MSNBC "Countdown With Keith Olbermann" - Transcript
Interview
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REP. JAMES CLYBURN (D-SC), MAJORITY WHIP: Good evening, Keith.
Thank you so much for having me. And let me offer my condolences as well.
OLBERMANN: I"m very moved. Thank you, sir.
Let me start with what will last out of this. Congratulations, and
I assume you think that this is, if not signed and sealed and delivered,
impossible to divert from being signed, sealed and delivered.
CLYBURN: I think so. We will go to the White House tomorrow. The
president is going to sign the first bill. The fixes will make--the
Senate will start working on that on tomorrow as well. I understand they
have established 20 hours of debate, and they plan to try to get this done
between now and Sunday.
So, I do believe that the country is going to see a very
comprehensive health care plan that is going to be accessible, affordable,
and accountable.
OLBERMANN: To what happened over the weekend before the vote, the
abuse and the venom that was behind it. John Lewis said he hadn"t heard
some of this stuff since 1960. What--you were there, you saw it.
CLYBURN: Yes.
OLBERMANN: How do you--how do you explain this? Can you?
CLYBURN: Well, I don"t know that you can--except that I joined
with John Lewis in that assessment of what we saw on Saturday, especially.
I experienced some of it. I didn"t hear the slurs, but the chants, the--
some of the venomous comments from people, you wondered what that was all
about.
We"re trying to have a civil debate on how to proceed into the
future with health care for our citizens. I don"t think there"s any place
for some of the stuff that we heard and the stuff that I heard about. That
is just--should not have a place in how we go about trying to fashion
legislation. And I was so sorry to hear it.
I just celebrated, Keith, last Monday, the 50th anniversary of the
march that I helped to organization down in Orangeburg, March 15th, 1960.
In talking with those students on those two campuses last Monday, they
asked us a lot of questions about how we felt, what we experienced. And I
said to them at one point, we did a lot of things back then so they as
students would not ever have to go through that again.
I"m not too sure now that I don"t need to modify some of that.
OLBERMANN: Something that I think dovetails with what you just
said. This is from the conservative online thing, the "National Review."
It"s a quote. "Racism in America is dead." "We now have the occasional
public utterance." "Real racism has been reduced to menace levels." I"ll
vote for the first politician with the brass to say that racism should be
dropped from a national dialogue."
Do people say this you suppose because they"ve never been personally
the victims of racism? Do they say it to reassure racists that they"re not
really racist? Do you have any theory about a statement like that?
CLYBURN: Well, you know, I"ve always said that we are but the sum
total of our experiences. And I think that if you have never experienced
it, maybe you don"t recognize it when it"s there in front of you. But when
you"ve been through this and you look at--into the eyes of people like we
did on Saturday, you"d know that there"s something very much alive in the
hearts and minds of a lot of people in this country. If you look at some
of the faxes that I got today, racial slurs, nooses on the--on gallows,
and I"m telling you, some very vicious language.
This stuff is not all that isolated. It"s pretty widespread. I
hope it"s not too deep.
OLBERMANN: What about the Republican lawmakers who cheered on
occasion over the weekend the protesters who were escorted away? And we"re
not necessarily saying these are the particular ones who abused Mr. Lewis
or any of the other congressmen. But should they--is there not a point
which you say, "I can"t support a group that permits this to be
perpetuated"?
CLYBURN: Well, the lawmakers who were cheering did so on the floor
of the House. I saw at least a dozen lawmakers clapping as the people up
in the gallery were trying to disrupt the proceedings of the House. Now,
that is a violation of the decorum of the House.
Now, I know some of my colleagues are saying, "Let"s just move on."
But, you know, we said the same thing back when we had the outburst when
President Obama came to speak to a joint session, and we wanted to just
move on.
Now, at some point in time, we are going to have to allow for the
rules of the House to take hold and be adhered to. You can"t just make up
the resumes rules as you would have them be and recognize whatever it is
that you want to recognize. That, we have got to bring a stop to.
OLBERMANN: Agreed. Those protesters will never apologize to you or
Mr. Lewis or Carson. So, I"ll have to do it for them.
My great thanks and my--by proxy--apology for them.
Congressman James Clyburn--and also congratulations on all your
efforts in the last two years on this.
CLYBURN: Thank you so much, and thanks to you for all of your
efforts as well.
OLBERMANN: I"m just a by stander but a happy one. Thank you.
CLYBURN: Thank you.
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