Rep Apologizes for Obama 'Tar Baby' Comment

[Kiki Cannoli]

Firstly, Uncle Remus stories were some of the most endearing stories ever told, and they were full of wit and wisdom on how sweet little animal characters could outfox the fox. Like Brer (Brother) Rabbit and his laffin' place, the Brier Patch. Of course, when he begged not to be thrown in the brier patch, he was and escaped forthwith.

Smart people use their wit to escape injustice, and that's exactly what Uncle Remus was all about, all the time.

To call someone a racist because he quotes from Uncle Remus is just silly.

The real rub is that it was said by a Republican, and all that is left to smear one with sometimes is the false charge of racism over any little thing for which a Democrat would be patted on the back.

Good gravy.

Secondly, no real racist honest or dishonest does minority communities any good. That'd be like KKK folks of yesteryear riding into a minority area carrying guns and shooting people over a rumor sans a court hearing.

What I find remarkable is that the guy apologized, but, yet and still, somehow liberals are being blamed for what he said. BTW, do you seriously think we all don't know the tar baby story? You left out how the term has been adopted by racist to refer to blacks in a derogatory manner. And no, a Democrat wouldn't be patted on the back for using that phrase. Or do you so soon forget how Harry Reid was condemned by Dems when he made the "negro dialect" comment? The difference was that liberals weren't trying to find some way to excuse him, or blame republicans for it.

Literary experts do not back your claim up.

The Wonderful Tar-Baby Story
Editor's Analysis of "The Wonderful Tar-Baby Story

If anything, the stories of Uncle Remus point out how shrewd black people were in spite of the ill-mannered treatment they suffered with punishment for daring to learn how to read and write in some parts, and the stories should be read to show how their wisdom overcame nearly every encountered perverse trial they faced as well as their far better good humanness than any tormenter they had.

Speech issues? Hey, pal I endured years of whining about Bush's drawl at NYT Forums years ago, and it wasn't Republicans doing the complaining, it was Democrats.

So a race issue?

It gets the wah-wah trumpet ridicule it deserves from me.

Uncle Remus pulled out the best, not the worst in black people. Using dialect as a dagger on somebody else is nothing but a wire whisk that whips up froth in the silliest of ways.

FreedomBecki - just curious, have you never heard the term 'tar baby' used as a pejorative? I agree that the original intent was positive, but unfortunately, over the course of time the phrase took on a negative connotation. I do not know what the Rep. intent was, could all be rather innocent however IMHO it was insensitive.

 

[freedombecki]

What I find remarkable is that the guy apologized, but, yet and still, somehow liberals are being blamed for what he said. BTW, do you seriously think we all don't know the tar baby story? You left out how the term has been adopted by racist to refer to blacks in a derogatory manner. And no, a Democrat wouldn't be patted on the back for using that phrase. Or do you so soon forget how Harry Reid was condemned by Dems when he made the "negro dialect" comment? The difference was that liberals weren't trying to find some way to excuse him, or blame republicans for it.

Literary experts do not back your claim up.

The Wonderful Tar-Baby Story
Editor's Analysis of "The Wonderful Tar-Baby Story

If anything, the stories of Uncle Remus point out how shrewd black people were in spite of the ill-mannered treatment they suffered with punishment for daring to learn how to read and write in some parts, and the stories should be read to show how their wisdom overcame nearly every encountered perverse trial they faced as well as their far better good humanness than any tormenter they had.

Speech issues? Hey, pal I endured years of whining about Bush's drawl at NYT Forums years ago, and it wasn't Republicans doing the complaining, it was Democrats.

So a race issue?

It gets the wah-wah trumpet ridicule it deserves from me.

Uncle Remus pulled out the best, not the worst in black people. Using dialect as a dagger on somebody else is nothing but a wire whisk that whips up froth in the silliest of ways.

I guess you think being deliberately obtuse makes you seem clever. Yes, since you're obviously too stupid to figure that comment out, I'm calling you obtuse. Either deliberately, or by some freak accident of nature. Please find one single source that directly claims that the term Tar Baby is NOT a racial slur. Understand me now, because I know you're kind of slow. I don't mean an "expert" from a KKK website, or some obscure quote with no author attribution, taken out of context. I want the actual words..."Tar Baby is not a racial slur", or words to that effect.

