Obama Undone

Obama's stuttering, stumbling, rambling today in a series of "ahhhhs.....uuuuhhhs....ya knows.....sooo..." was an extraordinary event - a news conference that looked and felt like a campaign meltdown.

Obama's bumbling of the whole Wright affair and his shifts and turns on this and other matters demonstrate his poor judgment, stubborness and immaturity.

Wright's words and actions have never changed. Not yesterday. Not last year. Not five years ago. Wright has always believed these things; he's always believed in "liberation theology."

So, why has Obama changed his mind about Wright now? Why does he choose to step away now?

Because this is threatening Obama's suddenly shaky campaign, that's why - because Obama finally - finally - realized that Wright is not a political asset.

Though, incredibly, Obama said today he has still not severed ties to Wright's church and Obama never flat out said today" "I was wrong. I was wrong about Rev. Wright. I'm sorry."

This could be it for Obama.

Now, it just may be time to wave "Goodbye!"

More Words From Wright

Today in remarks at the National Press Club in Washington Rev. Jeremiah Wright called Louis Farrakhan "one of the most important voices of the 20th or 21st centuries" and said of Farrakhan: "He is not my enemy." He noted that Farrakhan had called "Zionism - Zionism, not Judaism - a gutter religion 20 years ago" and Wright refused to disassociate himself from those remarks.
The Associated Press has already describe Wright's appearance as "defiant" and noted that Wright said he's told Obama that if he is elected in November and is inaugurated in January, "I'm coming after you." He said that's because his differences are not with the American people, but U.S. policies.
Wright also refused to take back any of the words of his controversial sermons saying "there is no excuse" for the things that the American government has done and declaring that the government of this country "grinds under people" [grinds people under]. Regarding 9/11, he repeated that "if you engage in terrorism you will have terrorism committed against you."
He said America's leaders must "apologize for racism and slavery" and "until that apology comes" he doesn't feel a need to apologize for anything he's said about America.
Of Obama, he said: "He speaks as a politician and does what a politician does and I speak as a pastor and do what a pastor does. . . He did not denounce me. He distanced himself from some of my remarks, like you, having never heard the complete sermon. He had to distance himself - because he's a politician - from what the media was saying I said . . . He [Obama] said I 'didn't offer any words of hope.' How would he know? he never heard the rest of the sermon."
He revealed that just before Obama made his formal announcement of his presidential candidacy last year at the Illinois Statehouse, he [Wright] prayed with the Obamas and their children "downstairs."
He compared America's "troops stationed all over the world" to the age of Roman "imperialism" and talked about "ages of oppression" adding: "Yes, I can compare that because we have troops stationed all over the world. We run the world."
He said that he did not speak up in the immediate aftermath of the controversy surrounding his remarks because he was trying to follow "my mother's advice, which is 'better to be quiet and be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.'" Wright said "they [the media] were trying to make a fool of me." He said he finally decided to speak up "to defend the tradition of the black church."
In one of the last questions Wright answered (about whether or not he thinks it is God's will for Obama to be President) Wright said that "if God intends for Mr. Obama to be President then no white racist, no candidate and no political pundit will get in the way; for God will do what God wants to do."

The Ayers Connection

Nearly two months ago I reported right here about Barack Obama's connection with the unrepentant terrorist William Ayers.
Now the connection has surfaced in the most recent televised debate and is attracting the glare of the national media.
To hear Obama tell it, Ayers is just a guy "who lives in my neighborhood." But as Ben Smith at Politico has reported Ayers and Obama "have crossed paths repeatedly in the last decade. In 1997, Obama cited Ayers’ critique of the juvenile justice system in a Chicago Tribune article on what prominent Chicagoans were reading. He and Ayers served together on the board of the Woods Fund of Chicago for three years starting in 1999. In 2001, Ayers also gave $200 to Obama’s state Senate reelection campaign." And Obama has also been linked to 60s radical Bernardine Dohrn.
When it comes to people like Rev. Wright, Dohrn, Ayers and others, what's at question is Obama's judgment - his judgment in continuing to associate with people such as this; his judgment is refusing to walk away from them; his judgment in not seeing the dangers in the views espoused by these individuals. Now, Obama's unwillingness to face up to the situation suggests a level of arrogance and immaturity that we'd do well to reject.

Obamas: 26G To Wright Church

They talk a lot about "being poor" but last year Sen. Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, made $4.2 million according to their just-filed 2007 income tax return.
Among their charitable donations in 2007 was $26,270 to Trinity United Church of Christ, where the incendiary sermons of Obama's former pastor have created problems for the candidate.
Obama keeps saying he's got a lot of problems with Wright's views and sermons, but damn -- that hasn't stopped him from funneling a lot of dough The Reverend's way!

