Video: The obligatory “Dan Rather mumbles something about Obama and watermelons” clip
posted at 4:49 pm on March 8, 2010 by Allahpundit
Limbaugh played the audio this afternoon and now it’s anywhere and everywhere. Ironically, it’s the fact that it’s so cringeworthy that makes me think it was innocently intended: Had Document Dan meant to take a veiled racial swipe at Obama, he surely would have veiled it more thoroughly than this. (Same with Clinton supposedly saying of The One, “A few years ago, this guy would have been getting us coffee.”) Lacking the left’s ability to read minds, I feel obliged to give him a pass — although I suppose we could compromise and say he’s guilty of unconscious racism, where the audience gets to tell the speaker what he “really” intended. Good enough for “Countdown,” good enough for me.
Don’t forget to add this post to the bookmarks in your “What if a conservative had said it?” folder.
Blowback
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Why on earth should he get a pass?
This is why the left is able to define the right – because they will use every opportunity to frame the right in every negative light they can, while the right will shrug in a situation like this, and give the idiot the benefit of the doubt.
I don’t like the rules they’ve set up, but I don’t like the lopsided playing field either. Rather should be treated just like any conservative would be.
capitalist piglet on March 8, 2010 at 5:24 PM
What gripes me is inability to conceive even the possibility that this is bad legislation capable of rendering an unacceptable situation worse. There cannot be healthcare cost controls without rationing. This bill would strangle private insurance with unfunded mandates and price controls, leaving big government to save us, to be the “hero”. Makes me want to puke.
The bill is worth opposing on its sleazy merits.
exdeadhead on March 8, 2010 at 5:24 PM
Growing up in the Deep South, I never heard any connection between watermelon and black folk until I reached college in the early 70′s.
Typically during the harvest season of watermelon, there are many pickup trucks and some with trailers who buy them from local farmers and set up shop on the sides of the highways entering urban areas.
Kermit on March 8, 2010 at 5:24 PM
Rather’s just angling to be sent to the showers, in hopes that Rahm will be there to give him what for.
Wind Rider on March 8, 2010 at 5:25 PM
I suspect Dan would get banned if he came to HA and posted something like that as well.
As to why Dan gets a ‘pass’ just because he said it somewhere other than HA, however, I’m not sure…
Midas on March 8, 2010 at 5:25 PM
Media Matters remains unavailable for comment.
JammieWearingFool on March 8, 2010 at 5:28 PM
Media Matters remains unavailable for comment.
They are busy selling watermelons
J_Crater on March 8, 2010 at 5:31 PM
I’m a loser
I’m a loser
And I’m not what I appear to be
Of all the stories I have won or have lost
There is one story I should never have come across
It was a document in a million, my friend
I should have known it would turn out to be forged in the end
I’m a loser
And I lost an anchorship that was dear to me
I’m a loser
And I’m not what I appear to be
Although I talk and I act like I’ve been all around
Beneath this mask I am wearing a frown
My tears are falling like rain from the sky
Is it for my anchorship and myself that I cry
I’m a loser
And I lost an anchorship that was so dear to me
I’m a loser
And I’m not what I appear to be
What have I done to deserve such a fate
I realized the document was forged but it was by then too late
And so it’s true, pride comes before a fall
I’m telling you so that you won’t lose all
I’m a loser
And I lost an anchorship that was dear to me
I’m a loser
And I’m not what I appear to be
MB4 on March 8, 2010 at 5:31 PM
What if Dan had said:
or
or
or
Seven Percent Solution on March 8, 2010 at 5:31 PM
OT: CNN is showing the SNL skit…on CNN…heh
d1carter on March 8, 2010 at 5:33 PM
He’d be an equal-opportunity bigot? LOL
Liam on March 8, 2010 at 5:33 PM
IDK… I always thought illegals sold fruit on the side of the road… Even the birthers would say Obama’s not an illegal.
MeatHeadinCA on March 8, 2010 at 5:33 PM
It’s not that he was “taking a swipe” at Obama, that’s just how white lefties view black people, in a stereotypical fashion. See, what makes it “different” in liberal minds is he (Rather) and they “mean well” so it’s not malicious. And indeed no malice was intended, he’s just bigoted.
KittyLowrey on March 8, 2010 at 5:33 PM
Hear all sides of the issues on the Chris Matthews show! with guests Dan Rather, Andrea Mitchell and Joe Klein.
Ted Torgerson on March 8, 2010 at 5:35 PM
…and here’s your Match Game host – Gene Rayburn!
“The President is such an epic fail, that he couldn’t sell BLANK if you gave him BLANK”
Good luck!