I heard the story at a tender age and laughed till I cried because it was so funny. I wasn't thinking black or white, I was thinking "silly funny animals." The literary commentary backs me up one hundred percent. The black people survived and thrived under the duress that was placed upon them by sheer wit and wisdom against virtual dulliards who would harm them.

You're only seeing what you want to see. I've seen racial hatred and racial meanness up close and personal. I didn't prefer to see it, it was merely there, seen in a way I couldn't possibly miss it. Such perversity is not in any Uncle Remus tale, but its diametric opposite is--human cleverness and diversion tactics in the face of meanness.

Get a grip.

 

[The_GiantNoodle]

GOP Rep. Doug Lamborn of Colorado has apologized to President Obama for using the controversial phrase "tar baby" in a talk-radio discussion of the president's economic policies (specifically, "I don't want to be associated with him. It's like touching a tar baby and you get it, you're stuck").

According to the Huffington Post, the term "tar baby" has origins going back to an 1881 Uncle Remus story by writer Joel Chandler Harris and can be used to imply that a situation is difficult to solve. It has recently developed more derogatory connotations related to African Americans.

Lamborn, who has been called the most conservative member of Congress, was of course only familiar with the "difficult to solve" definition. And he's already decided that the president will accept his apology, telling the Denver Post, "I am sure that he will not take offense and that he'll be happy to accept my apology because he is a man of character."

The Tea Partier may be right. With a record of voting to the right of 96 percent of his colleagues on economic issues and 93 percent on social issues, Lamborn's poor choice of words (he says in retrospect that he would have used "quagmire" instead) reflects badly on his judgment and vocabulary (and perhaps his subconscious), but it's probably the least of the president's problems with him. Rep Apologizes for Obama Tar Baby Comment

Just what the Tea Party needs right now. The only thing I agree with him on is that Obama will probably accept his apology. I hope the voters don't.

HOLY F-IN CRAP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I didnt hear about this till now. This is HORRIBLE!!!!!!!!!!!!
Much worse than a sex scandal!!!!!!!!

 

[The_GiantNoodle]

Ladies and Gentlemen......
CONTACT HIS OFFICE!!!!!!!!!!!

Contact Doug

WASHINGTON OFFICE
437 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: (202) 225-4422
Fax: (202) 226-2638

DISTRICT OFFICES
1271 Kelly Johnson Blvd. Suite 110
Colorado Springs, CO 80920
Phone: (719) 520-0055
Fax: (719) 520-0840
415 Main Street
Buena Vista, CO 81211
Phone: (719) 520-0055
Fax: (719) 520-0840
(no mail delivery)

DESTROY HIM!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[freedombecki]

What I find remarkable is that the guy apologized, but, yet and still, somehow liberals are being blamed for what he said. BTW, do you seriously think we all don't know the tar baby story? You left out how the term has been adopted by racist to refer to blacks in a derogatory manner. And no, a Democrat wouldn't be patted on the back for using that phrase. Or do you so soon forget how Harry Reid was condemned by Dems when he made the "negro dialect" comment? The difference was that liberals weren't trying to find some way to excuse him, or blame republicans for it.

Literary experts do not back your claim up.

The Wonderful Tar-Baby Story
Editor's Analysis of "The Wonderful Tar-Baby Story

If anything, the stories of Uncle Remus point out how shrewd black people were in spite of the ill-mannered treatment they suffered with punishment for daring to learn how to read and write in some parts, and the stories should be read to show how their wisdom overcame nearly every encountered perverse trial they faced as well as their far better good humanness than any tormenter they had.

Speech issues? Hey, pal I endured years of whining about Bush's drawl at NYT Forums years ago, and it wasn't Republicans doing the complaining, it was Democrats.

So a race issue?

It gets the wah-wah trumpet ridicule it deserves from me.

Uncle Remus pulled out the best, not the worst in black people. Using dialect as a dagger on somebody else is nothing but a wire whisk that whips up froth in the silliest of ways.

FreedomBecki - just curious, have you never heard the term 'tar baby' used as a pejorative? I agree that the original intent was positive, but unfortunately, over the course of time the phrase took on a negative connotation. I do not know what the Rep. intent was, could all be rather innocent however IMHO it was insensitive.

