He’s going to get away with it, of course. No one will dare point to the fact that once again, Barack Obama has disposed of a problem, not by addressing the cause but rather the political garbage that goes along with it.
After 20 years association, the near nominee has decided to end his association with Trinity United Church.
Was it because of the racist, hate mongering sermons of Jeremiah Wright?
Was it because his church has embraced Louis Farrakhan?\
Was it because the church allowed a Roman Catholic priest to preach sermons that ape the worst of Reverend Wright’s rants against whites and America?
Was it because almost everything about the church was far from mainstream Christian thought and that he finally rebelled against the message of hate that spewed from its pulpit for 20 years?
Not according to the candidate himself:
“We don’t want to have to answer for everything that’s stated in the church,” the Democratic front-runner said. “We also don’t want the church subjected to the scrutiny that a presidential campaign legitimately undergoes.”
Obama said he was resigning “with some sadness.”
“This is not a decision I come to lightly,” he said. Watch Obama discuss departure »
The resignation comes days after the Rev. Michael Pfleger, a visiting Catholic priest, mocked Obama’s Democratic rival during a sermon at Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, Illinois.
In the sermon, Pfleger wipes his eyes with a handkerchief and suggests that Sen. Hillary Clinton wept because she thought that as a white person and the wife of a former president, she was entitled to the presidency.
Pfleger is a Catholic priest at St. Sabina Roman Catholic Church on Chicago’s southwest side. He is also a friend of Trinity’s former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, from whom Obama distanced himself in April.
Obama said the Pfleger controversy made it clear that, as long as he remained a member of the Trinity congregation, remarks from the pulpit would be “imputed” to him, even if they conflicted with his personal views.
In addition to being friends with Wright, Pfleger is also a long time friend of Barack Obama, a relationship that goes back almost as far as the candidate’s relationship with Wright. While in the state senate, Obama steered around $300,000 to various programs headed up by Father Pfleger while the bigot priest gave Obama $1500 in political contributions over the years. Obama has also claimed Pfleger as one of his “spiritual mentors” and the priest has been hanging around the campaign off and on over the past year, offering his “mentoring” whenever the candidate has hit a rough patch.
I bring this up because CNN didn’t think it was newsworthy to mention the close, personal relationship Obama has with Pfleger - which is another reason why the candidate is going to slide on the real reason he is quitting the church.
Representative Robert Wexler of Florida gives the media its marching orders:
Some Obama supporters, including U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler of Florida, said that disconnecting from the church signaled a chance for the campaign to move on.
“I think it bodes well for us in the general election that we can put whatever issues there were behind us in respect to the church,” Wexler said.
Don’t worry, Bob. The media already never heard of Trinity Church, or Wright, or Moss, or Meeks, or Pfleger. They are now officially “non-associates” of Barack Obama and can be safely ignored.
What then, to make of Obama’s quitting Trinity Church? Once again, Obama has proven himself to lack any kind of political courage. He makes the Cowardly Lion look like Audie Murphy. He once again tries the straddle approach - trying to disentangle himself from a political problem without alienating his base. And once again, political expediency and not conscience or moral outrage guides his actions.
The calculating nature of this move is made obvious by asking the one, simple, question that no one in the media has yet even raised by my reading so far; what the hell took you so long, Barry? No one believes the candidate when he says he never heard Wright utter his foul diatribes against America and against white people over 20 years of sitting in the pews at Trinity Church. That doesn’t even pass the laugh test. Nor does anyone believe him when he says he was “surprised” at Father Pfleger’s rants. Everyone in Chicago is familiar with Pfleger’s views on whites and on America. Much more so than Wright, Pfleger has been a fixture on local news and is good for a colorful quote or two whenever the media needs one on race or housing or on the Iraq War.
To repeat, what took you so long Obama? The fact is, as long as belonging to Trinity was a political plus - contacts with the movers and shakers in the black community as well as demonstrating his “authentic” blackness to his constituents - Obama embraced his church.
But now, running for president and having his pastor and church exposed as radical adherents to Black Liberation Theology, Obama throws them under the bus without hesitation. (Would that he was so decisive in matters of policy.). They have become a drag, a hindrance to his ambitions and must go the way of his other friends and associates he has summarily dismissed from his royal presence.
You wonder what Tony Rezko is thinking after spending years in promoting the young Obama to where now he stands on the threshold of the presidency and because of his trial, the candidate makes out as if he barely knows Rezko. Same goes for Bill Ayers who plucked Obama from obscurity and made him head of Ayer’s baby - the Chicago Annenberg Challenge - only to see the candidate describe his close relationship with Ayers as him being “just a neighbor.”
