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Opinion: Democrat Sharpton denounces Democrat Maloney for using bad word

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There is a word in the English language that we can’t use here.

No, it’s not the eight-letter barnyard epithet. No, it’s none of the four-letter naughties that might come into your mind if you are a foul-mouthed, -minded sinner who’s going to the four-letter bad place in the afterlife.

It’s a six-letter racial epithet for African Americans that’s so bad only African Americans can use it.

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And Rep. Carolyn Maloney, who is not African American, seems to have been caught crossing into that forbidden linguistic territory by the Rev. Al Sharpton, who is African American.

The six-letter gaffe has its roots in New York Gov. David Paterson, who is African American, last year not selecting Caroline Kennedy, who isn’t an African American, but instead picking upstate Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand, who isn’t an African American, as the Senate replacement for Hillary Clinton, who isn’t an African American.

You should know that all of these characters belong to an eight-letter political party that begins with D.

Maloney thought she was politically senior, savvier and smarter and would be a better Senate selection, despite also not being African American.

Unlike Gillibrand, Maloney’s House district (14th) is in populous downstate New York, which historically produces more successful statewide candidacies.

In fact, Maloney’s district is Manhattan’s Upper East Side, an area that is so uber-wealthy and intelligent that residents choose to cram themselves into high-priced apartment buildings so they can hear toilets flush on other floors.

Well, Maloney’s feelings have been festering. So much so that despite urgings against the move by the African American governor, among others, she’s announced a primary challenge to Gillibrand for the statewide seat in next year’s elections.

In a telephone interview with a New York website, Maloney -- attempting to denigrate her fellow party member’s candidacy -- recounted somebody else’s alleged characterization of something Gillibrand might have said in Puerto Rico about English-only.

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Sharpton, who not coincidentally is supporting Gillibrand and not Maloney, somehow found an e-mail and fax machine to issue a statement calling attention to Maloney’s alleged use of the forbidden word that only African Americans can use.

And today Maloney issued an apology for repeating ‘a word I find disgusting.’

Just before a big fundraiser to be attended by a seven-letter ex-president whose wife’s appointment to the Cabinet of the first African American president created the Senate vacancy the two women are feuding over now.

-- Andrew (seven-letter last name here)

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