Newsweek.com--In advance of Saturday night’s Viva Don King boxing card at the Seminole Hard Rock in Hollywood, the 80-year-old promotional legend threw his verbose support behind those squatting in Lower Manhattan to make their case against those financial institutions that have been deemed “too big to fail.”
Making a point about Angelo Santana, the Cuban defector who will defend his WBA Fedecaribe Super Lightweight title on Saturday’s card, King veered off into a pretty powerful statement of support for the OWS protestors.
“Here’s a a young man who comes over on a raft or boat, shark-infested waters, seeking freedom and liberty,” King began. “We take it for granted like it’s nothing. That is why I support Occupy. That’s the First Amendment. That enables us to do things. But if we start to beat them up like we’re doing, it ain’t no different from the Middle East, ain’t no different from Khadafi, ain’t no different from Syria, ain’t no different from Saddam Hussein.
“If you start beating these kids up, you’ve got to understand, the next thing you know, you’re going to have somebody get killed. And when they get killed, you are definitely right there in the mix of all of that. We boast the self-evident truth. We live the self-evident lie. We got to be able to stop that lie and bring truth back to the fold. That’s what I’m fighting for: freedom.”
From there, King segued into an eloquent statement of support for American troops struggling in the wake of their service.
“This kid Santana is doing a great job,” King continued. “He’s demonstrating what we should be demonstrating. That’s the love of a nation and the freedom and liberties it expounds. We should be able to enjoy them. Because our troops go out and put themselves in harm’s way to protect these liberties and safeguard our freedoms and when they come home and they can’t get no job, that ain’t gonna be cool either.
“You can’t keep telling them how great they are. Courageous. What valor! Patriotism is beyond belief! And then when a guy gets home, he’s starving to death. Kick ‘em to the curb. Give ‘em some platitudes, some rhetoric. We can’t do that.”
Posted By: Siebra Muhammad
Sunday, November 6th 2011 at 5:12PM
You can also
click
here to view all posts by this author...
