Just in case anyone was still confused, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright emerged over the last day or so to explain (I think) what I’ve already said about his sermons: He meant what he said the first time.
It seems he was being "descriptive," not "divisive."
Asked whether he thought some of the things he said might be less than "patriotic," he changed the subject — he mentioned his service in the Marine Corps in his youth, and mentioned that Dick Cheney never served. To which I say, "Huh?" To elaborate, thank you for your service, Reverend — I stand in awe of anyone who has been a Marine. But did you mean "God Damn America" or not? Were you being ironic, or stating a wish that was not your own, or was that "descriptive?" And how does that message square with Semper Fidelis?
I should mention that he also explained that if you take exception to his message, you’re a racist. Just so you know.
He also made the same argument that has been made in his behalf by others, that his remarks have been taken out of context — mere "soundbites." I’m still waiting to hear the context that makes "God Damn America" mean something else. Sadly, I’ve not heard it yet.
Poor Obama. With friends like this one…
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Brad: Usually I like your blog, but I’ve got to speak out now, in favor of Reverend Wright. And I do it for ONE REASON:
People need to: (1) Watch the Bill Moyers interview in its entirety, not just the sound bite – and read the transcript in case you missed something; and (2) Watch the keynote address he gave at the National Press Club in its entirety, not just the sound bite – and don’t forget the Q&A at the end.
Rev. Wright has called America’s attention to the fact that we do not DO OUR HOMEWORK!!! Sure, any and everything he said can be misconstrued in a “sound bite”! Sound bites make ANYONE LOOK STUPID, OR MEAN, OR APATHETIC, OR ATAVISTIC – if you aren’t privy to the entire argument, speech, sentiment, etc.
If people actually took the time to say, “Hey, I don’t like what this guy’s saying – where’s the rest of it?” – and we actually went in search of and found the rest of it – the things he said would make more sense! But, this instantaneous, extemporaneous, YouTube type society we live in has A.D.D. – no wants to sit still and actually learn what they need to learn. If you do that, and you still disagree after the fact, then that’s truly your prerogative. Your comments above highly suggest that you have not read/reviewed/listened to all of the information. If I am incorrect in that assumption, please clarify.
(Had you watched the NPC Q&A, you will note that he quoted scripture, briefly explained the etymology of the word “damn” and referenced – as any person who knows the Bible SHOULD – the fact that God did not and DOES NOT bless everything and everyone all the time, because all is not good and perfect and worthy of blessings all the time. You cannot in good conscience send evil out into the world and not expect it to come back to you.)
Dang! I’m tired of having to do everyone else’s job and not get paid for it! I could use the gas/food/rent money!!!
Brad I agree with you ,what else could it mean taking the lords name in vane.Remember Ward Churchill,they almost got a rope for his comments.I submit this goes on in a lot of black churches through out America.
dnd, I made the same point about his use of “damn”. McCain seeks the support of Hagee, a preacher who claimed that the devastation wrought on the Gulf area, including 1800 deaths, was God’s wrath (damnation).
Brad, you heard the context but you are staying the course with your preconceived narrative. In the same sermon he speaks of God’s blessings and curses. He speaks of an unchanging God but a government that does.
BTW, he served his country while his country considered him a second class citizen. Despite this and as a Christian, I don’t agree with how he is preaching the message. I do agree God is certainly unhappy with much of what our government has done.
I’m not defending Wright, I’m trying to mitigate the demagoguery that pushes aside deeper analysis.
Wright comes in loud and clear”
* “black culture is not inferior to Western Europe – just different”. Yes, it may have some good things, but it is not superior. It is an early iron age culture, 2,000 years behind Europe.
* “5 to ten generations more” of reparations to blacks… and not just from the sons of the Confederacy, not just all whites, but all Asians and Latinos, too.
* “I didn’t say that 911 was chickens coming home to roost. I was quoting the Iraqi ambassador.” Enough said.
* “America supplied biological weapons to Iraq.” Flat out lie. Then the hater repeated his accusation that AIDS was genetically engineered by white scientists to kill blacks.
No, it was the abortion industry which was engineered by white Progressives to contain the black and Asian populations. AIDS is a venereal disease, originating in Africa and spread by grossly immoral sex practices.
DND WROTE:
“Sound bites make ANYONE LOOK STUPID, OR MEAN, OR APATHETIC, OR ATAVISTIC – if you aren’t privy to the entire argument, speech, sentiment, etc.”
Did you see the “soundbite” of the L.A. police beating of Rodney King? …or did you see the entire 7 minute video of a doped-up maniac hitting, spitting, and cursing everyone in sight for most of those 7 minutes? (that would have been Mr. King)
It’s the exact same logic but this time but racially reversed. The same standard of judgement should be applied to both cases.
Hey Brad, remember what I said a few blog entries ago about Hillary trying to stretch the last two minutes of the game as long as possible?
