Jeremiah Wright On Fox News

Obama’s former pastor Jeremiah Wright appeared on Fox News just over a year ago where Sean Hannity tried to railroad him into submission (at Fox “News” they call this an interview) but Wright was not having it. Watch the clip:

At it’s core, these attacks on Wright are racist. These are attacks by white folks who can’t understand why black people would have any hard feelings about hundreds of years of being treated like property. These same people say that Dr. King was a great man but don’t read everything King said. King said many of the same things that Wright has said.

King said that America starts unjust wars (Vietnam in King’s time, Iraq today) and that America has treated blacks unfairly. This is nothing new. And furthermore acting like it’s “crazy” is truly ridiculous. It’s not “crazy” at all. It’s mostly true.

Sure, Wright did not use the best words to get his thoughts across but is that such an awful crime? No, it is not. The crazy thing is thinking that Barack Obama should storm out of his church because it’s not like a white church. This is gross racism if you look at it at it’s heart. This is the excuse that white people who don’t want a black president were looking for.

Certainly the things that Wright said are far less offensive than the words of Pat Robertson who said that 9/11 was God’s work. Think about that. Wright said that 9/11 was a response to American foreign policy. Guess who else thinks that? The CIA. Ron Paul. Anyone who knows anything about foreign policy. To say that 9/11 was a response to foreign policy does not justify what happened on that day, it only explains it. There is never a justification for killing thousands of innocent people.

We must get past knee jerk reactions and mindless patriotism to the point where we are having real thoughtful discussions. That’s the promise of a Barack Obama presidency. Real thoughtful actions. Not reactionary stupidity. Not empty “patriotism” but instead a real patriotism of wanting to make this country everything that it can be. It is not patriotic to accept a corrupt government and unjust wars. In fact there is nothing more anti-American than that.

If you don’t vote for Barack Obama because of Jeremiah Wright, you are an ignorant racist. End of story. This has nothing to do with Barack Obama and everything to do with your own ignorance and racism. How can you convince yourself that Barack Obama going to a typical black church makes him unqualified to be president when there’s thousands of people dying in Iraq, a failing economy, and a broken health care system. How have you convinced yourself that that is somehow more important than all of the real issues facing this country.

The Obama campaign never tried to make race an issue, in fact they were doing a fine job of staying above the race issue until the Wright “story” broke. It was racist organizations/people that have continuously brought up Obama’s race, his black church, his middle name, it’s all fear mongering, it appeals to the very worst of human nature. Obama responded to this issue because he has been forced to. He would much rather speak about foreign policy and economics (and he makes far more sense than John McCain when it comes to these real issues.)

The Obama campaign is about hope, Fox News is about fear. We’ve had 8 years of fear, isn’t it time to try something new?