UGH...I had a better comment written, but my computer crashed - so I'm recreating some of this from memory. I'll actually start where I ended the lost comment.

I'm rather disappointed that you're trying to justify the Rev's words here, Alex. Racism runs in all directions regardless if you're a failed Senatorial/VP candidate or a southside Chicago preacher, racism is racism. Whether you think what the Rev did was racist is probably debatable, but it's the exact same kind of "race-baiting" the Clintons were vilified for supposedly trafficking in as well.

This kind of discussion has no place in presidential politics. While racism itself is a very important topic and worthy of much discussion, it is impossible to discuss it in a political context. In this context, it's just plain stupidity that goads people into saying these incredibly bumble-headed things. It's equally abhorrent what has been said on both sides here and these viewpoints should be repudiated, rejected, and renounced (and any other action verb you want to throw in there.)

Anyone who says otherwise is racist too, in my opinion. There is NO context for some of what the Rev. Wright has been quoted as saying regardless what you believe a preacher's job is to do. Injecting race into a sermon for the purposes of political machinations is deplorable in ANY context. Specifically, I am referring to the Rev's quote about Hillary not having ever been called a "n-word" so she can't possibly understand.

I think what the Rev. forgets is that she is a woman and while he may not be African-American, he's still a male and this is still a heteropatriarchy as you are fond of pointing out. She may not be able to relate to the plight of African-Americans, but she has certainly overcome her own obstacles as a woman.

So, now that we've proven there are racists in BOTH camps, can we get back to substantive issues that actually relate to being president?

WHO exactly is claiming that "government and power can do no wrong"? Name them, please.

Wrightgate is not about that kindergarten-revolutionary fantasy, nor is Wrightgate any more about what Obama believes himself than was McClurkingate—but it IS...just as was McClurkingate...about Obama's credibility, Obama's judgment, and about what Obama believes is MORE important.

Anyone who knows the truth about Louis "Hilter was a very great man" Farrakhan need go no further than watching the video at the link below to get what is wrong with the "Rev. Wright wasn't on fire when I sat down on him 23 years ago” bullshit Obama is now furiously shoveling to prevent not Rev. Wright but Obama himself from burying his campaign.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXS_YrYp07Q&feature=related

Wright was a pal of "It's the wicked Jews, the false Jews that are promoting lesbianism, homosexuality"-Farrakhan BEFORE Obama met Wright, was already an extremist—and in claiming all of this is news to him Obama is lying as surely as he did when he claimed he passed an Illinois nuclear industry regulation bill that was, in fact, never voted on.

According to a “Chicago Tribune” article from January a year ago:

"In his 1993 memoir 'Dreams from My Father', Obama recounts in vivid detail his first meeting with Wright in 1985. The pastor warned the community activist that getting involved with Trinity might turn off other black clergy because of the church's radical reputation." - Chicago Tribune, Jan. 21, 2007.

Was he lying 15 years ago or is he lying now?

Obama seemed to have forgotten that when he told a crowd "earlier this month...'I don't think my church is actually particularly controversial'. He said Rev. Wright 'is like an old uncle who says things I don't always agree with', telling a Jewish group that everyone has someone like that in their family." - ABC News

HUH? Then why disinvite him from your candidacy announcement rally a year ago? And such AMAZING loyalty Obama now displays! The man HE has repeatedly identified as his inspiration, the one who married him, baptized his children, and gave him the title of his best-selling book, “The Audacity of Hope,” he now reduces to crazy old Uncle Fester.

Obama keeps forgetting Wright's 1985 warning as he’s kept repeating the “I’m shocked; absolutely shocked” spin over the weekend and expects us to believe that OVER TWENTY-THREE YEARS and over a THOUSAND + Sundays he never "personally heard him preach [such things] while I sat in the pews of Trinity or heard him utter in private conversation."

