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Excerpts of Seven Year-Old Obama Interview Cause Stir
Produced by Ben Calhoun on Monday, October 27, 2008
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In 2001, Chicago Public Radio interviewed then Illinois State Senator Barack Obama about civil rights. Over the weekend, someone posted excerpts of the interview, edited to misrepresent Obama's statements. The item is now catching national attention.
Click here for Obama's full interviews.
The clips are taken from an interview that aired in January of 2001. Then State Senator Obama is one of three legal scholars interviewed for a show about civil rights. Over the weekend, someone pulled excerpts of the show and posted them to You Tube—and today, the posting caught fire on political blogs, the Drudge Report, and Fox News.
The 4 minute spliced collection of clips portrays Obama as advocate a redistribution of wealth through the power of the Supreme Court. That folds in with some allegations by the McCain Palin campaign.
The twist here is that, when heard in the context of the whole show, Obama’s position is distinctly misrepresented by the You Tube posting. Taken in context, Obama is evaluating the historical successes and failures of the Civil Rights movement—and, ironically, he says the Supreme Court was a failure in cases that it took on a role of redistributing resources.
The McCain campaign told ABC News it plans to use the material to bolster its criticism of Obama.
I’m Ben Calhoun, Chicago Public Radio.
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sDee, Hyde Park // Monday, October 27, 2008 @ 4:46 PM
So where can we find the whole interview to have a listen?
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John Paul Telhomme // Monday, October 27, 2008 @ 4:50 PM
Damn fools are making and can only make a big deal of this because they have nothing else to talk about. Obama's position regarding the courts is the same as Justice Scalia's: the court should not be an advocate for any position and it must not be used to leverage change. If you want change (reverse Roe for example) change the law (in Congress). Obama goes one step further: If you want to change the law (easily) make it popular so that the people's representatives will respond to the expression and needs of their constituents. This is actually conservative thinking. Liberals have always argued differently: That the Courts ought to and should right wrongs when they see them (example Gore v. Bush). The Supreme Court rejected that. So, Obama is right and the loud mouths are wrong.
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Josh Andrews, WBEZ // Monday, October 27, 2008 @ 5:32 PM
We've posted the full interview, along with a few others, on the WBEZ Blog. http://apps.wbez.org/blog/?p=639
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Ted, Logan Square // Monday, October 27, 2008 @ 5:36 PM
There is no irony in Obama saying the court found intervening in school funding issues or redistributing resources a cumbersome adminstrative task. Or better said, if that is ironic it is nonetheless not the point. You see we are not considering the man for Supreme Court justice. He's running for president, so burdensome administrative tasks will be no hinderance to his plans. Nice spin though Ben. I'm sure you early voted for Barack.
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theantibush, Hawai'i Kai // Monday, October 27, 2008 @ 5:53 PM
This radio discussion with Mr. Obama and others is a discourse regarding the influence of the Federal Supreme Court upon the states, and the interpretation of the Constitution, which changes over time as views within society changes.
Specifically, the discussion describes changes in civil rights, especially those of minorities, and the question of equal educational opportunities post-Brown vs. Board of Education (1954-1955), where the central issue became how to accomplish such objective. This is the ‘REDISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH’ as discussed, the question of “how do we get more money into the schools” to make equal education possible, as called for in the ruling.
The case of San Antonio vs. Rodriguez (early 1970’s) is cited as an example wherein, as ruled, the courts (federal and state) are out-of-bounds to hear cases regarding such redistributions of monies to schools.
Mr. Obama describes the Constitution as an article “of negative liberties”, that is, a document stating what states (and the Federal Government) cannot do to you, such as prevent you from voting based upon your faith, sex, or ethnic background. He mentions that it is not a document describing what the states or the Federal Government “must do on your behalf”.
The radio discussion explored the ways in which compliance to Supreme Court interpretations of civil rights laws under the Constitution were enacted, given this separation. These included withholding federal funds based upon non-compliance.
Mr. Obama commented that, as radical as some would describe the Warren court, that “...it wasn’t that radical. It didn’t break free from the ESSENTIAL CONSTRAINTS that were placed by the founding fathers...”
