Posted on 05/02/2008 2:02:38 PM PDT by The_Republican
"Here endeth the lesson."
Sean Connery's memorable line in the 1987 movie "The Untouchables" followed sage advice to Kevin Costner character Elliot Ness that had nothing to do with politics or image rehabilitation.
But, oh how I wish those four words had come to mind for the Rev. Jeremiah Wright last week when he concluded taping his memorable, but now forgotten, interview with PBS journalist Bill Moyers.
But then we would have all missed last weekend's attention-grabbing flurry of activities. None of us would know that the good reverend could do a pretty good imitation of a drum major for a soulful college marching band. Or that he is capable of pretty bad impersonations of Presidents Kennedy and Johnson.
Nor would we have heard his scholarly explanation of how culture and ancestral roots affect musical styles, tastes and traditions. And, of course, there were his flippant and dismissive responses to questions posed to him at the National Press Club event.
But couldn't we all have lived just fine without any of that? I know I could.
To be so deprived would have been just fine, first of all, because it would be more likely that the Wright distraction was behind us.
Barack Obama's forceful denunciation and disavowal of his former pastor doesn't change the fact that it is an irrelevant distraction entirely created by cable television pundits using out-of-context and skewed sound bites.
Yes, Wright himself sought the spotlight last weekend, with the Moyers interview followed by the NAACP speech and then the Press Club fiasco. When TV pundits wondered aloud why he would seek the spotlight and opined that bringing attention to himself would hurt Obama, I essentially agreed with them.
But their supposedly innocent analyses and sanctimonious scolding of Wright ignore the salient fact that it was a media obsession, preoccupation and dishonest portrayal that made him a story in the first place.
The same media that vow every four years not to let swift boat-like, dishonest or phony issues dominate campaign coverage is at it again. When the inevitable quadrennial hand wringing again takes place, there's a key difference that media scholars and critics should notice. This wasn't a case in which political operatives with malicious intentions created a phony issue and spread it with campaign dollars and all the viral means at their disposal until the media took notice. In this instance, the media created a phony issue, and remained obsessed until it provided adequate fuel for the swiftboaters.
Moyers' illuminating interview with Wright didn't fit the narrative that portrays Wright as an unpatriotic hatemonger with outrageous views. Moyers played longer excerpts of the very same sermons of which the seconds-long snippets had been aired over and over.
Wright, responding in the Moyers interview in a conversational style, came across as a reasonable man, hurt by what he felt were unfair portrayals, but not immodest. He and Moyers talked about his scholarly influences and his impressive 36-year ministry at the Chicago church where he met Obama.
At the end of it, I wondered if the pundits who had been so obsessed with Wright and so determined to define him had watched it and how they would treat it. For the next 30 hours I flipped repeatedly between CNN, Fox News and MSNBC.
Nothing. It was as if Wright's first extended interview hadn't taken place. Even on networks that had teased the Moyers interview repeatedly, using excerpts from the two-minutes of it that PBS had posted in advance on its Web site, there was no comment, no analysis, no report about what had been said in the interview.
But then on Sunday, CNN decided to show Wright's speech to the Detroit branch of the NAACP live and in its entirety. We all got to see Wright singing, dancing, preaching and signifying in front of a friendly and receptive crowd that no doubt encouraged the tone and tenor of his performance at the National Press Club the next day.
He preached that "different does not mean deficient," urging Americans to respect cultural differences to foster greater understanding.
Had he heard and heeded his own message, I suspect he would have chosen a different communication style, and perhaps a less defiant message, in his disastrous appearance before the Press Club.
It is unfortunate that Wright, no doubt a man of considerable accomplishment, has now helped to write his place in history as that of the crazy preacher who derailed, or significantly affected, Obama's presidential campaign.
He deserves better. Obama deserves better. America deserves better. Here endeth the lesson.
I’m pretty sure Wright needed no help.
Maybe he shouldn’t have been hawking copies of his “sermons.”
They really don’t need to give Wright too much help; he’s extremely competent at turning himself into a jackass all on his own.
another liberal with his panties in a wad over all the attention this buffoon is getting-if this jerk-off had been McCain’s pastor I sure the author would have had no problem with that.
His ego insisted on repeatedly outing himself because he felt he was that important.
I would say, “This endith the lesson”, but people like him are too stupid to ever learn.
To be so deprived would have been just fine, first of all, because it would be more likely that the Wright distraction was behind us.
Barack Obama's forceful denunciation and disavowal of his former pastor doesn't change the fact that it is an irrelevant distraction entirely created by cable television pundits using out-of-context and skewed sound bites.
In other words, Mr. Bunting prefers not to be distracted by facts. His mind is made up and he has no interest in any contrary truths.
The fact that his presidential candidate has -- for two decades -- been advised and mentored by a pastor who is not only racist, but anti-American, makes no difference to the liberal holding his hands over his ears and his eyes.
