I agree that funerals shouldn't be rose-tinted affairs, but you need to look at the quotes themselves and make your own judgments.
This (
http://drudgereport.com/flash8.htm) was the first article that I saw about it, and it presents the information in a pretty unbiassed way:
Today's memorial service for civil rights activist Coretta Scott King -- billed as a "celebration" of her life -- turned suddenly political as one former president took a swipe at the current president, who was also lashed by an outspoken black pastor!
The outspoken Rev. Joseph Lowery, co-founder of Southern Christian Leadership Conference, ripped into President Bush during his short speech, ostensibly about the wife of Martin Luther King Jr.
"She extended Martin's message against poverty, racism and war. She deplored the terror inflicted by our smart bombs on missions way afar. We know now that there were no weapons of mass destruction over there," Lowery said.
The mostly black crowd applauded, then rose to its feet and cheered in a two-minute-long standing ovation.
A closed-circuit television in the mega-church outside Atlanta showed the president smiling uncomfortably.
"But Coretta knew, and we know," Lowery continued, "That there are weapons of misdirection right down here," he said, nodding his head toward the row of presidents past and present. "For war, billions more, but no more for the poor!" The crowd again cheered wildly.
Former President Jimmy Carter later swung at Bush as well, not once but twice. As he talked about the Kings, he said: "It was difficult for them then personally with the civil liberties of both husband and wife violated as they became the target of secret government wiretaps." The crowd cheered as Bush, under fire for a secret wiretapping program he ordered after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, again smiled weakly.
Later, Carter said Hurricane Katrina showed that all are not yet equal in America.
"This commerative cermony this morning, this afternoon, is not only to acknowledge the great contributions of Coretta and Martin, but to remind us that the struggle for equal rights is not over. We only have to recall the color of the faces of those in Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi," Carter said, the rest of his sentence drowned out by loud applause. "Those who were most devastated by [Hurricane] Katrina know that there are not yet equal opportunities for all Americans. It is our responsibility to continue their crusade."
Now, I don't really have a problem with Jimmy Carter's comments about Hurricane Katrina. Yeah, they probably were an underhanded stab at President Bush, but for one thing, they have to do with civil rights, and therefore fit in a funeral service for Coretta Scott King, and for another thing, of all of the areas in the US that need to work on racial equality, the South is probably the one area that needs the most work. So I'd be willing to give him a pass on that one.
Rev. Lowery's comments and Carter's comment about wiretapping, however, were unexcusable. They were nothing but political attacks, and had no place at a funeral service. Carter clumsily tried to make his anti-wiretapping comment into something appropriate by framing it in the context of the Kings life, but it didn't really work, it was still an extremely transparently political statement.
I can understand people making political statements, but there's a time and a place for that, and a funeral service isn't the time or the place.