Hitchens lowers the boom on Obama and Wright; Update: Obama’s numbers inch down again
posted at 1:29 pm on March 24, 2008 by Allahpundit
I’m still in the grip of Wright fatigue but better writers than I are not, so let me direct some traffic. Read Karl’s link-heavy response to the claim that Trinity — whose new pastor spent Easter comparing Jeremiah “America invented AIDS” Wright to the crucified Christ — isn’t a “crackpot church.” Note the data cited near the end. One of the keys to Obama’s strategy in getting himself off the hook is convincing whites that Wright’s beliefs, however regrettable they may be, are thoroughly mainstream in black America and therefore inescapable; why, walk into any black church and you’re bound to hear the same thing, which is why he can’t disown the good reverend without disowning the entire community. The numbers beg to differ, although naturally that won’t stop the media from trying to prop up his thesis with anecdotal evidence. Thus does the new great national conversation on race begin with a lie, smearing untold millions of blacks who don’t follow people like Wright in order to excuse a guy who did for 20 years.
That brings us to Hitch, whose views on which churches do and don’t qualify as “crackpot” are, as always, more nuanced. We fade in with Obama having just thrown grandma under the bus…
This flabbergasting process, made up of glibness and ruthlessness in equal proportions, rolls on unstoppably with a phalanx of reporters and men of the cloth as its accomplices. Look at the accepted choice of words for the ravings of Jeremiah Wright: controversial, incendiary, inflammatory. ["Fiery"? -- ed.] These are adjectives that might have been—and were—applied to many eloquent speakers of the early civil rights movement. (In the Washington Post, for Good Friday last, the liberal Catholic apologist E.J. Dionne lamely attempted to stretch this very comparison.) But is it “inflammatory” to say that AIDS and drugs are wrecking the black community because the white power structure wishes it? No. Nor is it “controversial.” It is wicked and stupid and false to say such a thing. And it not unimportantly negates everything that Obama says he stands for by way of advocating dignity and responsibility over the sick cults of paranoia and victimhood…
I assume you all have your copies of The Audacity of Hope in paperback breviary form. If you turn to the chapter entitled “Faith,” beginning on Page 195, and read as far as Page 208, I think that even if you don’t concur with my reading, you may suspect that I am onto something. In these pages, Sen. Obama is telling us that he doesn’t really have any profound religious belief, but that in his early Chicago days he felt he needed to acquire some spiritual “street cred.” The most excruciatingly embarrassing endorsement of this same viewpoint came last week from Abigail Thernstrom at National Review Online. Overcome by “the speech” that the divine one had given in Philadelphia, she urged us to be understanding. “Obama’s description of the parishioners in his church gave white listeners a glimpse of a world of faith (with ‘raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor … dancing, clapping, screaming, and shouting’) that has been the primary means of black survival and uplift.” A glimpse, huh? What the hell next? A tribute to the African-American sense of rhythm?
To have accepted Obama’s smooth apologetics is to have lowered one’s own pre-existing standards for what might constitute a post-racial or a post-racist future. It is to have put that quite sober and realistic hope, meanwhile, into untrustworthy and unscrupulous hands. And it is to have done this, furthermore, in the service of blind faith. Mark my words: This disappointment is only the first of many that are still to come.
Follow the link for what Team Obama’s demagoguery of Geraldine Ferraro means for the new “post-racial” politics, and for thoughts on James Meeks, another friend of Barry, and Hagee and Rod Parsley, not quite spiritual gurus of 20 years standing for McCain (and yes, Rick Ellensburg, that is a relevant distinction) but deemed worthy of endorsement nonetheless.
Update: Only a one-point drop since Saturday but the Messiah’s favorable/unfavorable spread is now -6. Hillary’s, incidentally? -13.
Blowback
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It’s 10am on Sunday morning…
faraway on March 24, 2008 at 1:31 PM
I am still eagerly waiting for Christopher Hitchens to say at least one thing I would actually give a flying flaming rat’s patootie about.
pilamaye on March 24, 2008 at 1:40 PM
The Hussein Train is off the tracks.
saved on March 24, 2008 at 1:42 PM
Preach it, Brother Hitchens! I’m a-feelin’ some o’ that “inchoate resentment” myself!
Oh, wait…
pseudonominus on March 24, 2008 at 1:50 PM
Oh Hitch…
Vizzini on March 24, 2008 at 1:53 PM
Incidentally, I just put up a post explaining the importance of factoring in the temporal dimension (and not just the three spatial ones) when determining a relationship between two people. I’m not sure why liberals have trouble with that concept, but its easy enough to explain.
frankj on March 24, 2008 at 1:56 PM
Oh shit, that’s too funny. Ha!