NumberTwo on March 8, 2010 at 5:36 PM
Has anyone mention that watermelons are African in origin?
baldilocks on March 8, 2010 at 5:37 PM
Give Dan Rather on pass on this? NO WAY, JOSE!!!!
RATHER = RAAAAAACIST!!!!!!!
RATHER = RAAAAAACIST!!!!!!!
RATHER = RAAAAAACIST!!!!!!!
pilamaye on March 8, 2010 at 5:38 PM
I don’t know how this racial stereotype got started, but it seems to me people need to get over this racial paranoia over using watermelon and Mr. President in the same sentence. Or ribs, or chicken, or collard greens, or chitlins…
scalleywag on March 8, 2010 at 5:38 PM
Exactly.
scalleywag on March 8, 2010 at 5:41 PM
Baldi!
How and where in the he!! have you been?
thomasaur on March 8, 2010 at 5:41 PM
JammieWearingFool on March 8, 2010 at 5:28 PM
I would bet a chicken dinner at Popeye’s that had Sarah Palin said something like this, media matters would be burning up the twitter service like there is no tomorrow.
lukespapa on March 8, 2010 at 5:42 PM
It goes back to old junk art that shows Blacks eating watermelons. They are usually shown with big red lips shaped in a grin. It is much worst that eating fried chicken or collard greens. I have known Blacks that would not eat watermelon.
jeannie on March 8, 2010 at 5:42 PM
Question is, will Maureen Dowd hear the word “BOY” in there anywhere? Bueller? Bueller?
GarandFan on March 8, 2010 at 5:42 PM
I’m gonna be a racist….against his other half….
BobMbx on March 8, 2010 at 5:43 PM
The stuff of a “real news” channel right there.
KittyLowrey on March 8, 2010 at 5:43 PM
BUT,… maybe he can sell fried chicked and greens…
RAAAAAACIST!!!!!!!
RAAAAAACIST!!!!!!!
RAAAAAACIST!!!!!!!
Kuffar on March 8, 2010 at 5:45 PM
Um … why isn’t this already a subsection of the Hot Air archives?
krispy on March 8, 2010 at 5:46 PM
I think everybody’s missing a piece. This guy is a professional talker. He’s got a reservoir of one liners. This one-liner is a series of caricatures that lefties think Republicans think. It’s the old idea that only Republicans can be racist – and they all are!
He didn’t say he thought that. He said, “Republicans will say . . . Republicans will try to make a case . . .”
I still find it offensive, but he’s smarter than to just let that slip as some pent up racism.
Pablo Snooze on March 8, 2010 at 5:46 PM
Gunga-Dan strikes again…
Wyznowski on March 8, 2010 at 5:47 PM
Seriously.
Abby Adams on March 8, 2010 at 5:48 PM
Chris Matthews caught what Rather was saying & cut him off to cover up for him. I’m a southerner and our family ate a lot of watermelon in the summer. It’s northern elites that have created the stereotype of blacks somehow linked to watermelon. Good grief! Our family reunions & church homecomings weren’t complete without watermelon.
kitkat-n.c. on March 8, 2010 at 5:48 PM
Maureen Dowd has reviewed Dan R’s statement and she’s sure she heard the word “boy” being inferred, every time Rather referred to Teh Won
alwyr on March 8, 2010 at 5:49 PM
Come on, he’s from the South, he should be able to come up with some folksy saying without racial overtones. You know like he could sell ice to an Eskimo.
Cindy Munford on March 8, 2010 at 5:50 PM
You Know what? I don’t think Rather was commenting on the connection between watermelons, blacks, the south or anything like the “Fried Chicken & Watermelon, Riverboat in De Sky” attitude.
.
I think that he was saying that Øbummer, The nation’s biggest celebrity Constitutional scholar, is a dud at salesmanship and persuasion. I’d like to hear what Rather said in it’s entirety but, as usual, Chrissy Matthews was running his big mouth over top of Rather’s
cheapaccurate insinuation.ExpressoBold on March 8, 2010 at 5:52 PM
Sorry, AP, but this statement of yours implies that Rather is intelligent. He’s not, as his episode with the faked memo
scandal proves.
Del Dolemonte on March 8, 2010 at 5:55 PM
I agree, it might have been a fine descriptive explanation if Mr. Matthews would have hushed. We will never know.
Cindy Munford on March 8, 2010 at 5:58 PM
Sounds like the right quote, interpreted by newsbusters.
ExpressoBold on March 8, 2010 at 5:59 PM
Now, had he said, Obama couldn’t sell black eyed peas . . .
keep the change on March 8, 2010 at 5:59 PM
Just curious, why does a drink with no watermelon in it have this name?
