Obama's Radical-Left Ties Broad And Deep

National Review Online: Senator Approves Of The Political-Theological Outlooks Of Michael Pfleger and Jeremiah Wright

(National Review Online)  This column was written by Stanley Kurtz.

---

Having now left Trinity United Church of Christ, can Barack Obama escape responsibility for his decades-long ties to Michael Pfleger and Jeremiah Wright? No, he cannot. Obama’s connections to the radical-left politics espoused by Pfleger and Wright are broad and deep. The real reason Obama bound himself to Wright and Pfleger in the first place is that he largely approved of their political-theological outlooks.

Obama shared Wright’s rejection of black “assimilation.” Obama also shared Wright’s suspicion of the traditional American ethos of individual self-improvement and the pursuit of “middle-classness.” In common with Wright, Obama had deep misgivings about America’s criminal justice system. And with the exception of their direct attacks on whites, Obama largely approved of his preacher-friends’ fiery rhetoric. Obama’s goal was not to repudiate religious radicalism but to channel its fervor into an effective and permanent activist organization. How do we know all this? We know it because Obama himself has told us.

A REVEALING PROFILE
Although it’s been discussed before (because it confirms that Obama attended Louis Farrakhan’s Million Man March), a 1995 background piece on Obama from the Chicago Reader has received far too little attention. Careful consideration of this important profile makes it clear that Obama’s long-standing ties to Chicago’s most rabidly radical preachers call into question far more than Obama’s judgment and character (although they certainly do that, as well). Obama’s two-decades at Trinity open a critically important window onto his radical-left political leanings. No mere change of church membership can erase that truth.

By providing us with an in-depth picture of Obama’s political worldview on the eve of his elective career, Hank De Zutter’s, “What Makes Obama Run?” lives up to its title. The first thing to note here is that Obama presents his political hopes for the black community as a third way between two inadequate alternatives. First, Obama rejects, “the unrealistic politics of integrationist assimilation - which helps a few upwardly mobile blacks to ‘move up, get rich, and move out. . . . ’ ” This statement might surprise many Obama supporters, who seem to think of him as the epitome of integrationism. Yet Obama’s repudiation of integrationist upward mobility is fully consistent with his career as a community organizer, his general sympathy for leftist critics of the American “system,” and of course his membership at Trinity. Obama, we are told, “quickly learned that integration was a one-way street, with blacks expected to assimilate into a white world that never gave ground.” Compare these statements by Obama with some of the remarks in Jeremiah Wright’s Trumpet, and the resemblance is clear.

Having disposed of assimilation, Obama goes on to criticize “the politics of black rage and black nationalism” - although less on substance than on tactics. Obama upbraids the politics of black power for lacking a practical strategy. Instead of diffusing black rage by diverting it to the traditional American path of assimilation and middle-class achievement, Obama wants to capture the intensity of black anger and use it to power an effective political organization. Obama says, “he’s tired of seeing the moral fervor of black folks whipped up - at the speaker’s rostrum and from the pulpit - and then allowed to dissipate because there’s no agenda, no concrete program for change.” The problem is not fiery rhetoric from the pulpit, but merely the wasted anger it so usefully stirs.

OBAMA’S NETWORK
De Zutter gives us a clear glimpse of Obama’s radicalism. Obama is called “progressive,” of course, and is said to yearn for “massive economic change.” That could simply mean an end to widespread poverty, rather than social restructuring. Yet Obama is also described as holding “a worldview well beyond” his mother’s “New Deal, Peace Corps, position-paper liberalism.” De Zutter lays out Obama’s ties to radical groups like Chicago Acorn, as Acorn’s lead organizer, Madeleine Talbott, is quoted affirming that: “Barack has proven himself among our members . . . we accept and respect him as a kindred spirit, a fellow organizer.” In “Inside Obama’s Acorn” I explore Obama’s links to this radical group, and to Talbott, who practices the sort of intimidating and often illegal “direct action” Acorn is famous for. (For more on Talbott’s affinity for “direct action,” see “Where Do We Begin?”)

De Zutter also touches on some other key elements of Obama’s network. Obama’s early organizing work for the Developing Communities Project was “funded by south-side Catholic churches.” Clearly, this early work cemented Obama’s close ties to Father Pfleger, whose support formed a critical component of Obama’s grassroots network. Precisely because of this early link, Pfleger threw his considerable support behind Obama’s failed 2000 bid for Congress. By the way, Pfleger’s political influence in Chicago is such that Mayor Richard Daley actually declared his 2002 candidacy for a fourth full term as mayor at Pfleger’s St. Sabina church. In “Inside Obama’s Acorn” I explore the possibility that Obama’s seat on the boards of a couple liberal Chicago foundations may have allowed him to direct funds to groups that served as his de facto political base. De Zutter quotes Woods Fund executive director, Jean Rudd, praising Obama for “being among the most hard-nosed board members in wanting to see results. He wants to see our grants make change happen - not just pay salaries.” No doubt, Obama was sincerely supportive of the sort of leftist organizations favored by the Woods Fund. However, if Obama was in fact looking to some of the groups supported by the Woods Fund as a personal political base, his unusually active board service would make all the more sense.

