Let's Just All Agree That Wright Apologized And Move On

Can someone help me with what looks like the latest fantasy from Obama as he explains his Reverend Wright (emphasis added) [and see LAST WORD below for Obama's side]:

WASHINGTON - White House hopeful Barack Obama suggests he would have left his Chicago church had his longtime pastor, whose fiery anti-American comments about U.S. foreign policy and race relations threatened Obama's campaign, not stepped down.

"Had the reverend not retired, and had he not acknowledged that what he had said had deeply offended people and were inappropriate and mischaracterized what I believe is the greatness of this country, for all its flaws, then I wouldn't have felt comfortable staying at the church," Obama said Thursday during a taping of the ABC talk show, "The View." The interview will be broadcast Friday.

Let's make the working assumption that this excerpt is accurate and in context - time will tell, since the show airs tomorrow.

So, when did Wright acknowledge that what he had said was deeply offensive and inappropriate?  The AP story recounts some of Wright's controversial comments but oddly omits to mention his apology, as does all other news coverage with which I am familiar.  And I am strangely certain that a Wright apology would have made the news - unless he never made it publicly.

So what are we supposed to believe - that Wright apologized to Obama, who is now apologizing to the rest of us on Wright's behalf?  For heaven's sake, this really does show that Obama is made of Presidential stuff - maybe he can do an Apology Tour, just as Bill Clinton did.

But why is Wright apologizing to Obama, who only heard these remarks second hand - well, "second hand" if we still believe Obama's insistence that he missed every service with these controversial comments (Huffington Post) but heard others (The Speech) but didn't hear anything at all (town hall).  Shouldn't Wright be apologizing to those of us who took offense?  Or after thirty years of delivering three sermons per week, has Wright developed a fear of public speaking?

Oh, well - even though this is clearly just extemporaneous BS from Obama, I suppose a few follow questions would be in order, if only to generate more extemporaneous BS. 

Away we go - when did Obama give serious thought to leaving the church - presumably it was when he became aware of these ghastly comments from Wright and received an apology, but when was that?  Per his Huffington Post Obama claimed, implausibly, that he only learned that Wright had attitude issues at the outset of his Presidential campaign.

When did Wright apologize, or explain, or whatever, and in what forum, and to what audience?  Was this apology in response to a specific protest from Obama?

And how did it happen that this apology was not mentioned in Obama's statement at the Huffington Post or in the big race speech?  Are we to believe that Obama only just decided to mention it now - why keep that helpful news about Wright's redemption and repentance in reserve?  Or did Wright's apology follow "The Speech", which implies that Obama was considering leaving his church just last week, a month after Wright's retirement?

I suspect the MSM will be all over this one.

PROPS:  To Don Surber:

When it came time to leave the church, Obama voted present.

MORE:  Does Wright seem repentant in this back-and-forth with the Times, in their coverage of his disinvitation to Obama's campaign kick-off?  Ponder this:

Mr. Wright said that in the phone conversation in which Mr. Obama disinvited him from a role in the announcement, Mr. Obama cited an article in Rolling Stone, “The Radical Roots of Barack Obama.”

According to the pastor, Mr. Obama then told him, “You can get kind of rough in the sermons, so what we’ve decided is that it’s best for you not to be out there in public.”

In a follow-up blast at the Times reporting, Wright added this:

I do not remember reading in your article that Barack had apologized for listening to that bad information and bad advice. Did I miss it? Or did your editor cut it out?

Repentant?  How about in this Times story a month later:

Mr. Wright, who has long prided himself on criticizing the establishment, said he knew that he may not play well in Mr. Obama’s audition for the ultimate establishment job.

“If Barack gets past the primary, he might have to publicly distance himself from me,” Mr. Wright said with a shrug. “I said it to Barack personally, and he said yeah, that might have to happen.”

Barack is shoveling nonsense.

SPEAKING OF NONSENSE:  Wright's new digs, a 10,000 square foot home in a gated community.  In "Dreams From My Father" Obama recounts Wright urging someone or other not to take his family from the the 'hood for the suburbs; Obama offers that it might be safer, and Wright rejoins that a black man isn't safe anywhere.  Well, that was twenty years ago.

Wright grew up in comfort and will retire in same, Black Values and its Disavowal of the Pursuit of "Middleclassness" notwithstanding.  Whatev, Rev.

THE CAPTAIN ALLAHPUNDIT TAKES A STAB at bailing Obama out:

Tom Maguire thinks Obama’s deceitfully trying to suggest here that Wright has apologized when of course he hasn’t. I don’t read it that way at all. I think he’s speaking purely hypothetically, if inartfully: If Wright was still pastor of the church and if he refused to apologize for the sermons, then Obama would have to quit. Since he’s not still pastor, there’s no need to quit irrespective of whether Wright has apologized or not.

Hmm - one of the most articulate politicians of this generation speaks inartfully (or very artfully!), inadvertently creating an impression helpful to himself.  If it's that complicated, it's still misleading - listeners aren't sitting at home drawing Venn diagrams.

I certainly agree that the presentation was not artful, but let's see - as AllahP presents it, it is clear that Obama's message was that Wright had to either resign *or* apologize, or else Obama would leave the church.  So let's imagine this construction - this is Obama, in a hypothetical re-write; the highlighted sentence captures the current controversy:

I was only comfortable staying in the church if Wright either resigned or apologized.  In other words, I would have left the church if he had not resigned and not apologized.  However, he resigned, so it's all good.

