Doesn't every family have a kooky uncle who's always saying something inappropriate, but who gets a free pass because he was in "the war" and might have returned slightly altered?

That's who Andrew Young has become.

The dignified man who during the most turbulent period of the civil rights movement was on Dr. King's left hand -- Ralph D. Abernathy was on his right -- has in recent years become the kooky uncle who's liable to say anything. And often does.

Can you imagine Dr. King ever defending the business practices of Wal-Mart and Nike? And accepting money from them? Neither can I. Yet Andrew Young has.

Young, even when he was President Carter's ambassador to the United Nations, was known for shooting from the lip or, more generously, for being his own man. He frequently had to apologize for or disavow his own comments or actions, such as meeting with the PLO in 1979 (he was forced to resign as ambassador as a result).

Young, who as Carter's conduit to the black community was arguably more important than anyone in getting Carter elected, is now supporting Hillary Clinton. Of her husband, he said, "Bill is every bit as black as Barack."

Ouch. If you think I'm making that up, you can see him saying it on the Internet in an undated speech. Young later said of Bill Clinton, "He's probably gone with more black women than Barack."

We can cut Young some slack for that one, since he was kidding and said so. He was not kidding, though, when he said in the same interview, "I want Barack Obama to be president -- in 2016."

It is unlikely that Young's endorsement carries as much weight as it did in 1976, and it's not necessarily a bad thing that there's a division between old-school black leadership -- as represented by Young -- and younger black leaders who support Obama.

But the irony of Young, 75, telling Obama that it's not his time, to be patient, to wait, shouldn't be lost on anyone with even a rudimentary knowledge of history. Young, Dr. King and everyone else who fought for equal rights were often told to be patient when they demanded the right to be served at lunch counters, to sit in any bus seat, to work any job.

In his "Letter from a Birmingham Jail," Dr. King wrote this:

"For years now I have heard the word 'Wait!' It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This 'Wait' has almost always meant 'Never.' "

You can bet your "I'm With Hill & Bill" lapel pin that such will be the case this time, too. Young said he'd love to see Obama become president after, presumably, Hillary Clinton has served two terms. Want to bet, though, that after that Young and the old-school leadership he personifies will find someone else in whom they believe or to whom they're beholden?

When black businessman Bob Johnson acted as a Clinton hatchetman and attacked Obama, it's doubtful that many people were surprised. Johnson's self-interest has always come before any concern he professed for black America.

(What am I talking about? He never expressed any. If he cared one whit for humanity, he wouldn't have polluted its airwaves for decades with his singular creation and legacy, Black Entertainment Television.)

Young, however, has been on the front lines of black America's struggles, has been jailed, felt the police dogs' teeth, the policeman's billy club. His altruism is unquestionable.

That doesn't mean that he and the Old Guard that has fallen predictably into lock-step behind Hillary Clinton -- many of the younger leaders are supporting Obama -- can't be wrong.

Not wrong for whom they support -- they've more than earned the right to campaign for whomever they want -- but wrong for counseling Obama to "wait."

That's a word with which they should be all too familiar.