US: Republican leaders look for Scalise flap to blow over

[webfact]

Republican leaders look for Scalise flap to blow over
CHARLES BABINGTON, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Party leaders hope that a flare-up over an appearance before a white supremacist group 12 years ago by the House's third-ranking Republican will fade ahead of the convening of the new Congress.

Rep. Steve Scalise, the Republican whip in the House, said Tuesday that he regrets making the speech in 2002 and condemns the views of such groups. He said that as a state legislator he spoke to many groups at that time about a major tax issue.

"One of the many groups that I spoke to regarding this critical legislation was a group whose views I wholeheartedly condemn," the Louisiana congressman said in a statement. "It was a mistake I regret, and I emphatically oppose the divisive racial and religious views groups like these hold."

Republican leaders defended Scalise within minutes of his statement. The new Congress, in which the Republicans will control both the House and the Senate, convenes next week.

House Speaker John Boehner said Scalise "made an error in judgment, and he was right to acknowledge it was wrong and inappropriate." Boehner said Scalise "has my full confidence as our whip."

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy said Scalise "acknowledged he made a mistake and has condemned the views that organization espouses. I've known him as a friend for many years and I know that he does not share the beliefs of that organization."

Scalise won a key endorsement Monday from Rep. Cedric Richmond, who will be Louisiana's only Democrat and only black in Congress when the new Congress convenes. Richmond told NOLA.com: "I don't think Steve Scalise has a racist bone in his body." He said he has worked closely with Scalise and "I am not going to let them use Steve as a scapegoat to score political points when I know him and know his family."

Louisiana's Republican governor, Bobby Jindal, an Indian-American, also defended the congressman.

Scalise acknowledged speaking at a 2002 Louisiana convention of the European-American Unity and Rights Organization, which called itself EURO. Former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke founded the group, which the Southern Poverty Law Center has classified as a hate group.

In an interview Monday with The Times-Picayune of New Orleans and NOLA.com, Scalise said he had little staffing as a state legislator and didn't always know details of groups he was invited to address. "I didn't know who all of these groups were, and I detest any kind of hate group," Scalise told the newspaper.

His statement Tuesday did not deal with the issue of weak staffing or sketchy knowledge of his audiences in 2002. Scalise, who is Catholic, said "these groups hold views that are vehemently opposed to my own personal faith, and I reject that kind of hateful bigotry."

Louisiana Republicans say Duke, who ran unsuccessfully for governor in 1991, did not attend the 2002 EURO convention, but addressed it at one point by phone.

In his NOLA.com interview, Scalise said he knew about Duke, but indicated he didn't recognize Duke's connection to the group.

"Everyone knew who he was," Scalise told NOLA.com. "I would not go to any group that he was a part of."

Democrats were measured in their criticisms. For instance, House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi's office issued a statement not from her but from her spokesman, Drew Hammill. It said Scalise's "involvement with a group classified by the Anti-Defamation League as anti-Semitic and the Southern Poverty Law Center as a hate group is deeply troubling for a top Republican leader in the House. "

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee criticized Scalise in an earlier statement on Tuesday, saying he "chose to cheerlead for a group of KKK members and neo-Nazis at a white supremacist rally."

Scalise, 49, ascended to his leadership post in June in the chain of events that followed then-Majority Leader Eric Cantor's surprise defeat in a Republican primary.

Scalise won the whip race with the solid backing of House conservatives, particularly Southerners who wanted a greater leadership voice considering the region's role in giving Republicans their largest House majority since President Herbert Hoover's administration at the start of the Great Depression.

___

Associated Press writer Bill Barrow in Atlanta contributed to this report.


-- (c) Associated Press 2014-12-31

[willyumiii]

Democrats were measured in their criticisms

If this were something Obama had done the Republicans would certainly not be measured in their criticisms.

They would be screaming " IMPEACHMENT!"

It's past time these greedy, spoiled brats grew up.

Just one more nail in the coffin for the Republican party...please hurry!

Wonder what kind of spin Faux News is trying to put on this one?

[Ulysses G.]

Wonder what kind of spin Faux News is trying to put on this one?

Pointing out that this was a single event that happened happened 12 years ago, but there is no evidence that there is anything that has happened since that would indicate any racism at all.

“There is a double standard,” he continued. “Obama became didn’t just wander into Jeremiah Wright’s church one time 12 years ago. He sat in it for 22 years as the man who is a racist raved against America and talked about 9/11 being chickens coming home to roost… These aren’t even comparable.”

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/krauthammer-obamas-rev-wright-far-worse-than-scalises-kkk-meeting/

[willyumiii]

Wonder what kind of spin Faux News is trying to put on this one?

Pointing out that this was a single event that happened happened 12 years ago, but there is no evidence that there is anything that has happened since that would indicate any racism at all.

“There is a double standard,” he continued. “Obama became didn’t just wander into Jeremiah Wright’s church one time 12 years ago. He sat in it for 22 years as the man who is a racist raved against America and talked about 9/11 being chickens coming home to roost… These aren’t even comparable.”

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/krauthammer-obamas-rev-wright-far-worse-than-scalises-kkk-meeting/

I knew mentioning Faux News would get a reply form you General.