Hmmph.  As a matter of strict logic and deep charity we could agree that Obama's statement is not false.  However, it is still very misleading, since it is (in my opinion and personal experience) likely to create the impression that an apology has been delivered when in fact it has not, publicly at least.  This impression arises in part because Obama is describing both a reality (Wright's announced retirement) and a hypothetical (Wright's apology) as having equal weight in his stay/go decision, when in fact, Obama may never have sought an apology.  As presented, Obama lays out a lot of detail for a hypothetical and factually irrelevant apology - why bother, other than to confuse the issue?

It is also neither unreasonable nor unprecedented to think that Obama might have wanted both an apology and a retirement, as when Samantha Powers got tossed under the bus.  For example, this could be a hypothetical re-write of Obama:

I was only comfortable staying at the church if Wright both apologized and resigned.  If he had not resigned and not apologized, I would have left the church; fortunately, he did resign and  he apologized to me in a secret session, so it's all good.

In that construction Obama wanted Wright to satisfy two conditions, not simply order from the menu and choose one.

When a skilled speaker delivers a false-but-favorable idea wrapped in a true-if-parsed-favorably cloak, I still think is close enough to lying to be called that.  These aren't depositions with legalistic wiggle room; in the court of public opinion we value straight talk.  That said, now that I see Obama's comments both ways, I can see how someone might have seen it the other way first, or only that way.  A very familiar feeling...

BONUS DETAIL: Jim Geraghty stoops to conquer by live-blogging The View:

Barbara Walters: "Had the reverend not retired would you have left the church?"

Obama: "Had the reverend not retired, and had he not acknowledged that what he had said had deeply offended people and were inappropriate and mischaracterized what I believe is the greatness of this country, for all its flaws, then I wouldn't have felt comfortable staying at the church."

It looks like he was ready to say more, but *sigh* Hasselbeck interrupts.

Karl at PW delivers a savage beat down (I'm jealous...).

So the Captain sees Obama responding to Barbara with, roughly, had Wright not retired and, having stayed on, had he not apologized, I would have left.

I am reading it as 'had he not both stepped down and apologized, I would have left'.

Closer to the mainstream, Ben Smith of The Politico headlines the "Might have left church" and seems to be sniffing BS:

In a clip posted by ABC, Obama says: 'Had the reverend not retired, and had he not acknowledged that what he had said had deeply offended people and were inappropriate and mischaracterized what I believe is the greatness of this country -- for all its flaws -- then I wouldn't have felt comfortable staying there at the church."

In Obama's speech in Philadelphia last week, he said: "I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community."

At the WaPo blog, bafflement about what did Obama hear and when did he hear it, if ever.

Kate Phillips of the Times Caucus reports on The View revelations without comment, but adds this:

He also told the show’s hosts that he had spoken with Mr. Wright since controversy erupted over excerpts of some of the pastor’s sermons. “I think he’s saddened by what’s happened, and I told him I feel badly that he has been characterized just in this one way, and people haven’t seen this broader aspect of him,” the Democratic candidate said.

Is that meant to be understood as some sort of private apology?  C'mon, "saddened" is pretty broad - Wright might be saddened that Rush Limbaugh didn't choke on his microphone while covering this.

LAST WORD:  The AP takes this up with Obama's press flack and gets the "it was hypothetical" defense:

WASHINGTON - Democrat Barack Obama seemed to suggest in an interview aired Friday that his former pastor has acknowledged that his controversial remarks were inappropriate and hurtful, although there are no public accounts of the minister having done so.

...

Obama spokesman Bill Burton said the senator's remarks did not imply that Wright has expressed misgivings about his statements.

"Sen. Obama was clearly saying that were Rev. Wright not retiring, he would need to be assured that the reverend understood why what he had said had deeply offended people and mischaracterized the greatness of this country," Burton said.

I question whether Obama was "clearly" communicating that Wright had not, in fact, apologized, but I understand the logic of the position they are promoting.

Comments

[Soylent Red]

Obama = Messiah = the Word.

"In the Election were the Words. And the Words were with Obamessiah. And the Words were Obamessiah."

Gospel of Duval, Ch.1, Vs.1

[RichatUF]

Cecil-

Reading through some of the Black Theology stuff, it's pretty interesting. It's metaphorical of course ("white" means oppressor, "black" means oppressed . . . not [horrors] racist), and over-the-top...

I was looking at some stuff on BLT and found this link [a book from a very leftist perspective].

I was thinking about starting my own blog and wanted to do my own perspective on this but am having difficulty expressing it. I was looking at it as a system where BHO is the center and the poles are Gramsci, Alinsky, and BLT. The connective tissue of this mess is going to be Foucault (esp. his idea of "power/knowledge") and multi-culturalism. The more I think about the more it seems to have been done-Lewis at AT has had some great articles and Spengler' have been pretty good. FWIW and have enjoyed you comments and links regarding the subject-

[Soylent Red]

"His Light shineth in the Whiteness, but Whitey comprehended Him not."

Gospel of Duval, Ch.1, Vs.5

[Rick Ballard]

"He's a far left radical and a very smart and manipulative one."

Barney,

I agree that's the core - he's as Red as a ripe Delicious. You can read his life as a verification of the Gramscian affinity process working in high gear from birth to present. I would note that "Red", cheap Chicago pol, race huckster and empty vessel are not mutually exclusive identifiers. He appears to be a one man, 100% overlap Venn diagram - a man of many "layers" making up one stinking cake.

The Muddle is absolutely incapable of being led through the maze of Gramscian affinity and Alinsky Acolyte references to reach a conclusion that would correctly inform their choice come fall. The target audience is, once again, midgets riding Shetland ponies, so the aim has to be fairly low.

