The president's extraordinary embrace of Al Sharpton last week has as much to do with his rejection of Jesse Jackson, Cornel West and Tavis Smiley as it does with the once-embattled reverend.
President Obama's extraordinary embrace of Reverend Al Sharpton last week has as much to do with the president's antipathy for three other black leaders-Jesse Jackson, Dr. Cornel West and Tavis Smiley-as it does with any genuine White House enthusiasm for the controversial New York preacher. Unlike Sharpton, who actually sat in the front row at Obama's December announcement of the deal to extend the Bush tax cuts, Jackson, West and Smiley have criticized the president's centrist tilt, alienating themselves from the administration.
Obama stayed so far away from Sharpton during the 2008 campaign that Sharpton, with Obama's blessing, never even endorsed him. Yet not only did Obama just become the first president ever to appear at...
President Obama's extraordinary embrace of Reverend Al Sharpton last week has as much to do with the president's antipathy for three other black leaders-Jesse Jackson, Dr. Cornel West and Tavis Smiley-as it does with any genuine White House enthusiasm for the controversial New York preacher. Unlike Sharpton, who actually sat in the front row at Obama's December announcement of the deal to extend the Bush tax cuts, Jackson, West and Smiley have criticized the president's centrist tilt, alienating themselves from the administration.
Obama stayed so far away from Sharpton during the 2008 campaign that Sharpton, with Obama's blessing, never even endorsed him. Yet not only did Obama just become the first president ever to appear at...
- 4/13/2011
- by Wayne Barrett
- The Daily Beast
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