Jeremiah Wright just got through speaking at the National Press Club [watch it here]. I don’t know if it’s going to help Obama or hurt him. But it helped me. In the South, the black church is the best of things. It has always been a refuge for our Afro-Americans throughout our troubled history. It has been their government at times when they didn’t have one of their own. It was the repository for the parts of our Constitution that were not enforced ["all men are created equal"]. It was the nidus for the Civil Rights Movement that got things headed in the right direction. Jeremiah is no fool like those clips portrayed him. He’s just one of those fine black preachers that happened to be in Chicago instead of down here.
I actually disagree with Barak Obama that Wright’s message is dated, part of his history as a black man growing up in a segregated society. I think his message is still alive. So does he. The American experience is still different for black Americans than white Americans. If you go to Rush Limbaugh’s web site right now, you can find all the racism you’ll ever need to hear, or for that matter, a jillion other sites. Just because it’s not spoken out loud doesn’t mean it has gone away. It’s all over the place.
When people have said that they don ‘t think affirmative action is fair and it should be discontinued I say imagine you were black in this country and how you would feel. I then ask them if they had a choice what would they choose, to be white or black in this country and if their white they say white of course. Do you remember the book “Black Like Me” well the author was shocked with the different treatment he received as a black man. I wish Americans in this country would admit to the racial indifference in this country. Rev. Wright has every right to feel the way he does.
I did not see the whole press club interview when I wrote the comment earlier and I’d like to write that after watching the whole interview today, Rev. Wright went too far.