Appalling and inflammatory. And true. (Obama's pastor, Rev. Wright)

[Miss Authoritiva]

Appalling and inflammatory. And true.

By Grace Nearing @ Scriptoids

“Across a broad spectrum of articulate opinion, the fact that the voice of the people is heard in democratic societies is considered a problem to be overcome by ensuring that the public voice speaks the right words.” -- Noam Chomsky

“The broad spectrum of articulate opinion,” which in the United States means, of course, the corporate media and the arbiters of received US history, has unanimously determined that the very public voice of Barack Obama’s pastor, Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr., is not speaking the right words -- but that’s not to say Rev. Wright is not speaking the truth.

So Sen. Obama has been forced into denounce-reject-distance-renounce mode. Future political candidates may see the wisdom in adopting coy agnosticism or shrug-it atheism, but for now presidential-aspirant Obama has had to call some of Wright‘s statements “inflammatory and appalling.” But are the statements wrong?

I haven’t seen or read the entire catalog of Rev. Wright’s “wrong words,” but the statements itemized in this NYT article hardly seem lunatic-fringeworthy. Some of the statements are established facts; some can be reasonably asserted and debated. All have been presented and analyzed in the NYT and elsewhere, including Congress.

For example, Wright is quoted as saying that the United States imports drugs, exports guns, and trains murderers. Only the truly naïve, the willfully uninformed, or the virulently ideological would dispute this.

That the United States is the world’s leading arms dealer has been verified and confirmed by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, an office of the Library of Congress. In 2006, the United States exported nearly $11 billion in weapons to developing countries.

Score one for Rev. Wright.

Since the NYT failed to give any context to Wright’s statements, I’m going to assume that his comment about the United States importing drugs refers to charges that the Reagan-era CIA “facilitated” the US cocaine trade of Nicaraguan Contras as a particularly easy and profitable form of fund-raising….

Article continues here … with Score Two and Score Three for Wright’s claims.

[lligrd]

1. K&R

[Tarheel_Dem]

2. K&R.....

:thumbsup:

[ClayZ]

3. K and R

[jody]

4. The Wright issue and BO's denunciation prove he's a political chameleon willing to do anything for

self-gain.

The Wright denunciation proves BO doesn't have the right stuff.

[tabatha]

5. pfffft

[IndependentDem]

6. that depends

on if he really does agree with Wright... it will be interesting to see if his denunciation creates a backlash from black voters. either way this was definitely not good for obama's GE possibilities. hopefully people will compare the message of Wright to the message of McCain supporters like Hagee, which is worse? i would hope most americans would agree that the trash that Hagee preaches is not something we should be proud of. (or their support)

[Tarheel_Dem]

8. NO backlash from black voters, not even from his own church..

bank on it. Although many of us disagree with the GD line, there's really nothing that Rev. Wright said that wasn't true, and we realize that it was important for Obama to distance himself from that kind of rhetoric.

[IndependentDem]

9. couldn't agree more.

and i think that most dems agree too, thats why i dont think it is going to hurt him in the primary. but i dont think that a good portion of the general public and the cross-over republicans are going to feel the same way.

[Two Americas]

10. yes

I agree with you completely.

There is nothing that Reverend Wright said that is not true, and at the same time, of course Obama needed to distance himself from the rhetoric. That is a statement about the state of race relations in America - and the persistent denial of the truth by many whites - and is not a condemnation of Obama. Far from it.

Most of the posts I see that are arguing the two supposed sides of this issue are both wrong. Many Obama supporters are condemning Reverend Wright's remarks as "hateful" and "racist" but then are saying that this does not represent a danger to Obama in the general. The reverse is true, and the two statements contradict each other. Many Clinton supporters are saying that this "proves" that Obama is hypocritical and possibly "racist." Nonsense.

First, there is no such thing as "reverse racism" so neither Obama nor Wright can be called racist. "Reverse racism" is a manufactured and illogical piece of propaganda created by the extreme reactionary right wing, and the concept of "reverse racism" is itself racist.

Secondly, many whites are oblivious to the fact that Black people need to work harder, perform at a higher level, and make far fewer mistakes to be seen as equally qualified for a task or position as whites are seen by whites. Blacks also cannot be seen as threatening to whites in any way. This is an enormous burden that Obama is carrying. The condemnation of Wright by many of Obama's supporters is telling. They do not have his back on this. That is why Wright's remarks are potentially damaging in the general, and why Obama must distance himself from the rhetoric Reverend Wright used.

Many, perhaps most, whites in modern America are not willing to hear the truth about race and racism in our society. That is the reality, and we can't expect one person, Obama, to single-handedly change that, nor can he ignore that reality. We cannot blame Obama for this situation. How many Obama supporters are saying in essence, that they are not themselves willing to face the truth about race, while at the same time saying that it doesn’t matter, while at the same time denying or ignoring the challenge that the candidate they supposedly support is facing.


on edit - typos

[futureliveshere]

7. I agree

This is the crux of what the whole issue is. Re. Wright may be saying politically incorrect things, but does that make him unpatriotic? He might love this country as much as anyone else, or maybe more which is why he makes these provocative statements. In fact they are provocative only because they fly in the face of established socially acceptable ideas and norms. This is more of the same logic where anyone who disagreed with Bush and his cronies during the height of the fear-mongering were branded 'Unpatriotic Americans in league with the terrorists". Jeez!!!