Does anyone believe that this is the first Obama has heard of these series of remarks by Wright?

[ruggerson]

Obama is a pretty religious guy and it's pretty hard to believe that he wasn't sitting in the pew for at least a few of the things this guy said. Or at least heard about them from fellow parishioners.

The man has been going to the same church for twenty years.

When Wright said that Clinton screwed the African American community like he screwed Monica Lewinsky and then started mimicking sexual gyrations in the pulpit, we are supposed to believe that Obama never heard about it?

I'm glad he repudiated Wright's more offensive remarks. I don't think he needed to repudiate the man, I know they're close.

But I have a hard time believing Barack when he says this is the first he has heard of this.

[ruggerson]

1. .

[jackson_dem]

2. No Obamite has bothered to answer. No sane person can believe he didn't know Wright was a bigot

"present'

[moxie_1]

5. And if you roam around the 'net, you'll see that's going to be the theme for tomorrow:

Obama's being dishonest when he says he didn't know what Wright was about.

[jackson_dem]

43. And the theme at water coolers on Monday, family dinners tomorrow night

[Steely_Dan]

3. He Did Know and...

he was concerned about Wright's rhetoric. Rev. Wright was supposed to say a (public) prayer at Obama's announcement that he would run for President. Obama did not want Wright to give the prayer that day. So, you know that he was aware of Wright's ...problem.

-P

On Edit:

What further concerns me is that Rev. Wright compared the hardships that Obama has faced with the hardships Jesus faced. Troubling.

-P

[Whisp]

4. I still can't believe a democratic Hillary voted with Bush for the Iraq war...

so I'll have to get back to you about this preacher thing when I figure this one out first.

[WinOneAlready]

31. I don't think DU'ers will decide the election, do you?

The point is that this thing with Wright may very well make Obama unelectable. John Q. Public doesn't take very well to "God Damn America." Hell, I'm a lefty, and even I don't take well to it. I think it was his Dean scream moment.

[Whisp]

34. ha! with all the foreclosures and all the etc.

I'd say they're a lot of God Damn America going on.

[WinOneAlready]

35. I don't think most Americans hate their country

Maybe on DU that thinking is more prevalent, but not in the real world, I don't think. And I even live in a blue state.

[Whisp]

38. it's not about hating your country

it's hating the few people who have changed it into something else.

The country is the people, but we forget sometimes. so the God DamnAmerica has nothing to do with our neighbours and friends but everything to do with what the Bushes and Clintons are.

[WinOneAlready]

39. It didn't sound that way when they played the clip

It sounds like Obama goes to a church for the past 20 years with a religious zealot nutball for a pastor. Kind of makes you question that judgement he keeps telling us is so good.

[DearAbby]

49. I donno

Most of America is struggling trying to survive. Patriotism is not top most on their minds. Wondering where they are going to get the extra money to fill up their cars so they can get to work, probably occupying more and more of their attention lately. What now do they have to go without, so they can do this? Pray like hell no one gets sick or in an accident. There are some who are wondering when their loved one will return home from Iraq, and what condition will they be in when they do get home.

Sometimes I feel this country has been damned. Damned from years of this shit. And wondering when will it end? We have a chance. The condition of this country is nothing to be proud of. We have a lot of work ahead of us. It's time we set aside our differences, and get to work. By doing so, we can create something we surely can be proud of.

[Umbram]

6. I doubt that this was the first he's heard of it. (nt)

[Orangepeel]

7. I keep seeing clips from the same two sermons, so I don't know what he said regularly

I believe it was the first he saw it on video and realized how crazy it sounded.

[Justice Is Comin]

8. Have you seen Meet the Press?

The only time he isn't lying his ass off is when Russert is talking.

[Whisp]

9. how can you possibly equate this with Hillary's vote for war?

really, truly.
wtf?

thats my yardstick. devastating bone grinding deathly war.

compared to a preacher talking loud.


??????? !!!!!!

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

15. Are you high? Is there something in the OP about the war?

[Whisp]

25. it's all about The War....

It's not to be dismissed.

She voted for it. She owns a part of it. She was too fucking lazy to read the papers.

