A question for a certain kind of Hillary Clinton supporter (you know who you are):

If Barack Obama's returning to Reverend Wright's church Sunday after Sunday, exposing himself and his family to Wright's alleged hate speech, is, for all intents and purposes and by default, an endorsement of Wright's alleged hate speech, and hate speech in general, shouldn't it follow that Hillary Clinton's returning to Clinton, Inc., night after night, exposing herself and her family to Bill's confirmed infidelity, is, for all intents and purposes and by default, an endorsement of Bill's confirmed infidelity, and infidelity in general?

Show me how it doesn't. Or is this yet again one of those one-way streets that you insane brainiacs have become so fond of here lately? I mean, all y'all are talking about how Wrightgate speaks directly to Obama's judgment and how that would affect his decisions as president. What does it say about the judgment of a woman who basically ignored the fact that she was cheated on and how she might react when Israel turns The Golan Hights into a giant Bloomingdale's? [Full disclosure: I'm a rabid Zionist who hates Jews.]

Quiblit.com. People you hate to love to read, but without all the hoople-headed retards. Yet.

Apologies, sincere, to the sort of Hillary Clinton supporter who doesn't count him/herself amongst these bigoted raisin cakes. You know as well as I that sometimes you've gotta fight fire with fire, or, in this case, with a petroleum product. If you're gonna destroy your own party for the sake of power, why not do it with a little sincerity for a change?

Kucinich/Gandalf, 2012!

The better question is how she returns, time and time again, to prayer services conducted by a cult.

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I'm not a natural Hillary supporter, but being pledged to serve the Anti-Christ due to an obscure clause in a document unearthed from the family archives, I'm with her all the way.

That said, I never, even during the whole Monica thing, thought to blame Hillary for Bill's alley-cattin. Why did she stick with him? He's her husband. Father of her child. I just don't feel right judging the marriages of other people.

And when that knuckle-dragging goon asked Chelsea about it, I so wanted her to take that mike and beat the living shit out of him.

"In an interview with the United Methodist Reporter, she expressed regret that her church had focused too much on social gospel concerns in the '60s, '70s, and '80s, "to the exclusion of personal faith and growth." The spirit, believe theological conservatives, matters more than the flesh. Clinton added that she was happy to see her liberal denomination becoming more salvation centered in the '90s.

When Clinton first came to Washington in 1993, one of her first steps was to join a Bible study group. For the next eight years, she regularly met with a Christian "cell" whose members included Susan Baker, wife of Bush consigliere James Baker; Joanne Kemp, wife of conservative icon Jack Kemp; Eileen Bakke, wife of Dennis Bakke, a leader in the anti-union Christian management movement; and Grace Nelson, the wife of Senator Bill Nelson, a conservative Florida Democrat.

Clinton's prayer group was part of the Fellowship (or "the Family"), a network of sex-segregated cells of political, business, and military leaders dedicated to "spiritual war" on behalf of Christ, many of them recruited at the Fellowship's only public event, the annual National Prayer Breakfast. (Aside from the breakfast, the group has "made a fetish of being invisible," former Republican Senator William Armstrong has said.) The Fellowship believes that the elite win power by the will of God, who uses them for his purposes. Its mission is to help the powerful understand their role in God's plan."

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"This, then, is held to be the duty of the man of Wealth: First, to set an example of modest, unostentatious living, shunning display or extravagance; to provide moderately for the legitimate wants of those dependent upon him; and after doing so to consider all surplus revenues which come to him simply as trust funds, which he is called upon to administer, and strictly bound as a matter of duty to administer in the manner which, in his judgment, is best calculated to produce the most beneficial result for the community-the man of wealth thus becoming the sole agent and trustee for his poorer brethren, bringing to their service his superior wisdom, experience, and ability to administer-doing for them better than they would or could do for themselves." Andrew Carnegie "The Gospel of Wealth" 1889.

Being in the same club as Andrew Carnegie should make throwing around the 'elitist' insult a little more difficult. Luckily for the HRC campaign most people haven't read Carnegie's book, or indeed have much close acquaintence with American History.

It is within my moral rights to forgive those who have sinned against me, but not those who have sinned against others. Bill's victim is Hillary herself, but Wright's victims are not Obama but the millions of whites who live under terrible racial oppression and prejudice.

If Obama is man person enough to learn from his mistakes, he'll look up to the examples Hillary and McCain have set in this matter. Repudiate and reject first, then hug and befriend. Not the other way round, hello! HillJohn's dealings with Scaife and Falwell are textbook examples of how to go about associating with strange bedfellows.

Seriously, though, this endless circus about these jeremia(h)ds has been very revealing about one aspect of racism as it exists in America today. Blacks may sit in the front of the bus, but don't dare exercise the same freedom to be politically wacky as WASPs.

Wright's demagogery is distasteful primarily because it is an insult to blacks, not whites, the way a lot of the ideologies of identity and victimhood (strands of feminism, anti-colonialism, Africanism, pan-Arabism, etc.) demean their subjects. They portray them as perpetual weaklings, pliant slaves, existing beyond the realm of moral responsibility and incapable of living with dignity outside the bubble of a self created counter-culture.

