I'm a brand new reader and just wanted you to know that I'm here listening. Interesting stuff. You've been added to my blog friends. I hope you don't mind. D
http://down32months.com/

The condemnation of Rev. Wright for his comments on AIDS in the black community are taken from impressions. I did not actually hear him say that white people made HIV-AIDS to kill non-Whites. Prehaps he did at some other time. However, your own organization PBS in its program "Secrets of the Dead" shows that Northern European Whites who survived the plague of the Middle Ages and later possess genetic protection from both HIV and AIDS. This may be where this bel;ief comes from. Having worked as an engineer and a scientist I know that we lacked the ability to construct such a virus at the time of its onset.

Now, Obama has finally quit the whole church. Gone. Done. The comments of Wright, plus the new comments of Otis Moss III, and now the outrageous, outlandish rantings of Fr. Michael Pfleger while a visiting speaker at the church -- it was all too much.

The Obama Campaign knew their guy had to cut his losses. The American public was finding the church to be more and more extremist.

But with so many apparent supporters or Jeremiah Wright, and Moss and Phelger(!?!) to be seen on this weblog, will Obama now be seen as an opportunist, willing to throw his former spiritual advisors under the bus for the sake of appearances, to advance his political campaign?

Interesting how the Obama campaign let the news slip out on a weekend, just as the news of the Florida-Michigan delegate resolution was breaking. Do you suppose that Obama submitted a letter of resignation days ago, and the campaign held the story until just the right moment?

A "Wright" moment?

I work on organs for MOST of the black churches in Boston & Providence & have NEVER heard any of them preach the Hatred that Wright has for America... No wonder Obama won't salute our flag...

I am still hearing echoes of voices in the media saying that Rev. Wright's comments about the government being responsible for the spread of AIDS in the African-American community (he did not say that the government invented the disease) were little more than paranoid rhetoric.

As a young woman living in San Francisco during the 80's, i watched helplessly as many friends died from the disease as the president and government did little to nothing to help us for years. We thought the government was trying to kill us off, and It wasn't much of a stretch to come to that conclusion.

I am quite certain that the government did allow AIDS to spread in certain communities; as a matter of fact, I was witness to it. No one cared when it was just drug addicts (often minorities) and Homosexuals dying off.

As Americans we have varied histories and experiences; don't be so sure that his fears are unfounded. We weren't all brought up in nice, white-collar, white bread communities, yanno.

Thank you Mr. Moyer, A friend sent me a clip of the piece you did with Dr. Wright. Although I don't understand or agree with all of his views and I certainly do not agree on how he has handled himself in the media, but some of his views is right on target. Dr. Wright has step on some toes and the people who are yelling the loudest are guilty of the deep rooted ugly feelings they have for African Americans. Some of the whites that disagree or just don't care to hear or understand are simply afraid to say out loud; I DONOT WANT TO LOSE MY POWER! This is a power struggle. I thank you Mr. Moyer and I wished we could get you on Prime time telvision. You have spoken the truth for both sides. What do we need to do to get your voice heard loud and clear.

The Children Must Adapt…..
BJ,
You bring up an interesting hidden truth in the Black community. I believe Pastors like Rev. Wright help these children realize that they come from a strong people, that they can achieve greatness and to believe in themselves. It is this truth that you mention, that I believe is a huge problem and why in some cases the children do not make it past the 11th grade. We must begin to discuss this openly because it is my belief that we lose some of these children during what I will call the awakening period or transformation period. Some of our children do grow up wishing they were White and this may be an issue more in the suburbs than in the city. I believe by the time they get to 6th and 7th grade it is a determining factor time on what course in life this child will experience. While their ancestors suffered greatly, they now have a chance to reach for the stars. These children deal with or experience some of what I listed below before the 8th grade or they have a higher chance to be on a separate course in life that is negative.
If they have not dealt with some of the following by the Eighth grade and the inner struggle or have strong people in their lives to help them resolve issues they face and questions they ask, during the transformation, they could be headed for failure in life.:
1. They should learn history and past sins inflicted on their ancestors so that they understand how valuable it is to vote ensuring history will never repeat itself as well as have a strong Pastor to help them understand forgiveness like Rev. Wright.
2. They must deal with the fact that they will never be White and enjoy the benefits of being the Majority race and white; however, they can live side by side and still live happy and achieve greatness.
3. They could never straighten their hair enough.
4. I would say, the child could never be President of this great nation however; Obama may have buried this issue and thereby, changing the course of history. African American, Mulatto, Black, Negro, Colored, Brown parents will no longer say to our children Son you can be the president of the United States of America and the Parent feel like they have just told their son a half truth like the Santa Claus fairy tale or Tooth fairy tale the we so often tell our children. This parent is praying that when the child comes to the realization that this ideal will never happen that their hearts will not be broken. America has shown that it is possible except for a few states this dream can be realized. People working together for change seeing no color but working together to be innovators in America.
5. They must accept the fact that they must work three times harder than their white counterpart to even be judged by the content of their character and erase all the stereotypes and stigmas attached to the darker one. They must be extraordinary in their talents, gifts and knowledge and they must not fight or rebel against this because it is just the way it is. In striving for greatness, they will benefit regardless. There will be more stress however, if they take care of their bodies they could beat the odds and live just a little longer.
6. They must swallow their pride when injustices occur due to the person in Authority and that person’s subconscious belief system.
7. They must deal with the fact that if one time, I mean one time they get their name in the " Police System" and end up at the court house pleading their case, their life as they know it is over. There is no redemption once you become a member of the Prison system and are found in the Police database.
8. Once these children’s names are mixed up in the “System” someone enacted a law that says three strikes and your out. If this child rolls his eyes wrong this child could end up in prison.
9. These children must realize that if they try to escape reality and fall prey to the great evil “substance abuse”, there are special laws waiting for them and different laws for their lighter counterpart. When they get mixed up in this terrible habit they will be considered trash and expendable, while their lighter counter part will have all this Nation’s resources thrown at them to save them, it will be characterized differently for their lighter counterparts. The drugs their lighter counterparts prefer will carry less weight therefore no jail time for growing and using the "substance" and the media will say they are self medicating. When the darker ones engage in this behavior they will lock them up and throw away the key. When the darker counterparts are caught doing something wrong they will be judged by the full weight of the law while the media will call their lighter counterpart misbehavior “youthful indiscretions.” The inmate will come to a funeral and you would have all but forgotten about him and the love you have for him you take a 2nd look and se he is walking as if he had shackles on like a caged animal, shuffling his feet and drooping his head. Then you remember, he was in the car and some how got the same punishment as the perpetrators. He didn't know what they were doing, he was trying to hang with the big kids. He was a good kid at the wrong place at the wrong time. I could be wrong on this, so please educate me if somehow I’ve characterized this known phenomena incorrectly.
10. They must assimilate, adapt, conform and not feel that they have somehow become subservient like their ancestors or a 2nd class citizen.
11. They must realize by rebelling against the act of conforming they will surely live like a slave in prison. The very thing they are rebelling against is where they are headed toward. It is the consequence of failure to assimilate. There are ways to celebrate your individuality and still adapt and conform.
12. These children must realize that they must not rely only on the teacher to teach them but teach themselves. Pick up a book read, research, study, write about it. Our ancestors in some cases taught themselves when it was illegal for a Black to go to school, assemble together or be taught to read. Our ancestors strived for greatness under far worse conditions than the children today face. If our ancestors could endure ungodly conditions and still strive for greatness, lead people to freedom, fight for freedom and teach their children, then surely this child can achieve greatness even though there may be no heat in home, no hot water due to high gas prices and the rate increases as well as parents struggling financially due to 5/11 injustices posted below and finally no food.

Parents, we need to tell these children “so what the teacher disrespects you!”, that is going to happen more often than not in life. We need to say “So what, they hang a noose out side and bully you.” ‘Child, by attempted to right a wrong, the ones who are the majority will show you just what happens when a Negro gets to big for his britches.” Are the Gina Six still in jail? We need to say, does that in anyway change their self worth or who they are? We need to communicate or say listen, children you have what it takes to succeed in life! You have all the ingredients to achieve greatness! If you feel you are not learning in the classroom tell a parent try to get the lesson on PowerPoint with step-by-step instructions! Learning should not be a guessing game. Try on-line classes. Seek help with the school guidance. There are teachers who genuinely want to see you succeed in life. Seek out veteran teachers who are more interested in teaching you than usurping their authority over you or making an examples out of you. Newer teachers have to grow into the position especially with teaching children. They are learning to be in authority and will go to the extreme to usurp their authority calling everything and anything disrespectful. Veteran teachers have learned ways to teach children realizing that all children do not learn the same and that the 30 students, one black board, no book and one teacher style does not work for all children. Some times you have to read it, write it, say it and seek out a different book to read from a different author’s point of view. Some children are visual and some need to experience it to learn it. Unfortunately we could not discuss this because “machine” knew how to drive the public debate and change the subject and deliberately set out to discredit Rev. Wright and humiliate a person by the sheer media coverage Two Radio stations from sun up to sun down. The “machine” then applied a technique as old as “Jim Crow” days. If you associate with the N word than you will be considered the N word. The “machine” applied this technique to those great White Warriors who fought for the Blacks and in some cases risking life, limb and freedom to ensure Blacks were free and saved from abuse. If these warriors I speak of were seen with a Black then they too were fair game to be equally abused. You see this same tactic with Wright and Obama debate. Wow, when I think of what we could have done to save so many children and help the achieve greatness if we decided as a nation to dialogue instead of ridicule…oh well, can’t cry over spilled milk now.

Too bad we do not have a Radio station or Tool like Fox that will spend sun up to sun down dealing with the frustrations and issues we face daily. Tavis Smiley and Derrick McGinty has to follow the mainstream media rules, while the “machine” follow no rules, so all these hidden issues are buried until the next great communicator dare deal with issues to heal this nation and the Twoism of America. They have all but marginalized Rev. Al Sharpton and Rev. Jackson.

