Why Was Bill Clinton Shaking Hands With Jeremiah Wright?

This was certainly before the sermons in question, although we can be sure Wright was spewing hate throughout his entire career. This was before Youtube allowed
for the quick and simple broadcast of Wright's speeches to the world. The Clinton's had probably
never even heard any of Wright's sermons, right? Again, you have a hard time
differentiating between pandering and spiritual mentoring. This is a simple act
of pandering. You could compare this photo to the way in which Obama pandered
to Louis Farrakhan in the past. Or you could even compare it to Obama’s meeting
with William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn of the Weather Undergound.  

How does a picture of Clinton
shaking Wright’s hand equal or negate Obama’s conscious decision to adopt
Wright as a spiritual mentor rather than simply pander to him and his church? I
would say that Clinton
was smart in attempting to make inroads into all facets of the black community.
He was even smarter not to allow this person to baptize his child or call him
his spiritual mentor.

If Obama is President, he will certainly not allow Wright to come to the
White House for a special visit. Will that make Obama worse than Clinton? Will that make Obama a real “classy”
guy for not allowing his spiritual mentor whom he holds in the same regard as
his grandmother not be allowed to the White House all for political reasons? Is Obama a real "classy"  guy for distancing himself from William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn now that's it's politically expedient? They didn't even have to visit him in his office, Obama made a house call for that dynamic duo.

The whisper campaign is being engineered by the polls, which show Obama
faltering. You don't need a whisper campaign when the majority of Americans are
appauled at the Obama – Wright connection.

So Obama's membership at TUCC didn't become a problem until after September 1998.

"Spiritual mentor" is an absurd concoction politicians use for their advantage, except in cases like this one where they enable a terrible two step of triviality. But I suppose if we're agreeing to play dumb and pretend it signifies anything meaningful, then we'll have to agree that John McCain agrees with his spiritual mentor that the United States was created to destroy Islam.

Here's an assertion so strong it's absurd: Obama shares any of Wright's hateful beliefs.

Here's an assertion so weak it doesn't prove anything untoward: Obama joined TUCC out of a need to connect with the black community in Chicago, or cynically to boost his political position, or some combination.

How does the two step work? Hop from the weak, trivial assertion, to the strong absurd assertion, and back, repeatedly, to create the impression that the strong absurd assertion pulls in some of the weak assertion's truth by an osmotic process.

As for Clinton's spiritual mentorship --- it did, indeed, exclude Wright, except momentarily, when Clinton needed him. It included crotchety old anti-Semites like Billy Graham, and occasionally Al Sharpton. And these frightening folks.

Fascinatingly, after four horrific weeks of coverage, Obama's poll numbers dipped a bit. But now they're ticking up again, and the recognition may at last have set in that the nominating contest has been over since the middle of February.

"So Obama's membership at TUCC didn't become a problem until after September 1998."

-- Well, did governor Spitzer's illicit affairs become an issue until before or after they became public? Since we now know about his hypocrisy all those years, we certainly have a different view of Spitzer now don't we? Since Wright's sermons were not proliferating the internet or media, and because Clinton probably did not have any idea what his sermons consisted of, I would say that they did not become an issue until everyone discovered the content of his sermons. Since Obama, as a member, already knew the content of the sermons -- yeah, it was a problem for him because he chose to continue participating with full knowledge of the message. I don't get your logic on this implicit question --

""Spiritual mentor" is an absurd concoction politicians use for their
advantage, except in cases like this one where they enable a terrible
two step of triviality. But I suppose if we're agreeing to play dumb
and pretend it signifies anything meaningful, then we'll have to agree
that John McCain agrees with his spiritual mentor that the United
States was created to destroy Islam."

 -- First, "spiritual mentor" is a political invention in most cases. McCain has always been very secular, pro choice, denounced people like Falwell in the past, etc. He is clearly using Hagee and Parsely to pander for evangelical votes, going against the grain of his usual middle of the road secular approach -- total politics. Wright is a spiritual mentor by Obama's own personal account both verbally and his in book. Obama took it one step further, however, when he confirmed that his relationship with Wright goes far beyond that of the typical "spiritual mentor" we so often hear about amongst would-be candidates. Are you saying Obama's lying? It only signifies something meaningful based on Obama's own claims that Wright is like a member of his family....are you asking me to pretend Obama didn't make these claims? Am I also supposed to pretend that Hagee or Parsely are part of McCain's family even though he's never claimed as such? Whose words are you trying to parse, mine or Obama's? --

"Here's an assertion so strong it's absurd: Obama shares any of Wright's hateful beliefs."

