Obama: Rush Limbaugh, Lou Dobbs Responsible For Rise In Hate Crimes Against Hispanics

At a fundraiser in Florida Thursday night, Barack Obama accused anti-immigrant crusaders Lou Dobbs and Rush Limbaugh of "ginning things up" to such an extent that there was a rise in hate crimes against Hispanics last year.

"A certain segment has basically been feeding a kind of xenophobia. There's a reason why hate crimes against Hispanic people doubled last year," Obama said. "If you have people like Lou Dobbs and Rush Limbaugh ginning things up, it's not surprising that would happen."

Politico's Jonathan Martin writes that Limbaugh addressed Obama's remarks on his radio show today and said that the remarks hurt his feelings.

"I actually don't believe this. Barack Obama, in my own state, raising money for his presidential campaign called me xenophobic at a fundraiser," Limbaugh said. "I thought this guy was the unity candidate? Calling me a Xenophobe? Responsible for hate crimes? My feelings are hurt here."

Earlier this year, promoting his book "His Panic: Why Americans Fear Hispanics in the U.S.," Geraldo Rivera called Dobbs a "hate-monger" and said "I would not shake his hand because this is a man that's done more damage to the cause of sensible, comprehensive reform than anyone with a microphone."

Comments

[londubh]

Limbaugh should probably take some Oxycontin to dull the pain of his hurt feelings.

[margardner]

Lou Dobbs is an arrogant monster who spews hate speech.
Whenever he is challenged he never allows people to finish their thought. He immediately goes on the attack like a pit bull in heat!

I tuned out and stopped listening to him a year ago. if your not going to allow people a decent debate, why listen to a one sided blow hard.

[BVanderet]

It remains a mystery to me how Dobbs achieved and maintains his status as a commentator on a national news station like CNN. He is a not-too-bright, ill-informed but vehemently opininiated fellow who reminds me of cab drivers I ocassionally meet going to and from JFK in New York. His recent blow-up at a challenge to his ludicrous comments on the "NAFTA Superhighway" was telling. Why CNN lets this blowhard bumpkin continue never ceases to amaze me.

[ADVOCATE4ZPG]

It's probably something to do with why you're surveying the opinions of cab drivers in NYC (many of which are ILLEGAL ALIENS) and not running a "news" network like CNN. You're of the cohort whose OPINIONS (Read: "biases"!) cannot be altered by exposure to facts, events, data which contradict the former.

Undoubtedly, anyone who disagrees with YOUR apocrypha is subject to being labelled "not-too-bright, ill-informed but vehemently opininiated[sic] fellow."

The question remains for you and your ilk: Why do want 15-20 ILLEGAL ALIENS, who have IPSO FACTO violated various sections of the U.S. legal code, to be granted AMNESTY, i.e., a kind of expiation.....with the additional REALIZATION that, since most are Latino/Hispanic, that grant is, by your definition, RACIST. (c.f., La Raza ['the race"]?

[biogroup]

Right on, EdCoughlin! Where does all of this anger, hatred & xenophopobia come from? Is this the alternative to reasonable intellectuals like Lou Dobbs? Yikes! May a higher power help us all...

[EdCoughlin]

Making the point that illegal immigration ruins the American Economy is not hate speech. Saying I hate someone because they're hispanic is hate speech but Dobbs does not say that (in fact his wife is hispanic as far as I know). What Dobbs says is those who enter illegally demean the status of those who entered legally and cause widespread economic problems both in lower wages and in flooding the social safety net. That is not hateful, that is true.

[WasteNJ]

My gripe is when illegal immigrants and legal immigrants are lumped together to cloud the issue and strengthen their case. This is usually done by so-called "immigrant advocates", not by Dobbs who tends to call them on it. I used to like Dobbs but he has hopped on the ego express and never looked back. Now he's a one trick pony.

My father was an immigrant, now a US citizen. My fiancee's parents came from Colombia, and came here legally. They paid their dues and followed the rules. Now, after all these years, to be grouped together with people who basically hopped the fence and are reaping the benefits that other legal immigrants have worked hard for is insulting. It cheapens the value of citizenship and leaves those who followed the process correctly feeling slighted.
I know this is a complicated human issue. Laws are laws and if you break one, you're acting illegally.

