John McCain was lightly heckled during his speech today down in Memphis---on the site and the day that ML King was assassinated. When he apologized for his vote, a vote that will haunt him, a vote he made when he was very old---some spectators chose to honor the memory of ML King by showing him a little kindness. Something that was unavailable to the Black community so many years ago. I also included Soldedad O'Brien's commentary at the end of the video. She called it very accurately.
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In his speech today, McCain tried to explain his misguided vote by stating, “We can all be a little late sometimes in doing the right thing”:
We can be slow as well to give greatness its due, a mistake I made myself long ago when I voted against a federal holiday in memory of Dr. King. I was wrong and eventually realized that, in time to give full support for a state holiday in Arizona. We can all be a little late sometimes in doing the right thing, and Dr. King understood this about his fellow Americans. But he knew as well that in the long term, confidence in the reasonability and good heart of America is always well placed.
During these statements, some in the crowd said, “We forgive you,” but many others began loudly objecting to McCain’s comments. CNN reporter Soledad O’Brien called it “a little bit of heckling.
