Pajamas Media: Can Obama Overcome the 'Wright Stuff?'

March 24, 2008 1:30 AM

Barack Obama never wanted to run for president as “the black candidate.” But now, he doesn’t have a choice, writes Bill Bradley.

“I charge the the white man.” This incendiary speech, opening the film Malcolm X and culminating with a burning American flag resolving into the letter, encapsulates the anger and fear surrounding Barack Obama’s association with Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

By Bill Bradley

The racial politics swirling around Barack Obama will undoubtedly dominate the week ahead in presidential politics. In fact, they may well dominate much of the next seven-odd months. It is not only about race, either. The questions yet unanswered by his speech last Tuesday in Philadelphia are at least as much about patriotism.

John McCain, returned from his tour of the Middle East and Europe, is in California for three days this week to raise badly needed funds and to stake a longshot claim to the Golden State in the general election. On Wednesday morning at the Bonanventure Hotel in Los Angeles, he delivers a major address on national security and geopolitical matters, addressing what he learned in Iraq and the other nations he toured last week.

Notwithstanding the firestorm of controversy over the past comments of his former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, and some consequent teetering in the polls, Obama had a good week last week. For one thing, it became apparent that he had far more cash on hand at the end of February than rival Hillary Clinton, not to mention John McCain, whose best month of fundraising doesn’t match Obama’s best week.
Obama’s fundraising machine, centered on the Internet, has been humming along the whole time.

In addition, Hillary’s fading hopes for the nomination took a major hit when it became apparent that there would be no do-over primaries in Florida or Michigan, two states which she had previously claimed victory notwithstanding the fact that she’d earlier agreed with the Democratic Party’s decision not to recognize their rogue primaries in which no one campaigned. The hurdles to hastily organized primaries at the tail end of the season in June were simply too high, and Clinton forces would have had to block independents who participated in the real Republican primary — largely on behalf of McCain — from voting in a real Democratic primary.

By week’s end, it was apparent that Clinton almost certainly could not catch Obama in delegates won in the primaries and caucuses or in the popular vote. The media counts, incidentally, which have Obama over 700,000 votes ahead of Clinton, do not include, oddly, votes cast in the caucuses. Most of those caucuses have had record turnouts, making them easily the equivalent of smaller primary elections. Include them in the popular vote, as they should be, and Obama’s lead is well over a million votes.

And now the bad news. Obama got a good start on addressing his Jeremiah Wright last week. But only a start.

As I wrote in real time as the Jeremiah Wright firestorm broke 10 days ago, it was a clearly survivable situation. When Obama gave his speech on race in America and the Jeremiah Wright controversy six days ago, he solved much of his problem with regard to the Democratic nomination fight.

Polls show that his speech worked, especially with Democratic voters, and largely with independent voters.

An even more recent poll for CBS News showed, as does the Rasmussen poll, that most Americans think highly of Obama’s speech. http://www.cbsnews.com/htdocs/pdf/MARB-ObamaCallback.pdf

Nevertheless, Barack Obama’s path to the White House has certainly gotten longer and more perilous.

Obama is unlikely to become president unless he can explain Malcolm X (Wright’s most outrageous statements are a stand-in for what he represented), the anger that produced him, and the preposterous statements that not infrequently emanate from the leadership of his church and other black churches.

He can’t simply float along as the easy post-racial figure, a man Americans can vote for as a salve for the issue of race in America.

This may have been inevitable. And it certainly became inevitable when he decided not to be a Hawaiian, or a nice Ivy League lawyer, but a black Chicago politician.

Obama made a choice. He was born and in large measure raised in Hawaii, America’s polyglot paradise in the Pacific, a place where questions of racial background can become so complex as to be irrelevant. But after a glittering Ivy League debut, he decided to enter politics, not as a multi-racial, post-racial figure in Hawaii or California — where he spent two years attending Occidental College — but in a 76% black state senate district in Chicago.

