In the spirit of unity (lol) I will say I agree with you: the American public can be pretty stupid. Exhibit A, for me, would be the fact that Obama has gotten so many votes but that’s just my view.
Oddly enough, I actually believe from a purely strategic point of view he would’ve been better off saying nothing (which wouldn’t have been GOOD, but not as bad as this) especially because I didn’t hear Wright say anything he hadn’t said before, having listened to his speech and Q&A.
If anything, Wright looked triumphant and the crowd loved him.
I wonder how long before Hillary is blamed for this? Everything, of course, being her fault since Obama can do nothing to shoot himself in the foot with his mouth (ahh, here it is: “Press Club Chief: Clinton Not Involved in Wright Event” (FoxNews.com) LOL) It’s amazing. The blame Hillary spin is waaay old.
He was asked point blank about the AIDS comment and he cut off the questioner to answer that he hadn’t heard it yesterday.
What difference does he think it POSSIBLY makes to anyone whether or not he did or didn’t hear Wright make the AIDS remark yesterday??? I found that amazing.
Look, either he heard the remarks before or he didn’t. To answer a question as to whether he’d ever heard the AIDS remark before by saying he didn’t hear that he’d made the remark AT THE PRESS CLUB until after he saw the transcript is inane.
So what? It matters that he said it at the Press Club or something? He obviously had to have already known that Wright had made that comment before. Sheesh.
Parsing! LOL
"QUESTION: Why the change of tone from yesterday? When you spoke to us on the tarmac yesterday, you didn’t have this sense of anger and outrage.
OBAMA: Yes, I’ll be honest with you — because I hadn’t seen it yet.
QUESTION: And that was the difference you…
OBAMA: Yes.
**QUESTION: You heard the reports about the AIDS comments.
Yes, there is evidence that Wright said things that were “inflammatory” in Obama’s presence: Obama.
He himself said that Wright had said inflammatory things in the past, whether or not that particular term was used is just more fricking parsing.
And here’s another piece of evidence: common sense.
Wright didn’t just become someone else recently, that’s absurd. He’s been talking about the writings of Cone for years and he said so himself; it’s a central tenet of his beliefs and what he’s been preaching about and Black Liberation Theology was prominently promoted ON THE CHURCH’S WEBSITE for christ’s sake. You know how many times Wright mentioned Cone in the last few days?
Gee, Obama sure is a later bloomer/learner about his “close friend” of 20 years.
“Black theology refuses to accept a God who is not identified totally with the goals of the black community. If God is not for us and against white people, then he is a murderer, and we had better kill him. The task of black theology is to kill Gods who do not belong to the black community … Black theology will accept only the love of God which participates in the destruction of the white enemy. What we need is the divine love as expressed in Black Power, which is the power of black people to destroy their oppressors here and now by any means at their disposal. Unless God is participating in this holy activity, we must reject his love.” - James Cone, Black Liberation Theology
But you’re a hard core Obama supporter. I’m talking about swing voters. Maybe it wasn’t clear, because that was in an earlier post.
Well, that makes it even worse. They knew about him, but didn’t do anything until it reached the scandal level? Well, what else do they know about, have done nothing about, and will reach scandal level between now and November?
Keep in mind that I’m not saying Hillary’s argument is going to convince you. I’m talking about people on the fence.
That’s her argument, not mine. But who is in the midst of an unvetted scandal right now-- Hillary or Obama?
As if anybody but himself and Wright are responsible for this situation.
yojimbo, if you can propose a more appropriate term than “True Believers” for people whose decisions are made on the basis of emotion over fact, as this thread is only the latest to illustrate, then what is it?
Why do you think his Philadelphia speech from a few weeks earlier, the one that got him all that praise, “one of the greatest political speeches in history” etc., could not continue to apply? Was it, perhaps, a 10-point loss since?
It simply confirms what many people have already concluded; she’s a habitual liar (as opposed to someone who strategically lies now and then for advantage).
Either that, or she has a Reaganesque tendency to have senior moments in which she confuses some nightmare she had with reality.
Bullshit. It nothing more than manufactured outrage to scare white Americans away from voting for the scary black man. Obama is a highly intelligent man. Since growing up, he has said next to nothing, enacted no legislation, or done anything that would make people think he is a closet racist. In fact, he’s done so much more to try and talk about race in America (which will be his downfall if he has one) and bring people together. So the HRC attack machine and the right wing can’t get at him for himself. So they have to go to those around him. So they make up shit about his wife being a black separatist in her treatise, and they grab his ignorant pastor, take things he says out of context and try to paint him as a modern day, black David Duke. And yet those people aren’t Obama. Anyone with half a brain should know that. This idea that Obama is somehow responsible for, or secretly controlled by, Wright is ludicrous.
The worst, THE VERY WORST you can say about Obama in this entire episode is that he showed bad judgment in being close to Wright and having him on his staff. Big Fucking Deal. Meanwhile, McCain gets a pass for Renzi, you have people like 9th Floor making excuses for Clinton. Why do you suppose the most succesful attack on Obama so far, even as manufactured as it is, has to do with race? Weird coincidence isn’t it.
Quoted for truth. Obama would like me to believe that the man who converted him to Christianity, married him, one of whose sermons inspired his book title, and who he referred to as “my pastor, mentor and friend” was not his “spiritual advisor”. Come on - that doesn’t even depend on what the meaning of is, is.
