I’m satisfied that he was right there when it happened, and the eyewitnesses who were critical of Jackson do not dispute his presence. He was only a few feet away and well within the zone of danger.
Lie is an interesting accusation against Jesse Jackson’s claim to be present when Dr. King was assassinated. YOU ARE THE LIAR. Jesse Jackson is a self-centered man, but he was there, believed he was the last person, or one of the last people to speak to King, and has spent his life speaking out against racial injustice. You, on the other hand, are just a useless damned liar and repeater of lies.
And your claim that Jackson was a liar is just that: a lie. He was, as you now acknowledge, right there in the parking lot, talking to the victim. What a piece of shit you are.
Does for me. I really can’t figure this kind of shit out. Jesse Jackson has done a lot of things one could be critical of. Why some racist shit bag would pick this plainly true assertion on his part to call him a liar just goes to show how fucked up assholes like **kidchameleon ** are.
You do realize that quote confirms he was there? The dispute in that clip is whether he was the last person spoken to, a matter that any number of people at the incident could reasonably claim. Ralph Abernathy attributes a last quote about a song, spoken to him. Jackson claims it was a remark about a tie. Neither of these is a lie in the way that the New York Times suggests unnamed people are bitter. The New York Times has a deep bias against Jesse Jackson, Bill Clinton, Wen Ho Lee and others, all of which seem unexplained. NYT also hated Richard Nixon with a passion and never explained that either, but since everyone in the country at one time or another hated Richard Nixon, we kind of gave the newspaper of record a pass on that.
Jesse Jackson was there, the clip proves it. The bitter people seem to be the NYT.
Why do you insist on claiming that Jesse Jackson wasn’t there when the shots were fired? Or that King didn’t speak to him at about that time? Why are you so deeply disconnected from reality? It is entirely reasonable for Jesse Jackson to claimed to have been right there and Dr. King spoke some of his last words to him about wearing a tie. This isn’t Brian Williams making up stories about being shot down in a helicopter when it was another helicopter a mile away and ten minutes apart. Jackson was there. Why, for luck’s sake, are you such a lucking liar and unreliable reporter of history? I am truly interested in what the motivation of such damned lucking revisionists could possibly be. Why?
I get it that people don’t like Jesse Jackson because he has a larger than appropriate ego, but in this instance, he wasn’t lying. He was just a few feet away in the parking lot below and had just had a conversation with the guy. Why do you insist that he was lying? From his point of view, he wasn’t even exaggerating. He probably knew nothing of Abernathy’s probably simultaneous conversation.
There are people who outright, deliberately and with malice aforethought lie about this incident for the purpose of ruining Jesse Jackson’s reputation. You guys are those libelers. Please stop lying for a few minutes and explain your motives in being such lying bastards.
However much respect I have for his early work and courage, over time he has, in my opinion, devolved into someone who makes a very comfortable living advocating for the poor. That bothers me in a way I simply cannot ignore.
I agree* that *is only slightly less disappointing than the Republican’s despicable use of religion to impoverish and humiliate the poor.
My point, however, was what inspires these Jesse Jackson haters to say he was lying about being right there and talking with Dr. King? And the NYT to offer that unnamed sources are bitter about it? I get that Jackson is not a likeable guy. But to lie about historically documented facts. Eww.
Human, all too human. Sure, money is corrupting, but not nearly so corrupting as attention, calling a press conference and filling the room, people listening to you in rapt attention.
Crosby, of Crosby, Stills etc. Said something like when you are a rock star, people suddenly start listening to you, and the next thing you know, you start to think its because you are saying something important.
This is strictly my opinion, but here’s my theory:
Mr. Jackson was, of course, near MLK when the assassination occurred in the sense of being close by and able to rush to the scene quickly. However, Mr. Jackson seems inclined to tell the story in such a manner that it either implies or can lead the listener to conclude he was standing right next to MLK when the shots were fired, such that it implies he himself might have been hit by gunfire had the shooter’s aim wavered. Now, I have never actually heard him say that, but he has never seemed eager to correct people on details of the story that make him look less, I dunno, heroic or in the center of things.
For those who have NOT looked into the matter in detail, who have largely heard only a passed-on-by-word-of-mouth (which leads to distortions) version of the story, they believe Mr. Jackson claimed to be near in the sense of “separated by inches” rather than “separated by a building level”. Such a person, upon finding out the actual facts, may well conclude that Mr. Jackson has been misrepresenting himself all these years - i.e. “lying”. As I said, I have not heard or found an example of Mr. Jackson saying he was standing next to MLK when he was shot, only that he heard the man’s last words and was next to him when he died but this would hardly be the first example of what many believe a person to have said is not, actually, what was said. It wouldn’t hurt if, over the years, Mr. Jackson had exerted a little more effort to correct the details on the story when the opportunity arose.
You all may now resume your argument previously in progress.
Reminds me of that Senator mentioned in the other thread, who often said he served during Vietnam – implying “in”, with no eagerness to correct people on the details he was leading 'em to conclude – before eventually screwing up by saying “in”.
Sure, Jackson was at the motel. However, Rev. Williams disputes the notion that Jackson was anywhere in the immediate vicinity of Dr. King at any given time: ‘‘I saw the blood on Jesse’s shirt and I know Jesse had not been near Dr. King.’’
This raises the question of what, exactly, was on the shirt and how it got there. Did he drip ketchup on himself while eating and pass the drips off as Dr. King’s blood?