Same Sharpton, Different Audience

MINNEAPOLIS—So the Rev. Al Sharpton was talking to a room full of Republicans at a panel on education, leading them in what he called a “nonpartisan” prayer. At one point, he told them about a rambunctious Democrat who, he said, asked if he was really serious about going to the Republican National Convention.

Then, with former House Speaker Newt Gingrich sitting onstage nearby, Mr. Sharpton told the crowd that the rambunctious Democrat in that story was, in fact, him. It went over well.

“It was hilarious. It brought down the house,” said Jim Reavis, 44, of Fayetteville, Ark.

It was a curious sight.

Just days earlier, Mr. Sharpton was in Denver telling a room full of Democrats that he working to make sure there were no voting irregularities like what took place in Ohio 2004 and Florida in 2000. Straight partisan red meat.

But today, the message was about reforming public education. And Mr. Sharpton was there to seek common ground. “He said when you’re in an argument like this, there can be no sacred cows,” Mr. Reavis recalled. When approached by a reporter asking about Mr. Sharpton’s remarks, Mr. Reavis gushed, “I loved him. Wasn’t he fantastic! What? Thought I was going to hate him. He was really cool.”

Mr. Sharpton’s remarks to a nearly all-white crowd weren’t “white or black or a factional conversation,” Mr. Reavis said.

Lois Clausing, a retired teacher from Enid, Okla., said Mr. Sharpton “made some real good points—that parents have to be there and they’re just not involved in their kids’ education. I think that’s one of the most important things in a child’s life,” she said.

Friis Arne Petersen, the Danish ambassador to the United States, said Mr. Sharpton “was a really great speaker. He had some great insights into education.” He predicted Mr. Sharpton would play a “very needed role” in the bipartisan effort here to fix the American education system. “Definitely,” he said.

Speaking before the event to New York reporters, Mr. Sharpton was more like his usual self, however.

Asked about Senator Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, who is scheduled to speak later tonight, Mr. Sharpton said, “I’m glad to see him home where he belongs, at the Republican National Convention.”

And as for former Republican New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who was rescheduled from his original Tuesday night speaking slot?

“I’m so disappointed that he won’t be speaking,” Mr. Sharpton said, with convincing earnestness. “I’ll try to recover.”

apaybarah@observer.com