Garlic Noses?

Fox News, Newsmax and CNS News are all reporting that Obama's [former] pastor, mentor and "uncle" Rev. Jerimiah Wright has slurred Italians referring to them as "garlic noses."
Wright, who is now "pastor emeritus" of the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago included the slur in a piece published in the most recent issue of his Trumpet Newsmagazine.
"(Jesus') enemies had their opinion about Him," Wright wrote in a eulogy of the late scholar Asa Hilliard in the November/December 2007 issue. "The Italians for the most part looked down their garlic noses at the Galileans." Wright continued, "From the circumstances surrounding Jesus' birth . . . up to and including the circumstances surrounding Jesus' death on a cross, a Roman cross, public lynching Italian style. . ."
"He (Jesus) refused to be defined by others and Dr. Asa Hilliard also refused to be defined by others. The government runs everything from the White House to the schoolhouse, from the Capitol to the Klan, white supremacy is clearly in charge, but Asa, like Jesus, refused to be defined by an oppressive government because Asa got his identity from an Omnipotent God."
Put Wright's aside the hateful anit-American rhetoric for the moment and focus on his ethnic slurs.
Over the course of many years I've heard my share of slurs and guttural language used against Italians and Italian-Americans. But this is surely a new low - and couched in religious terms, to boot.
Rev. Wright is a man who apparently harbors deep and lasting hatreds and resentments.
In failing to clearly and completely disown Rev. Wright, Obama has committed a grievous error.

Clinton On Wright

Hillary Clinton on Rev. Wright:
He would not have been my pastor. You don’t choose your family, but you choose what church you want to attend. You know, I spoke out against Don Imus, saying that hate speech was unacceptable in any setting, and I believe that. I just think you have to speak out against that. You certainly have to do that, if not explicitly, then implicitly by getting up and moving.
Clinton made her comments during a Pittsburgh Tribune-Review interview. For a video clip of Clinton's comments on Wright click here.

Gerry: 'I Won't Forget'

Calling it "divisive for the party" Geraldine Ferraro today says Barack Obama "didn't have to bring me into" his remarks last week about Rev. Wright and race. Ferraro says she was "appalled" at the way Obama brought her (and his grandmother) into the speech and compared their comments to those of Rev. Wright.
Ferraro made her comments on the Laura Ingraham talkfest and expressed her gratitude to Laura for giving her the chance to tell her side of the story. Ferraro says she's upset at the way she's been treated by Obama and other some other Democrats and adds: "I won't forget this. I can't forget this."
BTW: Obama ends his Virgin Islands vacation today to return to campaigning. Obama says he observed Easter at an impromptu private ceremony with his wife and two children.
At last report Rev. Wright was hiding out at the Ritz Carlton in Puerto Rico.

The Speech

Quick observations on the Barack Obama speech today in Philadelphia:
1) The bulk of the speech was well crafted but (like most Obama oratorical efforts) it could have been much shorter. After Obama addressed the Wright controversy (the real reason for the speech) the remarks could have ended. Instead, Obama careened off into a rather typical campaign speech.
2) It occurs to me that it's hard to have it both ways. One can't say we must get beyond race and then, in effect, play the race card. On the significance of race the great actor Morgan Freeman has said "I don't downplay it. I just don't play it." And when asked how we might end racism, Freeman responded: “Stop talking about it. I’m going to stop calling you a white man, and I’m going to ask you to stop calling me a black man.” Today, Obama talked and talked and talked about it.
3) I think it was a mistake for Obama to allow himself to be introduced by former Pennsylvania Senator Harris Wofford. Not because I do or don't like Wofford but because I think that Obama should have just walked to the podium and made his statement. No introduction. No buildup. No cheeleading. Let the speech speak for itself.
4) It's standard for Obama to use a teleprompter (he seems ill at ease without one) but today he seemed to pay particular attention to the teleprompter screens on either side of him to the point where he rarely looked straight ahead to the camera, the TV audience. This detracted from the power of the remarks.
5) In the quest for the presidency, your own personal story will only take you so far. Once we know your story, we want to get beyond it and discover what your plans are, what your real philosophy is. We want not just your narrative but the essence of you and what it will mean to the future of our country if we choose you. The story and the philosophy must make sense together. Today, Obama went back to the story. And that's OK, I suppose. But this alone will only will only take him so far. We're still asking: "Is this all that defines you? Where's the rest of you? What do you really believe?"