Parents, if we do not come together and discuss this we will continue to see our kids placed on the track for the industrial prison complex. Rev. Wright tried to sound the alarm however, they closed their ears and through stones. By the 11th grade these children will be set on a course to spend the rest of their life in prison and will lose the right to VOTE for life. Parents will think it is their child that is the problem and will go along with the lie and will not go to the school and find out just what is happening to your child. Some kids have realized by 8th grade how to adapt and have found coping skills to deal with inner struggle however, most who were not raised in the church and of course some who were will on the surface appear to rebel and by the 11th grade they will be tracked from School, reform school, barred from school and then to Prison.

If Barrack Obama became our President, nothing would please me more than if he reconciled with Jeremiah Wright and appointed him either Director of Homeland Security/National Intelligence or Ambassador to the United Nations. Wright provides the EXPERIENCE we need. Hell, Clinton or McCain could also benefit from Rev. Wright in their administration! He could remind everyone how public office remains a sacred trust even after the required separation of church and state.

Posted by: Jack Martin

Amen!

If Barrack Obama became our President, nothing would please me more than if he reconciled with Jeremiah Wright and appointed him either Director of Homeland Security/National Intelligence or Ambassador to the United Nations. Wright provides the EXPERIENCE we need. Hell, Clinton or McCain could also benefit from Rev. Wright in their administration! He could remind everyone how public office remains a sacred trust even after the required separation of church and state.

May God watch over those suffering from Great turmoil and disasters. My heart and my tears continues to be with them and my prayers are with them every minute of the day that more will be saved from this tragic moment in time across the ocean. We are their brothers and sisters today. God bless their children and save their children and families.

Let them speak part II:

When we the people challenge you on subjects such as Where did Aids come from? and why is it the the Black population has the highest rate and why was Africa cited as the origin? Is it some genetic reason that Blacks and gays have such a high concentration of the disease or is this information propaganda also? When we point out our arrogance, get the best and the brightest or better yet get the common man to discuss what they believe. There is no wrong or right answer.

While we waste time on issues that don't aid us in our day to day living we missed the chance to make a change in our future.

There is a pattern in the political realm of America and it is no accident that we are discussing recessions, depression and redistribution of wealth in my opinion. Living through our economy for the last 40 years and analyzing our the political scandals and decision, I have noticed a pattern. Ask the question. Who is in power when the stock market, financial market, housing market, savings and loan market, oil market, accounting market, as well as other entities that rise and fall in worth and prices are low? Is it the RepublicDEM reigning? When there is a down turn in the economy it is a good thing for those who can afford to buy houses and stock and anything that is low in worth. The segment of the population that benefit from a economic downturn is the “have mores”. These investors and business owners realize that when the DemRublican are elected that stock worth will rise and housing equity will rise and it is a win/win for the RepublicanDEM and DEMRebpublican who are part of the “have more” segment of the population. The fact that the “haves” and the “have nots” are unable to take real advantage of the stock market during a down turn in the economy ,except through their employer, is why the redistribution of wealth through the following are a huge problem:
1. overtaxing food, fuel for cars, property, income, capital gains, payroll taxes, cable, fuel for homes, electric, water , county taxes , etc,
2. high interest rates for housing ,cars and property.
3. penalties for withdrawing you own money from your 401k plan during a economic down turn is a problem.
The fact that in a down turn of our economy, that the “haves” and the “have nots” are unable to purchase property as an investment and realize the ROI when the market goes up again is also a real problem.
It is a coincidence that an Oil Man is president and the Oil Market is reporting record profit. It is disturbing to hear that people actually believe that we don’t remember history, we don’t move to change history, and finally that we don’t care.

We don't forget and yes we have good memories, is instead of thinking of Americans as stupid people who can't see the forest before the trees start thinking of ways that we can let our voices be heard. When we tell you what the average person is facing, investigate. When we say there is a problem with the Scoring system, investigate. Listen to Rev. Wright's points. Investigate each one of them then report. Don't kill the messenger before the message has been debated.

Of course, I could have it all wrong and welcome a debate on Let them speak Part 1 and Part II.

Let them speak Part I:
Let me say that you all have brought up good points and I am liberated to be able to debate and discuss issues that affect the American people.
We must realize that in less than a week or so, Rev. Wright exposed the hidden issues that many of the “Have mores”, “elite society”, “concentration of power ‘Ole Great ones’” or “special membership” or whoever this few / 10 % group of people are and the special interest groups do not want discussed in the public debate arena. Anytime the injustices that I mention on 5/11 are discussed, it puts a segment of the population or a special group of people on the defense and thereby making it impossible for them to drive the public debate or discussion to advance their own agenda or propaganda. The ones who blindly follow these “elites” believe they are a card carrying member, who will benefit by advancing the agenda and arguments of the few in power. If you bring up something off the subject, they can not debate if it is off Script from what their favorite commentator handed them that day..
If mainstream, America is discussing real problems, that real people face on a daily basis that is affecting their quality of life, then real solutions can be found to address them. If the “have” and the “have nots” are busy working, paying high fees, paying loan sharking fees, usury fees, living paycheck to paycheck, living by the rule of law, being denied access to the inside membership of this group and the benefits this special group are able to enjoy, then they have no time to address the fleecing of America or the issues that matter most to our nation such as WAR.
A segment of our populations has made an art form of the political debate arena that has been developed and the “elite” or “machine” have mastered this art form. All one has to do is listen a few times to the following pundits, commentators and self described experts, to understand how rooted this issues have become in our society as they dance around the race issue or their attempt to demonize anyone who disagrees with their way of thinking:
1. Fox news
2. Hannity
3. Ann C.
4. Rush Limbaugh
5. Levine the Ole great one
6. Don IMUS
7. All other media outlets who have become basically cowards, after the Dan Rathers’ of the worlds and others who dare challenge the “machine” are castrated.
These people thrive off of dancing around the race issue, calling the best and the brightness of our nation non-patriotic , calling anyone who they believe will threatened their cause, a fascist, a communist, victim and they have even gotten to the point where they can interchange the “N” word for anything. Any other thought process that goes against this “machine” is thought to be a conspiracy theorist person which can be equated easily to the N word thereby delegitimizing public descent and public discourse. This concentration of power and the continued consolidation of our mainstream communication vehicle has effectively prevented a true debate on any issue that matters to the American People and affect us on a daily basis thereby allowing the continued fleecing of America.
The same theme of calling a race of people the “N” word and their men a “Boy” has not gone away. It is alive and well. This “machine” is able to in one day, ruin a person’s reputation, cause this person to lose any influence in society, and even reduce them to a humiliation of society or so we think by running their propaganda machine from sun up to sun down on the radio. Have you ever wondered where the video or the tapes of a conversation of people who are in the business of challenging the establishment of power have come from or who created the tape to begin with knowing we have a Constitution in place and the rule of law ? Look at the tapes that mysteriously appeared of Rev. Al Sharpton or Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King. The people that make it to the “black list” of the concentration of power” better know that any human defect that they posses, will be exposed by this elite group of people in an effort to delegitimize the “black listed’ in the public debate arena and to utterly humiliate them. The “machine’s” listeners, hang off their every word and are an army force, who are quick to call you a non-patriot or suggest you are someone who does not love their country as much as we do. The fact is we love our country more and we work at democracy of this great republic daily! Our ancestor shed blood for this country that you and I could live in peace. These noble people will never be able to take this away from us. NEVER!!!!

I do not blame the Listeners of the “machine” for the following reasons:
1. They are rightfully so, angry about not being able to say what they feel in their hearts about a race of people for the last 40 years.
2. They were not allowed to live they way they wanted separate and unequal.
3. They hate civil rights and racial quotas.
4. They believe they are a more moral people before 1966.
5. They believe they are law abiding citizens and those of fall fate of their wrath deserve the broom stick , the 50 shots on their wedding eve, the three strikes and your are out, the stiffer laws, the 28% interest rates, the ghettos, the economic status and the low FICO SCOREs.
6. They believe we are victims and that we are solely to cause for our misfortune in most cases despite the higher fees for one set of Americans and the lower fees for the other set.
7. They were unable to keep their children from going to school with the “colored’ ones.
8. They feel that they should not pay the price or be blamed for the sins of some whose father s were apart of demonizing a race of people and enslaving them, raping their wives and doing unspeakable acts to their children, their men and daughters. They feel their families came over and worked as hard and never enslaved anyone. Some won’t even check and will say they had nothing to do with the cruelty to a race of people for 400 years.
9. Some feel they are a superior race and are entitled to riches of this world and all others should bow to them and be their slaves.
10. Some feel what was done to the Colored ones was not as bad as what was done to those who got reparations for their miss-fortune in life and think that the colored ones should just shut-up and stop whining and get over it despite still living the affects of JIM Crow and black law disguised as something else.
11. Some blame the Colored ones for their “white guilt” what every that means. (Can some explain this to me?)

These noble Americans had a right to believe and live the way they wanted and in 20/20 hindsight should have not been made to bury their true feelings and be demonized just because their wanted a different way of life. Some of them moved from Democratic to Republican party in late 1960s and by 1974 they had gained control of the once great Republican party who stood for the party of the Great Lincoln who was a friend of Frederick Douglas.
Now, it is easy for me to suggest that these noble Americans should have been allowed to at the very least voice their opinions even while change in America was occurring, and maybe they did. However, in the last 30 years these noble Americans who fall prey to the 10% rhetoric have been silent, driven underground, speaking in codes and singing songs in codes similar to the underground railroad that liberated so many slaves in the past. It is easy for me to call them nobile and a just people that should have been given a right to communicate their personal beliefs because I am judged by most part for my ability and the content of my character and instead of my color when it comes to getting a good job. It is easy for me to hold this opinion, as I am one of the beneficiaries in the last 40 years to go to school with white girls and white boys who have been my best friends all my life, who treated me like their sister, I did not go to separate bathrooms, or separate water fountains or sit on the back of the bus or taken to a back of the restaurant where the dogs ate crumbs and I was on the surface treated like I was equal, I was not humiliated or my dignity destroyed. The question is did driving the public discourse on the “Black” issue in America underground, change the course of history?
The “elite” or “machine” now capitalizes on this known fact that causes Twoism of America and the listeners blindly follow their commentator’s every word and even changing their political party to undermine our great experiment called Democracy. These followers around the US called it “Operation Chaos.” These noble Americans call themselves the true Patriots and anyone who disagrees with them may be subject to their “come by here, my Lord” remix or deemed an enemy.
This “machine” living by the motto, that the more a “lie” is repeated and discussed it will become the “truth” in mainstream media or they can rewrite history while we are living it. Their commentators then manipulate the public debate by using the word “Drive by” to discuss anyone who would dare challenge their primitive thinking or challenge their concentration of power or special membership they hold to get entitlements like warefare recipients from the trickle down from the 10%. If for some reason this trickle down does not make it to the followers , the 10% could always blame the Black and the Brown for stealing their jobs and changing their way of life. The media then follows like puppy dog does with his tail tucked between their legs when they are ashamed or afraid because the very people who now own there business or the media business will surely correct their behavior if they step out of line.
The causality of allowing this machine to grow year after year is the following:
1. Rev. Wright’s rebuttal to America’s past wrongs that he spoke at the NAACP and Press Club became household “N” word.
2. Howard Dean who believed passionately along with his followers what they were doing was removed from mainstream America and the debate even though it was a grassroot effort.. They made Howard Dean’s expression of passion, for what he believed, to be a household “N” word. Genius, don’t you think? They know something about the human mind and how the “herd mentality” or “group think” could drive public debate subjects or discussions.
3. The machine “swifted boated” or made the casting of doubt on someone’s patriotic duty a household “N” word. When one attempted to turn this on the “elite” their leader the news reporter himself was ostracized and the media through the stones the hardest. Genius! we are left wondering how did that happen?

