My first link to the Huffington Post! I predict that that place is going to be providing one heck of a lot of blog-fodder.

There's a "blog" entry from (I feel like I should say "purporting to be from" in this case for some reason) Russell Simmons, chastising the ADL's Abe Foxman for calling on African-American leaders to "reconsider their support" for the upcoming "Millions More" march commemorating the tenth anniversary of the Million Man March. Simmons says that opposing the march will...wait for it...create more anti-Semitism! In the piece he doesn't get into his reasons, but this should be a familiar canard. Speaking out against anti-Semitism and hate just creates more of the same. Don't get uppity! It only makes matters worse.

Foxman opposes the march because its organizers, Louis Farrakhan and Malik Zulu Shabazz are virulent anti-Semites. They're not anti-Semites because Jews don't like them, they're anti-Semites because they don't like Jews! They don't need a reason. They need to be opposed.

And we're not talking about a mild case of the hate, like saying "Some of my best friends are Jews," or "Psst...You know those Jews, they're a little cheap..." or even once calling New York City "HymieTown." These guys make a living off Jew hate.

Here's Farrakhan this past February:

Shabazz is the head of the New Black Panther party, quoted as saying:

At a recent appearance at Carnegie Mellon University, in which members of his "security" entourage paraded around carrying nightsticks, one student described the scene:

These aren't quotes out of context. These quotes are a career.

I can't wait to hear his speech at the march. And these are the people Russell Simmons thinks Jews shouldn't speak out against. I have a question, why aren't more African Americans joining their voices with Abe Foxman's? If these are the best that the Black Community has to offer, what does that say about the sorry state of Black leadership in America today?

Russell Simmons thinks that Abe Foxman should be quiet and take this opportunity to embrace the positive aspects of the march (the same argument that was made ten years ago), and take this as an opportunity for dialogue. What kind of dialogue is that? We know what Farrakhan and Shabazz think of Jews. What is there to say to them? Where do you start? "We're sorry for being conniving cheats...really we are...and we apologize for everything in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion too while we're at it."

If the KKK were sponsoring a "Mom, Dad and Apple Pie" summer picnic, would Simmons suggest we all attend and focus on the positive for that one day and forget about the rest of the 364 days of the year? Of course not! You don't give legitimacy to groups like the KKK for putting on one day of happy face, and you shouldn't do it for Farrakhan and Shabazz, either.

Simmons:

You know what's sad? Simmons is probably right in that, and that's too bad. It shouldn't take Abe Foxman issuing a press release to encourage Black leaders to do what they should be doing for themselves.

Update: Abe Foxman has his own response here (and hits most of the same points I do, only more...professionally).