During an interview on The Breakfast Club with
Charlamagne tha God (an American radio presenter, television personality, and
author, who is black), the host asked Joe Biden to come back on the program, adding,
“It’s a long way to November. We’ve got more questions.” Biden replied, “I tell
you if you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump, then you
ain’t black.” To which Charlamagne tha God replied, “It has nothing to do with
Trump. It has to do with the fact that I want something for my community.”
Now enter Robin Roberts, to lob soft pitches to
Biden and running mate Harris about the statement. (The interview transcript
can be found HERE.)
First, she throws out the actual phrase to Harris.
ROBERTS: So when you have a running mate who makes
a comment like, “you ain’t Black,” and leads some people to say, “he just doesn’t
get it.” Have you been able to speak truth to him about that?[i]
Harris deflects the question, bragging on Biden.
HARRIS: And Joe speaks the words and actually
knows how to say the words “Black Lives Matter.”
Of course, “Black Lives Matter” is an organization
rather than just a statement of concern for the lives of black people. Further,
Senator Harris brought up Joe Biden’s “personal reaction” to Charlottesville. That
is interesting in light of Biden’s acceptance speech at the DNC, in which he
lied about what Donald Trump said about Charlottesville – that Trump said “neo-Nazis
and Klansmen and white supremacists” were “very fine people.” This lie has been
exposed for a couple of years now, yet Biden repeated it in his speech. (I
guess truth does not matter in political. In fact, I’m pretty sure of it!)
Trump did say there were “very fine people on both sides” of the Confederate
monument debate, but that there also were some very bad people on both sides.
He clearly condemned the neo-Nazis and white supremacists: “I’m not talking
about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists, because they should be condemned
totally.”[ii]
Now we come to the point where both liberal and
conservative media have headlined that Joe Biden admitted that he should not
have made the “you ain’t Black” remark – each side for their own reasons I
suppose. Biden made a reference to The Breakfast Club interview, and said he should
not have said “that.” However, he revised what “that” was, and the
pro-Democratic anti-Trump interviewer never called him on it. Just slid on to
something else to beef up Biden’s Black Lives Matter creds.
BIDEN: You know, when I was asked a question
about, you know, why should someone vote for you or they were talking about
Trump, and I said, he said, “Well, we like Trump.” I said, Well, and I
shouldn't have said it. And I said, “Well, OK. Who are you? How could you vote—how
can a Black man vote for him?” I shouldn’t have said that.
Say it ain’t so, Joe. I guess you’ve been run
through the Black Lives Matter washing machine and all you’ve said and done are
cleansed and forgiven. But you didn’t actually apologize to Charlamagne tha God,
and you didn’t apologize directly for saying to this black man and blacks in
general “I tell you if you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or
Trump, then you ain’t black.” People are who they are based on who they are,
not on whether or not they vote for you, Mr. former Vice-President.
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