So the underlying racism in all this lies not in viewing Wright's strident views as an error (they are, on the whole), but something lying outside the domain of socially acceptable errors, one that belongs in the same box as eugenics as opposed to, say, American exceptionalism. It's the requirement that its holder be treated as a pariah, unlike those that believe wrongly and unwaveringly in non-existent WMDs or the supposed economic burden of immigration.

I don't know if you noticed but this place has more or less been overrun by obsessive and retarded bigots.

So the underlying racism in all this lies not in viewing Wright's strident views as an error (they are, on the whole), but something lying outside the domain of socially acceptable errors, one that belongs in the same box as eugenics as opposed to, say, American exceptionalism. It's the requirement that its holder be treated as a pariah, unlike those that believe wrongly and unwaveringly in non-existent WMDs or the supposed economic burden of immigration.

I couldn't agree more (and have been in an ongoing "debate" on this in another forum). There is a pernicious habit, developed over the last 8 years, to take away the freedom in order to silence the outrageous.

This is a far cry from America's historical reliance on decency and law, while protecting variant speech and beliefs.

I know many people believe that all racism in the United States is centered in The South - that we're all a bunch of redneck, KKK, cousin-marrying cretins. But the truer, and more insidious and more dangerous racism in America is coming up in this "outrage" at Rev. Wright.

In my family there are members who have said from the get-go "this country needs a white man as President" (honest to god they said that and I am NOT proud of that!) -- but I thought that it was a product of generations of living south of the Mason Dixon line.

Imagine my surprise to read all over the internet how relieved so many people are that they now have a "reasonable" excuse to exclude Obama as a viable candidate.

I don't mean to impugn her religion or her religious motives. Whatever good or ill I'd find in this group, and I suspect there's a good deal of both, the point is I don't really think I need to know, or to graft onto her the motives or words of its leaders or certain of its adherents. It may be as simple as her wanting to network through a powerful group.

Point is that you can't have it both ways -- belong to your secret organization with your own private thoughts and faith yet claim that others lack that privilege.

Well said.

and I may well have

But did Hillary claim to have issue with Obama's church membership?

I have issue with all of their religious beliefs, myself.

But since there can be no president in this supersticious nation without that belief in the supernatural, I am willing to give them all a pass.

Gregor_Samsa:

Wright's demagogery is distasteful primarily because it is an insult to blacks, not whites...

You're wrong about Wright. He's a highly intelligent analyst of the human condition. His congregation has grown from 87 to over 6,000 - mostly because of what he does rather than what he says. But, what he says is extremely consistent with what he does, including his endorsement of Farrakhan's deeds (he does not endorse his words).

The man's problem is that he really believes in Jesus. This is so highly unusual among Christians, apparently, that the man has to be rebuked and repudiated on national TV.

with his continued attendance at a church where someone says things she finds distasteful. I'm saying she also attends church and shares worship with people we think say things which are distasteful. Objectively so. Yet, no one claims she must be a wackdoodle because she shares prayer breakfasts with them. And that's appropriate.

Why else would she support the marriage defense act? or try to criminalize flag-burning...or try to make it okay for your local police to NOT guard women's clinics under attack from terrorist christians? or refuse to ban clusterbombs?

I think she going to have to do a lot more than denounce the members of cult she belongs to. I think she still needs to explain her voting record and why it so closely matches those of a fundie christianist...

I didn't say a majority of blacks find Wright insulting. I said they should. That's of course a massive compliment to a majority of blacks. By recognizing their capacity to be stupidly parochial like everyone else (Jews, Palestinians, Irish, Chinese, Southern Baptists and Cambridge educated folks), I acknowlege their humanity. Some of their mentors don't.

You're probably right about the Jesus thing. Had he lived today, he would've preached against the government's secret AIDS experiment or 9/11 conspiracy, while tending the soup kitchens and foster homes. I mean things like structural poverty or erosion of constitutional checks-and-balances don't exactly make for stirring moral narrative, do they?

Gregor_Samsa:

I didn't say a majority of blacks find Wright insulting. I said they should. That's of course a massive compliment to a majority of blacks. By recognizing their capacity to be stupidly parochial like everyone else (Jews, Palestinians, Irish, Chinese, Southern Baptists and Cambridge educated folks), I acknowlege their humanity. Some of their mentors don't.

You're probably right about the Jesus thing. Had he lived today, he would've preached against the government's secret AIDS experiment or 9/11 conspiracy, while tending the soup kitchens and foster homes. I mean things like structural poverty or erosion of constitutional checks-and-balances don't exactly make for stirring moral narrative, do they?

Your first paragraph is just a good illustration of where you're wrong. "Stupidly parochial" is the antithesis of what Wright stands for and preaches.

Your second paragraph is condescending to Wright's work and completely mischaracterizes his actual teaching. I know it's a bit of effort to actually find out the truth, but I'm a bit disappointed that you would pontificate without doing that.

I'm more disappointed in Obama, though.