BLACK CHURCHES
The threads of this political network are pulled tighter as Obama turns to a “favorite topic,” “the lack of collective action among black churches.” Obama is sharply critical of churches that try to help their communities merely through “food pantries and community service programs.” Today, Obama rationalizes his ties to Wright’s Trinity Church by citing its community service programs. Yet in 1995, Obama was highly critical of churches that focused exclusively on such services, while neglecting the sort of politically visionary sermons, local king-making, and political alliance-building favored by Pfleger and Wright. Obama rejects the strictly community-service approach of apolitical churches as part of America’s unfortunate “bias” toward “individual action.” Obama believes that what he derogates as “John Wayne” thinking and the old, “right wing...individualistic bootstrap myth” needs to be replaced: “We must unite in collective action, build collective institutions and organizations.”

Obama sees the black church as the key to his plan for collective social and political action: “Obama . . . spoke of the need to mobilize and organize the economic power and moral fervor of black churches. He also argued that as a state senator he might help bring this about faster than as a community organizer or civil rights lawyer.” Says Obama, “We have some wonderful preachers in town - preachers who continue to inspire me - preachers who are magnificent at articulating a vision of the world as it should be.” Obama continues, “But as soon as church lets out, the energy dissipates. We must find ways to channel all this energy into community building.” Obama seems to be holding up people like Wright, Pfleger, and James Meeks (who he has listed as his key religious allies) as positive models for the wider black church - in both their rhetoric, and in their willingness to play a direct political role. If anything, Obama would like to see the political visions of Wright and Pfleger given greater weight and substance by connecting them to secular leftist political networks like Acorn.

END RUN
By the end of De Zutter’s piece, Obama’s distinctive vision comes clear. While in his years as a Chicago organizer and attorney, Obama took care to maintain friendly ties to the Daley administration, in Obama’s campaign for state senate, he specifically avoided asking the mayor or the mayor’s closest allies for support. Obama’s plan was to make an end-run around Chicago’s governing Democratic political network, by building a coalition of left-leaning black churches and radical secular organizations like Acorn (perhaps with de facto help from liberal foundation money as well). This coalition would provide Obama with the flexibility to play out a political career some distance to the left of conventional Illinois democratic politics. And sure enough, Obama’s extremely liberal record in Illinois vindicated his strategy.

The De Zutter story sheds considerable light on the debate over the significance of Obama’s ties to Pfleger and Wright. For the most part, that debate plays out with a relatively apolitical notion of church membership in mind. Obama’s defenders say that he should not be held responsible for the occasional political excesses of his preacher. Critics point out that the extremism of Wright and Pfleger is long-standing and well known. At some point, this line of thinking goes, the radicalism of such preachers ought to become intolerable. And what does it say about Obama’s judgement that he actually built his own national reputation by pointing to his appreciation of Wright’s sermons? Obama’s critics also see his decision to join Wright’s church as an opportunistic move by a politically ambitious secular humanist in search of a respectable religious home.

I agree with all of these criticisms of Obama. Yet De Zutter’s article shows us that the full story of Obama’s ties to Pfleger and Wright is both more disturbing and more politically relevant than we’ve realized up to now. On Obama’s own account, the rhetoric and vision of Chicago’s most politically radical black churches are exactly what he wants to see more of. True, when discussing Louis Farrakhan with De Zutter, Obama makes a point of repudiating anti-white, anti-Semitic, and anti-Asian sermons. Yet having laid down that proviso, Obama seems to relish the radicalism of preachers like Pfleger and Wright. In 1995, Obama didn’t want Trinity’s political show to stop. His plan was to spread it to other black churches, and harness its power to an alliance of leftist groups and sympathetic elected officials.

So Obama’s political interest in Trinity went far beyond merely gaining a respectable public Christian identity. On his own account, Obama hoped to use the untapped power of the black church to supercharge hard-left politics in Chicago, creating a personal and institutional political base that would be free to part with conventional Democratic politics. By his own testimony, Obama would seem to have allied himself with Wright and Pfleger, not in spite of, but precisely because of their radical left-wing politics. It follows that Obama’s ties to Trinity reflect on far more than his judgment and character (although they certainly implicate that). Contrary to common wisdom, then, Obama’s religious history has everything to do with his political values and policy positions, since it confirms his affinity for leftist radicalism.

