• Lawrence O’Donnell On Being A Liberal

    by  • January 6, 2012 • Politics • 7 Comments

    Lawrence O'Donnell Liberal Quote

    What did liberals do that was so offensive to the Republican Party? I’ll tell you what they did. Liberals got women the right to vote. Liberals got African-Americans the right to vote. Liberals created Social Security and lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty. Liberals ended segregation. Liberals passed the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act. Liberals created Medicare. Liberals passed the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act.

    What did Conservatives do? They opposed them on every one of those things, every one. So when you try to hurl that label at my feet, ‘Liberal,’ as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, it won’t work, because I will pick up that label and I will wear it as a badge of honor.

    -Lawrence O’Donnell Jr.

    • Azrose

      Sounds good, is there proof that I can go to ? I am on the left my husband on the far right when I read it to him he said not true, I said really? show me The quote of the day from him was ” If they really did all this we wouldn’t need Republicans” I chose not to say anything

    • http://www.chailife.com/ Evan Primakow

      If you’re looking for proof that all of the above were passed by majority Democrats, look no further than history books. Everything mentioned above are laws that were voted in to office with majority Democratic support, signed by Democratic Presidents, and held up every step of the way by Republicans.

    • Guest

      LIES:
      The Nineteenth Amendment’s (Passed June 4th, 1919) text was largely drafted by Susan B. Anthony. On November 18, 1872, Anthony was arrested by a U.S. Deputy Marshal for voting in the 1872 Presidential Election two weeks earlier. She had written to Stanton on the night of the election that she had “positively voted the Republican ticket—straight. (probably why she got arrested : ) WHy Mike? Now the facts. The 66th congress that passed the 19th Amendment on June 4th 1919 had republican majorities in both the Senate and the House.

      Senate
      Democratic (D): 47
      Republican (R): 49 (majority)
      TOTAL members: 96
      House of Representatives
      Democratic (D): 192
      Republican (R): 240 (majority)
      Prohibition (Proh.): 1
      Farmer-Labor (F-L): 1
      TOTAL members: 435 
      The outgoing president, one person name Woodrow Wilson, was a liberal and his party was duly crushed in the 1920 presidential election of Warren G Harding. Perhaps a lot of women voted for the first time huh? Maybe because, as a matter of FACT, It was liberal dominated congresses that came into power in 1912 thru 1918 with progressive support that rejected the 19th amendment several times. Do your homework. One outgoing liberal president does not support your claim that liberals gave women the right to vote. That is Bullshit. Why dont you give Suan B Anthony , A WOMAN, a little credit since it was her lifes mission not only for womens suffrage but for minorities of all color and creeds, a 40 year struggle. The proposed amendment was first introduced in the U.S. Senate colloquially as the “Anthony Amendment”, by Senator Aaron A. Sargent A REPUBLICAN from California, back in 1872 mind you. What is it about Liberals that they feel they can rewrite history? I guess its pretty easy when the can just repost BS on the likes of facebook without knowing or caring to look up the facts.

    • Guest

      More Lies:
      Liberals gave blacks the right to vote? REALLY? Mike, Im sorry but you posting this garbage is a disgrace. Its a lie and you obviously didnt bother to check the facts. 

      Adoption of the 15th Amendment.

      The Congress proposed the Fifteenth Amendment on February 26, 1869. The final vote in the Senate was 39 to 13, with 14 not voting. Several fierce advocates of equal rights, such as Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner A REPUBLICAN, abstained from voting because the amendment did not prohibit devices which states might use to restrict black suffrage, such as literacy tests and poll taxes. The vote in the House was 144 to 44, with 35 not voting. The House vote was almost entirely along party lines, with NO DEMOCRATS supporting the bill and only 3 Republicans voting against it. Thats 144 republicans FOR, and Not one democratic vote FOR. Now who was the President at the time? 

      How about Ulysses S. Grant, and some more facts. 

      Despite the efforts of groups like the Ku Klux Klan to intimidate black voters and white Republicans, assurance of federal support for democratically elected southern governments meant that most Republican voters could both vote and rule in confidence. For example, an all-white mob in the Battle of Liberty Place attempted to take over the interracial government of New Orleans. President Ulysses S. Grant, A REPUBLICAN, sent in federal troops to restore the elected mayor.

      General Grant implemented Congressional plans to reoccupy the South and hold elections in 1867, including black voters, which gave Republicans control of the Southern states. Grant was elected to the presidency in 1868. Reelected in 1872, he became the first president to serve two full terms since Andrew Jackson. As president, he effected Reconstruction by signing and enforcing civil rights laws and fighting Ku Klux Klan violence. Grant won passage of the Fifteenth Amendment; giving constitutional protection for African American voting rights.

    • Bsanders

      FOLKS, O’Donnell wasn’t talking about Democrats and Republicans, he was talking about Liberals and Conservatives. In the late 19th century Republicans were the liberals and Democrats were the conservatives. If you’re going to use history in your arguments, at least get it right.

    • Rcv1001

      half of these things would have never happened if republicans didnt agree. I am not exactly republican nor democrat, they both have good plans. they just need to follow through

    • Tigerclaw1

      Hey Lawrence, you forgot to give credit to the liberals for the 50 million people who died in the Great Leap Forward, the over half a BILLION abortions worldwide, the oppression suffered in North Korea, Vietnam, Cuba, China, the USSR (now defunct, thanks to conservatives),  and people who died due to liberals takeover of those regions. You forgot to take credit for the decline of the American family, for the regulations that drive small businesses out of business and leading to mass employment (and taking credit for feeding those people is a slap in the face that belongs on the face of the whore that delivered you to this planet from Hell), for putting up every obstacle the liberals’ tiny brains can muster to impede progress in technology and social aspects, and for setting America into fractured groups of victims with false senses of entitlement, pitting them against each other, and audaciously wringing your hands about hate speech. A liberal complaining about hate speech is like a Frenchman complaining about the speaking of French in France. People don’t outgrow conservatism. You almost NEVER see a conservative become a liberal. The opposite happens, though not frequently enough. Why is this? Because liberalism is a childish mentality, especially by children who suck at life. They grow up and become you.