Whats your take on Al Sharpton?

DOBERMAN_07 · 04-13-2007, 01:27 PM

****WARNING**** THIS IS NOT ABOUT RACE! I WILL FIND A WAY TO BAN YOU IF YOU GET THIS LOCKED

So after the ugly comments made on the radio, Imus (the host) decided to apologize to Al Sharpton. I honestly missed the turning point of Sharpton becoming the representative for the Black community, especially with his past record. IMO, the guy is a complete hypocrite and there are MUCH better candidates that show integrity and class. All Sharpton does is yell and pound his fist when something upsets him.

Quote:

TAX EVASION: In a 1988 interview, Sharpton said he saw no reason why blacks should pay taxes. “If we do not have a justice system that protects us, what are we paying for?” Sharpton has faced multiple charges—and one conviction—of tax evasion.

TAWANA BRAWLY: 1987. Al Sharpton, during the infamous Tawana Brawley case, falsely accused a former assistant district attorney of raping and sodomizing Ms. Brawley. Young Tawana stated that white racists abducted, raped, and sodomized her, scrawling the initials “KKK” on her in human feces. A grand jury later found the entire incident a complete hoax. Most likely, Ms. Brawley, afraid of punishment for staying out too late, fabricated the entire story. This did not stop Reverend Al Sharpton, who accused Pagones an assistant district attorney, of the crime. “We stated openly that Steven Pagones did it. If we’re lying, sue us, so we can go into court with you and prove you did it. Sue us—sue us right now.”

Pagones did. After receiving death threats, and threats against his child, Pagones sued Sharpton and two others for defamation. A jury unanimously concluded that Sharpton defamed Pagones, ordering Sharpton to pay $65,000 to Pagones. The Reverend promptly announced his intention not to pay. A couple years later, Sharpton’s buddies passed the hat and paid off Sharpton’s debt, which totaled $87,000 with interest and penalties. To this day, never having paid one penny of his own to Pagones, Sharpton refuses to apologize, “I did what I believed….They are asking me to grovel. They want black children to say they forced a black man coming out of the hard-core ghetto to his knees….Once you begin bending, it’s ‘did you bend today?’ or ‘I missed the apology, say it again.’ Once you start compromising, you lose respect for yourself.”

CENTRAL PARK JOGGER: In 1989 “the jogger,” a young white woman, was monstrously raped and nearly beaten to death in Central Park. Sharpton insisted—despite the defendants’ confessions—that her black attackers were innocent, modern-day Scottsboro Boys trapped in “a fit of racial hysteria.” Sharpton charged that the jogger’s boyfriend did it, and organized protests outside the courthouse, chanting, “The boyfriend did it!” and denouncing the victim as “Whore!” He brought Tawana Brawley to the trial, to show her “white justice” and arranged for her to meet the attackers. Sharpton appealed for a psychiatrist to examine the victim, generously saying, “It doesn’t even have to be a black psychiatrist….We’re not endorsing the damage to the girl—if there was this damage.” (While it doesn’t excuse his calling the victim a “whore” and denigrating any damage to her, or his accusations against the boyfriend, the convictions of the accused were eventually vacated, despite their taped confessions, after another man—whose DNA matched—confessed to the rape in 2002.)

CROWN HEIGHTS/ “DIAMOND MERCHANTS”: In 1991, Gavin Cato, a seven-year-old black child was killed in a traffic accident in Crown Heights (in Brooklyn), when a car driven by a Hasidic Jew went out of control. Sharpton turned it into a racial incident. Sharpton led 400 protesters through the Jewish section of Crown Heights, with one protester holding a sign that read, “The White Man Is the Devil.” There were four nights of rock- and bottle-throwing, and a young Talmudic scholar was surrounded by a mob shouting, “Kill the Jew” and stabbed to death. A hundred others were injured. Sharpton said, “The world will tell us that [Gavin Cato] was killed by accident….What type of city do we have that would allow politics to rise above the blood of innocent babies?…Talk about how Oppenheimer in South Africa sends diamonds straight to Tel Aviv and deals with the diamond merchants right here in Crown Heights….All we want to say is what Jesus said: If you offend one of these little ones, you got to pay for it. No compromise. Pay for your deeds.” Later Sharpton said, “If the Jews want to get it on, tell them to pin their yarmulkes back and come over to my house.”

ARAFAT: When Sharpton announced a 2001 trip to the Middle East, Rabbi Shmuley Boteach helped plan his itinerary. Sharpton, according to the Rabbi, promised not to meet with Yassir Arafat, yet only days later, Jewish New Yorkers opened the morning paper to see a smiling Arafat and Sharpton, meeting and shaking hands in Israel. Furious, Rabbi Boteach said, “Prior to our recent trip to Israel, U.S. black leader Reverend Al Sharpton and I discussed several times that there were to be no meetings with Arab or Palestinian leaders, not because I wished to set preconditions for our travel, but because the express objective of our mission was to show solidarity with Israeli victims of terror. The idea was to provide a magnanimous gesture of friendship and solidarity with the Jewish nation that would hopefully have strong reverberations for the relationship of the Jewish and black communities back home.”

