Why did Jesse Jackson break the rules that you don't attack your party's nominee with a nasty remark about Barack Obama?
Turns out, he was merely venting during a commercial interruption that he thought wasn't being broadcast/recorded.
During a break from taping "Fox & Friends" on Sunday, a fellow guest asked Jackson about speeches on morality Obama has given at black churches. Jackson said at a news conference Wednesday that he responded that Obama's speeches can come off as speaking down to black people and that there were other important issues to be addressed, such as unemployment, the mortgage crisis and the number of blacks in prison.
In September, The State newspaper in South Carolina reported that Jackson had said Obama was "acting like he's white" in his response to the arrest of six black juveniles in Jena, La. Jackson disputed the quote.
While we agreed that Obama should have shown more guts during the days of the Jena Six, we know that Obama isn't going to make everyone happy. There will always be people who want him to do everything for the country and do it all at once. This is unrealistic-- he only has so much time to win over middle-class voters, the centrists who make up "the swing vote." He can't spend all his time talking about one group's problems or what he will do for that one group while in office. Jackson, who would've never made these comments on the record, knows this-- he immediately apologized and pledged his continuing, unwavering support for Obama '08.
The real question is whether this division in the black community will come to the surface-- will more prominent members accuse Obama of "talking white," etc., and turn off previously energized African-Americans? Most pundits argue that it's actually Jackson that looks bad, whereas Obama comes off like a weird cousin of Bill Clinton following Clinton's attacks on Sistah Souljah:
"It will, be damaging to Jesse Jackson, particularly among African-American who are not going to forget what he said. Barack Obama is a unique figure; he is an African-American candidate for president. But he doesn't come out of the civil rights movement like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. There could be some resentment because of that. Maybe they feel he should be more deferential to them, pay more respect to his elders" [CNN]
Via Hotline on Call and the AP.