4. President Clinton, feeling his oats ,seduced by a very controlled woman who had the presence of mind to save a blue dress with evidence, another woman who had the presence of mind to tape her, an out of control Attorney General Kenneth Starr who not only made Mrs. Clinton look like a fool when she found out her husband actually had a human defect as old as sin as well as a willing Congress who was willing to impeach a man for his human failure and finally a media who failed to ask the question, why was it that a man’s failure to past the test of seduction was worthy of impeachment and his attempt to save face in a court of law rather than asked the question should a President be impeached for falsifying the reasons for going to war and placing dark faces in front of countries and the UN to perpetrate the lie even further as well as outing of a CIA agent. They demonize anyone who will dare ask the question. Genius!

5. When a woman of color, said what did you know and when did you know it after 9/11? She was ostracized, the media allow picture of her to look like she was crazy as guards harassed her when she entered the Congress building. They made sure they took pictures that could mislead the public.

They are masters at what they do and they are to be admired for the way they have run this machine for the last 40 years, since the civil rights era which is at the center of their disgust with America and the cause of the “machine” to be developed in the first place. At least I think. It may be bigger than the race issue now. It may be about money or the love of money. The race issue may be a bait to keep control of their own followers or subjects that will communicate their propaganda day in and day out.
While we the people, continue to fall prey, to their ability to drive WHAT Americans will debate and WHAT Americans will not debate in the public arena, they are refining and enhancing this “machine”. They now have the internet to reach millions. A few Big corporations have a huge “database” with your personal information in it. These businesses sit on Boards together thinking of ways to get their money back from the American people who may have won it in a lawsuit or Insurance litigation. They sit on special boards of schools in Utah and other places meeting regularly thinking of ways to make money. The insurance companies meet to figure out how to drag a case out and make the jury of your peers believe you, the working person, is a awful person with all your injuries while the one who are a fault are without responsibility in a simple accident. The courts now side with the businesses on a regular basis and they have demonized Trial lawyers by sighting a few crazy cases as an example to demonize a worthy cause which is “fighting for the American people”.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with making money or believing what you believe or living the way you want to live as long as it does not affect your neighbor; however, when one that disagrees with you such as Rev. Wright, Maxine Waters or others, steps out of line, then the “Machine” goes work. You may make a phone call to the person who has been “black listed” by the “Machine” “angry white men” from the Reagan era or top 10% of society and find yourself out of a job the very next day. This is how you drive public debate. Put fear in the average American person who just want to live, work, raise their family , love their God, their country and their neighbor, and help those in need. This fear is great and has stymied the American people and now the press also have fallen victim. Have you ever wondered why “BET” does not cover what a segment of the population is discussing anywhere in their programming such as Fox News who is a tool of the machine? BET does not discuss any issue their audience face. Strange? They keep in line with the same old propaganda.
Now that our media has basically become cowards and the consolidation of the media ownerships and the consolidation of the newspaper industry and the harnessing of the information this will continue to be a force to be reckoned with.
Ask yourself, whoever you are, whether you are the “have”, “have nots”, black, brown, yellow, red, blue, purple, gay, straight, Christian, Jew, Muslim, Protestant, Catholic, native, Alaskan, immigrant, guess worker, legal alien, the invisible people, how do we make a change to ensure you children and your children’s children live in peace?
1. How do we find new ways to allow our nation to discuss issues that affect us?
2. How do we stop the “machine” from driving what we will discuss and what we will not discuss?
3. How do we stop the demonization of people such as Ron Paul, Reagan, Ollie North, President Bush Senior,Bush Sr’s wife who was only commenting on the truth after Katrina! Kennedy, Roosevelt, or Al Gore or Senator Warner or Conservatives or Democrats who are not part of this “machine”?
4. How do we stop the twisting of facts and the demonization of people who dare to disagree?
5. How do we expose when a person does disagree and loses their job or somehow become prey of the “machine” because they dare challenge the establishment?
Look, we have got to get to a place where we Agree to Disagree! There are some things we will never see eye to eye on due to our differences and our different experiences in life. However, all of us want to live happy, raise our families, work, make money, live healthy, provide the best for our posterity and so much more that we have in common. We do agree that there is too much taxes on the people and we do not want government controlling our personal lives unless is harms the human. We believe in religious freedoms.
I am a firm believer that people should not be demonized if they do not like Black people or disagree with the civil rights movement. They are entitled to what they believe. If they don’t like you because of your race or your economic status here is why you want to let them have a voice in society:
1. You don’t want them teaching your child causing you child to become angry and drop out of school by the 11th grade due to injustices they see on a daily basis in their schools.
2. You don’t want to live by them.
3. You don’t want them investigating why 50 shots were needed to take down your finance who was unarmed.
4. You don’t want them investigating your 14 year old daughter’s brutal murderer and wondering why as a mother, the murderer has not been found in your county, while another in the same county ,who was lighter, killed by a drive-by alleged murderer was tracked down in another state and shot in the door while the ones tracking became judge and jury.
5. You don’t want them serving you food if they don’t want you in their restaurant.
6. You don’t want them making the decision on your health or how much money you will pay or where you will live.
I say it again. It is much better for them to be overt than covert, therefore, I commend the Rush Limabuagh’s , Levine, Hannity and others for giving a voice to those who also dare to disagree with civil rights movement or racial quotas.
People let them talk! If Don Imus wants to call someone a name and show his ignorance, then by all means ,let him do it. You have a choice not to listen to him. If Jimmy the Great wants to tell a little history lesson about how the “elite breed black man and women because the evil people who could dream up such a evil act were an immoral people and that is why he believed that this race of beautiful people are strong and athletic, then by all means let him say it. Because you can’t debate what you can’t see and the consequence is no one will be able to challenge or speak the opposite such as Rev. Wright.
There is a pattern in the polictical

gaprddesc (5/11) lists many continuing injustices and rightfully asks for reason; Moises (4/26) may be venting passionately rather than offering "scientific" discourse, but if you
have no comprehension of American apartheid or compassion for those who suffered under Jim Crow, then you're suffering from snowblindness; d'ann (4/26) and others have appropriately pointed to American history as one way to understand Rev. Wright's apparent diatribes; that's where I will add another thought, specifically regarding the "chickens have come home to roost sermon" for the 'love it or leave it position' taken by John (5/13) and others who, I believe, are not looking past the propoganda machine.

The context for Rev. Wright's sermon, if one were permitted or willing to listen to it, would have been made plain. For just a few historical examples:

(1) The British enlisted the aid of Arabia against the Ottoman Empire in World War I. Remember Lawrence? He was able to forge that alliance because he was authorized to promise independence to the Arabs following defeat of the Ottomans. At Versailles, the British broke that promise. The United States has inherited Britain's role and reputation in the region.
(2) Do you know that contemporary Iraq was created by the Allied Powers after World War I?
(3) Near the end of World War II, President Roosevelt reached an agreement with King Abd al-Aziz ibn Saud to support the House of Saud's rule in order to assure Western access to Saudi Arabian oil.
(4) Iranians remember well that their democratically elected Prime Minister, Mohammad Mosaddeq, was overthrown in a coup engineered by American agents that resulted in
concessions to American oil companies.

If, like Rev. Wright, we knew something about American foreign policy that has been and continues to be designed to profit big corporate contributors, maybe we'd be less likely to create the conditions that lead to retaliatory events like those of September 11, 2001.

Black liberation theology is not racist. Check your facts. Dr. King is from the same tradition. I guess Dr. King was a racist as well. Check your facts again. Obviously you know nothing about the history of liberation theology and have not heard Dr. Wright's sermons in full. Dr. Wright has not criticized any other religion or race. Having pride in Blackness is not racist.

BJ

I think that William Andrews’ post of May 7 on this blog eloquently gets to the crux of the Rev. Wright controversy, wherein Mr. Andrews states “It offends Americans that he includes the United States among the perpetrators of illegitimate state violence…the evidence is of no importance. All that matters is the comfortable assumption that the United States uses violence responsibly and only as a last resort. There is no greater offense than disturbing that assumption and that comfort.”

I have seen that offense, face to face, while marching in an anti-war protest and being called a terrorist by a counter-protester, because I carried a sign that read “War is a Racket” – a quote from Brigadier General Smedley Butler.

Here in the United States of Amnesia, as Gore Vidal so aptly puts it, there is little knowledge among the general populace of our history, and what is taught is largely sanitized, and those people on whom our actions have been and continue to be inflicted, both here and abroad, are largely dismissed. There is a correlation between the African American’s enslaved ancestor, whose only record of existence can be found on the master’s estate inventory with the hogs and chickens, listed not by name but gender, age, and whether black or mulatto, and the fact that today’s hang-wringing debate over what to do about Iraq does not involve even a mention of what the Iraqi people want us to do, which, by the way, according to polling by our own government, is for the U.S. to end its occupation of their country.

