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post #36
Obama Disavows Pastor’s Remarks
Looks like Barack Obama is kicking his crazy uncle out of the basement.
The Democratic presidential hopeful has compared his longtime pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, to an “old uncle” with whom he doesn’t always agree. But with the controversial preacher’s racially inflammatory remarks and sermons burning up the Internet over the past 24 hours or so, the Obama campaign had to respond with some tough love.
In a posting on Huffington Post, Obama called Wright’s statements “inflammatory and appalling” and said, “Let me say at the outset that I vehemently disagree and strongly condemn the statements that have been the subject of this controversy. I categorically denounce any statement that disparages our great country or serves to divide us from our allies. I also believe that words that degrade individuals have no place in our public dialogue, whether it’s on the campaign stump or in the pulpit. In sum, I reject outright the statements by Rev. Wright that are at issue.”
Among his most controversial statements, Wright said African Americans should sing “God Damn America” instead of “God Bless America.” And he suggested that the Unites States invited the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks with its own “terrorism.”
Wright just retired from Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, where Obama, his wife, Michelle and their two young daughters attend. But Wright’s sermons have been immortalized on the Internet — unfortunately for Obama.
In one, Wright told his congregation the reason why “so many folks are hating on Barack Obama” is because he doesn’t “fit the model: He ain’t white, he ain’t rich and he ain’t privileged.”
“Hillary [Clinton] fits the mold,” Wright said, delivering a fiery tirade on how “Hillary never had a cab whiz past her and not pick her up because her skin was the wrong color,” and how “Hillary never had to worry about being pulled over as a black man driving” and how “Hillary was not a black boy raised in a single parent home.”
He also said Hillary has never been called the “N word.” (Wright used the actual word.)
On Huffington Post, Obama wrote, “The statements that Rev. Wright made that are the cause of this controversy were not statements I personally heard him preach while I sat in the pews of Trinity or heard him utter in private conversation. When these statements first came to my attention, it was at the beginning of my presidential campaign. I made it clear at the time that I strongly condemned his comments. But because Rev. Wright was on the verge of retirement, and because of my strong links to the Trinity faith community, where I married my wife and where my daughters were baptized, I did not think it appropriate to leave the church. “
As you can see in this mocked-up YouTube video, which came from Fox News, Republicans could have a field day using Wright as ammunition in a general election contest against Obama.
Todd Harris, a veteran GOP political strategist, tells us, “There are hundreds of churches in Chicago to choose from but Obama picked the one with a racist preacher who is anti-American and anti-Israel. This guy makes Louis Farrakhan look like Hello Kitty and we’re going to have a field day with this.”
Obama’s “crazy uncle” problem is particularly troublesome for his campaign as he seeks to allay Jewish voters’ concerns about his commitment to Israel and his endorsement from Black Muslim leader Louis Farrakhan.
ABC News reviewed dozens of Rev. Wright’s sermons and found “repeated denunciations of the U.S. based on what he described as his reading of the Gospels and the treatment of black Americans.”
Before the senator commented Friday, the Obama campaign put out a statement saying, “Senator Obama has said repeatedly that personal attacks such as this have no place in this campaign or our politics, whether they’re offered from a platform at a rally or the pulpit of a church. Senator Obama does not think of the pastor of his church in political terms. Like a member of his family, there are things he says with which Senator Obama deeply disagrees.”
By Mary Ann Akers | March 14, 2008; 4:51 PM ET