OBAMA DUMPS WRIGHT

The Reverend Jeremiah Wright has resurfaced and is making a tour-de-force across the pundi-sphere, starting with an appearance on Bill Moyers and culminating in a speech at the National Press Club in Washington.

During the NPC speech Wright said that Obama was only distancing himself from Wright because was a politician and saying what politicians say. This set Obama off and in a press conference Tuesday he broke decisively with Reverend Wright saying:

"I gave him the benefit of the doubt in my speech in Philadelphia, explaining that he has done enormous good in the church, has built a wonderful conversation. They are a wonderful people and what attracted me has always been the ministries reach beyond church walls. But when he states and then amplifies such ridiculous propositions, that the U.S. government is involved in AIDS, when he suggests that Louis Farrakhan represents one of the greatest voices of the 21st century, when he equates the United States' wartime effort with terrorism, then there are no excuses. They offend me, they rightfully offend all Americans, and they should be denounced. That is what I am doing very clearly and unequivocally here today."

Obama also said that he's (Wright's) not the same man he thought he knew for 20 years, but it still hasn't stopped the Hillaroids and even some of the media from tarring Obama with Wright because he was a member of the church for 20 years.

The major flaw in the "what was he (Obama) doing there for 20 years?" argument is the assumption that Wright has remained the same person for the entire period. But let's look at (part of) Wright's NPC speech:



I found his smirking and preening at the press club truly odd behavior for the venue. I am one of the few who actually went back and viewed the entire sermons from which the controversial clips were culled and he didn't seem to be acting that way even then. His demeanor at the press club seemed to be rudely dismissive and disrespectful of the entire body of those who'd asked him to speak at THEIR venue.

Why speak there then? If you hold the national press in such high disregard why bless them with your presence? His entire "performance" as Obama put it was for his "fans" who were obviously liberally sprinkled throughout the hall as indicated by the racket they made. I understand that that's how some African-Americans behave in their churches and I celebrate them for it -but giving a public speach as a guest is another matter. E.g. when you're invited to someone's home as a guest you don't invite your buddies over and start playing poker in the middle of the living room. Examining the video of the speech you can notice a few times when even his supporters seemed uncomfortable.

All of this is to say that perhaps Obama is right and that Wright is not or is no longer the same person he was 20 years ago or for 20 years. Whether this is because of medication, advanced age, mental illness or just plain change we can't know without more. I'd be interested in hearing from a few of his (other) congregants to find out if they've noticed any change in him.

I also think it's highly suspect that Wright makes himself into the spokesman for the entire "black church" (whatever that is -blacks follow as many denominations as whites or anyone else) through his claiming that the attacks on Obama using his sermons are not in fact attacks on Obama or on him but on the "black church". This is an attempt to paint the attacks on his controversial stances simply as racism and that is, at best, intellectually dishonest.

Finally, I think Obama has put himself in a win-win situation with his response: He's completely deflated any notion that he might secretly share Wright's more controversial views (except perhaps for the most die hard Hillaroids or Obamahaters) and if Wright comes back at him he'll only be seen as a victim.