SENSE OF MISSION
It could be argued that the new and supposedly moderate, “bipartisan” Obama of 2008 is the real Obama. Unfortunately, that argument is unconvincing. Again and again, De Zutter reports that Obama’s true passion, deepest calling, and most authentic sense of mission is to be found in his early community organizing work. Obama’s own vision for himself as a legislator is as a kind of super-organizer/activist, extending the “progressive” quest for “social justice” to society as a whole.

I see no reason to doubt Obama’s self-account, and many reasons to accept it. As De Zutter notes, Obama gave up a near-certain Supreme Court clerkship to come to Chicago and do community organizing. It’s also easy to imagine Obama joining one of the many other less radical black churches on the south side of Chicago, if that was all he needed to launch a political career. Clearly, given his good relations with the Daley administration, Obama could have asked for its support in his bid for the Illinois State Senate. Yet at every turn, Obama took a riskier path. That suggests he was operating from conviction. Trouble is, the conviction in question was apparently Obama’s belief in the sort of radical social and economic views held by groups like Acorn and preachers like Wright and Pfleger.

Obama was certainly more rhetorically smooth, and no doubt less personally embittered than some of his mentors. Yet what stands out after a consideration of Obama’s larger personal and political history is the general convergence of political orientation between Wright, Pfleger, Acorn, Chicago’s “progressive” foundations, and Obama himself. Obama in Chicago was a man of the Left, doing his level-best to assemble a coalition free from the constraints of conventional, middle-ground Democratic politics.

OBAMA SPEAKS
If there is any doubt about the accuracy of De Zutter’s detailed account, we get the same message from this too-little discussed but revealing and important piece by Obama himself. The chapter from a 1990 book called “After Alinsky: Community Organizing in Illinois” was originally published in 1988, just after Obama joined Trinity. The piece is called, “Why Organize? Problems and Promise in the Inner City,” and it shows exactly what Obama hoped to make of his association with Pfleger and Wright.

Obama begins by rejecting the false dichotomy between radicalism and moderation:

The debate as to how black and other dispossessed people can forward their lot in America is not new. From W.E.B. DuBois to Booker T. Washington to Marcus Garvey to Malcolm X to Martin Luther King, this internal debate has raged between integration and nationalism, between accommodation and militancy, between sit-down strikes and boardroom negotiations. The lines between these strategies have never been simply drawn, and the most successful black leadership has recognized the need to bridge these seemingly divergent approaches.

Of course, even James Cone, the radical founder of black-liberation theology, sees himself as synthesizing the moderation of Martin Luther King Jr. with the radicalism of Malcolm X. Obama here seems to be calling for an inside/outside strategy like the one he would have learned working with Chicago Acorn. Note Obama’s reference to the controversial tradition of “direct action” favored by Acorn (and earlier by Saul Alinsky, whose tradition of radicalism the book is meant to carry on). Obama offers radicalism with a moderate face.

Obama sketches out a vision in which a politically awakened black church would ally with “community organizers” (like Obama and his friends from Acorn), thereby radicalizing the politics of America’s cities:

Nowhere is the promise of organizing more apparent than in the traditional black churches. Possessing tremendous financial resources, membership and - most importantly - values and biblical traditions that call for empowerment and liberation, the black church is clearly a slumbering giant in the political and economic landscape of cities like Chicago.

After expressing disappointment with apolitical black churches focused only on traditional community services, Obama goes on to point in a more activist direction:

Over the past few years, however, more and more young and forward-thinking pastors have begun to look at community organizations such as the Developing Communities Project in the far south side [where Obama himself worked, and first encountered Pfleger, SK]...as a powerful tool for living the social gospel, one which can educate and empower entire congregations and not just serve as a platform for a few prophetic leaders. Should a mere 50 prominent black churches, out of thousands that exist in cities like Chicago, decide to collaborate with a trained and organized staff, enormous positive changes could be wrought....

Give me 50 Pflegers or 50 Wrights, Obama is saying, tie them to a network of grassroots activists like my companions from Acorn, and we can revolutionize urban politics.

MYSTERY SOLVED
So it would appear that Obama’s own writings solve the mystery of why he stayed at Trinity for 20 years. Obama’s long-held and decidedly audacious hope has been to spread Wright’s radical spirit by linking it to a viable, left-leaning political program, with Obama himself at the center. The revolutionizing power of a politically awakened black church is not some side issue, or merely a personal matter, but has been the signature theme of Obama’s grand political strategy.

Lucky for Obama, this political background is unfamiliar to most Americans. There are others who share Obama’s approach, however. Take a look at this piece by Manhattan Institute scholar Steven Malanga on “The Rise Of The Religious Left” and you will see exactly where Obama is coming from. Malanga ends his account by noting that religious-left activists often partner with groups like MoveOn.org and attend gatherings featuring speakers like Michael Moore. After the 2004 election, there was some talk of the Democratic party “purging” MoveOn and Moore. Far from purging its radical Left, however, the Democratic party is now just inches away from placing it in the driver’s seat. That is the real meaning of the fiasco at Trinity Church.

