Over the last couple of weeks, Glenn has called for a new civil rights movement, citing the IRS targeting of conservatives and attacks on people of faith as just a few examples of civil rights violations. And now it seems at least one person is not happy with Glenn’s analysis. MSNBC host Rev. Al Sharpton attempted to smear Glenn on his show last week for daring to compare today’s injustice to the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s.
Touting his civil rights background, Rev. Sharpton said he was the youth director for the organization founded by Martin Luther King Jr., adding that he is still involved with the group.
SHARPTON: I personally get offended by this. I've been in civil rights all my life. I was made youth director of the organization Dr. King founded when I was 12 years old. I've been in it ever since and to equate civil rights to fighting on these issues that have nothing to do with any rights that are denied and it's all about their polarization is really offensive. I mean, we can disagree but you don't miscast things as something that it's not.
Rev. Sharpton is specifically referring to a segment from the Glenn Beck Program last week. After appearing at the press conference in Washington D.C., Glenn told Stu:
GLENN: This is a civil rights movement and it's time for us to start moving as a civil rights movement. We have to be willing to have the dogs be unleashed on us because, believe me, after what I saw today on the way they're handling things at the capital, oh, you're not very far from having the same kind of oppression coming our way.
After playing that clip of Glenn on his MSNBC show, Politics Nation, Rev. Sharpton had this to say:
SHARPTON: It's unbelievable. He's talking about imaginary unleashed dogs, when real heroes of the civil rights movement actually had to confront those dangers. Yesterday Beck made his case at a rally in Washington, but even as he talked about civil rights, the slogans on the signs told the story of fear and paranoia. It was similar to what we saw at previous Tea Party rallies.
“Oh, man,” Pat said. “Fear and paranoia. There's nothing really going on. The IRS isn't really targeting them.”
“The IRS isn't targeting. The administration hasn't done everything in its power to harm those. He has labeled people enemies,” Glenn said. “That's not an open dialog, an open society by any stretch of the imagination.”
Aside from the IRS, we now also know that the NSA surveillance is beyond our wildest imagination – but, like the Reverend said, there is nothing to see here.
“It is truly amazing where we’re going,” Glenn said. “Tell me about starting a business. Tell me about it. How many people down right now are stopping their jokes about, I don't want to talk to you on the phone, I don't want to have this conversation on e‑mail, and it's nothing – you’re not a terrorist, but you are being made to feel like a terrorist.”
“You are being made to feel like a second‑class citizen,” he concluded. “It is the civil rights movement. It is. We're just early. As I said, we are just early.”
Watch the full clip from Rev. Sharpton’s show via TheBlaze HERE.