Everything she says and does is related because her tactics are so beneath what reality is for so many she chose to send off while she's comfortably yapping and finger pointing and coiffed and well taken care of. Sons and daughters are being bodily RIPPED APART, maimed, crying for help, because of THE FUCKING WAR she didn't stand against because of her personal political usage.

There are people being pulverized, right now, while we comfortably yap about some preacher talking too loud or SAYING some things that make some uncomfortable.

It's ALL ABOUT WAR. It has been for a long time now. Follow the money, don't follow a sermon to make it into a false war of words that doesn't exist except for campaign purposes.

[Honeycombe8]

21. I consider racist hatemongering talk more than a tad offensive. It can be deadly,

as we all know. But even if it weren't, ask any black person which he thinks is worse: the Iraq War, or hatermongering talk against his race.

Depends on your point of view, I'd say. To the average black person, I'm guessing they'd say the latter. It's PERSONAL. That's how some whites feel about this man...he said the same thing someone from the KKK would say about blacks, only it's in reverse.

[woolldog]

24. what exactly did he say that bothered you?

I don't see anything racist about the clips that I've seen.

[WinOneAlready]

36. Seems pretty clear Wright hates whites and America

[Whisp]

27. There is no reverse, It does not exist.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

29. Well, thank heavens we have that straightened out. Good to know.

[Whisp]

32. assuming you are a white person of privilege

did your ancestors go for price at block like livestock?
when was your family allowed to vote?
do your grandparents have remembrances of lynchings?
are you at risk for Driving While White?

There is no reverse racism unless this is so. and it is not so.

[PerfectSage]

10. So when is Hillary gonna go on Hannity and Combs and explain why she

belongs to a nutty right wing christian cult: The Fellowship with ties to Bush/Rove? Is that the first she ever heard of it?

[WinOneAlready]

17. I don't think that will fly

He has embraced Wright over and over, called him his mentor and spritual advisor, and written a book he says was inspired by the man. I don't think H&C is going to ask her about a bible study group while they have this issue with Obama to chew on.

[MonkeyFunk]

18. because she doesn't?

easy answer

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

20. Perhaps a docent will help you find your way back to whatever thread you think you're in

[PerfectSage]

30. A docent? Now that sounds like someting outta a Da Vinci Code Novel

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

11. Actually, nobody knows which remarks he repudiated

He repudiated the ones that are controversial... whatever that means.

It's an excellent trick, to be able to repudiate whatever anyone's upset about without ever acknowledging what he's even talking about.

It's a blanket statement, "I stand for whatever is good, and against whatever is bad."

Hell... If we had known that was an option all the candidates could have just announced that upfront and saved a lot of wear and tear. "Let me say, as I commence my campaign, that I'm sure that I and my surrogates and associates had said some awful thing in the past, and will say a lot of awful things in the months to come, so I repudiate whatever the hell it is you people will be upset about later."

[Ravy]

12. I take him at his word. nt

[WinOneAlready]

Well he knew enough.....

to disinvite him to previous events. I think the big mistake Obama made tonight was to pretend as if he this was all news to him. The press is going to eat that alive. He did the same thing with Rezko. Starting to look like a pattern. This is very bad for the party.

[robbedvoter]

13. Sure! he disinvited him last year on a whim. And Wright made sure for 20 years

to be on his best behavior when BO was there...:shrug:

[mrbscott19]

14. I'm an Obama supporter

and I think he's lying. But I also think there isn't a person on this planet who agrees with every single thing their priest/pastor/whatever says. I doubt there are 2 people on the planet who agree with each other on every single thing. This is a non-issue.

[scheming daemons]

16. These remarks represent about 5 total minutes out of 12,000+ hours of sermons....

The clips you have seen were SPECIFICALLY chosen because they represent the most incendiary things that Wright has said....


What, besides Hannity's spin, makes you think the other 99.9999% of his sermons were as incendiary?

[WinOneAlready]

19. Oh, I'll bet there is much more

Wright looks to be fairly crazed. This is probably the tip of the iceberg. The next stories will be about Obama claiming he didn't know about the pastor's views on every news channel tonight when there is ample evidence he did know. That was a foolish falsehood for Obama to tell.

