BET founder backs Clinton
CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) - April 15, 2008 The Charlotte Observer reported on its Web site Monday that Bob
Johnson, one of Hillary Rodham Clinton's top black supporters, was
commenting on remarks previously made by Geraldine Ferraro, another
Clinton supporter.
"What I believe Geraldine Ferraro meant is that if you take a
freshman senator from Illinois called 'Jerry Smith' and he says I'm
going to run for president, would he start off with 90 percent of
the black vote?" Johnson said. "And the answer is, probably
not."
"Geraldine Ferraro said it right," Johnson added. "The
problem is, Geraldine Ferraro is white. This campaign has such a
hair-trigger on anything racial it is almost impossible for anybody
to say anything."
Ferraro, a Democratic candidate for vice president in 1984,
stepped down last month as an adviser to Clinton amid controversy
over comments she made to the Daily Breeze newspaper in Torrance,
Calif. "If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this
position," Ferraro said. "And if he was a woman (of any color) he
would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be
who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept."
Obama campaign spokesman Dan Leistikow called Johnson's remarks
"just one in a long line of absurd comments by Bob Johnson and
other Clinton supporters who will say or do anything to get the
nomination. The American people are tired of this and are ready to
turn the page on these kind of attack politics."
Johnson, who owns the NBA's Charlotte Bobcats, is a longtime
friend of both Hillary Clinton and former President Clinton.
In January, Johnson seemed to refer to Obama's acknowledged
teenage drug use while introducing Clinton at a South Carolina
event. He said the Clintons "have been deeply and emotionally
involved in black issues - when Barack Obama was doing something in
the neighborhood; I won't say what he was doing, but he said it in
his book - when they have been involved."
Obama wrote about his youthful drug use - marijuana, alcohol and
sometimes cocaine - in his memoir, "Dreams From My Father."
Johnson later denied that he was talking about Obama using drugs.