The Politics of Personal Destruction
Reverend Jeremiah Wright, former pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ on Chicago's South Side has been the victim of a systematic attack, wherein he's not the main target. Funny huh? And how, you might ask, can one be the victim of attacks, where you're not the target?
It's easy.
Such a thing happens when your intended target has resisted every entreaty to sling mud and play the usual game of "destroy your adversary," and when the establishment senses that their grip on the reins of power might be slipping, no matter how slightly, away.
No, the real target in this case is Senator Barack Obama. Jeremiah Wright is just a foil.
But a convenient foil he is.
The reverend is controversial. Indeed, he does spit fire from the pulpit and you don't want to be on the receiving end of one of his eloquent (and effective) diatribes. Ask Richard Daley. As a member of his congregation during my time in Chicago, I could count on one thing from Reverend Wright: that he would deliver the truth, unvarnished and without fear. I appreciated that because so rarely do you hear someone speak truth to power, without worrying about the consequences.
And so, his many sermons denouncing the role of the U.S. Government in some of the world's great atrocities, his calling the nation to the carpet, has ensnared him, and one of his (many) famous congregates, Barack Obama. Never once was Wright anti-semetic (he works with many in the Jewish faith in Chicago); and never has he been anti-American (although he does speak out against flawed and failed U.S. policy).
But his "sin" is more insidious than most, to the mainstream.
Here's why white folks (not all, but many) have their beef: He's not walking around being a buffoon or duplicitous. He's not cooning, he's not making himself irrelevant by personal misdeed. He's not debasing himself to make a buck or to enrich his own. He's being true to his word and his calling things as he sees them.
And, black and brown and other people (of color) are listening and internalizing his message.
When the reverend says that God calls everyone, black, white, straight, gay and in-between, rich or poor, the upstanding or the downtrodden, the saint and the sinner, to the altar to worship, he's right. Faith isn't limited to just those that look or act like you or I do.
When Reverend Wright says that America has been untrue to her own "ideals," he's correct. This country fails its least-able, both Black and White, on a daily basis. Equality in America is a myth. Only thing is, many white poor and working-class people don't see how they're at the bottom, unappreciated, unwanted and expendable, too, just like poor black and Latin folks.
When he says there is an element of racism in Zionist thought, he's correct. Mocha-skinned Palestinians die 10-, 20-, 30-, 40-to-1 when one of their own kills a Jewish citizen of Israel. And the world sits by and does nothing to stop the carnage, because Israel "has a right to defend herself." Sure she does. But wholesale slaughter and oppression of the indigenous people there is something God will surely remember of his "chosen people."
When Wright says that 9/11 was at least in part due to America's role in marginalizing other people of color in the middle east, he's right. Their oil is good enough for us, but God forbid those "towel-heads" and "sand niggers" govern themselves as they see fit. That wouldn't be American. We might have to undercut their governments, support the murder of their leaders, install our own favored dictators, and export our own version of democracy, so they don't get any ideas. And then we wonder why the weapons and policies and people we turned loose on them are turned back on us.
When Reverend Wright says "The government gives [black peoples] the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, God damn America, that's in the Bible for killing innocent people," he is right!
"God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human. God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme."
Damn Skippy. And I'm a native-born, patriotic, red-blooded, tax paying, capitalist, "U-S-A" chanting-during-the-Olympics, American citizen. But I'm one who is disappointed when the country of my birth fails the very people that have made her great.
Jeremiah Wright is...right. And what's scary for a select few is, perhaps Barack Obama believes it too... you can hear folks now: "He's drank the truth Flavor-Aid too?! Oh that nigger can't be my president!"
You see, that's why Wright is the target.
Obama has been presidential in his bearing, and has escaped the urge to debase himself in the face of attacks from every quarter. But, his soft underbelly is, and has been, his religion, or at least questions surrounding it. Remember, he was alleged to be a Muslim...Well, we know that's not true. He's a Christian.
But what kind of Christian? is the question that the mainstream wants you to ask.
What better way to sew the seeds of doubt than to cast his pastor, his church, and therefore his faith into question. It's sad and it's despicable. This is the worst kind of character assassination, with a bonus: you destroy two good men for the price of one.
This is the real politics of personal destruction.
It's easy.
Such a thing happens when your intended target has resisted every entreaty to sling mud and play the usual game of "destroy your adversary," and when the establishment senses that their grip on the reins of power might be slipping, no matter how slightly, away.
No, the real target in this case is Senator Barack Obama. Jeremiah Wright is just a foil.
But a convenient foil he is.
The reverend is controversial. Indeed, he does spit fire from the pulpit and you don't want to be on the receiving end of one of his eloquent (and effective) diatribes. Ask Richard Daley. As a member of his congregation during my time in Chicago, I could count on one thing from Reverend Wright: that he would deliver the truth, unvarnished and without fear. I appreciated that because so rarely do you hear someone speak truth to power, without worrying about the consequences.