Happy New Year to you!

I look forward to another year of banter with an informed member of the opposition.

Best Wishes!

Peace!

[chuckd]

And we won't even mention that famed Democrat, the late Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV), who was the "Grand Wizard", or some such title, for the KKK.

But then, Republicans are held to a much higher standard than are the Democrats.

They are expected to do the right thing...not so much the Democrats.

[ggt]

You know...I heard when Scalise was 8 years old he once used the "N" word...that should surely disqualify him from holding public office...

[abrahamzvi]

Democrats were measured in their criticisms

If this were something Obama had done the Republicans would certainly not be measured in their criticisms.

They would be screaming " IMPEACHMENT!"

It's past time these greedy, spoiled brats grew up.

Just one more nail in the coffin for the Republican party...please hurry!

Wonder what kind of spin Faux News is trying to put on this one?

download.jpg

Well said. Thank you!!

[Floater 7]

Republicans crack me up.

Reality, science and logic, not a strong suit.

Guns, wars, racism and anti-envirmentalism, seems to be. How those things and religion go together, I've yet to figure out.

[tonypace02]

The best thing about being 73 years old and no longer in the peak of health is the sure and certain knowledge that I will not have to put up with all this political childish bull shit much longer.

[Ulic]

Politicians talk to just about any group that will listen when they are in campaign mode. Very plausible

he did not know the groups philosophically racist agenda. All these groups often have misleading names

that sound fine in principal. Something that happened 12 years ago, in a state campaign is not news.

The real question is, is he a racist or not. If not move on.

[chuckd]

The best thing about being 73 years old and no longer in the peak of health is the sure and certain knowledge that I will not have to put up with all this political childish bull shit much longer.

I'm 77 and find it gets better with age.

The older you get the more you realize that old saying about age and politics is true:

If you're a conservative at 25, you have no heart.

If you're a liberal at 35, you have no brain.

[Publicus]

The best thing about being 73 years old and no longer in the peak of health is the sure and certain knowledge that I will not have to put up with all this political childish bull shit much longer.

I'm 77 and find it gets better with age.

The older you get the more you realize that old saying about age and politics is true:

If you're a conservative at 25, you have no heart.

If you're a liberal at 35, you have no brain.

Well said and having myself just entered septuagenarian territory, I ever more appreciate the already well spoken line by John Huston's filthy rich and corrupt character Noah Cross in Chinatown, when he pronounced to Jack Nicholson's hapless detective character J.J. Gittes, 'Course I'm respectable. I'm old. Politicians, ugly buildings, and whores all get respectable if they last long enough."

So does even a false saying....I myself wuz a conservative at 25, then by 35 I had become what rightists here would call a liberal, which disproves the favorite and shopworn adage so adored by conservatives. Among the boomers and those on the cusp of the boomers, we recognize especially the fallacy of the conservatives' favorite fallacy.

Here in fact is the accurate and correct adage:

If you're conservative at 25, you have no heart.

If you're conservative at 35, you have no conscience, temperament, or good judgement.

I'd say to grow up but it is far too late for that unsolicited advice.

It is anyway wrongheaded to believe such things are generational, so I speak only for the sake of argument.

[Scott]

Inflammatory posts removed.

Chose your words carefully if you want your post to remain.

[chuckd]

The best thing about being 73 years old and no longer in the peak of health is the sure and certain knowledge that I will not have to put up with all this political childish bull shit much longer.

I'm 77 and find it gets better with age.

The older you get the more you realize that old saying about age and politics is true:

If you're a conservative at 25, you have no heart.

If you're a liberal at 35, you have no brain.

Well said and having myself just entered septuagenarian territory, I ever more appreciate the already well spoken line by John Huston's filthy rich and corrupt character Noah Cross in Chinatown, when he pronounced to Jack Nicholson's hapless detective character J.J. Gittes, 'Course I'm respectable. I'm old. Politicians, ugly buildings, and whores all get respectable if they last long enough."

So does even a false saying....I myself wuz a conservative at 25, then by 35 I had become what rightists here would call a liberal, which disproves the favorite and shopworn adage so adored by conservatives. Among the boomers and those on the cusp of the boomers, we recognize especially the fallacy of the conservatives' favorite fallacy.

Here in fact is the accurate and correct adage:

If you're conservative at 25, you have no heart.

If you're conservative at 35, you have no conscience, temperament, or good judgement.

I'd say to grow up but it is far too late for that unsolicited advice.

It is anyway wrongheaded to believe such things are generational, so I speak only for the sake of argument.

Brevity is also something that comes with age. You and I said basically the same thing,

I said it using 49 words.

You needed 177.

[elgenon]

Republicans crack me up.

Reality, science and logic, not a strong suit.

Guns, wars, racism and anti-envirmentalism, seems to be. How those things and religion go together, I've yet to figure out.

Well said. And against taking care of their fellow man (socialism) and against same-sex marriage because it upends marriage but yet their divorce rate is sky high. Why not outlaw divorce to preserve support marriage? Oh and pro death penalty. All of these also seem to not be aligned with religiosity. Mao kao jai!