I believe that following the Red Witch strategy of highlighting "cheap Chicago pol" followed by "race huckster" will probably work better and may even resonate to a minor degree with the MSM which, left tilting as it is, would minimize the Red aspect to the point of disappearance.

[boris]

IF not A and IF Not B then C

Correct. That parsing is an algorithm rather than a logic expression. It is a shortened version of:

IF not A then C
IF not B then C

The conjunction AND simply joins them unconditionally.

[susan]

Just watched Obama on the View. He IS charming, until someone [Elizabeth] asks him a question he doesn't like! Then you can see his facial expression and his demeanor change dramatically! There's apparently a lot of anger inside of Obama; gee, who could have instilled THAT??? Maybe 20 years of Wright's hate sermons HAVE had an effect on the great orator, after all, despite Obama's assertion otherwise. And I also agree with one comment I read here, he 's a great orator, but ONLY in front of a teleprompter!. One-on-one he's terrible, and stammers and stutters if he is challenged ar asked something he does't particularly want to answer. He's a fraud!

[M. Simon]

Obama = cult of personality.

[Foo Bar]

As the transcript shows, Walters prompts him with same "had X not happened.." construction:

"Had the reverend not retired would you have left the church?"

I guess if Obama were an honorable man, he would not have paralleled Walters' construction in his answer (as is commonly done when answering a question). He would have instantly realized that "had he not done X and had he not done Y" would be a misleading construction and would have changed the grammatical construction in his answer. Shame on him.

Or maybe Walters and the Obama campaign were in grammatical cahoots. The duplicity and complicity of the MSM knows no bounds...

[M. Simon]

boris,

I like pseudo code for explaining stuff to non-coders. Or to check if the spec matches the rqmts with a customer.

[Niah Waters]

I just wish that I can scrape your IP addresses and do a background check on some of you.

[Rick Ballard]

ot
Rich,

Here's a nice piece on the hedge funds impact on wheat prices. What the hell is the CFTC doing encouraging heavy weight speculation in commodities? Who, aside from the hedge funds, gains from this type of garbage?

[M. Simon]

I look forward to seeing the Big O in debates against McCain. McCain is better on his feet.

[boris]

I like pseudo code for explaining stuff to non-coders.

Yep. A flow diagram would have clarified as well. The error of Fubird and Allahpundit was simplifying the statement into a logic expression rather than Obama code.

[fdcol63]

And ...

Obama = 0 Positive Change

[Rick Ballard]

"I just wish that I can scrape your IP addresses and do a background check on some of you."

If either Red Witch or BHO is elected you can apply for a position with the new NKVD or KGB and fulfill your hearts desire. If the Politburo approves and your block commissar gives you a good recommendation, of course.

[Jane]

I think it was already mentioned but James Lewis piece at AT today is the best thing I've read about "our need to have a national conversation about race" to date.

Link under my name.

[Barney Frank]

Rick,

I concur that those pathologies are not mutually exclusive. My point, which I think you agree with, is they converge in a stream of red hot lava of political radicalism that his entire facade of sonorous platitudes and Rodney Kingisms is meant to conceal; but beneath it all is a magma chamber of policies that could be to American politics what Vesuvias was to Pompei. That article comparing his potential to what Trudeau brought to Canada's politics a few days ago was the most cogent and worrying I've seen.

[GMax]

Rick

J R Dunn has a piece up going thru the whole sordid mess that is American Liberalism today and since he mentions Antonio Gramsci in the article to explain a point, I thought you would enjoy the read.

I can send a link but I am sure you know how to get to American Thinker.

[PeterUK]

GMax,
Whilst I'm uncertainly of the political affiliations of the journalists you refer to,there is one useful principle that can be used to analyze the scribes of the sinister.
Left trumps right,black trumps white,female trumps female.The left have the orgasmic situation where there are two leftists to choose from but, quelle horreur,one is black and the other is a woman.I don't know how Rove managed it but there it is.Now, how does a good leftist choose without sinning,racist or sexist?The central committee has,as yet,made a decision as too which thought crime takes precedence.
Sit back and enjoy watching the contradictions of political correctness unravel.

[M. Simon]

Niah,

My preferred background is chartreuse. But puce will do in a pinch. Why do you ask?

[cathyf]

BHO isn't anywhere near the bottom. He'll reach that point when Rezko spills in exchange for either a plea deal or a lighter sentence.

Well you totally got that wrong! Rezko is being prosecuted by Fitzgerald -- which means that he'll give Rezko a plea deal to testify against the gardener who mowed the side-lot lawn. Who "committed perjury" when he said that he was surprised on July 11, 2006 that there was a bare spot that needed reseeding on the Obama/Rezko side lot. Because Rezko will testify (in exchange for total immunity for everything) that he was in the Home Depot a month before and saw the gardener buying a bag of grass seed.

[PeterUK]

"I just wish that I can scrape your IP addresses and do a background check on some of you."

Only fair I suppose,we have got yours.

[Jane]

Rick,

Don't tell Niah that we automatically do background checks on people we don't recognize here and she should expect a knock on her door any minute.

[clarice]

McCain may be better on his feet, but you can be sure the moderators will have the fix in and lob super softballs at O who will have had plenty oof time to draft and memorize his answers ..only if Brit gets to ask the questions will there be anyway McCain's advantage will matter.

****
Off point--but some math stuff:

A visual comparison on the war death toll and civilian deaths.http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/03/cents_of_perspective.html>See for yourself

And Reuters of all things reports:

U.S. personal income rose more than expected in February as the economy teetered on the brink of a recession, while both personal spending and a key price measure increased only slightly, a government report showed on Friday.

