AJC Opines on rightwing weeping over Bush-smacks at funeral

From the AJC editorial page: "The funeral of Coretta Scott King was a wonderful thing, and not least among its wonders was the controversy stirred by comments from the Rev. Joseph Lowery, former President Jimmy Carter and others.

The remarks themselves weren't much, amounting to a couple of minutes of a six-hour ceremony. Without naming names or parties, Lowery and Carter criticized the war on Iraq, the federal response to Hurricane Katrina and continuing budget cuts for anti-poverty programs. But what made the comments so controversial in some eyes is that they were made in the presence of President Bush.

Bush, to his credit, handled the situation graciously, as did his father, former President George H.W. Bush. But to some, the comments seemed unfortunate and out of place. Others --- much more graceless about using the funeral for political purposes than either Lowery or Carter had been --- seized the chance to manufacture an artificial outrage that was all out of proportion to what was actually said. The conservative New York Post, for example, cited Carter's comments as cause to name him the most shameless president of all time.

But to those who followed the careers of Mrs. King and her late husband, there was something sweetly familiar in these complaints about poor timing and about unnecessarily injecting tension into a situation."