Here's the Boston Globe's Jeff Jacoby, from a piece with the devastatingly sly title "It's still a question of Wright and wrong":
The problem for Obama is that Wright, the spiritual leader he has so long embraced, is a devotee not of [Martin Luther] King ...
Above all, the problem for Obama is that for two decades his spiritual home has been a church in which the minister damns America ...
And here's Martin Luther King:
I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today -- my own government. For the sake of those boys, for the sake of this government, for the sake of hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence, I cannot be silent.
... In a way we were agreeing with Langston Hughes, that black bard of Harlem, who had written earlier:
O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath--
America will be!Now, it should be incandescently clear that no one who has any concern for the integrity and life of America today can ignore the present war. If America's soul becomes totally poisoned, part of the autopsy must read Vietnam. It can never be saved so long as it destroys the deepest hopes of men the world over.
Now, I know it's easy to laugh at Jacoby. I did it myself. But in fairness to him, he was talking about Smilin' White Disney Martin Luther King, not actual Martin Luther King.
The reaction to Wright's comments are incredibly bizarre, aren't they? I realize this is not an original or insightful comment but God Damn, America, I just had to say it.
Posted by: cemmcs | Friday, April 04, 2008 at 01:01 PM
I said to a nice liberal friend campaigning for Obama, over email, that it was wrong to denounce everything his pastor said. She said these were the points of controversy:
She didn't mention whether they were controversial to her or someone else.
What does one do with this?
Posted by: StO | Friday, April 04, 2008 at 08:52 PM
cemmcs: I think the best way to understand it is this: patriotism is a religion, and what Wright said is blasphemy and heresy. The psychological mechanisms and the reactions are exactly analogous. I definitely agree that they're bizarre—but that's also just how I feel when religious types go berserk about any perceived insult to their deity of choice.
StO: That's a tough nut, and it does depend on her perspective (i.e. if it's just her own thoughts, or her perspective as an Obama campaigner having to explain Wright's views to other people). Sometimes I'll say to someone, ok, solely for the sake of argument, accept that A is true (where A is one of the numerous crimes this country has committed). And then I'll ask: given that you accept that A is true, wouldn't you be more likely to {think B, say C, suspect D, do E}? Emphasizing that they're accepting A solely for the sake of argument, of course. If they're honest, they'll say yes. (And if that goes well the next step is to explain why A is in fact true, and say that they shouldn't take your word for it but should check it out on their own.)
I've done this sometimes in situations where the person I was talking to thought lefties were motivated by nothing more than vicious, irrational hatred of the wonderful United States of America. If the person is at all thoughtful, it will at least make them see that there's a reasonable perspective on the other side of the argument, even if they may disagree strongly with it—which is an important step. So maybe you can do that with your friend about Wright.
Posted by: John Caruso | Saturday, April 05, 2008 at 01:13 AM
Do you attribute this bizarre reaction solely to "patriotism"? Don't you think that racism has something to do with it?
I wonder how "patriotic" the average person really is. When you talk to people who are not politicians, pundits or part of the corporate media it does not seem as if they are all so gung ho on the idea of American Empire or a nation that is run for the benefit of a wealthy few.
Racism, however, seems a lot more pervasive.
Posted by: cemmcs | Saturday, April 05, 2008 at 07:31 AM
Not solely to patriotism, but primarily. I think racism was more like an accelerant on a fire in this case.
I'd say the average person is extremely patriotic, in the usual usage of the word. There's no contradiction between that and not being gung ho about empire or rich thieves—and it's not at all unusual to hear that kind of thing when you're talking one on one with otherwise patriotic people, because the patriotism is usually reflexive and not deeply considered (again, just like religion). So those are just instances of America failing to live up to its "transcendent purpose" (Hans Morgenthau, by way of Noam Chomsky).
In looking up that quote and the context it's basically a summary of what I'm saying, so here you go:
Posted by: John Caruso | Saturday, April 05, 2008 at 10:11 AM