The Rev’s latest comments are putting Obama on the line again for some more free throws. Some kind of definitive, very strong repudiation, will represent making the free throws and clinching the game. Not doing so, or offering something tepid and cautious? Clank. Brick.
Here’s my conspiracy theory: Jeremiah has been having some friendly chats with Bill Clinton lately.
Just in case anyone was still confused, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright emerged over the last day or so to explain (I think) what I’ve already said about his sermons: He meant what he said the first time.
-Brad
So? Last time I checked he’s not running for any elective office. This story shows just how empty and irrelevant the press has become. No wonder newpaper circulation and network TV ratings are down. With non-stories like this continuing to dominate the media’s attention everyone has to turn elsewhere for information.
You judge a man by the company he keeps.
Bill Clinton is judged by the sleazy associates and scandals which defined his career.
Jeremiah Wright is only one of the many radicals, socialists, and anti-Americans which are close friends of Barry Obama.
Terrorists like Bernadine Dorn, Bill Ayers, Angela Davis and the French Communists on his campaign staff all indicate Obama’s bitterness, his twisted view of America, and his lack of judgement and character.
Obama is toast, done in by his own hand and those of his pastor.
Victor Davis Hanson make this salient point:
Hanson links to a column by WaPo’s Dana Milbank who cites Wright’s National Press Club appearance as the beginning of the end of Obama’s downfall.
Whether he believes what he says or cynically spouts that craziness as a means to earn a living, Wright is the medium of a hateful, offensive message and Obama will now be hard pressed to separate himself from his former pastor.
Having read Brad and the posts, and listened to Rev. Wright clucking to his chickens, I can say that somebody is after your money.
When you have the spotlight like the Rev. Wright, you use it to your advantage and make millions (example those babes in toyland).
I have not heard “a sermon” by Rev. Wright. All I heard was how the blacks have been done so wrong by the government and the whites. If that is church material and preaching the bible, I am lost in the wilderness.
This is about name and face recognition and using the subject of race to make money.
I believe that Slugger has it right. The Rev. Wright is just another in the same vein as Jesse Jacksnon and Al Sharpton that are making money by race baiting.
I do believe that Obama is foolish to allow his loyality to Wright to destroy his campaign. I can understand this because there have been scoundrels in my own life that I have been forced to part ways with even though they possessed some traits that I liked.
If Obama were smart he would deliver one of his famous speeches severing ties with the Rev. Wright. It could be delivered with Bill Clinton like ” I feel your pain ” emotional pleas. A tear or two wouldn’t hurt. This will sew up the democratic race for him. It works just ask Hillary.
Are we shocked by the Rev. Wright’s inflammatory words because they are truly radical or because politics and the pulpit seem so unrelated that any mixing of the two seems alien?
My southern tradition – the Southern, historically white-dominated Presbyterian Church – benefited from slavery and so developed a system that separated spiritual from political, attempting to blind itself from the evil of slavery rather than engaging it, as though Jesus came only to make us feel better about our condition and not free us from the bonds of injustice that enslave us.
This segregation of spiritual and political has become second nature. Easter Sunday, many ministers chose to preach about Jesus rather than Sen. Obama, about the Resurrection and not politics, as though these issues were not interrelated.
But will ignoring the relationship between our faith and our government free us from injustice?
Will ignoring problems of race make racism go away?
Will ignoring economic injustice bring equality?
Will talking about Jesus as though He just wants a personal relationship truly honor His revolutionary gospel?
I know one thing: the Romans and Sanhedrin didn’t want Him dead because He just wanted people to feel good.
Jesus calls us to bear each other’s burdens, listening to each other’s anger and sorrow, finding solutions as one nation under GOD.
Rev. Joe Evans
Good Shepherd Presbyterian Church
On the contrary Brad, rather than failing to clarify, Wright has made his positions even more abundantly clear to me.
And I think the quote from Hanson that Mike Cakora cites is dead on: Obamas’ “contextualizing” of Wright means nothing more or less than that Obama at least tacitly agrees with Wright. In this case, any equivocation translates directly to (at least passive) assent.
Obama is toast. That is good news, because he is NOT suitable presidential material for a host of reasons, even apart from his support for Wrights’ positions. Beyond that good news however, is even further good news: He doesn’t realize he’s toast, and so will continue to mud-wrestle with Clinton, Howard Deans’ plaintive cries notwithstanding.
The bad news is, this democrat trainwreck helps McCain, and may just get him elected. McCain is democrat light, and not the best hope for this country. Better than the other two to be sure, but not the best. David
The LSC is now at 8.
For the Rev. Wright, it would seem to be all about him, despite his being a pastor.
Finally a black man has a chance to be president, but another black man is doing everything he can to get in the way.
Why doesn’t he have the sense to just go home and shut up?
Or must he make what he can of this opportunity now that he has finally misspoken his way into the limelight?
