Obama’s Real Van Jones Problem

As late Friday’s have historically served as document dumps for the White House, we now have late Saturday serving as a czar dump. Van Jones is out, and with his resignation the Obama White House hopes to move past the matter. Byron York noted the recent past, giving the Obama administration justification for the hope that the path forward will be made smooth by many in media.

Of all that has come to light in just a few days about Van Jones, I believe the most damaging to President Obama would have been Jones’ association with and support of Mumia Abu-Jamal. Mumia has spent years on death row, convicted of the 1981 murder of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner.

Jones is not only a Mumia supporter but produced and appeared on a music CD with Mumia. For a taste of what that contained (courtesy of Verum Serum), at 4:40 we hear Jones say:

“We have this now global struggle against the U.S. led security apparatus and military agenda that impacts people here and impacts people around the world and we have to see our problems as linked.”

I have thought for a while that a considerable catalyst to President Obama’s precipitous slide even presaging the health care imbroglio was the Henry Louis Gates - Sgt. Crowley affair, wherein before knowing the facts of the matter, President Obama sided publicly with the arrogant and class conscious Gates against the decent and professional cop, Crowley. The blush was off the rose on Obama’s post racialism with that, leading, I believe, to many who had had “hope” being, well, disappointed and feeling tricked.

At the time of the Gates-Crowley affair it was missed by the media (of course) and the Senate (which doesn’t have to advise and consent on czars) that a high level administration appointee was a supporter and collaborator with a convicted cop killer! Had that been known at the time, it might have indicated a certain pattern of thought.

The Obama administration is hoping that the Van Jones story dies out totally before the Mumia connection becomes generally known, and well they should. The media is already obliging, as a search on Google News shows not one single major media outlet connecting Van Jones to Mumia.