In a story from Memphis on the 40th anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King in that city, ABC's Steve Osunsami acknowledged great economic progress for black citizens with “a definable black middle class,” but warned “there are still large disparities.” He then featured a man at the anniversary events who insisted “we're waiting for progress” followed by Jesse Jackson using the solemn occasion to complain about the Iraq war and tax cuts:

We are freer but less equal. To that extent, we spend $3 trillion on the war in Iraq and give tax breaks to the wealthy. You have this body of poverty, growing poverty in our cities. And our response to it is what? First-class jails and second-class schools.

The Reverend Bill Kyle, who was with King when he was murdered, rued that “now that we have the right to go to a school, we need the money to pay the tuition,” before Osunsami concluded by agreeing King's dream of equality remains unfulfilled: “Not quite what Dr. King had dreamed. But some dreams take a mighty long time to realize.”

Since the Rev. Jeremiah Wright revelations first shook the Obama campaign, one of America's so-called foremost civil rights leaders has been conspicuously silent about the subject.

With this in mind, Fox News producer Griff Jenkins went to the Take Back America convention in Washington, D.C., Wednesday to get Jesse Jackson's opinions about the controversy that virtually everyone in America is talking about.

Sadly, the Reverend wasn't interested in answering any of Jenkins' questions on this matter (video available here courtesy our friend Ms Underestimated):

Playing the moral equivalence card in his speech this morning, Barack Obama said this:

I can no more disown [Rev. Wright] than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother - a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

Which sent me scurrying to Google for the quote I was sure I remembered. And sure enough:

There is nothing more painful to me ... than to walk down the street and hear footsteps and start thinking about robbery, then look around and see somebody white and feel relieved. -- the Reverend Jesse Jackson, as quoted in US News, 3/10/96

In the midst of their seeming support for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, the good folks at NBC's "Saturday Night Live" appeared to advise Barack Obama last evening to do everything within his power to distance himself from Reverends Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.

In an animated sketch entitled "The Obama Files," candidate Barack is seen hiding Jackson from the press by talking to him in a broom closet as he instructs the reverend to go abroad as a "special envoy" to what ends up being non-existent countries.

Later, Sharpton showed up complaining that Obama had sent him to East Paraguay (h/t Tim Graham):

A couple days ago, speculating that Contessa Brewer might be a closet conservative, I expressed the hope that I wasn't making trouble for her at MSNBC. Maybe I did. For the anchor now has gone out of her way to express PC sentiments that almost make you wonder whether she wasn't trying to prove her liberal bona fides to her MSNBC honchos.

 

Jesse Jackson would normally be the last person who'd need to be persuaded to take offense at any comment that could possibly be considered to have racial overtones. Usually, it's a case of duck meets junebug.

But for whatever reason, interviewed by Brewer on MSNBC this afternoon at 4:18 PM ET, Jackson was on his way to taking the high road regarding Ed Rendell's recent remark about some whites in Pennsylvania being unwilling to vote for blacks . . . until Contessa cut in to point out the possible racial slight. Jackson took the hint and proceeded to express the criticism Brewer had apparently been hoping for.

In the wake of Hillary Clinton's 2-1 thrashing in South Carolina at the hands of the politician I typically refer to as BOOHOO (Barack O-bomba Overseas Hussein “Obambi” Obama), the spin from Mrs. Clinton's husband is that it has no more significance than Jesse Jackson's Palmetto State victories in 1984 and 1988.

Kausfiles blogger Mickey Kaus shows that the claim doesn't stand up to scrutiny (links and bolds are in original):

Pacifica Radio’s "Democracy Now" program hit Barack Obama from the left on Wednesday after he lost in New Hampshire, so far from the left that Professor Michael Eric Dyson, a leftist favored by NBC anchor Brian Williams, was almost the conservative in a debate with Glen Ford of Black Agenda Report. Ford thought Obama was "relentlessly sending out signals to white people that a vote for Barack Obama, an Obama presidency, would signal the beginning of the end of black-specific agitation, that it would take race discourse off of the table."