[irliberal]

"Obama''s Radical-Left Ties Broad And Deep"

Uh-Huh.

McCain sings "Bomb Bomb Bomb Iran" to the Beach Boys'' "Barbara Ann" to the PRESS and thinks it''s *funny*.

How about ...
"McCain''s Warmongering Sure and Strong"

OR

"McSame''s Radical-Right Wing Senility"

[shingles1]

the article is available online, if you''d prefer to read it in person rather than take Stanley Kurtz''s word on it:

www.chicagoreader.com/obama/951208/

[wogerwabbit]

The Rise Of The Religious Left???!!!

Huh? Buwhahhahahahaahaaaaaa!!! The worms turns and bites him right in the a$$, which the writer by no coincidence is talking out of. What religious left?

[downsteamjim]

Obama for President [of Sudan].

[noloyalisti]

As soon as I saw this title of the article I knew it must be written by the right wing wackos of the NRO.

Obama is not left at all, he is mainstream. The war profiteering right wing media has painted liberals and progressives as left wing. How ridiculous is that? The left are the radical communists and socialists, NOT the majority of the country and Democrats. Get real!

[shalopash]

FEAR, FEAR, FEAR! I''m no longer a slave to FEAR!!!!! I''m smart and I want CHANGE!

Naive DEMs,
When they could not find radical video clips over twenty years showing Barrack in the audience %u2013 they created one to radicalize his church by targeting Hillary. The Pfleger video was a Chicago style hit-job designed to split the democratic party a week before the last primaries and the DNC rules meeting. It was only possible due to the sensation-seeking TV media that spent a month looping out-of-context video/trivial analysis defaming and endangering a congregation with a long record of rebuilding in Chicago. Hillary had piled on at the time. OFCOURSE the congregation celebrated Pfleger''s counter-punch, delivered by a visiting white priest from a different Christian denomination....as if to say %u201Csee we are not crazy, everyone thinks this way%u201D

Why would Pfleger 1) duplicate Wright''s theatrical performance, 2) one week before the final primaries, 3) at Wright''s old pulpit and 4) with a personal fight that was never his to begin with, especially 5) when it is nearly won, 6) using race as the argument. 7) Amazingly a camera caught it and Youtubed it in two days. The REAL audience was the national TV media!

Pfleger''s long-term mutual support with Obama is peanuts when compared to what he could get for his ministry in such a high stakes drama. Here is real info.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/2/20/201332/807/36/458633

[PulSamsara]

Get an editorial clue CBS !

You run someone else story - The National Review ! - disguising this as ''forwarding discussion.''

Work for a living CBS !

[idnnsg]

Stanley Kurtz of the NRO is so incredibly far to the "right" that maybe HE belives "Obama''s Radical-Left Ties [are] Broad And Deep", but no rational person is buying it!

Face it, repugs, you are looking very desperate. How can you sell the idea of 8 more years of the Bush/Cheney fiasco that has bankrupted this country, destroyed the middle class, and trampled the US Constitution, without making us one iota safer? No amount of fear-mongering is going to do it.

The fact is, Barack Obama is very middle-of-the-road. He wants what nearly ALL of America wants: to end this stu.pid war in Iraq that costs $2.7 billion each week, distracts us from other threats, kills our soldiers and countless Iraqis, and undermines our security.

[wyvern7-2009]

Wow! I didn''t realize that CBS was now owned by Fox News and the republican party...

OH NO! You mean someone actually wants to help poor people and non-whites... And end a war over power and oil!!! Why, he must be a commie!!!

Come on, people... Think for yourselves instead of buying into the politics of fear that continues to make the rich richer and the poor poorer... It''s time for change... And Obama will actually bring that.

Oh, and incase anyone is wondering, I''m a white female who grew up with a right-wing republican father.

[garyd631]

CBS--time to trade in the proud peacock symbol for a mouldy parrot.

Just how do you justify posting this claptrap without comment? Do your own research or at least offer readers fuller info on the sources you are digitally parroting.

[jesse1115]

The fact that conservatives and the status quo must always use such obviously faulty logic and tactics of fear and deceit to construct arguments against Obama is very revealing. Many of them have nothing to rely on but fear, ignorance, and deception and they are debasing themselves with increasing severity.

Let Obama''s success following his unprecedented campaign be a lesson to all politicians in the future: We, the American people have great access to information now and we are learning how to sort the good from the bad.

You, the far right who must be deceiving yourselves to believe that your tactics will benefit this nation, are fast becoming obsolete.

