HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher might just be the greatest show ever broadcast on television. Why? Last Friday, former Bush flack Scott McClellan was on the show and Maher called George W. Bush “President Shit-for-Brains.” Right to McClellan’s face. And Maher meant it.
That single moment was a left-wing thrill-seeker’s vicarious nirvana. Every person in this country who has been the object of Bush’s scorn desperately wants to say something mean to his face, or at least something mean about him to the face of someone who actually is close to him. But we all know we’ll never get inside that bubble. And here was Maher, doing it, and doing it in style -- he actually got McClellan to laugh! Priceless.
Earlier in the very same episode, during his opening monologue, Maher announced that with the decision by the Rutgers University women’s basketball team to accept Don Imus’ apology, “our long national nightmare is over.” Then, after his monologue, Maher interviewed Al Sharpton via satellite. (You can watch the interview via YouTube.)
The interview is vintage Maher, who is capable of taking -- and explaining -- complicated positions. Maher condemned the racist comments by Imus, acknowledging that they were the latest example of the “unspeakable” racism that blacks in this country have faced hundreds of years of racism. At the same time, he expressed concern that in going after Imus’ scalp, Sharpton was not only threatening open discourse, but also shifting the civil rights battle from its mission of fighting injustice to a game of cat and mouse.
Maher said:
The civil rights battle used to take place in courts and it used to take place in the United States Congress. Now it takes place in the media, and it seems like when it’s in the media, it’s a lot about gotcha’, it’s a lot about just catching people.
Sharpton replied:
I don’t think that’s true. I think that if you that if you look at the history of the civil rights movement going back to the Montgomery boycott, it took place in the streets, and the national media projected it. That’s how it got to the courts.
Maher’s point is incredibly valuable and I don't think Sharpton's reply directly addressed it. In fact, his reply indirectly reinforced Maher's point: the Montgomery boycott was a true social movement that filtered its way up and led to great change. In many ways, the Imus affair was a battle waged amongst elites, further alienating all Americans from power structures in our society. It didn't take place on the streets; it took place on radio shows and television studios.
And while the benefits of banning segregation on buses is self-evident, what will the long term benefits of the Imus dismissal be? If the strategic goal was to muzzle him, he’s already back on the air. I’m sure he’ll have a national deal pretty soon. If the goal is to ensure that nobody says anything racist on the airwaves, it’s not clear whether the Imus firing will be successful, especially if it encourages the adoption of alternative distribution channels like the internet or satellite for radio programming.
One obvious negative impact is that it reinforces the precedent that committed groups of activists can get a media personality fired for saying something they find offensive. And that’s something that Bill Maher is acutely aware of. In the late 1990s through 2001, Maher hosted Politically Incorrect which followed Nightline on ABC’s late night schedule. Shortly after 9/11, he said:
We have been the cowards lobbing, cruise missiles from 2,000 miles away. That's cowardly. Staying in the airplane when it hits the building, say what you want about it, it's not cowardly.
ABC fired him a few days later.
Imagine what happens when the day comes that Jon Stewart says something that some people find offensive and the media has a slow news day. What will we be able to say then? Maher was fired. Imus was fired. Shouldn’t Stewart be fired?
And don’t you think that right-wing groups are watching The Daily Show every single day, hoping to catch Stewart say something they can protest? The Daily Show is one of the very few shows on television that exposes the Bush Administration’s propaganda for what it is. Don’t you think that the right-wing desperately wants it off the air before 2008 rolls around?
Although I hate the fact that the media is filled with blowhards like Imus, I don’t think his dismissal will do much good, and probably will ultimately provide justification for some retribution against a progressive voice. Whatever the case, it certainly won’t have the impact of a major civil rights victory such as 1967’s Loving v. Virginia decision in which the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Virginia’s law banning interracial marriage.
Meanwhile, as I wrote yesterday, there are examples of terrible injustice in this world. Genarlow Wilson, a young black man, is serving a ten year prison sentence for engaging in consensual oral sex with a girl in his high school. Al Sharpton showed his formidable clout by getting Don Imus fired. But I wonder if he wouldn’t do more good by fighting for Wilson freedom?
Obviously, these need not be mutually exclusive. But I do wonder why I haven’t seen Sharpton out in front on issues like this. Say what you want about Jesse Jackson, but there is no doubt of the man’s convictions. You may hate Jesse’s politics, but you cannot deny that he is genuine progressive.