It's insensitive when a Republican says it about a Democrat?

But it's not insensitive when a Democrat caterwauls a southern dialect and speech impediments rendered a recent Republican POTUS a Mad Magazine fool?

The only difference here is that Republicans apologize if there is even a hint they have erred in someone else's perceptions.

I have not seen one single Democrat apologize for the spurilous if not calumnous things said about President George W. Bush that were categorically straight out of JHHatfield's lying manuscript which became the platform of the Democrat Party in 2000 and perilously, 2004. Not one!!! Even Dan Rather who was excoriated and fired for publishing a falsified story about the President years later went on and on and on about how truthful he was, when such was not the case. His story was not founded in proof but in hatred and the prejudice garnered over years of hearing the JHHatfield schtick over and over and over.

JHHatfield was a Texas convict who served time for setting a carbomb up in his boss's automobile for the purpose of murdering him. Mr. Hatfield took exception when then-Texas Governor Bush refused to pardon him. When his term was served, Mr. Hatfield decided to get even with Governor Bush by writing a huge piece of fiction he successfully passed off to Little Brown and Co., who planned to publish it as nonfiction. When the four interviewees of Mr. Hatfield allegedly interviewed were queried, each of them told the same story--Mr. Hatfield not only had never interviewed any of them, he hadn't even talked to any of them on the phone, verified by the phone company.

lol

What a number the Democrats did on President George Bush. Most Presidents get 100 days. The Democrats didn't give President Bush 100 seconds. At his first address to the nation, the new Senator and former First Lady Clinton rolled her eyes every time President Bush said one word. I saw the camera shots of her, and it wasn't too dignified. I don't care any more. It's water under the bridge. What I do care about is the two-party system. When one party executes such egregious behavior as that, they lose status in the eyes of everyday people who aren't leaning one way or the other. It would have been understandable if the party learned a lesson from it the first time, but the same carbon copy charges as Hatfield falsely claimed came up in 2004 election, almost verbatim. Bush won on a sympathy vote twice the Electoral College, and he had stiff competition both times.

I hope I never see another political party worship the words of a wannabe murderer as some kind of Yoda being to build a party plank around. The entire JHHatfield package was rejected by the American people twice and I'm sorry to say, Mr. Rather let it be his downfall..

 

[Kiki Cannoli]

Literary experts do not back your claim up.

The Wonderful Tar-Baby Story
Editor's Analysis of "The Wonderful Tar-Baby Story

If anything, the stories of Uncle Remus point out how shrewd black people were in spite of the ill-mannered treatment they suffered with punishment for daring to learn how to read and write in some parts, and the stories should be read to show how their wisdom overcame nearly every encountered perverse trial they faced as well as their far better good humanness than any tormenter they had.

Speech issues? Hey, pal I endured years of whining about Bush's drawl at NYT Forums years ago, and it wasn't Republicans doing the complaining, it was Democrats.

So a race issue?

It gets the wah-wah trumpet ridicule it deserves from me.

Uncle Remus pulled out the best, not the worst in black people. Using dialect as a dagger on somebody else is nothing but a wire whisk that whips up froth in the silliest of ways.

FreedomBecki - just curious, have you never heard the term 'tar baby' used as a pejorative? I agree that the original intent was positive, but unfortunately, over the course of time the phrase took on a negative connotation. I do not know what the Rep. intent was, could all be rather innocent however IMHO it was insensitive.

It's insensitive when a Republican says it about a Democrat?

But it's not insensitive when a Democrat caterwauls a southern dialect and speech impediments rendered a recent Republican POTUS a Mad Magazine fool?

The only difference here is that Republicans apologize if there is even a hint they have erred in someone else's perceptions.

I have not seen one single Democrat apologize for the spurilous if not calumnous things said about President George W. Bush that were categorically straight out of JHHatfield's lying manuscript which became the platform of the Democrat Party in 2000 and perilously, 2004. Not one!!! Even Dan Rather who was excoriated and fired for publishing a falsified story about the President years later went on and on and on about how truthful he was, when such was not the case. His story was not founded in proof but in hatred and the prejudice garnered over years of hearing the JHHatfield schtick over and over and over.

