Paul

Ibrahim

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April 4, 2008

Barack Obama Digs Himself Deeper In the Jeremiah Wright Scandal

It is a very difficult time to be an honest, patriotic Democratic voter these days – the choices of presidential nominee for such voters are getting worse by the day.

On the one hand, there is Hillary Clinton, whose, well, creativity with the truth is being exposed more and more through such stories as the Bosnia non-adventure and the revelation that she had been fired from a job 34 years ago for being a “liar.” (Is this job included in “her 35 years of experience”?)

On the other hand, there is Barack Obama, who refuses to disown an America-hating bigot who served as his pastor, spiritual guide and family shepherd for 20 years.

What is surprising is that, whereas Clinton does suffer heavily (both in the opinion polls and at the actual polls) for her behavior, Obama has only seen a moderate dent in his numbers among Democratic voters since the Wright controversy finally made it into the mainstream media.

Although anyone who has turned on a television or logged on to the internet in the past few weeks should know about Reverend Jeremiah Wright, here is a very quick review: Wright is the pastor of a congregation that describes itself as committed to “Africa,” allegiant “to all black leadership who espouse and embrace the Black Value System,” and disavowing of the “Pursuit of ‘Middleclassness.’”

Wright has referred to 9/11 as “America’s chickens coming home to roost,” insisted that the government gives black people drugs and that it even invented the HIV virus to eliminate the black race, and has said that black infighting is “fighting the wrong enemy.” Wright has also referred to our country as “White America, the U.S. of KKKA,” and repeatedly urged that “God damn America.” These words are not merely a collection of one-time gaffes. They are instead a small sample of Wright’s paranoid, conspiratorial and hateful philosophy.

Politics aside, Obama’s affiliation with Wright is truly and deeply problematic. Before we delve into analysis, let us examine the facts of the situation:

It is a fact that Wright is an unpatriotic bigot, and that he is active and outspoken and spreading anti-American and racist rhetoric. It is also a fact that Obama developed and maintained an extremely close and personal relationship with Wright, who officiated at Obama’s wedding, baptized Obama’s children and helped Obama through his spiritual challenges.

Obama is on record as saying that Don Imus should be fired for referring to a women’s basketball team as “nappy-headed hoes,” and has pledged to never again appear on Imus’s show. Obama has also been a member of Wright’s congregation for 20 years.

It is a fact that Obama said his church was not “particularly controversial,” yet after Wright’s words became widely publicized, Obama said that he had heard Wright being a “fierce critic” of U.S. policies. Also factual is Obama’s insistence (during the “big” speech) that he could not disown Wright, yet Obama soon thereafter also said the following: “Had the Reverend (Wright) not retired and had he not acknowledged what he had said had deeply offended people and (was) inappropriate and mischaracterized what I believe is the greatness of this country, for all its flaws, then I wouldn't have felt comfortable staying there at the church.”

Those were the facts. You can make what you will of them. The analysis follows:

Obama said that if Wright hadn’t resigned and acknowledged the inappropriate and offensive nature of his words, he would have left the church. But Wright spent the 20 years of Obama’s church membership repeating similar statements without any acknowledgment of inappropriateness, so why, only now that the point became moot, is Obama saying he would have left the church? Why the inconsistency? Could it . . . Could it be dishonest politics?

And besides, how would leaving the church have been any different from “disowning” Wright, which, in the greatest-speech-since-ever, Obama stressed he could not do?

Wright’s rhetoric about “fighting the wrong enemy” and “White America, the U.S. of KKKA” is the equivalent to a white pastor saying that white infighting is “fighting the wrong enemy” and calling America “Black America, the U.S. of Black Panther USA.” So why does Obama insist he cannot disown Wright, who has made far more recurrent racist statements than Imus’s one-time error of judgment, while insisting that Imus be fired and promising to never appear on Imus’s show?

Obama has spent 20 years being willingly guided by Wright, and fully knowing the nature of Wright’s beliefs and philosophy. Obama also knew that Wright thought it his mission to actively spread his dangerous beliefs to his trusting congregation, and yet Obama contributed to that goal by pouring large amounts of money into the church’s coffers. And now, when the publicity arrived, Obama has come out with a series of excuses that show him as inconsistent, and, unless he clarifies his answers, quite dishonest.

Obama has the opportunity to either express regret for his intimate affiliation with Wright, or to remain loyal to his lifestyle of 20 years. Instead, he is trying to have it both ways, and is only digging deeper.

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