But these ones, whether counted as property or, if we bother, as collateral damage, don’t matter – they don’t even have any good slogans to rally behind, like “States’ Rights”, or “Remember the Main”, or “There, Not Here”… and because we don’t fully know, acknowledge, confront our history, and consequently apply that wisdom to the present, we continue to allow and even support the actions and policies of our government that the good Rev. Wright tells us God would condemn.

We still do not know if Obama believes or subscribes to Black Liberation Theology. It matters to me if he does hold those views of blacks and whites and will take it into the White House with him. He has rid himself of Jeremiah Wright for other things said - not because Wright is a Black Liberation Theologian. Oh that subject, Obama has been mute.

Correction:

I meant eugenics was practiced in the U.S. and African American woman where sterilized, most times without their knowledge.

Charles:

African Americans have very good reason not to trust the government and link it to HIV/AIDS. The Tuskegee experiment was not stopped in 1972 and their was a cure found in 1947. And eugenics was practiced on African American women. Most times without their knowledge. This knowledge and mistrust of the government is simply passed down from our elders. The U.S. is all too good at trying to cover up so many injustices that not only happened to Black Americans but native Americans and immigrants as well. I have heard stories of African American males getting castrated as well in the past.

Dr. Wright is not political campaigning for Obama and so what if he is, he has a member/ex-member that is running for President. Dr. Wright is trying to instill pride in African American culture. Other cultures do the same thing. Don't you know that Black children grow up wishing they were white at some periods in their life. Some how they are getting the message in school and abroad that being Black is bad and being White is good. How? Dr. Wright speaks truth when he says "Different not deficient." Other cultures in America instill pride in their culture and religious affiliations and they do not have to apologize for it. Why should Dr. Wright and the African American Christian community? Being pro Black is not being anti-White or racist.

Why don't people know the the history of Christianity during enslavement and how the Black church come about? Other cultures have their own churches as well. The media depiction has been very unfair and slanderous in trying to cast Trinity and other African American majority churches in a cultist light. Do not be fooled by the media.

Hagee do not compare to or parallel Dr. Wright and the two can not be compared.

BJ

BJ - I am sorry. I don't equate "misspeaking" with what became a central thesis of a prepared speech to the largest dinner audience in America, broadcast on national television.

Wright is thoroughly unrepresentative of what I view as mainstream Christianity in America. So is Reverend Hagee. I have attended a wide variety of Protestant and Catholic churches, and the kind of political rhetoric that seems to be routinely utilized by Jeremiah Wright and John Hagee seems to me to be extreme.

It is puzzling and disturbing to me, the number of commenters who have said that Wright's most controversial views are actually shared by significant percentages of the African-American community; that what he is saying is not felt to be radical; and that the amount of political speechmaking and secular history theorizing is not unusual for any black church.

If indeed that is really the case, then I'd say that all churches -- the few white churches like Hagee's and the the many black churches like Wright -- ought to do a whole lot more Christianity and a whole lot less political campaigning.

The Sacrifical lamb.
Rev Wright did nothing more then review History! Granted the 'Deveolpment of AIDs' may appear to be 'off the Wall' to anyone who has avoid our Gov'ts activities when it comes to ANY minority. But one thing they can Not deny (if the return just back to the Reagna Regime0 Is that it was intentionally allowed to flourish in the minority Communties- And which is more criminal the investion or it's spread?
I was never offended by Wright, in fact he could have gotten this 'Recovered Catholic' back in the Pew.
I left Heirarchial Organized Religion because it constantly was a odds with what was Written in the Bible.They spewed hate, or just Judgement on 'Creations', They determined what would be their punishment, They demanded our undying loyality (worship) of Their interpretations, They even decided who would be saved & who would not. Blasphamy & heresay.Judging the 'Almighty's 'Creation' placing themselves above to levy judgements and sentencing, demanding they be worshipped like Idols and proclaiming divine knowledge regarding what an omnipotent being has planned for the great Design. Mere Moratls claiming to be 'Holier than Thou' not just US but their own maker. Evangelicals like Hagee & parsley go even father then even the Catholic church they threaten and Push 'God' to bring about 'Judgement DAy' so they will be 'Rapture' Telling God they are the Chosen generation.Arrogance beyond anyone with real belief. Such required participation from Man to fulfill a great Design tells me this entity they worship is not the 'almighty' but a lesser more devious Being. there arrogance reminds me more of an ArchAngel who was Cast Down for just such reasons!Who do they really worship, work for..'Could it be Satan' (Dana Carvey- "Curch Lady" prophetic) certainly he would be such a entity that would require their assistance in this matter.Hagee & Parsley are not just dangerous Sociopaths to this country (and the world, considering their friends & followers in high places) They are the worst Form of Heretics!

Nicholas A Loisos:

Could it be that you can't understand how Bill Moyers reached his point of view because you are ONLY seeing things from YOUR OWN point of view? Clearly the media took what Dr. Wright said out of context. And this is not the first time the media has tried to ruin someone for their own agenda. Black, White or Brown. They are supposed to report the news unbiased. Not use sound bites to sum up what a person is about. Bill Moyers allowed us to see who Dr. Wright was and all he has accomplished to go along with the sound bites.

BJ

Charles,

Dr. Wright simply miss spoke in his understanding of what Dr. Hale was trying to say in her book. No big deal, people miss speak all of the time. Again, you are looking for some reason not to like the man and link him to Senator Obama.
Dr. Wright not trusting the government and linking the government to HIV/AIDS and the demise of Black folks throughout the diaspora has nothing to do with his patriotism. He was not goddamning the American people, he was goddamning American policy (the bearucrats)for allowing innocent people to die due to arrogance. He is a pastor and this is typical from a religious man. Scripture talks about God punishing and damning people for sinful things all through it. America is not some all holy place that has never practiced terrorism. Isn't that why we go to church to pray for forgiveness of our sins etc?

BJ

The level of respect I have for Bill Moyers suffered some fraying when I clearly heard him blame the media for R. Wright's statements.

This is a clear case of a person with an incredibly twisted perspective of the world, which is more obvious as one listens to more of his "sermons." He is an extremist on the same level of a KKK person, intent on distortion for political agenda.

To say that it is disappointing that Bill M does not see this, is a vast understatement, one that I can only attribute perhaps to the aging process, catching up to him. I cannot see how else he can reach this point of view.

Bill:

Did you REALLY comment that the media was responsible for what came out of Rev. Wright's mouth...???

*Shaking my head in disbelief...!!!

THa would be like blaming the ambulance for the death of the patient.

Granted...the media loves to cover (even enflame...???) controversy, but to say they are the root cause of fomenting his responses. Respectfully, there is NO agreement. BOTH Rev. Wright and the press should aim for higher values and practices that demonstrate them.

Right now, as the hour grows near...we need to make a clear, concise, wise and unobstructed choice as to which Democratic candidate has the best chance of beating McCain...That's just the bare-naked truth of the matter...The alternative is unacceptable...This country has been damaged so severely in the last 7+ years by the current administration that I personally feel we need someone who's been there before or very close to it...The past elections scared me to my core...The imbecilic 'sheep' of this country, with the help of those who threw their vote away on the likes of a narcissist-Nader (or chose not to vote at all (which was inexcusable, considering the circumstances and importance of what was hanging in the balance 'OF OUR CHILDREN'S FUTURES!!' Or if you place ANY value on human life, whatsoever)...And lastly...& most importantly: 'How America allowed the (election,HA!) to be completely hijacked, held hostage, then outright stolen (or bought and paid for...either way, it was done openly for all-to-see, regardless of how illegal)...Just the simple fact that people, who have audacity to call themselves 'Americans' stood by and watched one of the most morally and ethically bankrupt instances in history take place 'without so much as making a peep'...Deciding instead to take the advice of the village idiot and 'go shopping'...I don't know...I just don't know what else to say...I'm saying the same things now that I said during the very 1st debate (Poor Gore, I still feel bad for what he was subjected to without a fistfight...That took will-power!)...I was really unable to even put two words together, in hopes of forming anything 'even' resembling a sentence...(then, the 'after the debate' political-pundit, talking-heads and their unbelievably-stupid comments...which continue on (& on) today...And yes, once again...yes, I'll say it once again..."We are surely 'all' headed straight to hell...in a petroleum-based, lead-painted, chinese-made, plastic handbasket (from walmart)...sadly, its deserved...that could the saddest part of it all (naturally, I mean besides the all the body bags and families without children or futures)..the saddest thing is that 'we deserve it', because 'for all the INACTION, we have to face the REACTION'...In closing, I really think we must have experience over anything else to close this election and get our country back on track...I think the republicans 'want' Obama as an opponent, simply because they can turn the reverend's comments into 'a doubt'...and they will given the opportunity...without question...THEY WILL...

Kahale - Let's just take one example. One example that does not and should not rely on soundbites, but is best understood in terms of detailed and lengthy context.

At his speech to the NAACP in Detroit, Rev. Wright went out of his way to acknowledge the professional work of Dr. Janice Hale of Wayne State University in Detroit. Wright then proceeded, in his own, uninterrupted words, to ramble on for four or five or more paragraphs about the differences between the Right-brain and Left-brain learning differences between white and black children.

As I sat and watched and listened to Wright's speech, broadcast live and uninterrupted by both Fox and CNN, I thought to myself, "This is a disaster. An unmitigated disaster for the Obama Campaign, and for Rev. Wright personally." I felt the same way as when I saw (also live), Howard Dean's "I have a scream" speech that marekd the disastrous end of his own Presidential speech. I thought, "No white person could ever say such things on television without the severest and most deserved criticism for racist junk science."

But at the time, Rev. Wright's comments didn't seem to sink in with many commentators. I was puzzled. Because now, I am convinced that I was right. And, no less an authority than Dr. Janice Hale herself -- mentioned by name by Rev. Wright -- appears to agree with me.

Check this link to columnist Rochelle Riley writing for the Detroit Free Press:

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080508/COL10/805080417

In that column, Ms. Riley notes Dr. Hale's mostly-polite horror at her work having been so badly misquoted by Reverend Wright.

