Had to love Fox's coverage of yesterday's inauguration. You had Chris Wallace actually question whether Barack Obama is in fact the President, since Obama messed up the oath thanks to conservative Chief Justice 'No Notes' John Roberts. And then you had Megyn Kelly, who used her coverage of the inaugural ball as an opportunity to spout GOP talking points for "finishing the job" in Iraq.
But the award for sleaziest inaugural coverage has to go to Glenn Beck, who feigned outrage over the benediction from civil rights leader Rev. Joseph Lowery. Lowery offered perhaps the most humorous moment of the day, asking God to "help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get back, when brown can stick around, when yellow will be mellow, when the red man can get ahead, man, and when white will embrace what is right."
It was an acknowledgment that racism still exists in our society, and that we must learn to respect all races and cultures. Of course, leave it to Beck to turn words so humorously poignant (and completely innocuous) into racially loaded garbage.
Beck accused Lowery of suggesting all of America was racist, and then likened Lowery to Jeremiah Wright. (How's that for incendiary bigotry!) Beck went on and on, disingenuously claiming that he and his family have been praying for President Obama to succeed, and that there are many people in this country who don't hate minorities, and are "perfectly fine with brown sticking around."
Beck is going to have to do better than that if he's going to convince us that a) he's not a huge racist himself, b) that Rick Warren wasn't the sole controversial religious figure up on that stage yesterday, and c) that he doesn't see race a la Stephen Colbert.
