The media had a hot story.
The clips of Wright's sermons were sure to horrify. What horrible things to say.
This angry preacher attacking America, the government, whites.
You all heard it. Over and over and over we heard it for ourselves.
I've never seen anything like it. There is no defending this.
But I don't mean Wright's words. They aren't the point here.
The media is guilty of attempted assassination of a candidacy. They are guilty.
It was not wrong to show Wright's sermons even if they showed only the most inflammatory excerpts.
But those alone are not the story. They added a bit so that anyone watching knows Obama has gone to the church for 20 years, they were married there and the so ons and so forths.
That's what people saw and heard.
The "balance" was letting Obama come and defend it.
Have they all turned into fox network? I'm not sure I can find the words to express this but I shouldn't have to. The unfairness of this is so glaring that not only should it be obvious but it should not have been possible,
This is not reporting. This should never have been presented without more of the story.
Could they at least note that most or at least some of the sermons they listened to in finding these excerpts were not hateful, were the gospel, were even a message of love?
Could they not include a panelist who has been to the church, who knows Wright? Someone like the minister who wrote this?
Jeremiah Wright's Influence on my Ministry
The title of the sermon, "What Makes you so Strong?" was preached by Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright. The power, the intellect, and the spirituality of the message were like nothing I'd ever heard. I left that night with more questions than I was given answers, but it unleashed a curiosity that remains to this day.
With love at the foundation, Rev. Wright presented Jesus as a radical, revolutionary, and deeply subversive individual who sided with those on the underside of life, and was committed to changing the status quo.
What about a member of the church or even someone who went occasionallywith friends?
I live in Chicago, and my friend goes to Trinity Church. I've been there myself and I've never heard anything inflammatory. The gospel choir is amazing. The preaching is uplifting. I was shocked when I first saw the tape of Reverend Wright's comments. I had to double check to make sure it was the same church. I was aware that the church was pro-African American and that the theology was liberation theology, but I never felt hate or prejudice or noted any kind of "anti" tenor. It was more about pride, self-determination, self-reliance, PEACE, and Jesus. I hate that I have to say this but, for the record, I'm white. The congregation was kind to me, not hateful. There was no prejudice against me. It was an amazing church with thousands of people pouring through the door. The list of social programs affiliated with the church is vast.
How could they present the statements without doing a small bit of work to see if there was any reason to believe this might be a decent church and Wright have had a decent ministry? That there might be another side.
They give people the clear picture that this Senator has been going to a hate filled church for twenty years with and then let him come on with just his voice to say it isn't that way.
That's ridiculous. People don't know him, they are right about that, so after their presentation his words are weak, another dishonest politician except more frightening.
The words were not weak but I could hear how they sounded to the ears of those his past is a stranger to. They just had the evidence of his values right before their eyes, his spiritual hero was a hateful bigot.
He then appeared a fake, running on hope and unity with division and hate in his heart, fooling the people. He wasn't introduced that way but he may as well have been.
Pundits on every network saying people don't really know him, he came from nowhere and just burst on the scene. Now we are seeing part of what we didn't know.
But the media could know more about him even if they didn't investigate themselves if only they knew how to use google.
I'll do the work for them, I'll find that bad angry man who we haven't seen yet.
The NY Times recently talked to dozens of his high school and college classmates.
What dangerous things did they learn about this angry young black man?
"When he talked, it was an E. F. Hutton moment: people listened," (snip) "He would point out the negatives of a policy and its consequences and illuminate the complexities of an issue the way others could not." He added, "He has a great sense of humor and could defuse an argument."
Who did he hang out with?
"These were the kids most concerned with issues of social justice and who took classes and books seriously."
The summary is-He was cool. Well he didn't know Wright yet and we've now learned he hadn't learned Muslim jihad after all so let's move on to those who've know him for years
People must have noticed something odd at SOME point. Well yes. This long piece knows what to call him The Conciliator and reveals a few things
Obama’s calm is also a matter of temperament. The first thing almost everybody who knows Obama says about him is how extremely comfortable he is with himself.
No, of course we mean a problem. Something strange. Look, a tic!
Obama’s drive to compromise goes beyond the call of political expediency—it’s instinctive, almost a tic. "Barack has an incredible ability to synthesize seemingly contradictory realities and make them coherent,"
No, let's get serious. He must make people angry and disappoint them. Yes! Here's proof!
But, coming from Obama, the talk about unity isn’t boilerplate—he actually means it, and it’s substantive, which is to say that it has consequences that make people angry.
Obama is always disappointing people who feel that he gives too much respect or yields too much ground to the other side, rather than fighting aggressively
Oh that profile by the New Yorker is only 11 pages long. Forget them. He's learned to hide his rage or something. Let's look at his Harvard days. They said he listened to Wright's sermon tapes while he was there.Bet he was a troublemaker.
Look, this is hopeful. Descriptions of campus then:
-"I never saw politics as bitter as at Harvard Law Review in the early ’90s," -"extreme political ideologies."
-so ardent that they would boo and hiss one another in class.
-a campus shaken by racial politics
So let's see how he added to the anger.
-He proved deft at navigating an institution scorched with ideological battles, many of which revolved around race.
That's sounds like a lead. He deftly did stuff. Bet it was bad.
-He developed a leadership style based more on furthering consensus than on imposing his own ideas.
