"RedNeck Rap": Bill Otto, GOP Lawmaker, Criticized For Anti-Obama Song

TOPEKA, Kan. — A video featuring a Kansas legislator criticizing President Barack Obama's policies while wearing a hat describing opossum as "the other dark meat" was removed Thursday from YouTube, where the lawmaker had posted it last month.

Republican Rep. Bill Otto said he didn't remove the video, titled "RedNeck Rap," and didn't know why it had been taken down. Google Inc., YouTube's owner, could offer no explanation.

Otto said criticism of the video was unfounded. He said the hat's saying, which he repeats at the end of the short video, refers to redneck stereotypes, not Obama.

The White House declined to comment Thursday, but Kansas Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, a Topeka Democrat, called the video "disturbing." He said it's logical to see the reference as being to the first black president's race.

In the video, Otto pauses after criticizing Obama and his policies, repeats the saying on the cap and adds, "A little greasy, but hey."

"It's a reference to rednecks," Otto said during a telephone interview from his home in LeRoy, a small town about 75 miles south of Topeka. "It's like 'The Beverly Hillbillies,' eating opossum bellies, grits and pigs' feet."

The flap comes less than two months after U.S. Rep. Lynn Jenkins, another Kansas Republican, remarked in a public forum that the GOP was still looking for "a great white hope." She later said she wasn't referring to Obama and didn't know of the phrase's past link to pre-civil-rights era racism.

Attempts by AP to access Otto's video Thursday night resulted in a message stating that it had been "removed by the user." Google spokesman Scott Rubin said if a video is removed for violating YouTube's standards, a message would say so.

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"With 20 hours of video uploaded every minute to YouTube, we cannot comment on individual videos," he said in an e-mail.

Meanwhile, Hensley accused Otto of "bigotry."

"If opossum is the other dark meat, what is the original dark meat he is referring to?" Hensley said. "It is not only thoughtless, but outrageous."

Otto replied: "I don't know where he's getting that."

Hensley, though, pointed to an incident he said happened earlier this year involving Patrick Woods, legislative liaison for the Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services.

Woods said he encountered Otto in March while walking between the Statehouse and an office building, and Otto said he'd confused Woods with Rod Bremby, the state's secretary of health and environment. Woods said Otto told him, "I almost shot you. You look a lot like Secretary Bremby."

Both Woods and Bremby are black, but Bremby is decades older and has a beard, while Woods does not. Woods said he took the remark as "a terribly inappropriate joke," not a threat.

But Otto said the suggestion that he made such a remark is "totally bunk." He said any encounter with Woods occurred perhaps several years earlier and he only suggested Bremby ought to be fired over how his agency regulated day care centers. Otto said he confused Woods with Bremby only from a distance and only because he didn't know Woods well.

Hensley also noted Otto sponsored an unsuccessful amendment to the state budget this year to withhold funding for the state advisory commissions on disabilities, African-American Affairs and Hispanic and Latino American Affairs.

Otto called it a cost-saving move amid the state's financial problems, but acknowledged Thursday that he believes it's "racist" for the state to have special commissions for some groups and not others.

"We haven't had an Irish-American council or an Asian-American council," he said.

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On the Net:

Kansas Legislature: http://www.kslegislature.org

Comments

[LeftOfCenter44]

I need to get at least 1,000 signatures soon. Please help me. This cause is very important to me and many others. Especially after the Haliburton/KBR rape case and SA 2588 introduced by Sen. Frankin that followed. I'm ready to hand deliver this petition with all signatures intact but I'm not there yet. I'm going out today to get "physical" signatures as well. Please help me. The link is: http://www.change.org/actions/view/demand_congress_stop_funding_private_armies_in_the_middle_east

[jasev01]

I don't see the racism at all. People need to lighten up. Every criticisms is not racism. There are too many real racist things to complain about this.

[Dupree]

To all those who insists that the race card is a deck that is conveniently played by people of color as an excuse. It should be evident to those that has any ounce of integrity left in their soul to acknowledge that there is a climate change going on in our country. The racism that was self-monitored and under restraints by its occupant...is now becoming harder and harder to control under the leadership of this nation very first African American President. For those of us that have been the ongoing recipient of the racism that has been dealt to us from various arms of deliveries.....blatant and subtle...it is NOT news to us although I have to admit it is alarming to see how many come out from under the proverbial sheets and boldly express their fixation of the color of skin...like never been seen to this degree since the sixties. WE, already was quite aware of the cards being dealt underneath the table as those that were in great denial or just plain not willing to be exposed by projecting that the cards did not exist...is now seeing just how prevalent the cards are and how the trend is to boldly come out of the closet with the joker leading the way.

