Wright Is Wrong For Obama

For some unfathomable reason, Barack Obama’s favorite pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, has chosen to hit the airways with a PBS interview with Bill Moyers. To date, Rev. Wright is known for his hateful, anti-American rantings from the pulpit and having married the Obamas and baptized both their children. Almost single-handed, Wright has stopped Obama’s march to the Democratic nomination and The White House.
Why he would choose to surface now defies logic. It can only serve to refocus voters on the fact that Obama seemed not to have a problem embracing a lunatic hiding behind a bible. My guess is Rev. Wright has determined this is the only time anyone in the mainstream would give voice to such a fringe character. The fact that it’s “is he still alive?” Bill Moyers giving him air time only underscores my argument. The Rev. Wright will never pay for a drink again if a Clinton or McCain supporter is in the room.
Now as many of you know, I have believed for a long time Sen. Obama would be the Democratic nominee and I still do. But with the Rev. Wright resurfacing, the road to the nomination and certainly the presidency just got a little longer. Because among the many attributes Sen. Obama brings to the campaign, electability has always been a huge part of it. He provides a stark ethical contrast to the Machiavellian Clinton candidacy and he represents a true break from the grubby politics of the recent past. He’s intelligent, thoughtful and his last name isn’t Bush or Clinton.
A big part of Obama’s appeal, however, is rooted in race or racism depending on your point of view. That appeal simply put has been he is not seen as an angry or threatening black man. I’m not talking about the redneck or latte extremes on race but the vast number of good people in the middle. These are the people who elect Presidents not the haters on the right or the loonies on the left. They won’t be voting for anyone remotely sympathetic to a Rev. Wright or Louis Farrakhan.
Thanks to Rev. Wright’s anti-American diatribes particularly his revolting 9-11 comments, voters are taking a second look at Obama. People are wondering why the Obamas chose to sit through Wright’s venomous preaching and allowed him to play such an intimate role in their lives. That’s a very fair question and to date Obama hasn’t given the American people a credible answer. By not denouncing Wright, Obama leaves the door wide open for the fear mongering tactics of Hillary and Bill Clinton as well as the Republicans down the road.
For some reason the Obama camp keeps thinking the Rev. Wright thing will just fade away. They couldn’t be more wrong. In a race where the American people are being asked to look beyond decades of racial prejudice and stereotypes, Obama can’t be seen as some kind of black Manchurian candidate. Nothing short of a total and very public repudiation of Wright and his views will do.
2008 has already proven to be a year where every vote counts. If even a small percentage of voters believe Obama is a closeted angry black man, he’s going to lose in November.