Do the right thing and shut up, Lee urges pastor

Guardian UK ^ | May 1, 2008 | Xan Brooks

[billorites]

Director Spike Lee has waded into the controversy surrounding Jeremiah Wright, the Chicago pastor whose provocative statements have proved a thorn in the side of Democrat frontrunner Barack Obama. Lee advises the preacher to do the right thing and keep quiet. "The more he opens his mouth, the more damage he does," he told the Guardian.

For good measure, Lee hinted at a political conspiracy behind Wright's recent, contentious attempts to justify his remarks. "It looks like he's being paid to keep talking," he said.

"Jeremiah Wight needs to be quiet," Lee said yesterday. "If he loves Obama he needs to shut up right now. It makes me question his motives for talking. I'm starting to wonder whether somebody has been contributing to the building funds of his church. Seriously."

Lee, whose best-known films have frequently tackled the issue of race relations in the US, believes that Obama had hoped to survive the presidential contest without talking about race. "But now he's been forced to by a combination of Jeremiah Wright and the Clintons," he said.

The director of Malcolm X and When the Levees Broke is an ardent Obama supporter. "I love him," he said. "He's a unifier. He's the one who can get us out of the situation we're in today, because this country is going to hell in a handcart."

Lee will be at the Cannes film festival next week as jury president of the Babelgum film festival. He will also be promoting his latest feature, Miracle at St Anna, a story of black American soldiers in the second world war. He compares America's international standing now with its high water mark in the mid-1940s. "The way the US is viewed around the world is at its lowest point ever," he claimed. "But Obama will change everything."

[Dr. Ursus]

I’ve been bamboozled!

[Niuhuru]

This is one of the most profound things I’ve ever heard during this whole mess. Kudos to Spike Lee.

[Sacajaweau]

Spike is saying what I said: “He’s been bought and paid”.

[Virginia Ridgerunner]

For good measure, Lee hinted at a political conspiracy behind Wright's recent, contentious attempts to justify his remarks. "It looks like he's being paid to keep talking," he said.

So, Wright is secretly on the RNC payroll, is that what you're saying Spike?

[ClearCase_guy]

"He's a unifier."

On what basis does anyone say this about Obama?

Obama is a far-Left extremist with views that are far out of the mainstream. He has insulted gun-owners, church-goers, and whites. Hispanics have not fallen in love with him.

It's conceivable that he could collect a lot of votes -- that means people give HIM what he's looking for. It says nothing about his ability to unite the country and give US anything that we want.

I consider him to be very poorly positioned to be a unifier.

[LottieDah]

I think Spike is saying that Wright is being paid by the Clinton camp to keep talking.

[djpg]

More phoniness from the left. Lee believes almost everything that Wright believes, but he just wants Wright to remain silent about it, so that Obama can get elected.

This seems to be the unwritten rule of the left: Don’t tell the public what you really think.

[ClearCase_guy]

AIDS in the black community? Well, that's because there's a conspiracy!
Crack in the black community? Well, that's because there's a conspiracy!
Violence in the black community? Well, that's because there's a conspiracy!
Rev Wright is saying stupid things? Well, that's because the White folks got to him!

Yeah, this is a healthy view of the world.

[sheik yerbouty]

Even Sheldon Lee gets it..

[TheWasteLand]

When Spike Lee is telling you to shut up because you’ve gone too far, buddy, you’ve gone waaaaay too far.

[L98Fiero]

Well put.

[period end of story]

Nah, nah, nah!

Wright needs to write quickly and get that book on the market well before November.

[MEGoody]

"It looks like he's being paid to keep talking," he said.

No, Spike, he keeps talking because he wants to be paid. Jerry knows that playing the race card will lose a lot of its power if a black man is elected President.

[zerosix]

Gee Spikey, don't you believe in "freedom" especially the "freedom of speech?"

I just LOVE hearing the good "Rev" ramble on and on about his "faith" and his "politics."

It is very illuminating for me and I'm sure millions of others.

I suspected that the good "Revs" beliefs were those shared by a number of people that I encounter, now I have proof positive.

[Chode]

jerry wright... the NEW jessy sharpton.
and the RATS, take another one in the..................HA ha!!!

[socialismisinsidious]

Lee, whose best-known films have frequently tackled the issue of race relations in the US, believes that Obama had hoped to survive the presidential contest without talking about race

No duh. As a racist that is exactly what Obama wanted. Funny how Lee can't shut up about race...ahem, when the "right" race is promoted and the "wrong" race is vilified.

[contemplator]

"...If he loves Obama he needs to shut up right now..."

I've been seeing this mentality coming up a lot in various articles this morning coming from various figures in the black community. They dont seem to be angry with what the Rev. said and they don't seem to have a problem with Obama's complicity with it, they are simply mad at the Rev.'s timing. I have only seen one instance where an article mentioned that only a few people they spoke with said that the Rev.'s ideas were from a different time which America had gotten over. The rest seemed to indicate that the Rev.'s message was still valid today, but that with Obama's nomination hanging in the balance the Rev. showed unbelievably poor judgement in his timing. The most appalling idea I saw this morning was where people in the African American's indicated that if people were upset about the Rev.'s message, then that was a sign they they were bigots. Unbelievable.

[50sDad]

"It looks like he's being paid to keep talking," he said.

The pastor is a racist idiot. If Lee, supposedly an insightful and brilliant man, were to have said that, I could respect anything else he said. But in that sentence, clearly what he means is "I agree with what the Rev says, but he's putting his racism out there where whitey can see it, and if he does that, all our fellow travellers in the white liberal socialist branch of the Democratic party are going to see that Obama has been good friends with a racist for twenty years, and we black folks aren't going to be able to count on them voting our man into office." Lee nowhere mentions that Wright is wrong...just that he needs to shut up.

For the right black man or woman, I would vote in a heartbeat, or better yet, for the right man or woman, race would not be an issue. But it would have to be a man or woman who understood the value of unborn life, who viewed the Bible as authority, and who believed that our Founders were RIGHT in what they planned for America. To vote a person in because "goody, goody, I can show how unbiased I am!" is laughable at best, and dangerous at worst.

[Puppage]

Lee hinted at a political conspiracy behind Wright's recent, contentious attempts to justify his remarks. "It looks like he's being paid to keep talking," he said.

It's always something other than the person in the middle just being a complete idiot.