[ubrew12]

ME: I believe in progressive taxation.

NRO: ANOTHER member of the ''radical left!''

[oldtom12]

Yet again CBS leaves it to the reader to discern political bias, although in this case, it isn''t difficult. Kurtz is a far-right conservative and member of several conservative think-tanks.

For example, the reason conservatives ignored the growing problems in Iraq according to Kurtz? Why, the media, of course! That''s right, the "media has discredited themselves, making it tough to take them seriously even when they are right..." http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=YTc5ZGQ1ZWFiZmI2NDg4MGU1MDU3MDRkZWJlZDEyNzc=

And what will gay marriages lead to? Why, legalized plural marriage! (As if one spouse isn''t enough!) http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/006/494pqobc.asp?pg=1

How refreshing it would be to actual hear a well reasoned discourse on the real issues that face Americans, instead of this constant stream of hysterical diatribes about peripheral issues presented by CBS under the guise of presenting "balanced" discussion.

[dolcette]

How pathetic. We have one of THE MOST insightful articles YET on who this Sen. Obama really is, and all the leftist bloggers here at CBS can do is act like little kids. Clearly, it can be rough on children when their messiah is shown to be a complete fraud (I hear a guy named "Father Pleger" has some fake tissues you can use to wipe away your tears. Check into it. He probably likes little kids, so you''d be welcomed I''m sure).

Maybe these guys can get Bozo the Clown to run for president next time. That way, when it''s revealed how completely unsuitable the man (or "metrosexual") is for office, he can still make them giggle instead of whine, bawl and snivel - and thus help them to quickly forget how impossible it is for their party to produce a viable candidate for president.

Bravo to CBS for being brave enough to print the truth no matter from where it came. And THANK YOU to the authors behind it. Good work!

[jfcaffrey]

Geez! - Mr. Kurtz, standing on top of De Zutter%u2019s article (folded twice I''ll guess for higher moral ground) stopped just short of revealing that Obama is the Anti-Christ. What an anti-climax.

[cyhtriys]

For opinion, this is pretty awful and should not be carried by CBS. Kurtz takes benign round quotes and bashes them into his square peg-hole.

"Children are God''s great blessing" With Kurtz'' logic he could work a quote like this into a 2000 word editorial on how the person who said it is a child molester.

What people like Kurtz are afraid of is the real change that Obama represents, and the represents them no longer being in power.

[ubrew12]

Dolcette said: "We have one of THE MOST insightful articles YET on who this Sen. Obama really is"

What insights did you glean as to what the ''radical left'' politics of the Trinity Church is? The author keeps mentioning another author, De Zutter, with the ''full scoop'', but never mentions what these ''radical far left priorities'' are.

When someone SAYS you''re a member of the ''radical far left'' and then uses up several pages avoiding any specifics as to WHAT makes you a member of that horrid group, then they are lying to you. Thats why I said ''I believe in progressive taxation. NRO: oooh, another member of the radical left''.

You come away from this article absolutely sure that Obama''s a member of the radical far left, and with no understanding what that means!!

[Syndicate]

Wow! Now it all makes sense.

[ubrew12]

this article is instructive in ONE way, however.

This is exactly how the right will attack Obama in the months to come: by appealling to the religious right with the specter of ''antiChrist coming''!

The Republicans fooling the religious right to get it to vote Republican has worked many times before: those people are dumb as posts! So focused on Armageddon, so blind to what their doing to their own country, the country their own children will have to inherit (as in, inherit the $10 trillion Reagan/Bush debt).

[downsteamjim]

Lots of comments that seem to say Obama is not responsible for his past, his church, his friends, his extremist beliefs,etc. He belongs in the same fringe grouping as a David Duke.

[jfcaffrey]

Geez! - Mr. Kurtz, standing on top of De Zutter%u2019s article (folded twice I''ll guess for higher moral ground) stopped just short of revealing that Obama is the Anti-Christ. What an anti-climax.

Naive DEMs,
When they could not find radical video clips over twenty years showing Barrack in the audience %u2013 they created one to radicalize his church by targeting Hillary. The Pfleger video was a Chicago style hit-job designed to split the democratic party a week before the last primaries and the DNC rules meeting. It was only possible due to the sensation-seeking TV media that spent a month looping out-of-context video/trivial analysis defaming and endangering a congregation with a long record of rebuilding in Chicago. Hillary had piled on at the time. OFCOURSE the congregation cheered Pfleger''s counter-punch, delivered by a visiting white priest from a different Christian denomination....as if to say %u201Csee we are not crazy, everyone thinks this way%u201D

Why would Pfleger 1) duplicate Wright''s theatrical performance, 2) one week before the final primaries, 3) at Wright''s old pulpit and 4) with a personal fight that was never his to begin with, especially 5) when it is nearly won, 6) using race as the argument. 7) Amazingly a camera caught it and Youtubed it in two days. The REAL audience was the national TV media!

