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Ted Cruz Walks Out Of Nelson Mandela Memorial Service In Protest

TheDemSocialist

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While Barack Obama extended his hand, Ted Cruz turned his back.The Cuban-American U.S. Senator from Texas traveled to South Africa as part of a congressional delegation to attend Nelson Mandela’s memorial service on Tuesday. In contrast to President Obama, who made headlines for greeting Cuban head of state Raúl Castro with a handshake, Cruz walked out of the ceremony when Castro’s turn came to speak, ABC News reports.
“Sen. Cruz very much hopes that Castro learns the lessons of Nelson Mandela,” Cruz spokeswoman Catherine Frazier told ABC News. “For decades, Castro has wrongly imprisoned and tortured countless innocents. Just as Mandela was released after 27 years in prison, Castro should finally release his political prisoners. He should hold free elections, and once and for all, set the Cuban people free.”
CNN noted that Castro's speech would be a “challenging moment” for the senator, whose father emigrated from Cuba at age 18 in the 1950s, shortly before Cuban dictator Fidel Castro came to power. Like most Cuban exiles who left around those years, Cruz’s father is a dogged critic of the Cuban government.
It’s doubtful that Mandela himself would have shared Cruz’s interpretation. The South African leader was a loyal supporter of the Castros and the Cuban Revolution, in part because of Cuba’s strong opposition to Apartheid.


Read more @: Ted Cruz Walks Out Of Nelson Mandela Memorial Service In Protest

I think Ted Cruz needs to take a little history before making an idiotic gesture/statement. I dont think he remembers how Mandela and Castro are allies...
 
Wow, that will show them! Ted now can claim to have the biggest Johnson.

He is as plastic as his "patriotism"
 
Now, if he could just walk out on Congress. Forever.:lamo
 
With the thousands of people in attendence who would have noticed a Texas senator leaving?

Definitely Cruz had this planned for a publicity stunt. It was more about getting his name on the news than Castro feeling slighted.

Another camera whore like Palin.
 
remolcadorbig.jpg

Excerpt:

>" A conservative estimate gives the range, according to Matthew White in his website Necrometrics, at between 5,000-12,000 Cubans killed by the Castro regime compared with Chileans killed by the Pinochet regime which number 3,197. Rudolph Joseph Rummel, a political science professor at the University of Hawaii and an expert in Democide (murder by government) also takes into account the Cuban boat people who have died fleeing the dictatorship and estimates 73,000 dead Cubans between 1959 and 1987. In The Black Book of Communism in chapter 25 "Communism in Latin America" by Pascal Fontaine states that in Cuba between 1959 through the late 1990s "between 15,000 and 17,000 people were shot." All these are conservative numbers. The Cuban Archives place the number at 100,000..."<

Notes from the Cuban Exile Quarter: The Rising Body Count in Cuba
 
lol wtf? where did you get that from? That's so random!

Bill Seluga was a great improv comedian of the 70's he was in Ace Trucking Company with Fred Willard, Patty Deustch (Match Game queen), and George Memmoli.

The "Johnson" routine was a big meme in the mid 70's, he did it on several TV shows, and commercials...even was spoofed in the Simpsons...

But..you doesn't has to call me Johnson.....

 
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that's fantastic! I never knew about this, thanks!
 
I don't understand the GOP. First, they attack Mandela for being a supposed communist. Then, they praise his work for holding the free & fair elections that the capitalist apartheid government would not and freeing the prisoners that the capitalist apartheid government would not. So, is Mandela now bad or good? Who cares. Right wing schizophrenia is in full swing.
 
that's fantastic! I never knew about this, thanks!

Ace Trucking Company used to appear on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show in the 60's and 70's they were fantastic!

Another great group like this was "The Credibility Gap" with Harry Shearer, Michael McKean and David L. Lander (AKA "Lennie and Squiggy" from the Laverne and Shirley show). Add in the Firesign Theatre and the National Lampoon Radio show (Belushi, Chevy Chase, Gilda Radner, Richard Belzer, Bill Murray, Christopher Guest, Michael O'Donohue, Harold Ramis, Doug Kenney (the genius who produced Animal House and Caddyshack), and there was such a great comedy underground back then. But, you had to find it, and that was the joy of it all. You have to remember, before Lenny Bruce and his progeny George Carlin and Richard Pryor and Rodney Dangerfield (who reinvented himself as Rodney after a failed comedy career), comedy in America was terrible! Repressed Borsch Belt crap that was all centered around "Kids today", "my mother in law" and other completely unoriginal crap (exception being Phyllis Diller who created a fantastic character and trail blazed for female comedians).

I have to assume you are younger than me! I've never felt like the old guy...but, really, this stuff was groundbreaking and fantastic.
 
Ace Trucking Company used to appear on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show in the 60's and 70's they were fantastic!

