Joyner, aka the "Fly Jock," announced last week that Smiley would be leaving because Smiley "can't take the hate" he's been getting over his harsh criticism of Sen. Barack Obama.

"People are really upset with him," Joyner said. "He's always busting Barack Obama's chops. They call. They e-mail. They joke. They threaten. You know Tavis like I do. He needs to feel loved."

So, Joyner exhorted his 10 million listeners to send Smiley some love to get him to change his mind and stay on the air.

You'd think Smiley would have the drill down by now. He's not new to the game. He knows that the haters are always lurking, ready to pounce if they don't agree with you. And no matter how well respected you are, you can't count on everyone - even your diehard, core constituency - to silently accept whatever position you take, particularly when you're up against someone with the appeal of Obama.

You're going to take fire for that.

Smiley has been hitting Obama pretty hard, accusing the candidate of not paying enough attention to issues affecting African-Americans. The heat was turned up after Obama declined Smiley's invitation to attend his annual State of the Black Union forum.

Smiley, whose latest book is "The Covenant with Black America," also criticized Obama for not being in Memphis for the 40th anniversary of the death of the Rev. Martin Luther King. Both Sens. Hillary Clinton and John McCain were there. And Smiley says that Obama should have stood more firmly by his pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

But what Smiley apparently doesn't factor in is that in addition to courting black voters, Obama is running for president of the entire United States - not just black folk. So, it's understandable that his focus is wider. And regardless of how glaring his absence at certain key events might appear, it's unrealistic to expect Obama to be everywhere people want him to be.

"I'm a big believer in going to places where you're weak, not where you're strong," Obama was quoted as saying in yesterday's Daily News "and reaching out to people that you might not otherwise expect to vote for you."

Incidentally, one reason Obama wasn't at Smiley's 2007 State of the Black Union forum was because he was in Illinois announcing his candidacy for president. I'd say that trumps Smiley's event, don't you?

If you ask me, the longer this goes on the more it gives rise to the suspicion that this hullabaloo has more to do with Smiley's ego than anything else.

But that doesn't mean Smiley should be silenced by an uproar from the "black thought police," as Earl Ofari Hutchinson referred to them on HuffingtonPost.com. Nor does it mean that many of the questions Smiley raises aren't valid. Smiley has a job to do, just as Obama does. *

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