Almost exactly MM, almost exactly.

The sad thing is that, even though Imus (and his cast of characters, side-kicks, etc.) have done a lot of abusive things, some racist, some sexist, some bigotted and biased in many other ways,  he has also done some good along the way too.

Please let me be clear here and say that his using the "I'm a good person that said a bad thing" was bogus, and him using any of the "but I've done great things to help several charities" to help blunt the criticism was weak and wrong too.

But... if someone really examines the man's accomplishments a bit, then yes, they really do have to acknowledge that he's done great things for some charities over time.  He helped raise a good bit of money for research into SIDS -- Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.   He has also worked on "his ranch" for kids suffering from tragic diseases.   Noble causes to be sure.

None of which excuses the bad behavior, but definitely underscored by the irony in the timing of his firing.

His suspension was originally delayed because of his yearly radiothon to raise money for these charities.  He's now gone.  The radiothon may continue, and money may be raised for these causes, but who knows for sure how the fundraising will have been impacted?!

I say "almost exactly" above only because I'd have to slow down and say that it wasn't just Al and Jesse that got Imus fired, and actually wasn't really them at all.  No one got Imus fired except Imus and perhaps his friend and side-kick McGuirk.  They have no one but themselves to blame for making the comments that they did.  Imus has no one but himself to blame for not manning up and apologizing immediately.  It became a huge mess because of lame attempts to dig out of the hole.

And finally, it wasn't really Al and Jesse because there were a lot of other individuals involved that fanned the flames and stoked the fires that got Imus fired.  A lot more mainstream names, rather than just Al and Jesse.  Imus made himself toxic, and a lot of people looked at how toxic he had become, how toxic he had been, and they decided to speak up.

That includes the behind the scenes people at MSNBC, and I'm sure a lot of behind the scenes people at CBS that demanded these results.  People that demanded these results *regardless of Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson*

Sharpton and Jackson may thump their chests a bit and try to take credit for the results, but they most certainly are not the reason that things wound up as they did.  They were just there trying to take advantage of a situation that might get them more publicity.

I'm no fan of political correctness or of the white-washing and censoring of things from our history.  A good example of why (for me) is the thought that companies like Walt Disney will never again release or make available a film that I remember seeing in my youth: Song of the South.  Why?  Because there is a belief that it demeans Blacks.

Disney has locked that movie away in their vaults and kept it there because they don't want to take the heat for a portrayal of a time in our country's history when Blacks were normally kept off in other areas of the plantation, rather than in the main house.  Ironically though in what I remember of Song of the South the smartest person in the movie was Uncle Remus, who was able to tell tales with great morals and teach life lessons through the use of those tales.

Song of the South also featured the use of the tar baby, a term that is seen as derogatory.  If seen in context of S.o.t.S., then Tar Baby has a completely different and much more reasonable meaning.

Anyway, there are certainly efforts to censor at least one side of the conversation while the other side creates new meanings for some words, creates new words, and comes up with a lot of ways of hurling insults that are many times worse when used by people that aren't of the same race.  That severely irritates me and makes me think of just how ignorant some people really are.

On the issue of freedom of speech though, I'm not sure that we've seen that much loss here.  Imus was able to say what he wanted, but he had to face the potential repurcussions of his words.  Those repurcussions included advertisers dropping their sponsorships which put pressure on the syndicators and owners of the radio network and TV network that carried the show.

Freedom of speech doesn't guarantee anyone the biggest platform in the area to use to make their speeches from.  Imus still has his freedom to say whatever he wants, he just won't have the audience that he had in the past and won't have the same avenues of communication open that he had.  At least not without finding a new radio or TV job, or not without being a guest on someone else's program.

Vilifying Imus is like doing the happy dance when you no longer have open Herpes lessions.  It does nothing for the fact you are still infected.  Thanks to racists like Jackson and Sharpton, the infection is still there - and very potent.