So, in summary, this isn't a case of Wright's being the victim of a soundbite, nor of Wright's being taken out of context. I was "there" in terms of seeing the entire Wright/NAACP speech, live. I've re-read the transcript of the speech. There were no hostile reporters, no questions to Wright of any kind. He wasn't on the defensive that night; he was in front of an adoring audience that was primed to hear him speak. And, Wright had just come off the warm, friendly, softball interview with Bill Moyers.

Still, with all this going for him, Wright committed an embarassingly huge blunder. An error so great that the people he relied upon for his information want to dissociate themselves from him. Dr. Hale wants to dissociate herself from Wright's "neuroscience." And Barack Obama wants to dissociate himself from Wright's politics.

So, there is what I think is a pretty comprehensive case against Wright's value as a speaker. And I didn't even have to mention his AIDS conspiracy theory, or his equation of the United States with terrorist organizations.

Please go on youtube or whatever you choose & PLEASE tell me what was INcorrect about what this man said & how it DID NOT come out of & tie into the Biblical Scriptures! Now make sure you watch the WHOLE THING/SERMON & put everything in CONTEXT (con=with or within; text=written or spoken body) before you truly form an opinion. If after that, you understand, but you STILL have issue with his words or the choice thereof, then say what you will. However, don't act COMLETELY ignorant, or at least look in & around the BANDWAGON before you COMPLETELY jump on board!!!

Thank you.

Please go on youtube or whatever you choose & PLEASE tell me what was INcorrect about what this man said & how it DID NOT come out of & tie into the Biblical Scriptures! Now make sure you watch the WHOLE THING/SERMON & put everything in CONTEXT (con=with or within; text=written or spoken body) before you truly form an opinion. If after that, you understand, but you STILL have issue with his words or the choice thereof, then say what you will. However, don't act COMLETELY ignorant, or at least look in & around the BANDWAGON before you COMPLETELY jump on board!!!

Thank you.

First of all a preacher shouldn't be damning America to its parishiners if he doesn't like it go live somewhere else no one is forcing him to stay. He said alot of anti-american remarks and Obama should have denounced him from day one thats one reason I will not support him. I just can't trust him there is something about him that is not trustworthy from the people he dealt with to never really answering honestly questions about his relations with these anti-americans. Every church I've been to has never cut down blacks or america and if this isn't racial I don't know what is . We are talking about the next President here not a grocery clerk lets get real. I hope Hillary goes Independant and takes away his chances from becoming the first anti-american President.

Are John F. Kennedy or Robert F. Kennedy the kind of "Catholic politicians" you are talking about? John Kerry? Teddy Kennedy? Patrick Kennedy? Dick Durbin? Pat Leahy? How about Robert Casey, Jr. (D-PA), Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Mary Landrieu (D-LA), Ken Salazar (D-CO), Tom Harkin (D-IA), Maria Cantwell (D-WA), Patty Murray (D-WA), Jack Reed (D-RI), Christopher Dodd (CT-D) or Claire McCaskill (D-MO)? All "Catholic politicians," every one. Should they all take responsibility for "travesties" in the priesthood?

It seems to me that this Comments thread has jumped the tracks in terms of commentary on the methods of Bill Moyers' journalism, which is what I had presumed was its focus.

I think it is unfortunate that all this attention is being given to this man and His opinions. I wonder how many Catholic politicians knew their priest were molesting little childrens all the years that they sat in the pews and applauded their speeches?? Did they NOT know what their pastors or priest were capable of; are they not responsible for their behavior??? If they feel they are not responsible; then how can they blame Mr. Oboma for what another adult does; says or thinks. Some one should ask them what portion of responsibility do they share in the travesty that has affected so many children by the hands of those that many thought they could trust; like their Priest. It is a shame America; because you do not want to take responsibility for your ancestors behavior toward Africans whom were forced into slavery; but you waste so much energy on this pathetic issue in a presidential race. I think all politicians pastors should investigated if this is how it is going to be. Let see what the research shows; and how many have sorted backgrounds that they never knew about; but sat in the pews weekly.

Correction:
Applaud should be replaced Apall or outraged, sicken.

Charles,
It is Rev. Wright’s job to inform his congregation of those things he believes are true. It is our duty as citizens to study, research and explore whether Tuskegee incident could ever happen again. It is our duty that we research, study, confirm whether designer diseases could be created to target a certain race of people. If during your research, you find that those people in 1972 was a unique people and that it is not happening today, then it is your duty to debate this issue and inform the public. However, those of you that hear something, then dismiss immediately, as if it never happened, have no place in public debate. How can you debate someone who lacks knowledge of history and purposely stick their head in the sand and ignore the past?
I'm sure that people were offended and appalled when it was stated that Black men were being purposely infected with syphilis and that the U.S. government allowed this along with the Public Health System to continue for years. I am sure they were outraged as Americans to think that someone would even say that the government had the cure but did not treat black men up until 1972.
I’m sure that many of the incidents in our past were dismissed as not being true until they actually saw it on the T.V. and could not ignore it any longer.
I’m sure when someone said that police were sticking broom sticks up a black person’s personal part where dinner comes out that America was offended and applaud that someone had the gull to say that a member of our police department would do such a savage act.
I am sure when someone said that Black men were being beat beyond recognition by people in authority that many sat in the comfort of their homes, such as you, and dismissed the allegation until they saw it for themselves and even then thought that the person deserved the savage act.
What would you have people to do? Huh? Stick their head in the sand and not learn from the past? What is that saying when people ignore history…. Do they repeat it?
I’m sure to this day there are people in their homes, with comfort thinking concentration camps never happened and that people were not hung from a trees because of their color as people had a picnic with their families.
When you debate someone or try to dismiss someone’s allegations, do the research! Ask the hard questions! Ask where did it come from! Stop shooting the messenger. He could very well be wrong if he even said it, but you are wrong for not exploring the issue and purposely calling the man crazy! Dismiss a whole race of people distrust after Jim Crow laws, Slavery, Tuskegee, and Black Laws.
Here is the ironic thing, these same preachers who expose the fears some blacks have are the same preachers who say forgive them, love them, turn the other cheek, don’t harbor those feelings because it will only eat you up. It is the preacher who helps the person transform and rise above a few ignorant people who would treat mankind so bad.

We still live in the greatest country in the world who can ask these hard questions, then stop it from happening again. We live side by side no matter what the race or what we have been through whether it is Beruit or Pearl Harbor whether it is slavery or the civil war. We love one another as brothers and sister and cherish the freedom that we share despite what happened. That is what separates the U.S. from any other country! We learn from our mistakes and continue to work at the greatest experiment called America. We cannot allow a few ignorant evil people to change the way we treat each other. We debate each other and agree to disagree! We ask the hard questions and seek the truth! We love each other like brothers and sisters despite our differences! Despite hardships we work together. We have always looked out for each other even during slavery and civil rights. There were white people who saw the wrong and risk their own lives to save their black brother. We must never forget that. We cannot drive people's fears underground like we did those who hate blacks because of their color. They have a right to speak and we have a right to not hang around them. What was done to Rev. Wright should have never happened. If anything, it was a chance to change the minds of Black America that we have finally gotten to a place in time where no PHS or Government would ever treat its citizens less than human. We could have had an honest debate instead we demonized Rev. Wright and thereby demonizing all those black Americans who harbor this fear that could be killing them inside to this day. If we could have debated, got our best scientist and health official together to debate where AIDs came from we could have healed deep wounds. Instead we saw what was done when a so called "negro" steps out of place! He will be dismissed as a crazy man for even thinking that PHS could come up with such an evil act. Charles you are asking the hard questions, and that is a start. The dialogue must continue. I will be the first to say I am wrong when I am found to be wrong but calling me names and dismissing my ideas is not the answer. You just drive the hurt deeper causing more distrust.

Can anybody explain what good there is in telling the members of Trinity United Church of Christ that HIV was an invention of the U.S. government?

Sen. Obama says that such statements "are rightly offensive to most American."

So can anyone explain why Wright would ever have said it in the first place, why he wouldn't retract it and apologize, and why he would be defended for having said it?

Again, I ask specifically, what good does such a statement do for the churchgoers at Trinity?

Even Bill Moyers is repelled by the Wright allegations as to an AIDS conspiracy, right?