[Soule23]

The immigration laws of a quarter century ago do not compare with their draconian modern counterparts.

[mojopo]

That's the truth. With Homeland Security manning the helm, people get stuck in a mess of expensive paperwork and wait a long time for the opportunity that might be denied (or delayed). Citizenship doesn't come cheap and it comes with plenty of prohibitive reasons that keep good people out. I have a friend who was sent back to his country of origin for paperwork (as part of his citizenship process), family in tow, and they had to surrender their family dog. They are still waiting for the OK to return to the US, eight months later. Part of his wait is due to the slow pace of bureaucracy in his home country, but mostly because of the glacial pace of progress in this country and the intensely prohibitive rules Homeland Security has put into effect. The only thing these new rules have done is to encourage illegal immigration while penalizing other people for doing things the right way.

Then, of course, there is the questionnaire immigrants have to complete regarding US history, branches of government, our Constitution, the flag (etc.). I'd like to see natural born citizens take this test, because I would bet you cash money more than half of us would fail.

[EdCoughlin]

This is exactly right WasteNJ. To advocate for breaking immigration laws demeans the sacrifices made by others to come in the right way. It is untrue that there are no ways to enter this country legally and just because its difficult does not mean it should not be done.

Its more difficult to work for years then it is to rob or sling drugs but does that mean we should excuse muggers and drug kingpins because it would be hard for them to do things legitimately?

[eyendall]

Lou Dobbs is a populist, economically illiterate, conceited blow-hard who never lets facts get in the way of his prejudices. Watch out for those aliens folks: They may piss on your strawberries and put starch in your underwear! And they speak Spanish!!!

[EdCoughlin]

And they take what were good American lower middle class jobs and turn them into minimum wage dead ends by undercutting American workers. There were none of these "jobs Americans won't do" a hundred years ago. Americans will even be sanitation workers, the worst job I can imagine, if paid decently and given benefits. What's creating "Jobs Americans won't do" are these illegals who undercut American wages to the benefit of the very upper crust of America who pocket the difference between what they'd have to pay an American and what they pay an illegal.

Go ahead and pretend being against illegal immigration is pure xenophobia. Quite simply though its not, there are plenty of valid economic reasons to be against illegal immigration because it makes the plight of the already badly off in the US even worse. By letting the desperate in Mexico come over and usurp American jobs by making them pay so little Americans can't survive on the wages we're creating an underclass of Americans with no hope of a decent life. We're turning great swaths of America into a Tijuana style ghetto by allowing this unchecked illegal immigration. Look at pictures of black neighborhoods like Watts today vs 60 years ago, the plight of many working people both white and black (and even legal hispanic) has been made far more desperate by illegal immigration cutting wages by huge amounts.

[Soule23]

If I'm not mistaken, a certain John McCain advertised heavily to try to recruit working class Americans to pick his lettuce in Arizona at $50 per hour. He ended up in a situation where he had to recruit H2-A workers from Mexico, because there are, in fact, jobs that Americans won't do. Being against illegal immigration is not xenophobic. Turning Hispanics into "Tijuana style" bogeyman, as you do in your post, is.

[BGM1906]

That does not justify hate crimes...so basically you're saying the hate crimes are ok because they lash out against illegal aliens that are taking jobs that most Americans don't want anyway? Sounds about right...huh? It absolutely astounds me that in the 21st century, we're still caught up in this race B/S. At what point will our immature minds catch up with the technology that surrounds us?

[Durango]

There were plenty of jobs only the Irish would do. Or African-Americans.

There has always been a racist underclass in America. Be it Irish, Black, italian or Hispanic.One of the things that made America "Great." Cheap labor.

Race has been used in America to seperate people. And keep them from realizing that the poor, no matter their color, race, ethnic origin, have far more in common with one another than they do with the ruling classes.

Divide and conquer. Distract people with artificial issues like race, homosexuality. Anything to keep them from voting for their own interests. And against those who would "Rule" us.