We are to believe the candidate who has worn religion on his sleeve more than any other, who recently proclaimed, “I praise Jesus every Sunday,”...that he and his family never went to church like tens of millions of other Americans the Sunday after 9/11 where he WOULD have heard Wright screech:

"...the stuff we have done overseas is now brought right back to our own front yards. America's chickens are coming home to roost."

Equating being disgusted by that with denying that evil hasn't been done in America's name is juvenile.

We're expected to believe that, at least, SOMEONE he knew didn't TELL him then about such remarks? And that was SEVEN YEARS ago; why did it take Obama seven years to denounce Wright's blaming America for 9/11?

Obama MUST have heard about the time Wright told his parishioners that "we should sing, "God Damn America." And HOW is that a part of "the gospel of Jesus" that Obama says he got from Wright? How do any of Wright's good works cancel out his demonization of whites and others?

If Obama didn't feel the need to formally, fully disassociate himself from Wright after 9/11 or "God Damn America" or 15 months ago how about just FOUR MONTHS AGO when Louis "The white man is our mortal enemy" Farrakahn received the "Rev. Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr. Lifetime Achievement Trumpeteer” Award and Wright said of him,

“Minister Farrakhan will be remembered as one of the 20th and 21st century giants of the African American religious experience. His integrity and honesty have secured him a place in history as one of the nation’s most powerful critics." Again, see video above.

There IS unfairness to guilt by association [such as that constantly used against Sen. Clinton for far less], but for Obama to willingly continue that association for 23 years, to continue to praise Rev. Wright even as Wright grew more and more extreme....even after Wright called 3000 terrorist murders in New York City, DC, and a Pennsylvania corn field where gay hero Mark Bingham helped bring down Flight 93 just the result of "chickens come home to roost"....even after Wright canonized racist, antiSemitic, homohating Louis "Jews, Palestinian Arabs, Koreans, and Vietnamese are bloodsuckers" Farrakhan this past November.... UNTIL he was forced to, until the world finally saw and heard some of Wright's pathological outrages... AND THEN claims he's the ONLY close friend of Wright, the ONLY one who's known him for 23 years, the ONLY member of his congregation, the ONLY Chicago resident, the ONLY religious black man in all of America NOT to have known all of this reveals a chasm in credibility and a depth of poor personal and moral judgment in Obama that no one asking us to choose him over another as candidate for President of the United States should possess.

Jerame~

1. I'm rather disappointed that you can't read this post through anything other than a "Clinton vs. Obama" mindset, that this whole thing has to come down to presidential race and only the presidential race, that there aren't some issues that are more important than who gets the Dem nomination.

2. I think that racism is a substantive issue that should be discussed in a political context. I think that trying to sweep it under the rug won't solve anything.

3. "it's the exact same kind of "race-baiting" the Clintons were vilified for supposedly trafficking in as well." Um, I don't see the connection. At all. And I don't see how the Clintons doing X, Y, or Z is part of the calculus of whether Bill-O is right or not.

4. "Anyone who says otherwise is racist too" Of course, Jerame. Everyone who disagrees with you is racist. That's the ideal political discussion, isn't it?

5. The point isn't that Wright is always right. Of course he isn't. The point is that a prominent politician is being vilified for being associated with his criticisms of America. It doesn't really matter what Wright said throughout his life - all Bill-O's picking up on

6.

So, now that we've proven there are racists in BOTH camps, can we get back to substantive issues that actually relate to being president?

Actually, some of us don't think that we should be talking about the presidential race 100% of the time. Some of us want to talk about what two journalists and Bill-O think about a preacher in Chicago and how that affects what we see as possible.

MB~

WHO exactly is claiming that "government and power can do no wrong"? Name them, please.

Didn't just name them, I put up a video of one.

Other than that I'll leave it there. I'm going to take the advice Sara left on Jerame's penultimate post and just accept that there's no talking reason with crazy candidate supporters on anything tangentially related to the presidential race. Maybe we can talk about this in November.