Why he decided to embrace his blackness as a very young man may be a matter more for the psychologically inclined than the politically inclined. In any event, it is what he did.

As a man who was neither a movie star nor super-rich, Obama needed a base for his rise. As he is a politician and not a deity, he is by nature an opportunist. (All politicians are opportunists. The question is the degree of egregiousness.) A big part of his opportunity was being a member of what is arguably the leading black church in Chicago.

For a man with a missing father, Trinity United Church of Christ and the Rev. Wright played a key role in Obama’s life. Mothered by a white woman and raised in large measure by white grandparents, Obama sought what he did not have in his life as a biracial boy. A black family. The black church in Chicago became a stand-in for that. And Wright, a complex man who, by most accounts, has done some serious good in Chicago to balance his now well-publicized ranting, became in Obama’s own recent words, an “uncle.”

The church also answered the formerly frequently posed question about Obama. Is he “black enough?”

But as a result of this embrace — and Obama notably refused to disown Wright even as he renounced his now infamous comments — Obama still has serious questions to answer.

He has to explain to America — and in particular, to key voting groups such as the Scot-Irish who make up much of the working class and patriotically-oriented in the country — the anger that produced such irrational notions as the US government inventing AIDS to destroy the black people, or the idea that the US may have deserved 9/11. And why men such as Wright, whose generation grew up with a frequently rugged racism directed toward them and developed within them, have a chip on their shoulder today.

This task certainly not what Obama wanted to take on when he launched his candidacy on a wave of high-flown, impressively-delivered rhetoric, floating over the historic divisions of America on a cloud of post-racialism.

But it is what he must do now. He didn’t intend to run as “the black candidate” but as a candidate who happened to be black. But being black, or at least, “black enough,” as it turns out, was at least in part a choice for Obama. And as a result of that choice, he rose in Chicago enough to become a United States senator. And as a result of being a senator, he has enough stature to wage this campaign.

As a result, this conversation about race will continue throughout the campaign, together with a conversation about patriotism. “God damn America” is not a concept that goes down well with most voters.

This may be even more of an imperative for Obama than the racial issue, though the two are joined.

What is his idea of America? How is he an American patriot in a time of war?

What can he do to convince the Scots-Irish American voter that he is enough of a patriot to take on the uber-patriot, John McCain, a man who does not have to wave the flag because his very presence waves the flag?

In many respects, Obama represents an emerging America: multi-racial, with an internationalist perspective. But he will not represent any America, at least as president, until he demonstrates that he represents the enduring America.

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Comments (16)

A. N. Pierson :

The roots of Obama's problem were revealed in his vaunted speech. The moral equivalence between Wright's public racist sputum and Obama's own grandmother's private words was outrageous (and a despicable treatment of his own grandmother - what a horrible man he must be) and will come back to haunt the candidate until November. Obama is over.

Mar 24, 2008 07:21 AM

jb :

I blame the media for running sound bites which distort Wright's message. I agree with Dan Rather that TV news is all about ratings.
It would have much more ethical if they had presented an extended version of Wright's message in order to really inform the public. Last night CNN Weekend FINALLY played an expanded version of the speech which made perfectly good sense. Maybe we have been punk'ed by the media.

Mar 24, 2008 08:04 AM

vwcat :

The media has been itching to put Obama in the 'black candidate' box since S. Carolina. They are obsessed with it.
With the Wright story, which by all sense, would have been at most a 2 day story if not for the media's obsession over Obama's race.
Instead, to this day, they are still obsessing over it. They never talk about Obama, the person. It's all about Obama the AA.
Most people would have moved on and forgotten about it except in an effort to keep the race going and the drama hyped, they have boxed Obama in and keep the thing going continuously for almost 2 weeks now.