If in fact it is true that fear is the motivation for the demonization of African American, Black and Negro Reverends, what is it that they fear? Angry “white men”?
1. Do they fear redlining? Being steered to homes that are in bad areas, dangerous plants and electrical lines?
2. Do they fear walking in a bank with a better paying job, better credit score, and greater track record only to be denied or given enough to stay in debt, while their friend from other race, agrees to the experiment, applies for the loan that you did with lessor credit score, lessor paying job and they get the loan plus more money and you are denied or given just enough to stay in debt?
3. Do they fear a doctor telling them that their pain is in their head and let them continue to suffer and in some case die of something as simple as a cold?
3. Do they fear driving while white?
4. Do they fear that the demographic make up of the jails will change to a lighter color?
5. Do they fear being denied a job because of their color? Or Denied a position because they do not make enough to dress for success?
6. Do they fear walking in a store, head toward the electronic section and have a guard stand next to you and stare you down?
7. Do they fear that the teachers who were driven underground for the last 40 years and denied the chance to say what they believe in the hearts because of civil rights would be in the classroom teaching their child? And as a result writing their child up for small stuff and suspending your child from school for nothing, going to court to fight for your child to stay in the county schools? Then having the court stereotype your child just because of their beliefs rather then looking at the facts.
8. Do they fear going to a car dealership and being charged 28% interest on a car? Do they fear being kept in the dealership until 3:00 am until you would sign anything because you were too young to know better?
9. Do they fear that the “FICO scoring method” would unfairly keep your score low because no one has the guts to investigate why the score is low? And why their race score tend to be low?
10 Do they fear the Mortgage company would make an agreement with them , then you pay on the agreement date however, the Mortgage company will continue to report to the credit report agency the original contract date and not the new agreed upon date driving their score down and preventing them from buying anything?
11. Do they fear predatory lending?
12 Do they fear insurance company’s client who is at fault, refusing to pay the medical bills of your children which in turns denies your children medical service for over four years do to the insurance companies decision to drag out the process in the hopes that one will forget the injuries?
13. Do they fear the jury make-up in court would deny them justice because of their own stereotype attitude , fears and belief systems?
14. Do they fear having radio talk show hosts from sun up to sun down dancing around the race issue continuously calling their race victims as if what they describe they face everyday, is not true?
What is it that they fear?
15. Do they fear “White laws” will be developed to keep their race down?
16. Do they fear swinging from a rope, while the so called moral people of that day have a picnic watching this demonic type action?
17. Do they fear being considered less than human and as property?
18. Do they fear being stereotyped as lazy even though their ancestors is the one who built America while the lazy ones raped their wives, sold their children, whip the men and woman leaving deep scars, burning down their churches with children in them, burning down their town that is thriving?
What is that they fear? I challenge you that they do not fear! They know Blacks are a moral people who live by the law and would never ever think of a race of people as property. They would never communicate hate of a people because of their color or preconceived notion of what the people stand for. They would never warehouse people by redlining in the ghettos , then ensure there are no jobs thereby causing people to become like animals because they are trapped , while drugs are flown from other countries into their neighborhoods keeping the weak amongst them in a “stuper” state, ripe for jail while the others cling to God and Guns. Developing a Welfare system that makes a policy to keep the father away from the mother and children realizing this policy will affect generations to come. See Willie Lynch Doctrine.
I think that Limbaugh, Hannity, Levene, and FOX thrive off of demonizing African Americans. I think the “angry white man” who were conceived in the Reagan years are alive and well, targeting prominent Black men and exposing their human defects while hiding their own race’s immoral behavior. I believe there are “think tanks” that spend sun up to sun down , thinking of ways to demonize a race of people. Finally, I think these people are few in number. I think we as Americans no matter what the race live side by side as friends and treating each other as family. I believe there is a few with money who can make it seem like it is many however, we eat dinner with each other, we fight for each other and we love each other like a brother or sister. We even laugh and cry together. Think about it! It is NOT your co-worker or friends of another race that embodies these negative behaviors. It is the “Group Think” people who think they speak for the people. This lie that blacks and whites don’t get along is further exploited through TV that picks and chooses what they want to report or what they want to poll. It is the consolidation of businesses that will follow the “Jim crow laws “ disguised as something else or the “Black Laws” disguised as something else. All you need to keep a people down is the following, a “scoring system” that will keep you score low thereby justifying the “loan sharking behavior”, Car dealership that will sell you a lemon and a State that would have no lemon laws, licensed predatory lenders, IRS and heavy usury type fees and finally a Mortgage company as well as the Car company and dealership with high interest rates. These behaviors will never be exposed because of privacy laws and no transparency as well as no oversight. Ask Fair Isaac why it is that the credit scores matters and how once you are marked there is no way out. All one has to do is target the college bound student and sell a car that is too high, that is a lemon and interest rate is high, Gap insurance that will not pay after 3 or more deferments, repossession by financial institutions who are practicing loan sharking behavior and a court system that enforces the behavior by always ruling in favor of the company, thereby lowing the mark. The court system will further injure the people by granting back interest pay that was never part of the agreement once you have paid for a car that you never owned. Check the court system records. This is not a white and black issue any longer!. This is a greed issue and no, I do not think there is fear as much as there is a few people who thrive off of blaming others for their misfortune! If there was transparency with the FICO SCORE and Car Dealership and how the Court system is ruling in favor of car companies despite the facts, I would not feel so strongly about this issue. There is no transparency, no oversight, and no one willing to take these issue that affect average Americans daily which gives the greedy part of our society, fuel to continue to fleece American citizens.

Charles,
I don't think people really care about what Hagee said. If the media made it a top story and ratings went up then all the news stations would talk about Hagee. The truth is, I have never seen any white reverend demonized in the media, ever. Not that I watch that much but I am pretty sure that the only reverends demonized in the media are Black.
If Hagee wanted to explain he could contact the media himself. I am sure that the media would not miss the opportunity. Did you ever consider that Hagee did not want to address the issue? He has no reason to defend his words because the media is calling for it.

Obama'08
BJ

I think the problem here is that people are using the Dr. Wright thing to have some reason to not trust Senator Obama because of his race. The media, especially the Fox News channel are basically creating fear in the people about Obama. Senator Obama should not have to answer any questions about Dr. Wright. It had nothing to do with the campaign and most Americans were tired of it and wanted to hear about the real issues that affect their lives.

What did Dr. Wright say that hurt people? What did he say that offended people? We have a right to question, debate and disagree with government policy as we are tax payers and have a constitutional right to speak our minds.

Senator Obama simply needed to end the focus on Dr. Wright so the media could move on from it. He answered the questions about Dr. Wright and the media has to move on now (thank goodness) because we know that if he did not end it the media would have milked it forever.

What did Dr. Wright say that peeves you so? And how does that reflect on Senator Obama?

I think Dr. Wright spoke out to stop the hate that was being created toward his church. Fox news channel and others were trashing Trinity and the members, it was ridiculous that people actually believed that Dr. Wright was some kind of crazy man. He is a scholar and at the press club the man was applauded during and after the speech. I applaud him.

We need to understand what the media heads tried to do. The media has an agenda as well. Who owns the media? I am sure that only a few top people are responsible for what we hear and what we don't hear. Why do we hear about Brittany Spears but not about a bill that passed and how it is going to affect our lives? Most people are busy day to day trying to make ends meet and spending time with family. SO we don't pay close attention to the people we put in office to protect us. The Dr. Wright story is another distraction away from who we really need to question, the bureaucracy. This is supposed to be a democracy, for the people by the people. Not lobbyist cutting deals that only help a small group of people. We the people (all of us).

Obama '08
BJ

It is interesting and very disappointing to see all media, commentaries and pundits spin the Rev. Wright words to be negative and even with the truth spoken the story was still spinned as a negative. I was disappointed to see Barack Obama fall for the rhetoric by the media, pundits and commentaries. Why did he feel the need to denounce a man of Rev. Wright's caliber. Group Think has taken over the media and we no longer get the news unfiltered. Stop asking the question Media! This new style the media has with asking stupid questions instead of reporting does not fool us after this last event any longer. You matter as well go ahead and say what you believe on any subject because you truly showed you colors on the Rev. Wright’s prophetic sermon and the question at the bias press club. The media and it’s pundits have been exposed. The conservatives start at 8:00am in the morning until after 6:00pm propagating lies, half untruths and public hatred toward the black race and nothing is said. One Black man stands up and dares to challenge the establishment and ruling party and they tar and feather him. It is because of Michele that I became interested in Barack O. less Barack fool himself into thinking anything else. It is Rev. Wright, who for the first time since Rev. Dr. King (the spokesman for the Civil Rights movement), made a step to heal this nation. First you must admit there is problems before the twoism of American can be healed. Yes, there is distrust of medical field and the role the government played in the Tuskegee incident. Many do not even know what Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment was about. For forty years between 1932 and 1972, the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) conducted an experiment on 399 black men with syphilis. PHS healed white me and let black men suffer with the disease and some cases allowing the black men to die even though there was a cure. Many know that in the heart of Africa Scientist were study SRV/SIV in monkeys and those monkeys supposedly escape the experiment facility. Scientist claim SIV cannot mutate to HIV and there is no way humans could have contracted this in African even if monkey brains was a food source. Tell me why the media does not ask the question about AIDS? Hmmm? “Where did AIDs come from”? What is the DNA of Aids? Did South Africa instruct their scientist to develop biochemical warfare against certain race of people? Is there such thing as designer diseases? I have long known that certain children do not learn well in a class room with 30 students and one teacher and black board. Verbal vs. Visual hands-on led class vs. instruction-led teaching style. Using Power point for instruction that show step-by-step verses verbally communicating what the teacher may not understand. This man in two days went a long way to heal this nation and the few ignorant people could not take it and the squeaky wheel got the grease. What about the silent majority? We watch and were truly perplexed to see what we saw done to Rev. Wright and take a false interpretation of what occurred and tried to make Barack O apologize for the truth? What in the world are people thinking. They called this black man a crazy man. This is a sad time and really made me wake up. I've lost respect for the media except for one man. Bill Moyer who remain the lone voice of reason. If people disagreed with Rev. Wright then debate the man. The DemRubplican, media, pundits and commentaries could not debate Rev. Wright because they knew he was right. What happened to debate in this country? Bill, I first saw you on Charlie Rose and I am blessed for finding out about you. Thank you. The fact that we even care to dialogue about the wounds Black Americans carry, shows how much we love the country built on the backs of our ancestors even though the Willie Lynch followers were to lazy to work. They meant it for bad, but God meant it for Good. We are in the greatest country in the world with all it’s faults. We have a chance to heal and fix what may be broke then move together to be innovators and making a better place for our children. And yes, I believe Cynthia Mckinney, Olie North, Grease Man , Don Imus, Jessie Jackson, Rev. Al Sharpton, Ron Brown and others have a right to say what they believe without being tarred and feathered. I am convinced that the Rev. Wright incident was pay back for Don Imus. I would rather a person be overt than covert. You cannot debate what you cannot see or hear. Driving these type of folks underground for the last 40 years has done a great disservice to my generation. These people driven underground are in our classrooms teaching our children, they are police, they are doctors and because they were not allowed to say “hey, I do not want to live around black people” they take it out on our children and the symptoms are great in every aspect of our lives. Because it is covert behavior they are allowed to say “blacks act like they are the victim” while causes unnecessary stress in the daily lives of the unaware minorities. This is the greatest disservice that I’m sure many are not aware of. May we keep the dialogue going and agree to disagree, then move on to work together and make the greatest experiment called America a reality. Rev.Wright, we heard you and we did not close our ears nor did we shut our eyes. We know that you love this country and cared enough to say what many of us feel on a daily basis. Rev. Wright know that your work is not in vain and the life you live was a testimony to God. Thank you for helping people, standing tall keep telling the truth, many will hear and others will be given over to a reprobate mind. Barack, beware you are treading on a thin line. If change is to come the truth must be allowed to be said. I would have much rather you debated Rev. Wright on the portions you disagreed in instead of playing the role of the good negro and pandering to those who mean you and other no good. The media truly controlled you and you know for a fact that the Press Club was disrespectful to the man and he had no choice to put the moterator on notice on who she was dealing with the questions were a disgrace and still Rev. Wright cared enough to answer them. It is a good thing it was not me up there because I would have been more colourful dealing with the lady who had the smirk on her face as she stated that noone in the audience agreed with rev. wright over and over again. She did not do that with any other offensive people however, she had all the confidence in the world disrepecting the man of God. Unfortunately, she messed with a child of God this time. I welcome McCain to bring Rev. Wright up. lets hear these people explain away Tuskegee!

