Geraldo to O’Reilly: Media Treated MLK the Same Way They Treat Sharpton

‘If you look at the contemporary press ... MLK was accused of the same kind of shenanigans as Sharpton’

Geraldo to O’Reilly: Media Treated MLK the Same Way They Treat Sharpton (Mediaite)

Geraldo Rivera squared off with Bill O’Reilly tonight over the influence of Al Sharpton in the black community, and came to Sharpton’s defense by saying Martin Luther King, Jr. was scrutinized by the media in the same way that Sharpton is today.

O’Reilly insisted that Sharpton is and continues to be massively unpopular (as evidenced by a new poll of New Yorkers), but Rivera argued the more important statistic is whether the black community likes him, and they do.

He told O’Reilly that Sharpton “is the man for the black civil rights movement right now,” and a Fox News host not liking him is “irrelevant.” In fact, Rivera went so far as to compare the media coverage Sharpton gets to the coverage Dr. King got.

O’Reilly argued there’s one important distinction: King deserves admiration; Sharpton does not.

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