Mar 24, 2008 08:41 AM

Rhonda :

He absolutely can and will. Why should Obama be held to a different standard than the one we hold all of the other candidates to? Have you sought out all the remarks made by John Hagee who endorsed McCain? McCain has said he is a friend of his and he values his support, though he does not agree with his anti-semetic, etc. comments. Why is it that Obama is held responsible for someone else's comments and not the rest of the candidates? If Cindy McCain were addicted to drugs in the past, would that be John McCain's fault because he's her husband and thereby guilty by association? If Hillary Clinton's husband had an affair, does that make her an adulterer? Again, guilt by association? That's ridiculous. The people who are blowing this out of proportion are hoping that others will focus on this and not the issues because nobody left in this race can beat Obama in a head to head matchup focused on the issues. He's a brilliant Harvard graduate who deserves our support, no matter what race he is.

Mar 24, 2008 08:59 AM

Rhonda :

Yes, John McCain is doing a great job trying to appear presidential. The only problem is that he doesn't have his facts straight. In a general election, he will not hold up well in a debate with Barack Obama. Trust me, when people hear how eloquent this man is and the future plans that he has for this country, they will discover that all of this race bating has been just that. There's no real outrage here, unless people are just being hypocritical. If you have sat quietly by and someone made a racist remark and didn't immediately denounce and reject them, you are being hypocritical about this. Racist comments are never appropriate, no matter who makes them or in what setting. If you have listened, and not responded, you are guilty. Don't try and hold Obama to a higher standard than the one to which you hold yourself.

Mar 24, 2008 09:04 AM

Dark Helmet :

Why is it that a man who is as much one as the other allowed to run as only the half that he chooses?

obama is no more black than he is white.

The rev wrights remarks are just plain old racism. So what. This country was founded on racism. It is a painful pimple on the face of all America that has to be dealt with by each and every person.

The only thing that is more alarming to me than wrights calling for the damning of this great nation, is the lack of concern that he attacks America, as though somehow this was less evil than hating white people.

Let me take you back to Sept 11, 2001. There were no blacks or whites, remember? Only Americans. So I ask you, each of you, what is more important here?

An angry old black man still ticked off about wrongs of past or a community leader who currently and actively hates this nation?

We can get past being racist, we always have.

But without the unity of one country, we are done.

Think about it.

Mar 24, 2008 09:33 AM

Marc :

Comparing a wife and a pastor is illogical. A pastor, in most cases, espouses philosophical and spiritual advice on a weekly and private basis. One can listen to this advice, and incorporate it into their lives or not. This relationship is based upon what the pastor can offer; guidance, advice, direction. This is a matter of choice. No one put a gun to Obama's head and said, you need to follow this message. He did so willingly. He neither took no oath before God and his family to be married to this pastor for the rest of his life either. Standing by your wife and standing by your pastor are two separate things. Furthermore, to choose the message that this pastor is preaching to be the cornerstone of what your children will believe in is egregious. I don't care what context the man was using "God Damn America" in, I think it is tantamount to burning the flag. Who knows what he said in private, or on Sunday's without video. Obama prescribed to this ideology, for twenty years. It is simply unacceptable. No amount of white guilt will delude me into believing this man, and especially not to trust him to hold the highest office in the land.

Mar 24, 2008 09:53 AM

mishu :

Wow, the replies to this post are quite nostalgic. I haven't seen this type of a reaction since PJ media posted about Ron Paul's newsletters. I guess, to Rhonda, that situation wouldn't be equivalent.

Mar 24, 2008 10:14 AM

liamascorcaigh :

We took Obama at his own evaluation but now of course we all know better. We have, after all, attended Jeremiah Wright's seminar: "Far Left Anti-Americanism - The Tell-Tale Symptoms". The vanishing lapel pin, the wife's grudging remarks, the crotch cradling salute to the Flag all now make sense because we don't now feel the need to explain them away. They fit into a pattern so saddening, so dismaying, so outrageously at odds with the image Obama sought to foist on us that it will take some time for the American people to come to grips with this gut-wrenching truth:

The only thing that Barack Obama likes about the America we love is the Presidency.