BJ, are you saying that Obama's "kicking Wright to the curb" was somehow done with a wink and a nod? That it is somehow understood to have been an insincere denunciation by Obama? Something that he just had to do, as a politician, as Wright himself has suggested? With Obama secretly agreeing that Wright's comments were not that offensive at all?

If so, what does all of that tell us about Obama?

On the other hand, if Obama truly thought that Wright had crossed a line of decency, but has somehow forgiven Wright after denouncing him, how should we feel about the offensive comments by the Reverend John Hagee? Should Bill Moyers be offering Reverend Hagee a cahnce to explain himself in a face-to-face interview?

I am not mad at Dr. Wright or Senator Obama. I feel that Dr. Wright is serving his community well and only has to answer to God. Senator Obama denounced some of the things he said. The reason he denounced Dr. Wright is because he felt that Dr. Wright did not apologize for possibly offending people. I think Dr. Wright really offended Senator Obama at the National Press club interview. He did say some things that I thought were unnecessary. But as humans we are imperfect and I understand. When he read his speech, it was very good. "....different not deficient...." But when he answered questions he was on the defensive and it was not a good look for him.
Whether Senator Obama denounced Dr. Wright or not it still hurt his campaign. It was a double edge sword. On one hand he was going to alienate white voters who fed into the news loops and on the other end he was going to alienate black voters for denouncing Dr. Wright.
In the end I like that he gave Dr. Wright a chance to speak for himself before kicking him to the curb.

Obama '08
BJ

I really don't get it -- if Reverend Wright was speaking such profound wisdom and if "most of what he said was true" (interesting phraseology), why did Senator Obama denounce him?

Particularly after Obama said, "I could no more denounce him than my own white grandmother."

Should Wright be denounced? Because that is what Obama did.

Or should Obama be denounced for thowing his pastor overboard?

It has to be one or the other, right?

To those of you who have commented so negatively about the Reverend Wright and see some sort of conspiracy by Senator Obama, I have only one thing to say to all of you. Your racism and blindness is overwhelming. The double standard here is also very troubling. It seems pretty obvious that White preachers can say anything they want, even condoning murder of blacks by the Ku Klux Klan, murder of doctors or perform abortions, of Catholics and Jews, yet Reverend Wright cannot do the same. I am white and quite frankly ashamed of this country for the way it treats people who are not white. If those of you who have made such racist comments consider yourselves christians, then you need to take a long hard look at yourselves. Most of what Reverend Wright said was true - and the truth hurts. It's time to take a long hard look at the history of the policies of this country which have been nothing short of devastating to those less fortunate.

Shame on all of you

To those of you who have commented so negatively about the Reverend Wright and see some sort of conspiracy by Senator Obama, I have only one thing to say to all of you. Your racism and blindness is overwhelming. The double standard here is also very troubling. It seems pretty obvious that White preachers can say anything they want, even condoning murder of blacks by the Ku Klux Klan, murder of doctors or perform abortions, of Catholics and Jews, yet Reverend Wright cannot do the same. I am white and quite frankly ashamed of this country for the way it treats people who are not white. If those of you who have made such racist comments consider yourselves christians, then you need to take a long hard look at yourselves. Most of what Reverend Wright said was true - and the truth hurts. It's time to take a long hard look at the history of the policies of this country which have been nothing short of devastating to those less fortunate.

Shame on all of you

Many of Rev. Wright's ideas remind me of Malcom X, Stokely Carmichael, and the Black Panthers. Too bad our country has no memory, especially for truth. I'm not black, but I have always appreciated those who speak their mind while they actually take care of their community. Obama would seem the bigger man (to me) if he had actually stepped away from Wright years ago. Now he seems rather the self-serving "politician" in his remarks about Wright. Geese. I respect Wright more than Obama for being truthful.

Explain then, Ralph, the differing treatment of Wright and Hagee by Moyers.

With Wright, it was a warm, softly-lit conversation between two people who so clearly were in sync with each other that it was more of a therapy session than a a hard political interview.

With Hagee, it was an arm's-length hit piece. Soundbites of the most inflammatory rhetoric, no interview of Hagee giving him a chance to explain himself, etc.

I'm more than confident that I am the one being even-handed in this analysis, and that all the Obama supporters among the Moyers viewership are the ones that cannot see the imbalance.

C'mon, Charles. To say that there's no substantive difference between the constant barrage of inflamemotainment propaganda from Fox, the explicitly hateful and distorted inanity of Hannity in particular, and that of Moyers sit down interview with Rev. Wright is, well, silly.

Moyers lifelong commitment to the democratic party and liberal social principles notwithstanding, his discipline to high journalistic standards and openness to other viewpoints is what defines him and so inflames the narrowness of the rigid right.

Fox, on the other hand, with it's diatribe force and repetitive, agenda driven content is not only a parody of journalism, but of itself.

We're it not for the likes of Moyers, the desolation of broadcast journalism would be a grim fait accompli.

BJ, I appreciate Fox News because it is such a good antidote to the rest of television news. And Fox, in particular, is unafraid to criticize our PBS and NPR networks (even as Fox News employs Mara Liasson of NPR and Juan Williams of NPR).

I have not utilized this blog to campaign for any candidate as you (Obama '08) have. I have tried to keep the focus on Bill Moyers' journalism standards, which is precisely the focus and function of this Comments page.

Neither Hagee nor Wright would have merited national debate but for the fact that both McCain and Obama sought the two pastors' support and blessing. I kind of wish that neither candidate had involved themselves with either pastor.

But my greater point wsa that there was no substantive difference between what Bill Moyers, a loyal Democrat and a very liberal television personality did, and what Sean Hannity an upwardly-mobile conservative ideologue, did. Moyers wanted his viewers to be scared by Hagee soundbites, as he tried to link Hagee to McCain. Sean Hannity tried to scare his viewers with the Wright sermon soundbites, as he linked Wright to Obama.

Condemn both equally if you want to, but to hold up Bill Moyers as some kind of ideal in this sordid affair is just a joke.

Charles, You must be a Fox News supporter. How is this one interview compared to months of Dr.Wright being looped over and over again in the media. He only tried to show the real man behind the loops. I have never heard of Hagee, but everyone is entitled to their own opinion. Clearly the Fox News network is trying to change the way people see Obama because they have their own agenda. Anybody could have a pastor or similar in their faith that may have unflattering opinions about the government. So what, shouldn't we all question our government. You don't have to agree with everything your pastor says, especially if it is politics. Give me a break. I have had co-workers, friends, and family that have said controversial things. What are we supposed to kick them out of our lives because of it? No! Because you know deep down they are good people who have good hearts. That is what Mr. Bill Moyers showed us with his interview with Dr. Wright.

Obama '08
BJ

Here is a link that some Bill Moyers viewers might be familiar with.

It is a link to this very website: Bill Moyers' carefully-produced report on the group, Christians United for Israel, and Pastor John Hagee.

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/03072008/profile.html

Note the use of the video production tools that Bill Moyers has decried in the case of Rev. Jeremiah Wright. In the Hagee story, Moyers himself apparently never spoke to Hagee at all. There was no chance for Hagee to speak without his words being edited by Moyers' producers.

They used the most inflammatory "soundbites" that they could find on Hagee.

I don't much care for Hagee, just as i don't care for Jeremiah Wright, but I do know what Wright would say if he had been put in the position of Hagee on the Moyers program. He'd have asked Moyers -- "Have you been to my church? Have you heard any of my sermons? The WHOLE sermons? Have you ever given me the chance to come onto your program to speak for myself?"

As I have stated before, the notion that Bill Moyers represents some journalistic ideal is nonsense. Bill Moyers is nothing more and nothing less than a left-wing version of teh Fox News Channel. The difference being that the Fox News Channel has so many more viewers, it can pay for itself on its own private network, thank you very much. We see Bill Moyers only because of the Public Broadcasting network.

So who do we see about getting our money back?

LunchAdmin:

You not fooling anyone with this crap link. Everybody knows it's a fake, bigot. You're anti Obama and that is fine but when you start making up stuff just to feed your own bigotry, that is truly pathetic.

Obama '08
BJ

Beware the terrible simplifiers? You are one such simplifier Mr. Moyers.

Did John McCain campaign from Reverend John Hagee’s pulpit? No HE DID NOT. Did Barack Obama do just that from Reverend Jeremiah Wright’s pulpit? Yes HE DID.

Did John McCain distribute pamphlets claiming him to be a “committed Christian” complete with photos of him praying in Hagee’s church? No HE DID NOT.

Did Barack Obama produce such a pamphlet complete with photographs praying within Wright’s church?

Why yes … YES HE DID, and in so doing he violated campaign guidelines – but that’s an issue needing a separate blog post.
See the pamphlet here. http://departmentoflunch.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/pander.jpg

So you know what Mr. Moyers?

Barack Obama ignored the Constitution’s ban on religious tests for federal officeholders; he put his preacher and his faith out there for everyone to judge. John McCain has been endorsed by a few racist crackpots, but so far he has not worshiped with them or written books praising their message.

In no way do I write this in support of John McCain. It’s just that your argument that black preachers in this case are getting the short end of the stick does NOT hold up.

Mr. Moyers:

Thank you for your very informative piece on Rev. Wright. I, as a Black American, wish that all Anglo Americans could sit down with someone that they may not agree with and seek the truth and the real reasoning behind their position. You do so and as I watched you over the years. You seem to be able to get to the root of the controversy with honest questions with a clear intent.