“The Communists intend to use Obama as a sleeper agent and, using Rev.
Wright to compel him to follow his orders. Obama is controlled by none other
than his own domineering preacher, who is working with the Communists in a
plot to overthrow the government”.
The plot is from The Manchurian Candidate only the names have been changed.
Only the Shadow knows for sure?
Pastor Evans –
With all due respect, I am shocked at much of what Rev. Wright says because it is gibberish, irrational, and hateful.
Mike-
With all due respect, instead of being shocked and angry…say a prayer for the man. God is still in control!
Well folks.
Obama just delivered his cover your @ss speech. He stumbled and studdered until he finally got the words out of his mouth to distance himself.
Do we believe all his “do not agree with Rev. Wright” remarks? Too little. Too late. Horse already left the gate. Should have opened this door before he decided to run.
Rev. Wright showed himself to be a real nut case and Obama had to cut the apron strings if he wanted to win the presidency.
Okay, bud, I’ll bite: What’s “LSC?”
Obamas’ transparent attempt to do damage control today did not work, and his presidential campaign is rightfully toast. He was never qualified to be president anyway, and mercifully he has been shown to be incompetent, ill-equipped and basically unable to deal with the rigors of a simple primary race. Wonder what sort of disaster he’d have been as president? Thankfully, we’ll not find out.
Husseins Obamas’ hubris (he really believes his own press) will inevitably lead him to continue his fight against Mz. Clinton, however. This is the part of him I love. His huge ego (so typical of these liberal messiah figures, and fed by the adulation of swooning kooks and black sycophants) is going to make for an interesting summer and keep hope alive for what would have otherwise been a no-chance campaign by RINO McCain.
My fondest hope is that Jeremiah Wright doesn’t just slink away after having been thrown in front of the train by Hussein. Oh how I hope that Wright gets even more vociferous and maybe even resentful of Obama, so that these two stay in an ugly and destructive Kabuki dance right through until Obama finally is forced to call it quits. Dr. F
Mr. Warthen, LSC is a term bud came up with which stands for “Lee’s Socialist Count” and is a running tally of the number of times he uses the word Socialist to describe Democrats or Liberals or any other left-leaning institution.
So now Sen. McCain is saying just a few minutes ago that every American deserves healthcare. How about all those that are illegal that already now go to the emergency rooms and get free care and all the babies born (free) in our hospitals and they automatically become citizens.
Is Sen. McCain now going to open his liberal doors to try to out promise the democrats?
It is a never ending story of politicians. Tell those stupid votes what they want to hear even when it is not financially feasible. Do we not care about the future of our children and our grandchildren?
You can pick on Lee if you want to but it would behoove you to listen.
One question for everyone? Why are we trying to mix church and state? End of Message!
Jenny, are you happy living like that? Pretty sad, I’d say.
Apart from making a completely silly and meaningless comment, congratulations! You’ve qualified and identified yourself as a moron who is unworthy to participate here.
Hope that tremendous intellect and tremendous vocabulary work out for ya! Dr.F
“jenny’s” comment is gone, and she’s banned now.
Ditto with "Jim Rockford," who also just lost his "winging-it" privileges…
Slugger: So you’re saying we should let human beings who can’t afford health care just die on the street corners?!?!?
And, as far as McCain being “liberal” — I didn’t realize you were trying to be a comedian. (That has to be it given his life time conservative ratings.)
Just, on another string, you accuse me of resorting to hyperbole when speaking the truth about Obama. What I used was not hyperbole, it was fact that you didn’t happen to like.
Now, if you want an example of hyperbole, I would point out the huge whopper you just attempted to get away with. Sluggers’ comments can in no way be construed the way you tried to present them. And your use of over-the-top, irrational lies to make your erroneous point would be…YES boys and girls! HYPERBOLE! And ridiculous hyperbole at that! Bonus score!
By the way, we don’t have national health care now, and haven’t ever had it. Upon which street corners have you observed dead bodies? Answer? No street corner. People aren’t dying in the streets and you know it.
By the way, we can’t afford nationally to pay for the social security, prescription drugs and other programs we’ve promised right now. Have you applied your obviously huge intellect to that little problem yet? I’d like to know how you think McCain, or Obama or Clinton would pay for national healthcare when we’re presently going broke. But hey…that’s just me. Dr F
Obama’s proposal for healthcare is an income surtax of “between 5 and 10%” on all Americans ( only 16% of whom actually pay any income taxes).
Hillary’s proposal is to mandate that everyone buy a private health insurance policy. She would hand out $2,500 to every family, then pay for it by taxing medical treatments of those with “high incomes” ($50,000) and by mandating lower wages for doctors and nurses.
If that’s not socialist, what is it? It’s not American.
One thing’s for sure: Obama and Hillary are as ignorant of basic economics and morality as the rabble who cheer them on.