"Of course, Jerame. Everyone who disagrees with you is racist."

With appreciation to Mart Crowley, "That's the pot calling the kettle beige." You see more racists under more beds, Alex, than a cockroach in a Ku Klux Klan mattress factory.

"Didn't just name them, I put up a video of one."

Drool. He never said that. Of all the endless horrible things he's said I doubt that O'Reilly has ever said that. But I congratulate you on your growing syllogistic propaganda skills.

O'Reilly is bad.
O'Reilly criticizes Wright and Obama.
Therefore, Wright and Obama are good.

Whenever you post one of these hocking hissy fits you remind me of nothing less than Cartman in "South Park; The Movie" after he's had a chip implanted in his neck that gives him an electric shock every time he cusses which makes him cuss more which results in another shock which causes him to cuss which.... And we LUV your CD:

http://www.cartoonskickass.com/ghetto.wav

- Michael Bedwell
"Unreasonable, crazy candidate supporter."

MB~ I'm sorry you drool uncontrollably, but that's neither here nor there.

Bill-O said that a former Marine was an America hater because he criticized America. Bill-O pretty much calls anyone who says anything bad about America an America-hater. I think that's a pretty transparent attempt to shut down criticism of America.

Obama (and Clinton or any other Democrat, for that matter) had better be thinking about the stars and stripes and how America's never done anything wrong while he masturbates or he can't be president.

Bwahaha! Very colorfully said, and so true given the way things are these days.

I'd like to add that Wright's anger resonates with some of us who are not black, too. We are entrenched in race in this country, and Wright particularly addresses racial issues, but America has betrayed its promise to all of us--especially lately.

Alex,

1. I'm viewing this post through the lens you set it up with, Alex. None other.

2. It's silly to think that you can have a substantive discussion about race in the middle of a campaign like this. Race is being used as a weapon, not as a starting point for healing. Neither side is approaching this as a substantive discussion and neither side will. It is naive to think that somehow after all the silliness you've seen that it will all be suddenly put aside because you said you wanted to have a real discussion.

3. I wasn't referring to what Bill O was saying there - I was referring to the rev's other comments - I even said so right in the comment.

4. Gee, talk about being taken out of context. You are such an astute debater, Alex, that you have to cut the quote and make it sound more insidious than it was. Great skills!

5. I don't think the "America" comments are that bad, actually. I didn't even comment much on those - it's the other things he said that offended me and I said so in my comment. I think America has been shitty to blacks, women, Muslims, asians, Mexicans, Irish, etc. Still, it's racially charged and tinged speech that plays into the undercurrent of racism that is still a part of everyday life. It's still bumblheaded for Obama to have known how much of a firebrand he is - and knowing some of the things he's said are on YouTube - and to give him a spot in the campaign.

Oh, and Bill O is the biggest hypocritical whack job ever to disgrace the TV screen - that doesn't mean he can't tap into a sentiment that will resonate with a large swath of normally rational people and use it to beat the Dems about the head for it. If this guy wasn't part of the campaign and JUST Obama's personal preacher, it wouldn't be near the issue it is. It was a mistake.

6. I don't think we should be talking about it all the time too. But you should also accept the reality that this isn't just "tangentially relate" to the campaign. It's directly related because it's happening RIGHT NOW and involves one of the candidates.

Let's see, presidential politics, "anti-American sentiment" (notice I used quotes to mean "not necessarily", and racial overtones...That's a perfect shit storm no matter WHEN it happens, let alone in the middle of a hotly contested presidential race. Catch a clue and don't get so petulant.

His many attempts at damage control having failed so far, Obama has announced that he's going to give a major speech about it all. That promises to be a bigger challenge than JFK's speech about his relationship to Catholicism or Romney's to Mormonism because despite whatever preconceptions voters had they were never encapsulated [or seemed to be] in incendiary video clips starring a black Elmer Gantry with 'roid rage. Will a campaign that has been given so much life by YouTube die by YouTube?

