Meet 49-year-old Eddie Edwards. He's the owner of Glencairn, Ltd. It's a Pittsburgh-based company that manages several TV stations owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group. The Sinclair Broadcast Group helped Edwards to launch his career as a television executive with a 1991 loan. Sinclair is owned by a white family. Edwards is black.
Three years ago, Edwards tried to sell his management business to Sinclair. But the Federal Communications Commission got involved--thanks to Jesse Jackson's Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. Rainbow/PUSH filed several petitions with the FCC to block the sale. The chair of the FCC at the time was Bill Kennard--a friend of the Sloganmaster.
What's the gist of the Rainbow/PUSH complaints? They say Eddie Edwards is just a minority front man for a white-owned company. Jackson's complaints have held up Edwards' business plans for three years...and cost him a pretty penny.
Jackson has a track record when it comes to media mergers. His group filed FCC petitions in 1999 to block several media mergers. But they reversed their position in each case--and by the end of the year they had received sizeable contributions and other gifts from the companies involved.
Edwards, however, refuses to cave into Jackson's shakedown tactics. He refuses to join the growing list of companies that feed Rainbow/PUSH protection money to avoid boycotts and bad press. He says "there's absolutely no way" he'll give in to Jackson.
This is how Jesse Jackson operates, my friends. He finds something that's not to like about a corporation--say, not enough blacks in management positions--and goes to the management. He threatens a boycott or a protest outside the corporate offices. He threatens to bring news cameras and reporters. What does he ask in return? Oh, only a modest donation to the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. The executives pay up, and Jackson goes away...for a little while, at least, until he decides he wants more money. Or favors for his family and friends. Like that Anheuser-Busch beer distributorship he got for his sons Yusef and Jonathan after targeting the brewing company
for protests.
The only way for Jesse Jackson to lose his grip on national race relations is for businesses and the public to just ignore him. Given his talent for seizing the spotlight, that's not likely to happen soon.
http://www.nypost.com/commentary/32082.htm
Three years ago, Edwards tried to sell his management business to Sinclair. But the Federal Communications Commission got involved--thanks to Jesse Jackson's Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. Rainbow/PUSH filed several petitions with the FCC to block the sale. The chair of the FCC at the time was Bill Kennard--a friend of the Sloganmaster.
What's the gist of the Rainbow/PUSH complaints? They say Eddie Edwards is just a minority front man for a white-owned company. Jackson's complaints have held up Edwards' business plans for three years...and cost him a pretty penny.
Jackson has a track record when it comes to media mergers. His group filed FCC petitions in 1999 to block several media mergers. But they reversed their position in each case--and by the end of the year they had received sizeable contributions and other gifts from the companies involved.
Edwards, however, refuses to cave into Jackson's shakedown tactics. He refuses to join the growing list of companies that feed Rainbow/PUSH protection money to avoid boycotts and bad press. He says "there's absolutely no way" he'll give in to Jackson.
This is how Jesse Jackson operates, my friends. He finds something that's not to like about a corporation--say, not enough blacks in management positions--and goes to the management. He threatens a boycott or a protest outside the corporate offices. He threatens to bring news cameras and reporters. What does he ask in return? Oh, only a modest donation to the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. The executives pay up, and Jackson goes away...for a little while, at least, until he decides he wants more money. Or favors for his family and friends. Like that Anheuser-Busch beer distributorship he got for his sons Yusef and Jonathan after targeting the brewing company
for protests.
The only way for Jesse Jackson to lose his grip on national race relations is for businesses and the public to just ignore him. Given his talent for seizing the spotlight, that's not likely to happen soon.
http://www.nypost.com/commentary/32082.htm