[EdCoughlin]

There is a key mistake here in blaming Lou Dobbs and Rush Limbaugh (though believe me Rush is wrong on so very many things, this is just not one of them) for anti illegal immigrant sentiment. I know a vast number of people, liberal California voters who never would even think of listening to Rush and usually ignore Dobbs too who feel just as strongly about illegal immigration though probably for different reasons. There are many valid reasons to hate the scourge of illegal immigration which is doing more then almost anything else to destroy the American working class.

It is strangely poignant that scion of the farmworkers movement, immortalized with his own holiday in California, was closer to Lou Dobbs then the illegal immigrant apologists looking for amnesty. Cesar Chavez actually marched on the border and set up a Mexican version of the minute men to stop illegal immigration. Why would a hispanic be against illegal immigration from Mexico? Quite simply his primary concern was American farm workers and they are, more then any other group, hurt by illegal immigration. This is the primary reason that I and many other liberals are strongly against illegal immigration.

Jobs Americans took for a hundred years have become "Jobs Americans won't do" which is not at all true since Americans did do them for a long time before massive waves of illegals. Americans won't do some jobs at the wages offered to illegals (often minimum wage if that).

[BGM1906]

It still doesn't justfy hate crimes...

[Soule23]

Apparently hate crimes are justifiable as long as they're being committed against Mexicans. That's the impression I'm getting from a vocal majority of the people on this thread anyway.

[biogroup]

Thanks EdCoughlin:
A voice of reason in the wilderness!!!
Your quote:
"It is strangely poignant that scion of the farmworkers movement, immortalized with his own holiday in California, was closer to Lou Dobbs then the illegal immigrant apologists looking for amnesty. Cesar Chavez actually marched on the border and set up a Mexican version of the minute men to stop illegal immigration. Why would a hispanic be against illegal immigration from Mexico? Quite simply his primary concern was American farm workers and they are, more then any other group, hurt by illegal immigration. This is the primary reason that I and many other liberals are strongly against illegal immigration."
is really a great point.
It is difficult to believe that so many people equate the desire to protect our borders and the belief that people should be required to immigrate legally into our country as in some way being anti-hispanic. I just can't understand that kind of thinking.
Thanks!

[KarlaElisa]

I've been waiting for more than a decade for Rush Limbaugh to be immortalized with a hail of gunfire.
Junkie with a small, obnoxious following and felonious tendencies is all he is.

[Truthfighter1]

Lou and Rush slander and misquote and pick out words from his statements to use to their advantage true or false so to those of you who love these two hacks, I don't care if Obama mis-states their positions they do it to him all the time, who he really really should be going after is Hannity but maybe he doesnt' want to acknowledge the worst right wing slut Hannity, he does'nt want to give him that type of status of being mentioned.

[Reno Raider]

The racists in this country are members of "La Raza" and their ilk. What nitwit doesn't know that la raza mean "The Race"? Those people are trying their best to divide the country into those that speak spanish and those that speak English. They're not interested in becoming acclimated to the American way of life. It's becoming so in parts of the country that applicants that are bi-lingual are given preference over English only speaking applicants because hispanics know they don't have to learn English in the USA anymore. They are giving Americans the big middle digit and laughing their asses off.

[Soule23]

Although I don't agree with racially divisive groups, La Raza is no more racist than the Black Student Unions or Chinese Students' Associations that you can find on most college campuses. It's just ok in our society to call out hispanics for joining such organizations.

People who are bilingual should be given preference over monolingual; it's a valuable skill that takes years to develop and can act as a useful asset in almost any industry.

[McPander]

LMAO

[KVB]

So B. Hussein Obama still has not backed up his claim about Dobbs/Rush causing hate crimes against hispanics. I hope he gets sued.

[JoshuaF]

KVB -

Nice. Really smart reply. I'm not sure why you didn't just shift that Obama to Osama and really raise the level of debate. What would you attribute the rise in hate crimes in the last year alone to? Just a random event? Hardly. Limbaugh in particular loves to stir the pot.