It’s really insane though, am I supposed to think this is what every black church has as a component? Ugh. Depressing.
Dash on March 24, 2008 at 1:57 PM
Obama and Hillary might be closet agnosts, continuing to fool many…both are capable of such grand deceit.
Entelechy on March 24, 2008 at 2:00 PM
The year is so new…and way more interesting than anticipated.
Entelechy on March 24, 2008 at 2:01 PM
AP,
Thanks for the link and the kind words. FWIW, I spend a lot of time looking for other topics. But if Obama is going to just visit friendly fora to make untrue claims, I feel compelled to write about it.
I’ll also take this opportunity to very pointedly note that the angle no one else seems to be interested in is the degree to which the theology of Obama’s church runs contrary to the principle of separation of religion and politics. Granted, I’m sure you (AP) are as aware as any that said separation is observed to varying degrees in US history — but black libeartion theology was influenced by Karl Barth, a German theologian who comes out of a tradition that never bought into the Enlightenment.
Karl on March 24, 2008 at 2:02 PM
I think “typical white” folks are just coming to realize they may have been hoodwinked.
White folks have been “post racial” for some years now. If these churches are typical, it would be clear that blacks have been secretly preaching “hate” for years.
faraway on March 24, 2008 at 2:03 PM
Hitch always manages to cut through the chaff, there can be little doubt that Barry is a solid gold plated phony. He has cynically attached himself to this ‘church’ as a means to a political not spriritual end and thus feels he has no need to truly disassociate himself from the reverend hate monger’s views in his attempts to be all things to all people and con the American people into his brand of socialism.
StuCon on March 24, 2008 at 2:05 PM
I love when all the lunatics have at it.
Now Hitch is in the pig pile.
Hening on March 24, 2008 at 2:06 PM
This nobody is quite interested in those topics. You’re doing a great job, Karl.
baldilocks on March 24, 2008 at 2:16 PM
AP, thanks for referencing this article; it’s good to hear not-your-typical-conservative-or-right-wing-site slam NObama and his mentor.
Of the last paragraph, which you did copy, I liked this part the most:
To have accepted Obama’s smooth apologetics is to have lowered one’s own pre-existing standards for what might constitute a post-racial or a post-racist future. It is to have put that quite sober and realistic hope, meanwhile, into untrustworthy and unscrupulous hands. And it is to have done this, furthermore, in the service of blind faith. Mark my words: This disappointment is only the first of many that are still to come.
Disaster, not simply “disappointment”, is the historical resultant when such dangerous people aspire to power.
Lockstein13 on March 24, 2008 at 2:19 PM
Most attempts to gain “street cred” end in the same way: the crowd with which one had hoped to gain favor for personal gain ends up costing him much more in the end. Obama seems to be gaining quite the reputation as a result of attending his church, although it’s probably not the reputation he envisioned when he first started listening to Wright’s sermons.
Big S on March 24, 2008 at 2:19 PM
I guess Hitch is just another typical white person.
Sugar Land on March 24, 2008 at 2:21 PM
heh….looking at that screencap, I thought Hitchens quit smoking…
JetBoy on March 24, 2008 at 2:22 PM
I don’t often agree with Mr. Hitchens, but in this case he’s hit the nail squarely and firmly on the head and sunk it in one blow.
I’ve been to many black churches and never heard anything like this at all. I don’t think they’d suddenly change their service because one white woman showed up. Likewise, I’ve known too many black people whose goal in life is to have a nice life for themselves and their families, who educate and discipline their children appropriately, who live and work hard to believe that they have nothing better to do than kill whitey or blame them for every last ill or setback they suffer.
I’m done with racial crap for myself. It’s Dr. King’s “content of character” thing for me and mine. Mr. Wright’s character shines through loud and clear, and by derivation, Mr. Obama’s who has listened to this tripe for over 20 years.
Mommynator on March 24, 2008 at 2:22 PM
Hussein scoped the Chicago landscape and decided, “Hmmm, if I join this lunatic’s church, it’ll wash out being raised in Hawaii by my white mom.” I mean, he joined this
race cultchurch to seem normal.Akzed on March 24, 2008 at 2:22 PM
Perfect description of Kmiec’s column where he declares for Obama after supporting Romney. How embarrassing for him.
funky chicken on March 24, 2008 at 2:40 PM
Me too. Not one “the CIA invented AIDS to kill blacks” or “FDR knew about Pearl harbor” or, for that matter, any discussion of the “grassy knoll” conspiracy theory either.