The Commerce Department reported that February personal income rose 0.5 percent, exceeding a forecast of a 0.3 percent gain made by analysts polled before the report.

Stock index futures briefly added to gains after the report, while the dollar and U.S. government debt prices rose.

The department said personal spending increased 0.1 percent in February, in line with expectations, after a 0.4 percent gain in January.

The personal consumption expenditure price index, a key measure of inflation, rose 0.1 percent in February after a downwardly revised increase of 0.3 percent in January. Excluding volatile food and energy costs, the personal consumption expenditure index also rose just 0.1 percent, in line with analyst expectations.

On a year-over-year basis, this core index rose 2 percent, matching the prior months' gain, which was downwardly revised from 2.2 percent.

"The decline in the year-over-year core PCE is important in that it supports the notion the Fed is making the right decision in cutting rates aggressively and not threaten long-term price stability. It argues that the Fed can lower rates in the months ahead," said Zach Pandl, an economist with Lehman Brothers in New York

http://biz.yahoo.com/rb/080328/usa_economy_inflation_pce.html?.v=3> Economy

[Jane]

Oops, PUK beat me to it.

[TMF]

Anyone know if there would be intellectual property issues with the RNC airing the Wright comments during ads in the general election campaign?

I hear the clips in the news, so obviously to some extent they are public domain

These statements- particularly the nearly orgasmic JOY he takes in the murder of 3,000 perfectly innocent people- NEED to be heard.

By EVERYONE.

And we cannot rely on the media/PR machine for Dems to do it

[GMax]

NIah I will swap IP addresses with you. Why do I suspect yours is at a public library however?

[boris]

"had he not done X and had he not done Y" would be a misleading construction

Actually it is not a misleading construction. Your effort to parse it as a logic expression rather than simple English was your problem. The commonly understood meaning is also the correct one when implemented as a flow diagram.

Your parsing is thus:

"had he not done X and had he not done Y"

Time to give it up FuBird.

[Bill in AZ]

"I just wish that I can scrape your IP addresses and do a background check on some of you."

Sounds typically liberally fascist...

cathyf - you owe me a new keyboard, but you are undoubtedly correct. Fitzlaw - solving crime by prosecuting one victim at a time.

[bgates]

It's analogous to Bush saying that had we known what we now know re:WMD he still would have invaded.
Had we not kept American casualties under 5,000, and had we not found vast storehouses of chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons that demonstrated how thoroughly Saddam had violated the cease-fire requirements and what a grave threat he posed to the region and the United States, then I wouldn't have felt comfortable ordering the invasion.

-see any problem with that statement, FB? It parallels Obama's construction exactly.

[Sue]

"I just wish that I can scrape your IP addresses and do a background check on some of you."

Why? Most of us would tell you our background without all the work involved in doing background checks. In fact, you could just read back on some of the threads and find out we are pretty much your typical neocons. We worship Bushitler. We deplore Fitzgerald. Karl Rove is our god. And we all want to be Cheney when we grow up.

[Porchlight]

Heh, cathyf, well done. Love the choice of the gardener as the fall guy - were you channeling Being There? Required viewing for anyone following this Obama mess.

Barney and Rick, Stanley Kurtz at the Corner is on the same page as you are:

But it’s now evident that even a Hillary campaign would be tame by comparison to the cultural confrontation flowing from an Obama nomination. The transformation of the 2008 campaign into a full-fledged cultural battle is what is really emerging from the Jeremiah Wright flap.

A president who identifies with Malcolm X? A man who grew up alienated from ordinary American life and determined to avoid becoming a "sellout" by hanging with Marxist professors and radical feminists? In his commentary, Mark Steyn highlights Obama’s alienation — the fact that even his many radical gestures never felt quite satisfying. Yet it’s important to emphasize that Obama’s inability to feel fully satisfied by radicalism wasn’t overcome by rejecting radicalism. On the contrary, when Jeremiah Wright came along and offered himself as a substitute father figure, Obama overcame his alienation and embraced leftist organizing and Wright’s radical sermons in earnest. Obama finally grew up when he threw away his alienated radical pose and embraced the real radical thing instead.

[clarice]

PUK--My legendary and persistent typos aside(including a good half dozen in my previous post), you said "female trumps female"
and I am positive you meant female trumps male.

[Fat Man]

"Disavowal of the Pursuit of "Middleclassness" notwithstanding"

Well, he didn't disavow the pursuit of Upperclassness, did he?

[GMax]

"female trumps female"

Nah everyone knows rock breaks scissors, paper covers rock...

[ben]

"I just wish that I can scrape your IP addresses and do a background check on some of you."

Niah, don't bother with IPs....there is plenty of work to be done. Start in your neighborhood writing down everyone with U.S. flags in their yards, and write down the license plate of anyone with a McCain bumper sticker on the freeway. This will be deemed valuable information by the Komissariat when Obama is elected, and you will probably be appointed to report on any patriotic activities in your area.

[GMax]

And we all want to be Cheney when we grow up.

Yeah so, want to go hunting NIAH?

[PeterUK]

Clarice,
"female trumps female"

Nowadays who can tell?

[clarice]

Brava,cathyf!

[clarice]

*slapping PUK indignantly with my furled umbrella--the one with the carved ivory griffin handle*

[PeterUK]

*slapping PUK indignantly with my furled umbrella--the one with the carved ivory griffin handle*

Not the one with the ruby eyes made by Faberge in 1909 for the Czarina? I am honoured!

