Conservative provocateur Andrew Breitbart did it again, quite spectacularly this time. His first memorable foray into the slime was his destruction of ACORN with misleading videos edited to make it look as though the umbrella organization of community organizations, which primarily helped the poor and disadvantaged, was corrupt. His attempt at smearing civil rights hero John Lewis with preposterously edited videos was so outrageous even Fox News wouldn’t run them. His deliberately distorted videos of Shirley Sherrod’s speech initially appeared to be so damning that the NAACP, the White House and the Dept. of Agriculture (her employer) panicked and ran for the hills before the truth emerged. Breitbart claims that he simply ran the video and had no part in editing it, but given his history of deliberate distortions, it’s hard to believe him.

Even if he’s telling the truth, he didn’t bother to check the story. In that, he’s not alone. Fox News played the video without any qualms (hardly a surprise). The NAACP, which should have known better, rushed to denounce Ms. Sherrod, and her boss at Agriculture summarily fired her,  with the approval of the White House, before doing even the slightest fact checking.

The far right understands all too well how easy it is to whip up white resentment with a black man in the oval office, and shamelessly looks for ways to fan those flames. It’s sad and despicable, but we should be used to that by now. What’s almost as sad is how easy it was to spook the folks who should be standing firm against such disgusting behavior, and how badly they reacted.

Given the events of the past week, we can look for the Breitbarts of the world to continue their high-tech lynchings. So much for post-racial America.

Topics: Andrew Breitbart, cartoon, conservatives, Fox News, NAACP, Obama, opinion, race, race baiting, right wing, Shirley Sherrod, white house