic, anti-democracy spite characteristic of some on the dissident left -- whom Cornell West epitomizes. And some who believe their poison were deluded into trying to destroy.

"A republic" if you can keep it. ~ Benjamin Franklin

applegrove

(118,006 posts)
5. I too was angry at West's treatment of Obama but it was idealogical
Sat Jul 4, 2020, 03:04 AM
Jul 2020

and the whole democratic party including Biden are moving to the left. Obama admits he made some mistakes because he is a grown up and a great leader.

 

StarfishSaver

(18,486 posts)
9. West's treatment of Obama wasn't ideological. It was personal
Sat Jul 4, 2020, 08:40 AM
Jul 2020

And if we're moving to the left, it has nothing to do with anything West has ever said or done.

Kid Berwyn

(14,642 posts)
11. Hmm. Really?
Sat Jul 4, 2020, 11:11 AM
Jul 2020

“Never forget that justice is what love looks like in public.” — Cornel West



Tim Geithner used America's homeowners to ''foam the runway'' for the bankster landing.

Neil Barofsky, the former special inspector general for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, has published a new book, “Bailout: An Inside Account of How Washington Abandoned Main Street While Rescuing Wall Street.” It presents a damning indictment of the Obama administration’s execution of the TARP program generally, and of HAMP in particular.

By delaying millions of foreclosures, HAMP gave bailed-out banks more time to absorb housing-related losses while other parts of Obama’s bailout plan repaired holes in the banks’ balance sheets. According to Barofsky, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner even had a term for it. HAMP borrowers would “foam the runway” for the distressed banks looking for a safe landing. It is nice to know what Geithner really thinks of those Americans who were busy losing their homes in hard times.

CONTINUED w VIDEO and links and more letters...

http://washingtonexaminer.com/video-geithner-sacrificed-homeowners-to-foam-the-runway-for-the-banks/article/2502982

Here in Detroit, people have foamed the runway for centuries, from volunteering to fight in the Civil War to striking for fair working conditions to busting their chops as the Arsenal of Democracy to showing the world people of all races, religions and creeds could live and work together. Wall Street? Not so much.

 

StarfishSaver

(18,486 posts)
12. Yes, really.
Sat Jul 4, 2020, 12:01 PM
Jul 2020

That photo was taken before West turned on Obama because he hurt his feelings.

There's nothing "ideological" about calling President Obama a "black puppet," a "black mascot," a "brown-faced Clinton," and a “Rockefeller Republican in blackface."

highplainsdem

(48,718 posts)
2. That's a variation of a well-known Oscar Wilde quote:
Sat Jul 4, 2020, 02:24 AM
Jul 2020

"America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between."


I didn't see that Anderson Cooper 360, but some googling turned up a Cornel West interview published in January, which includes this:

https://mronline.org/2020/01/11/cornel-west-interview/


James Baldwin used to say ‘innocence itself is the crime’. You think you’re innocent and you’ve already stolen the land of indigenous people, enslaved these Africans, exploited various workers of all colors, confined women to domestic households, debased and demonized gays and lesbians and trans and so forth, then like any other empire, like any other nation as Walter Benjamin would say “You’re tied to some form of barbarism.” And if you think you’re innocent and in denial about your own barbarism, then there’s a good chance you’re living in America, because America is unique among empires to believe it moves from perceived innocence to corruption without a mediating stage of maturity. We as an empire have grown powerful and rich, but we’ve never really grown up. We’ve had some great figures who’ve tried to teach us to grow up, Melville and Whitman and Martin Luther King and Malcolm X… Stephen Sondheim, some of the great prophetic figures in the history of the American empire, but as a whole though, we’re still Peter Pan-like, we just don’t want to grow up.



Editing to add the link for the original source of that interview:

https://www.fusionmagazine.org/cornel-west-interview/

ms liberty

(8,478 posts)
8. Thank you for actually answering the question
Sat Jul 4, 2020, 08:19 AM
Jul 2020

I wanted to know as well, and was beginning to think this thread was going to offer nothing except editorializing about the person who made the quote rather than discussion of the quote itself.
A very interesting snip there, I see some truth in it.

JustABozoOnThisBus

(23,282 posts)
14. Nice quote, but I'm not sure about the "innocence" starting point.
Sat Jul 4, 2020, 04:46 PM
Jul 2020

The corruption will only be complete if RBG has to leave the SC before McConnell loses the senate early January 2021.

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