Mr. Obama considered the Civil Rights Movement a success in that it “...succeeded in vesting formal rights (right to vote, etc) ...” to minorities. His criticism of the movement was, in his view, the focus upon the courts as the major agent of change when, by constitutional constraints mentioned earlier, it cannot be. The position of the high court is to interpret the Constitution and adherence to it. The rest is up to society.
Perhaps the McCain campaign is hoping nobody actually listens to the entire discussion, and instead latches onto a tiny portion taken completely out of context.
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Larry Linn, Los Angeles, CA // Monday, October 27, 2008 @ 6:10 PM
You Neo-Cons are just whiners. Bush has been the president for almost eight years, and the Neo-Cons Republicans have controlled Congress for six of those years as well as the last two years of the Clinton Administration. How many Presidential vetoes by Bush has Congress overridden? Four! All of those vetoes required support by some Republicans in both the House and the Senate. Bush and his ilk, have followed the economic policies of the Fascists. Mussolini defined his economic stance by saying that his Fascist government "will give full freedom to private enterprise and will abandon all intervention in private economy." Bush and the Republicans followed this philosophy, and now our country is on the verge of bankruptcy.
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Ken Maddox, Mississippi Gulf Coast // Monday, October 27, 2008 @ 6:32 PM
Thank you for posting this. I have a lot of Obama info on my blog.
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David Shestokas, Lemont, IL // Monday, October 27, 2008 @ 7:28 PM
I have just concluded listening to the entire interview, and am an attorney. Mr. Obama's remarks that have been posted are not out of context, and prior to his volunteering the subject, the redistribution of wealth was not part of the discussion. The clip available on You Tube presents all his comments on the subject and fairly presents his feelings that the court did not go far enough. One gets the sensation that the tragedy he refers to is that the Warren Court ultimately found itself bound by the constraints placed upon it by the founding fathers. I got the impression that he found it unfortunate that the Supreme Court found it necessary to follow the Constitution. The Constitution has historically stood as a constraint upon government action as Mr. Obama said. He seems to lament that the court would not read into the Constitution a redistributive philosophy that he apparently shares.
The Court should maintain its historical role as protector of individual liberty. The notion (a favorite Obama term) that the Court should be a distributor of collectivist justice for groups is misplaced and dangerous.
The program discusses at length the evolution of the 14th Amendment and the due process clause. The extension of constitutional limitations on state power that had previously existed on federal power was a marvel that I see at work daily as a criminal defense lawyer. The Constitution protects all of us from the exercise of the awesome power of the government when it seeks to take away our liberty property and life.
A view of the Constitution that involves the courts in essentially a kind of goup social justice would remove the court from its role as our protector to some kind of hopefully benevolent dictator. I truly hope Mr. Obama's vision of the court does not come to pass.
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afraidofobama, Palo Alto, CA // Monday, October 27, 2008 @ 8:31 PM
I listened to the whole 1 hour program available at the ABC News website. From the context of the discussion it's very clear that what has come out in the 4 min youtube clip are exaclty Obama thoughts regarding "wealth redistribution" in 2001. From his answer to Joe the Plumber, it is clear he hasn't changed his mind in between. Stop making excuses for the One. The backing of Obama by the MSM is so obscene that that it embarasses very respected members of your profession
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Drzlecuti, Chicago // Monday, October 27, 2008 @ 10:35 PM
Mr. Shestokas, you must not have listened to the entire interview, because Dennis Hutchinson brought up the topic of redistribution several minutes before Mr. Obama did.
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pj, easton pa // Monday, October 27, 2008 @ 11:59 PM
Unfortunately for the liberal spin Senator Obama's comments do reference redistribution of wealth as social and economic justice, terms which go far beyond simply funding schools. That the excerpts are but a small part of the conversation is irrelevant as they form a major portion of Senator Obama's contribution to the conversation. Combined with other statements, the conclusion is unavoidable, the Senator, if he becomes President will take money from wage earners and give it to others who for any reason have less. The other disturbing issue is the Senator's desire to rewrite the constitution to allow more government intrusion into our lives in direct contravention of the founder's principles.
