This is possibly the most offensive interview sequence I’ve ever seen.
Lawrence O’Donnell lectures and snidely criticized Herman Cain, who was a minor when Rosa Parks refused to sit in the back of the bus in 1955 and in high school for the desegregation fights in the late 1950s and early 1960s, for not participating in civil rights demonstrations later in the 1960s. The Freedom Rides referenced in the interview and as to which O’Donnell lambasted Cain for not participating, were in 1961, when Cain was in high school.
Here are some memorable O’Donnell questions:
Where do you think black people would be sitting on the bus today if Rosa Parks had followed your father’s advice [for Herman not to make trouble if told to sit in the back of the bus; my note, Cain was 9 years old at the time of Parks' act of defiance.]
You watched black college students from around the country and white college students from around the country come to the south and be murdered, fighting for the rights of African-Americans; do you regret sitting on the sidelines at that time?
How easy it is for a liberal like O’Donnell to lecture someone who lived through it. If this had been a Fox News interview of a black liberal candidate, there would be an uproar and demands for a firing.You watched black college students from around the country and white college students from around the country come to the south and be murdered, fighting for the rights of African-Americans; do you regret sitting on the sidelines at that time?
The full interview is here.