[Babzter]

"Redskins" is a racist term used everyday, but fans insist it is a term of respect, not a reference to bounty skins from the 19th century.

[lafayette2009]

We are living in an age in which people make comments that are not overtly racist or inflammatory but close enough to create a stir when they are published.

Recently, we have had the Rush Limbaugh situation with the NFL, the comment about "The Next Great White Hope" also from a Kansas republican politician, the Monkey being shot by the police "cartoon", the JP in Louisiana and on it goes and now this one.

None consider their comments racist and yet most people recognize them as such. The fact is that if any of us who work in companies made such comments out loud in the workplace, we would either be severely reprimanded or fired.

The only way we can fire politicians is by calling for impeachment (hardly likely here) or voting them out at the next election. The only way we can "fire" talking heads and news media, is by trying to get advertisers to boycott their shows and don't buy their newspaper.

Despite the claims to the contrary, racism is still with us so we have to deal with it as best we can. To the people of Kansas; if you really feel aggrieved by comments such as this, then don't vote for these people when they are up for reelection.

[psaltseller]

And the winner for the most embarrassing response to the class reunion question "what is your job?":

Science Teacher at a Kansas high school.

[keepemhonest]

Possum is WHITE MEAT ... Otto is so ignorant he does NOT even know that!

[GoodwithWood]

Well I didn't know that either! Guess I'm just ignorant.

[unhipcat]

I guess it's only funny if you accept the fact that he thought the guy he said he was going to shoot was a different black guy. When you look at it that way, you can really see the humor, eh?

[Cathar]

I was born and raised in central Kansas. Yes bigotry is alive an well in Kansas. Yet, I also resided in Ohio and Louisiana and not one state has a hold on bogotry.

[Imzadi]

Well, it IS Kansas.

A state where very few people like Obama and think inappropriate content is cute. Then they get all confused why other people don't like it.

[annie0107]

jerk

[disgustedwithall]

Wonder if the guy from KS and some of the posters have a close family member whom is a JP in the state of LA, long known for it's approch to equality. Am sure they would agree the JP was "Just doing this for the good of the children" and argu that such stuff in not truly racist? Racists always easy to ID as they hide behind "what if a white did it" or as in this case, doing for good of the kids..
yea sure you are..
http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/10/16/louisiana.interracial.marriage/index.html

[ClareP]

It's a very old and transparent ruse- imply it indirectly and when anyone challenges you on it, pretend it's all in the minds of the challengers. Sexism, racism, any kind of nastiness at all -- people try this stuff all the time. He needs to be held responsible. If he intended it, he's too racist to be allowed in government. If he really didn't (though unlikely), he's too stupid. Either way, he ought to be out.

[Liberalforsure]

God isn't a racist, what entitles the gop to be?

[cybexg]

Mostly uneducated, poor people being influenced by wealthy, somewhat evil people

[Enigma2008]

I am white. Grew up in the south. I know racism when I hear it because I have been surroundedby it for over 60 years. But it isn't just the south. I have worked all over the country and it is everywhere.

Most of these people are so naively ignorant that they really think they aren't racist because it is so ingrained in their circles of friends and associates. They all think they same way, they are "good christians," they don't mean any harm, they don't understand why anyone is offended. They are totally desensitized to the facts of racist thought and action and instead take offense when they are called out. Often they are even charitible---but the key that gives them away is their accepted concept of "the other."

You hear it all the time when every reference to another person is accompanied by the inclusion of the race or ethnicity of that person as in "my Indian doctor," "hired a Filipino girl," "my black mailman." "saw my jewish neighbor," "the couple at the door was mixed." "hire some Mexicans" ---all heard in conversations within the last couple of months. People who categorize people so casually can't then say that they aren't reacting to the race of the president. They are just as intolerant toward anyone who doesn't share their religion---basic ignorance about the world.

They need to be educated about racism and called out on it every time. Ignorance can't be an excuse.

[Aaryck]

well said.