FREDDY’S FASHION MART/”WHITE INTERLOPER”: 1995. A Jewish store owner in Harlem was accused of driving a black record store owner out of business, when the United House of Prayer, one of the largest black landlords on 125th Street, raised the rent on the Fashion Mart owned by a Jew, Freddy Harari, who then raised the rent on his subtenant, Sikhulu Shange, who ran a record store. At one of many rallies meant to scare the Jewish owner away, Sharpton said, “…There is a systematic and methodical strategy to eliminate our people from doing business off 125th Street. I want to make it clear…that we will not stand by and allow them to move this brother so that some white interloper can expand his business.” Following a demonstration three months later, one of the protestors, a black man, stormed Freddy’s Fashion Mart with a pistol, screaming, “It’s on now! All blacks out!” In addition to shooting, he set fire to the building, eventually killing himself and seven others. Initially, Sharpton denied having spoken at any rallies. When tapes surfaced, he said, “What’s wrong with denouncing white interlopers?” Eventually, he apologized—but only for saying “white,” not “interloper.”

CRIMINAL JUSTICE: During the “Million Man March” in Washington, civil rights “activist” Al Sharpton thundered, “O.J. is home, but Mumia Abu Jamal ain’t home. And we won’t stop till all of our people that need a chance in an awkward and unbalanced criminal justice system can come home.”

OUT OF THE KING MOVEMENT: Although he was 14 when Martin Luther King was assassinated, Sharpton claims he “came out of the King movement.” Sharpton once explained, “I was on some show this week, and people said, ‘Why don’t you just let it go? Why don’t y’all just get over it?’ Get over what? Get over Dr. King dying? Get over Medger Evers dying? Get over Goodman, Chaney and Schwerner dying? Get over those four girls in Birmingham dying? We are never gonna get over it, and we are never gonna let you forget it!”

FBI TAPES/COCAINE: In 2002, HBO aired a 19-year-old FBI surveillance of Sharpton with self-described mobster Michael Franzese and an undercover FBI agent posing as a Latin American businessman. The three were discussing promoting boxing matches and musical events. HBO’s “Real Sports” got a hold of a hidden camera video that shows undercover agent Victor Quintana posing as a drug dealer trying to convince Sharpton to play a middleman in a big cocaine buy.

Sharpton asks the undercover agent, “What kind of time limit are we dealing with?”

“Coke?” the agent asks.

“Yeah.” Sharpton says.

The phony drug dealer says, “Could be about the same time we have 4 million coming to us.”

Sharpton: “End of April?”

“End of April. Six weeks from now. Is that a good time you think?” the agent asks.

“Probably,” Sharpton replies.

Later on, the undercover agent offers Sharpton a finder's fee for help with the drug deal and says to Sharpton, “I can get pure coke for about $35,000 a kilo ... Every kilogram we bring in, $3,500 to you. How does that sound?” Sharpton nods in response.

The deal never went down, and Sharpton has said he was just playing along because he was scared of the would-be kingpin. “And I'm in his office. I don't know whether this man is armed. I don't know what's going on. So I kind of say, ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah,’ to get out of there,” Sharpton claimed the tape was leaked by law enforcement officials to disrupt his 2004 presidential run, and he sued HBO, its parent company AOL Time Warner, and several individuals who worked on the story. No charges were ever brought against Sharpton because of the tape, which was allegedly made to get Sharpton to act as an informant for the feds into an investigation into corruption by Don King and the boxing industry. The HBO report featured former Mafia captain Michael Franzese saying that the FBI was on the right track when it targeted Sharpton in a sting back in 1983 to try and root out corruption in boxing.

Sharpton admitted in 1988 that he informed for the government in order “to get rid of drugs and election fraud” in black neighborhoods. He denied informing on civil rights leaders and organized crime figures.

See next post...

DOBERMAN_07 · 04-13-2007, 01:33 PM

Quote:

FBI TAPES/DONATIONS: After Sharpton’s name surfaced on wiretaps in an unrelated Philadelphia City Hall corruption case, the FBI launched a probe into Sharpton’s fund-raising for his failed 2004 presidential run. The FBI secretly videotaped Sharpton on May 9, 2003, pocketing campaign donations from two “shady fund-raisers” in a NY City hotel room, and then demanding $25,000 more. The two fund-raisers were La-Van Hawkins and the late Ronald White. Hawkins is currently on trial in Philadelphia on corruption charges. White was going to be indicted, but died before charges were brought. A later wiretap recorded Hawkins telling White that they had raised more than $140,000 for Sharpton the previous quarter, but Hawkins was concerned that Sharpton had only reported about $50,000 to the Federal Election Commission, as required by law. Sharpton said the allegations were a “politically motivated smokescreen” to hide the fact the Justice Department is out to get him. He ripped the probe and the secret videotaping, saying, “Can you imagine what would happen if it was a white presidential candidate?”

http://www.larryelder.com/ascrimes.html

Weebles · 04-13-2007, 02:47 PM

Here are my thoughts...