--Do I think he shares all of Wright's beliefs? No, although certainly "any"...I think it's absurd that anyone wishing to run for President would, for 20 years, continue to not only attend such a distasteful and hate mongering congregation, but accept the hate mongering preacher as a member of one's own family ...That's what's absurd. And there is no reason this should not be an issue. I simply do not want a president that consciously accepts a racist as a member of his or her own family and then rationalizes the bigotry by celebrating the message in church every Sunday. Pandering, on the other hand, doesn't bother me. I have no problem with Obama pandering to Louis Farrakhan for the fringe black vote (although, like Hagee's endoresment of McCain, Farrakhan's endorsement wasn't sought out by Obama). In fact, I don't think the Farrkhan endoresement was even worth a second glance by the pundits. Obama - Farrakhan is a closer match to McCain - Hagee --

"Here's an assertion so weak it doesn't prove anything untoward: Obama
joined TUCC out of a need to connect with the black community in
Chicago, or cynically to boost his political position, or some
combination."

-- Yes, this is probably true. Why did he take Wright into his family? I would assume he has a better reason to do this than simply to connect with Chicago blacks? Right? Do I need to ingratiate myself to Louis Farrakhan and bring him into the family in order to connect with blacks? So, Wright is the key to the heart of all blacks because they are all in agreement with him??? Hmmmm.....

"As for Clinton's spiritual mentorship --- it did, indeed, exclude
Wright, except momentarily, when Clinton needed him. It included
crotchety old anti-Semites like Billy Graham, and occasionally Al
Sharpton. And these frightening folks."

--Yeah, these folks are very frightening....Are any of them part of Clinton's family?? You are confusing pandering (politics as usual, of which everyone including Obama engages in) with the conscious decision to include a hateful demagogue into one's own family. There IS a difference. --

 "
Fascinatingly, after four horrific weeks of coverage, Obama's poll numbers dipped a bit. But now they're ticking up again, and the recognition may at last have set in that the nominating contest has been over since the middle of February."

-- After four weeks of using Wright's own words to condemn him, McCain is now leading Obama in the general race by varying gaps depending on the poll (some as much as 49 - 42, which is a fairly significant turn around). Clearly Obama will most likely still be the Dem nominee.....But he will have some serious trouble in the general election.--

The fact remains -- If McCain had a spiritual mentor who was as close to him as Wright is to Obama, and this mentor directly disparaged the black community, his candidacy would be over immediately. There is a double standard whether you want to admit it or not.

The man McCain described as his spiritual adviser has fantasies of wiping out Islam, compares Planned Parenthood to the KKK, and describes legalized abortion as a genocidal conspiracy against blacks. Of what is that reminiscent?

I see the terrible two-stepping continues undaunted. You know Obama doesn't share Wright's antipathies. You know McCain's turbulent priests are just as and perhaps more toxic than Wright. And you know that the reason the Wright association has put Obama on the brink --- though he recovered beautifully and has regained his lead over Clinton nationally as of today --- while McCain has received scarcely any scrutiny is not the length of either association, but the fact that Wright and Obama are black, and McCain, Parsley, and Hagee are not. (And on the head to head polling, it's not exactly believable to feign surprise at the fact that the Republican nominee is benefiting from the Democrats' Mexican standoff, just as it's not exactly convincing to claim that a single bad week in March obviates the massive structural and financial advantages of the Democrats, especially now with Richardson signalling it's time to pull the plug on Clinton. Let's talk in September.)