He tried to downplay his relationship with Wright, with Pfleger, with Reverend James Meeks (another radical bigot) - anyone and everyone who has proven themselves to be a danger to his ambitions has either been tossed on the garbage heap or dismissed as inconsequential.
Anyone see a pattern here?
Let us take Obama at his word for the moment and pretend that he has a ghost of a chance in realizing his campaign promises to bring “change” to Washington. Doesn’t matter how (the candidate hasn’t told us anyway). Whatever plan he comes up with will demand political courage. He will be going up against the most entrenched of interests who will fight tooth and nail to maintain their privileges and access.
But Obama has shown no sign of possessing the kind of political courage it would take to realize any of his goals with regard to “changing” Washington. This should be obvious even to his most rabid supporters. He has never gone against his party. He has never crossed the aisle to work in a bi-partisan manner on anything consequential. (His anti-Iraq war stance took about as much political courage as an alley cat has. He wasn’t running for any federal office and his state senate district makes Berkley look like Utah as far as ideological makeup is concerned.). In short, Obama is a Flim-Flam Man who has gotten away (so far) with relying on a friendly media to cover his ass for him as he tries to put radical after radical in his past behind him.
Pretty soon, the media is going to have Obama looking like a mainstream politician - something I didn’t think was possible but now believe that is the ultimate goal of the campaign. The sad fact is, as long as Obama doesn’t murder some one between now and the election, he stands a very good chance of winning.
10:01 am
You are dead-on right about the media. I have seen nothing like this ever…Barry is their candidate…no longer even a pretense of objectivity. Maybe only in 1960 when “Mattress-Jack” Kennedy was running against the liberals’ satan Dick Nixon and even that campaign doesn’t compare well with this one.
Both Reuters and TIME in recent days have posted soties about Obama with attached photos showing Barry with a helo. I am not kidding. He’s being advertised as a kind of modern Christ…imagine that? After coming out of Chicago politics…a Christ?
The mainstream media is deeply corrupt.
10:43 am
rick,
wonderful, again you hit the nail on the head. i would have to agree with you, one would think this really hurts him at his base, i mean real courage would not be throwing your mentors under the bus… but alas we already know how his ilk talk behind the scenes (i.e., canada and nafta). some may see this as abandonment but the real obama has shown himself, and much akin to pfleger’s apology to clinton (i am sorry if mrs. clinton was offended by my comments, i really have never in my life heard such words in church, even behind the scenes, much less on the pulpit), none of it is sincere it is all for political expediency, words mean nothing, but everything he is, is hung on these meaningless words. keep up the good work.
1:44 pm
Obama quits Chicago church after long controversy
…
Barack Obama said Saturday he has resigned his 20-year membership in the Trinity United Church of Ch…
2:12 pm
Conservatives are so hypersensitive to news coverage outside their orthodoxy I’m not sure there’s any way to appease them. The Reverend Wright flap got endless coverage in the media. Want proof? You bring it up yourself. Obama’s been forced to abandon a church he’s attended for many years to deflect media criticism.
Of course, the media - aside from reliable conservative sources like talk radio and Fox News - won’t obsess over this issue enough to satiate your anti-Obama angst but that’s no reliable gauge of media bias.
So what are we to suppose of your many guilt-by-association attacks on Obama? You try to tie him to supposed radicals. For what purpose? Is Obama a “racist” in your estimation? Or merely a “bigot”? Is he crooked like Tony Rezko? Do you suppose he’s a bomb-throwing Weatherman sympathizer pining for death and destruction? If not, why mention Ayers?
We see two sides of the issue blowing away all the smoke. One, political contributions which, IMHO, mean little. McCain has similar problems with the likes of Hagee. Has he handled his stuff any better?
Then we have him crossing paths with Ayers on the board of an anti-poverty program. We see him crossing paths with Pfleger steering money to one of his good charitable works (even right-wing Bill O’Reilly admits Phelger has done much good charitable work). Wright, too, has done much good. But they also have their radical side which is all the far right wants to talk about because, frankly, their only interest is in discrediting Obama because what could be worse than a liberal in the White House?
BTW, I’m no huge Obama fan and didn’t vote for him in the primaries. However, given two poor choices - I’ll make the safe assumption Hillary is done, stick a fork in her - Obama emerges as the better of the two. McCain’s phony “straight talk express” seems no more genuine than Obama’s vague “change” agenda.