Al Sharpton is a horrible, hypocritical leader for his movement, and he's not really helping his cause. He may have helped to accomplish some good things, but it's difficult to take him seriously when he acts the way he does. Anyone who would say the kinds of things that he has does not really want equality; he wants attention. If anything, the oppression he has felt should enable him to empathize with Jews, not discriminate against them.

I think his leadership has hurt the equal rights movement. The publicity surrounding him angers people who really do want equality for all.

Amitiel · 04-13-2007, 02:53 PM

I agree with Weebles - kudos to you for saying what I wish I could have

I came from a very severly discriminating area of the country - family members part of the KKK - - I do not, never have, discriminate because of race, religion, etc. I will treat you like trash IF you act like trash, Sharpton I would treat like trash

cshellenberger · 04-13-2007, 03:00 PM

Yes, he's a hypocrit and frankly he's as biased as he claims our justice system is.

Mdawn · 04-13-2007, 03:03 PM

My boyfriend and I were just talking about Al Sharpton the other day about this very same thing. My opinion is that he's a racist, he's just allowed to get away with it. I also agree that he just wants personal attention for himself and is using the very real problems the African American community faces for his own personal agenda. I'm not a fan of Al Sharpton...

SFury · 04-13-2007, 03:23 PM

Al Sharpton is a racist animal. He has more hatred in him than most people do. Everything he does is to promote him and the black community being put into charge over the non-black community. He wants to be able to oppress others as he feels he's been oppressed.

Rev. Jesse Jackson is another racist bigot and hypocrite as well. He screamed at people for having affairs, and saying how faithful he was as he was screwing his secretary. Why the black community doesn't shoot both of them is beyond me. They have hurt the equal rights movement far more than any help they have given to it.

I may not be perfect, but I couldn't stand in the spotlight and throw racist ideals around like both of those race mongering bigots. They prey off of hatred and rage, and are fleecing the very people they say they represent. I know crooked politicians that I have more respect for.

DOBERMAN_07 · 04-13-2007, 03:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SFury

Al Sharpton is a racist animal. He has more hatred in him than most people do. Everything he does is to promote him and the black community being put into charge over the non-black community. He wants to be able to oppress others as he feels he's been oppressed.

Rev. Jesse Jackson is another racist bigot and hypocrite as well. He screamed at people for having affairs, and saying how faithful he was as he was screwing his secretary. Why the black community doesn't shoot both of them is beyond me. They have hurt the equal rights movement far more than any help they have given to it.

I may not be perfect, but I couldn't stand in the spotlight and throw racist ideals around like both of those race mongering bigots. They prey off of hatred and rage, and are fleecing the very people they say they represent. I know crooked politicians that I have more respect for.

that pretty much sums up my opinion on those two... They are truly a disgrace.

Also this:

DogueEdaddy · 04-13-2007, 05:12 PM

I was born and raised till 12 in South Louisiana and Central Miss. I had a God fearing Mamma who loved all people. I had a black Nanny when I was young in New Orleans that I loved as a near 2nd Mamma. I'm no racist.

I can't add anything to the excellent dissertation by Doberman_07, et al. Both the persons mentioned are beneath my contempt.

God Bless All......Stan

Net4N6 · 04-13-2007, 05:51 PM

I feel sorry for African-American people. Al Sharpton and Rev. Jackson are not represent 10% of them. I hate both of them.

Notes: I've here almost a month. Unfortunately, this is my first post. I am not a troll.

lovemygreys · 04-13-2007, 06:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SFury

Al Sharpton is a racist animal. He has more hatred in him than most people do. Everything he does is to promote him and the black community being put into charge over the non-black community. He wants to be able to oppress others as he feels he's been oppressed.

Rev. Jesse Jackson is another racist bigot and hypocrite as well. He screamed at people for having affairs, and saying how faithful he was as he was screwing his secretary. Why the black community doesn't shoot both of them is beyond me. They have hurt the equal rights movement far more than any help they have given to it.

I may not be perfect, but I couldn't stand in the spotlight and throw racist ideals around like both of those race mongering bigots. They prey off of hatred and rage, and are fleecing the very people they say they represent. I know crooked politicians that I have more respect for.

Well said. I completely agree.