Further to today’s theme of fragrant irones and identity politics, here’s the good reverend perpetrating a little double standard of his own while professing to have even the barest idea of when race-baiting goes too far. Why jump in and attack BJ when Sharpton hasn’t even endorsed Obama? Because while South Carolina may not have made the Messiah the “black candidate,” the margin certainly established him as a black leader. Compare his 81% of the black vote to the 17% received by Sharpton himself while running against Waffles and Silky in 2004. Win or lose, Obama’s now a force in black politics — which is all to the good — and Sharpton knows it, which is why he isn’t about to get on the wrong side of this feud.

And in fairness, he’s hardly alone in giving this advice. Hillary’s people sound like they’re on the brink of staging an intervention.

Memo to Jon Chait and pretty much every other Democrat in America: You should have seen it coming.

Many of these same [liberals] do not like it now that they see similar two-faced [Clinton] tactics being employed against “one of their own.” Well, tough. And many of the most prominent and eloquent black columnists—Bob Herbert, Colbert King, Eugene Robinson—are also acting shocked. It’s a bit late. I have to say that Bob Herbert shocked even me by quoting Andrew Young, who said that his pal Clinton was “every bit as black as Barack” because he’d screwed more black chicks. How is Hillary Clinton, or Chelsea Clinton, supposed to feel on hearing that little endorsement? One gets the impression, though, at least from the wife, that anything is OK as long as it works, or even has a chance of working… Say what you will about the Clintons, you cannot acquit them of having played the race card several times in both directions [in the past] and of having done so in the most vulgar and unscrupulous fashion. Anyone who thinks that this equals “change” is a fool, and an easily fooled fool at that.

This is worthwhile, too. As with most Red State Updates, the best material is saved for the end.