[RichatUF]

Rick-

Your 1:18 comment is well done.

Regarding the CFTC, I'm not sure what those guys are doing at this point. I thought at this point they would have stepped in and started to raise the margin requirements to squeeze out the hot money hedge funds. It might have something to do with the quant-fund link from the WaPo that anduril posted the other day. The guys (and gals?) running the funds have built a trading model in such a way that fed action lancing one causes a massive panic across the board. The fed might want to do something about it but has to plan the worst case scenario during which time the speculation gets worse.

[Sue]

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003781895>LOL

According to new data released by the Newspaper Association of America, total print advertising revenue in 2007 plunged 9.4% to $42 billion compared to 2006 -- the most severe percent decline since the association started measuring advertising expenditures in 1950.

The drop-off points to an economic slowdown on top of the secular challenges faced by the industry. The second worst decline in advertising revenue occurred in 2001 when it fell 9.0%.

Uh, yeah. Constantly getting caught lying wouldn't have anything to do with the decline, would it?

[PaulL]

Obama has a certain number of hard-core devotees. I don't know how many there are, but it doesn't matter what Obama does or doesn't do as far as they're concerned. Clearly a huge percentage of the MSM are devoted to him, and will do all they can to cover for him.

I just wonder how many individuals are truly in play.

[GMax]

Jamie Gorelick representing Duke Univ versus their own students and former student athletes is asking the court to order the plaintiff to take down their website. Is the website spreading unsubstantiated lies? Well no. Well is the there another reason why the court should act? Quite so, the site is "incindiary".

Wow so much for teaching our kids about the right to free speech.

Does anyone remember anything incidiary going on during the immediate aftermath of the incident? How about the pot bangers and the whole rush to judgement and condemnation of the entire squad? Was anyone worried about "incindiary" at Duke then? Not so much per my distinct recollection. Disgusting.

[DebinNC]

Now that you mention it, GMax, the "Group of 88" agendist Duke faculty members were Wrightists.

[GMax]

If Duke had not so
callously and deliberately violated its contractual and legal duties to its innocent students,
it would not now be facing these historically unprecedented legal actions by what
effectively amounts to its entire 2006 lacrosse team.

A snippet from the plaintiff answer to Ms Gorelick that had to hit like a 9 pound hammer.

[PeterUK]

"Wow so much for teaching our kids about the right to free speech."

Jamie Gorelick - "Another Brick in the Wall".

[hit and run]

Duh

72.246.51.104

[Barney Frank]

Was just reading a Chicago Tribune article (which I promptly lost) on Barack's new pastor. Seems he 'fell in love' with the black liberation theology of James Cone himself while a student at Yale.
But he does seem a little more circumspect than Wright in how he reveals his marxism-masquerading-as-Christianity. Rather reminiscent of Obama actually.

[Rick Ballard]

Barney,

I do concur with your assessment concerning the potential for great damge to be done to the country should BHO be elected. We face a real conundrum here because I regard BHO as Trotsky and Red Witch as Stalin. We may suppose that Trotsky might have been much "better" than Stalin but Stalin resolved the question definitively, leaving us only supposition as a guide. Red Witch already has a core of adherents remaining in bureaucracies and ready to go much further should we suffer the misfortune of Clinton redux. OTOH, BHO's "people" come from a slightly different branch of the same diseased ideology and are not festering within our current government to anywhere near the same extent as Red Witch's minions.

At the moment, I believe that the focus should still be getting the Red Witch into her lead sealed coffin and off the back of a boat cruising over the Mariana's Trench. BHO's cult of personality is already fraying and we still have seven months in which to fully expose his extraordinary shallowness. Besides, I think Red Witch holds the best oppo research garbage on McCain and I don't think she'll share it with BHO should she fail - it would be too useful to her in '12 when she'll make another grab for the ring.

She really is Smeagol - has been since the '60's. Why else would she marry Flem Snopes?

[cathyf]

raise the margin requirements to squeeze out the hot money hedge funds

Margins in the futures markets work differently, in that they are in interest-bearing objects (typically T-bills). Since the marginer doesn't have to pay interest on the margin money, it doesn't act as the same sort of disincentive to hold positions.

Of course the main difference is that futures markets pay/collect overnight. There are no unrealized gains or losses in the futures markets; mark-to-market is not some accounting rule, it's real money that really moves into or out of your account, by 7am Chicago time, every trading day. The only thing that the margin collatoralizes is one day's potential losses. It's not like in the stock market where you can buy a stock, lose money, wait for it to come back, and if it does come back you aren't out anything. In the futures markets the margin is collateral purely against today's potential losses. Yesterday's losses, and every day before yesterday, you've already had to settle up, otherwise you wouldn't be allowed to trade today.

Futures markets aren't like stock markets -- they have settlement prices (and settlement) every day. There is no way to get particularly leveraged, and so raising margins won't provide any material incentive to stop trading.

[Sara]

I am flu blogging today and full of Benydryl, which makes me groggy, so this story penetrated the fog of drifting in and out of sleep. In the haze, I heard Fox report this morning that the $1.6 million mortgage is included in a $10 million line of credit for the property and there was something about a trust for the Reverend that got transferred to his wife.

I've been waiting to hear the story again since what is above is what I got out of hearing it in a semi-conscious state.

[Ranger]

Limbaugh played a few sound bites from Obama's View thing. Looks like Obama made a couple more 'were you lying then or are you lying now' statements.

'People are making too much of my relationship with Rev. Wright... He was just my pastor.'

I though Obama and Wright had been pushing how tightly associated they were just a few months ago when Obama way talking about how faith must instruct our government policies.