This will sound like a contradiction of my lobbying against Obama, but I hope he succeeds in that speech.

Because if he doesn’t, if he attempts to turn it, as the church itself and Wright’s replacement have into a "why are you blaming us"/"this is just more white racism" and “character assassination” of the Misunderstood Saint of South Chicago whine....and then the Party is still foolish enough to give him the nomination, I fear that McCain will win through all the crossover votes from white and Jewish Dems and independents who “hear” nothing but black racism/anti-Americanism in Wright and black racism/anti-Americanism plus antiSemitism in Wright’s bosom buddy Farrakahn.

And all of this is NOT being helped by pseudo intellects like “undecided superdelegate” wink wink nudge nudge Donna Brazile telling TV viewers that Wright is one of the “more moderate” black preachers, and others saying it’s just a different “style” of preaching rather than addressing the substance. And it will take a lot more than erasing various policy statements from the church’s Website such as the "Black Value System" manifesto, as they have. And a lot more than erasing Wright’s picture and endorsement from Obama’s site, as they have done, or removing Wright himself from his campaign’s religious advisors committee.

Obama was tested with McClurkingate and failed but most Americans don’t care about homophobes like McClurkin so he got away with it. But this will be his biggest test yet...the biggest in his entire public career.....involving many complex topics that no one speech can ever adequately address [e.g., OF COURSE a great deal of evil has been done in America’s name BUT...]...and the simplest, ultimate one....why the candidate exalted for being “above race” didn’t detach himself from dated race victimologist Wright and Wright from his campaign before being forced to. However long the litany of good works Wright might have done that Obama might recite is not going to erase in those voters' minds the kind of Farrakhanish "Whitey is the enemy" cons that Wright should have thrown out with his bell bottoms and Redd Foxx LPs long ago.

Historical note: the infamous Fred Phelps has a history of fighting for racial equality, but look where he is now in the eyes of nongay Americans of all colors. Fairly or not, Jeremiah Wright is Barack Obama’s personal Fred Phelps. Even “Saturday Night Live” aired a mocking cartoon about Obama’s long-distancing himself from Jesse Jackson, Sr., and Al Sharpton and all the time he was with mindnumbing stupidity ignoring the giant albatross in his own backyard.

He doesn’t have the advantage of his famous “blank screen” this time but the memories of countless screens over the last five days projecting what is for many Americans a nightmare. If Obama doesn’t summon a depth and breadth of eloquence he’s never demonstrated before, we might not just lose the White House but see race relations generally set waaay back.

Boys Boys Boys,

Something that strikes me as really funny about all of this, including Geraldine Ferraro's comments is that it seems like it isn't okay to mention that Obama is black. I agree with her comments that he is where he is and for that matter who he is because he is black. How does that undermine his candidacy? I think it is okay to be black? Is Hillary where she is because she is a woman? Yes. She is who she is because she has lived as a woman for a long time. Obama is black. I think that it is cool and obvious and probably should be okay to say.

Now, I agree with Jerame and I agree with Alex (sorry micheal I don't read your comments anymore - I know I know obama is like hitler). Alex, I agree absolutely that we need to be discussing race and the idea that we can not talk about it in this election or that we shouldn't talk about it in any election seems simply well white and racist. There is a certain amount of white privilege that goes into declaring that race shouldn't be an issue. I think the same is true for men who claim that gender shouldn't be an issue with Hillary being slammed left and right by the sexist media.

Jerame is pretty dead on though in saying that the Rev.'s comments are inexcusable and shouldn't be overlooked or ignored. I don't know about losing tax exempt status and all that but Obama has been going to that church a long time and some pretty inflammatory and damaging rhetoric regarding diversity issues seems to come from there. Let's not excuse hate.

I would like it a lot if you two would wrestle naked about this. Just saying.

