Why Jesse Really Attacked Obama

Rev. Jackson,

Your vulgar tirade caught on tape by Fox News, in which you said you wanted to rip Barack Obama's nuts off and accused him of talking down to black folks with moral lectures at churches, is simply the last straw for me and a growing number of African-Americans.

There are many blacks across the nation (myself included) who are appreciative of the work and contributions you have made in your civil rights career. But at this point, you are hurting Black America and Senator Obama. Your continued verbal attacks (see Jena 6 drama) are unwarranted. It is as if you're jealous that he has eclipsed you and both of your campaigns for the Democratic nomination.

Senator Obama's recent comments about black fathers not abandoning their children and accepting moral responsibility is a lesson you apparently needed to learn when you were younger. If you had, it may not have caused you to cheat on your wife and father a child out of wedlock with a former staffer.

Maybe that's what really bothered you about Senator Obama's Father's Day message urging black fathers to be responsible for their children. You certainly haven't been.

Living in Los Angeles, I have watched your ten year old daughter Ashley Laverne Jackson grow up. Over the years, I have had the pleasure to spend several holidays with your daughter including Christmas, her birthday parties and other milestones in her life. I will never turn my back on Ashley, her mom and their family. It is about providing friendship, support and love while you have been missing in action.

Your daughter has never traveled with you. You have an annual birthday party in Beverly Hills every year where your entire family is welcome, but your youngest child has only attended it once. She has had very little contact with her siblings and has never even met her big brother Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr, who apparently doesn't want anything to do with her. Allegedly (I believe it to be true), he was the one to leak the scandal to the media concerning your affair.

Now don't get me wrong, Senator Obama is not above reproach. He is a politician and is fair game to be fairly criticized by you or anyone else. But to personally attack him is crossing the line. Senator Obama is not talking down to Black people. He wants you and other dead beat dads to spend time with and care for your children properly.

The destruction of the black family and absentee fathers is a major problem in our community.

It's a problem that Dr. King spoke about and fought against. Forty years after King's murder, I can see why King didn't trust you. If you can't and won't sincerely help Senator Obama in this historic run, then at least stop attacking him.

Listen to his message of being a responsible father and start with taking care of your own daughter.

Najee Ali is a founding contributor of the African-American news and opinion site, UrbanThoughtCollective.com. Mr. Ali also serves as Executive Director of Project Islamic H.O.P.E, a national civil rights organization that advocates for oppressed people regardless of race, gender or religion.

Comments

[tanyainsacramento]

I think its time to move on from this. The fact that we talk about it when there are worse things that need attention on mccains campaign, is hurting obama.

[mypov123]

Ouch! lol. Well, from your perspective Jesse is mad because Barack's fatherhood speech "hit a little too close to home" for him I guess lol. Rev. Jackson and others like him need to understand that Barack cannot run on the same "black civil rights leader" platform that he and Al Sharpton used when they ran for President, I hate to be blunt but it is a LOSING platform if you actually want a real shot at the presidency and you want to use your position as President to help all Americans, including Black people. America is not ready for such a presidential candidate, certainly not if it's a Black man.

[SanityClaus]

Mr. Ali, I was about to pop in and complain that this makes at least the 500th post at HuffPo about the Jackson comments, but reading your first-hand perspective was truly valuable and I thank you for your contribution.

[JohnFromCensornati]

That headline is pretty outrageous.
Jackson said something he foolishly thought was private.
How is that an attack?
His biggest sin was appearing on Fox.

[JohnFromCensornati]

Please.
Enough with "vulger".
Enough with "crude".
When did ultra-prudishness set in?

[lakat]

It's something not said in polite company, is it not? He is a very public man, he should be mindful of what he says and how he says it. If not vulger and crude, he was mean spirited and hypocritical, wouldn't you say?

[eanderso]

Way to see the trees and miss the forest completely. Twice.

[PennP]

You are correct. Expressing the desire to castrate someone isn't vulgar or crude. It's hateful, sadistic, perverted, sick, and just plain evil. Prudishness has nothing to do with it. It's all about decency and humanity.

Help me understand: Is wishful violence against the man who's likely the next president of this country made light of because Obama is young, or black, or Jackson is older, or black, or the fact that Jackson said it in front of a mic that he says he thought was off, or it happened while he was working for Fox, or he was whispering his sweet hateful nothings to another black man, or..... What the hell IS it that makes people take this so lightly? I don't want to think that it's speaking to the nascent longings in the hearts of some here, who might feel it's appropriate redress for Obama's, ah, arrogance--or whatever transparent euphemism for "uppity" is being used these days.

It's not the vulgarity, it's the VIOLENCE that's the shocker. I can't believe I voted for the SOB.