But not his mouth...
Uh huh. Just like the media was “complicit” in making Britney Spears look like a skanky, drug-addled, airhead. The media sure has some easy jobs on its schedule these days. Point camera, push “record” button, job done.
“But their supposedly innocent analyses and sanctimonious scolding of Wright ignore the salient fact that it was a media obsession, preoccupation and dishonest portrayal that made him a story in the first place.”
This goes unnoticed when the target is a Republican. The hypocrisy of the media’s double standard is absolutely staggering. Don’t these idiots ever watch the evening news with their brain engaged??
So a person running for the office of POTUS, went to this church and listened and agreed with these statements, is irrelevant.
Only to a Liberal!
Wright disappeared for a month ducking the media.
And when he returned, it was to spoon on air with a fellow traveller on PBS.
And Obama flipped, flopped, and threw his grandmother under a bus in defense of this man he now disavows.
Pass the popcorn.
Wright is a disgusting racist lunatic who gleefully repeats an endless stream of outworn accusations in pursuit of enlarging his already monstrous ego. If people such as Mr. Bunting would quit apologizing for him and push back a little Obama wouldn't have been sucked into this morass. And yes, it's relevant. Had McCain spent 20 years nodding at Fred Phelps's idiocies I'd be very concerned about that as well.
His new pastor is same as his old pastor.
It is “justified” to smear Republicans in the media...
As Wright said repeatedly during the Press Club fiasco, just before spouting nut-speak, Moyers edited his interview heavily.
Moyes interview was a whitewash, we saw the real Wright at the NAACP and the NPC.
No Wright did that all to himself. The Media was merely dragged kicking and screaming to do their job and report it.
Oh, brother. That’s one scary, foaming-at-the-mouth cultist you’re showing me there. Is that Fred Phelps on the other end? ;-)
It is the entirely the media’s fault…for report that Obama is blind to seriously flawed individuals and/or pandering to extremist in order to get a political toe hold in Chicago politics. Either way it is absolute none of our business. (Yes I am being sarcastic!)
Seriously, if the media had not been so infatuated with him they would have found these serious flaws months ago.
Consider the Source.
The Seattle-PI editors are dumb as a post, and without the name, would have no intelligence at all.
Wright... his place in history as that of the crazy preacher who derailed, or significantly affected, Obama’s presidential campaign.
‘bout sum it up.
s
A man who uses the altar of God to push a political agenda is not a PASTOR..he is a hireling and needs to be exposed. A man who uses the altar of God to bring division among the brethren is not a PASTOR but a wolf in sheep’s clothing and needs to be exposed. A man who preaches another Christ than the Christ of the Bible, is a false teacher and needs to be exposed.
I do not want all people to believe that all black churches are made up of men like Jeremiah Wright, for this is not true. Some black churches actually stay true to the living God, and may God be with them and bless them.
... I wish those four words had come to mind for the Rev. Jeremiah Wright last week when he concluded taping his memorable, but now forgotten ...
And from http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2010130/posts
And then it’s like seeing a movie that seems terrific at the time, but by the time you get to the restaurant twenty minutes later, you can’t remember a thing about it. And that’s like a lot of Obama’s rhetoric.
Memorable, but not forgotten, indeed!
Um, no. Wright made himself look bad. Then there was that whiny little “it was taken out of context” crap. WTF?
Media complicit in doing its job (for a change).
Well....it was kinda hard for the media to mess this one up....since WRIGHT SCREAMS everything to the press!
You’re so right. The Seattle-PI is one stupid newspaper.
The best of the PI was when a story broke about a possible terrorist attack on the ferry and the PI ran a contest as to who could write the best haiku about terrorism.
Mine was great. First line was Silly boobs edit the PI.... I should have won, but they canceled the contest due to the derision it received.
Wright don't need any help..
Am I the only one who found the "denunciation" to be anything but forceful when viewed live / on tape, as opposed to read in print?
I really don't understand how anyone, other than the true believers in the Obama retinue, could call that carefully measured statement a "denunciation", much less characterize it as one that was "forceful".
Yes, I know. I'm hoping that some good will come out of this in that this brand of "black church" will be exposed as a fringe and rejected for its teaching.
thanks for your reply.
You are not too comfortable with the truth of Rev. Wrights beliefs, eh Mr. Bunting?
Just more nauseating liberal blather from the PI.
Who would expect anything less?
They're just mad because this might cost Obama the presidency. There is something about liberals, a deep self-deception always at work. They seem to deny every natural feeling, claim those feelings to be wrong and then label it as evil when spoken or practiced by others.
Does he ever. It’s not, I think, just that he screams. It’s just as much what he screams. His words are so over the top that even the Drive-Bys can’t stomach his Marxist/Socialist ravings and his black liberation anti-Americanism. They’ll do what they can to cover for BHO, but Wright has gone too far even for our Liberal press.
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