Del Dolemonte on March 8, 2010 at 5:59 PM
When I grew up in Hawai’i in the 1960s, many of the locals sprinkled sale on their fresh pineapple. Try it sometime.
Del Dolemonte on March 8, 2010 at 6:03 PM
I had kinda forgotten just what a SHMUCK Rather
is. But he didn’t look out of place on that panel.
Klein and Chrissy M are both running around frantically looking for the remnants of what used to be their minds, and Andrea, as everyone knows by now, is just getting by on her looks, literally.
ontherocks on March 8, 2010 at 6:05 PM
He was trying to say: this is what Obamas opponents/challengers will be saying about him in the future, inserting race-tinged remarks, because that’s what anyone challenging obama would do, because they are racists.
Over30 on March 8, 2010 at 6:06 PM
I guarantee that clown along with Rev. Al and Jessie J will not say a word…and if they do it will be an excuse.
Vigilante on March 8, 2010 at 6:07 PM
Right, saying Barack Obama oughta be getting us coffee isn’t racist, and saying he has no Negro dialect isn’t racist, and saying he can’t sell watermelons ain’t racist.
Uh-huh.
Chris_Balsz on March 8, 2010 at 6:10 PM
That is the only way we ate it growing up in Texas.
txmomof6 on March 8, 2010 at 6:15 PM
what is funny is the three Liberal Socialist Democrat media whores that accept the clearly
RACISTwatermelon slipmathewsjw on March 8, 2010 at 6:15 PM
Somebody forget to tell Gunga-Dan using the W-word is now racist?
chickasaw42 on March 8, 2010 at 6:15 PM
She’s been hanging at Ace’s place. I’m a longtime lurker over there… :D
SouthernGent, yeah, we always put salt on ours. And as for watermelons, hell, we GREW them! Would feed the rinds to the horses afterwards too, they loooooved them. Guess that comment makes me a HOOORRRRSSSIIIISSSTTTTT
bikermailman on March 8, 2010 at 6:16 PM
Haha.
He said articulate and watermelons (and clean cut?) bwahahaha.
Doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see where his mind was.
Not a big deal, but I love how these race hustlers come out and start talking about “code words” when it is politically convenient.
reaganaut on March 8, 2010 at 6:23 PM
I think Dan Rather was clearly being racist by suggesting Obama would sell watermelon because black people are always eating watermelon… and in 2010 no less!
CCRWM on March 8, 2010 at 6:23 PM
How dense can you be?
What makes it so retarded is that Dan doesn’t even realize how racist the comment was. Their racism is so embedded in these fools they don’t even know their racists, it’s part of their culture.
God (sorry, god) forbid Beck, or Breitbart would have “innocently” said such a thing…
The problem with moron Democrats and the conservatives that demogogue them is that “black people food” to them is in reality “Southern cooking.”
uknowmorethanme on March 8, 2010 at 6:26 PM
On the contrary, Kool-Aid is all he is serving.
Wolftech on March 8, 2010 at 6:27 PM
Clinton says “Obama should be getting us coffee” and you say that ain’t racist,
Reid says Obama has no “enn eee gee err oh” (apparently its modded) dialect, you say that ain’t racist
Rather says Obama couldn’t sell watermelons, you say you can’t read his mind…
Lemme ask, when George Wallace got in front of locked schoolhouse doors and hollered “Segragation taday, segragation tamarra, segragation faevah!” was that…YOU KNOW….
Chris_Balsz on March 8, 2010 at 6:27 PM
Sorry bout that mix up.
uknowmorethanme on March 8, 2010 at 6:28 PM
You’re right. But they originated in “South” Africa, which as we all know was racist for decades.
Del Dolemonte on March 8, 2010 at 6:33 PM
Why yankees?
reaganaut on March 8, 2010 at 6:34 PM
Dan and Miss Chrissy Thrill Up Her Leg just wasted another thirty three seconds of my life! THIRTY THREE SECONDS THAT I’LL NEVER HAVE BACK!!!
Vntnrse on March 8, 2010 at 6:36 PM
This should make it easier to understand:
1. Conservatives are racist.
2. Liberals are not racist.
Therefore, when a conservative says something with racial overtones, it provides further evidence of racism. When a liberal says something with racial overtones it is not racist. The statement is simply misinterpreted as racist by conservatives who are inherently racist.
These rules make it possible to still have a Democrat U.S. Senator who was in the KKK.
If you are confused, refer to rules 1 and 2.