I'm all for wrestling naked, but only if I get to go to France and wrestle Alex there. I hear Europe is fantastic in the springtime.

In all seriousness, I appreciate the measured response, Bruce. The one thing I want to make clear is that I'm not against discussing race - just that it's an awfully bad time to have the discussion when nerves are on end and racism claims (both false and true) have been flying for weeks. Perhaps a cooling-off period before we get back into it knee deep? You can't have a substantive discussion about race when both sides are calling the other racist and no one is listening, which is the point I was trying to make.

More importantly, however, I think you hit it on the head when you said that it seems to be taboo to talk about Obama's being black. That's how I've felt for a while now. I too believe he is who he is because he is black the same way Hillary is who she is because she is a woman. It doesn't in anyway demean their candidacies or make them "suspect" as another commenter suggested in another post. It simply makes them who they are - and for the record, they are BOTH extraordinary people.

But Bill O'Reilly is still a whack-job nut-case. At least we can agree on that.

But, Brucie, you cut me to the quick. Everything I've ever written anywhere has been with you solely in mind. Even before you were born.

Unfortunately, I can empathize and agree with Reverend Wright's sermon. Not because I hate America, but because I love it. We need to live up to the ideals, not a history that is and will continue to be a history of shame and injustice.

And that MAN was so rude that I did want to throw something....

I read that one Michael. It was the most coherent thing you have posted in a while. :)

Seriously, you would do well to shorten your comments a little even though I agree with you a lot of the time they are very very very overwhelming.

Obama paid me to say that. It is the black folks conspiracy to keep Hillary supporters down. :)

I don't think the "America" comments are that bad, actually. I didn't even comment much on those - it's the other things he said that offended me and I said so in my comment.

And those were what I was talking about in the post. I wasn't going to write about the Rev at all until I saw this vid on Jasmyne Cannick's site, which, guess what, was all about the patriotism comments. And then I wrote all about the patriotism comments. And then I titled the post something explicitly about patriotism. I mean, to come on here and leave several long disagreement comments calling me racist (because I disagree!) and then almost at the bottom tack on that you don't even feel like talking about the same thing is kinda mean. It made me eat granola, which I finally found here.

OK, more context:

This kind of discussion has no place in presidential politics. While racism itself is a very important topic and worthy of much discussion, it is impossible to discuss it in a political context. In this context, it's just plain stupidity that goads people into saying these incredibly bumble-headed things. It's equally abhorrent what has been said on both sides here and these viewpoints should be repudiated, rejected, and renounced (and any other action verb you want to throw in there.)

Anyone who says otherwise is racist too, in my opinion.

I completely disagree that race shouldn't be talked about in a political context. I mean, sure, there will always be certain candidate supporters who say whatever they feel need to support their fave candidate and therefore can't be trusted to give an honest opinion (while I try to ignore a certain one on this thread), but still if we're not taking these opportunities to start conversations, then we're just sweeping it under the rug.

Bruce~ I would hope that we were trying to move beyond "right" or "wrong" and reducing everything to a two-sided argument. While there's a certain someone who somehow read this post as "Vote for Obama" written 300 times over, that's not what it's about.

Are we seriously white-washing Ferraro's comments now and pretending that she was just pointing out, no reason at all, that Obama's black, and that it relates, in the way all identity relates, to one's experiences? Psh-aw, she knew what she was doing.

Jerame in 10~ "The one thing I want to make clear is that I'm not against discussing race - just that it's an awfully bad time to have the discussion when nerves are on end and racism claims (both false and true) have been flying for weeks."

We could put forth some effort. Instead of reading everything related to the campaign as a personal attack because someone supports a certain candidate, we can try to put that to the side a little for issues that are going to be around long after Obama and Clinton are dead.