And so, his many sermons denouncing the role of the U.S. Government in some of the world's great atrocities, his calling the nation to the carpet, has ensnared him, and one of his (many) famous congregates, Barack Obama. Never once was Wright anti-semetic (he works with many in the Jewish faith in Chicago); and never has he been anti-American (although he does speak out against flawed and failed U.S. policy).
But his "sin" is more insidious than most, to the mainstream.
Here's why white folks (not all, but many) have their beef: He's not walking around being a buffoon or duplicitous. He's not cooning, he's not making himself irrelevant by personal misdeed. He's not debasing himself to make a buck or to enrich his own. He's being true to his word and his calling things as he sees them.
And, black and brown and other people (of color) are listening and internalizing his message.
When the reverend says that God calls everyone, black, white, straight, gay and in-between, rich or poor, the upstanding or the downtrodden, the saint and the sinner, to the altar to worship, he's right. Faith isn't limited to just those that look or act like you or I do.
When Reverend Wright says that America has been untrue to her own "ideals," he's correct. This country fails its least-able, both Black and White, on a daily basis. Equality in America is a myth. Only thing is, many white poor and working-class people don't see how they're at the bottom, unappreciated, unwanted and expendable, too, just like poor black and Latin folks.
When he says there is an element of racism in Zionist thought, he's correct. Mocha-skinned Palestinians die 10-, 20-, 30-, 40-to-1 when one of their own kills a Jewish citizen of Israel. And the world sits by and does nothing to stop the carnage, because Israel "has a right to defend herself." Sure she does. But wholesale slaughter and oppression of the indigenous people there is something God will surely remember of his "chosen people."
When Wright says that 9/11 was at least in part due to America's role in marginalizing other people of color in the middle east, he's right. Their oil is good enough for us, but God forbid those "towel-heads" and "sand niggers" govern themselves as they see fit. That wouldn't be American. We might have to undercut their governments, support the murder of their leaders, install our own favored dictators, and export our own version of democracy, so they don't get any ideas. And then we wonder why the weapons and policies and people we turned loose on them are turned back on us.
When Reverend Wright says "The government gives [black peoples] the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, God damn America, that's in the Bible for killing innocent people," he is right!
"God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human. God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme."
Damn Skippy. And I'm a native-born, patriotic, red-blooded, tax paying, capitalist, "U-S-A" chanting-during-the-Olympics, American citizen. But I'm one who is disappointed when the country of my birth fails the very people that have made her great.
Jeremiah Wright is...right. And what's scary for a select few is, perhaps Barack Obama believes it too... you can hear folks now: "He's drank the truth Flavor-Aid too?! Oh that nigger can't be my president!"
You see, that's why Wright is the target.
Obama has been presidential in his bearing, and has escaped the urge to debase himself in the face of attacks from every quarter. But, his soft underbelly is, and has been, his religion, or at least questions surrounding it. Remember, he was alleged to be a Muslim...Well, we know that's not true. He's a Christian.
But what kind of Christian? is the question that the mainstream wants you to ask.
What better way to sew the seeds of doubt than to cast his pastor, his church, and therefore his faith into question. It's sad and it's despicable. This is the worst kind of character assassination, with a bonus: you destroy two good men for the price of one.
This is the real politics of personal destruction.
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what would be presidential is for obama to decide whether he really wants wright in his corner or not. quit spaghetti-backing when it benefits ou or hinders you. when he was running for senate wright was an asset, now he's a liability. figure it out. i can't say i don't agree with wright myself on SOME things, but for obama to act like e had no clue what wright, his spiritual mentor, was saying in the beginning was silly. you knew what this dude was saying, but now that folks are mad, you want to denounce it. it sounds like politics as usual to me.
Here is my problem with all this religious-based nonsense, and this goes back to the need for Obama to "renounce and reject" Minister Farrakan. The segregated, jim-crow, aparthied-in-action American created the necessity of the Black Church-Christian and Muslim. Obama should not have to apologize for the words of these men who, 99 percent of the time, are only speaking of truth, empowerment, fiscal and social responsibility. The fact that Wright and the Minister have more in common with the conservatives (Pro-life, Pro-marriage, self-regulation rather than government) isn't even being mentioned.
Obama should ask the press to listen to more of what all of these people said, then get back to him. He, like most, disagree when the rhetoric turns divisive, isolationist, or antagonistic. But when they talk about the Black community needing to step up and do what it hasn't been doing, when they talk about demanding that America represent the ideals of the founders, with every citizen represented, respected and protected... Sorry, those positive comments didn't get the sound-bites.