[scheming daemons]

23. Um... sorry... I would think Fox would be playing the WORST clips now.....

They scanned his sermons going back for at least 7 years... and they found the 5 minutes from the 3 or 4 sermons that we've all seen on TV.


They specifically CHOSE the worst ones, to create the story.

[WinOneAlready]

28. Well this is way worse than anything they had on Kerry

I'm not sure how you can deny that. I guess you are a true believer and nothing will make you see reality if this story doesn't.

[lumpy]

47. U Tube has several clips of Wright's sermons. There certainly

was more than 5 minutes of his 'worst ones'. Of course Fox isn't going to take up time presenting all of it. Looks to me like Wright was preaching and parroting Farrakhan on a regular basis.

[democrattotheend]

22. If these comments were isolated incidents and not typical sermons, absolutely

I explained why here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=5087537&mesg_id=5087537

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

26. Anything is possible, but they are close. They know each other.

Let's say a have a very close relationship with someone. And that someone gives a speech in the park every Saturday.

I go listen to him most Saturdays for twenty years. And when I'm out of town, sometimes my wife goes by herself to hear him.

And every time I see him speak it's about the brotherhood of man.

Except sometimes when he speaks it's about how Japanese people should all be deported. But I just happen to miss all of those. And so does my wife... or else she doesn't find it noteworthy enough to even mention. And no one in my circle who hear him speak ever thinks it's noteworthy enough to mention to me. "Hey... what's the heck is up with Tom and Japanese people?"

And in my close friendship with him over 15 or 20 years talking about all sorts of things, I never picked up on him having any problem with Japanese people.

If Barack is telling the truth then it suggests that nobody in his Trinity circle who saw those sermons thought anything untoward about them... not enough to mention. (And talking about whether everyone else agrees with that sort of wild sermon last week is something people in church circles do talk about.)

Sure, it could all happen. But nobody should be expected to believe it. True or untrue, it doesn't pass the giggle test, and that's the only test that matters in politics.

[boppers]

42. You ever been to a branch of the UCC?

How about a fire and brimstone Baptist service?

Maybe watched a TV evangelist?

Wright hasn't said anything YET, AFAICT, that's even worth pausing over, unless one is of the indignant-and-fainting crowd, or is sooooo incredibly out of touch with Black America that they don't realize how colorful, and common, this general style of invective is.

protip: google chickens and Malcom X.

[mattclearing]

33. If you read his article at HuffPo, you'd know Obama said he was aware of them when he declared.

Link? Do you have any idea what you are talking about?

[HuffleClaw]

37. not a chance

and its already been disproven

[boppers]

40. Inventing a lie, and then claiming Obama made it, looks like the next strategy.

It's the same BS strategy they're puling with Rezko.

Obama said that a few very specific remarks were ones that he heard for THE FIRST TIME.

(Gyrations, by the way, don't make noises until you're my age.)

He's not saying he didn't hear rumors.
He's not saying he didn't know Wright had colorful invective.
He's not saying he didn't know Wright was controversial.

The media, and his opposition, are trying to paint him as a hypocrite, and will create false realities (and perceptions thereof) left and right in order to pretend that Obama said, or didn't say, something he should have.

Rev up your engines folks, this game's going to the wire.

[DiggerDan]

41. This whole manufactured controversy is laughable

Toss out the AIDS comment by Wright and there's ABSOLUTELY NOTHING he said that I haven't seen on DU since Shit for Brains was sworn in. There was a time, before the Hillary supporters took over the board with their plastic flag waving bravado Wright would have been a hero around DU.

[rodeodance]

45. HA HA---Us Hillary supporters are the TRUTH BRIGAGE-keeping you informed and honest.

There was a time, before the Hillary supporters took over the board with their plastic flag waving bravado Wright would have been a hero around DU.

[rodeodance]

44. BO ddi not pass the smell test of WHEN DID HE KNOW.

[rodeodance]

46. thanks

[MethuenProgressive]

48. "I never heard his sermons, I just attended for 20 years wearing earmuffs"

Another fairy tale...