Election 2008
(2008-05-01)
BALTIMORE, MD
(wypr) -
The Democratic presidential primary campaign lurched along this week with another installment of Barack Obama-Jeremiah Wright matter. WYPR's Senior News Analyst Fraser Smith comments in his weekly essay.People have wondered for months if a black man could be elected president of the United States. Senator Barack Obama was poised to help answer the question.
Then came his minister, of all people, to campaign against him. Call it Swift pastoring. At the National Press Club in Washington, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright gave a speech and a press conference during which he stood by controversial pronouncements: the United States government invented AIDS to destroy black people; etc.
Senator Obama has had to renounce, condemn, step away from and duck them all.
The press club encounter was a stunning illustration of dueling agendas. The press club president was determined to get through a long list of questions based on inflammatory sound bytes from Rev. Wright's speeches - each one of which has been hung about the head and shoulders of Senator Obama. How could such a man be the candidate's pastor? And so on. If the idea was to hear the minister explain himself, the rapid-fire format didn't help.
Adding insult to injury - perhaps without meaning to - the minister suggested Senator Obama was saying things during the campaign he didn't really believe. Just what politicians do, Reverend Wright said.
At several points during the press club question and answer session, the minister had opportunities to clarify things he said had been missing from reporting on his inflammatory remarks. He stood by most of them.
In one dramatic instance, he asked the questioner if she had heard one of the sermons - a legitimate question. But when she said no, he dismissed the question entirely, instead of supplying the context himself. He's minister, after all, not a seasoned parry-and-thrust campaigner.
Obama was left, once again, to fend off the damaging words of the man who presided at his marriage and the christening of his children.
At this rate, the Republicans won't need a Swift Boat crew. The campaign is about to produce its own verb for negative attack ads. In the future, a candidate so targeted will have been Wrighted or will it be wronged.
You've been listening to an essay by WYPR's Senior News Analyst, Fraser Smith. Your responses are welcome at fsmith@wypr .org. © Copyright 2012, wypr
