Why McCain Should Welcome the Reverend Wright / Hagee Comparisons

Many Dems welcomed the news of Reverend Hagee’s vile remarks and Senator McCain’s rejection of his endorsement as way a to offset the damage done to Senator Obama by Reverend Wright. However, this is a comparison that benefits the McCain campaign. The reason being that there is no tie between Senator McCain’s views and Reverend Hagee’s views. The questions for Senator McCain are about how his campaign seeks endorsements, and if proper vetting occurred. Senator McCain never attended Hagee’s church, and never condoned his remarks, so while the association may be a little unsettling for the campaign it does not speak to who Senator McCain is as a person.

Reverend Wright is a different story. Senator Obama attended his church for 20 years, and after seeing Reverend Wright’s recent press conference it is virtually impossible to believe that Senator Obama did not know the types of sermon’s he was giving. Attending Reverend Wright’s church for such an extended period of time shows a willingness for Senator Obama to either condone or accept the views of Reverend Wright. Senator Obama even graced the cover of the ‘Trumpet’ the church newsletter, the content of which provides more evidence that Reverend Wright’s extremist views were not isolated speeches, but were part of the doctrine of his church. The questions for Senator Obama center around who he is as a person, what he believes, and the manner in which he conducts himself. The primary question being whether he joined the Trinity Church for political gain, or if he actually subscribes to the ‘Black Liberation’ theology that the church openly preaches.

While the two candidates may both now have ties to an embarrassing pastor, the similarities stop there. There is a real reason why Senator Obama has not been able to shake the Reverend Wright issue because it leaves open questions about Senator Obama as a person. The reason Reverend Hagee has caused significantly less trouble for Senator McCain is because the questions aren’t about him as a person, they are about whether his staff did enough research.

Picture from Bizzy Blog

Article First Posted at NH 4 McCain

Tags: controversy, hagee wright, mccain, nh, oabama trumpet picture, Obama, obama picture, obama trumpet, Pastor Wright, reverend hagee, reverend wright, trumpet

6 comments May 23rd, 2008

Charles Krauthammer challenges Obama’s Wright Speech

Charles Krauthammer wrote a very interesting article entitled The Speech: A Brilliant Fraud. His article points to the reason the issue of Pastor Wright isn’t going away for Senator Obama. While many have come to a conclusion about Obama’s ties to Wright, Krauthammer points out the many questions that remain. These and other questions about Pastor Wright will continue to dog Senator Obama if he chooses to avoid them. It’s a difficult issue, but people have legitimate concerns about how tolerant he was of hate filled sermons. Maybe Senator Obama has a legitimate answer for these questions, but he has to bite the bullet and answer them as intolerance and prejudice should not be accepted in any form.

Excerpts from The Speech: A Brilliant Fraud by Charles Krauthammer

“The beauty of a speech is that you don’t just give the answers, you provide your own questions”….

“The question is why didn’t he leave that church? Why didn’t he leave — why doesn’t he leave even today — a pastor who thundered not once but three times from the pulpit (on a DVD the church proudly sells) “God damn America”? Obama’s 5,000-word speech, fawned over as a great meditation on race, is little more than an elegantly crafted, brilliantly sophistic justification of that scandalous dereliction.”

Addressing the problem of the grandmother/Wright comparison he notes Obama’s statement, “I can no more disown (Wright) than I can my white grandmother.” and continues…

“Yet Obama compares her to Wright. Does he not see the moral difference between the occasional private expression of the prejudices of one’s time and the use of a public stage to spread racial lies and race hatred?”

Tags: Barack Obama, grandmother, hate, Jeremiah Wright, Pastor Wright, preacher, preaching, Senator Obama, speech, tollerence

3 comments March 21st, 2008