-Another of Mr. Obama’s techniques relied on his seemingly limitless appetite for hearing the opinions of others
Oh please, Not more nice, peaceful crap.
Here we go. Violence!
He often played pickup basketball, replacing his deliberative off-court style with sharp elbows and aggressive grabs for the ball.
Oh fine, I'll take that as close enough and move on to some paper that will tell the truth. We're finding evidence. I'm sure the title is misleading At Harvard Law, a unifying voice just to distract us from truth.
"A lot of people at the time were just talking past each other, (snip)
"Barack transcended that."
Transcended! Not more cult crap 17 years before the cult crap started. NO transcending Obama, for shame.
Classmates recall an especially emotional debate in the spring of 1990
OK, great. I bet he took advantage of that and attacked whitey.
Presiding over an assembly of 60
(oK, get ready. What did that angry Wright listening black guy do?)
-Obama listened to impassioned pleas
-pressed conservatives to explain their reasoning
-liberals to sharpen their thinking.
-He was leading the discussion but he wasn't trying to impose his own perspective on it.
-He was much more mediating.
OK look, I want crime here.
OK getting closer. He dressed wrong for basketball.
"If there was any knock against Barack, he pulled his socks up a little too high and his shorts were a little too small,"
Here! Oh no. A real scandal.
Records from Somerville show that he still owes the city $72.63 in excise taxes and $45 in late penalties on two parking violations.
The bright, young law student parked illegally in a bus stop in 1990 and illegally in a street-sweeping zone in 1991.
If he has paid since it's just plain political expediency,sorry Obama. You're running on your judgment but your socks are too high, you left unpaid tickets and you only brought peaceful outworking to a divided group in tense times.
For shame Mr. Barack Hussein Obama. Do you really think we will look at the shiny objects like the leadership and healing you brought to difficult situations on campus and in law review, the 60+ hours you put in reviewing law books and papers, the way you brought out the best of opposing sides so they felt it their accomplishments instead of imposing your view, that you graduated magna cum laude and miss seeing the truth! Using your elbows while wearing your socks too high on the basketball court and getting a parking ticket!
Shame on you Barack Obama!
Look I'm sorry Obama, I'm getting reports from people who knew you on the dirty streets of Chicago in this old 1995 Chicago Reader article, knew you when you worked as one of those lefty organizers.
This guy describes the type to us
A lot of organizers ...are these self-anointed leaders with this strange, way-out approach and unrealistic, eccentric way of pursuing things
here we go then! They tell us. So they are strange kooks, right?
-Not Barack.
-he brought a certain level of sophistication and intelligence to community work,"
-"He had a reasonable, focused approach t
He's not about calling attention to himself. -He's concerned with the work.
-It's as if it's his mission in life, his calling, to work for social justice.
But this guy will see right through Obama, look how the guy describes himself
I'm one of the most cynical people...always looking for somebody's angle or personal interest,"..."I've lived in Chicago all my life.. I've known some of the most ruthless and biggest bullshitters out there...
Sorry Obama, he's going to spill the beans now
-but I see nothing but integrity in this guy."
Oh brother. Well since this article is from before he got into politics. Maybe he gives away what his devious plans might be once he gets power. This could be it
"The political debate is now so skewed, so limited, so distorted," said Obama. "People are hungry for community; they miss it. They are hungry for change.
"What if a politician were to see his job as that of an organizer," he wondered, "as part teacher and part advocate, one who does not sell voters short but who educates them about the real choices before them? As an elected public official, for instance, I could bring church and community leaders together easier than I could as a community organizer or lawyer. We would come together to form concrete economic development strategies, take advantage of existing laws and structures, and create bridges and bonds within all sectors of the community. We must form grass-root structures that would hold me and other elected officials more accountable for their actions.
That does it! I've read all about your years teaching Constitutional Law and working in the State Senate and it's more of the same.
SHAME ON YOU SIR! You are running as someone who is calm and values hope and unity and learning and hard work and honesty and thoughtfulness and hearing and respecting one another while all your life you have demonstrated calm and valuing hope and unity and learning and hard work and honesty and thoughtfulness and hearing and respecting one another.
Look at the influence you let this dangerous Wright have on you because...um...well..
A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds. That's it. Is that it? Because this is no foolish consistency
Boy, if people knew all this about you they might respect your integrity and listen to your words about Rev Wright and there would be a good chance they would hear you.
Unless they saw your socks. But moving on.
Back to the press. Perhaps they felt the need to attack in this way where truth is no defense because they knew about the socks.
Obama isn't perfect but a look at any of our candidates will not show a picture like this. This is a uniquely fine man and anything but the way they are trying to make us feel he might be.
But that he is special doesn't matter. Even if someone had holes in their socks or were moody in their youth or are not very smart or who I don't like or who has body odor or cheats on their taxes...they deserve something like this presented fairly.
It is a must that to present at least the minimal balance, the other sides of this story.
Knowing how volatile the statements and the atmosphere we are in this was indeed akin to attempted assassination of a candidacy, of attempted murder of Truth by burying it in slime and smears and dirt.
You owe us media, you are robbing our nation of a chance at a true choice. You have to make that up to us.
You better try to undo the wounds you inflicted, you better hope the candidacy of this man heals again or the charge against you will be all the greater.