I mean, the fact that people even assumed that I was supporting Obama-over-Hillary from this post shows that they're just looking for a fight in that arena, I know, I agree, but honestly I refuse to take responsibility for other people's hang-ups re politics. I'll talk about the patriotism tests the right sets up for liberals and Democrats any damn time I please! :)

Yes, France, in general, is fantastic in the spring. Am I the only person who gets hornier around this time of year? I know humans don't have seasonal sex cycles, but it seems to me that with the weather changin' and everything, a good wrestle sounds like a good idea.

MB~ Let's join hands and start chanting "Vote for Hillary," because that's all that matters always!

Jerindc~ I'm glad you locked away all your highball glasses!

Seriously, the first time I watched that clip I had to get up and walk around; Bill O'Reilly just pisses me off that much.

AB: you really MUST try to copyright "reduction to absurdity" because I've never known anyone so smart do it so often and so well.

All that matters = vote for Hillary? Once again you've proven that you don't read before you jump to your Playskool barricade waving your little Cartman flag against those who dare to disagree with you.

Were I there, I would try to spell it out in your little hand like W A T E R, but the following will have to suffice. NB: not for your benefit but for others who might believe your latest epistolary seizure.

1. Electing a Democrat is all that matters in this election.
2. Electing the better Democrat = electing Sen. Clinton.
3. Electing Obama is better than electing no Democrat at all.

Bruce: Hug hug. Kiss kiss. :- )

Wow, we have it all here, racism, anti-americanism, facism, and any number of others a person could think of.

Why does it look more and more like another 4 years of a republican administration?

If you were going to have a discussion on race, you know, the time woud have been back around Iowa or so, maybe even before the primaries started.

Now, it is just more fuel for the McCain fire. Don't get me started with the I told you so's, as far as America still being a racist country that will not at this time elect a black man as president.

I is, they won't.

No amount of wishful thinking or speechifying, or what have you is going to change that. It isn't just the south either. I have heard my share of yankees mouth the same old bull crap any good ole southern redneck would. The north might have fought against slavery, but it wasn't so they could put a black man in the white house. Hell, Lincoln wanted to ship the freed slaves back to Africa, great emancipator my now missing right testicle!

Things are better, marginally, than they were in the 70's which was the last time I saw a "colored only" water fountain. The racism is not as overt as it once was. It is less socially acceptable to air those opinions in public anymore. Now they have gays and "immigrants' to bash publically, so that lets the blacks off with a pass, for now.

You can't legislate acceptance, you can not change public attitudes with a law. Enough time has not passed yet for the lowering of the racial barriers that many people still have. Some people will never change, and they will try and pass on their attitudes to their children, as my father tried to pass on his to me. It is in the hands of the next few generations, to finally overcome the institutional racism of our society.

Sorry, that is the way it is.

diddlygrl,

Let me say that you said, "my now, mising right testicle" and I love you for it.

That is pretty much all I have to say.

Alex,

I see your point re being off topic. I reread your post and my comment and you're right that I was off topic. I think part of my issue here is lumping a great number of comments together, rather than focusing on the one issue. I think I reacted because I'm just not feeling like a strong defense of the Rev is what is in order when taking some of the other comments into question. These happen to be not as bothersome to me.

What pisses me off is the feeling that trying to explain ANY of it away is going to enrage a good section of white folks (some racist, some not) and it's creating another divide. To have clearly racial, if not racist, overtones mixed with words that can also be interpreted as anti-American is not going to play well in the heartland.

And what MB says rings very true to me in all of this - it's going to set back race relations by decades if it doesn't get dealt with properly. People like Bill O can exploit this for their own means, which is exactly what he's doing. Do you know how many times they play those videos a day on CNN? MSNBC? FOX? It's, like constantly for the past two or three days.

As for Ferraro - I'm not sure it's a white-wash to acknowledge her piss-poor explanation while still pointing out that she didn't really say what she's says she said. What she said, on at least 3 separate occasions, sounded pretty racist to me. While her "clarification" may be an accurate statement by itself, her actual quotes were pretty shitty.