[KVB]

Did you see the riot at an LA H.S. in between Latinos and Blacks? If hate crimes are up against Hispanics, it's probably coming from blacks, not whites.

Still, your reply has nothing to do with B. Hussein Obama's accusation against Rush and Dobbs and hate crimes.

Hate crimes are all bullsh!t anyway.

[edwarvir]

Your problem is







These were high school children, and what example is rush, lou, hill and bill
setting for them. Young people are like sponges. We are responsible for
teaching them, and if they are fighting and hating on each other like the
kids say IT"S Our Bad We all of us must do better, and we can
start with getting rush, lou. bill, and hill out of their lives and off the air.

[Pinknose]

Obama has just raised his level for pandering to Hispanics. He realizes Hispanics have overwhelmingly supported Hillary and this is merely a lame attempt to smear Lou Dobbs and Rush to 'appear" sympathetic to this base of voters. Obama is a fraud through and through and I doubt anyone will actually believe this comment was anything less than politically movtivated.

[edwarvir]

Your problem Pinknose is that you don't know a decent man when you see
amd hear one. You think being fair and nice to people is pandering

Lou Dobbs and Rush Limbaugh are hatefilled old men , who sit around all day
long and stir up hate. Something needs to be done about the immigration
problem that's true, but what good does it do to sit around and stir up the
hate pot all day. Rush, Lou, and bill O"reilly and Hil like to fight and spit out
hate except when it suits their purpose, they should be given their gear and
their marching orders and send these hateful people out of this country and
let America become what she could be. The Ill Senator should be given a chance. Try Love Stop all this Hate

[havisham]

Three cheers for Obama on this one! It's about time that public figures held media figures responsible for the consequences of their irrational, bad-faith claims; their exploitation of people's anxieties and their pandering to their worst instincts.

[ibsteve2u]

The thing about illegal immigration and even legal, temporary immigration is the question about who is pandering to who.

For instance, during recent Congressional testimony on H2-B ("temporary non-agricultural guest worker") visa testimony, R. Daniel Musser III, President, Grand Hotel, Mackinac Island, MI talked about how critical the ability to import workers was to his business (http://www.house.gov/apps/list/press/ma10_delahunt/h2bhearing.html).

Now the interesting thing is that if you go to the Grand Hotel's website and check their rates (http://www.grandhotel.com/internetspecials.html), you find that their CHEAPEST "Internet Special" is $185 per night per person based upon a double occupancy.

Now isn't that interesting? Hmmmm....what income quintile do you have to be in to be able to afford $390 a night for you and your significant other? And why does your wallet need to be protected with imported low cost labor?

lolllll...and if you are in that quintile, are you more likely to be a Democrat or a Republican?

Further, are you more or less likely to yearn to have a job at that hotel - if only you knew it was available and that they would pay you a wage that would enable you to remain fed and protected from the elements - while living in America as an American citizen?

[Soule23]

Not to be too disagreeable, but the Grand Hotel is in a unique situation: it is a truly ancient wooden building that must be maintained in mint condition and it is only accessible by horse and carriage. Those two factors could drive the price up significantly. I know lots of young, working Dems who have honeymooned up there because of the unique and beautiful location.

[kingofscotts]

Of course this is a completely non-sense claim by Obama.

However the worst part of this article is thsi quote....

"Barack Obama accused anti-immigrant crusaders Lou Dobbs and Rush Limbaugh"

How the hell do you leave the word ILLEGAL out of this. Neither Rush or Lou have ever said anything "anti-immigrant". They seem to have a problem with ILLEGAL immigration.

I don't know maybe it's the part about it being illegal that they object to.

What whackos huh. Imagine somebody actually being against people breaking the law. What has this country come to?

[Soule23]

considering that the gvt (Dems and Reps) turned a blind eye to illegal immigration for twenty five years, your ILLEGAL argument has some flaws. We are now breaking up families, orphaning children and deporting people who have no recollection of their countries of origin (they were brought over by their parents at a young age. What has this country come to?