JHHatfield was a Texas convict who served time for setting a carbomb up in his boss's automobile for the purpose of murdering him. Mr. Hatfield took exception when then-Texas Governor Bush refused to pardon him. When his term was served, Mr. Hatfield decided to get even with Governor Bush by writing a huge piece of fiction he successfully passed off to Little Brown and Co., who planned to publish it as nonfiction. When the four interviewees of Mr. Hatfield allegedly interviewed were queried, each of them told the same story--Mr. Hatfield not only had never interviewed any of them, he hadn't even talked to any of them on the phone, verified by the phone company.

lol

What a number the Democrats did on President George Bush. Most Presidents get 100 days. The Democrats didn't give President Bush 100 seconds. At his first address to the nation, the new Senator and former First Lady Clinton rolled her eyes every time President Bush said one word. I saw the camera shots of her, and it wasn't too dignified. I don't care any more. It's water under the bridge. What I do care about is the two-party system. When one party executes such egregious behavior as that, they lose status in the eyes of everyday people who aren't leaning one way or the other. It would have been understandable if the party learned a lesson from it the first time, but the same carbon copy charges as Hatfield falsely claimed came up in 2004 election, almost verbatim. Bush won on a sympathy vote twice the Electoral College, and he had stiff competition both times.

I hope I never see another political party worship the words of a wannabe murderer as some kind of Yoda being to build a party plank around. The entire JHHatfield package was rejected by the American people twice and I'm sorry to say, Mr. Rather let it be his downfall..

Well thanks for the answer. Actually the whole R vs. D thing never entered my head...I was just thinking about humans mistreating humans.

 

[The_GiantNoodle]

It's insensitive when a Republican says it about a Democrat?

But it's not insensitive when a Democrat caterwauls a southern dialect and speech impediments rendered a recent Republican POTUS a Mad Magazine fool?

.

Dear LORD!!!! Im not for EITHER side but THIS is a HORRIBLE thing. How dare you be political on this crap! Yes, blacks tend to be a bit more racist on whites. But it has ZERO bering here!!!!!! We are to be HONERABLE people. And we are to lift ourselves above this shit.
Plus your a bringing in politics to the conversation! WHAAAAT? I am no sympathiser. Especially since I was beaten and robbed by blacks years ago. (Im white) But how DARE you turn something that is not.... into something that you spin into some BS racist crap!!!!

 

[Tank]

Obama says he was just being a "typical white person".

 

[The Infidel]

A nation of pussies.

I weep for America.

I agree. Apparently, a sticky substance is now offensive. How pathetic. That's what left wing whining about 'racism' has done. We now cannot speak in case some fucking moron creates some faux outrage. Pathetic jerkoffs.

Kind of like Eeny, meeny, miny, moe

Eeny, meeny, miny, moe - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

or drinking the Kool-Aid

Anything to give the idiots out there a reason to squawk and whine...

I say any dumbass that took that as a racist statement ought to look in the mirror. To Hell with an apology.... FTW!

What a bunch of pussies indeed!

 

[rightwinger]

Literary experts do not back your claim up.

The Wonderful Tar-Baby Story
Editor's Analysis of "The Wonderful Tar-Baby Story

If anything, the stories of Uncle Remus point out how shrewd black people were in spite of the ill-mannered treatment they suffered with punishment for daring to learn how to read and write in some parts, and the stories should be read to show how their wisdom overcame nearly every encountered perverse trial they faced as well as their far better good humanness than any tormenter they had.

Speech issues? Hey, pal I endured years of whining about Bush's drawl at NYT Forums years ago, and it wasn't Republicans doing the complaining, it was Democrats.

So a race issue?

It gets the wah-wah trumpet ridicule it deserves from me.

Uncle Remus pulled out the best, not the worst in black people. Using dialect as a dagger on somebody else is nothing but a wire whisk that whips up froth in the silliest of ways.

