Mohawk, Macaca-What's the difference to George Allen, Redskin coach's son?

[bigtree]

See the incident here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9G7gq7GQ71c


Allen apologizes for calling Webb volunteer ''macaca''

By TIM CRAIG AND MICHAEL D. SHEAR, The Washington Post
© August 15, 2006

RICHMOND - Virginia Sen. George Allen apologized Monday for what his opponent's campaign said were demeaning and insensitive comments the senator made to a 20-year-old volunteer of Indian descent.

"The kid has a name," Webb communications director Kristian Denny Todd said of Sidarth, who is a Virginia native born in Fairfax County. "This is trying to demean him, to minimize him as a person."

Asked what macaca means, Allen said: "I don't know what it means." He said the word sounds similar to "mohawk," a term that his campaign staff had nicknamed Sidarth because of his haircut. Sidarth said his hairstyle is a mullet - tight on top, long in the back.

Allen said by the comment welcoming him to America, he meant: "Just to the real world. Get outside the Beltway and get to the real world."

http://home.hamptonroads.com/stories/story.cfm?story=109268&ran=205074



-- Josh Marshall
(August 15, 2006 -- 12:13 PM EDT // link)

Ahhh, George Allen's America. Where the borders are secure and dark-complected Americans are derided as monkeys.

What did Allen mean? We now know that not only is 'macaque' a French language slur used to describe North Africans but Allen has a dizzyingly direct way of being familiar with the word. His mother is French Tunisian. Given that it would be amongst the French colonial population in North Africa that the word would have the greatest currency (even if only by familiarity rather than use), it seems close to impossible to believe that Allen didn't become familiar with the word growing up.

Last night a friend asked me if it's really believeable that Allen teed off on Sidarth with a racial epithet while he knew he was being videotaped. (My understanding at least is that it was Sidarth himself, the Indian-American Webb campaign volunteer, who was videotaping him as this happened.) I had a couple thoughts along these lines. No, I don't think Allen would have done it intentionally, at least not in the narrow sense. He may be a closet racist (and there's actually a pretty good case to be made (sub.req.) that he is, quite independent of this incident) but I don't think he's intentionally self-destructive.

What I do think, what I know from experience, is that all sorts of things come out of your mouth when you're speaking extemporaneously. Ask anyone who's spent much time on TV or radio. Not things that weren't in your mind somewhere to say, but some things you might have thought better of if you had a few moments to consider it. If you're not a racist, in most cases racial slurs don't come pouring out or, like one conservative yacker, fantasies about sterilizing African-Americans.

I suspect that Allen started off with a pretty crude effort to make fun of Sidarth as an immigrant, an outsider, perhaps by snidely but in his mind jocularly mispronouncing his name. Who knows? But in the moment, when he was looking at this kid who was clearly getting on his nerves, and amongst a lilly white crowd, this is the word that came to his mind and he used it.

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2006_08_13.php#009422



MARTIN SCHRAM: Allen shows his true colors

Scripps Howard News Service
August 15, 2006, 01:53:51 PM PDT

(SH) - "This fellow here, over here with the yellow shirt, Macaca, or whatever his name is. He's with my opponent. He's following us around everywhere. And it's just great," Allen. He went on for 55 seconds and, as his audience began to laugh and whoop, Allen led them in belittling applause for his dark-skinned fellow Virginian, whom he treated as a foreigner. "Let's give a welcome to Macaca, here. Welcome to America and the real world of Virginia." Allen used that to segue into his topic du jour - "My friends, we're in the midst of a war on terror ... "

Later Allen maintained he did not know what "Macaca" means. But Google knows - most Web sites say it is a monkey in Asia and Africa. Some Europeans use it as a racial slur about African immigrants. Allen later tried the explanation that Macaca sounded like "Mohawk," which could refer to Sidarth's haircut except he doesn't have one. Instead, he has a cut known as a "mullet" - short hair on the top and sides and in front, but long in the back.

Allen has had past controversies due to an infatuation with the Confederate flag. Initially, Allen's campaign said he had nothing to apologize for. Later, as controversy erupted, he apologized.

All of that is pathetic and contemptible. Why, when cornered, do politicians play dodge ball with the truth and toss us explanations that are insultingly phony? Does anyone think that if the Webb campaign's videotaping job were being done by a white Anglo-Saxon protestant that the senator still would have repeatedly called him by a made-up name of "Macaca" and treated him as a foreigner? Of course not. Allen looked out, saw a dark-skinned face, and off he went, discriminating at first sight.

http://www.losbanosenterprise.com/sports/story/3351389p-12338163c.html



from the DNC:

Senator Allen Made to Apologize for Racially Demeaning Remarks

The Webb staffer was named S.R. Sidarth - not "Macaca". The son of Indian immigrants, Sidarth was born and raised in Fairfax, VA and is a senior at the University of Virginia. He hardly needs welcoming to America or Virginia. For a candidate on a "Listening Tour" of Virginia, Senator Allen appears to have done more talking than listening.

Senator Allen's remarks display a level of ignorance that has no place in the Senate. We join with Indian-Americans like Sidarth in supporting Jim Webb, a candidate who will respect and honor diversity instead of using our differences to divide us.

On September 7, the Indian American Republican Council of New York will feature Senator Allen at a gala evening in Washington DC. We look forward to finding out whether Senator Allen will be able to refrain from calling any of his check-writing Republican friends "Macaca".

http://www.democrats.org/a/2006/08/virginia_senato.php

[tularetom]

1. Wait until G Felix's "base" finds out that his mother

is a French Tunisian. That should go over real well with the inbred bubba crowd he's tryin to appeal to.

[DemoTex]

7. You give G. Felix's base way too much credit!

I doubt that many Allen supporters (other than, perhaps, a few WW-II vets) know where Tunisia is located. I doubt, too, that many know the history of the bloody fighting between the Allies (UK, US, plus some French) and the Axis (Germany, Italy, plus some Vichy French) in Tunisia. Fewer still would know of the pivotal Kasserine Pass battles in Tunisia. Like G. Felix Allen, his supporters really are not well informed citizens.


Kasserine Pass, Tunisia

[The_Casual_Observer]

2. "welcoming him to America"

"Sidarth, who is a Virginia native born in Fairfax County" . Needless to say, felix is a dirty rotten coward bastard.

Allen sr. didn't own the redskins, he was the coach. Later on, after they kicked his ass out, he went back to coaching minor league stuff & Cal State Long Beach. He was never very successful as a head coach. He bought in Palos Verdes during the good times, when property was very cheap.

[Rex]

3. Racism flourishes under Repuke Administrations.

Goes along with their hate and fear attitude.

[rsdsharp]

4. Not that it really matters

but G Felix is the son of a former Redskins coach, not owner.

[bigtree]

5. of course

thanks.

There just HAD to be that disconnect. Damn.

[Cha]

6. Will Sidarth be felix's

Waterloo? His "read my lips"? His "putz"?