And now, I defend Tucker Carlson?

This is going to be shocking, at least to regular readers. 

I am going to defend Tucker Carlson, a little bit like Mark Antony speaking at Caesar’s graveside.

Tucker Carlson: There is this much truth in what I say. (Photo: Bloomberg)

The difference is I come neither to bury, nor praise, the fired Fox News host. Some might call what follows mansplaining, or whitesplaining.

If you look back at my previous posts, you will find many attacks on Carlson’s boldface lies, distortions and shameless propaganda on behalf of V. Putin and the aggressive, criminal Russian bear. 

Columns such as this one, and this one, and this one. Dig in and enjoy. 

Clearly, I am not a fan.

But nor am I a fan of falsely accusing someone who is so dripping in actual offenses. I am referring to the pasty-white host with the fake soprano laugh being called a racist because of a text he sent to one of his producers.

It was a private conversation, not a tweet, not something said on broadcast. Here is the text, which CNN and others described as “racist”:

“A couple of weeks ago, I was watching video of people fighting on the street in Washington,” Carlson texted a producer. “A group of Trump guys surrounded an Antifa kid and started pounding the living s**t out of him. It was three against one, at least. Jumping a guy like that is dishonorable obviously. It’s not how white men fight. Yet suddenly I found myself rooting for the mob against the man, hoping they’d hit him harder, kill him. I really wanted them to hurt the kid. I could taste it.”

What made it racist? Apparently this sentence: It’s not how white men fight.

I see no attack on any other race, although it does seem to smack of white supremacy.

Is that what he was doing, or was it more like, “It’s not how gentlemen fight.”

Would I say something like that?

Yes. I can give you the context.

In 1994, after Israeli Dr. Baruch Goldstein killed more than three dozen Palestinians while praying in a mosque, I attacked him as a cold-blooded murderer, adding, “Jews don’t do things like that.”

Was that racist? Was it anti Palestinian?

No, it was a condemnation on behalf of members of “my” group.  I believe that’s what Carlson did, and if it was “racist,” we have really devalued the meaning of the word.

If you keep reading Carlson’s words, you find something else, something strange happening:

“Then somewhere deep in my brain, an alarm went off: this isn’t good for me. I’m becoming something I don’t want to be, The Antifa creep is a human being. Much as I despise what he says and does, much as I’m sure I’d hate him personally if I knew him, I shouldn’t gloat over his suffering. I should be bothered by it. I should remember that somewhere somebody probably loves this kid, and would be crushed if he was killed. If I don’t care about those things, if I reduce people to their politics, how am I better than he is?”

See the U-turn? From his emotional wish the mob kill the kid, his — dare I say — Christian beliefs emerge and he condemns the attack.

Does it seem quite so “racist” now?

Not to me, who has been called “racist” numerous times for my opposition to illegal immigration, starting with Mayor Jim Kenney, who said, “I guess you just don’t like brown people.”

No, I don’t like stupid people and politicians who try to turn my position from principle into race.

Kenney very well knows Philly has (sssh) a large contingent of illegal Irishmen, not to mention Canadians, Russians, and Jews, all of whom are white. 

I don’t know which straw broke the camel’s back for Fox News management. Was it this one?

I don’t know.

The Left swarmed around, waving the text as “proof” of Carlson’s “racism,”

Fox has a strange habit of creating stars — Glenn Beck, Megyn Kelly, Bill O’Reilly — then blowing them up, although each case is different.

Beck’s departure in 2011 was explained this way by NPR (clearly no fan): “Beck’s weekday arrival at Fox News in January 2009 — his show debuted the day before President Obama’s inauguration — took Fox on a roller-coaster ride. He embarked on a run that incorporated conspiracy theories, wild-eyed accusations and predictions of doom.

“Over the past year, however, his ratings were declining and protests led to the withdrawal of hundreds of advertisers.”

As I remember, Kelly’s major flap was insisting that Santa Claus is white, clearly the truth at the fictional character’s creation as St Nicholas — in Turkey!

He has since gone international, and Megyn was slow on the uptake.

O’Reilly was bounced for allegedly pouncing on female staffers.

As a matter of fairness, a number of big shots from other networks were dismissed on similar grounds — Charlie Rose, Matt Lauer, Fred Savage, Harvey Weinstein, Rick Sanchez, Bob Beckel, Eric Bolling, Chris Cuomo, among others. 

Does this forgive Carlson? No. It just places him in context.

He should have been fired for his actual lies, as what happened to Brian Williams, not for a trumped up accusation of racism.