I wonder if the Rev. Dr. Wright ever did a sermon on how a peace loving palestinian like Sirhan Sirhan could never have killed a soldier for the oppressed like RFK?
Obama’s church is home to racism and crackpot conspiracy theories, and he chose to take his kids there for spiritual education. End of story.
funky chicken on March 24, 2008 at 2:45 PM
Hey now. Reverend James Meeks is a member of the privileged class now. He’s State Senator Reverend James Meeks.
gabriel sutherland on March 24, 2008 at 2:48 PM
“Hitch always manages to cut through the chaff, there can be little doubt that Barry is a solid gold plated phony.”
Most of his apologists are relying upon him being a phony on religion.
davod on March 24, 2008 at 2:52 PM
Dead on.
Attila (Pillage Idiot) on March 24, 2008 at 2:54 PM
Hitch scores another one. It’s true though, what is yet to come before the GE. There will be blood.
ronsfi on March 24, 2008 at 2:55 PM
Anyone who pulls that kind of shi**y stunt with their Grandma is not a very nice person.
Wonder if he goes to church, oh, wait…I bet the Good Rev would do the same.
Barry is a ruthless mfer.
benrand on March 24, 2008 at 3:02 PM
Boy, I’ve been waiting for Hitchens to check in on this, and I am not disappointed. If he chooses to make the rounds on the issue, he might head first over to MSNBC and give Chris Matthews the bitch slap he richly deserves. This guy Wright is a christian version of Louis Farrakhan. I see very little difference between the two in terms of views on race and society.
Sean68 on March 24, 2008 at 3:12 PM
Now let me guess your race…
Nonfactor on March 24, 2008 at 3:14 PM
After reading Hitichens, I’m more concerned over “grandma” then I was before. It’s not just “white grandmother” anymore, it’s “sick white alone grandmother.”
Obama doesn’t deserve “benefits of the doubt,” as some have given him in the media (O’Reilly), because he hasn’t earned any points to deserve that. He appears to be nothing more than a “deadbeat grandson,” and a two-faced liar.
moonsbreath on March 24, 2008 at 3:16 PM
Would you have had the same compliants against Martin Luther King and his active political life?
Nonfactor on March 24, 2008 at 3:17 PM
Surely you jest.
Jaibones on March 24, 2008 at 3:19 PM
The problem for Obama is that if he succeeds in convincing whites that Wright’s beliefs are mainstream in black America, he may get off the hook personally for sitting in those pews for 20 years, but he’ll still lose a huge chunk of white voters and set black politicians back a great deal. There are many white voters who will make the decision that America is not ready for a black president after all and won’t be until the black community gets past this Wright-style anger and hatred. People like me who naively thought that most black people don’t think about race every moment of every day are now wondering if we were wrong about that. I now wonder how many of my black acquaintances secretly hate me just because I’m white or believe that I’m part of a power structure that is deliberately scheming to kill black people and keep them from success and happiness. I don’t want a leader who represents a community that hates me, just like they don’t want a leader who’s a member of the KKK–or even someone who just says he “understands the anger” of the KKK and “accepts it” as part of the “reality of being white in America,” and then claims that most white people really do hold the beliefs of the KKK, so that makes it mainstream and therefore okay. What?! No one would go for that for a moment, and I think many people are thinking hard about what Obama said and are deciding they won’t go for it. The polls seem to be confirming my assumption. One can only imagine how hard the public would be turning against Obama and Wright-speech if the media weren’t feeding it to them through a prism of Obama-love.
aero on March 24, 2008 at 3:31 PM
http://blogs.tnr.com/tnr/blogs/the_spine/archive/2008/03/24/thoughts-on-wright.aspx
OBAMA’S PASTOR RAISED IN PRIVILEGE, NOT POVERTY
How do I know?
It happens that, as a Philadelphian, I attended Central High School – the same public school Jeremiah Wright attended from 1955 to 1959. He could have gone to an integrated neighborhood school, but he chose to go to Central, a virtually all-white school. Central is the second oldest public high school in the country, which attracts the most serious academic students in the city. The school then was about 80% Jewish and 95% white. The African-American students, like all the others, were there on merit. Generally speaking, we came from lower/middle class backgrounds. Many of our parents had not received a formal education and we tended to live in row houses. In short, economically, we were roughly on par.
