28 Comments

I understand — according to The Hill— as of 2 hours ago, Cory Booker’s speech had received 350m likes on TikTok 💪

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Other reports have said, as noted in Letters From An American, the speech received 400m likes before his speech was through.

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When I first heard that Senator Booker was going to filibuster, I thought "Oh, what a silly stunt." Then I began to catch snippets of his speech on CNN and MSNBC and on line. By the end I was truly moved. What a passionate and eloquent speaker! What a leader!

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Courageous, disciplined, necessary move. I was inspired and happily gave a donation to him and Senator Chris Murphy. We need these moments of solidarity, hope and resistance to get through the next 4 years. Ready for next. Keep them coming.

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To anyone who would call Sen. Booker performative or that his actions here any thing other than what it was.. To obstruct. To impede… To disrupt… For the benefit of good trouble..❤️

It was bonafide good trouble.. no party earned that. A man earned that.. for others.. if they so choose.

Someone.. fit Mr. Booker for John Lewis classic trench coat, because that, and pork pie hat.. might as well be the armor of a Samurai… 🙏

That’s the thing about bonafide performance, it isn’t performative… When children are using adult words in an infantile way, we ought to run the pedantic d-baggery risk of calling out the malaprop, and get to the core of it about these people..

The dean of one the finest educational institutions the world has ever known… Faber College… once said.. “Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life son.”

Let them throw rocks. That trench coat protects…even when it isn’t there.. Well done Mr. Booker.

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This was totally inspiring for the 400m of us who watched and will be protesting in Hands Off!

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Frederick Douglass, Martin Luther King, and Fannie Lou Hamer all rolled into one Cory Booker.

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"Activists like former Senate staffer Gabe Garbowit have called the speech merely performative."

Here's the thing about "performativity"--"performativity" is how change takes place. It's "being the change." Sometimes it's "fake it till you make it," but the important part of that is that ultimately, you make it. Was it performative for four Black men to occupy seats at a whites-only Woolworth's performative? Hell yes. It didn't create immediate change, but it made a statement of aspiration that was duplicated until it was ultimately fulfilled.

We don't yet know what impact Cory Booker's filibuster will have, if any. But if it is "performative" to demonstrate that Democrats can take control of the Senate floor, not yielding until they decide to yield, I say: "Hell, yes." If it's "performative" for a Black Senator to make history at a time when the achievements of Black people are being scrubbed from government websites, military academy curricula, and possibly the Smithsonian museums, I say, "Hell, yes."

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As Cory Booker said during his speech: The power of people is greater than the people in power.

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No, Democratic senators did not "apply pressure using all of the procedural tools in their arsenal." They seemed to have leaned too much on the side of not fighting everything, just the important things. And it all came too fast for them, too. They should have discerned better what was "important," and they should have been prepared. So the question is, can they now move forward with fight in their views. People need to write to their Dem senators to up their game!

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Agreed. I’m in NJ and I’ve been calling and writing to senators Booker and Kim plenty. My question to my Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill (WHAT TF ARE DEMS DOING) even got answered (lukewarmly, but still) during her appearance on WNYC radio. All that to say, maybe Dems are starting to hear us. Keep it going!

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And Cory said he was doing this because his constituents have been pressuring him. So, you helped make it happen!

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The heart of Cory Booker's huge speech appealed to our morality as human beings. Surely this is an idea that evokes emotion out of reason and compassion, not simply emotion for its own sake. I appreciate your keen mind, Anand, and your ability to zero in on issues with creative language. But I strain against what seems to be an emphasis on hitting people with emotions and delivering on-the-spot visible signs as opposed to the slow but steady improvements to the common good put into place by Biden. To me, some of your comments and those you interview, diminish the "higher angels," dormant or not, in everyone created in God's image. Assuming people act out of selfishness and are unable to rise to moral values feels like selling us short for the sake of pragmatism.

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He's a great guy, Mr Booker. I was feeling 'meh' until I read your piece. It is something. We need much more....but something is good.

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For the playlist --

Fugazi, Burning Too

X, The New World

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I sat in the Senate Gallery for an hour and a half listening to him. It was EPIC. And, ELECTRIC.

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How about “Bread and Roses” for the song lost?

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Love the playlist!!

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I didn't look at the whole track list so I don't know if this made it on to your playlist but you really couldn't do anything better than "Get up off our knees" by The Housemartins for Revolutionary song!

https://youtu.be/34q1CPdDr7I?si=99dEOogC_cJMhiBv

Get up off our knees

Famines will be famines, banquets will be banquets

Some spend winter in a palace, some spend it in blankets

Don't wag your fingers at them and turn to walk away

Don't shoot someone tomorrow that you can shoot today

Time to end the praying

Listen what they're saying

Get up off your knees

You can wag your finger till your finger's sore

Shake your head till it shakes no more

Paupers will be paupers, bankers will be bankers

Some own pennies in a jar, some own oil tankers

What may sound like tomorrow could be ours today

There's no more need for sorrow if we get off our knees to pray

Time to end the praying

Listen what they're saying

Get up off your knees

You can wag your finger till your finger's sore

Shake your head till it shakes no more

Countries will be countries, borders will be borders

Some have lost their folks at war, some have give orders

Don't wag your fingers at them and turn to walk away

Don't shoot someone tomorrow that you can shoot today

Time to end the praying

Listen what they're saying

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