Anyway, it felt a bit pro-Obama to be what I perceived as cherry-picking which statements to support of the Rev's. I reacted to the entirety of the Rev's statements rather than the one you were focusing on - I can concede that.

I don't, however, think my actual points were invalid, just misplaced.

Jerame~

I see your point re being off topic. I reread your post and my comment and you're right that I was off topic. I think part of my issue here is lumping a great number of comments together, rather than focusing on the one issue. I think I reacted because I'm just not feeling like a strong defense of the Rev is what is in order when taking some of the other comments into question. These happen to be not as bothersome to me.

I love you too, Jerame! It's my fault too for making the post seem like it was more about the Rev. when really I was mostly thinking about Bill-O.

Let's go back to the good times, back when we'd go down to the river with our picnic baskets and our fair ladies (you bring Bil and I'll pick up someone from gay.com) and laugh over tea and watercress sandwiches!

Ditto on Bruce in 19. That cracked me up.

Reduction to absurdity, Michael? I can't copyright that! What about calling me an Obama propagandist, because, as you put it in #4, I don't like Bill O'Reilly. I didn't know that anyone who doesn't like him is now an Obama supporter! I would have imagined that he'd be cruising at around 99% of the popular vote right now if that were the case, but maybe Bill-O's fan club is a whole lot bigger than I once imagined.

But I don't feel any need to sit around and try to steal Bill O'Reilly's audience, sorry. I'm sure there's another webpage just for them.

I'm going to ask the same question that's beein going around in the African-American community?

Why isn't John McCain being castigated for his assocation with John hagee in the same manner as Obama's being swift-boated on Rev. Jeremiah Wright?

That's an excellent question, Monica. Digby asked when this whole thing broke out why when Huckabee said he wouldn't release his sermons no one pressed him on that, but the media combed through Wright's.

I would think that the sermons the candidate himself delivered would be far more important than the ones s/he listened to!

"Why isn't John McCain being castigated for his assocation with John hagee in the same manner as Obama's being swift-boated on Rev. Jeremiah Wright?"

Excellent question??? It's a silly, virtually irrelevant question. It's like equating rabbit poop and horse shit.

McCain is not the worst Repug ever but Time as we know it would stop if he becomes Prez while the body bags would keep piling up and his rimming of Hagee for votes is reprehensible. Hagee is a medieval theocratic facist who makes black nationalist, all-bombast and no balls fool Wright look like St. Jeremiah of Assisi.

BUT do the math .... McCain has not spent 23 years describing Hagee as his personal hero and friend; McCain never named a book after one of Hagee's sermons; probably hasn’t attended Hagee's church 23 times let alone for 23 years. Hagee didn’t perform McCain's marriage nor baptize his children. And one doubts McCain has donated thousands of dollars to Hagee's church as Obama has Wright's.

Is Hagee's picture and endorsement on McCain's campaign Website? [BTW, Wright has been erased from Obama's and the more controversial philosophies of Wright's church erased from its own site.] And, while Hagee hobnobs and honors any number of fellow facists, are any of them the international racist, antiSemitic monsters [hmmm, where have I heard that word recently?] that Louis "Hitler was a great man" Farrakhan is who is probably looking at his four-month old "Rev. Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr. Lifetime Achievement Trumpeteer” Award right now and smiling.

Oh, and as for that "Swift Boat" analogy; that's just as silly and inapplicable. The charges against Kerry by the Swift Boaters were never proven; the consensus among decent people [but not enough voters] was that they had little if any basis.

The only thing that remains in dispute in Wrightgate is whether Obama was as ignorant of Wright's outrages for as long as he claims and why he didn't erase him from his campaign sooner in any case.

Further, one could agree with EVERYTHING Wright has ever said and still understand that Obama was a fool for remaining so close to it when the average American voter would find things he said repulsive. Obama is not "the uniter," he's the denier.