But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.

That was the one oh so very crucial thing that went missing from Obama's speech.  He addressed America to let us know he understood why Wright's sermons were wrong and divisive, and he addressed us then again to let us know that should we continue to dwell on Wright's sermons, then we were being wrong and divisive ourselves, but he never turned around, and addressed his community, the Trinity congregation.

There was no moment in the speech where he began:  "But there is something that I must say to my people ..."

Check the videos and see if there are any children present...Sunday School is typically where the kids are at--not at the sermons.

i did some bouncing around to other sites, to get a flavor for how the wright thing, and sen. clinton's interview, are being taken.

holy cow! it's clear to me that many of those people have gone off their meds! either that, or the aliens came, took them away and replaced them with pod people. what a bunch of screeching nutjobs!

if you came from another planet and read some of that stuff, having no clue what it was all about, you would, rightfully, assume she had been found guilty of sacrificing virgins in her sen. office, to bathe in their blood.

Koch asks how Obama can let his girls sit and listen to Rev. Wright. From my perspective, I can see how the Obamas believe that exposing their daughters to the totality of the black experience--including those parts that are extreme and ignorant--is important. In his speech Obama talked about how Trinity is a representative congregation of black culture, including everyone from the most enlightened to the most ignorant, the poorest of the poor on up to the very wealthy, and with all colors represented.

Instead of assuming the worst, I imagine the Obamas teaching their girls that it is true that America has an ugly history of abusing black people but that it is also the country that provides them with the privileged life they lead. I also imagine them teaching their daughters that instead of abandoning the black community and disdaining the ignorant myths perpetuated by some, they are called by God to be role models for civic education, self-determination, and true empowerment. That's what I imagine, but I would really like to hear Obama say it himself.

So.  Huckabee made some nice statements above.

But ask him if he would stay at a church where a preacher was preaching the things Rev. Wright preached.

Check out this Diary.

http://www.mydd.com/story/2008/3/26/3321/76150

If you find yourself listening to a pastor who is appealing to your deepest resentments, who is telling you who to blame instead of how to love, then it might be time to find a new one.

The same man whom Joyce Purnick of the New York Times twenty-one years ago properly described as someone who has often acted "provocatively and defensively toward the issue of race"

The Super Delegates will desert Hillary after the North Carolina primary.  The Clintons know this.  Forget the kitchen sink, that means we will all be subjected to the entire kitchen, and you and yours, as previously, will continue to enable and condescend, still certain that you deserve this and no one is going to take it away.

Call me naive but I think Hillary has been far more vocal and out in front of issues on race and Obama has done as much as possible to keep from discussing race himself, at least until he absolutely had to.

Clearly Obama doesn't want a dialog on race.

As for your impressions of TalkLeft...you are free not to hang out here if you don't like what you are reading. You are also free to oppose diaries/comments but you do little service to that end via comments like the above.

It's clear from the above that you think you see the truth and most here do not.

When this is how you go about it you can expect there will be discord.

Their job is to teach us that they know more about God than we do. They will drum beat into our heads what they believe or how they interpret things to get us to fall in line behind them and therefore support their Church. Their purpose is to convince us that they are speaking for God.

God bless America for giving a tax free bully pulpit for these people to consume the minds of our children. Indoctrination into a church and it's beliefs is done by repeating the message until it becomes "truth" without investigation. That's why the Pastor is the Shepherd and we are fondly called the flock (sheep).

I never heard anything hateful about ethnicity, sexual orientation or anything even close while I attended church. I do not see the pulpit as a place for politics. God doesn't know where the borders of America are.I think he/she has bigger issues to attend to if I believe at all.

Pastors should follow the teachings of their religion and not soley rely on their personal experiences as being divinely inspired. They have a choice in what message they deliver. We have the choice to walk away from that message.  

If we choose not to then we are basically in agreement with that message. We are allowing the Pastor's words to take the place of God's.

Because if you were, this article from the WaPo citing a  Rand Corp. and Oregon State University study   wouldn't surprise you at all.

