Mirror, Please! Al Sharpton Accuses GOP of a 'Long History of Fear and Smear'

On Thursday night’s “Politics Nation,” Rev. Al Sharpton began by accusing someone else of having a “long history of fear and smear.” Put "Sharpton and Tawana Brawley" in Nexis. Sharpton never brings up her (and his) phony story.

Like the other hosts on MSNBC yesterday, Sharpton was pounding away at the New York Times story on the Ricketts Memo and Jeremiah Wright: “Tonight's lead, fear and loathing from the campaign trail. For decades, the Republican party has thrived on tearing down Democrats in presidential elections. Today, the GOP may be writing an ugly new chapter in their long history of fear and smear.” It’s as if MSNBC is offended anyone is actually running with the intention of defeating Obama:

SHARPTON: Today, The New York Times reveals that some top Republican strategist presented a 54-page proposal to conservative billionaire Joe Ricketts entitled quote, "the defeat of Barack Hussein Obama." It plans to lead the president, once again, to Reverend Jeremiah Wright, and to quote, "Do exactly what John McCain would not let us do in 2008"....It’s a shocking document exposed on the front page of The New York Times.

The Rev was especially insistent that the plan was to "dehumanize" Obama by associating him with his longtime minister:

SHARPTON: We start in 1988 with the attack add against Michael Dukakis. And we saw it again in 2004 with the swiftboating of John Kerry. The party has run entire campaigns on character assassination. But the latest effort, it's about more than just winning an election. It's about dehumanizing President Obama.

...I think we went through that four years ago, everyone knows where the president stands. I think this was more geared trial to trying to bring race and really dehumanize the president.

...I must say that Ricketts has said he is not going to do it. He turned it down. It`s merely a proposal that he rejects. But the fact that these major strategists would go and try and bring this plan about shows some very insidious political maneuvering that really wants to dehumanize this president.

Dana Milbank of the Washington Post was one guest, channeling the same line that this as every other liberal journalist on MSNBC. It was "profoundly stupid," because "Everybody knows President Obama now. He's got high favorable ratings. He is personally popular. They are not going to be able to spend $10 million and redefine him in a way that they weren't able to last time. So, they`re backing away from it because it`s explosive, because it will have a backlash, and the potential for success here is so low because Obama is already defined in the eyes of Americans.”

This says: We already defined him as popular. Don't try to fiddle with our hard work.

The other was Rep. Emanuel Cleaver of Kansas, who found the whole Wright-mining issue racist on its face:

CLEAVER: We thought that this kind of thing was in our distant and dark past, here in this country. Obviously, it’s not. There are people who still carry some of these troglodytic ideas with regard to race. But what I would say to the people of good will in the United States, the majority of the people, be offended. Be offended. And be on the lookout for subliminal injections of race, henceforth, until the convention is over, and maybe even until the election is over. This is what a small group of Americans are thinking about and we’ve got to squash it. And so, everyone who is of good will, be offended, be very offended.

Apparently the "injections of race" into politics are outdated. Did anyone notify Sharpton? His injections are never subliminal.