Air America - Liars and The Lies They Tell

Michelle Malkin has a great column about Air America's double standard.

Air America's flagship New York City station is housed on Park Avenue at WLIB-AM, owned by Inner City Broadcasting. The company shunted aside its black-themed talk format at WLIB to accommodate Air America. In return, Air America made room for a few minority radio hosts and also entered into lucrative lease management agreements with Inner City Broadcasting, which owns and operates 17 radio stations in five markets.
The co-founder of Inner City Broadcasting is New York media mogul Percy Sutton, best known as Malcolm X's lawyer and former Manhattan borough council president. Sutton helped bail Sharpton out after Sharpton was ordered to pay former Dutchess County prosecutor Steven Pagones over the Tawana Brawley race hoax. Sutton also raised and donated money for Sharpton's 2004 presidential bid. Sharpton still broadcasts a Sunday radio show on WLIB. Sutton and Jackson are longtime friends and partners. Sutton served as Jackson's 1988 presidential campaign finance chairman. Jackson has lobbied on Sutton's behalf. Sutton sits on Jackson's Citizenship Education Fund. As original investors, Jackson and his wife reportedly hold more than 23,000 shares in Inner City Broadcasting.

I also agree with this assessment.

Where are they? Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton are the supermen of the civil rights establishment -- able to leap tall buildings in a single bound to get in front of a picket line. When victim politics calls, the demagogic duo leap into patented action: March. Boycott. Shakedown. Repeat.
But the raging reverends are nowhere to be found as a scandal involving the liberal radio network Air America and a Bronx, N.Y.-based inner city charity for poor children brews. Why the silence?
[...]
Now you know why there will be no boycotts at Air America headquarters over the possible bilking of poor Bronx children. Race hustlers care about only one color: green.

More from the "big liar" himself:

Mr. Franken said he has learned details of the story only in the last week. He said Piquant LLC, current owner and operator of the radio network, found a record of the transfers while conducting a "forensic" investigation into the finances of the previous owner, Progress Media, which was run by Mr. Cohen. That internal probe was conducted before the city agency became involved, Mr. Franken said. Efforts by The New York Sun to reach Mr. Cohen for comment in recent days have been unsuccessful. (via The New York Sun)

But was their investigation only started because of a legal investigation, or had they already discovered the "larceny" and just did not say anything -- I think so, but you can make up your own mind.

A spokesman for the Department of Investigation, Keith Schwam, said that if Air America discovered the transfers before the city probe began, "They neglected to tell anyone at DOI or in the city about it." (via The New York Sun)