My new column is up addressing the use of the race card by Michael Jackson’s family. Here’s the intro:

Cry me a river. Michael Jackson’s father is blaming — what else? — American “racism” for his ghoulish son’s persistent legal and personal problems.

Joe Jackson reportedly told CBS News’s “48 Hours”:

This is just the United States. All the rest of the countries, all over the world, are proud of Michael. It’s here we have the most trouble out of them. It is racism.

Who is “them”? After millions of American record buyers of all races propelled Michael Jackson to unimaginable heights of fame and fortune during the past four decades, we are now supposed to believe that this nation’s unparalleled societal intolerance for black people led to the King of Pop’s fall from grace.

I go on to contrast the Jackson family’s complaints about American bigotry against black entertainers with the phenomenal success and mainstreaming of fellow black entertainer Snoop Dogg and conclude:

The lesson of Jacko and Snoop Dogg’s America is not that this nation is too intolerant, but that it is not nearly intolerant enough.

After I filed the column, news broke about the lawsuit against Snoop formally filed by makeup artist Kylie Bell, who claims Snoop and others raped her last year after Snoop appeared on the Jimmey Kimmel show. I predict it won’t make a dent in Snoop’s efforts to transmogrify into a lovable mainstream character. Look for him to snag a Grammy or two on Feb. 13 and for the entertainment industry to embrace him even further.