For a couple of weeks leading up to Monday’s MLK Day “Freedom Train” event, there was a story going around that San Jose/ Silicon Valley NAACP president Reverend Jethroe Moore II made some rather offensive remarks during a radio interview. The rumor was sparked by two anonymous comments on San Jose Inside and Protect San Jose, claiming that during a segment on radio station KLIV, Moore said “the MLK taking money from the POA is like the Jews taking money from the Nazis.”
Asked about the anonymous post, KLIV’s news and program director George Sampson said he’d never let anything that odious on their air. But it turns out that Moore did make the POA / Nazi comparison—not on KLIV, but on KCBS.
In a report by Matt Bigler that aired on Monday, Jan. 11, Moore is heard saying: “‘Hypothetically speaking, if this was a Nazi group giving money to the Jewish party, a Jewish group, would they accept the money? No, just on moral principle.” (The clip has been uploaded here.)
Bigler says the statement was consistent with other incendiary comments Moore had been making regarding the event.
“It definitely caught my ear,” Bigler says. “I didn’t think it was so inflammatory we couldn’t use it.”
Bigler says he’d heard from a credible source that Moore had made some similarly reckless statements to the San Jose Mercury-News last week, including a quote to the effect that “cops beat and kill African Americans.”
A source at the Merc confirmed that Moore had used the Nazi analogy in an interview with the newspaper, but that the comment was left out of the story. Asked whether that decision helped Moore’s argument sound more reasonable than it actually is, the Merc source said: “It that situation, we’re damned if we do and we’re damned if we don’t. Use the quote, and the POA has us calling them Nazis. Don’t use it and we’re holding back information.
“Ultimately we decided it was just too inflamatory.”
Moore did not returned numerous calls for comment.
Sounds like the Merc is covering for Moore. Do they hate the POA that much. Shameless bastards. Would be nice if they explained themselves.
Actually, there is an explanation, but it’s weak: by leaving out a comment that would give the reader insight into Rev. Moore, the Merc is actually hiding a relevant piece of info from its readers.
If they were worried about it being too inflammatory, the reporter could have quoted somebody else condemning Moore’s “Nazi” quote, or they could write an editorial themselves condemning the quote. In fact, they could do that now…
We can judge their journalistic standards by their decision to do so or ignore this controversial but relevant information.
I wonder if Raj still agrees with Rev. Moore?
Absolutely I stand by Reverend Moore. He is a true leader, rooted in values, service, and a moral compass that I trust and respect.
Were you on the Freedom Train on MLK day to honor the legacy of what MLK lived and died for?
Only in San Jose could two guys like Jethroe and Raj could be community leaders instead of two Target retail clerks.
As a Target retail Clerk, I would be more than honored to have Raj and Jethroe on my shift anytime.
One two three, we see this clerk, Raj and Jethroe, right behind the tree,
On their break, with a paper sack, a jug, and thee,
Hate the police and thee, for doing our jobs, but these three, hate security.
Generally, as they all have to ax to grind about you and me.
Dr King would be so ashamed of both Raj and Rev Moore.
Why wouldn’t Raj have Reverend Moore’s back?
Shakedown artists.. er.. community organizers gotta stick together.
Raj,
I am a black women who resents you speaking for the African American Community. You do NOT represent me or my friends. No one in MY community with an education on the history of Hitler would ever condone calling the POA Nazis.
The first Freedom Train was founded by Betty Dunson, a personal friend of Coretta Scott King. She worked with the BLACK POA here in San Jose. Not only did she accept donations to run the train from the POA, but she and others in the African American Community also worked with them on many other events in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Who do you think protected us when we marched with Dr. King from Selma to Montgomery? The Police did!
Dr. King would never agree with what you, Jethroe Moore, and Richard Konda, are doing to the MLK Association, or to the POA in the name of people of color. He worked with politicans, the Police, unions, the poor, and was a great collaberator. He was not a man of ego but a man dedicated to peace, and his people. The three of you could learn a lot from his teachings.
Moore is a worst type of angry reckless community activist attacking other groups regardless of facts and ignoring facts that don’t support his threats while speaking under the banner of righting wrongs which he does to others
He has embarrassed himself, NAACP and his community while losing credibility in community after he was unwilling to help MLK Association raise money for the train but criticized others trying to do right for MLK and community
He calls himself Reverent Moore when his actions are anything but Christian or following teachings of Martin Luther King Jr
Jethro is just a believer in free speech. He is one of my guys
Rain until the floods!
Jethro is a disgrace to the civil rights movement.
I’m getting burned out on this whole Martin Luther King holiday thing.
It began as shameless pandering to a special interest group founded on ethnic narcissism and racialist scab picking, and went down hill from there.
First there were the bandwagon chasing grifters like Jesse Jackson, who wasn’t at the scene of MLK’s assassination but managed to ghoulishly sop some of his blood on his clothing and get his picture splashed all over the news. (It made his career).
Then there were the greedy relatives demanding to be paid for the use of MLK’s name, even in connection with MLK holiday observations.