[GMax]

Stanley Kurtz, no wild eyed Republican he, has listened ( and read ) to the Obama book and says he think we are about to see the mother of all cultural battles.

One can only hope, cuz if its a true cultural battle and the American people learn of the Marxism twisted so thoroughly into the DNA makeup of Obama, it will be a blowout that will take the Dhimmicrats years to recover from.

[clarice]

Ranger, they were tight when Barack was trying toshoe he wasn't Muslem--though as we know now the difference between Black Musleem and BLT may only be the special sauce.

[Sara]

Via Dan Riehl:

Checking the census data for Tinley Park, a gated community, I'm told, it seems the pastor from the "unashamedly black and and unapologetically Christian" church is moving into a community that is only 2% black and 93% white. For reference, as a whole, Illinois is 15% black.

While it is not uncommon for an accomplished clergyman to live in luxury, Wright’s retirement residence is raising some questions.

“Some people think deals like this are hypocritical. Jeremiah Wright himself criticizes people from the pulpit for middle classism, for too much materialism,” said Andrew Walsh, Associate Director of the Leonard E. Greenberg Center for the Study of Religion in Public Life with Trinity College in Hartford, Conn.

“So he’s entitled to be tweaked here. So the question really is, how unusual is this? Somewhat unusual,” he said.

According to documents obtained from the Cook County Register of Deeds, Wright purchased two empty lots in Tinley Park, Ill., from Chicago restaurant chain owner Kenny Lewis for $345,000 in 2004.

Documents show Wright sold the property to his church, Trinity United, in December 2006, with the proceeds going to a living trust shared with his wife, Ramah.

The sale price for the land was just under $308,000, about $40,000 less than Wright’s original purchase two years earlier.

Public records of the sale show Trinity initially obtained a $10 million bank loan to purchase the property and build a new house on the land.

But further investigation with tax and real estate attorneys showed that the church had actually secured a $1.6 million mortgage for the home purchase, and attached a $10 million line of credit, for reasons unspecified in the paperwork.

[Patrick R. Sullivan]

Now that I've heard the clip of Obama, it's very hard to accept that he was trying to say, 'If he hadn't retired (not having apologized...)...then I....'

But, he's free to revise and extend his remarks, thus clearing it all up for us.

[clarice]

Heads up--O is pulling out of his nose dive. Gallup has him 8 pts ahead of Hill--Now it's time to buck her up again--Do not let this be resolved before the convention.

[PeterUK]

Haditha charges against Tatum dropped. Time to ask the candidates what their opinion of this is.

[Porchlight]

I was wondering about that statement, too, Ranger. I've seen it quoted two different ways:

From Geraghty's liveblog:

I talked to [Wright] after this episode. I think he's saddened by what's happened. I feel badly that he has been characterized in just this one way. But he was my pastor. I think people overstate this idea of mentor or spiritual adviser. He was my pastor.

From the liveblog of a Dem-leaning (as far as I can tell) site, AMERICAblog:

I spoke to Rev Wright after this episode, and I told him I felt badly he's been characterized in this one way. But he was my pastor. I think people overstate his role as my mentor or spiritual advisor.

Hasn't Obama called Wright his mentor/spiritual advisor before? If so, then the Geraghty version shows a total dodge by Obama. The AMERICAblog version less so, but it's still sneaky.

A more definitive transcript would help. If there's one out there that I failed to find, my apologies. Ranger, you heard the clips on Rush, so you've probably got the gist of it correctly.

[DebinNC]

Was PA Gov. Casey told to take a hit for the team with his endorsement of Obama today? Hillary can't win NC, so if she loses PA, where her lead is down to single digits, will she ignore the calls to stop? I think if she loses PA, she'll stay in but be like Huckabee - stop Obama bashing but be in the wings in case the star breaks his leg.

[clarice]

She can't continue if she loses either of those states I think, but BOTH would surely be curtains. Rumor is she's seriously out of money in any event.
Casey backs Obama, Rendell and the mayor of Philadelphia and Murtha back Clinton. I do not see Obama winning Pa. If he does his chances in the general election are considerably higher than I imagined them being.

[Other Tom]

Jane is on to the man: when you spend enough time listening to people do it in court, you can instantly spot when someone is treading water, and that's what Obama does when he doesn't like the question. It's a kind of verbal throat-clearing.

Concerning what he said on the View, the very first thing that strikes me is that he simply didn't answer the question that was asked. Instead, he larded his answer up with something that wasn't asked--the stuff about the apology--with the result that some very intelligent people of all political stripes are trying to figure out what the hell he meant, and there doesn't seem to be a consensus.

It strikes me that DeMorgan's Rules don't tell us much here, in light of his speaking in what appears to be the subjunctive. "Had he not retired and apologized" has one very clear meaning meaning. "Had he not retired and had he not apologized" is less clear, but to my ear it means the same thing. But with this guy, who can say?

Anyway, we know he retired. Let's hear a little more about this apology.

[Other Tom]

Strike the second "meaning," for Christ's sake.

[michaelt]

Senator Casey? What a nonentity he is.

[M. Simon]

Here is something that just crept into my evil mind.

Si, se pudenda.

Well they ought to be.

[Ranger]

Well, we can only hope that Hill is as ruthless as she has tried to convince everyone she is. The only way she wins this at this point is to start running adds that really challenge Obama.

Something like this:

Start with a clip of Obama talking about how faith should instruct policy.

Then quotes from the BLT author who says:

"To be black is to be committed to destroying everything this country loves and adores."