You really are an ignoramous aren’t you?
“Crossing paths.” ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME? He has been friends with Pfleger since at least 1988. And the relationship with Ayers has yet to be fleshed out. We know that somehow, someway, Ayers took a totally unknown Obama and put him in charge of his Annenberg educational project. Obviously - so obvious it hurts - Obama and Ayers are much better acquainted than “crossing paths.”
Moron.
Wake up idiot. The man we are about to elect president has so many radical associations and radical political alliances God knows what he will be capable of. One or two, yeah, ok. But the number and extent of his radical friends is astounding. The fact that you can’t see it or worse, don’t care, means you deserve whatever this guy comes up with over the next 4 years.
ed.
2:49 pm
Obama is shocked…shocked that these terrible things were being said in his church….and, and, and, those people…they looked like they were enjoying it all….
Why, he had no idea that there were those kinds of things being felt, and spoken, there. After all, he only attended the church briefly…for 20 years, was married there, and, worst of all, exposed his young children to this vile hatred…..
What a pusillanimous, palavering, popinjay!!!
He knew darn well what the church’s dogma was. He knew darn well what revs. Wright and Moss and Phleger were all about. Not only was it politically expedient for him to belong to trinity; it’s warped, Marxist, form of Christianity, black liberation theology, conformed well to his red diaper baby upbringing as well as appealing to the ideals inculcated through his ultra left wing academic experience.
Oddly enough, this episode exposes Obama for the hypocritical, usurpacious, fair weathered friend type of individual he really is. His proclamation of being a new kind of politician, practicing a whole new brand of politics, is pure poppycock!
The only thing remotely revolutionary about his campaign, besides the Marxist idealism exhibit by his Che Guevara loving campaign workers, is his campaign’s brilliant use of the internet to produce at times what appear to be an Orwellian mental synergy, and an ominous cult of personality reminiscent of the former Soviet Union. Otherwise, it is the traditional, opportunistic politics of useful friendships, sordid cloakroom dealings, and vote purchasing constituent pay-offs.
Most of the mainstream media will herald this as a “bold” move that will afford Obama a “fresh” start, unencumbered by any stigma of radical racist associations. In the usual fashion, they will declare that “the debate is over” and “the matter is closed”. Any attempt to question him about his 20 years there will be dismissed as “dwelling on the past” or the perfunctory “distraction from the important issues”.
What’s really important is that if the tables were turned, and Maverick had sat idly by listening to the pontifications of the grand poo-bah of the KKK, or some other white supremacist, he would have been TOAST long ago. Not only do the mainstream media tolerate reverse racism, most outlets are actively engaged in trying to get Obama elected. I wonder if they really believe in him, or are they emulating the head of the Illinois state legislature; the man who decided he would play king maker and get Obama elected to the US senate.
Exit question; are the mainstream media wanna-be king makers or simply useful idiots; I’ll let you decide………….
3:02 pm
Latest Rasmussen has only 31% trusting Kaka Urkel Obama on national security. I suppose those are the die-hard Kool-Aid drinkers. What with the media in the tank for him and white libeeal guilt, it is so sad that the rest of us get stuck with Jimmy Carter II. I don’t really recall who benefited under Jimmy, but Obambi’s bestest friends are most already sitting swell. I’m sure Rezno would get his full pardon and that great Trinity church welcomed back. Isn’t anyone capable of exposing who is really pulling the strings on this marxist fakir? Ok, the Chicago machine politics, but who actually is the one in control?
3:02 pm
Look at the bright side. Since Obama has (again) revealed himself as a political hack we know that he is not a True Believer. So a President (hack) Obama would not be as committed to crazy, socialist stuff as a President (True Believer) Obama. In other words, put up a strong enough fight and the worst stuff can be blocked or bottled up in Congress.
That assumes a willingness to fight. Hmmm. WE’RE DOOMED!
4:35 pm
“Moron.
Wake up idiot. The man we are about to elect president has so many radical associations and radical political alliances God knows what he will be capable of. One or two, yeah, ok. But the number and extent of his radical friends is astounding.”
So we’re into name calling. Great.
Rick, you’re wound up like a top over Obama. Not that I’m surprised. This isn’t called the “Right-wing Nuthouse” for nothing.
Again, what do all your guilt by association smears add up to? “God knows what he will be capable of” doesn’t cut it. Just more alarmism. Smear Obama with the stink of some radicals then leave the rest to one’s imagination.