Obama further wants me to believe that he was shocked - shocked! - that Wright was saying all these racist, inflammatory things. This after sitting in the pews and listening to him for twenty years. Suuuuuurre…
And then the cap-off - Wright is denounced, not for saying these racist and hateful things, but because he is hurting Obama’s campaign.
Either Obama knew about all this, and is just lying about it, or he is so detached from mainstream America that he didn’t realize how extreme Wright sounds. I think it is more the latter - it would fit with his comments about how people only cling to their religion and the Second Amendment because they are bitter about losing their jobs twenty-five years ago.
This is a function of Obama’s lack of national experience. He has been wrapped up in the Chicago political machine too long - he doesn’t play in Peoria.
Whether or not this will deny him the nomination or the White House remains to be seen. But the general election hasn’t started yet, and all the screaming in the world isn’t going to stop the Republicans from putting him thru the wringer.
Maybe the Usual Suspects don’t like that? Tough shit.
Actually, he did say something to that effect. (My emphasis.)
They [Wright’s views] certainly don’t portray accurately my values and beliefs. And if Reverend Wright thinks that that’s political posturing, as he put it, then he doesn’t know me very well. And based on his remarks yesterday, well, I may not know him as well as I thought either.Now, you might say that that’s not similar enough to what you said. After all, it would mean your doing what you want him to do — namely, admitting you were wrong.
As Tamaran Hall, an African-American news anchor for MSNBC explained yesterday, there are two mainstream churches on the south side of Chicago where newcomers are directed when they move into town seeking to network with others, and this church was one of them. It is not the case that this is some radical congregation, nor is it the case that Wright speaks on behalf of it. (Speaking to, and speaking on behalf of, are two different things.) Tens of thousands of people have been baptized by Wright and have sought his spiritual counsel without knowing of his personal political ambitions. Her explanation satisfied the ever-skeptical Chris Matthews, who has been whoring for Clinton since the beginning. So I think Obama has dealt with this exceedingly well.
Hillary has done such a good job of trying to destroy him and the Democratic party that when Obama faces McCain, all this stuff will be old news and completely debunked. And she will have burned bridges so badly with so many of the Democratic Party’s core constituency that her whole career might end, including in New York. And that would be great.
9th Floor - after reading the entire thread, and looking at some of your other posts here, you have crossed the line. A line you have yourself mentioned many Obamacons have crossed - you are vehemently defending to the tune of being a rabid fan, your candidate. That’s fine - however, when you bring up press stories and stand next to them as being fact you cast a light on yourself that makes you appear to be wearing blinders. I really do not care if you do not think Obama is going to win the nomination, as I am sure you could care less that a lot of people on this board feel Obama is going to win. However, time and time again you defend Clinton with MSM hype and denounce Obama as a loser. In case you have not been paying attention Obama is winning, and has been for along while. They will continue to trade wins for losses but at the end of the day Obama will be in a better position entering the convention. Your unwillingness see that or even acknowledge that gives me pause in taking what you say with any seriousness at all. You know I like to give credence to both sides of a coin before saying anything, and I am not one to use the word “should” so I will ask this of you: Please fact check your responses before posting - it will really make reading your posts a little easier to swallow.
It’s not like Obama never left his pew in twenty years. He didnt sleep there.
Quite honestly, I don’t think a person who has never experienced a friend turning on him has the standing to complain about someone else’s lack of life experience. It’s good on you that all you friends and mentors have turned out to be stainless saints, leaving you imbued by association with a spotless morality. But for the rest of us, we have to deal with these kinds of life surprises. And I think Obama dealt with it perfectly appropriately, defending the man on a personal level for as long as he could and not rejecting him until he was first rejected.
If Hillary were that honest and decent, she’d be almost likeable.
This is the sensation du jour, but given that the news media have the attention span of a six-week old puppy, there will be a series of “scandals” and “gaffes” involving the candidates to fret about from now until the election, along with every latest permutation of the polls and the “numbers” proving this and that…until they shift again.
Unless Wright descends further into loopy attention-seeking behavior, this affair is now heading for the back burner, to be replaced by the next gotcha. Supporters of Clinton and McCain can’t feel in the least assured that they won’t wind up the target of something as bad or worse, given their previous penchant for embarassing “misstatements” and rattling noises from their respective closets.
If Wright hadn’t decided to throw Obama under the bus, Obama wouldn’t have had to return the favor.
He’s only been whoring for Hillary lately. There was a time where he had a very palpable digust for Hillary and was almost giddy about the excitement that Obama was making. It seemed to change in the Pennsylvania build-up but prior to that I thought he was clearly in Obama’s camp.
I see this entire race following predictable lines. Obama rolls with the punches much more dilligently than Clinton and many candidates in the recent past. Being an Obama supporter I don’t see this race veering too far off the standard deviation. Obama will still recieve the nomination I’m sure to Hillary’s disdain. Other candidates in recent memory have hurtled the same if not worse infractions than Obama’s Wright Controversy and still made it to the white house. His biggest mountain to climb are those middle class blue collar white voters. And by this time in the race, most of the fence sitters already now who they are going to cast their vote for.