Posted on 03/19/2008 9:22:16 AM PDT by seanmerc
Will the Gospel According to Jeremiah Wright sink the Obama candidacy? Not very likely.
Let's start with two basic facts:
1. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., has already won the Democratic nomination. It's over. Regardless of how the remaining primaries and caucuses go, including Michigan and even Florida, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) can never catch Obama in elected delegates.
His current lead of 170 pledged delegates will not be overcome no matter what happens. Even if Clinton beats him by 10 points in each of these primaries, he will still lead among elected delegates by over 100. The superdelegates will not override the will of the voters unless Obama is in jail. They will not let themselves in for a civil war by overruling a black man who is beloved by the young by going over the heads of the electorate and naming the candidate that lost the primaries as the nominee.
Regardless of how damaged Obama may be by the Wright tapes, it will not provide sufficient cover or cause for them to do so.
2. Wright's rantings are not reflective of Obama's views on anything. Why did he stay in the church? Because he's a black Chicago politician who comes from a mixed marriage and went to Columbia and Harvard. Suspected of not being black enough or sufficiently tied to the minority community, he needed the networking opportunities Wright afforded him in his church to get elected. If he had not risen to the top of Chicago black politics, we would never have heard of him. But obviously, he can't say that. So what should he say?
He needs to get out of this mess with subtlety, the kind Bill Clinton should have used to escape the Monica Lewinsky scandal — but didn't. As the controversy continues, Americans will gradually realize that Obama stuck by Wright as part of a need to get ahead. They will chalk up to pragmatism why he was so close to such a preacher. As they come to realize that Obama doesn't agree with Wright but used him to get started, they will be more forgiving.
While he lets this fact sink in, he needs to continue to distance himself from Wright by characterizing that kind of anger and animosity as a thing of a generation past. He needs to compare the progress of which whites are proud in discarding the racism of our forebears with his own pride at being a post-racial candidate. He needs, again and again, to reject what Wright says and emphasize his belief in America and the validity and morality of the American Dream.
As the controversy matures, he can increasingly depict those who fan its flames as trying to live in the past and re-fight the civil wars of race that have divided America.
All these themes were evident and articulately presented in Obama's Tuesday speech on race.
What Obama needs not to do is to resort to the kind of Clintonian fudging that animated his interview with Keith Olbermann. By saying “I wasn't there” and “I didn't know” and “I didn't hear him say it,” he will invite contempt and derision. If he were to continue in that vein, he would buy himself a controversy akin to that which drowned John Kerry in the facts and allegations of his service in Vietnam. People will surface to say, “I sat next to him, and Wright said such and such,” and Obama will be hostage to everybody's subjective memory.
But if he handles the situation with subtlety and lets what he cannot say — that it was opportunism that led him to stay in that church — sink in among the electorate, he can and will survive this battle.
And let's remember one other thing: The Democrats will increasingly realize that he will be their nominee and, in continuing this battle, they are eating their own.
Actually, we should all be thanking “Rev.” Wright. After all, it was he who finally got the media, and even some of Obama’s disciples to start asking serious questions about their messiah. Obama’s true colors (no pun intended) are now in the sunshine. Morris is very wrong if he thinks this side of Obama will go away.
Next week , Morris will be saying the opposite.
It’s pretty amazing that the guy can make such a lucrative living by just changing his mind all the time.
Obama has serious deficiencies, among them
*involvement with Rev. Wright - no, I did not think his speech yesterday was a home run
*lack of experience
*wimp image - he even feared to appear on Fox's debate
*supporting drivers licenses and other perks for illegal aliens and voting against the Cornyn amendment
What he has going for him are his opponents - Hillary and McCain are no improvement as to amnesty, experience, or ability to fight WOT. In a number of trivial matters they appear worse than he.
*He looks more presidential.
*He speaks better and lies less.
*He appears normal, is not known for hysterical fits, and is more likable. He does not make manic faces like Hillary or acts weird like McCain.