For further extensive analysis go to
[chrismatthewsotherleg.blogspot.c...]

Mar 24, 2008 10:28 AM

liamascorcaigh :

The only thing that Barack Obama likes about the America we love is the Presidency.

For further extensive analysis go to
[chrismatthewsotherleg.blogspot.c...]

Mar 24, 2008 10:29 AM

John the Dennis Miller Libertarian :

Rhonda said: Don't try and hold Obama to a higher standard than the one to which you hold yourself.

You bet I will. He wants to be my president? I'll hold him to any standard I choose.

Mar 24, 2008 12:17 PM

Ed Wallis :

The man who claims to be a "uniter" vaunted:

Victimology-as-Virtue
You-Owe-Us pandering

in his speech. It was insulting and arrogant, in particular to American whites:

His "typical white person" radio remark makes him an unacceptable candidate for any white person who has a scintilla of self-respect, as well as for any voter who abhors racial - even loosely suggested - slurs (SEE: macaca).

The man who claims to be the "post-racial" candidate vaunted the hypothesis:

Whites-Are-Born-Into-The-Sin-Of-Slavery

and suggested that the only way to buy "racial indulgences" (from Pope NObama I ?!) was to fund ever more trillions into programs for blacks only.

By the way, you forgot to mention that, in the process, he said our Constitution is stained.

That doesn't sit well with me - metaphorically or otherwise.

Mar 24, 2008 01:22 PM

Cato :

Putting aside the rethorical speeches of Obama, fit only to excite old lesbians, one wonders why this guy wants to be president. I find no better explanation than he is willing to get to Oval Office to enjoy some marijuana sitting at the presidential table.

Mar 24, 2008 01:59 PM

Patricia :

Wright was not raised in poverty in some ghetto. He comes from an upper class family. His father was a Baptist preacher. Someone in the congregation said that the congregants generally considered Jeremiah, Jr. to be a juvenile delinquent. I consider him to be a racist.

Mar 24, 2008 02:22 PM

Ed Wallis :

Rhonda, I only just now read both of your posts. It seems you want to "equate" (some call it "moral relativism") the Wright-Obama relationship with some McCain-Hagee or you-and-someone-making-a-racist-remark.

Point 1. Ask yourself if McCain has written a book, dedicated to Hagee, using part of a sermon of his as the title.
Ask yourself if McCain calls Hagee his "mentor."
Ask yourself if McCain consults Hagee on each important piece of legislation before voting.
Ask yourself if McCain brought his child to hear year after year of racist, anti-American hate speech.
Ask yourself if McCain had his child baptized by Hagee.
Ask yourself if McCain let Hagee marry him and his wife.
Ask yourself if McCain attended Hagee's church for 20 years, claiming in his own autobiography, "to gain street cred."
You're wrong, Rhonda.

Point 2. Wrong again, Rhonda. On your "if-you-hear-anyone-making a racist-remark" accusation, "John the DML" speaks well when he mentions that NObama is running for the presidency.

Obama makes no excuses and has earned no excuse or pardon from this voter.

Mar 24, 2008 02:51 PM

Ed Wallis :

JB + VWCAT: It certainly might be interesting to hear more of Reverend Wright. I think, however, both of you may be disappointed.

In such a case, the newly released vile anti-American and racist statements by Wright will be packed in amongst other rhetoric...but: packing filth such as "U.S. of KKK-A!" or "God DAMN America!" does not make it any less repulsive or less worthy of utter rejection.

"Oh, how EVIL are those who use this association to hurt Obama!" you both claim. Crocodile tears, m'dears: NObama freely chose his bigotted "partner" in spirit for 20 years, he can very well live with the consequences of his choice.

After all, he is running for the Presidency, a position in which the incumbent will be making profoundly significant decisions. This charlatan is not my choice.

Mar 24, 2008 03:15 PM