I attended Central a few years after Rev. Wright, so I did not know him personally. But I knew of him and I know where he used to live – in a tree-lined neighborhood of large stone houses in the Germantown section of Philadelphia. This is a lovely neighborhood to this day. Moreover, Rev. Wright’s father was a prominent pastor and his mother was a teacher and later vice-principal and disciplinarian of the Philadelphia High School for Girls, also a distinguished academic high school. Two of my acquaintances remember her as an intimidating and strict disciplinarian and excellent math teacher. In short, Rev. Wright had a comfortable upper-middle class upbringing. It was hardly the scene of poverty and indignity suggested by Senator Obama to explain what he calls Wright’s anger and what I describe as his hatred.
In recent days, we have seen clips of several of Rev. Wright’s sermons, showing him declaring “G-d Damn America,” blaming America for intentionally creating the drug problem, for creating the AIDS virus, for supporting Israeli “state terrorism against Palestinians,” for being responsible for causing 9-11, for being white supremacist and racist and for intentionally keeping people in poverty.
We have also learned that, last year, Rev. Wright’s Church honored with a lifetime achievement award Nation of Islam leader, Louis Farrakhan, who has said that “Judaism is a gutter religion,” that “Hitler was a very great man” and that “white people are potential humans, they haven’t evolved yet.” In fact, Rev. Wright accompanied Farrakhan in the 1980s on a visit to Muammar Gaddafi’s Libya, which was then illegal under U.S. law. Nevertheless, the Church and Wright’s successor as pastor, Rev. Otis Moss III, have issued a statement defending and praising Wright, while completely ignoring Wright’s horrific statements.
Morton A. Klein is National President of the Zionist Organization of America.
funky chicken on March 24, 2008 at 3:32 PM
I hope what Hitch foresees as more inevitable disappointments do arrive before election day 2008. I dread the prospect of another Dem president riding a raft of lies to the White House empowered by personal charm and MSM coverup. That way lies a dangerous, ruinous arrogance.
Owing to his atheistic biases, Hitch employs his own misguided moral equivalence between McCain campaign supporters and Obama spiritual advisers. Within the Christian community, conflict over Biblical interpretation is what has defined differing faiths since the Reformation.
Terrie on March 24, 2008 at 3:33 PM
Wow Allah…better than Hitch there. Bravo!
funky chicken on March 24, 2008 at 3:36 PM
So, black Americans fought to not have to sit at the back of the bus, only to be thrown under it 50 years later by the first viable black candidate for the presidency.
aero on March 24, 2008 at 3:49 PM
My hope is that Hitchens will smoke himself to an early death.
Vaporman87 on March 24, 2008 at 3:56 PM
“Thus does the new great national conversation on race begin with a lie, smearing untold millions of blacks who don’t follow people like Wright in order to excuse a guy who did for 20 years.”
Well said AP, but, even tho I think it would be much better if Hitch were to just channel Bill Buckley, he does have that sharp Brit edge I still love so much. I know, I’m a nutter.
Christine on March 24, 2008 at 4:01 PM
I was going to suggest that no one who takes money from Vanity Fair can be trusted, but Vaporman87 seems like a big picture guy.
mymanpotsandpans on March 24, 2008 at 4:02 PM
Okay, really though, this game is getting tired. The pastor is crazy – yes – okay. But these weren’t Obama’s words. Obama condemned then, what more can he do? In his speech on race, I think he made his position very clear. He does not share those views, as I’m sure many of Jeremiah Wright’s congregation don’t share some of his views. I’m all for calling a duck a duck and Wright’s comments were disgusting, but as Obama said there’s a lot of anger in this country, racism has really torn us apart to our core and divided us, and this is what we need to move past to become unified. Wright’s comments were deplorable but you have to figure in a larger context in which the anger and resentment that people have encountered in their lives based on racial divisions, the BOTH black and white people have felt, has caused a lot of pent up anger and frustration in all communities, and the negative effects of which are clear. Clearly Rev. Wright is stuck in a victim mentality, but black history in this country did begin in bondage. I would never abdicate personal responsibility, but to not understand the anger on some level that’s present in this country would be to simply not have empathy.
mattyj86 on March 24, 2008 at 4:15 PM
mattyj86:
There are lots of other churches in that small area of Chicago that didn’t mix the racism and crackpotism, but Obama made his home in the land of teh crazee, for 20 years and thought it was the “Wright” place for his kids too.
funky chicken on March 24, 2008 at 4:37 PM
Hitchens always has to use the meat cleaver when a scalpel would suffice.
Remnants of his Trotskyite days when he was debating against other thugs and trash.
Is he himself a thug and trash today? Pretty damned close to it..
SteveMG on March 24, 2008 at 4:45 PM
Your ad is covering the post.
