http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/03/post_25.html March 25, 2008 The Audacity of Rhetoric By Thomas Sowell It is painful to watch defenders of Barack Obama tying themselves into knots trying to evade the obvious. Some are saying that Senator Obama cannot be held responsible for what his pastor, Jeremiah Wright, said. In their version of events, Barack Obama just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time -- and a bunch of mean-spirited people are trying to make something out of it. It makes a good story, but it won't stand up under scrutiny. Barack Obama's own account of his life shows that he consciously sought out people on the far left fringe. In college, "I chose my friends carefully," he said in his first book, "Dreams From My Father." These friends included "Marxist professors and structural feminists and punk rock performance poets" -- in Obama's own words -- as well as the "more politically active black students." He later visited a former member of the terrorist Weatherman underground, who endorsed him when he ran for state senator. Obama didn't just happen to encounter Jeremiah Wright, who just happened to say some way out things. Jeremiah Wright is in the same mold as the kinds of people Barack Obama began seeking out in college -- members of the left, anti-American counter-culture. In Shelby Steele's brilliantly insightful book about Barack Obama -- "A Bound Man" -- it is painfully clear that Obama was one of those people seeking a racial identity that he had never really experienced in growing up in a white world. He was trying to become a convert to blackness, as it were -- and, like many converts, he went overboard. Nor has Obama changed in recent years. His voting record in the U.S. Senate is the furthest left of any Senator. There is a remarkable consistency in what Barack Obama has done over the years, despite inconsistencies in what he says. The irony is that Obama's sudden rise politically to the level of being the leading contender for his party's presidential nomination has required him to project an entirely different persona, that of a post-racial leader who can heal divisiveness and bring us all together. The ease with which he has accomplished this chameleon-like change, and entranced both white and black Democrats, is a tribute to the man's talent and a warning about his reliability. There is no evidence that Obama ever sought to educate himself on the views of people on the other end of the political spectrum, much less reach out to them. He reached out from the left to the far left. That's bringing us all together? Is "divisiveness" defined as disagreeing with the agenda of the left? Who on the left was ever called divisive by Obama before that became politically necessary in order to respond to revelations about Jeremiah Wright? One sign of Obama's verbal virtuosity was his equating a passing comment by his grandmother -- "a typical white person," he says -- with an organized campaign of public vilification of America in general and white America in particular, by Jeremiah Wright. Since all things are the same, except for the differences, and different except for the similarities, it is always possible to make things look similar verbally, however different they are in the real world. Among the many desperate gambits by defenders of Senator Obama and Jeremiah Wright is to say that Wright's words have a "resonance" in the black community. There was a time when the Ku Klux Klan's words had a resonance among whites, not only in the South but in other states. Some people joined the KKK in order to advance their political careers. Did that make it OK? Is it all just a matter of whose ox is gored? While many whites may be annoyed by Jeremiah Wright's words, a year from now most of them will probably have forgotten about him. But many blacks who absorb his toxic message can still be paying for it, big-time, for decades to come. Why should young blacks be expected to work to meet educational standards, or even behavioral standards, if they believe the message that all their problems are caused by whites, that the deck is stacked against them? That is ultimately a message of hopelessness, however much audacity it may have.
If no liberal is able to refute the points laid out in the article, I will hereby close discussion on the topic, and the article's content will stand as truth
...and McCain's spiritual adviser thinks it's America's divine purpose to eradicate Islam... that Islam is basically the most evil force on Earth. No way is that a better alternative than Wright. That's sheer insanity. Neither McCain nor Obama should be judged by what these guys say... but if they are, McCain's got it worse. Which is why I wonder the media has barely touched the McCain story.
LOLOL maybe we're just tired of rehashing the same argument. What did Wright say that's racist? If you want to do this again and again and again and again and again and again. I realize for you guys that this is the only issue that's going to hurt obama against mccain, but can't we at least wait till the general election to rehash this again and again and again and again and again and again.
why did you not take the article from the source? HTML: http://www.townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2008/03/26/the_audacity_of_rhetoric
No. How about we just have one thread per topic? You guys can have a sticky about the scary dark man, his hidden adherence to the Koran, and his angry, scary friends. Every time one of you find a new essay bout the same topic, it does NOT deserve it's own thread. You, and basso, and your brother, are B.O.F.s Barack Only Fans.
To make up for the last 8 years of the lack thereof? I am sure 20 years of boozing with regular runs to Mexico for hookers and blow will fix whatever ails Obama politically, no?
Didn't you get the memo? All Republican talking points are to be repeated until they are accepted as fact.
This is also a quote from Jeremiah Wright... is this the racist part? the guy made some comments I disagree with...the guy made some comments I agree with. so...that makes him like everyone else. do I think he should talk politics from the pulpit. No. I wouldn't regularly go to that church. Not because its racist, but because that ministry is not what I want to hear. I wouldn't call this view republican. Mike Huckabee came out and defended both Obama and Wright. Alot more than another democrat, did...
what a load of crap. can't anyone stop perpetuating the guilt by association fallacy please? i haven't commented because i thought this would go away, but PUHLEASE. GET OVER IT ALREADY.
The association exists because Obama named him to his spiritual advisory team. It's no coincidence that they are associated, it's totally voluntary and purposeful. Obama chose to associate with Wright for 20 years, despite anti-American rhetoric, and racist, bigoted, and anti-semitic rhetoric. That just shows bad judgment and a flaw in Obama's character.
No, Obama was ranked the most liberal senator. I forget who did the ranking, but it's never been disputed by Obama or anyone in his campaign. The guy's on the far left on almost every issue. I don't exactly see how that can translate into uniting people. Unless we're using the left-wing definition of unity which is conservatives accepting the liberal's point-of-view(unfortunately McCain seems to subscribe to the same philosophy).
I'm certainly not a conservative by any stretch, but I very much agree here. I could care less whether conservative voters like his personality or his message and are more ready to unite behind him than Clinton or anyone else. What matters is what conservative politicians who are in Congress would be willing to do, and based on Obama's record, the unity argument is a hard sell for me.
No, actually the problem with this silly ranking has been well chronicled. But yeah I guess being liberal is a dirty word, given the last 8 years of failure by the conservative movement, resulting in their repudiation in 2006.
I know who did the ranking. It's the national Journal. They do the same thing every time and it's completely bogus. Obama has rebuked the findings and went even further in rebuking all labels like liberal etc. The ranking is a joke. Bernie Sanders is a registered socialist and all also a Senator. He's far more liberal. The national journal does this everytime the Dems look like they have a nominee. Kerry jumped from something like 12th most liberal, to all of a sudden being the most liberal when it was clear he would be the nominee in 2004. This site has quotes from a couple of different sources showing how laughable the rankings are. http://www.mostliberalsenator.blogspot.com/ That being said, there is no doubt that Obama's beliefs are liberal. But he's done well in working with Republicans, and in a bi-partisan fashion.