I don’t think the lesson of Obama’s relationships mentioned here is that he’s a closet Weatherman sympathetic of anti-American violence, closet “racist” or “bigot”, or any more financially corrupt regarding campaign money than Clinton or McCain. Do you?
“Ayers took a totally unknown Obama and put him in charge of his Annenberg educational project.”
More leave it to the imagination guilt by association silliness. Implying what? Ayers saw a man of obvious talent or there’s some grand conspiracy to build from straw?
It’s not surprising an up and coming community activist in Chicago, such as Obama, would have picked the prominent church he chose. Nor is it surprising he’s involved in prominent charities. Less surprising to me than Obama working with Ayers on the board of a charity is how a radical like Ayers is able to get back into the mainstream.
“The fact that you can’t see it or worse, don’t care, means you deserve whatever this guy comes up with over the next 4 years.”
More insults. Actually, none of the above. It’s obvious from my earlier post I’d heard of these controversies and weighed them. Moreover, I do care. He needs make clear he doesn’t support, say, Wright’s racism which he did. He criticized Pfleger’s ’sermon’ and even Pfleger has since apologized for it.
I held my nose during the primaries and voted for Clinton. She’s out now except for the crying. I can bitch about it. I can whine about it. Doesn’t matter, it comes down to McCain or Obama. IMHO, neither of them are good but the only real alternative is not to vote at all (which I am considering though unlikely to follow through on).
McCain’s stance on the war and health care, thus far, are deal breakers. So I’m - as I type this (subject to change without notice) - favoring Obama. Like you, I can’t stand not really knowing the guy as well as I’d like. Unlike you, my political bent isn’t hard to the right so I’m not experiencing your anti-Obama angst which, apparently, makes me a “moron.”
5:01 pm
Rick wrote: “No one believes the candidate when he says he never heard Wright utter his foul diatribes against America and against white people over 20 years of sitting in the pews at Trinity Church. That doesn’t even pass the laugh test. Nor does anyone believe him when he says he was “surprised” at Father Pfleger’s rants.”
The one hope that we have is that this is true. He is a liar, deceiver, and the most liberal candidate (with the possible exception of McGovern) that has ever been nominated. In the short term, his presidency will be a disaster. In the long term, we may be doomed because of the lifetime appointment of his judicial choices (possibly up to 3 SCOTUS appointments in 8 years).
God help us (or in your case, Rick, Karma, or something besides God, help us).
5:50 pm
[...] MORE: Hot Air; Michelle Malkin; Little Green Footballs; The American Pundit; Webloggin; Power Line; Rightwing Nuthouse [...]
7:26 pm
Rick,
Its no use arguing with the likes of sknbat - there are millions of people who draw the exact moral equivalance between Obama’s relationship with his “spiritual mentors” and McCain’s endorsement from Hagee. You cannot reason with unreasonable rubes like sknbat - he is profoundly ignorant of the seriousness of Obama’s connection to these radicals. And even when you point out that, he is going to come back with ” yeah, they have their radical sides but so what they have done a lot of good?” - this was the essence of Obama’s excuse for that historical “imperfect union” speech on race.
Ofcourse Obama has now thown away even that pretense that he showed in his “historic” speech - internal polling would have shown that people didnt buy his horseshit - otherwise he would never have pulled this stunt.
Peter Wehrner at NRO put it best some thing along the lines of - “WE FORGOT THAT THE PERSON WHO WANTS TO “CHANGE” WASHINGTON IS ACTUALLY A POLITICIAN FROM CHICAGO”.
He also says that “Underneath the attractive veneer of Barack Obama beats the heart of a very, very ambitious man. Time will tell how problematic this may be and what snares this character trait may eventually lead him into.”
When you have dumbasses like sknbat who have their “eye on Fox News” with no worries about the charlatan posing for President, you have to read Wherner and go ” shit, we are going to get the first radical/liberal President”
8:44 pm
I am not sure we can prove this but many people in Chicago say it’s the dirty secret about Barack Hussein Obama. IT is TRUE!!!! SEND TO EVERYBODY YOU KNOW! - allyson
1.) FIVE African American women in Barack Hussein Obama’s church Trinity run by his white-hating racist preacher friends have told three independent people that Barack Hussein Obama SLEEPS with MEN in the church but he is on the “down low” which I am not sure what that means but some kid told me means he is always on top with men.
2.) Father Michael Pfleger - that socialist extreme white-hating Catholic priest who should be excommunicated by Catholics - is Barack Hussein Obama’s LOVER for a long time.