Terrye on March 24, 2008 at 4:50 PM
mattyj86
Obama claimed he was unaware of Wright’s views. This was a lie. Wright is a close personal friend, spiritual mentor and until recently was part of Obama’s campaign.
Michelle Obama has also demonstrated her America-hating credentials. Given that Senator Obama’s wife and pastor share many of the same hateful opinions, don’t you think it’s perfectly valid for us to question Obama’s real worldview? He didn’t choose his grandmother, but he did choose his wife and minister.
Couldn’t Obama have found another black church in a city of 3 million people?
btw Obama didn’t really condemn Wright’s views. He kinda sorta did, but he also heavily qualified it by saying “I can understand his anger coz Whitey is such a bastard.”
The MSM may have had a collective orgasm over Obama’s speech, but ultimately it was a huge mistake.
infidel65 on March 24, 2008 at 5:02 PM
So how long
canshould the black community hold a grudge against dead white people?100 years……200 years……….how long?
omnipotent on March 24, 2008 at 5:08 PM
He can stop lying about not knowing the first thing about it, for starters.
Jim Treacher on March 24, 2008 at 5:08 PM
So good it bears repeating yet again. Well done.
rhodeymark on March 24, 2008 at 5:08 PM
Obama lied………..Chrissy M. cried (or maybe that was a shriek).
omnipotent on March 24, 2008 at 5:09 PM
BTW, nice use of but-monkeys. (I counted 5)
Don’t let the TRUTH hit you in the arse on the way out, ostrich.
omnipotent on March 24, 2008 at 5:12 PM
Yes, he condemned Wright’s words, but then he immediately turned around and excused them. Condemnation doesn’t count when you say, “I condemn these statements, but really I think they’re understandable and excusable.” He cancelled himself out by trying to qualify something that can’t be qualified. Either he condemns Wright’s insane and hateful points of view or he doesn’t. You’re letting him have it both ways. I won’t.
aero on March 24, 2008 at 5:14 PM
Obama didn’t really credit whites with reasonable resentments vis-a-vis blacks. What he really said, smoothly but condescendingly, was that, yes, working-class whites have resentments but this has nothing to do with affirmative action or welfare, it’s really because they are being manipulated and tweaked by the nose of their ignorant prejudices by…what else? Rich white guys! A guy wrote an entire book about it: “What’s The Matter With Kansas.” And he didn’t even address absurdly high black crime rates–well, I guess he did somewhat: I feel sorry for his grandmother.
Sean68 on March 24, 2008 at 5:28 PM
We don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows and we don’t need Hitchens to know a racist liar and deceiver when we hear and see one.
Barry Obama is a disgrace!
He will NOT receive my vote, but he will receive my scorn!
Wright, and those who dance, scream, and clap to his offensive form of racism, bigotry, and hatred, are equally guilty and should be scorned and shunned. They don’t have the character to be trusted in any sense of the word!
Clinton is a vile individual whose ambition out ranks any sense of character, values, mores, and morals. As a president she would be right up there with Darth Vader, ruling with intimidation, force, deception, and malevolence.
It is time we stood up to these hate mongers in brown skin, the “Klan with a Tan” as Dr. Walter Williams calls them.
Their sickness runs deep, and they are a bane on our society and our culture.
Racism, bigotry, and hatred by any color is just that, racism, bigotry, and hatred. May it be relegated to the ash heap of history, never again to raise its ugly, red eyed, horned head!
William2006 on March 24, 2008 at 6:09 PM
Bad-mouthing Vader IS a punishable offense.
omnipotent on March 24, 2008 at 6:17 PM
It’s unfortunate that Hitchens, while righlty criticizing another fool like Rod Parsely, has to leap to saying “How true it is that religion poisons everything.” How about, some dorks will find any means to express their idiocy and religion just happens to be one of them?
aikidoka on March 24, 2008 at 7:42 PM
I said a couple of weeks ago that I felt we were just seeing the tip of the iceberg of the Obama hypocrisy.
New’s flash, Obama is just another left wing it’s all America’s fault politician.
Hog Wild on March 24, 2008 at 9:40 PM
hitch is my hero.
he did; that’s an old pic. he inspired me to quit, too. :-)
as full of s**t as they both are, they could be satan-worshippers or transsexuals for all we know.
homesickamerican on March 25, 2008 at 12:58 AM
While I myself am one of them nutty religious wackos (i.e. Christians) that Mr. Hitchens may disdain, I can at least respect him for being what seems to be a nearly extinct breed in today’s political arena: a critical-thinking liberal.
Hell, he’s been more consistent on Iraq than the Bush Administration has collectively been.
Cylor on March 25, 2008 at 7:27 AM