[edwarvir]

This country always broke the law when it suited them

[Jonni Rae]

I agree with you havisham. People in the media must be held responsible for what they say. Dobbs has been beating this drum relentlessly for a couple of years now. These pundits who acquire followings are getting away with too much. I keep waiting for the FCC to step in, but they never do. Case in point: Lix Trotta's words on Fox about assasinating Obama, whom she called Osama. How do these people get away with stuff like this. It's the dog whistle strategy. We have freedom of speech, but along with that freedom comes responsibility. I boycott Dobbs now and all CNN actually, as well as Fox and ABC. The only way you are going to get these people to learn their lesson that Americans don't want anymore of this divisive, ghoulish crap is to not watch them. or listen to them. Do something good for someone instead.

[LeftLeaner]

To blame Lou Dobbs for the crimes against Hispanics is OUTRAGEOUS.

With Obama, and ALL the other Democratic candidates PANDERING to the (ILLEGAL) Hispanic community, I, as an AMERICAN citizen find this comment utterly out of bounds, and FALSE.

Mr. Obama, what about all the crimes committed by Illegal aliens against Americans because of our porous borders???­??????????­??

Oh, I know, that's not a PC (politically correct) position.

I don't want any group to be a victim, but le'ts think about the AMERICAN citizens FIRST, Mr. Obama.

[zuffaloo]

Sen. Obama is 100% behind enforcing our border policies, as are all sane politicians. It's the politicians driving the immigration "debate" who've been thumbing their noses at the population by creating all this stir about "fixing the immigration problem". They know very well that new legislation will do nothing when we're not even enforcing existing legislation. And the wall they're building has some serious gaps - literally - certain VIPs who own land there are exempted from the wall (hint, wannabe illegal aliens: dress up like a caddy & walk across one of those posh golf courses), while Chertoff is 'waiving' every environmental law in the book (not to mention property rights) to build the wall through land not owned by friends of the Bush administration.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/glenn-hurowitz/big-balls-bigger-wall-c_b_69683.html
http://www.texasobserver.org/blog/index.php/2008/04/01/a-fools-folly-chertoffs-mega-waiver/

[Soule23]

It's not only an un-PC position to disregard the increase in hate crimes against hispanics because we ought to "put Americans first." It also demonstrates almost criminal ignorance of the basics of US constitutional law: first, a number of the people being targeted by such crimes are likely US citizens. second, illegal immigrants can be dealt with by ICE, but while they are in the country they are protected by American law.

[biogroup]

Good! HuffPost has gone really right-wing of late - I had expected MUCH better.
Obama's supporters ought to begin looking into his REAL background. He is a pretty-boy, PC-correct face designed to look good as a front for the corporocracy and FOOL the American people into putting him into the White House.
Hate to burst ya'll's bubbles, but once he gets IN its gonna be same-o, same-o. Even Hillary would be a far better choice than this guy thats about as "Afro-American" as I am (family heritage goes all the way back to the Mayflower & eariest Virginia colonies, with lots of ethnic groups merged into the family along the way!)

[Truthfighter1]

As soon as these hacks stop mis-stating Obama's positions then he will take more consideration next time in mis-stating their positions, I think he should do it more...lol. It's gonna be funny watching Lou tonight he hasn't been back on since this story broke, he is going to blow a gasket...lol. I love it, he has a personal vendetta against Obama and Obama knows it, that's why he always calls his name out on the stump.

[Jonni Rae]

Actually, Hilary was the first of the dem candidates to criticize Lou Dobbs.

[picodegallo54]

here's the real joke. you all are buidling a wall to keep us out, but we never left! want some salsa with those fries?

[Truthfighter1]

Any of you who are trying to somehow justify these fake wanna be reporters/pundits like Hannity, Dobbs, Limbaugh and other right wing hacks should be ashamed of yourselves. These guys spew hate,lies, misquotes and anything else they can throw at Obama all day long, every single day so Obama has every right to call them out, even if he is wrong about their positions they do it to him so what's fair is fair, his name is always coming out of their mouths. I have no sympathy for some of the worst media hacks ever known.

[uvymopkq]

These comments by Obama is nothing short of a lie. He claims to be different...but uses the same old tricks.