Jeremiah Wright's "black liberation theology" is at direct odds with what Obama has been saying. Or at least I think so?

Well, it's not at odds with what Obama hasn't said, which is a lot. I remember him advising people to look at his website for more specifics on policy. Can you imagine suggesting this to a prospective employer during a job interview? With the unspecific and lofty rhetoric of Hope, he invited a wide swath of the public to project upon him an identity. In doing so, he has dispensed with the difficult task of actually carving out an identity, or standing behind specific policy solutions, otherwise known as "taking a stand" or "leadership."

I'll even give him the benefit of the doubt when he says that he disagrees strongly with what Wright has said. But we can see how Obama treats someone with whom he strongly disagrees:  he gives him a $20,000 donation and calls him a close spiritual advisor for 20 years (and perhaps most troubling, he exposes his young daughters to this hateful, anti-intellectual substitute for the gospel of Christ.)

Even if you are willing to believe that Obama never heard anything tantamount to Wright's "greatest hits" sermons, surely he might have brushed up on what is black liberation theology sometime during his 20 year association with the church?  What's worse is that Barack Obama's life and achievements are a testament to the healing of the racial divide in America, as Rush Limbaugh pointed out yesterday, and I would add, a testament to the individual achievement available in America. So why even "go there" with the likes of Wright's failed retrograde racial divide politics?

Obama's approach has been to allow us to project our fantasy of a leader onto him. This has worked well until now, as the fatal failings of this approach have been exposed.

The Obama faithful will not allow anything to stand in their way. Call it the Donovan McNabb effect, except consider that it is exponentially more powerful, as there is much more at stake and it's more than the media involved here. Independents who naturally eschew identity politics are going to swing toward McCain, now that it is painfully clear that Obama has failed to fulfill his role as the post-racial messiah.
Wednesday, March 19, 2008 9:03:01 AM