Over at the Huffington Post — and no doubt elsewhere — the progs are clearly working themselves up into a righteous lather over Glenn Beck’s alleged racism and the smoking gun that Van Jones and Obama are both black and therefore — bada bing! — this is all about racism.

A couple weeks ago, I wrote a column about the poverty of seriousness and imagination on display in the Left’s incessant whines about racism and Obama. Somehow we’re supposed to believe that ideas and policies don’t matter at all, just skin color. If Hillary were president, we’d all rollover for Hillarycare instead of Obamacare because Hillary is white.

The same thing applies with these idiotic fantasies about Van Jones. Here’s a newsflash: Most conservatives I know — and I’ve met quite a few — have problems with white self-described Communists, who think 9/11 was an inside job and sing ballads to cop killers like Mumia abu Jamal. Michael Moore has come out with a new insipid attack on capitalism, but guess what? The pasty fish-belly whiteness of his skin won’t earn him much slack from anyone on the Right.

Anyway, after I wrote that column, I got a lot of e-mail from lefties insisting that I deliberately ignored the example of Glenn Beck, the obvious proof that the backlash against Obama was — and is — indeed racist. The truth is I’d planned on writing about Beck at the time, but it took up too much space to address what seemed to me to be such a silly and convoluted argument. According to the progs, Beck is a racist because he called Obama a “racist,” adding that Obama has a deep-seated hatred for white people.

That statement sparked the Color of Change — Jones’s old hangout — boycott attack on Beck which in turn may have prompted Beck to launch his investigations of Jones.

Now my chief problem is simply this: Beck’s comments aren’t really racist, are they? I don’t agree with Beck on the substance; I don’t think Obama has a deep-seated hatred for white people. But I don’t think his criticism of Obama is itself racist either. Beck’s accusation wasn’t meant as a compliment, was it? I know the man thinks racism is a bad thing. So how exactly is Beck’s accusation racist? Is it just because Obama is black that such criticism automatically becomes racist? Is it really racist merely to call a black person racist? I think Jeremiah Wright is something of a racist. I’m convinced that Louis Farrakhan is a racist. Does that mean I’m racist?

Now, the same crowd wants to make criticism of Van Jones racist, with equally iffy logic. But the simple fact is that if Van Jones had never been a truther, a Mumia-supporter, a Communist etc. no one would have cared that he’s black. And, if Van Jones was white and had the same record, conservatives would have launched exactly the same sort of fuss. Are the same conservatives who cheer Condoleezza Rice or Colin Powell or Michael Steele or Thomas Sowell suddenly racists because they don’t cheer for Van Jones? If your honest answer is yes, you’re simply a buffoon.

Update: From a reader:

Jonah, I just wanted to give you an idea of the Beck/Jones timeline. You said, “That statement sparked the Color of Change — Jones’s old hangout — boycott attack on Beck which in turn may have prompted Beck to launch his investigations of Jones.” In fact, Glenn Beck first began discussing Van Jones’ past statements on July 23rd, on-air – http://www.glennbeck.com/content/articles/article/198/28315/. He didn’t make his “Obama is a racist” statement on Fox & Friends until July 28th so Beck didn’t go after Jones in retaliation for the advertisement boycott by Color of Change. I’m sure Color of Change had just been waiting for the right opportunity to attack Beck and he provided them with it on Fox & Friends.
Unfortunately, I’ve seen it put forth in several columns that Beck only tried to bring down Jones after he started losing advertisers when a simple 5 minutes of googling is all that’s required to reveal the truth of the timeline.