Barack’s Obama’s silence on his longtime minister and mentor’s support of Louis Farrakhan speaks volumes.
Obama’s minister, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., was quoted in the November/December issue of his church’s magazine, Trumpet, heaping praise on Farrakhan.
“When Minister Farrakhan speaks, Black America listens,” Wright said in the article. “His depth on analysis [sic] when it comes to the racial ills of this nation is astounding and eye-opening. He brings a perspective that is helpful and honest.”
Wright’s comments ran in a video, which was played when Trumpet bestowed the "Rev. Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. Lifetime Achievement Trumpeteer award" on Farrakhan.
But in a statement issued this week, supposedly to address the issue, Obama ignored the point that his minister and friend had spoken adoringly of Farrakhan and that Wright’s church was behind the award to the Nation of Islam leader.
Instead, Obama adroitly said, “I decry racism and anti-Semitism in every form and strongly condemn the anti-Semitic statements made by Minister Farrakhan. I assume that Trumpet magazine made its own decision to honor Farrakhan based on his efforts to rehabilitate ex-offenders, but it is not a decision with which I agree.”
In his comment, Obama not only side-stepped the main point of the controversy, he disingenuously claimed he thought the magazine bestowed the award on Farrakhan for his efforts to rehabilitate ex-prisoners and that the decision was the magazine’s and had nothing to do with Wright and his church. Not only is Trumpet owned and produced by Wright’s church out of the church’s offices, Wright’s daughters serve as publisher and executive editor of the magazine.
Neither Wright’s encomiums about Farrakhan nor the Trumpet article mentions ex-prisoners. Instead, they refer to Farrakhan as an “icon” who “truly epitomize[s] greatness.”
Wright’s comments and the award to Farrakhan were first reported in a Jan. 14 Newsmax article, “Obama Minister Honored Farrakhan.” The following day, Richard Cohen of the Washington Post took Obama to task over his connection to Wright.
Hailing his “integrity and honesty,” Wright lauded Farrakhan in the Trumpet article as one of the giants of the African-American religious experience in the 20th and 21st century.
“His love for Africa and African-American people has made him an unforgettable force, a catalyst for change, and a religious leader who is sincere about his faith and his purpose,” Wright said.
Is it fair to connect Obama with his minister’s comments and actions? Absolutely.
If your minister, priest, or rabbi spoke glowingly of Farrakhan and gave him an award, would you continue to attend that house of worship or have anything to do with its leader?
Not only is Wright Obama’s minister, Wright is Obama's self-described friend and sounding board. Obama has said he found religion through Wright in the 1980s and consulted him before deciding to run for president. The title of Obama’s best-seller “The Audacity of Hope” comes from one of Wright’s sermons. Wright is one of the first people Obama thanked after his election to the Senate in 2004.
Obama prayed privately with Wright before announcing his candidacy last year.
Wright has long been a supporter of Farrakhan, whom he helped organize the Million Man March in Washington in 1995. Farrakhan has repeatedly targeted Jews, whites, America, and homosexuals with hate-filled statements.
He has called whites “blue-eyed devils” and the “anti-Christ.” He has described Jews as “bloodsuckers” who control the government, the media and some black organizations.
As noted in the Jan. 14 Newsmax article, in sermons and interviews, Dr. Wright has equated Zionism with racism and has compared Israel with South Africa under its previous policy of apartheid. On the Sunday following 9/11, Wright characterized the terrorist attacks as a consequence of violent American policies.
Four years later, Wright suggested that the attacks were retribution for America’s racism.
“In the 21st century, white America got a wake-up call after 9/11/01,” Wright wrote in Trumpet. “White America and the western world came to realize that people of color had not gone away, faded into the woodwork or just ‘disappeared’ as the Great White West kept on its merry way of ignoring black concerns.”
In one of his sermons, Wright said to thumping applause, “Racism is how this country was founded and how this country is still run! . . . We [in the U.S.] believe in white supremacy and black inferiority and believe it more than we believe in God.”
As for Israel, “The Israelis have illegally occupied Palestinian territories for over 40 years now,” Wright has said. “Divestment has now hit the table again as a strategy to wake the business community and wake up Americans concerning the injustice and the racism under which the Palestinians have lived because of Zionism.”
Instead of remaining silent, Obama should be denouncing Wright for supporting and honoring Farrakhan. Abraham Foxman, the national director of the Anti-Defamation League, suggested as much when he told the Jewish Week that Obama should confront Wright, whom he described as someone who “embraces, awards, and celebrates a black racist.” If Obama is unable to change Wright’s stand, he should leave the church, Foxman said.
Obama’s failure to do so and his close relationship with Wright for more than two decades suggest that he not only condones much of what Wright says, he agrees with it.
Ronald Kessler is chief Washington correspondent of Newsmax.com. View his previous reports and get his dispatches sent to you free via e-mail. Go here now.