Master Baiter

The war of words between President Trump and Rev. Al Sharptongue began a week ago after the President sent a series of tweets critical of House Oversight Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings’ combative rant against Acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan over conditions at detention facilities that house illegals entering the country.

“Rep. Elijah Cummings has been a brutal bully, shouting and screaming at the great men & women of Border Patrol about conditions at the Southern Border, when actually his Baltimore district is FAR WORSE and more dangerous. His district is considered the Worst in the USA.”

“...As proven last week during a Congressional tour, the Border is clean, efficient & well run, just very crowded. Cummings’ District is a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess. If he spent more time in Baltimore, maybe he could help clean up this very dangerous & filthy place.”

It was on like a pot of neckbones after that.  Miraculously materializing at the first whiff of racial trouble, The Right Reverend Al Sharptongue joined Democrats and others who loathe Trump to condemn the President’s remarks about Congressman Cummings and the city of Baltimore blustering, “[Trump] is never shy about insulting cities and countries that disagree with him politically, but he reserves particular insult for black and brown cities.”

Presidential candidates Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris tweeted their praise of The Reverend.

On Monday, Sharptongue held a news conference alongside former RNC Chairman Michael Steele to address what he called “Trump's racist remarks." 

“Little did I know that Mr. Trump was going to, on the eve of this, attack the congressman from this city. But not only the congressman but the people of this city, in the most bigoted and racist way."

Last year, USA TODAY reported that “Baltimore is the nation's most dangerous big city.” 

The poverty rate is over 22%, and the population is shrinking. The city’s politics are riven with endemic corruption — former Mayor Catherine Pugh resigned in disgrace this May. She's the third Baltimore mayor in a row to leave in the wake of intense scandal. Baltimore is dotted with thousands of vacant buildings, and as for rodents, exterminator Orkin listed Baltimore in the top 10 of its annual survey of “rattiest cities”.

Seth Mandel, Executive Editor of the Washington Examiner penned an Op-Ed in the Washington Post delivering a lengthy argument of why Sharptongue is “unworthy of such praise” due to his “history of race-baiting and deadly anti-Semitic incitement.”

Glenn Loury, Economic Professor at Brown University opined in The New York Times, Democrats “have yoked themselves to a genuine bigot.  The problem for them is “Al Sharpton actually is, as Mr. Trump put it on Twitter, a ‘con man’.  And not just a con man:  Mr. Sharpton is an ambulance-chasing, anti-Semitic, anti-white race hustler.”

Professor Loury concluded, “If Democrats cannot distinguish between Mr. Sharpton’s hucksterism and genuine moral leadership on race and justice in America, I assure you many moderate voters in Battleground States will have no trouble doing so.”

On the same day Sharpton held his news conference in Baltimore, 44 miles to the southwest, Alveda King, niece of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., joined 20 other inner city faith leaders at the White House.

King said the meeting focused on urban affairs, “things that many of us around the table were concerned about” including the sanctity of life, urban development, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, prison reform, jobs and Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU).

King told Sheila Poole, reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, she doesn’t think [President] Trump is racist or that his words and actions have emboldened white supremacists.

“I don’t believe white supremacists need anyone to embolden them, they’re bold enough all on their own and they are in great need of prayer,” she said.

“I have a picture of Rev. Jesse Jackson and Rev. Al Sharpton with Donald Trump, he wasn’t President then, and they were friends.  They were all supposed to be friends and look where we are now. It’s time for us as a nation to reconcile as one blood, one human race and work things out together.”