*Being relatively new to politics, he has fewer scandals and is not as controlled by special interests.
*He apparently has lead a normal family life.
*His wife might be angry but still she leaves a more dignified impression that sleazy Bill or Cindy.
Those young boys in the choir are just crackin’ up! :]
1 day, 2 days tops. That’s my prediction.
Fortunately, to the best of my knowledge, Dick Morris has never been right about ANYTHING even once. He’s managed to violate the broken clock rule. So, this may yet drag on a while.
“People who want to forget it will, those that don’t, won’t.”
Exactly.
On the one hand you have Obama who comes across as reasonable, intelligent and calm.
On the other you have Hannity, Savage and others yelling and pounding the table...
In the long run, trying to keep this issue going will backfire.
BS, Dick. Wright's (racist) church is far from the only place in town where Obama could've networked.
And I also don't agree that Obama has the nomination in the bag. ...but I'll concede that Hillary has quite an uphill battle ahead of her.
One thing is certain: If Hillary loses the nomination she'll be pulling for a McCain victory in Nov, because if Obama wins the WH her chances of ever sitting in the Oval Office in her lifetime are done -- Obama would be running as the incumbent Rat in '12, and if he somehow won re-election the chance of a Democrat winning in '16 after 8 years of Obama is nil. By that time she'd be too old.
So her only shot at the WH if she loses this time around is for McCain to win in '08 and her to challenge him in '12.
Yup.
Obama is a Muslims. Muslims hate America so that’s why he believes the same things Wright does.
Obama = Farahkan who is another Muslim.
Takiya is a teaching in Islam that tells Muslims to hide their religion form non-Muslims and to lie to non-Muslims.
I think e-mails with links to Wrights sermons on Youtube will keep this alive.
“The superdelegates will not override the will of the voters unless Obama is in jail.”
Not so fast, Dick.
One of the Clintons’ modus operandi is the use of blackmail. They use it very effectively.
As we speak, I have no doubt they are looking into every corner of these superdelegates lives and will blackmail them into voting for Hillary.
I've talked to a lot of "moderate" democrats, not political junkies by any means, and they all have the same general take on it.
"If that was a white guy up there talking about black people like that I'd be out of there in a minute flat".
This really resonates with them.
I don’t think they will be able to keep it up too much longer. You’re right, out of all the people involved, Obama is the only one that isn’t worked up to a froth over this...just adds more credence to my tagline.
The “true believers” in BHO loved his speach and will follow him anywhere, regardless of what he says or does. The main problem that RacistRev gives Obama is the large number of blue-collar dhims that were uncomfortable with him but couldn’t bring themselves to vote against him in Nov (white guilt, etc). Now that Obama’s closeness with this black separatist is exposed, these blue-collar dhims have a reason to either sit home or vote McCain. The dhims need every single vote that they can get (and resurrect from the dead). This issue will cost Obama the election like none other.
Lil Dick at it again. He misses the point. Obama has the dem nomination sewn, surely that is true. But the issue is whether this will harm Obama in the general election and there is no doubt it will. Obama is no longer a plain vanilla candidate who rises above race. He is now the face of the race industry.
I’ll bet it dont, cause hillary wont let it. This particular one might, but you can bet your last dollar that hillary has more, and will see that they get out if no one else does. Why didnt she quit when she got TROUNCED on super tuesday? She KNEW this was comiong. It aint over and wont be till she gets the nomination.
My gut tells me Morris is dead wrong on this point. To the entrenched Democrat graybeards, O'bama represents the destruction of the Democrat Party - the end of their reign of manipulation over the disparate groups that make up the Party.
They won't allow Obama to do that!
The big flap may slow down. The outcome is forever stuck in the minds of voters.
My husband has a liberal, union worker brother. He says he won’t vote for the old bag or the hateful black guy.
He also says he will not vote for McCain. So, this means he is not going to vote.
What does that tell us?
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