An end to racial agitation like Jesse Jackson’s and Al Sharpton’s? Has Obama specifically promised that anywhere? But "Democracy Now" host Amy Goodman added her two pennies to that, airing an interview segment where Jesse Jackson confirmed that Obama wants "distance" for "strategic purposes," and will not campaign with Jackson:

In speaking about the "Jena 6" case last week, the Rev. Jesse Jackson repeated the oft-heard line that there are "more blacks in jail than college." (In addition to televised reports (CNN), his words were also reported in articles like this one and this one.)

Sorry, Reverend, but the line is just not true. In fact, the Washington Post addressed this myth last month in an article about a new documentary from a black filmmaker. (Emphasis mine:)

In 2005, according to the Census Bureau, there were 864,000 black men in college. According to Justice Department statistics, there were 802,000 in federal and state prisons and jails, "even with the old heads holding on," [director Janks] Morton says.

Between the ages of 18 and 24, however, black men in college outnumber those incarcerated by 4 to 1.

In the midst of the media's typically one-sided view of Thursday's civil rights protests in Jena, Louisiana, Jason Whitlock, the black sportswriter who called Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton terrorists during April's Don Imus controversy, penned an op-ed in the Kansas City Star that should be must-reading for all Americans.

Entitled "Lessons From Jena, LA," Whitlock's piece marvelously exposed a side of this story that mainstream media outlets, as well as folks like Jackson and Sharpton, want to desperately withhold from the public in order to provoke racial tension rather than reduce it.

After a wonderful introduction, Whitlock got down to business (emphasis added throughout, h/t NB reader Thomas Rosenbrook):

Once again the Associated Press give us more of its prosaic brand of "unfair and unbalanced" news with a Jesse Jackson anti-gun story that doesn't offer a single word to counter his propaganda, their report doesn't present even a hint that there is any "side" but the anti-gun position. We aren't shocked at this, of course, but it needs to be pointed out for the record nonetheless.

Jackson faces a trial and possible jail time for his absurd June 23rd picketing of a gun shop in Riverdale, a suburb of Chicago. During the effort to disrupt the shop's business Jackson and his cohorts illegally blocked the entrance to the establishment an action that resulted in his arrest for trespassing.

As the AP reports on Jackson's first appearance in court to face these charges, they made all efforts to make Jackson seem the righteous actor, unruffled and heroic. AP even decided he was "relaxed-looking" is his appearance.

This is waaaaay too funny, folks, and requires all combustibles, potables, and sharp objects to be properly stowed before proceeding.

In response to the recent brouhaha concerning Don Imus and the Rutgers women’s basketball team, former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay has called on “conservatives to use the available media (radio talk shows, blogs, letters to the editor) to protest and demand that Rosie O’Donnell be kicked off The View.”  

They didn’t call him “The Hammer” for nothing, folks.

In a piece posted at his blog Wednesday – obviously before CBS radio decided to fire Imus – and deliciously titled “If the Left takes Imus, We’ll take Rosie,” DeLay described this deplorable event in a way that only he could whilst issuing a reciprocal call to arms:

In the midst of this disgraceful Don Imus affair, one thing has been sickeningly apparent: few members of the media have the guts to stand up to Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton and call them out for their obvious hypocrisy.

Such can certainly not be said of Jason Whitlock, an African-American sportswriter for the Kansas City Star who not only wrote a remarkable, must-read column on this subject Wednesday, but also went on MSNBC’s “Tucker” Thursday to say things about this issue and race relations in this country that few in the media would ever dare.

In reality, this is so fabulous that you must see the entire video (h/t to NB reader nicksmith112 and Hot Air), but here are some of the amazing highlights:

On the Thursday edition of what would be MSNBC’s "Imus in the Morning" simulcast, NBC reporter David Gregory spent almost 15 minutes of air time discussing the radio host's firing with the Reverends Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson.

Gregory, who quarreled with Sharpton on the April 10 "Hardball" over his role in the Tawana Brawley false rape charges, did not broach the subject again. He did, however, challenge Jackson over his use of the slur "Hymie Town":

David Gregory: "You referred to New York as ‘Hymie Town’ in the past. You, you apologized for that and you expected and indeed retained your platform in America as a civil rights leader and as an important voice in this country. Why, again, if I may, should Imus be denied that same opportunity for redemption and to retain a platform that potentially could be used for good?"