Moreover, Wright obviously has not the slightest influence on Obama's policy positions, or the ability to push any agenda during an Obama presidency. McCain, on the other hand, will quite likely hand out sops to the Christian right --- e.g., lunatic SCOTUS nominees, restrictions on stem cell research, government funding of religious projects, blocking over the counter emergency contraception, blocking the vaccine for the virus that causes cervical cancer --- in order to ensure their support for his foreign policy projects. (By the way, where does the idea that McCain has ever been pro-choice come from? McCain's record on reproductive rights is "clear and appalling," as Tedra Osell has written in this space. I suspect on some deep personal level he cares about social issue less than many of his co-partisans, but the idea that he would hesitate for a moment to trade personal freedom and inexplicably controversial medical technology away in exchange for war credits, let alone lift a finger to defend them, is preposterous.)

There is indeed a double standard.

In any case, I really have to limit the non-paid writing I do (to zero, if possible), so I'll have to confine any further remarks to a future post.

Congrats to Anon for his comments.  Of course it is fair and reasonable to conclude that Obama agrees with Wright and if Obama wanted to eliminate that impression he could have done so.  He said Wright contains the "good and Bad" of what is in his community without saying anything concerning what is the good part and what is the bad part.

His willingness to analogize ad nauseum insults our intelligence and this is pure evasion.  His bigger than life rhetoric, when under fire, melted down to petty name-calling and instead of standing tall in the saddle, he gravely lost his competitive edge of being above and beyond regular politics.  It is really a rather simple matter and when it comes down to saying that it is all very complex, he is losing his support.

Without any record of leadership--all this candidate has is his good words and his good name.  Suddenly, his words don't sound very good and his name has now been directly linked to the ugly underbelly of radical politics of the fringe.  At the very least, Obama has a taste for a very ugly brand of radical politics.

At this point, he cannot win.   

A few YouTube comments have been extrapolated to be the substance of what Wright has preached for the entirety of his career, thereby allowing the presumption that Obama heard and silently acquiesced to many such comments, "for twenty years."

This picture contradicts that extrapolation and the resulting presumption.

If Wright got a White House invite during the Clinton administration, it's because he was somebody.  Whether YouTube was around or not, there was a perception of who that somebody was, and it was based on what Wright was known to stand for. 

It seems reasonable to me to presume that neither Khalid Muhammad nor Sistah Souljah would have received the invitation.  So it also seems reasonable to me to presume that what Wright was known to stand for was far less controversial than the comments taken to be the essence of his persona in the past month.

So it seems 

Rev. Jeremiah Wright This man should not claim to be a Christian, God Said" You claim to love Me,but hate your brother" Wright only loves his black brothers. He is a racist and a liar. Obama would sell out his own white Momma to please his black brothers. Obama claims He can change things I don't see how....Especially with Wright feeding his spiritual needs.

I don't know what Wright's motives are.  It seems to me, he is more of hinderance than a help to Obama.  But I guess everyone knows where he stands.  Meaning, I have more respect for a klansman in a white sheet than I do a racist police officer who took an oath to protect and serve "everyone" and hides behind a badge to do his dirty work.  Right now I don't think Wright and Obama should be used iin the same sentence.  Whatever relationship they had is over.  Wright is not running for president.  I guess if Obama was so willing to sell "white folk" out, he wouldn't have thrown Wright under the bus in the first place.  I think Wright got sold out and now he's pissed.  I guess since Wright only loved his black brothers, he was only loving half of Obama in the first place.

To say that Barak Obama is a radical politician because he chose to belong to Wright's church is like saying all Catholics are child molesters because they keep going to the church where prieset molested children.  To say that Obama should have left the church because of what the pastor preached is to say that people who grew up with racist parents either has to deny their parents or they, too, are racists.  Do we all agree with everything that is said by the leaders in our churches, particulary regarding polictical and social issues?  When we disagree, do we denouonce the church because the pastor's opinion is different from our own?  I don't alway agree with my husband. nor he with me.  Shall we divorce?  Does Mitt Romney have to leave the Mormon Church because of a radical faction's behavior?  I think not.  Why do we set a higher standard for Obama than for Clinton?  We know she lied about Bosnia versus the conjection that Obama is lying about knowing about Wright, over whom he has no control.  And,  guess what folks, the media is the winner here and we just may be the losers once more. Alos, we need to discontinue our historical practice of requiring more of African Americans to succeed that we do of others.