Pfleger''s long-term mutual support with Obama is trivial when compared to what he could get for his ministry in such a high stakes drama. Here are the candidates OWN record
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/2/20/201332/807/36/458633

[bloogirl-2009]

you don''t stay in a church for 20 years because there isn''t anywhere else to go. if he didn''t believe in what his pastor was slinging from the pulpit, why didn''t he leave a long time ago? he is just absolutely too unbelievable. i can''t understand how so many people are being fooled by him

[tejasdemo]

Lol...what a bunch of flippin idiots...I mean idiots, Republicans really are.

[tejasdemo]

Every time a Republican opens it''s mouth the collective IQ drops a point.

[dukegw]

Mr. Kurtz spends much of this piece writing about "black rage," like it''s some sort of disease that''s running rampant through the African-American community. The quotes from Obama refer to "fervor, (i.e., passion)" which has nothing to do with "rage."
Obama''s central thesis is correct- fervor, passion, and emotion can be harnessed and channeled into action and can affect the social change needed to improve the black community. African-Americans have to solve their own problems and they have the ability to do it. Since when is the idea of self-reliance "radical and left-wing?"

Mr. Kurtz writes: %u201C%u2026the black church is clearly a slumbering giant in the political and economic landscape %u2026." Does Kurtz not know that just about all of the prominent African-American political leaders of the 19th and 20th centuries (e.g., Adam Clayton Powell, Martin Luther King, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, etc.) all came from the Black Church? Does he really not know what all good politicians seem to know- that if you want the African-American vote, you have to go to the Black Church? Is he not aware that Obama represents the new generation of African-American political leaders- the first generation of political leaders who did not emerge from the Black Church?

And shame on CBS News for not running the original news article that Mr. Kurtz has so graciously interpreted for us all.

[jfcaffrey]

Geez! - Mr. Kurtz, standing on top of De Zutter%u2019s article (folded twice I''ll guess for higher moral ground) stopped just short of revealing that Obama is the Anti-Christ. What an anti-climax.

[lvdragonlady-2009]

So what????
Barack is a half-black man and he participated in the 1M man march, so what?
Lots of black preacher''s go on tangents when preaching, what else is new?
The rest of this article, is one person''s opinion and not worth commenting on.

[stopkidding]

White conservatives are terribly frightened of any anger that comes from black men. I read this article carefully and it barely conceals its fear and bigotry.

[dolcette]

Ubrew,

You started your post/reply to me by asking "What insights did you glean as to what the ''radical left'' politics of the Trinity Church is?"

All you need do is read or listen to anything Wright has said over these past few weeks to know exactly what these "politics" are. I don''t need to outline them for you here, again, I am sure.

The insight is that Obama, it turns out, is every bit as smart as his supporters say he is. Even smarter. And that, Ubrew, is now a very frightening prospect. It should be to you and to anyone else. We wouldn''t elect a Nazi or a Communist to the office of the president. Why would we want someone who feels "sad" at having to leave an organization which has stridently supported a whole range of truly sociopathic positions?

(If we were allotted more than 1500 characters, I would say a lot more.)

[downsteamjim]

Let''s face it, it never really happened. Obama never went to that church, he never knew Rev. White, he never knew Rev. Pfleger, he never heard the racist speeches, he never associated with far left radicals. It is all right wing lies. In fact, Obama was born last week.

[macbeth76]

Mr. Kurtz forgot to call him Barack Hussein Osama... um, I mean Obama. Typical republican fear mongering article which has nothing to do with issues.

[greeneyes222]

Good article, and more on the issues than ever comes out of Obama''s mouth.

[bluestardad]

NRO
WOULD IT BE BETTER FOR AMERICA IF OBAMA TOOK MONEY AND DIRECTION FROM THE ISRAELI LOBBY AIPAC, OR PNAC, OR THE AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE? YOU KNOW THOSE GUYS THAT GOT AMERICA INTO THE WAR IN IRAQ AND HAVE SUCCESSFULLY LOBBIED TO KEEP AMERICA MIRED IN THE MIDDLE EAST FOR THE LAST 65 YEARS?

[downsteamjim]

To MacBeth76: It was that great neocon Ted Kennedy that called Obama Osama.

[dolcette]

And as for you, "StopKidding," it isn''t fear of "da Black man." It is fear of deeply-held beliefs that are way out of line with even half-baked reality.

I am just as ready as anyone to elect a Black president. To me, they are more likely than not to kick the hell out of our nation''s enemies, while bringing an undeniable and very personal knowledge of the struggles of the under-privileged. The former head of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) was a viable candidate in my mind, should he ever choose to run.

