Assemblyman Dov Hikind used his post-Shabbos radio show this week to call the candidates challenging Brooklyn DA Joe Hynes – Abe George, whose of Indian decent, and Ken Thompson, an African–American – ‘Articulate and Impressive’.

“Look, you’re an impressive guy, to be straight forward about it. You’re articulate. You’re impressive,” Mr. Hikind told Brooklyn DA candidate Abe George. Adding, “Ken Thompson, I’m going to tell you, is also Articulate. Also impressive. I’m not just using these words to be nice to you or to the other person running.”

Speaking to Ken Thompson, who was also a guest on the show, Mr. Hikind said “You’re an impressive guy. You know… Starting from being articulate… You’re a great candidate, there’s no question.”

There’s no doubt that Mr. Hikind meant to compliment the candidates vying to replace Joe Hynes. However, using the word ‘articulate’ when directed to an African American/Black person is considered offensive in the political world. “When a white person says that a black person is articulate, it is not meant as a compliment, as the white person believes it is. He may have thought that he was extending a compliment, but it is a backhanded compliment. It is meant that they didn’t expect for the black person to be equal in expression as they know themselves to be and take for granted they are,” writes the website Democratic Underground.

In 2007, Joe Biden got into trouble for calling Barack Obama ‘articulate and bright.’ In an article in the New York Observer, Biden, who was at the time a candidate for president, was quoted evaluating his presidential rivals. His remarks about Obama, the only African-American serving in the Senate, drew the most scrutiny.

“I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy,” Biden said. “I mean, that’s a storybook, man.”

Biden later issued a statement saying: “I deeply regret any offense my remark in the New York Observer might have caused anyone. That was not my intent and I expressed that to Sen. Obama.”

Obama, in a brief off-camera interview in a Senate hallway, said he thinks Biden “didn’t intend to offend” anyone.

In a written statement, Obama said “I didn’t take Sen. Biden’s comments personally, but obviously they were historically inaccurate. African-American presidential candidates like Jesse Jackson, Shirley Chisholm, Carol Moseley Braun and Al Sharpton gave a voice to many important issues through their campaigns, and no one would call them inarticulate.”

This is not the first time Mr. Hikind would be offending the Black community, unintentionally. Assemblyman Hikind already came under fire in March for wearing an afro wig blackface to a Purim party.

(Jacob Kornbluh – YWN)

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