"Black theology will accept only a love of God which participates in the destruction of the white enemy."

Tag: This is the doctine of faith that will instruct Barack Obama's policies.

[RichatUF]

Sara-

Wright purchased two empty lots in Tinley Park, Ill., from Chicago restaurant chain owner Kenny Lewis...

Curious, wonder if this Kenny Lewis character is involved with Rezco and the pizza resturants he had troubles with?

cathyf-

Interesting. So this is more a function of the accessibility of this market to capital from hedge funds then it is of any sort of supply-demand shock [which I suppose was the point of the article]? Wasn't exactly sure how they traded, but I don't see why they expanded the limits without another requirement that the parties pay more to trade?

I didn't go to the Hillary Clinton School of Futures Trading™ so this is an area I would tend to steer clear of anyway. It just seems odd that commodities have re-priced so aggressively even more so than the dollar's decline. The hedge fund money seems to explain part of it but I'm looking for more narrative...

[RichatUF]

cathyf-

I'm dissatisfied with my above respose to your post. Disregard.

I'm going to hit the bar for a bit-

[Sara]

Via Say Anything:

Condoleeza Rice Addresses The Issue Of Race In America In Straightforward Way

In an interview with the Washington Times she makes a straightforward and honest assesment of the race issue - without the type of vitriolic condemnation that often accompanies the subject:

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said yesterday that the United States still has trouble dealing with race because of a national “birth defect” that denied black Americans the opportunities given to whites at the country’s very founding.

“Black Americans were a founding population,” she said. “Africans and Europeans came here and founded this country together — Europeans by choice and Africans in chains. That’s not a very pretty reality of our founding.”

As a result, Miss Rice told editors and reporters at The Washington Times, “descendants of slaves did not get much of a head start, and I think you continue to see some of the effects of that.”

“That particular birth defect makes it hard for us to confront it, hard for us to talk about it, and hard for us to realize that it has continuing relevance for who we are today,” she said.

She goes on to say that there has also been enormous progress concerning race. progress that has allowed her to become a very prominent person on the world scene.

[clarice]

M simon--*slapping knuckles with ruler**Bad. Boy.

[ben]

Clarice is right...Hillary has to win PA big and keep the circus in town...

[Barney Frank]

Rick,

At the moment, I believe that the focus should still be getting the Red Witch into her lead sealed coffin and off the back of a boat cruising over the Mariana's Trench.

But the last time the Clintons were in office we got 12 years of Republican congress (which they admittedly frittered away). I suspect Hillary might be an even more effective RNC mole than Bill was.
BO on the other hand has the potential to change the political landscape very negatively even if his policies prove disasterous. Trudeau was a disaster for Canada but the entire political milieu was apparently permanently changed even for subsequent Conservatives.
Once in a great while a demagogue comes along who no matter how much havoc he wreaks marks a turning point toward his world view (for instance FDR's domestic policies).

BTW what is the origin of the term 'Red Witch'? She seems rather closer to C.S. Lewis' White Witch.

[Jane]

Kirsten Powers just said: Obama's problem is not with race, it's with patriotism. I think she's got that right - and given McCain's new ad, he gets it too.

[Jane]

FWIW, I've asked 4 or 5 so-called moderates (typical liberal voters but not moonbats) who they would vote for if the election were today. These are your typical voters, they don't pay a lot of attention, they strive to do the right thing, etc. Everyone has answered McCain.

It's early of course.

[DebinNC]

I hope the "Obama refused to salute the flag" claim making the rounds earlier isn't revisited, because that charge turned out to be false. And victims of false charges get a lot of sympathy when the truth is told.

[clarice]

That's an interesting report,Jane. I regard Kirsten as a reasonably representative moderate Dem.

[M. Simon]

Uh, Clarice, that was what I had originally intended. :-) but when I found that word I thought it fit better.

It means ashamed. :-)

The minds of some people. :-)

I think it has the same root (heh) though. Weird culture those spanish have.

[M. Simon]

Clarice is right...Hillary has to win PA big and keep the circus in town clowns...

fixed.

[hit and run]

Sara (quoting Dan Riehl):
Checking the census data for Tinley Park, a gated community, I'm told, it seems the pastor from the "unashamedly black and and unapologetically Christian" church is moving into a community that is only 2% black and 93% white. For reference, as a whole, Illinois is 15% black.

That's in reference to Rev. Wright's new community.

Now...

Breaking my self-imposed ban on SSP ... because it is a ...

Breaking News, World Exclusive.

Or, well, something or other.

FULL DISCLOSURE: It's a 4-beer post. It'll take a couple more before I hit my stride.

FULLER DISCLOSURE: No more SSP from me for at least a week.

[M. Simon]

Re: RW red = communist

[DebinNC]

ABC News on Obama on The View today:
...........................................
"Had the reverend not retired and had he not acknowledged that what he had said had deeply offended people and were inappropriate and mischaracterized what I think is the great character of this country - for all its flaws - then I wouldn't have felt comfortable staying there at the church," Obama said.

This seemed to imply that Wright had acknowledged that he'd deeply offended people with inappropriate remarks. Right?

Wrong, says the Obama campaign.

"Sen. Obama was clearly saying that were Rev. Wright not retiring, he would need to be assured that the reverend understood why what he had said had deeply offended people and mischaracterized the greatness of this country," says spox Bill Burton.

[hit and run]

BTW, since the only means I have of checking in on JOM at work is via Blackberry ... I miss out on a lot. Let me go back to Barney Frank's first post on this thread and say, Amen.

Though I think Wright has more badly damaged him than perhaps your conclusion -- what you said mirrors my thoughts about him as a candidate.