But it is ultra-stupid and extremely foolish to hand the keys of the White House to a man who clearly understood and, by decades-long association, must have embraced ideals which are obviously insane. Rev. Wright is a very sick and hateful man. Fr. Pfeger demonstrated a distinct lack of maturity. And Rev. Moss thanked Fr. Pfeger for his disgusting display of anti-Christian behavior by actually praising the "messanger" a-n-d by "Thanking God" for it!

The color of any of these mens'' skin doesn''t have a thing to do with it, except, perhaps, in your own and very personal nightmares.

(Is it possible to have an honest and reasonably intelligent discussion with "the opposition" without idiotic and groundless comments. I wonder.)

When they could not find radical video clips over twenty years showing Barrack in the audience they created one to radicalize his church by targeting Hillary. The Pfleger video was a Chicago style hit-job designed to split the democratic party a week before the last primaries and the DNC rules meeting. It was only possible due to the sensation-seeking TV media that spent a month looping out-of-context video/trivial analysis defaming and endangering a congregation with a long record of rebuilding in Chicago. Hillary had piled on at the time. OFCOURSE the congregation cheered Pfleger''''s counter-punch, delivered by a visiting white priest from a different Christian denomination....as if to say "see we are not crazy, everyone thinks this way"

Why would Pfleger 1) duplicate Wright''''s theatrical performance, 2) one week before the final primaries, 3) at Wright''s old pulpit and 4) with a personal fight that was never his to begin with, especially 5) when it is nearly won, 6) using race as the argument. 7) Amazingly a camera caught it and Youtubed it in two days. The REAL audience was the national TV media!

Pfleger''s long-term mutual support with Obama is trivial when compared to what he could get for his ministry in such a high stakes drama. Here are the candidates OWN record
http://www.dailykos.com/story/20
08/2/20/201332/807/36/458633

[frankson2]

Good!

[downsteamjim]

To hopeful08: Why not change your name to rerun08? Plow some new ground.

[saj210]

African Americans have had to deal with the ignorant and racist rants of white people for hundreds of years. I have no problem with Rev. Wright nor Rev. Pfleger because I believe what they have said is accurate. It''s their opinions and they are entitled to their opinions whether most of you folks agree or not.

If you don''t like what they have to say, don''t listen to it. Who told the news media to interfere in church services. They have not done so to Clinton nor McCain. I''m sure their pastors have said some things that are not pleasing. Hillary Clinton obviously hasn''t gotten much out of services as hateful as she is.

As far as I''m concerned I don''t believe much of what the media digs up, because a lot of them are bigots and the reason why America is in a sad situation.

Guilt by association is the sanctuary of those too lazy to look at a man''s own actions. In 14 years of public life, Obama would have made approximately 5000 "personal friends" at the rate of only one per day. (After all he ran campaigns in/for a large state that has 14 million people) A half dozen who have said/done radical things say nothing about Obama''s judgement except that he tries to work with everyone. I would expect McCain (due to his length of service alone) to have hundreds of questionable long-time friends. American culture does not dig up McCain''s relationships because we think we already know McCain through his war/Senate work. For example, the MSM only started talking about Hagee/Parsley after Rev. Wright came out.
Start with the main''s own extensive record
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/2/20/201332/807/36/458633

[becket03]

When a leftwinger criticizes "John Wayne individualism" he''s speaking code for "Everything inside the State; nothing outside the State," Mussolini''s slogan for Fascism. If you want to see a real attack on the Constitution --- not the mere piddling stuff Bush has been accused of --- just elect Barack Obama to the presidency. His "collective" vision wants everything you''ve got, starting with your liberty.

[downsteamjim]

To saj210: You have my sympathies. It must be tough looking at a racist everytime you look in a mirror.

[downsteamjim]

To Hopeful08: Why not go out and visit the churches of Hillary and McCain? You know that if they were as wild and racist as Obama''s, 60 MINUTES would be there every week.

[carld717]

What a joke.

Take out the author''s spin words ''radical'' and ''rabid'', and there''s nothing here.

Everyone knows ACORN are Alinsky-style reformists and the Woods Fund are decent liberals, and that both Wright and Pfleger, despite occasional over-the-top rhetoric, have received awards,wide and deep, for their positive impact on Chicago. The list of them really goes on for pages and pages.

Yet this NRO guy, to be kind, has been snookered and suckered by the Hannity-Fox media lynch party. (Bill O''Reilly''s term not mine).

I was part of the real Chicago left for decades, until I recently moved. Believe me, Obama is not part of it and never was. Which is not to say he isn''t a decent reform politician running a decent campaign, who opposed the war, and who did good things for Chicago. He''s my best option in November.

[carld717]

What a joke.

