This whole episode with the pastor -- as well as the crazy pastor who endorsed John McCain -- leaves me longing for a truly secular presidential candidate. There's just too much damn religion in politics. I know it's naive to think that a non-religious person will ever be a serious presidential nominee, but I still long for it.

-- midnightdream

Tuesday, March 18, 2008 08:32 PM

Bless you, hallelujah, amen - Damn! I've got to get some secular compliment words.

Bravo!

I deliberately waited this long to pull the trigger on this comment just to make it obvious that no one else was going to do so.

-- Aycharaych

How very kind of you. I know I have learned my lesson. The next time Obama replies to anything, anything at all that he has been asked to reply to, I will be sure to complain if he doesn't bring up the subject of "melanin in his skin" into his reply. After all, he is "the black candidate" right. And "the black candidate" is required to always address "the melanin in his skin" no matter what the subject is that he is being addresses about.

I'd happily wager that I could have waited until the thread was locked and no one else would have made this observation.

Aych, this is why you get so much pushback. It's not enough for you to make a valid, important observation. It's not enough for you to make a novel addition to the thread. You have to do it in such a way that somehow makes your novel observation somehow superior to everyone else's and not-so-subtly suggests that no one else is as moral, as virtuous, as clear-seeing as you.

It's not because of your politics.

It's because you're kind of an asshole about it.

I know this is a fantasy but just think about it:

What if Hillary came out and said, "Obama is what this country needs and I am stopping my campaign immediately. I would be honored to be his vice-presidential running mate but if he doesn't choose me, I will do everything in my power to see Obama elected as president."

Not bloody likely.....

In many ways, especially if you still embrace it like Obama seems to be proud of today. No one sane cares that his parents sent him to this or that school when he was 7. But if he gets up most Sundays, as he claims to now, plunks his butt in the pew and spends a raucous hour listening to this drivel then that's what he does, and reflects on and excuses today. Now. It's like claiming that an Italian politician really doesn't have any connection to the Mafia if a Don is his kids' Godfather, they all hang out together and yet the politician claims after the fact to not have any truck with organized crime.

Uh, ok, in a court of law that's called a conflict of interest.

Does it really matter if Obama is right? What matters is how its processed and packaged and presented to the public by the usual media suspects. How many people saw the speech in full, uninterrupted? Most people saw segments followed by "this is what you really saw" commentary by the same rouges gallery of shrieking heads who are somehow experts on every issue that arises.

What matters is whether or not Obama connect with the public outside of the media noise machines. That was his strength early in the campaign. He somewhat derailed when he attempted to play by the rules the Clintons end up writing. Hopefully this was not too late to get him back on track. One of Barack Obama's greatest appeals is that he doesn't dumb down or talk down to people. He seems to speak with the assumption that people are intelligent and engaged. He's inclusive, not divisive. Our current media is shrill, divisive and combative. They need to be to sustain a 24 hour tv/radio/ print cycle. The Clintons thrive in that, Obama doesn't. If he can regain his place somewhat removed from that dynamic, he'll recapture the public's imagination. His speech yesterday may have done that if enough people paid attention. He looked and sounded completely presidential. He spoke honestly and confronted an uncomfortable issue aas directly as we have seen. Compare that to Clinton's carefully constructed and contrived appearance and John McCain's senile-appearing appearance with Joe Lieberman in Lebanon and it was a good day for Obama all around.

On another note. I grew up on the southwest side of Chicago. My parents were racist, my grand parents were racist. They were, despite that, good people. They were creatures of their enviroment, and unfortunately it was a pretty intollerant and racist environment. Geowing up gay on the southwest side of chicago was not fun, let me tell you. I am constantly amazed and amused by the outrage and indignation of whites when confronted by anger and frustration of blacks. I can't presume to know what it is like living as an African American, but I certainly acknowledge their difficulty. Were Rev. Wright's comment over the top? Yes, some of them were, but there was an honesty at their core that I feel white's just don't understand. Ironically, there is very little white outrage or indignation over the bigotted and homophobic venom regularly spewed from the Christian right and right wing talk radio.

Obama delivered a pretty magnificent speech. John McCain still has not properly addressed his own "clergy problem."

Tell me I'm wrong..

Tell me that someone else was going to point out the stinking dead elephant in the room.

Your wrong. Justice is not blind.

And not one comment noting that a black man running for president of the USA made a forty five minute speech on race in America today and never once mentioned that one in three of his fellow black males will go to prison in his lifetime. ...

There is only so much a man can mention in any one speech on a given topic; but I will give you that a speech on race relations should mention the disparity between white incarceration rates and black incarceration rates. Whites notice this disparity even as they keep mum about it.

The drug war is the main cause; how in the hell can a desperate poor man in the inner city (white or black) beat the "smuggler's blues" as the song told us of years ago. Since it is the drug war that is a big part of the problem, a presidential candidate can not mention it if he wants to be elected in America.

Nor can he mention Israel's actions in Palestine. Ron Paul said he would not help Israel (or Arab states either) and look what it got him.

These are simple facts; even as we wish they were not.