IMUS: 'WHEN WILL SHARPTON APOLOGIZE TO DUKE PLAYERS'?

The Drudge Report ^ | 4/12/07 | Patrick Gavin

[Reaganesque]

Barely 12 hours after being fired from MSNBC...

6:12 AM: On Imus' radio program (no longer simulcast on MSNBC) this morning, Chris Carlin, who covers sports for the program, discussed yesterday's dismissal of charges against the Duke lacrosse players.

(rough transcript)

DON IMUS: When will Al Sharpton be apologizing to them?

(LAUGHTER)

CARLIN: I'm unaware of such a press conference.

IMUS: I'll be darned...

UPDATE 6:28 AM: After a station break, Imus came back to discuss MSNBC's decision. He said he was recently chatted with "another big time broadcasting executive" who was "complaining that [MSNBC] had cancelled the simulcast twelve hours before we were getting ready to conduct this radio-thon for these three charities."

Imus: "My position on all of this is not whining about the hideously hypocritical coverage from the newspapers -- from everybody -- or the lack of support, say, from people like Harold Ford, Jr. who I had my life threatened over supporting and all these kind of things. It all began, and it doesn't make any difference -- like [James] Carville said -- stop talking about the context, it doesn't make any difference. If I hadn't have said it I wouldn't be here. So let's stop whining about it...You gotta stop complaining. I said a stupid, idiotic thing that desperately hurt these kids. I'm going to apologize but we gotta move on."

UPDATE 7:37 am. IMUS: "The hypocrisy is absurd...Everybody knows what the deal is. And this is not over. This story does not end here."

Imus also gave a shout-out to Opie & Anthony, who support Imus on this issue.

UPDATE 7:57:

Imus says he spoke with MSNBC Senior VP Phil Griffin and said "some of the stuff that MSNBC has done this morning is frankly unethical and I've asked them to stop doing it."

But also said, "I'm not whining about the coverage. I'm not whining about any aspect of this."

"I've said 100 times: I said it and if I hadn't said it, we wouodn't be sitting here talking about it. And that's the bottom line."

Imus also said that losing television (via MSNBC) isn't as big as losing radio. "The big part of the program is radio. There's millions of people listening to the radio. At best a few hundred thousand are watching television."

On MSNBC's decision: "I understand the pressure they were under. I'm not stupid."

UPDATE 8:15am: Speaking with an African-American woman, whose son had spent time at the Imus Ranch, Imus said, "And I want to say to you as an African-American woman, I'm sorry for what I said...I want to apologize to all African-American women." The woman said, "Okay, I accept that."

UPDATE 8:19AM: Imus said that one of the "sad ironies of my stupidity" is that, at his ranch, "we sent six kids home because they couldn't stop calling girls bitches and hos."

UPDATE 8:21AM: "I want to thank Opie & Anthony...I love them and I love what they do. I know they offend people perhaps more than I do. They're good loyal guys...Even Howard [Stern] hasn't been horrible." (Although if you read this Stern show summary, seems like Stern still has his claws out against his longtime nemesis.) UPDATE 8:28AM: Imus says that he's had "a lot of big people in the media" calling him "whining about the hypocrsity in the coverage. We understand that. You just turn on the cable channels or read the newspaper, trying to portray me as some vicious racist or whatever and there's not one person talking about the other things I've done...There's a difference between premeditated murder and a gun going off...But you've got to take your medicine. I'm not whining about it."

"Don't tell me that context isn't important. Context is importnat in everything we do in our lives. But it's not an excuse."

UPDATE 8:38AM: Despite the controversy, Imus says contributions for The Tomorrows Children Fund and the Imus Ranch are "way, way up" compared to this time in the show last year, which is significant because "the money's more important this year than ever."

He added: "These bastards went after me. They got me. But they didn't catch me asleep."

UPDATE 8:44AM: MSNBC's Imus webpage is still up, with a statement and link to Imus' charities.

UPDATE 8:45am: "One day you've got a radio and tv show and one day you don't...Ordinarily we need to raise $3 million, this year we need to raise $100 million -- just in case (Laughter)."

UPDATE 8:57AM: Tells his friends, "Don't call me telling me that the coverage is unfair...If I hadn't said it, there'd be no coverage...Shut up about it...I've been dishing it out for a long time, and now it's my turn...I'm not going to whine about it."