Take out the author''s spin words ''radical'' and ''rabid'', and there''s nothing here.

Everyone knows ACORN are Alinsky-style reformists and the Woods Fund are decent liberals, and that both Wright and Pfleger, despite occasional over-the-top rhetoric, have received awards,wide and deep, for their positive impact on Chicago. The list of them really goes on for pages and pages.

Yet this NRO guy, to be kind, has been snookered and suckered by the Hannity-Fox media lynch party. (Bill O''Reilly''s term not mine).

I was part of the real Chicago left for decades, until I recently moved. Believe me, Obama is not part of it and never was. Which is not to say he isn''t a decent reform politician running a decent campaign, who opposed the war, and who did good things for Chicago. He''s my best option in November.

[carld717]

What a joke.

Take out the author''s spin words ''radical'' and ''rabid'', and there''s nothing here.

Everyone knows ACORN are Alinsky-style reformists and the Woods Fund are decent liberals, and that both Wright and Pfleger, despite occasional over-the-top rhetoric, have received awards, wide and deep, for their positive impact. The list of them really goes on for pages.

Yet this NRO guy has been snookered by the Hannity-Fox lynch party. (Bill O''Reily''s term not mine).

I was part of the real Chicago left for decades, until I recently moved. Believe me, Obama is not part of it. Which is not to say he isn''t a decent reform politician running a decent campaign, who opposed the war, and did good things for Chicago. He''s my best option in November.

Truth be told, Obama is a ''high road'' industrial policy capitalist and multipolar globalist--just read his Cooper Union speech a while back. Clinton is a garden-variety corporate liberal capitalist, which got her on the board of Walmart for years. And McCain is an unreconstructed neoliberal capitalist--''state all evil, market all good''--that kind that says ''We''re in business to make money, not steel, so we''ll gut these plants and speculate in oil futures, and the workers and towns be damned.'' In other words, the ones who ''cut taxes'' by putting everything on the China Visa card and got us into this mess.

Actually, Obama''s brand of capitalism is best for productive businesses, as opposed to speculators, and does least harm to the working class.

[carld717]

What a joke.

Take out the author''s spin words ''radical'' and ''rabid'', and there''s nothing here.

Everyone knows ACORN are Alinsky-style reformists and the Woods Fund are decent liberals, and that both Wright and Pfleger, despite occasional over-the-top rhetoric, have received awards, wide and deep, for their positive impact. The list of them really goes on for pages.

Yet this NRO guy has been snookered by the Hannity-Fox lynch party. (Bill O''Reily''s term not mine).

I was part of the real Chicago left for decades, until I recently moved. Believe me, Obama is not part of it. Which is not to say he isn''t a decent reform politician running a decent campaign, who opposed the war, and did good things for Chicago. He''s my best option in November.

Truth be told, Obama is a ''high road'' industrial policy capitalist and multipolar globalist--just read his Cooper Union speech a while back. Clinton is a garden-variety corporate liberal capitalist, which got her on the board of Walmart for years. And McCain is an unreconstructed neoliberal capitalist--''state all evil, market all good''--that kind that says ''We''re in business to make money, not steel, so we''ll gut these plants and speculate in oil futures, and the workers and towns be damned.'' In other words, the ones who ''cut taxes'' by putting everything on the China Visa card and got us into this mess.

Actually, Obama''s brand of capitalism is best for productive businesses, as opposed to speculators, and does least harm to the working class.

[carld717]

What a joke.

Take out the author''s spin words ''radical'' and ''rabid'', and there''s nothing here.

Everyone knows ACORN are Alinsky-style reformists and the Woods Fund are decent liberals, and that both Wright and Pfleger, despite occasional over-the-top rhetoric, have received awards, wide and deep, for their positive impact. The list of them really goes on for pages.

Yet this NRO guy has been snookered by the Hannity-Fox lynch party. (Bill O''Reily''s term not mine).

I was part of the real Chicago left for decades, until I recently moved. Believe me, Obama is not part of it. Which is not to say he isn''t a decent reform politician running a decent campaign, who opposed the war, and did good things for Chicago. He''s my best option in November.

Truth be told, Obama is a ''high road'' industrial policy capitalist and multipolar globalist--just read his Cooper Union speech a while back. Clinton is a garden-variety corporate liberal capitalist, which got her on the board of Walmart for years. And McCain is an unreconstructed neoliberal capitalist--''state all evil, market all good''--that kind that says ''We''re in business to make money, not steel, so we''ll gut these plants and speculate in oil futures, and the workers and towns be damned.'' In other words, the ones who ''cut taxes'' by putting everything on the China Visa card and got us into this mess.

Actually, Obama''s brand of capitalism is best for productive businesses, as opposed to speculators, and does least harm to the working class.