Then there were the ever diminishing and irrelevant MLK marches, trainrides, circuses, rodeos, etc. etc. culiminating in the cancellation of this year’s San Francisco MLK train ride.
And now, the seamy dust-up between the local NAACP and the POA.
Shabby, shabby, shabby.
The Martin Luther King Holiday is the ONLY national holiday that memorializes a single individual. Washington’s Birthday is gone. Lincoln’s Birthday is gone. Columbus Day is gone.
The current holiday calendar says that Martin Luther King was the most important person in American history.
Not Washington. Not Lincoln. Not Columbus. Not Jefferson. Not Teddy Roosevelt. Not Franklin Roosevelt. Not General of the Army, Supreme Allied Commander, and President of the United States Dwight David Eisenhower. Not the architect of cold war victory over the Soviet Union Ronald Wilson Reagan.
Nope. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Maybe a Martin Luther King holiday was a cheaper way of pandering to a voting block than building a 555 foot tall obelisk on the Washington Mall.
But the deference and obsequiousness to Martin Luther King, Jr. is far, far out of proportion to his significance to the history of the United States of America.
Go ahead. Call me an insensitive r*c*st, h*te monger, b*g*t, evil, awful person.
But as Walter Cronkite was fond of saying: “That’s the way it is.”
Your fear and hatred of Rev. Moore only elevates his status among those of us who believe in fairness, justice, and an end to police abuse. The guy is a rare figure in politics—one with integrity and the courage to voice his convictions. Keep em coming, I hope you break your keypads.
Rev. Jethroe has, by his own hand, become irrelevant.
Bet you are the first on the 911 call when you hear a noise in the backyard.
Okay, so the MLK taking money from the POA is bad. But, according the the NAACP, reparation for slavery is good.
I’m so confused.
MLK Association taking money from POA is a donation, but really just a publicity stunt by the POA to say—see we love people of color and we’re not racist. Even though the MLK Association is mostly white anyway.
Reparation is owed. You think the insurance companies WANT to give money that they owe and therefore have them admit they were wrong? Please.
Uh-oh… a free bottle in front of me… or was that a pre-frontal lobotomy?
Huh, what? Thu, Jan 21, 2010 – 1:42 pm .
“MLK Association taking money from POA is a donation, but really just a publicity stunt by the POA to say—see we love people of color and we’re not racist.Even though the MLK Association is mostly white anyway.”
Two of the original founders of the MLK Association AND the NAACP were white. Do you know how long civil rights would have taken to materialize if it were not for whites? Do you know how many white students died fighting along side their black brothers and sisters to give you the priviledges you young folks enjoy today? You should be ashamed of yourself for saying things like you have.
You young folks do not know your history, or the the many teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. because if you did you would never behave the way you are towards the Police or the MLK Association for re-establishing the working relationship that made the first Freedom Train possible. I will pray for the day that love over takes all this hate and brings us together as ONE!
Well said, Venita.
Huh, what? should read or watch Mississippi Burning which is the story of 3 young people, 1 Black and 2 Jewish, who were lynched by the KKK for their work in the Civil Rights movement in the 1960’s. Being white and Jewish myself I know that the Civil Rights movement had thousands of white Jews arm in arm with Blacks in the deep south.
I would like to ask Huh, what? what difference does it make if there are white people in the MLK Association? Isn’t this what MLK would have wanted? MLK was the one to say to judge by character and not color.
I am inviting those people who want to knock Jethro’s speech to a tennis match with Ric.
Ric
I am open to meeting for a conversation on Jethro’s side of the issue. If it needs to be at a tennis court, so be it.
Bob
Comments like this “NAACP President Compares POA to Nazis” help no one… it is sad that we live in a world, much less a city where even in rhetoric this has to come up. It is a disgrace to Jewish folks and t Black folks as well. When was the last time the POA did ANYTHING remotely on the scale or scope as a Nazi? Easy answer… NEVER. People like this need to just go away… and what makes it worse is he is supposed to be a reverend.. sad, sad, sad…
Mr. Moore’s rediculous analogy comparing the San Jose Police union supporting the MLK train to Jews taking money from Nazi’s is ignorant and appalling.I have no doubts about about the police intimidating and being brutal to people of color. Heck, the police are like that to white folks as well…just not as much…What’s historically inaccurate is knowledge of what the Nazi’s did to the Jews. To compare Nazi actions to the San Jose police department’s behavior is over the top. The police are not engaged in ethnic cleansing, extermination of a race, or forced labor. Good try but just plain ignorant.
Race and the urge to dissent.
What makes our political system works is that no matter how dirty, sleazy, petty or small-minded our politics become, we still love it. It’s like a car wreck we can’t help slowing down to check out. There’s an urge to engage in public discourse and debate and rational outcomes doesn’t always play into it. That’s why instead of gracefully accepting defeat on an issue or election, people sometimes hang around and make a career out of saying mean things.