That explains why Pfleger was on phone with Jeremiah Wright and B. Hussein Obama (Ann Coulter calls him that) when Obama was embarrassed cuz of what Jeremiah Wright was saying in Washington, D.C. in April. Pfleger brags to all the Chicago news people that he’s the go-between for Reverend Wright and Obama and on the phone with both of them all the time to try to make peace with them.
Pfleger and Obama are tight as ticks. But since Obama is on the “down low” I guess that means he always gets to be on top! Ha!
Barack Hussein Obama is a homosexual but he must have mounted Michelle His Bitchy Belle at least twice to make children, if they are his. We have rumors about that too, that she does it with a black man in Trinity to make the
kids.
Maybe since Jeremiah Wright likes to do the women in his church, behind their husband’s backs, he did it with Michelle too?
Everybody says not sure to believe Larry Sinclair who says he gave B. Hussein Obama a ‘B.J.’ in back seat of a limo but he swears his limo driver saw it happen and that Obama did crack cocaine and Sinclair did cocaine.
Believe me or not but we know it is the gospel truth. I put my hand on my grandfather’s Bible and tell you it is so.
9:44 pm
Allyon Whitey,
Please… please dont make Hussein Obama a martyr with unsubstantiated allegations like this. I have heard of the “Obama has had gay relationships” rumors before but until they are substantiated by the men who slept with him, it is nothing more than a rumor and a vile one at that.
Suspecting if Obama’s kids are really his or if Wright has been banging Michelle are even worse - if you have any proof, show it - otherwise it is as vile as the NYT hit piece on McCain having an affair.
11:15 pm
Hey Rick, just want to let you know that any time you make a valid argument against Obama, at least 5 commentators have to make points against him that are such without lucidity and reason, that it nearly negates your post altogether. Very frustrating!
By the way, I look forward to you writing the next installment of “What ails Conservatism”. This Obama-nonsense hasn’t distracted from that goal, right?
6:11 am
For goodness sake, Rick, please take down comment #12. It is beneath this blog to allow that crap. If you have proof, print it, otherwise don’t lower yourself to Huffpo’s (non) standards.
For better or worse - people can rant. If I took down comments that were bat sh*t crazy, there wouldn’t be too many left.
ed.
9:23 am
I’ve seen the same exact post by Allyson Whitey on other blogs. It might help if there were some actual proof like a video of the Trinity “christians” engaged in a daisy chain. Even if true, it would make some obamabots love him more. Even your media is sexually aroused by Urkel. Read some of their comments on his tight jeans, etc. In any case when has a liberal or marxist faced any real consequences related to sex other than impeachment of Bubba or Gary Hart being dropped from the ticket over the good ship “Monkey Business.”
NY Times wants to imply that McCain had an affair with a lobbyist, but couldn’t care less who Hill or Urkel did…and if Hill is doing that sexy Muslim aid, she has good taste. Better that than some Rosie O’Donnell clone.
9:50 am
Brilliant as always. Obama was described elsewhere as having a spine that resembled “an eclair”! Just what we need!
10:17 am
hoorrrrahhhhhh! bat sh$t crazy here we go…..
i actually have not heard those specific rumors on obama, be them true they will surely show their heads, but being a realist, that would have come out a long, long, long time ago. please tone down the naughty bits or i will have to start reading the huffingcrap post (and i don’t want to)…
as for obamas liaisons with radicals, that is what freaks me out the most about him, the unknown, i mean if he is truly just using them for his gain, fine, but i doubt it, and as rick states those IOU’s will hurt us all. as for his followers, people like him because they want change, but as you have stated over and over, the change they want is in themselves, they are not happy with their life choices, so they infer that superbama can change their lot in life. too many autobots out there want to be told what to do (i do what i am told, and i am told what to do). saw it in the military, saw it kill people (that is why they created the bullsh%t flag), i see it in the “real world” as well. people just don’t want to think for themselves, hell i pretty much think people can’t think for themselves after too many years of automation… damn the rise of the machine (stupid Ford).
looking forward to the he next installment of “What ails Conservatism”
10:29 am
The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the - Web Reconnaissance for 06/02/2008 A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention, updated throughout the day…so check back often.
12:23 pm
If the spineless eclair does get elected I shudder to think what kind of people he’ll have in his administration. The only thing on his agenda will be re-election in 4 years so he’ll be afraid to take any kind of a stand (like now) that may alienate potential voters. BTW, “What ails Conservatism” is great stuff, keep it coming.
3:45 pm
[...] http://rightwingnuthouse.com/archives/2008/06/01/obama-the-cowardly-lion/ [...]