• one Jesse Jackson calls the attention on the criticism a distraction from numerous bigger issues.
• two Al Sharpton says that the NAACP has allowed the Modern Tea Party to have center stage.
• three NAACP president Ben Jealous says it was a tiny part of everything he said. A tiny part! source

• NO in fact, they totally trashed their “tolerance for bigotry” source

• I’m busy today so notify me asap when NAACP renders verdict: are liberty-loving, equality-respecting patriots racist? Bated breath, waiting …
• Sarah Palin • Tweeting about the anticipated move by the NAACP to denounce the Modern Tea Party Movement* for “explicitly racist behavior.” Not often we say this, but … Palin’s right. Yo, NAACP, what happened to setting the example instead of playing angry reactionary? You guys are a pretty effective weapon in the war on racism, but if you’re using it to play politics, it will not work out for you. It seems as pathetic as boycotting a greeting card that sounds like something it obviously isn’t. source

* – After a little soul-searching and some feedback from fellow readers, we’ve chosen to revert back to referring to the Tea Party Movement as such, leaving “bizarro hippies” as a part of our past and adding the word “Modern” in front of “Tea Party,” which should get around the problem that the name creates – that it disregards and usurps the memory of the original Boston Tea Party. Let’s admit it. It was intended as a lighthearted joke but some readers didn’t take it that way.

• Officer Hardass seems to have missed the point of why he was working the G20 protests in Toronto recently. Note how the officer next to him tried to make cute conversation, but he wasn’t having any of that. About halfway through the video, they showed the officer arresting her. Boing Boing’s Cory Doctorow made a good point here: “If the goal of the police at the G20 was to act pissy and escalate minor incidents into major ones in order to assert their authority, mission accomplished. If, on the other hand, their mission was to de-escalate, keep the peace, find rapport, and celebrate the democratic right to protest, this officer is an abject, total failure.” source

• He’s been here for some time, I’m not going to specify for how long, but he has chosen to return.
• State Department spokesman Philip Crowley • Regarding the fate of an Iranian nuclear scientist, Shahram Amiri, who randomly surfaced in D.C. yesterday after being gone from his home country for a while. Obviously, considering his job, the U.S. probably wanted some intelligence from him. And there’s been speculation that U.S. spies kidnapped Amiri – that’s Tehran’s line. Julius is probably going to stumble into an Iranian embassy any day now. You were wondering why we went on vacation for so long, right? source

• This is probably what a lot of people are thinking about Switzerland’s decision to let Roman Polanski run free again. The Swiss have a tendency of neutrality, and it’s put them into odd situations like this in the past. Should be fun to watch what happens next.

• Reuters is also greatly underplaying the story at the very bottom of their front page. But at least they’re playing it, unlike Fox News, which spilled a lot of ink on it when it first broke. It’s only on their world page as a result of partner member The Wall Street Journal running a story about it (and them linking to it at the very bottom of the page). While not the biggest story on the digest, the initial controversy around Climategate – often a punching bag for skeptics of climate change – makes it a pretty important story to have something about. Other sites are covering it like so:

• CNN: Lead storyIn a lot of ways, the controversy around climate change is stronger in the U.S. than elsewhere in the world, so big play here makes sense.
• Guardian: Lead StoryNo individual source owned the Climategate story as much as The Guardian did, so it’s not surprising to see them giving it big play.

• 
  Google news: A lead itemWhile the Russian spy swap and the NBA’s free agency craziness are ahead of it, Google’s algorithms are giving it decent play.
• BBC: Secondary storyDespite the fact that the controversy is based around a British university, the BBC chose to play up Nicolas Sarkozy instead.

• New York Times: DownpageWhile given decent play, it’s not the site’s lead story this morning. They went with the Russian spy-trading story instead.
• MSNBC: DownpageYou have to go nearly halfway down the page to see the site covering this at all, which is pretty strange if you ask us.

• So, let’s get this straight: A bunch of conservatives are frustrated with being called racist because of their ideologies. So, what do they do? They create a shirt with the phrase, “Yup, I’m a racist” emblazoned on it. Because that’s not stupid or controversial. Look, this kind of rage-filled idiocy gets us nowhere. So why push it at all? source