Let's have all Wright all the time

    After being caricatured into a racist, hate-filled, anti-American nut job, Rev. Jeremiah Wright is emerging from his self-imposed public exile.
    Barack Obama’s former pastor appeared on Bill Moyer’s Journal on Friday, was the keynote speaker at the Detroit Branch NAACP's 53rd annual Fight for Freedom Fund Dinner on Sunday and  continued his message that different is not divisive in a speech and Q and A  at the National Press Club in D.C. this morning.
    Great. In this 24/7 news cycle world, we need all Wright all the time.
    I know this is counterintuitive, but I think it will serve the Democratic Party’s presidential frontrunner well if we see more Wright—much, much more Wright. 
    The conventional wisdom is that Wright’s return to the national scene is not doing Obama any favors. You hear that the Protestant pastor should have remained MIA until shortly before Thanksgiving—if not for eternity. You read that any time Wright speaks he only serves to stoke the passions of righteous Americans who have taken to heart the hard knock words they’ve heard out of context. You know that the running rap has Rev. Wright as a big-time blight hampering the Obama campaign from closing the deal.
    I say it ain’t necessarily so.   
    Since the manufactured controversy erupted last month, Wright gives certain American voters, as Chris Matthews describes it, a “permission slip” to not vote for Obama. The former Trinity United Church of Christ pastor gives them cover to continue voting whites only.
    Wright, however, doesn’t have to remain the blunt instrument the rightwing clinches to beat Obama down from here to November. With the exception of the conservative whites that aren’t going to vote for what could be America’s first black president for any reason at any time, a Wright P.R. blitz can shrink the mountain back to a molehill.
     Let’s begin with the obvious: Rev. Wright disappeared after misleading snippets began endlessly looping because a fair amount of his life’s work has been dedicated to social justice. Witnessing the very real possibility that this great nation may finally break its bad habit of electing one white man after the next to its highest office has to be as exhilarating to him as it is to me and millions of other Americans.
    But then, the situation got way out of hand. Rev. Wright’s four-decade legacy went to hell.  He had to flesh out the cartoon villain the viral videos have transformed him into. He needed to explain and defend his church’s black liberation theology, which has been so unfairly misrepresented. He’ll have to do it some more and then some more again.
    “I’m distressed by white people, out of a very different religious, cultural, racial, theological/ecclesiastical experience, presuming to judge African American faith practices and religious expression and preaching,” Rev. John Buchanan, who is white, said last month to his congregation.
    I found no evidence that Rev. Buchanan is related to that other Buchanan, Pat, a member of Sons of Confederate Veterans and rightwing agent provocateur who plays a political analyst on TV.  John Buchanan is the pastor of Fourth Presbyterian Church on Chicago’s Magnificent Mile. His Gothic-architecture church was the setting where Carmen Diaz got married in “My Best Friend’s Wedding.” In real-life, Fourth’s flock is just like in the movie. Its congregation is largely white and rich and powerful.
     “Senator Obama’s critics wonder how the senator could have remained in Wright’s congregation and under his leadership for twenty years,” Rev. Buchanan said in his week-after-Easter sermon. “The answer is that Wright didn’t say ‘God damn America’ every Sunday. In fact, Wright’s sermons were biblically based, relevant, literate, and eloquent, week after week. When the preachers of the land decide whose sermons and lectures or preaching they want to hear, Jeremiah Wright’s are near the top of the list.”
    Of course, you’d never imagine that by watching Fox Cable News or from any of the other ongoing outlets for the rightwing propaganda machine. Last week, the North Carolina Republican Party unveiled an ad using Rev. Wright to attack Obama as “too extreme.”
    Without question, that’s just an early cheap shot the rightwing is preparing to sling. The Republicans believes Wright will be their WMD. And that’s why he should saturate the media with his intelligence, conviction and reason. He should religiously make the media rounds from “Meet the Press” to “This Week” to “20/20” to “Countdown” to “The O’Reilly Factor” to “The Colbert Report” to “Nightline” to “Saturday Night Live.” He should go on Oprah, Ellen and "The View," too.
    Should he make those rounds, before long, the fickle American media with its attention-deficit audience will decide that what was once “shocking and stunning” is really basic and boring. Old news is no news.
    And for Wright, Obama and the nation at large, no news will be good news.