July 10 on March 8, 2010 at 6:47 PM
I think Rather is getting a bum rap here. If you listen close and read the transcript he is not making the argument, he is saying the Republicans will.
You can still attack him for calling the Republicans racist.
BermanPost on March 8, 2010 at 6:55 PM
How about
Obama couldn’t sell beer at a baseball game?
FIFY, Mr. Rather.
But it seems to me that Dan Rather couldn’t sell cocaine at
Studio 54.
thgrant on March 8, 2010 at 7:05 PM
I think Dan Rather should be charged with “melonious assault”.
dissent555 on March 8, 2010 at 7:08 PM
Everybody knows the President doesn’t sell anything; he just orders you to buy.
Chris_Balsz on March 8, 2010 at 7:25 PM
There you have it…Racism as owned wholly by liberal democrats.
daesleeper on March 8, 2010 at 7:46 PM
I think Chrissy cut him off because rasist comments on his show are made only by him.
mechkiller_k on March 8, 2010 at 8:10 PM
swesome perfect
by the way here in WI salt was never on watermelon but always on Honyedew and cantalope melons. Is it the same?
Gracelynn on March 8, 2010 at 8:11 PM
sorry about my spelling should be awesome
Gracelynn on March 8, 2010 at 8:12 PM
Actually – I was hoping that Document Dan had done something really bad. But this is just a Southern joke that’s aimed often at blacks or whites. It’s not a racial thing. Watermelons are often sold on the side of the roads down here and Dan is simply saying that Obama couldn’t sell them with the Highway Patrol channeling traffic to him. I don’t see this as a problem.
WHAT IS A PROBLEM is the perfectly un-biased Chrissy Tingle-Leg immediately cutting off Dan when the word “watermelon” was used. Clearly – he doesn’t like his lover being disrespected like this.
HondaV65 on March 8, 2010 at 8:40 PM
Why is it that Democrat Liberal Progressives can get away with saying such racist drivel?
Oh, that’s right, they’re DEMOCRATS !!
CatchAll on March 8, 2010 at 8:47 PM
He’s not saying that. He’s saying Republicans would say that. That Republicans are racist.
Name the person (living, breathing GOP person) your quoting Rather or apologize and completely retire from the public eye.
journeyintothewhirlwind on March 8, 2010 at 8:52 PM
As a kid, I always had trouble figuring out the watermelon-eating slur. Ripe watermelons taste delicious. It’s not like eating haggis or something.
The Race Card on March 8, 2010 at 9:04 PM
Fine, working…and hanging out at Ace’s. :)
Touché!
Anecdotally speaking, every picnic I’ve been to which had a)white people and b)watermelon present, a sista couldn’t get near the watermelon!
I felt oppressed. :P
baldilocks on March 8, 2010 at 9:05 PM
Well, when your on a show where the host says dumb**** stuff, then you will end up saying dumb**** stuff.
Hummer53 on March 8, 2010 at 9:26 PM
Yes, Dan Rather is a racist.
This isn’t new.
ToddonCapeCod on March 8, 2010 at 10:08 PM
And that is why you fail.
Had Limbaugh or Beck or Hannity said this…
drjohn on March 8, 2010 at 10:22 PM
What if he’d said: “He couldn’t sell socialism to the Democrats”? Oh, wait …
ajackson on March 8, 2010 at 11:27 PM
I don’t think Dan Rather is a racist. Heck, he voted for Obama for crying out loud. I think he was just attempting to be witty and funny.
SoulGlo on March 9, 2010 at 12:39 AM
SouthernGent,
The real question should be “who puts SUGAR on watermelon”?…Then, follow up with “WHY”?
Gohawgs on March 9, 2010 at 1:01 AM
Time to hang ‘em up Danny Boy. Surely Dan doesn’t need a paycheck?
elifino on March 9, 2010 at 4:33 AM
Look, another Limosine Liberal who has no idea he’s a racist. Black man can’t make it without the government crumbs ya know. Man, Johnson’s “Great Society” did wonders for that minority, doncha know???????
adamsmith on March 9, 2010 at 8:16 AM
Machts nicht. Despite the stir, he’s right.
LarryG on March 9, 2010 at 10:06 AM
I’m tired of all the PC crap…Dan is just a fool, but he’s not a racist.
Let the Left be intellectually dishonest…I’m not going to play.
Asher on March 9, 2010 at 10:37 AM
The problem is, he was projecting the remarks onto Republicans. I would normally be inclined to give this sort of comment a pass, too, but not while he is in the midst of slandering me.
“The mercy that was quick in us but late,
By [his] own counsel is suppress’d and kill’d.”
JackOfClubs on March 9, 2010 at 4:15 PM
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