RUSH: There is video, apparently, of Rachel Dolezal saying the N-word. In a series of videos of Rachel Dolezal talking about her experience as a black woman, she says the N-word. She has plagiarized a famous painting. “People online are drawing attention to the similarities between one of DolezalÂ’s paintings, The Shape of Our Kind, and The Slave Ship, an iconic work of art painted by J.M.W. Turner in 1840.
“She once claimed that her black father was beaten by a cop.” This is from the UK Daily Mail, now the worldwide Daily Mail, by the way. “The interview, from earlier this year, has Dolezal sharing stories about her black family, including one in which she details her fatherÂ’s ‘exodusÂ’ from the Deep South after he assaulted a police officer. … ‘My dadÂ’s exodus, the great migration to the North from the Deep South where they left on the midnight train because a white officer harassed and threatened to, was about ready to, beat his dad with a billy club and he whipped around and actually slapped the officer to his knees. They got out of town on the midnight train because as a black family in the Deep South if you had any kind of a negative altercation with a white cop where you stood up for yourself it was gonna go badly for you.'”
Her father’s not black! Her mother’s not black. Her mother and father have been on television. I think they’re actually Christian missionaries. You know, it’s clear, I don’t think there’s any doubt about what’s happened here. Well, there may be some doubt, but I think it’s a pretty safe bet what happened here to this woman.
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RUSH: Rachel Dolezal this morning on the Today Show. Matt Lauer interviewed her and just hit her point-blank. Remember, this woman is a Caucasian. There’s no question about it. There’s no doubt about it. It’s not debatable, but yet he asks her, “Are you an African-American woman?”
DOLEZAL: I identify as black.
LAUER: Your father went on to say: “She’s a very talented woman doing work she believes in. Why can’t she do that as a Caucasian woman, which is what she is.”
DOLEZAL: I really don’t see why they’re in such a rush to whitewash some of the work that I have done and who I am and how I’ve identified. And this goes back to a very early age with my self-identification with the black experience as a very young child.
LAUER: When did it start?
DOLEZAL: I would say about 5 years old. I was drawing self-portraits with the brown crayon instead of the peach crayon and, you know, black curly hair and, you know, yeah, that was how I was portraying myself.
RUSH: You know, folks, when I was five, when I was seven, I thought that I was Little Joe Cartwright on Bonanza and I ran around telling everybody was Little Joe Cartwright and they just smiled and they thought it was cute how I was so into that show and pretending to be. But one time — I’ll never forget this — some teacher somewhere, this is at grade school, apparently they were very worried. I was on the swing set out there at recess, teacher came out, “Hi, how are you today?”
“Oh, I’m fine.”
“So I hear that you think you’re Little Joe Cartwright on Bonanza.”
“Yeah, yeah, I am, I’m Little Joe Cartwright.”
They called my mom and dad, “You know, your son thinks he’s Little Joe on Bonanza.”
“Oh, yeah, we know. It’s just he likes the show, is all.” And that was it. What 5-year-old doesn’t identify as something? And now it’s courageous and it’s brave and it’s something that we should — But 5 years old, “I knew I was black.” Not African-American, she will reject if you tell her she’s African-American. “No, no, no, no. I identify as black.” Matt Lauer then said, “Look, you’ve changed your appearance. Your complexion appears darker than it did in the photos of you as a young lady. Have you done something to darken your complexion?”
DOLEZAL: I certainly don’t stay out of the sun, you know, and I also don’t, as some of the critics have said, put on blackface as a performance. I have a huge issue with blackface. This is not some freak birth of a nation mockery blackface performance. This is on a very real connected level how I’ve actually had to go there with the experience, not just a visible representation, but with the experience.
RUSH: Okay, are we all following this now? You didn’t understand that at all? You mean that didn’t make any sense to you? You see, that’s how mean-spirited you are. That didn’t make sense to you? That means you are intolerant. You’re supposed to take what she said there and talk about how brave and courageous it is for her to admit this. Look, this is a woman who, for some reason — I think it’s obvious — thought there was something attractive about being a minority and a victim. It’s that simple.
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RUSH: No, I’m sorry, I didn’t get to the media sound bites on Dolezal, but I will tomorrow. Don Lemon and Whoopi Goldberg are priceless. I’m sorry I didn’t get to ’em. It ticks me off. My own discipline fell short. I got sidetracked by other stuff. Oh, Don Lemon welcoming Rachel to the black fold and Whoopi Goldberg, “If she wants to be black, that’s fine with me.” The woman’s insane! She’s been driven insane!
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