I guess you think being deliberately obtuse makes you seem clever. Yes, since you're obviously too stupid to figure that comment out, I'm calling you obtuse. Either deliberately, or by some freak accident of nature. Please find one single source that directly claims that the term Tar Baby is NOT a racial slur. Understand me now, because I know you're kind of slow. I don't mean an "expert" from a KKK website, or some obscure quote with no author attribution, taken out of context. I want the actual words..."Tar Baby is not a racial slur", or words to that effect.

I heard the story at a tender age and laughed till I cried because it was so funny. I wasn't thinking black or white, I was thinking "silly funny animals." The literary commentary backs me up one hundred percent. The black people survived and thrived under the duress that was placed upon them by sheer wit and wisdom against virtual dulliards who would harm them.

You're only seeing what you want to see. I've seen racial hatred and racial meanness up close and personal. I didn't prefer to see it, it was merely there, seen in a way I couldn't possibly miss it. Such perversity is not in any Uncle Remus tale, but its diametric opposite is--human cleverness and diversion tactics in the face of meanness.

Get a grip.

Other people heard the same story and laghed and said "Look at that tar baby....ni**ers look just like that" Young black children were then taunted with the term tar babies and it became offensive

Once that bell was wrung, you can't go back to an innocent Uncle Remus story

 

[editec]

GOP Rep. Doug Lamborn of Colorado has apologized to President Obama for using the controversial phrase "tar baby" in a talk-radio discussion of the president's economic policies (specifically, "I don't want to be associated with him. It's like touching a tar baby and you get it, you're stuck").

According to the Huffington Post, the term "tar baby" has origins going back to an 1881 Uncle Remus story by writer Joel Chandler Harris and can be used to imply that a situation is difficult to solve. It has recently developed more derogatory connotations related to African Americans.

Lamborn, who has been called the most conservative member of Congress, was of course only familiar with the "difficult to solve" definition. And he's already decided that the president will accept his apology, telling the Denver Post, "I am sure that he will not take offense and that he'll be happy to accept my apology because he is a man of character."

The Tea Partier may be right. With a record of voting to the right of 96 percent of his colleagues on economic issues and 93 percent on social issues, Lamborn's poor choice of words (he says in retrospect that he would have used "quagmire" instead) reflects badly on his judgment and vocabulary (and perhaps his subconscious), but it's probably the least of the president's problems with him. Rep Apologizes for Obama Tar Baby Comment

Just what the Tea Party needs right now. The only thing I agree with him on is that Obama will probably accept his apology. I hope the voters don't.

It rather sad that the man is in trouble for this particular metaphor because metaphorically that was a good choice

The fact that tar is black and so too is Obama was not, I suspect, his point.

Tar baby is a well understood metphor to describe something that is a trap, and having NOTHING to do with RACISM.

It's time we Americans grew up when it comes to issue of race.

And in this case, its the DEMS who really ought to grow up.

 

[Stephanie]

LOL, now they have their panties in a wad over TAR BABY.

How figgen hilarious. I'll be glad when the Obama is gone, then we won't have to listen to stupid shit like this.

someone called him TAR BABY..lol lol lol lol lol

 

[Two Thumbs]

GOP Rep. Doug Lamborn of Colorado has apologized to President Obama for using the controversial phrase "tar baby" in a talk-radio discussion of the president's economic policies (specifically, "I don't want to be associated with him. It's like touching a tar baby and you get it, you're stuck").

According to the Huffington Post, the term "tar baby" has origins going back to an 1881 Uncle Remus story by writer Joel Chandler Harris and can be used to imply that a situation is difficult to solve. It has recently developed more derogatory connotations related to African Americans.

Lamborn, who has been called the most conservative member of Congress, was of course only familiar with the "difficult to solve" definition. And he's already decided that the president will accept his apology, telling the Denver Post, "I am sure that he will not take offense and that he'll be happy to accept my apology because he is a man of character."

The Tea Partier may be right. With a record of voting to the right of 96 percent of his colleagues on economic issues and 93 percent on social issues, Lamborn's poor choice of words (he says in retrospect that he would have used "quagmire" instead) reflects badly on his judgment and vocabulary (and perhaps his subconscious), but it's probably the least of the president's problems with him. Rep Apologizes for Obama Tar Baby Comment

Just what the Tea Party needs right now. The only thing I agree with him on is that Obama will probably accept his apology. I hope the voters don't.