Imus also lets readers know that he's doing today's show in the MSNBC studio.

UPDATE 9:01AM: Charlie McCord says that they've raised over $400,000.

UPDATE 9:10AM: On MSNBC:I understand their decision." "I appreciate them letting us use their studio this morning."

To "all of my friends in the media, out of the media: You can't whine about this...We wouldn't have been there if I hadn't said it."

He again called media coverage "outrageously hypocritical."

"Harold Ford, Jr. has been disgraceful in his lack of support. I endured death threats to endorse him...It's unfortunate that he has no courage."

"I'm not surprised by any of this. I'm not surprised at the hypocrisy of Al Sharpton, of Jesse Jackson or any of these people. But you can't whine about it."

"We can talk about all the good work that I've done forever, but I still said that. I'm not making any excuses. Everybody's got to stop whining and quit talking about it."

UPDATE 9:25AM: "I've dished it out for a long time and now it's my time to take it. That's fine. Bring it on."

UPDATE 9:28AM: After one guest said "kick ass," then followed that with "can I say that?" Imus said, "I think today you can say anything."

UPDATE 9:37: "We've never done this well before" (regarding the radiothon)

UPDATE 9:38: On meeting with the Rutgers basketball players: "I can't go through the rest of my life -- nor can they -- without us having this conversation and me telling them how I feel and, more importantly, them telling me how they feel."

[Calvin Locke]

I caught part of the Sharpton/Imus on the news. Sharpton was hiding behind his daughter.

[jdm]

Oops...

correction:

"You know you, lots of these conservative talk show hosts always say racist things.”

[jdm]

Why didn’t he say these on the Sharpton show where he was on “trial” before Sharpton ?

Because that was before all DUKE LAX charges were dropped. It was just bad timing. If the Duke charges had been dropped by the time of his interview with Sharpton, he would have said these things to Sharpton's face.

[Grampa Dave]

The link below will take you to a picture of the druggie ho that the two black Raci$ts, Rev Un$harpton and Je$$e HyJack$on lied about to make headlines and bucks for Je$$e and $harpton.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/04122007/frontback.htm

[jdm]

I think the other factor here is that when that interview took place, Imus didn’t know his future status at MSNBC. He might have thought refraining from blasting Sharpton at the time might save the MSNBC simulcast. But since then MSNBC has dropped his show. So now he knows he has nothing to lose (or far less to lose) by completely venting.

[nfldgirl]

"These bastards went after me. They got me. But they didn't catch me asleep."

I just wonder which ones in particular he's talking about?

[motormouth]

If you want to show why conservative’s always wonder why we are tagged “racists”, you’ll have to come up with better reasons. Because the example you gave is like comparing apples to oranges.

MM

[Malesherbes]

Yes, the hypocrisy is so thick you can cut it with a knife. Sharpton is a race huckster and Imus groveled before him - that’s hypocrisy too. But what Imus has been guilty of is cynically contributing to the coarsening of our “popular culture.” He has sneered at everything and, in this case, adopted the language of the Hip Hop scum. And it is interesting that he is now being deserted in droves by his erstwhile buddies, including Harold Ford, Jr.

[weegee]

Al’s trying to “Jew them down” again (his words, not mine).

[jdm]

Imus: "Ordinarily we need to raise $3 million, this year we need to raise $100 million -- just in case (Laughter)."

LOL

[Just sayin]

Imus has just found out that liberal leftists are just like Muslims. When there is no enemy to attack that is outside their clique, they waste no time going after their own.

Last year, a Chicago Cubs coach made it clear. He could say things, becasue he was black, that others, who are white, cannot say. Snoop Dog basically said the same thing yesterday.

Many white people fear saying this now, but I don’t. This whole deal is exactly that. Black people can say and do one set of things and white people must do another. Martin Luther King Jr. would be so proud of these people today huh? THERE is the real disgrace showing clearly today.

If only people would admit it.

Check out how advertisers made moves on this. Notice how they DIDN’T move when Rosie blamed 9-11 on our own people and government. I can tkake nothing from that but that those very advertisers agree with that position. How could I see it any other way? Let’s not forget the ‘ching chong’ thing. No Advertisers went running scared then either.

