NAACP Supports Van Jones, Calls Beck a 'Right Wing Extremist'

The NAACP issued a statement Friday in full support of President Obama's embattled Green jobs czar, Van Jones. The NAACP went further, calling Glenn Beck a 'right wing extremist' and questioned advertisers' sponsorship of his show.

From the Gateway Pundit blog, which has been breaking some major news items on the Van Jones story of late, comes this statement from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, siding fully with President Obama and his increasingly embattled 'Green jobs' czar, Van Jones. NAACP President Benjamin Todd Jealous also had the following strong words to say in condemnation of Van Jones' "right wing extremist" detractors, with FOX conservative pundit Glenn Beck front and center:

It is sad and unfortunate that our nation's precious airwaves and cable television time are being occupied with the unscrupulous, diversionary tactics launched by right wing extremists such as Glenn Beck.

Van Jones has established himself through his many years in public service as a hardworking advocate for positive, progressive change. He is a devoted husband and father. Mr. Beck and the other news services' portrayal of Mr. Jones to the contrary is not only distracting and disingenuous but harmful and destructive.

The closing statement by Hilary O. Shelton, Director of the NAACP Washington Bureau and Senior Vice President of Advocacy and Policy, was similar in tone and theme:

The tactics being deployed by right wing extremist commentators to divert the American people's attention away from very important issues of our nation such as sustainable energy, lack of dependence on foreign fuel sources, and the creation of living wage jobs are not only unethical but dangerous to the future of our country.

The NAACP's questioning of Glenn Beck's advertisers implies that the NAACP also supports the boycott started against Glenn Beck's show by Color For Change, an advocacy organization founded by Van Jones. In light of that released statement of support, the NAACP may find disconcerting a news item that has since broken (again, by Gateway Pundit) regarding a 2003 CD funded, produced and participated in by Mr. Van Jones, and hosted by convicted cop killer Mumia abu-Jamal, titled "Wartimes: Reports From The Opposition," a radical anti-war and anti-American project paid for by Freedom Fighter Music, a spinoff of Van Jones' Ella Baker Center for Human Rights.