Posted on 05/29/2003 2:05:50 AM PDT by Elkiejg
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Was Martin Luther King a shakedown artist? Surprising as it might sound, he was -- in the eyes of, get this, Jesse Jackson. Yes, I know this seems improbable, but so many of the things the Rev. Jackson has said seem improbable. He is a man who has risen on the power of his own scandals.
Do you recall his grave appearances at the Clinton White House to counsel the Boy President on his sex scandal with Miss Monica Lewinsky? Shortly thereafter, it transpired that the Reverend brought along his very own mistress, and she at the time was heavy with child. The couple posed for pictures with the embattled president. Lewinsky is not in the pictures.
Do you remember the uproar when it was revealed that he paid his mistress off with monies from one of his charitable foundations? And do you remember the three pardons this man of the cloth wrested from the Great Pardoner just hours before the Clinton administration was no more? Two of those pardoned were brought back to the Rev. Jackson's employment, one a crook who had defrauded the homeless out of $5,000,000 and another a crook who had been convicted of soliciting sex with a minor. The chap had been a member of Congress, so maybe his transgression was understandable.
At any rate, Jackson hired the ex-congressman as a consultant on prison reform. When he did, it put me in mind of Jackson's response to O. J. Simpson's acquittal on charges he had murdered his wife. Jackson suggested that now Simpson would be an excellent spokesman in the campaign against wife abuse. I did not make that up.
Now, the excellent John McCaslin tells us in his "Inside the Beltway" column, published in the infallible Washington Times, that Jackson has taken umbrage to claims made by the National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC) that he is a shakedown artist. During a public interview, Jackson, when asked about NLPC's objections to his importunities upon corporate America, exploded, "These attacks by the policy center, these are unending attacks," and more, "Dr. Martin Luther King was called a communist. He was called a nigger. He was hated. He was killed. This kind of hate baiting is really a perversion."
For my part, I do not believe King's struggle for equal rights and racial integration is in any way similar to Jackson's pursuit of money and favors from giant corporations. Moreover, though King did find himself occasionally in the company of leftists, he was not a communist. When he was killed, it was a tragedy for the civil rights movement and for America, though Jackson wasted no time exploiting the tragedy.
Within hours of King's assassination, Jackson was appearing on television, falsely claiming that King died in his arms. Actually, King died in the arms of the Rev. Ralph Abernathy, of a ghastly gunshot wound. Jackson was nowhere to be found. Yet in his public appearances he claimed the blood on his shirt was King's. The travesty was the beginning of Jackson's rise to the top, to Bill Clinton's side during his squalid sex scandal and to the executive suites of the corporations he now shakes down.
The saga of Jesse Jackson is an amazing one. As Kenneth Timmerman chronicles in his excellent study of the man, Shakedown: Exposing the Real Jesse Jackson, Jackson began his career with some genuine achievements capable of easing the plight of poor and uneducated blacks. But the colossal frauds that he perpetrated from the start far outweigh the achievements, and the frauds have continued to this very day. Many of the frauds are prominent on the public record. Long ago, Jackson should have been hustled off history's stage as a cheap huckster, but the denouement has yet to take place. It is typical of our times.
There is an amazing tolerance for corruption nowadays, particularly if the corrupt are on the left. That is why so many sectors of the American left are so corrupt. It is also why it now appears that the American left is in decline. Surely Jackson is in decline, but he can still draw a crowd and still make a buck. Will he ever totally exhaust the country's goodwill? Will there ever be for him one scandal too many? My guess is that he will gently shove off into retirement. It is not likely that he is going to have another Democratic president to counsel for a long time.
Two of those pardoned were brought back to the Rev. Jackson's employment, one a crook who had defrauded the homeless out of $5,000,000 and another a crook who had been convicted of soliciting sex with a minor.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Was Martin Luther King a shakedown artist? Surprising as it might sound, he was -- in the eyes of, get this, Jesse Jackson. Yes, I know this seems improbable, but so many of the things the Rev. Jackson has said seem improbable. He is a man who has risen on the power of his own scandals.
Do you recall his grave appearances at the Clinton White House to counsel the Boy President on his sex scandal with Miss Monica Lewinsky? Shortly thereafter, it transpired that the Reverend brought along his very own mistress, and she at the time was heavy with child. The couple posed for pictures with the embattled president. Lewinsky is not in the pictures.Do you remember the uproar when it was revealed that he paid his mistress off with monies from one of his charitable foundations? And do you remember the three pardons this man of the cloth wrested from the Great Pardoner just hours before the Clinton administration was no more? Two of those pardoned were brought back to the Rev. Jackson's employment, one a crook who had defrauded the homeless out of $5,000,000 and another a crook who had been convicted of soliciting sex with a minor. The chap had been a member of Congress, so maybe his transgression was understandable.
Hear hear !!
. . .Jesse imagines himself as important as MLK; and while this comparison besmirches MLK, Jesse attempts to silence his critics by a throwing out 'hate comparisons'; while oportunisticly trading, still on the personna of MLK.
Do not see a 'strecthing' of the truth here by Emmett; just a tpical Left-wing tactic on how to delfect the truth. . .and a writer's 'tactic' for good writing.
-Jay
Tia
Really do not think this a 'cheap shot' at all. Even by your examples of Jesse at his best, would indicate that making a 'cheap shot' against him is almost impossible.. . .Think this is more like a 'play shot' from Emmett; and one that actually follows Jesse's point.
P>. . .Jesse; like so many sick 'Lefties', takes special pleasure using - hiding behind - better reputations in order to deflect the truth of hiw own actions. . .
. . .and Jesse has made hight art of hiding behind the light of truth of MLK.
So think, he has justly earned the treatment of Mr. Tryell, 'the Impaler'. . .who is having a little fun and inviting us to enjoy as well.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
