Come Mr. Tally-man, Tally My Denial

If you wish someone ... Harry Belafonte, for example ... hadn't said something really stupid, you can just pretend he just didn't do it. That's what Memeorandum-tracked blogger Amygdala does:

ACTUALLY, NO, THERE WEREN'T. This is from CNS, an unreliable source with an a right-wing ax to grind, so add much salt, but, no, really, in point of fact, there weren't.

"Hitler had a lot of Jews high up in the hierarchy of the Third Reich. Color does not necessarily denote quality, content or value," Belafonte said in an exclusive interview with Cybercast News Service.

This wasn't the lede of the story; he is quoted with saying some other things they want to flog. But this one is simply a matter of asserting as fact that which is not, and it's not a meme I'd care to see spread, without at least, the truth close behind.

Well, let's take a little peek, shall we? Here's the CNS lead:

Atlanta (CNSNews.com) - Celebrity activist Harry Belafonte referred to prominent African-American officials in the Bush administration as "black tyrants" at a weekend march, and he also compared the administration to Adolf Hitler's Nazi Germany.

And here's the quote from the story from which the lead came:

Belafonte used a Hitler analogy when asked about what impact prominent blacks such as former Secretary of State Powell and current Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had on the Bush administration's relations with minorities.

"Hitler had a lot of Jews high up in the hierarchy of the Third Reich. Color does not necessarily denote quality, content or value," Belafonte said in an exclusive interview with Cybercast News Service.

"[If] a black is a tyrant, he is first and foremost a tyrant, then he incidentally is black. Bush is a tyrant and if he gathers around him black tyrants, they all have to be treated as they are being treated," he added. See Video

Seems pretty straightforward to me. Some people mellow as they age, some get angry. And some of the angry ones are stupid enough to talk to reporters when angry.