The Question: How should Barack Obama have responded to inflammatory remarks made by his former pastor, Dr. Jeremiah Wright? Are you responsible for what your spiritual leader says from the pulpit?
In the aftermath of Obama's major speech on race, one expects the affair of Rev. Wright to fade away. But one major theme of the speech was that moving beyond the racial divide can't be accomplished in a single election. It was a stretch to hold Obama culpable for a preacher's tiresome anti-white rants. Under normal circumstances nobody would call him on it, any more than Nixon would have been held responsible for Billy Graham's social views. But strategists in the Clinton camp and troublemakers on talk radio never thought of this as a moral issue. Rather, it was a political trap. They were playing on widespread doubt that Obama's integrity and idealism are too good to be true. Not so much for him as for us. He challenges us to follow our better angels, and we wind up worrying about our hidden demons.
In Philadelphia Obama invoked the framers of the Constitution and Abraham Lincoln, but I don't think one side of human nature can be confronted without the other. The Rev. Wright has entangled Obama in a web of issues that race brings up. A desire to rise above the racial divide is present in any good-hearted citizen, yet we cannot overlook distressing realities. The inner city is rife with drugs, crime, illiteracy, poverty, and the simmering recrimination so well represented by Jeremiah Wright. Black pulpits around the country perform one function -- keeping alive black hopes for a better future -- while at the same time condemning white society for destroying those hopes. It's a dynamic that has been in place for decades, and no doubt Obama has sat in the pew listening to sermons that would bring discomfort and anger to the most liberal white person.
Obama's idealism will play out in one of two ways. Either it will crumple under the assault of politics as usual. Or, and this seems quite extraordinary, it will succeed. FDR succeeded; JFK succeeded. But it's been a generation since idealism won a great victory, during which time we have suffered through a right-wing revolution. Fortunately, reactionaries have worn out their welcome, but there's enough residual fear among progressives that something as incidental as a black preacher's animus looms dangerous.
What should Obama do now? One speech won't put out the right-wing brush fire, and as the attacks become sneakier and dirtier, he will be getting advice from all quarters. I think he only has to be himself. What made the Philadelphia speech so moving is that it wasn't political in tone but moral and reflective. Obama's integrity is genuine on the face of it. As long as that remains true, people will have no trouble telling Wright and wrong. As for fighting back, Obama has stood up for himself quite well and honestly. There's no reason to think that will change in the future.
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