Another great group like this was "The Credibility Gap" with Harry Shearer, Michael McKean and David L. Lander (AKA "Lennie and Squiggy" from the Laverne and Shirley show). Add in the Firesign Theatre and the National Lampoon Radio show (Belushi, Chevy Chase, Gilda Radner, Richard Belzer, Bill Murray, Christopher Guest, Michael O'Donohue, Harold Ramis, Doug Kenney (the genius who produced Animal House and Caddyshack), and there was such a great comedy underground back then. But, you had to find it, and that was the joy of it all. You have to remember, before Lenny Bruce and his progeny George Carlin and Richard Pryor and Rodney Dangerfield (who reinvented himself as Rodney after a failed comedy career), comedy in America was terrible! Repressed Borsch Belt crap that was all centered around "Kids today", "my mother in law" and other completely unoriginal crap (exception being Phyllis Diller who created a fantastic character and trail blazed for female comedians).

I have to assume you are younger than me! I've never felt like the old guy...but, really, this stuff was groundbreaking and fantastic.

I'm older than 30 and younger than 40. So really, stuff that happened in the 60's and 70's....really not stuff I got to take in much. Thanks for the info though!
 
Not really important at all.

Like the Obama selfie this is a complete non issue.

These few days in South Africa are about Madiba, not petty American partisan pissing matches that only someone with an IQ in the single digits worries about.
 
I'm older than 30 and younger than 40. So really, stuff that happened in the 60's and 70's....really not stuff I got to take in much. Thanks for the info though!

It was a tight window, I remember before SNL started, it was Smothers Brothers, Sonny & Cher and Laugh-In, for the Hip crowd, and truly awful stuff like Bob Hope and Red Skelton and Hee-Haw for the old folk.

Things really changed, Lenny Bruce, George Carlin, Richard Pryor, Andy Kaufman, they are literally legends, they deserve all the awe and respect possible, they changed the entire paradigm...but now? Dane Cook, Carlos Mencia? Pure feces.... Sigh.
 
I don't understand the GOP. First, they attack Mandela for being a supposed communist.

To be fair the GOP had nothing to do with the negative comments made towards Madiba.

They were mostly far right wing fringe extremists that hid behind a computer to make their comments known.

This was what Ted Cruz said about him:

“Nelson Mandela will live in history as an inspiration for defenders of liberty around the globe. He stood firm for decades on the principle that until all South Africans enjoyed equal liberties he would not leave prison himself, declaring in his autobiography, ‘Freedom is indivisible; the chains on any one of my people were the chains on all of them, the chains on all of my people were the chains on me.’ Because of his epic fight against injustice, an entire nation is now free. We mourn his loss and offer our condolences to his family and the people of South Africa.”

And here's what Gingrich said:

President Nelson Mandela was one of the greatest leaders of our lifetime.
He emerged from 27 long years in prison with a wisdom, a compassion, and a commitment to help other people that was astonishing. His life was a triumph of the human spirit.
When he visited the Congress I was deeply impressed with the charisma and the calmness with which he could dominate a room. It was as if the rest of us grew smaller and he grew stronger and more dominant the longer the meeting continued.
His thoughtful disciplined but friendly and warm personality made him a leader who could define the right policies and the right behaviors.
Nelson Mandela was truly the father of an integrated, democratic South Africa.
He will be an inspiration for generations to come and an historic leader worth studying for as long as people want to learn about greatness in serving others.
Callista and I extend our condolences and our prayers to the Mandela family and to the people of South Africa.

They were attacked on Twitter and Facebook by many who felt betrayed.

Again like on this site, notice very clearly who calls Mandela a terrorist.

Very extremist right wingers.
 
Good for Cruz. Screw Castro.
 
With the thousands of people in attendence who would have noticed a Texas senator leaving?

Definitely Cruz had this planned for a publicity stunt. It was more about getting his name on the news than Castro feeling slighted.

Another camera whore like Palin.


Yes, let's talk "ATTENTION WHORE"



obama_vs_mandela_tribute.jpg
 

You really just can't seem to think clearly when you speak about this man can you?

Here's just a couple of examples from his speech when he "spoke about himself".

But I believe it should also prompt in each of us a time for self-reflection. With honesty, regardless of our station or circumstance, we must ask: how well have I applied his lessons in my own life?

It is a question I ask myself - as a man and as a President. We know that like South Africa, the United States had to overcome centuries of racial subjugation.

Michelle and I are the beneficiaries of that struggle.

I learned of Mandela and the struggles in this land. It stirred something in me. It woke me up to my responsibilities - to others, and to myself - and set me on an improbable journey that finds me here today. And while I will always fall short of Madiba’s example, he makes me want to be better.

Read more: Nelson Mandela memorial service: Transcript of President Barack Obama's speech - NY Daily News
 
8 sentences you quoted. He said "I," "me," "my" and "myself" 14 times. He used Mandela's name and "he" 3 times.

I'm like Mandelas biggest fan and not so much a fan of Obama and I'm not upset.

WHY WOULD YOU BE?
 
Yes, let's talk "ATTENTION WHORE"



obama_vs_mandela_tribute.jpg

How sad of a life is the one that made that graphic. Seriously, delusion...get over it.
 
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