ls Al Sharpton the Voice of Black America?

Jonah Goldberg recounts for us the unsavory history of the despicable Al Sharpton. The Al Sharpton of the Tawanda Brawley hoax, of the Crown Heights riots and murder, of the Freddy's Fashion Mart fiery deaths.

Goldberg asks the question of why Sharpton is embraced and empowered by the Liberal elite.  We know where he gets the microphone.  Here's the puzzle: where's his money, and how does a penniless man get invited to join the membership of the Grand Havana Room? 

 Taking up the penthouse floor of 666 Fifth Avenue, the Grand Havana Room is a private, invitation-only cigar club and four-star restaurant. Through its windows, you can see the toiling salary men 39 floors below as they scurry about like ants, some furtively smoking in doorways, ever fearful of Nanny Bloomberg’s All-Seeing Eye.

Named by Business Insider as one of the “11 exclusive clubs Wall Streeters are dying to get into,” the Grand Havana Room is where power brokers and celebrities hobnob with captains of industry in one of the last places where it’s still legal to smoke in the Big Apple.

Immune as I am to the seductions of class resentment and Jacobin envy, I will admit it: I love the place. If invited, and if I could afford it, I’d join.

The one question I have is: Who’s paying for Al Sharpton’s membership?

“The Rev” is an omnipresent member of the club. After his MSNBC show, he’ll swing by for dinner and cigars amid the other Masters of the Universe. I couldn’t confirm that he repaired there after he broadcast his radio show, Keeping It Real, from Zuccotti Park to show his solidarity with the 99-percenters.

The reason I ask who’s paying for his membership is that Sharpton’s relationship with money has always been complicated. When he claimed he didn’t have the resources to pay damages in a defamation suit he lost, Sharpton was asked in a deposition how he could afford his suits. He didn’t own them, he replied, someone else did. He was merely granted “access” to the garments as needed. The same went for his TV, silverware, etc.

 

So it turns out that he not only goads his followers to kill the Jews  and the "white Hispanics" and "creepy-ass crackers", he is a tax cheat.   But then, he fits in well with the other members of the Obama administration.  Which gets us to the headline question.  Al Sharpton manages to stir the passions of a lot of people.  Is he the voice of Black America?  Let me know because if he is we have more reason to be worried that you may think.