Congresswoman Maxine Waters

Obama Was Chiding Some Lazy Somebody During His CBC Speech, But Maxine Waters Sez It Ain't Her

To close the Congressional Black Caucus' Annual Legislative Conference Saturday night, President Barack Obama took to the stage and gave a fiery speech about the kicking off of ones slippers and getting back to work. It was meant to demonstrate his commitment to his Jobs Bill (that he once reminded Congress to pass) and to kick someone in the pants. Was that someone ... the CBC, itself? You, fair reader at home or work reading this? Republican obstructionists? Democratic volunteers? The base? The chattering Liberal punditocracy? Labor Unions? Obnoxious people who don't think there's any difference between the political parties when one is clearly awful and the other one is a quasi Doomsday cult right now? (I obviously support the one that's just awful.) Well, whoever the president was accusing of being the Debbie Downer of Negative Nellies it surely wasn't Congresswoman Maxine Waters of California, who was all over the teevee yesterday saying she didn't know who the president was talking to but it damn sure wasn't her!

Here's the president's speech in full, in case you missed it. It was a hum-dinger. Towards the end he channels one of my favorite indie rappers, Lyrics Born, and tells folks to "stop complaining."

From the official White House Transcript of the President's speech (potentially offending passage highlighted by moi):

And I know at times that gets folks discouraged. I know. I listen to some of you all. (Laughter.) I understand that. And nobody feels that burden more than I do. Because I know how much we have invested in making sure that we’re able to move this country forward. But you know, more than a lot of other folks in this country, we know about hard. The people in this room know about hard. (Applause.) And we don’t give in to discouragement.

Throughout our history, change has often come slowly. Progress often takes time. We take a step forward, sometimes we take two steps back. Sometimes we get two steps forward and one step back. But it’s never a straight line. It’s never easy. And I never promised easy. Easy has never been promised to us. But we’ve had faith. We have had faith. We’ve had that good kind of crazy that says, you can’t stop marching. (Applause.)

Even when folks are hitting you over the head, you can’t stop marching. Even when they’re turning the hoses on you, you can’t stop. (Applause.) Even when somebody fires you for speaking out, you can’t stop. (Applause.) Even when it looks like there’s no way, you find a way -- you can’t stop. (Applause.) Through the mud and the muck and the driving rain, we don’t stop. Because we know the rightness of our cause -- widening the circle of opportunity, standing up for everybody’s opportunities, increasing each other’s prosperity. We know our cause is just. It’s a righteous cause.

So in the face of troopers and teargas, folks stood unafraid. Led somebody like John Lewis to wake up after getting beaten within an inch of his life on Sunday -- he wakes up on Monday: We’re going to go march. (Applause.)

Dr. King once said: “Before we reach the majestic shores of the Promised Land, there is a frustrating and bewildering wilderness ahead. We must still face prodigious hilltops of opposition and gigantic mountains of resistance. But with patient and firm determination we will press on.” (Applause.)

So I don’t know about you, CBC, but the future rewards those who press on. (Applause.) With patient and firm determination, I am going to press on for jobs. (Applause.) I'm going to press on for equality. (Applause.) I'm going to press on for the sake of our children. (Applause.) I'm going to press on for the sake of all those families who are struggling right now. I don’t have time to feel sorry for myself. I don’t have time to complain. I am going to press on. (Applause.)

I expect all of you to march with me and press on. (Applause.) Take off your bedroom slippers, put on your marching shoes. Shake it off. (Applause.) Stop complaining, stop grumbling, stop crying. We are going to press on. We’ve got work to do, CBC. (Applause.)

And here's a sampling of Waters' response to this speech:

"Some of his words were not, I think, appropriate and surprised me a little bit," Waters said Monday morning on CBS. "I was curious about it."

But in the speech, it was pretty clear who Obama was speaking to. Lauren Victoria Burke of the blog Crew of 42 helpfully points this out by titling her recap post: "At Time No One Can Afford Silence, Pres. Obama Tells Black Members to Shut Up."

From Crew of 42:

Yes, black members of Congress shut up and “stop grumbling.” The unemployment rate for black Americans is 16.7%, 18% for males, 46% for young adults — so no money is coming into those households… These numbers are historic but shut the hell up. The foreclosure crisis has caused the biggest decrease in wealth in 50 years amongst your constituents – but the President says, “shake it off.” Black member of Congress: The President needs you to shut up. Don’t you get it? While your Tea Party colleagues loudly dismantle Medicare and Social Security: Stop crying. I wonder: Did Richard Nixon tell you that when he refused to even meet with the CBC in 1972? (Actually it was just the opposite — see short video) Stop grumbling and quit mentioning these problems CBC. To be sure: Anytime in politics someone tells you to keep quiet, something’s wrong. When has keeping quiet and not complaining worked for any political movement?

For the record, though, fellow CBC members Rep. Emanuel Cleaver of Missouri and Rep. Donna Edwards of Maryland didn't see anything wrong with the speech at all:

But other members of the CBC, including its chairman, Missouri Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D), have had different reactions to the speech, which they defended as a rallying call to African American voters, whose large turnout in 2008 helped fuel Obama's election, and whose 2012 turnout could be pivotal to the president's reelection effort.

"The Congressional Black Caucus supports the president; we intend to be as strongly pushing his reelection as anybody in the country," Cleaver said Monday morning on MSNBC.

"I was like most of the crowd there -- incredibly enthusiastic by the fighting spirit the president was showing. I think the president is right-on-message," Maryland Rep. Donna Edwards (D), another CBC member, said in a separate appearance on MSNBC. "I think it's incredibly clear, the difference, like night and day, between Republicans, who want to give special breaks to the wealthiest in this country, and the president of the United States. And it's important that we reelect him because we have to really get this country back...the president was on that message, and we're going to be on that message, too, for 2012."

So what does all this mean? It simply means that President Obama can be ever-so-frank with the CBC simply because he can. Telling the CBC to "stop complaining," while fun for a 24 hour news cycle, will never turn into the week-to-month long disaster of that one time he accused a white police officer who arrested scholar Skip Gates of "behaving stupidly." Obama could pretty much tell the CBC "what did the five fingers say to the face?" then proceed to slap everyone in the room, and he'd be lucky anyone bothered to cover it between "Keeping Up With the Kardashians" and "Morning Joe."

I know people tend to think the president is some big conciliatory softy, but I think he's playing the role of conciliatory softy at times because the real him would rather just curse Republicans out, but he can't, because people couldn't handle him talking down to a white beat cop -- even if he was president of the dang United States.

Personally, since they're going to complain no matter what, I feel he could spread the ridicule and butt kicking around a little more. The CBC is such low hanging fruit. They spent all week putting together their version of Freaknik for old Black Greeks and people with advanced degrees and got all dressed up and were all excited and had folks calling them all day to get tickets to their dinner just to see what the First Lady was going to wear and so random people could breathe the same air as the "Shining Black Prince Who Became President" and, you know, after a lot of "We're all in the same gang" throughout the speech, talking about "good crazy" and "bad crazy" and referencing the Civil Rights movement he ends the thing with a "OMG, would you please shut up?"

Sure. That might have felt good to say, but dude. C'mon. Everyone's poll numbers suck. Stop kicking sand on the only people in town more disliked than you.