When everything is said and done, Obama should demand he, like everyone else, should be judged by his own words and his own actions. This renouncing and rejecting BS needs to stop. Can we talk about the economy? Education? Foreign affairs? Still dangling Katrina victims getting evicted out of homes that were killing them anyway? Escalating violence in America? I can't take four more weeks of this. I'm getting to the point where I would be content for them to flip a coin, pick a winner, shut the hell up, heal the rift among the Dems, and actually act like a party that is trying to get elected to the presidency of the UNITED STATES, not a high school with a whole lot of short school buses parked outside...\
Much Love!
@Lynn ...what would be presidential is for obama to decide whether he really wants wright in his corner or not. quit spaghetti-backing when it benefits ou or hinders you. when he was running for senate wright was an asset, now he's a liability...
Fair enough.
Question is, regardless of what he chooses to do, does he get the same shake any other politician gets in the same situation?
I doubt it.
Obama is in the f***ed up position of being a black man with controversial black men (Farrakhan and Wright) that support his campaign. But because he's trying NOT to play the race card, he can't even take support from these men without vetting their every word.
Reverse this situation and make it someone on the Christian right, who makes some more-outrageous remark like Pat Robertson, Bob Jones III, Ralph Reed, the deceased Jerry Falwell (who I think said that 9/11 happened as punishment of America because of Jews and Gays), or any of a hundred more of those "religious" hacks and this is a non-issue.
Unfortunately for Obama, he HAS to move away, because silly-assed white folks (and some others) will hold against him words that he didn't even utter.
Sen. Obama, as he's said in the past, does not think of the former pastor of his church in political terms. Nor should he. He went to TUCC for spiritual uplift.
But the hidden monster -- race -- rears its ugly head such that Obama can't even be judged by the same rules as everyone else.
@Effaridi
You were posting at the same time I was...And pretty much the same thoughts.
Can we focus on issues, and not what some pastor, any pastor has said?
I'm way more worried about $115/barrel oil, and the economy tanking, than I am what Jeremiah Wright said (and was taken out of context) six or seven years ago.
@both of yas, i totally agree that i've been longing for this election to be based solely on the issues from the beginning. unfortunately, and i'm sure both of you will disagree with me, but when there was more hillary bashing in the beginning, nobody was worrying about this, but now that they've hit obama up too, now it's an issue.
the point is that democrats are in the same position they are every time elections come about, and even moreso now, we're being systematically divided. I truly believe in my heart that democrats like and appreciate things about both candidates, but with the media and overzealous supporters on both sides there has been so such extremism on both sides that the party has been divided and now we're all tired.
But I hope not too tired to keep fighting in the general election. now while i openly am a hillary supporter, again i say that if obama gets elected, i am fully behind him. i do NOT want to see this divide us so much that we don't go out and vote in the general election or god forbid go to the republican side... it's just not worth another 4 years of this hell.
this is an interesting article in regards to the response to geraldine ferraro's comments last week... tell me your thoughts:
main quote to note: "Mr. Obama has pointedly acknowledged that he benefits from his race, noting last year that a new white senator from Illinois would hardly have stirred comparable interest or intrigue. So Mr. Obama has embraced his role, but he has strived to be defined by more than color alone."
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/24/washington/24obama.html?_r=2&sq=obama%20third%20senator%20reconstruction&st=nyt&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&scp=10&pagewanted=all&adxnnlx=1205814418-c8BhsJNXK3fLbHSn/StHLQ&oref=slogin
That is a very interesting article and a great find! I do think, however, that while you did identify one of the most important parts of the article, I think you miss its significance.
Mr. Obama has gained notoriety because he is black, but that is in the context of him being elected as a senator from Illinois.
He's also correct that had Illinois elected another young, white senator, that individual would garner little national attention immediately, because in fact, he'd be white and young, and from Illinois, three things one would -- wrongly or rightly -- expect to happen in the American midwest.
But the reality is, given the fact that there have been a whopping THREE black senators to serve since Reconstruction -- a period of over 120 years, from about 1877 to now -- Obama is correct in that his blackness has helped him grab some spotlight.
In truth, I suspect that any black senator would benefit in the same fashion. By way of example, it should be noted that Carol Mosely Braun received the same "black senator bounce", and she was a candidate for president briefly in 2004. People said the same thing about her aborted campaign: "she's getting attention because she's a black woman."
But let's not confuse "notoriety" with "benefit." There's a fine-line difference.
What Geraldine Ferraro was insinuating is that Obama's only asset is his race, and that somehow, he's garnering attention simply because he's black. He is "benefiting" from his race. That is too simplistic, and does him -- and the rest of us, regardless of who we support -- a disservice because she wants to marginalize his substantial non-African-American support.
No, the truth is, he's got notoriety because he's young, black, and from Illinois. That is vastly different from what Ferraro suggested.
Real talk: let's not get it twisted; it is hardly his good fortune -- or to his benefit -- in much if not most of "Red-state" America to have been born black and to be named Barack Hussein Obama.
There's a big difference between what she suggests and what is reality.