audience than effectively dealing. i think it s the media s job to look beyond that. and learn the true story. it is our job to sort of listen to those. and go and ask the serious questions to learn who you are. if we don t ask those questions, how do the answers actually come? we know there s more to every story than what s on the surface. i think today we just don t have those journalists out there digging deep. everything is superficial. everything is sort of the obvious, the vanity of it all. where are the journalists really asking and knocking on doors. you know what i mean? it s interesting you say that, allison, because people were stopping me today that had saw the oprah interview and said i never knew you were a preacher since a little boy. they said what was your motivation and you couldn t have been ambitious and opportunistic there. you ve done this all your life. it doesn t excuse any time in my
depravity and thuggism as that s where you that s real blackness. street life and calling women names and all that. and it s really unsettling to me. nobody fights harder than i do for everybody s rights. but you also have to have standards and values if you re going to be able to uphold and uplift a community. and as you know, many people didn t like me taking that position, but i don t apologize for that. that is part of your legacy. being a i believe to say this is what i believe in. i m going to stand behind what i believe in. a lot of people criticized you for that, but you really have stood behind that. i think again that s part of your total story. and it has to be told every time the story of al sharpton is told. i think that s what your book does. allison, thank you for coming on tonight. allison samuels, thank you for your time tonight. and a programming note. my interview with oprah will
last night on the o.w.n. network, oprah interviewed me. it was quite an experience. we talked about my book the rejected stone, and as you d expect from a sit-down with oprah, she got me to open up about personal experiences. some of which i ve never talked about before on television. i wake up one morning, he gone. and not only is he gone, my older sister from his mother s first marriage how old was she? she was around 18. left with him and they had a child. and then they came and took my sister to live with them. we ve all gone through things in life that we have to get past. and that was why i felt it was important to share those moments in the interview. joining me now is allison samuels senior writer for the
0 this is a law that can and will work if republicans stop rooting for failure. three governors who embrace the law tell the washington post, quote, in our states, elected leaders have decided to put people not politics first. in states like theirs, nearly 400,000 people now have coverages thanks to medicaid expansion. and in kentucky the law will create 17,000 jobs. in washington it saved the state $300 million. and in connecticut the health care exchange there in connecticut has a 96% customer satisfaction rate. so no, jim demint, it s not terrorism, and no bushes, it s not katrina. and no, senator ayotte, your joke of a plan is no plan at all. here is the plan. we have a health care law and it s already working. right now. joining me now congressman emanuel cleaver and salon s joan walsh. thank you both for coming on tonight. good to be with you, reverend. congressman, let me go to you first. what do you make of all of this? i think it s silly to talk about something that cost
that than the first lady, who has been the target of so many attacks from the right. and yet she has made the decision just to ignore the noise. listen to this. i grew up in the same neighborhoods, went to the same schools, faced the same struggles, shared the same hopes and dreams that all of you share. i am you. and the only reason that i am standing up here today is that back when i was your age, i made a set of choices with my life, do you hear me? choices. i chose not to listen to the doubters and the haters. i mean, that s really inspirational. she is just look, she is magnificent. and she inspires me in so many ways because she is public school educated. you know, she just worked really, really hard. and i agree with what allison was saying. and i know it can be a very