Does Obama need a Sister Souljah moment?

It's more than mere ego for Wright. His old congregation has put him on a pedestal that the Pope may have cause to envy and that public will not forgive him if he backs down, apologizes or keeps quiet. On the contrary, they now expect him to be more public than ever.

Obama, on the other hand, cannot really denounce him without alienating a huge portion of his core constituency. The advantage to this situation is obviously to Wright, who can just keep on doing what he is doing with no consequences to himself in any practical terms while Obama is probably sinking slowly into the political sunset and we are left wondering what the race would be like if all this had come out before Super Tuesday.

why all this obsession with wright? he's far more mainstream than the reverand moon, who's deeply embedded in the republican party, and his obsession with sexual organs. when will the call go out to republicans to denounce moon?

I'm sorry. I watched both speeches and I don't see what all the cataclysmic fuss is about.

This is a black pastor from a predominantly white mainline denomination, heavily influenced by the vintage liberation theology movements of the 1970s and early 1980s and heavily inspired by the same sort of silly (but well-intended) top-down Afrocentric cultural mythmaking that brought us Kwanzaa. I've known these guys since my liberal arts college days. A little bit of intellectual crackpottery goes with the territory. But there is also a lot of poignant and uncomfortable truth-telling that goes with it. I observe a lot of sarcasm and shock-effect satire embedded in Wright's oratory that is not being recognized as such by an awful lot of literal-minded folks.

Quite frankly, I've heard conservative white ministers -- including one I liked very much -- say things that were more shockingly offensive than anything I heard Jeremiah Wright say last night or this morning. And I didn't denounce them, either.

McCain is a Moonie?

Is there such thing as the "entire black church"? Or is that just his fantasy? I mean, there's no "white church". In effect, he's claiming a de facto Superpope position and automatically excommunicating any black who disagrees with him or has different politics. It also seems like he's saying that being black means never having to say you're sorry.

McCain,s top adviser, charlie black does have ties to the rev. moon. he has deep ties to the republican party and the religious right. and he makes rev. wright look like a saint. moon also owns the washington times and gets homeland security contracts.

Wright is an active member in the overwhelmingly white United Church of Christ. I don't think he frowns on people going anywhere; he just offers a church that is based on the tradition of Black Liberation Theology, like many of the "black churches."

I'm digging how Wright, egomaniac showboater that he is, claims that an attack on his koo-koo self is an attack on every black Christian everywhere. Uh, I doubt that.

"Said criticism of him is criticism of the entire black church."

Good! Keep talking Rev., sooner or later the American people will take you at your word and realize the same poisonous bile is going on in "black churches" all over America. It's NOT just Rev. Wright, he's not some far out loon but a pretty typical black preacher.This racist trash has nothing to do with Christianity, it's warmed over Marxism.

"Obama needs not just to distance himself from Wright's views; he needs to disown him at this point."

He's gonna have to disown his wife too. She's nearly as bad as Wright. I'm pretty sure Obama believes all this garbage too, that's why he chose to have these people in his life. He just is trying to hide it, put him in office and it'll come out.

I don't see it. I read the entire transcript and it seems pretty tame. While one might disagree with him, I don't see anything too bizarre.

On the AIDS issue, he cites his sources as to why he thinks the government is capable of creating the AIDS epidemic. He might think they did and I might think it is a crazy idea, but I would have said the same thing about the Tuskegee Experiments and about dozens of other rather bizarre stories in the history of American public health.

We might think Louis Farrekhan is a nut, but there is no denying his importance in the race conversations of the late 20th century.

His comparison to Roman legionaries is explicitly in reference to imperialism and the fact that imperialism means some people rule and others are ruled. Our military is not enforcing our laws or collecting taxes, so the comparison is a stretch, but not a radical one. Replace "laws" with "economic interests" and replace "taxes" with "oil" and, presto!

I'll give you points four and five.

While all of this seems like tired rhetoric to my suburban white ears, banality is the worst criticism I can offer. I don't see crazy and I suspect that he is not even pushing the envelope in the African American mainstream. So, to call him crazy would be painting a wide brush across a lot of people. So maybe I'll take back point five.

Wright could be having more than senior moments but be on his way to a dementia like Alzheimers or borderline personality mental illness or some other form of mental illness- he needs a psych evaluation and if Obama says that this guy is different than he was 20 years ago when he met him- Obama might be right- the man is having a mental breakdown- he just retired ( looks like he was fired) and is taking it rather badly.

We the nation should not be punished for a man going crazy- he is not running for office.

We need a person who is for uniting people for building on confidence and hope and who will be respected by others 0 that is Obama and I am glad he got rid of his pastor!

I am sick and tired of pastors who end up in million dollar homes anyway- or that Pope who come to the US and still do not change the cannon law to protect children from priests- a pox on all their houses.

Give me the Dali Lama any time - a humble man who preaches love and compassion and peace.