Nearly half of the 500 African Americans surveyed said that HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, is man-made. The study, which was supported by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, appears in the Feb. 1 edition of the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes.

More than one-quarter said they believed that AIDS was produced in a government laboratory, and 12 percent believed it was created and spread by the CIA.

A slight majority said they believe that a cure for AIDS is being withheld from the poor. Forty-four percent said people who take the new medicines for HIV are government guinea pigs, and 15 percent said AIDS is a form of genocide against black people.

Two more quotes of interest by  Na'im Akbar, a professor of psychology at Florida State University who specializes in African American behavior

"This is not a bunch of crazy people running around saying they're out to get us," Akbar said. The belief "comes from the reality of 300 years of slavery and 100 years of post-slavery exploitation."

Today, he said, African Americans are more likely to live in communities near pollution sources, such as freeways and oil refineries, and far from health care centers. "There are a lot of indicators that our lives are not valued," Akbar said.

This NY Times article from 1990, might also be of interest to you.

"Because of who's being devastated the most, and growing up in the U.S. and knowing the history of slavery and racism in this country," Mr. Brown said, "you can't be black and not feel that AIDS is some kind of experiment, some kind of plot to hit undesirable minority populations." Mr. Brown, 30 years old, virtually apologized for his belief, saying, "I hope I don't sound too radical, because I'm not."

"I don't want to believe that AIDS is some kind of Government plot," he said. Then, pausing, he added: "But I guess I do. I do believe it."

Guess what? This IS a Democratic site and it IS a left site. Clinton is running for the DEMOCRATIC nomination. It is arguable that MORE DEMOCRATS like her than Obama. Just because she isn't your preferred candidate, and just because Obama hasn't sealed the deal and has problems that are pointed out here changes none of that.

If you want an echo chamber of your views, you have several choices.

If your ultimate goal is to unite us all into one happy Dem family (as long as it is YOUR candidate that is nominated), rather than telling us we are all dumb meenies to not dump our candidate, why don't you try harder to calm the waters and say "this too shall pass"?

The notion of Barack's and Michelle's daughters going to that church is interesting in that it makes it clear that they don't see any disconnect between the church teachings and their own belief system but neither do I.

The simple fact is whether those children go to that church, they will indeed encounter racism so it's logical that the church provide the tools, the identity and the confidence to deal with the rest of the country's race problem, which still exists, even in Chicago.

What I find striking is that blacks should be pissed off. American's in general should be pissed off.

All of the time and attention devoted to the minutiae introduced by the focus on identity and personality in this contest has done nothing to further the dialog about the real issues this country faces. For all the words used on television, blogs, newspapers, etc., we are no more aware of the the problems nor the solutions.

Do I believe that Barack Obama is any more capable of achieving a meaningful dialog on these issues? No.

Do I believe that Hillary Clinton is any more capable of achieving a meaningful dialog on these issues? Yeah, I actually do...that was one of the curious things with Bill Clinton...the surprising candor on issues that we faced. Granted, this is a subjective and superficial analysis.

http://tinyurl.com/33b2ft

Fills their minds with crazy thoughts when they should be focusing on algebra is too limiting and simplistic. It assumes that growth and development must be channeled in ways that you choose when the mind must embrace thoughts on a diverse range of subjects rather than to be limited.

If you don't like the message that Wright was speaking, I can understand - feel free to speak up.

If you feel as I do, the message isn't the problem, but religion in general is the problem, then you would feel that subjecting your children to the messages, regardless of who is the pastor is likely to cause conflict within impressionable minds.

Surely we as a culture subject our children to all sorts of absurd falsehoods starting with the toothfairy, the Easter bunny, Santa Claus, etc. Eventually children have to sort out why mommy and daddy filled their heads with this nonsense.

In fact, I have seen so many crazy stupid Christian notions that tend to lump them all in the same boat.

My faith of course, has it's share of morons and the leaders are likewise inclined to try and ram their twisted beliefs on their believers so there is no better here.