It isn’t possible to say the same thing about Sharpton. It’s true that he’s a good orator and has a great sense of humor. But it’s also true that he campaigned for New York’s Republican U.S. Senator Alfonse D’Amato in 1986 and New York’s Republican Governor George Pataki in 1994 against Democrat Mario Cuomo.
One might respond: Surely Al Sharpton isn’t a Republican. Didn’t he run for President as a Democrat in 2004? Well, yes. But do you know who Al Sharpton's chief political operative was at the time, helping him raise hundreds of thousands of dollars? The answer might surprise you: Roger Stone, a Republican operative and donor to Bush-Cheney 2004.
And Roger Stone isn’t your typical Republican hack. No, Stone played a key role in s(t)ealing Bush’s victory in Florida by organizing the mob of young Republicans whose mini-riot stopped the recount in Miami-Dade County. Yes, Al Sharpton's political strategist played a important role disenfranchising thousands of black Floridians and in the process robbing the country of its duly elected President, Al Gore.
So what’s a conservative like Stone doing in bed with Sharpton? Why would a conservative want Al Sharpton to become a powerful force in the Democratic Party?
For starters, Sharpton has demonstrated his willingness to help Republicans. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, although it does undercut Sharpton’s claim to represent the political left. Perhaps more importantly, however, Al Sharpton is incredibly unpopular. Tying the Democratic Party to such an unpopular national figure – especially one who is actually sympathetic to Republicans – is a good move by Republicans.
In fact, it’s really not surprising that conservatives spend so much more time talking about Al Sharpton than do liberals. A quick Google search for ‘sharpton’ on the conservative National Review web site yields 1,370 hits – almost six times the amount found on the web site of the left-wing The Nation. It’s pretty clear that conservatives want Sharpton to serve as a straw man for progressive politics and as an easy target on matters of race. It’s also pretty clear that liberals don’t trust Sharpton because he has never demonstrated consistent commitment to progressive causes.
The Republican strategy of funding Al Sharpton’s 2004 presidential race might be bearing fruit. Despite his abysmal showing at the polls, his incredible media savvy gave him national prominence. (Some have suggested he achieved prominence solely because of the color of his skin, an assertion which is clearly false. Former Illinois Senator Carol Moseley Braun, also black, failed to gain the media attention won by Sharpton. The fact is that Al Sharpton is a genius when it comes to the media.) Earlier this month, during the Imus affair, Sharpton solidified his position as the mass media’s chosen voice for black America. And now, this week Democratic presidential candidates are visiting Sharpton’s National Action Network conference, seeking his support.
I hope those Democrats understand that whether or not they win the support of Al Sharpton will have little impact on whether they win the support of black Americans in the 2008 primaries, notwithstanding the mass media’s efforts to anoint Sharpton as a power player in the battle for votes from black Americans.
The truth is, that unlike Martin Luther King or Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton is largely a creation of the media.
Take Jesse Jackson’s performance in the 1984 and 1988 primaries. In the 1984 primaries, he won five contests and 21% of all votes cast. Four years later, he won eleven primaries and seven million votes.
Meanwhile, in 2004, Sharpton not only failed to win a single primary, he failed to win more than ten percent of the vote in any state. Despite predictions from white conservatives like Bob Novak that blacks would support Sharpton simply because he too was black, Sharpton's lack of support crossed racial and ethnic lines. In fact, Sharpton failed to win majority support from any single racial or ethnic group in any election during the 2004 primary season. His best primary performance came in South Carolina, where he won just ten percent of the vote. Among South Carolina’s black voters, both John Kerry and John Edwards outperformed Sharpton, each of them winning more than twice as many votes as Sharpton.
Given Sharpton’s abysmal electoral track record, why does the mass media give him so much prominence? His results are about the same as those of Dennis Kucinich but Kucinich gets almost no attention whatsoever – and he’s actually a presidential candidate!
When the Democratic hopefuls visit Sharpton’s convention, I hope they remember that there is scant evidence that Sharpton’s support has much – if any – electoral value. And even more importantly, I hope they remember Sharpton’s political history. For better or for worse, Al Sharpton has not demonstrated consistent loyalty to the Democratic Party, nor has he proven that he is committed to the same progressive principles that unite liberals and left-wingers.
© Jed Lewison