Posted on 09/10/2002 12:21:51 PM PDT by fight_truth_decay
Blame America First. The 9-11 attacks were our own fault, former CBS News anchor Walter Cronkite contended on Monday's Larry King Live on CNN, because we hog so much of the world's wealth while many are destitute.
Cronkite said he believes "very definitely that foreign policy could have caused what has happened," before he asserted that anti-U.S. terrorism is caused by "this great division between the rich and the poor in the world." The people of the world "who don't have adequate housing, don't have adequate hospitalization, don't have adequate medical care, don't have adequate education," Cronkite warned, "are not going to live forever in the shadow of the riches that we display constantly." Walter Cronkite attributed terrorism to U.S. policy and world poverty: "We are suffering from a revolution of the...have-nots against the...haves and that's us."
Applying liberal logic which seeks to blame the U.S. for all the world's ills, Cronkite declared: "We are suffering from a revolution of the poor and have-nots against the rich and haves and that's us."
In fact, the al Qaeda terrorists were hardly poor and the vast majority of the world's poor do not support terrorism. The common elements amongst those targeting the U.S. is Islamic extremism and nation's without respect for individual liberty.
Cronkite's liberal ranting came about 45 minutes into the live September 9 interview tied to the 9-11 anniversary.
King prompted Cronkite by wondering about "foreign policy's affect on what might have caused 9-11?"
That set off Cronkite: "Yes, I think very definitely that foreign policy could have caused what has happened." King interjected: "Doesn't excuse it." But Cronkite plowed forward without acknowledging King's caveat, so he presumably did not agree with it: "We have been warned by other terrorist attacks elsewhere of the dislike for us and the intensity of organization to express that dislike in various terrorist acts around the country -- the two embassies that were blown up in Africa, the Destroyer Cole, for instance, episode, and that sort of thing. "It should be apparent to us, it should have been apparent to us a long time ago and it certainly should be apparent now -- it should be, for goodness sakes understood now, but it is not, that the problem is this great division between the rich and the poor in the world. We represent the rich. Each of our citizens is not rich, of course, but as a country we are exceedingly rich. As a country, all of these, most of these other nations of Africa, Asia and South America and Central America are very, very poor. The people in those countries who don't have adequate housing, don't have adequate hospitalization, don't have adequate medical care, don't have adequate education, they are not going to live forever in the shadow of the riches that we display constantly in our movies, in our travels around the world, in our airlines, in our shipping. "They're not going to put up with that forever. This is a revolution in effect around the world. A revolution is in place today. We are suffering from a revolution of the poor and have-nots against the rich and haves and that's us."
Yes, it's all our fault and Osama bin Laden is just trying to help the world's downtrodden improve themselves.
Huh?
Did this ever enter your small liberal brain?
The United States is rich because we are free.
Instead of directing their anger towards the freedom-loviong people of the United States, the people who do not enjoy what we enjoy should devote themselves to staging revolutions against those forces that throttle freedom in their own countries.
Arab people do not have to be poor. That they tolerate rulers who deny them basic freedoms is a BIG reason for their poverty.
Don't blame us. Blame them instead.
Besides, Bangladeshis, many Indians, etc live in abject poverty. I don't recall them screaming about destroying America. This generally starts in nations with at least some degree of education and wealth. Truly poor and destitute people are too busy eeking out their meager existence to worry about becoming terrorists.
Go rant into a toy microphone in front of a mirror, Walter.
Finally, I believe Walter has been enjoying retirement on his expensive yacht for years.
I actually watched a very few minutes of this interview.
I saw Cronkite was LK's guest and I figured he'd say something like this. I heard it myself.
In addition he echoed a sentiment I read here on FR yesterday expressed by Dan Rather. That is, that the media should always be questioning the administration.
My mind instantly pictured him boating with the clintons.
Disgusting.
If it wasn't for the productive people of the world we would still be living in caves but the leftist envy crowd doesn't understand that. Further proof that these degenerates have a low IQ lower than apes.
This explains why we are wealthy and repressed people are poor. It should be much easier for him to understand than Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith.
Or maybe he's just been hanging around Bill Clinton too much.
Cronkite is terribly revulsive to the poor as well as the rich.
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