Despite What Democratic Operatives Say, Obama’s Jeremiah Wright Problem Remains
 
The talking points for Obama surrogates on his "You are known by the company you keep" problem have been issued and the line goes something like this: nobody cares about Wright, or a former Weather Underground member who shared a non-profit Board of Directors position with Obama for several years. They reason that voters are more concerned with the Iraq War or the slowing economy and aren't going to accept the guilt by association tactic of the Republicans.
Many Democratic primary voters may be untroubled by Obama's voluntary long-term association with Jeremiah Wright. But then again, these are the same folks, who by distressingly large margins, also fervently believe that George Bush was complicit in the World Trade Center attack on 9/11. Such voters positively swoon over Obama's flowery rhetoric. They care not one whit that there is no evidence whatsoever in his background to sustain the myth of Obama as Uniter and Conciliator. For these voters, short of him committing a felony, Obama can do no wrong.
But, what about independents, uncommitted voters and those early Obama supporters who are now exhibiting buyer's remorse? One early Obama supporter is having second thoughts. The National Journal's Stuart Taylor finds Obama's justification for remaining in the pew for twenty years unconvincing:
Most important, perhaps, Obama's assertion that "I can no more disown [Wright] than I can disown the black community," together with his acknowledgment of "shocking ignorance" among many blacks, implies what other Wright apologists have said more directly: White-bashing, far-left rhetoric, and paranoid racial conspiracy theories are commonplace in many black churches and among many otherwise sensible black people. Obama won't disown these people, because that would be inconsistent with his lifelong quest to belong to the black community, movingly detailed in his 1995 memoir, Dreams From My Father. And because he needs their votes. All of this is understandable. But would the same Obama who lacked the fortitude to break with Jeremiah Wright be a good bet, if elected, to take on his party's own special interests? To break, when circumstances warrant, with the across-the-board liberal orthodoxy he has long embraced? Curb entitlement spending? Temper excessive affirmative-action preferences? Tame the lawsuit lobby? Assign the teachers unions their share of the blame for what Obama calls "crumbling schools that are stealing the future"? Could he get tough, when necessary, with fashionably leftist foreign dictators, highly politicized international institutions, and sanctimonious European America-bashers? Or would he instead heed such soothing platitudes as his wife's February 14 assertion that "instead of protecting ourselves against terrorists," we should be "building diplomatic relationships"? I have a hard time believing at this point that Obama is up to these tasks. I would love to see him prove my doubts wrong. And, of course, he does not have to be flawless to be the best candidate. He just has to show that his flaws are less crippling than the all-too-apparent shortcomings of Hillary Rodham Clinton and John McCain.
Though anything can happen, I believe that Obama will continue to disappoint Taylor. With his justification of Wright's inflammatory speeches, Obama has drawn a line in the sand. During repeated instances after his speech where he has been asked about the controversy, his response has been the same: he is not going to distance himself from the message or the messenger.
Clinton supporter, Lanny Davis is also unconvinced that Obama's speech on race ended the Wright controversy. For him, it raises more questions than it answers:
In his eloquent Philadelphia speech, Mr. Obama likened Rev. Wright to a beloved, but politically extremist, family member with whom one profoundly disagrees but whose rage one understands. But this comparison just doesn't work for me. I don't get a chance to choose my family members. I do get a chance to choose my spiritual or religious leader and my congregation. And I do not have to remain silent or, more importantly, expose my children to the spiritual leader of my congregation who spews hate that offends my conscience. Mr. Obama made a choice to join the church and to ask Rev. Wright to marry him and his bride. He said for the first time a few weeks ago that had Rev. Wright not recently resigned as pastor of the church, he would have withdrawn. But that only reraised the same questions: Why didn't he act before the resignation? If he did not want to withdraw from the church – and I truly try to understand his personal difficulty doing so – then why not at least speak out publicly and say, in the famous phrase of the late Sen. Robert F. Kennedy Jr.: "No – this is unacceptable." Furthermore, after knowing about some of these sermons and having serious problems with some of their messages, why did Mr. Obama still decide to appoint Rev. Wright to his official presidential campaign religious advisory committee?
Davis quite  correctly takes to task those who raise the race card when questioning the sufficiency of Obama's explanation:
Some have suggested that any Clinton supporters who continue to raise this issue are "playing the race card" or taking the "low" road. When I said on CNN recently that concerns about the Wright-Obama issue were "appropriate" to continue to be discussed, my friend Joe Klein of Time Magazine said, "Lanny, Lanny, you're spreading the poison right now" and that an "honorable person" would "stay away from this stuff." Attacking the motives of those who feel this discomfort about Senator Obama's response or nonresponse to Reverend Wright's comments is not just unfair and wrong. It also misses the important electoral point about winning the general election in November: This issue is not going away. If many loyal, progressive Democrats remain troubled by this issue, then there must be even more unease among key swing voters – soft "Reagan Democrats," independents and moderate Republicans – who will decide the 2008 election. One thing is for sure: If Mr. Obama doesn't show a willingness to try to answer all the questions now, John McCain and the Republican attack machine will not waste a minute pressuring him to do so if he is the Democratic Party's choice in the fall. But by then, it may be too late.
Davis and Taylor are both correct. Despite the spin of Obama supporters the Wright controversy is still very much alive.
 
Beacon Street Journal
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
By John Kinsellagh