NAACP Under Fire! August 2010

Hat Tip to Lynette Holloway for her follow-up on the issue of Ben Jealous and his lack of leadership at the national office of the NAACP. Also, a H/T to blogger Faye Anderson over at Anderson at Large for keeping it real on this issue.

Yes, forget all the negro 2.0 political correctness, Ben Jealous should be fired!

UPDATE: Ben Jealous has once again apologized. I agree with Journalist, George Curry, when he said:

"If you're going to attack someone, at least get the facts straight. And that's exactly what NAACP President Benjamin Jealous failed to do before unfairly criticizing Shirley Sherrod, who was fired by Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack on the basis of a doctored tape of one of her speeches. Jealous didn't merely join the parade of misinformed critics, he volunteered to serve as drum major."  Read more HERE.

AAPP: Now Ben Jealous wants to apologize and twist it like he always supportrf Shirley Sherrod, Shame on him. His new attempts to apologize and at the same time spread fear will not work. Shame on him! We remember what he said:

In the statement, distributed to reporters shortly before midnight on July 19, Jealous said:

 "We concur with U.S. Agriculture Secretary Vilsack in accepting the resignation of Shirley Sherrod for her remarks at a local NAACP Freedom Fund banquet. … According to her remarks, she mistreated a White farmer in need of assistance because of his race. We are appalled by her actions, just as we are with abuses of power against farmers of color and female farmers."

Think about it for a minute, the NAACP, a organization that publicized lynching and worked so hard to awaken the conscience of America, has lost it's way, and attacks a black woman that they invited to speak at their event?

Think about it, the NAACP, the organization that  litigated against segregation all over the the United States, the organization that helped organize the 1964 March on Washington now finds itself suffering from dwindling membership and decades of poor leadership and an inability to connect to the black community (judging from its lack of real membership numbers).

Now the NAACP is lead by a 30 something,  Ivy League educated black guy with an identity crisis, who said of Shirley Sherrod:

"Her actions were shameful," he continued. "While she went on to explain in the story that she ultimately realized her mistake, as well as the common predicament of working people of all races, she gave no indication she had attempted to right the wrong she had done to this man." More HERE

There are many in the black community, now raising questions regarding Ben Jealous.

Let's hope that people who read the recent ROOT article can ignore the wacko extremist, NAACPer, who wrote comments in the ROOT article. I would not be surprised if the writer using the pen name of Thomas Carlson, is actually Ben Jealous himself.

Black bloggers, black political analyst and writers continue to question the handling of Shirley Sherrod and the Tea Party by Benjamin Jealous.

AAPP:  "Ben Jealous has another year on his three-year contract, candidly, it would be in the best interest of the NAACP that he be fired. But then again, his contract should not be renewed. I can't believe that Hilary Shelton the director of the NAACP's Washington bureau and senior vice president for advocacy and policy is still defending Ben Jealous on the handling of this issue. Both Ben Jealous and Hilary Shelton should  stop making excuses." 

Get this, Hilary Shelton told The Root that technology was the real culprit in the Sherrod mishap, not communications or leadership.  Whatever, Hilary Shelton, Whatever. 

I agree with George Curry, former editor-in-chief of Emerge magazine, who wrote in a column for Black Voice News that Jealous essentially served as a "drum major'' in the attacks against Sherrod before doing enough research. Here is what George Curry had to say:

"The NAACP was duped by Fox News and the Tea Party?'' Curry wrote. "That's a sad commentary on the NAACP and the state of black leadership. How could the nation's oldest civil rights organization allow itself to be 'snookered' by its avowed enemies? And if the president of the NAACP is that gullible, what else [has] he been snookered on?''

AAPP: "No wonder Ben Jealous is refusing to talk with black bloggers and blogtalkradio host about his inability to move the NAACP forward. Even black members of the Tea Party wonder why Ben Jealous didn't talk with them first.

I also asked Ben Jealous to come on my highly regarded and popular blocktalkradio program; African American Political Slugfest, to answer some tough questions. Ben Jealous, of course, did not show up.

He and Hilary Shelton the director of the NAACP's Washington bureau and senior vice president for advocacy and policy, would rather kiss the ring of right wing bloggers and Fox, then say they were snookered."

Columnist Earl Ofari Hutchinson is right when he wrote the NAACP Still Hasn´t Atoned for Sherrod Blunder:

"Why was the NAACP snookered? And even after it realized it was conned, has it done enough to atone for its colossal blunder? The answers to both questions aren´t pretty. The group clearly had the tea party on its mind when it made the quick call on Sherrod. It did not want to be yelled at by tea party activists and the rightwing smear machine as hypocrites, for double dealing the race card, and for being soft on alleged black racism.


The NAACP´s knee jerk overreaction and appeasement had everything to do with timing, as it turned out bad timing. It came on the heels of the blowback that the NAACP got for its convention resolution a week earlier blasting racist elements in the tea party. Breitbart made no bones about why he trotted out the lying tape when he did. He said that he wanted to hit back at the NAACP. The NAACP could have easily ignored it, or taken a few moments to check it out, and found it to be the fraud that the world now knows it be. It didn´t and for that it took the deserved heat."

Read more HERE