It was a poor choice of words for people who spend thier days trying to be offended.

So I guess you will vote for someone other than obama since his choice for VP called his fellow Americans terrorist b/c they have a different opinion.

Unless, of course, you are yet another in a long line of lying hypocrites that see it differently.

 

[Wry Catcher]

So far back that no one even knows WTF it means.

Fucking wimpy assholes.

Those who read and remember know WTF it means:

Why "Tar Baby" Is Such a Sticky Phrase - TIME

Above links to an article in Time from 2006.

It generally means a sticky situation, and I take the Congressman's word he used it in that context.

 

[Sallow]

Again..with feeling..

List of ethnic slurs - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Racial Slur Database

Hulu - Saturday Night Live: Word Association

 

[Sallow]

GOP Rep. Doug Lamborn of Colorado has apologized to President Obama for using the controversial phrase "tar baby" in a talk-radio discussion of the president's economic policies (specifically, "I don't want to be associated with him. It's like touching a tar baby and you get it, you're stuck").

According to the Huffington Post, the term "tar baby" has origins going back to an 1881 Uncle Remus story by writer Joel Chandler Harris and can be used to imply that a situation is difficult to solve. It has recently developed more derogatory connotations related to African Americans.

Lamborn, who has been called the most conservative member of Congress, was of course only familiar with the "difficult to solve" definition. And he's already decided that the president will accept his apology, telling the Denver Post, "I am sure that he will not take offense and that he'll be happy to accept my apology because he is a man of character."

The Tea Partier may be right. With a record of voting to the right of 96 percent of his colleagues on economic issues and 93 percent on social issues, Lamborn's poor choice of words (he says in retrospect that he would have used "quagmire" instead) reflects badly on his judgment and vocabulary (and perhaps his subconscious), but it's probably the least of the president's problems with him. Rep Apologizes for Obama Tar Baby Comment

Just what the Tea Party needs right now. The only thing I agree with him on is that Obama will probably accept his apology. I hope the voters don't.

It rather sad that the man is in trouble for this particular metaphor because metaphorically that was a good choice

The fact that tar is black and so too is Obama was not, I suspect, his point.

Tar baby is a well understood metphor to describe something that is a trap, and having NOTHING to do with RACISM.

It's time we Americans grew up when it comes to issue of race.

And in this case, its the DEMS who really ought to grow up.

It comes up in the two databases I posted of racial slurs and the sketch with Chevy Chase and Richard Pryor.

 

[Two Thumbs]

But it's Ok to call conservatives terrorist.

I'm sure there's a story somewhere that uses terroist in some other fashion than to imply people that murder innocent by standards.

Whens the last time anyone ever head the term tar baby?

Let alone heard anyone call someone a tar baby.

 

[Divine Wind]

Yes, because he is black and it is racist to use it to refer to black people

When does it switch from being "racially sensistive" to "racist" when treating people different because of the color of their skin?

If this remark had been in reference to negotiating with Senator Reid or by a Democrat in reference to negotiating with Tea Party members, would we be having this conversation?

Is this racist:? “The Tar Baby” Strategy | The Democratic Daily

If President Obama accepts Rep. Lamborn's apology, is it because the President is a stand up guy? Being Politically Correct? or would it be because he'd prefer to be judged by the content of his character and not the color of his skin?

 

[California Girl]

LOL, now they have their panties in a wad over TAR BABY.

How figgen hilarious. I'll be glad when the Obama is gone, then we won't have to listen to stupid shit like this.

someone called him TAR BABY..lol lol lol lol lol

No one called him a fucking tar baby.

Geeez, it appears that both sides are incapable of discussing the actual facts of the comment and, seemingly, prefer to howl about something that did not happen.

No wonder the country is a mess. Far too much stupid.

 

[Stephanie]

LOL, now they have their panties in a wad over TAR BABY.

How figgen hilarious. I'll be glad when the Obama is gone, then we won't have to listen to stupid shit like this.

someone called him TAR BABY..lol lol lol lol lol

No one called him a fucking tar baby.

Geeez, it appears that both sides are incapable of discussing the actual facts of the comment and, seemingly, prefer to howl about something that did not happen.

No wonder the country is a mess. Far too much stupid.

If you say so.