(You can also see this post on ebonyjet.com. It ran on Tuesday under the headline, "Wright Here, Wright Now."  Check it out to see the comments. There are a lot more there than here. Also there are many other interesting posts on the website.)

Comments

[rawdawgbuffalo]

u have great taste in music to be a yougin' lol, im 45

[rawdagbuffalo]

Now we both know he is/was consequential, if he didnt exsit, the bilderbergs (lol) would have found someone else

[Luvjoy]

Has anyone but Reverend Wrong said anything about his disdain for Obama? Did anyone notice he mocked the way Obama says di-vi-sive. He is clearly angry with Obama and dead set on destroying his chance for the presidency.

Reverend Wright, or shall I say Reverend Wrong, is one of millions of crabs desperately trying to escape the bottom of the barrel. He has latched onto Obama's ankle with a (presidential) death hold, just to get a few minutes of international fame.

Please allow me to say a few things to the reverend:

Reverend Wright you are so wrong for what you have just done to Obama's campaign..... and to your people.

You are a jealous cornflake, who will never reach the masses as Obama has, no matter how much coverage you are given. You have just shown the world that you do not have good judgment and no political savvy.

No, you shouldn't be considered for Vice President. Go back into your hole.

You are selfish and ugly....and you know God don't like Ugly.

[James]

One thing needs to be said: Politicians should not be in the business of telling religious leaders what to say, or when to say it. A society that seeks to quench the voice of God is as unconstitutional as it is spritually and morally wrong.

For us to condemn Wright means that we as a practice should condemn people who are different from us or who don't agree with us.

Doesn't sound much like a society I can be proud of... even as an adult.

[David F., Evanston IN]

A view from within the United Church of Christ:

http://WWW.UCCTRUTHS.COM

Wright lights the fuse

Monday, April 28, 2008

Trinity United Church of Christ's former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, gave an indignant speech this morning before the National Press Club and African-American church leaders. The speech and Wright's response to questions afterwards will undoubtedly reignite the controversy around his sermons.

In his speech, Wright disowned the controversy by claiming that the media reporting and the public response was not about him, it was about the black church as a whole. Wright also mentioned the call to have a national conversation on race which was first raised by presidential candidate Barack Obama and formalized by the United Church of Christ's national office.

Throughout the question and answer period of his speech, Wright continually deflected questions about his sermons often answering a question with another question. When asked about his "God damn America" sermon, he asked "Did you hear the sermon?" When asked about his allegation that the U.S. governemnt created the AIDS virus to commit genocide on African-Americans, Wright asked if the questioner had read Horowitz's book and then claimed that he believed the government was capable of it. When asked about his controversial sermon that appeared to blame the U.S. for 9/11, Wright claimed to be quoting an ambassador although Wright clearly subscribed to the belief in the sermon.

On any level, the speech was a trainwreck. Wright didn't accept responsibility for his sermons or take ownership of his own words. By deflecting the controversy as commentary against the black church, Wright has also ignited a completely manufactured racial conflict and has unfairly cast a negative view of the black church and the United Church of Christ. Wright has effectively sabatoged the black church, the United Church of Christ and Obama's candidacy to protect his own ego.

While I personally agree with the spirit of Obama's call for a national conversation on race, it can not and should not be orchestrated as a defense of Wright's sermons. The controversy is not about race, it is about Jeremiah Wright. If we are going to have a real national conversation on race, it should be done in the spirit Obama's unifying optimism that we can overcome our shameful history.