I thought it’d be good to show Al Sharpton’s record. The fact is that he didn’t pay state income tax, that he incited a riot with anti-semitic language, and that he knowingly lied in the Twana Brawley case (where a prosecutor and police officers were falsely accused of kidnapping and rape). Al Sharpton doesn’t, and never will, speak for the party I am a member of and the party I vote for:
(Warning: From National Review…which maybe considered conservative by some):
http://www.nationalreview.com/lowry/lowry200312030840.asp(Snip):
“If the Jews want to get it on, tell them to pin their yarmulkes back and come over to my house."
Those were the immortal words of the Rev. Al Sharpton during the Crown Heights crisis in New York City in 1991. A car driven by a Hasidic Jew had run over a black child in the Brooklyn neighborhood, prompting black-Jewish tensions that eventually spilled over into antisemitic riots. Sharpton's contribution to civic peace was statements like the above, together with such classic anti-Jewish smears as: "Talk about how Oppenheimer in South Africa sends diamonds straight to Tel Aviv and deals with the diamond merchants right here in Crown Heights."
Failure to support 2001 Democratic Nominee for Mayor of New York:
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0146/goldstein.php(Snip):
Making peace with the Jews wasn't high on Al Sharpton's agenda last week. On election eve, he sat with top Democrats at a large round table in the lobby of the Four Seasons Hotel, where he sometimes holds court these days. The purpose of this Hail Mary huddle was to get Sharpton to endorse Mark Green. But, for whatever reason, the main deal maker—Bill Clinton—failed to show. So Sharpton left for the studios of NY1, where he repeated a nuanced invitation to his supporters to sit out the race. It was another cunning maneuver by New York's trickster prince.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/nation/president/sharptonprofile.htm(Snip)
He became a focal point in the 1991 Crown Heights riots, which turned the Brooklyn neighborhood into a national symbol of black-Jewish strife. He advised five black and Hispanic youths charged in the infamous Central Park jogger case, and served as an adviser to Tawana Brawley, a New York state teen whose claims of kidnapping and abuse were found to be a hoax by state investigators
(snip)
Sharpton accused Dutchess County prosecutor Steven Pagones of kidnapping, abusing and raping the then-15-year-old black girl an accusation unsupported by the evidence.
A grand jury concluded that there was no evidence to sustain Brawley's story. Pagones later won a $65,000 defamation judgment against Sharpton, but Sharpton has remained unapologetic.
The Brawley case also highlighted Sharpton's personal finances a topic that has drawn the interest of adversaries, prosecutors and regulators. His income had to be garnished to cover part of the defamation debt and supporters helped pay the rest.
Other financial questions have followed Sharpton. A jury acquitted him in 1990 of charges he stole from a civil rights organization he started as a teenager. In 1993, he pleaded guilty to not filing a state income tax return in 1986.