Now. More importantly -- would you be willing to give us an update on Mrs Frank...we're still thinking about here and praying for both of you.

[Sara]

Via Hot Air:

Confirmed: Obama didn’t mean to suggest that Wright had apologized

[PeterUK]

LiveLeak has taken down Fitna.

[Walter]

I regard BHO as Trotsky and Red Witch as Stalin. We may suppose that Trotsky might have been much "better" than Stalin ...

You know, that's always been my supposition. But then again, if Stalin hadn't been Stalin, someone else would have been. Perhaps even Trotsky himself. Something about "centralized planning" and "absolute power corrupts absolutely" comes to mind. Tie in "hubris comes before the fall" and you can bring in hedge funds to the aphorism party.

Part of the reason the Wright episode is so disturbing to me is that I was far too complacent about Obama's lack of specificity. I had assumed (with all that entails) that 12 years at the U of C law school would have had a positive effect on anyone--let alone a bright person who managed to (spectacularly) succeed in our economy due to his own efforts.

Heck, Cass Sunstein is (one of) his economic advisor(s).

Either Wright is wrong or the Sun is obscured by clouds of rhetoric. Given McCain's lack of aversion to statism, I certainly hope that Obama's been fooling the left for all this time (after all, he had to develop his talent for dissembling somewhere, didn't he?) and not the rest of us now.

Seriously, did you ever think that you'd be opposed to the one candidate in the race who was advised by (and a member of) the Chicago School?

[Rick Ballard]

Barney,

The "Red" comes from Clinton's inner desire to be the best Alinsky Acolyte ever to be advanced far beyond their very meagre capabilities. "Witch" is wholly self explanatory.

I believe that there has to be a match of times and demagogue for very destructive policies to be implemented. The Presidents for Life of the '30's gained and retained power due to economic collapse. Stalin was slightly different from Mussolini, FDR or Hitler in that the economic collapse in the USSR was wholly self inflicted and started a few years earlier than it did in Germany and Italy while the US (and FDR) was last.

Media promotion aside, there isn't much in the economic data to suggest that we're standing on a precipice looking into the abyss of a great depression which would allow the rise of a honey tongued demagogue to finish the destruction of the Republic so ably started by Roosevelt.

Trudeau was able to wreak havoc in Canada because of the parliamentary system. He is similiar to Blair in that respect and hopefully Canada can continue its recovery in a manner similiar to that achieved by the UK under Thatcher. Perhaps the UK will get another shot at reversing Labour's systematic and systemic looting in the near future.

IMO, effective control of the bureaucracies established by FDR is actually more important than control of the legislative branch. That 12 years of Republican majorities didn't exactly warm the cockles of my heart any more than Bush's rather lackluster imposition of his will upon the bureaucracies has. In his defense, he has been a bit preoccupied with the unplesantness wrt islam and he has performed decently regarding judicial appointments - which is the other area in which the Red Witch is to be truly feared.

[M. Simon]

Walter,

I'm a UC alum and it surprised me. Before I knew much about him I thought he'd be OK.

[Sara]

Live Leak has caved and taken down the short film "Fitna" because of a "saftey issue" for their employees, but there are still alternatives. One is Say Anything:

Fitna Taken Down From Liveleak, So It’ll Be Hosted Here On Say Anything

I had it posted on my site and I can't see why it is so controversial. I've seen 10x worse every day in blog posts and any of us could take video or stills and put commentary to them. What is the big deal on this film anyway?

[hit and run]

Walter:
Seriously, did you ever think that you'd be opposed to the one candidate in the race who was advised by (and a member of) the Chicago School?

Well, now the shoe is on the other foot ... thanks Obama.

How can we possibly ever look at any other Chicago School comrade without deep, dark forboding cynicism again?

::raising one eyebrow:: @ M. Simon

[MI]

These blogs are filled with (purposely) twisted kremlologists endlessly regurgitating sentences that were uttered in a somewhat casual conversation.

Wright obviously likes to paint caricatures that even he doesn't believe himself. His sermons are best left to Trinity United Church of Christ. Obama's comment on Wright's resignation and apology can be interpreted in numerous ways. Maybe you should try running for president and see how many ways your utterances can be parsed.

This is counterproductive for everybody. Get a life, people.

[M. Simon]

h&r,

I was a drop out. I decided girls and drinking were more important than school. Does that mitigate the crime? :-)

[M. Simon]

MI,

We have a life. This is it. You got a problem with that?

[clarice]

MI, has a point. The bigger problem is the many institutions regularly sucking the brains out of Americans. We need a new blog SYBO that focuses on nitwittery like that found on The View,in Vogue, in Newsweek, in Time--these folks wait to snatch your brains when you least suspect it--waiting in airports, getting your hair cut, sitting in the doctor's waiting room.

I even suggest we come up with reading material, advising readers to snatch and burn that carp and replace it with something that will put their brains back in.

[PeterUK]

If the RW is Stalin and the O man Trotsky,when does the latter get the Icepick Award?

[Patrick R. Sullivan]

Heck, Cass Sunstein is (one of) his economic advisor(s).

But, Sunstein isn't an economist. Obama's UofC econ adviser is Austan Goolsbee, who isn't a Chicago School Phd, but an MIT--i.e. Paul Samuelson--one.

[hit and run]

M. Simon:
Does that mitigate the crime?

Exonerates.

::lowers eyebrow::

[Jane]

I have always believed that UC is the best school in the land. You learn something new every day.

[cathyf]

Gee, will H&R think badly of me if I let on that I graduated from UC?