Why Obama outed his white grandmother

James Taranto at WSJ’s Best of the Web Today begins by giving the real reason for Obama’s “major speech on race.”

It was, of course, an attempt to rescue his campaign from the revelation that his so-called spiritual mentor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, espouses a virulently anti-American and anti-white worldview called "black liberation theology."

Amen to that.

I wish Obama and his MSM supporters would admit it.

Taranto goes on to quote the part of Obama’s speech that bothered him the most:

I can no more disown [Wright] than I can my white grandmother--a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

Taranto explains why that bothered him:

Our first thought was that it was pretty low of Obama to exploit his (still living) grandmother in this way. Is it really necessary for the whole world to know about her private expressions of prejudice? Doesn't simple decency dictate that a public figure treat embarrassing facts about loved ones with discretion?

Obama was trying to accomplish something very specific by dragging his "white grandmother" into this political mess. He was trying to diminish Wright's hateful theology by implying that it too is a private matter. Said Obama:

For the men and women of Rev. Wright's generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. …
And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. …

Note how Obama elides the difference between a comment at the "kitchen table" and a sermon delivered to a congregation of thousands and recorded on DVD. ...

Taranto’s entire post is here.

Comments:

I agree with Taranto. Only he said it better than I could.

If Obama meant to tell us some whites, like some blacks, and some people of every other skin coloration are racists, fine. That’s true.

But why’d Obama have to bring up his grandma? There were plenty of other ways to make his point.

Why not mention one or more white hate groups or David Duke?

Most of you know the answer to that question.

Doing that would make it obvious Obama’s close friend and pastor was not “a beloved religious leader” who now and then put a few controversial “snippets" in his sermons.