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Jim, Hightstown NJ // Tuesday, October 28, 2008 @ 3:44 AM
The only "twist" is this sentence above "Obama’s position is distinctly misrepresented by the You Tube posting." The clips share exactly what was said! You can call it "evaluating" the success and failure of civil rights movement but clearly he is lamenting that community organization did not maintain itself to push for more "redistributive" legislation since the courts are poorly equipped of that work. His positon is clear as is your trying to smear the youtube video.
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Bill Halloran, Newport Beach // Tuesday, October 28, 2008 @ 10:28 PM
Ben Calhoun, Sir:
Your comments are not truthful. Some of us have taken the time to read and listen to the interview, not just the snippets. Your characterization of it is dishonest. I urge all interested persons to listen to ALL and read ALL that is available. It is acyually worse than what is on Drudge.
We don't need any more MSNBC's and Ben Calhoun's to feed us manure-- listen and read for yourselves
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Ben Calhoun // Wednesday, October 29, 2008 @ 9:08 AM
FACT CHECK: McCain misreads 2001 Obama interview
By MARK SHERMAN – 19 hours ago
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican John McCain is misreading seven-year-old comments by rival Barack Obama about "redistributive change" to argue that the Democrat's tax policy is built on "taking your money and giving it to someone else."
The McCain campaign and the candidate himself are pointing to Obama's comments during a Chicago public radio program in 2001 that dealt with the civil rights movement and the Supreme Court.
"It's always more interesting to hear what people have to say in these unscripted moments," McCain told a rally in Dayton, Ohio, alluding to Obama's now well-known exchange in Ohio with Joe the Plumber. "And, today, we heard another moment like this from Sen. Obama.
"In a radio interview that was revealed today, he said that, quote, One of the tragedies of the civil rights movement is that it didn't bring about a redistribution of wealth in our society."
Obama never said that, according to an audio file circulated by Naked Emperor News, a Web site with many postings critical of Obama. Fox News also posted a partial transcript of the interview.
What Obama called a tragedy was the civil rights movement's focus on the court, rather than on "political and community organizing activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalitions of power through which you bring about redistributive change."
Obama did not define redistributive change in the interview, but he said one example of such change involves education, "how do we get more money into the schools and how do we actually create equal schools and equal educational opportunity."
McCain and Obama have sparred repeatedly over taxes. McCain says Obama plans a "massive new tax increase." Obama proposes an income tax increase on families earning more than $250,000 and individuals earning over $200,000 to help pay for tax cuts for the 95 percent of workers and their families making less than $200,000.
The interview on Chicago's WBEZ had nothing to do with taxes. The discussion centered on the court and civil rights.
Obama asserted that, while the Supreme Court under Chief Justice Earl Warren guaranteed rights to vote and access to public accommodations, it was not very radical because it "never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth."
The Warren Court "didn't break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution," he said.
Obama, who was then both an Illinois state senator and law professor, said, "I'm not optimistic about bringing about major redistributive change through the courts."
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T.B., Lincoln Park // Wednesday, October 29, 2008 @ 2:12 PM
He says the Supreme Court was a failure in redistribution of wealth only because it wasn't radical enough, and hadn't broken free from the "constraints" placed on it by the Constitution. He also says that blindspots of our founding fathers need to be compensated for... through redistributive activism from the bench. Just as "spreading the wealth around" in poor communities is meant to make ammends for the history of America, so making ammends to the world community must be, in Obama's view, accomplished by a forfeiture of our status as superpower.
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T.B., Lincoln Park // Wednesday, October 29, 2008 @ 2:13 PM
He says the Supreme Court was a failure in redistribution of wealth only because it wasn't radical enough, and hadn't broken free from the "constraints" placed on it by the Constitution. He also says that blindspots of our founding fathers need to be compensated for... through redistributive activism from the bench. Just as "spreading the wealth around" in poor communities is meant to make ammends for the history of America, so making ammends to the world community must be, in Obama's view, accomplished by a forfeiture of our status as superpower.
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