ED Hill just asked the question “Does Freedom of Speech depend on the color of your skin?”. Apparently the answer is yes with a disclaimer to that being gender, sexual and political orientation. Be gay, super far left or black and you can say and do anything you want without retribution.

Be white, straight and not so left (heaven forbid you be to the right) and you cannot say the very things those on the left, or gay, or non white people say all the time without losing your job or paying some other such heavy price.

Enough is enough with this clearly RACIST ‘policy’. You bet, I said it, RACIST against white people!!!!!!

[Blue Turtle]

Last year, Sharpton on O’Reilly:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,192277,00.html

[Max7]

This whole story has taken on such vast proportions - jobs lost, lives “scarred for life” (one of the players made this statement to the press, naturally), Sharpton making the threat that more of the same will be coming - that one must begin to wonder if the Lefties have not had some hand in it somehow. You have to give the Lefties credit. They do have their ways of thinking ahead to the How-to’s, and they’ll do ANYTHING to win the Presidency. Even destroy Imus because they think he’s expendable. They use whatever they can, whoever it hurts, whatever it is, to get where they want to go. Only this time, they’re beginning to point that gun right at their very own feet. Just a thought. But wait. Just wait. I predict that Imus will come back a whole lot bigger than he was before all this happened. Remember, there is no “bad” publicity, just publicity.

[StAnDeliver]

Imus deserves it all for supporting Kerry and parading every snarky DUm MSM SOB to freewheel dissemble on his show without interruption, like Chrissy, the fundamentally dishonest Gregory, the perpetually whiny Alter, two-faced sycophant Fineman, the proven liar Andrea, the proven loser Kerry, the bloated court jester Richardson, and on and on and on...

And while we're on the subject of up is down, Mr. Sharpton, put this in your pipe and smoke it:

[British Prime Minister Tony] Blair said: "Economic inequality is a factor and we should deal with that, but I don't think it's the thing that is producing the most violent expression of this social alienation.

"I think that is to do with the fact that particular youngsters are being brought up in a setting that has no rules, no discipline, no proper framework around them."

Some people working with children knew at the age of five whether they were going to be in "real trouble" later, he said.

Mr Blair is known to believe the tendency for many black boys to be raised in families without a father leads to a lack of appropriate role models.

He said: "We need to stop thinking of this as a society that has gone wrong - it has not - but of specific groups that for specific reasons have gone outside of the proper lines of respect and good conduct towards others and need by specific measures to be brought back into the fold." -- The Guardian, April 12, 2007

[lesko]

Being a liberal means you don’t ever have to apologize. Sharpton is the leader and we are simply the masses. Surely we’ve learned that by now.

[oldbill]

Imus always reserved his harshest criticism for conservatives, evangelicals, Catholics, and true Republicans. He always sucked up to the liberals like Biden, Dodd, Kerry, Russert, Gregory, Andrea Mitchell, Goodwin, Ford, etc.

Isn’t it ironic that the right is pretty silent on this issue, while his buddy liberals dig the knife deeper every day?

[svcw]

Please explain why nappy-hair is raciest.

[yoe]

Imus is not going down without a fight>>

Nor should he. Al Sharpton and Jessie Jackson are encouraging racist blackmail – it is their bread and butter. The Tawana Brawley creator, the Rev. Al Sharpton, is placing himself as judge and jury when his past and present activities are little more than a shake down. The Rev. Jessie Jackson is the King of shake down , take no prisoners type of blackmail. Both men are far more guilty of racist slurs than Imus ever was.

It is sickening to watch the media wallow in this cess pool of racism ignoring real issues and real problems go wanting all because of a stupid remark made by a known shock jock. - that or Anna N. Smith……………….Ohoooooooooooooooo.

SUPPORT OUR TROOPS AND CUT THE DAMNED PORK!

[StAnDeliver]

My God, a newbie nails a tag line! I may swoon; there is hope for the [Free] Republic yet. Good job, newb!

[stop_fascism]

He’s a pussy for running to Rev. Al in the first place. He thought he could get absolution by kissing Sharpton’s “ring”. Unfortunately, the Revs smelled blood in the water.

If this had happened to a decent human being it would be tragic. Luckily, it only happened to Imus. I’m only surprised he hasn't ’t run to rehab claiming he relapsed.