I wasn’t born until MLK was killed, but from what I’ve learned in school, segregation was a bad thing, and public officials would even practice racism as a matter of public policy. It took the courage of Truman, the discounted haberdasher to lead the way with an Executive Order to end segregation in the military. But twenty years later many southern states still practiced their Jim Crowe laws with stubborn pride until a nation galvanized by the civil rights peaceful movement (led with Ghandi-like grace and even more eloquence by MLK and countless unnamed people who risked life, liberty, personal property and their very freedom to resist the oppression) finally forced the states and municipalities still practicing official discrimination to end these practices (led by the feds, supreme court, army troops, etc.)
I don’t think that was a big part of the history of San Jose. There was not a colored and white only sign on doors and bus seats. I wasn’t there, so I could be wrong, but the historical photos I’ve seen don’t show it. So anyway…being a professional advocate for racial issues (NAACP?) I guess includes picking fights to keep the passions alive. I don’t think it was smart, appropriate or fair to equate uniformed public servants in California in 2010 with Nazi’s, but the urge to fight the man is strong and fills the pews and rallies more than mundane talk about educational attainment and career mentors and such.
Professional leaders rarely speak for anyone but themselves, and honor dies where interests lie. If you make money and attain prestige by hurting others with hateful words, you are a professional something, but its not servant-leader like Jesus.
Mercury used MLK Freedom Train controversy to distorting the news to their benefit by not telling the public all important news
Leaving out Moore’s Nazi comment prevented public from understanding Moore’s unreasonable anger and hiding an important piece of Freedom Train story violates journalism ethics
– Support the open exchange of views, even views they find repugnant.
Giovanni Wed, Jan 20, 2010 -said
” If they were worried about it being too inflammatory, the reporter could have quoted somebody else condemning Moore’s “Nazi” quote, or they could write an editorial themselves condemning the quote. In fact, they could do that now…
We can judge their journalistic standards by their decision to do so or ignore this controversial but relevant information. “
– Recognize that private people have a greater right to control information about themselves than do public officials and others who seek power, influence or attention. Only an overriding public need can justify intrusion into anyone’s privacy.
Look closely as Mercury’s arresting arrest, public drinking accusations of racial profiling and illegal arrests and front page story about a few police officers who used force multiple times who are innocent until proven guilty but Mercury which tried and convicted them without proof they did anything illegal
Mercury continues to distort news to support their advocacy against police officers and not follow journalism ethics
Shameful and unethical
I recall reading (online) a Merc editorial condemning the POA for a video that criticized Raj. Will they now criticize the Rev Moore for stepping over the line?
I notice above that Raj (if it was indeed he who commented and not some imposter) supports the Rev Moore. Wouldn’t that be hypocritical of him? No doubt.
“Look closely as Mercury’s arresting arrest, public drinking accusations of racial profiling and illegal arrests and front page story about a few police officers who used force multiple times who are innocent until proven guilty but Mercury which tried and convicted them without proof they did anything illegal…”
Almost as shameful as your butchery of the English language!
What would be “shameful and unethical” would be repeating Moore’s baseless, false, race-baiting statement in the newspaper.
Just because some headline-seeking whack job said it doesn’t mean it bears repeating. Why should the Merc give this guy a forum to make inflammatory statements attacking the character good people in our community?
I’m no fan of the Merc, but in this instance the newspaper made the right decision.
Besides, if you want really to hear mindless, uninformed hate speech there’s always talk radio.
I am not black, nor am I an expert on black history… HOWEVER, I have reviewed enough speeches from MLK and his philosophy to know that he would NOT have condoned this remark, and would have DENOUNCED it and the person who said it… We cannot move forward if were still looking backwards! It’s important to acknowledge the past in order to prevent mistakes, but repeating sentiments of the past is ignorance in the present.
If the NAACP didn’t have negitive statements, in order to continue contributions in order to exist, there would be no separation. Instead of preeching hate and separation they should preech love and respect.
I would like to say that I am grateful to the San Jose Police Officers Association for donating the money to keep the Freedom Train going and for keeping the memory of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, alive. As long as the train is running I know I am safe.
To the members of the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Association, I would like to express my graditude to you all for your remarkable strength and courage. You are not alone. Many of us in the African American community respect your efforts to keep the life, legend, and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. alive for our children, and for those of us who remember the struggles. God bless.
Chug-a-lugga-chug-a-lugga..choo-choo!
That the sound o’ the police
Chug-a-lugga-chug-a-lugga..choo-choo!
SJ Inside comments gotta cease
Chug-a-lugga-chug-a-lugga..choo-choo!
C.S. bout relevant as Rick Dees (member? U member…)
Chug-a-lugga-chug-a-lugga..choo-choo!
(He was on 102.7fm, Rick Dees in the morning?)…eese
Chug-a-lugga-chug-a-lugga..choo-choo!
How bout that Drew Breez?
Chug-a-lugga-chug-a-lugga..choo-choo!
Ok,ok, not San Jose, but an NFL team please?
Chug-a-lugga-chug-a-lugga..choo-choo!
Secretary of Labor is Hilda Solis
Chug-a-lugga-chug-a-lugga..choo-choo!
No cowardly online racism at this website? Sucka please…