Wednesday, March 19, 2008

AP: “Obama Grabs Race Issue”

Almost all major news organizations are resonating the Obama campaign’s meme he delivered yesterday “a major speech about race.”

I don’t entirely agree with that.

Obama was forced to make yesterday’s speech because of the outcry in response to circulation of sermon tapes of his friend and pastor of almost 20 years, Rev. Jeremiah Wright. The tapes revealed Wright frequently delivered virulently anti-American and racist screeds for the pulpit.

The following excerpts from an AP report suggest how tough MSM is finding it to report what’s really at issue:

[In the past] seven weeks since, race has mattered more and more in[Sen. Barack Obama's] presidential struggle against Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, threatening to dent his lead.

On Tuesday, Obama addressed it head-on in a speech that bluntly described a history of injustice to blacks, acknowledged the resentments of whites, and ended with the hope that his campaign can help heal racial divisions.
You wouldn’t know from that paragraph that Obama and his campaign wanted that speech to do two things: 1) distance the candidate from Wright; and 2) quiet public unrest about his association with the pastor. Surely a man as smart as Obama who plans to campaign in the fall in support of affirmative action and other forms of racial favoritism doesn’t really believe he can put race behind him except in the sense that most MSM will pretend its not there.

The AP continues.
Like any full-blown discussion of the sensitive topic, Obama's speech carries risks. Some whites may feel he did not do enough to distance himself from a fiery Chicago preacher who has depicted the United States as a racist society. The speech also could unleash wider discussions of race in the campaign rather than reduce its role as a "distraction" from more important issues, a term Obama used several times.
Wright’s anti-Americanism and racism are downplayed here as he’s described as “fiery.” Other news accounts use “controversial.”

I’ve yet to see one MSM news story that came right out and called them anti-American and racist.

Can you miss the contradiction between Obama saying he needed to deliver a major speech on race and not wanting it to become a “distraction” from more important issues?

In his speech he tried, I think at times very effectively, to point out how important and enduring are issues surrounding race. But to repeat somewhat: He will again and again in the fall support the continuation and expansion of racial preference programs.

Obama, his campaign people and his MSM flacks are talking out of both sides of their mouths.

There’s nothing unusual about that. Pols and their pals do it often. So do most of us.

I just don’t want to let myself be fooled.

How about you?

The AP’s story’s here.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

John:

Rev Wright's message was very subtle. It took many years of sitting through sermons for Obama to grasp the intent of the message. He should not be criticized for being a slow learner.

Heck, the folks at AP are still trying to figure out what "God d___ America" means.

Ken
Dallas

Insufficiently Sensitive said...

Some whites may feel he did not do enough to distance himself from a fiery Chicago preacher who has depicted the United States as a racist society.

And quite a collection of black ministers feel likewise. What a nasty tactic, to omit that from their article - they've shielded their pet candidate from accountability, as long as the rest of us stay ignorant of that excluded fact.

The AP's last initial means 'Propaganda'.

Anonymous said...

John: You are absolutely correct about talking out of both sides of their mouths. He cannot alienate his black base and yet had to try to rehibilitate his image to white voters. I believe he failed and that he is finished.

Anonymous said...

It looks like the main stream media folks are getting ready to bail on Obama.

ABC News: "Buried in Eloquence, Obama Contradictions About Pastor"

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=4480868&page=1

Insufficiently Sensitive said...

It looks like the main stream media folks are getting ready to bail on Obama.

Not all of them. The front page of the Seattle P-I (a poodle of the New York Times) this morning begins a long sigh of relief about what a noble speech this was, how Obama's a 'new Lincoln', and how he has fended off the purveyors of those mere 'snippets' of Wright's blatant racism on some media and YouTube. And furthermore, is ready to bring us all together (provided it's under his own immaculate leadership, of course)- and if we don't sign up, we must be some unworthy form of racists.

So as far as the P-I is concerned, Obama (regardless of his 20-year bath in Wright's anti-Americanism) is off in a cloud of dust for his date with the White House.

Who are you going to believe, a billowy speech from Philadelphia or your own non-nuanced eyes?

mac said...
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mac said...
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Anonymous said...

If I was to disclose that I have serious reservations about a President Obama simply because he is African, does that mean I’m a racist? Before you answer yes, please read below.

In a recent BBC TV report on the best run black African nation, South Africa, an admittedly left wing journalist reported on post apartheid progress.

Below are the items in the report that I remembered.

Twice as many black South Africans are now living on less than $1 a day.

The murder rate is up dramatically (at a level 7 times that of U.S). BTW if you don’t count the murders in America committed by blacks, our murder rate is about that of Sweden.

The estimated deaths that resulted from President Thabo Mbeki assuring his people that AIDS wasn’t being spread through unprotected sex could be one million or more.

The South African government aided and abetted President Mugabe's rape of Zimbabwe.

Desmond Tutu was interviewed and said that black South Africans should be ashamed for electing Jacob Zuma as their next president.

And, two black workers who were interviewed said that good job opportunities would only return to South Africa if the Nationalist (white) government came back to power. The journalist then assured us that they couldn’t really mean what they said (I guess political correctness is more important than eating - to the well fed).