I taped your program on that day and on the following day, had a friend, Anglo & staunch Catholic, start off with comments about that racist Rev. Wright. I invited him to sit down and view your program. I was dissapointed that he only viewed half, but what really made my day, was when he said was "In context the man is telling the truth and is teaching from the Bible" That really made me feel good to see a mind changed and the truth let out.

All I can say is keep shining your light and please shine some in the direction of our people in the governance of our country, our clergy that want to talk about " this week's ladies tea", Our schools that are producing too many dropouts', nitwhits' and otherwise under educated students. Most of all, please shine plenty of that light in the direction of your fellow journalists.

Thanks,
A longtime fan

Racism, Jim, is harboring hate against other races, not supporting your own in a reasonable, and in this case, in a unique candidacy.

And, you're overstating the percentage, there are many people of color that support the opposition.

Why can 99% of afro-americans vote for obamas and not be labeled as obvious racist? Yet when whites for for clintons they are considered racist?

Double Standard

The odd thing to me, William, is that Wright's historical expertise seems so suspect on so many other dimensions that I am not sure that he is credible on any of them. For instance, Wright finds time to talk about the U.S. nuclear attacks on Nagasaki and Hiroshima, but at the same time butchers history with the urban myth that the U.S. invited the devastating sneak attack on Pearl harbor.

I also wonder why, if Wright is such a prophet of peace, he wouldn't find time to mention the Japanese war crimes, the Bataan Death March and the rape of Nanking?

I am very much struck by the amount of politics that Wright has invovled himself in. That may be somewhat normal in the black church, I don't know. I do know that it is more or less required that any politician seeking election in any large American city must pass through the approval of the city's black ministers.

In every church I have gone to, politics were less than 1% of the church's mission. I know that there are the Pat Robertsons and Falwells and Hagees of the nation, but those are NOT representative of mainstream Protestantism and Catholocism. Is Wright a reasonably representative example of urban preaching?

For the real offense of Jeremiah Wright one need look no further than Bill Moyers's interview with him. In that interview, he provides a fairly scholarly critique of state violence and compares it with other forms of terrorism. He says that violence that destroys innocence people, whether conducted by the state or by free-lance terrorists, is not pleasing to God. In keeping with the prophetic tradition of the Old and New Testaments, he points this out in his sermons. It offends Americans that he includes the United States among the perpetrators of illegitimate state violence. He has obviously thought a great deal about this, and he can eloquently array the evidence, from the fire bombing of Tokyo, to the saturation bombing in Southeast Asia, to the attacks on Sadr City today. But the evidence is of no importance. All that matters is the comfortable assumption that the United States uses violence responsibly and only as a last resort. There is no greater offense than disturbing that assumption and that comfort.

To Mr. Bill Moyers:

Thanks again for offering some insight and perspective into the media's spin and distractions.
Your show is a bright beacon in the darkness of the information blackout we have in this country over issues that matter to all of us who live in the U.S.
To Mr. Charles Brown:
If you aren't a “neocon”, you must at least be a stauch supporter of the Bush Administration. It's becoming clear why you have such an interest in attacking both Obama and Wright. They’re both imperfect humans and as such will not be 100% correct all the time. None of us are 100% all the time. However, Jeremiah Wright isn't running for office. He's taking a stand, wrong, right or indifferent.

You give away your position when you make absurd comments like these:
“As for any "government lie" about a link between the Saddam Hussein government and the attacks of 9/11, I don't know what supposed "lies" that Wright was talking about. I've never heard a member of the Bush administration claim such a link. I have heard the Bush administration discuss links to terrorism within the old Baathist Iraqi regime, but only becuase there were such links.”

If you haven't had your head buried in the sand for the past 5 years, then you must only access media like The Weekly Standard. or perhaps you're a Fox News Fan. I suggest you watch Bill Moyers' excellent documentary, “Buying the War”. You can watch it at this very site. Here's the link:
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/btw/watch.html
Instead of obsessing over every detail of what Wright says or his accuracy, you might consider spending your time reviewing the Bush Administration's lack of accuracy and competence, which has led us into this Global War on Terror, the fiasco in Iraq , FEMA’s many failures in response to Hurricane Katrina and so many other disasters for this country that they can't be summed up here.
Here's one more link to get you started: http://www.democracynow.org/2008/1/24/935_lies_and_counting_study_counts

Hope that helps...

pallist

Only Bill would have to try to fix an interview after the fact by commenting on it and trying to spin it in a different direction. The people who were interested already saw the interview, Bill, and it is way too late to try to fix your poor interview skills with even worse commentary.

It is very interesting how sensitive Americans are w/Wright's comments. Our history speaks for itself and I pray that we will not loose our freedom of speech in the future. There are many angry Blacks in this country regardless of the their professional titles or economic status and that is the reality of the situation. Enough is enough and "it is" time for change. It is time for blacks to speak up and speak out to fellow Amercians about the continued racism in "our" country. As a Christian, despite my imperfection, I am inspired by Rev.Wright and it is not about color. It is about his courage to take on the ever growing beast in America that has the potential to devour everything that has made America what it is today. Study revelations folks. Study our history folks. Now, as for Blacks, we have so much to be angry about and I do believe that if it were not for religous leaders such as Rev. Wright that provide an enviorment for "honest" conversation, the rage will only get worse. There is nothing equal about our society and many of our leaders have done little to bridge the gap between all cultures of America. So all Americans have a choice to make and much work to do. Either we break through the glass ceiling many have tried to demolish, e.g. Dr. King, so everyone one can partake in the "American Dream", or we continue to spread the glass ceiling so far over our land that we all suffer. Our country is being bought up from below our feet daily. Our debt is out of control. Are you serious? All we can do is complain about Rev. Wright. What about gas prices? What about health care? What about the next four years? What about all of "our" children? What about disease control? What about the cost of food? What about the troops? What about foreign policy? What about the air that we "all" breathe? You, me, Rev. Wright, President Bush...we all have to breathe right?

Dear Bill,

Thank you so much for such insightful comment on Rev Wright; we all could almost be fooled again by a media machine... Please keep up the great efforts!!!

America is a great country with great people; given time and good work she will shine again. First we need to find all the root causes that's killing our country, be it anyone, or any group.

Who is benefiting from the pain of the majority; who has hijacked our policy, foreign and domestic, our finances, our values...

Our real enemy is only a tiny few manipulating us right here living at the top and behind the scenes.

Good people have to unite and make them pay, dearly.

Think for ourselves!

Take care

Dear Mr. Moyers,
I would just like to say I am
disappointed with your toothless and inept interviewing style made evident during your interview with Rev. Wright. You just sat
there and nodded sympathetically while the esteemed reverend bitterly complained about being treated "unfairly" by the media.
Let me get this straight!
Rev. Wright is free to espouse and express any beliefs, however unpopular.
Indeed, his holding and expressing those beliefs is
essential to the functioning of our democracy. What makes him a
brazen hypocrite is his claim (stated or implied) that by virtue of him being
a black clergyman he and his statements are exempt from scrutiny, criticism and ridicule. When his remarks first surfaced, a lot of people perceived them as a direct attack against their values. Naturally, those offended fought back. Facing scathing criticism Rev. Wright appeared on your show and instead of defending of what he so passionately believes in on
the merits, he began to whine. As far as I know there is nothing in the Constitution that prohibits criticism of a clergyman's or layman's statements made in the public domain. I find this attempt to justify and advance one's political agenda using religion repulsive. Even worse, this took place on the publicly funded TV station, on your watch Mr. Moyers!

Alex Golubev

Dear Mr. Moyers,
I would just like to say I am
disappointed with your toothless and inept interviewing style made evident during your interview with Rev. Wright. You just sat
there and nodded sympathetically while the esteemed reverend bitterly complained about being treated "unfairly" by the media.
Let me get this straight!
Rev. Wright is free to espouse and express any beliefs, however unpopular.
Indeed, his holding and expressing those beliefs is
essential to the functioning of our democracy. What makes him a
brazen hypocrite is his claim (stated or implied) that by virtue of him being
a black clergyman he and his statements are exempt from scrutiny, criticism and ridicule. When his remarks first surfaced, a lot of people perceived them as a direct attack against their values. Naturally, those offended fought back. Facing scathing criticism Rev. Wright appeared on your show and instead of defending of what he so passionately believes in on
the merits, he began to whine. As far as I know there is nothing in the Constitution that prohibits criticism of a clergyman's or layman's statements made in the public domain. I find this attempt to justify and advance one's political agenda using religion repulsive. Even worse, this took place on the publicly funded TV station, on your watch Mr. Moyers!

Alex Golubev

Dear Mr. Moyers,
I would just like to say I am
disappointed with your toothless and inept interviewing style made evident during your interview with Rev. Wright. You just sat
there and nodded sympathetically while the esteemed reverend bitterly complained about being treated "unfairly" by the media.
Let me get this straight!
Rev. Wright is free to espouse and express any beliefs, however unpopular.
Indeed, his holding and expressing those beliefs is
essential to the functioning of our democracy. What makes him a
brazen hypocrite is his claim (stated or implied) that by virtue of him being
a black clergyman he and his statements are exempt from scrutiny, criticism and ridicule. When his remarks first surfaced, a lot of people perceived them as a direct attack against their values. Naturally, those offended fought back. Facing scathing criticism Rev. Wright appeared on your show and instead of defending of what he so passionately believes in on
the merits, he began to whine. As far as I know there is nothing in the Constitution that prohibits criticism of a clergyman's or layman's statements made in the public domain. I find this attempt to justify and advance one's political agenda using religion repulsive. Even worse, this took place on the publicly funded TV station, on your watch Mr. Moyers!

Alex Golubev

Dear Mr. Moyers,
I would just like to say I am
disappointed with your toothless and inept interviewing style made evident during your interview with Rev. Wright. You just sat
there and nodded sympathetically while the esteemed reverend bitterly complained about being treated "unfairly" by the media.
Let me get this straight!
Rev. Wright is free to espouse and express any beliefs, however unpopular.
Indeed, his holding and expressing those beliefs is
essential to the functioning of our democracy. What makes him a
brazen hypocrite is his claim (stated or implied) that by virtue of him being
a black clergyman he and his statements are exempt from scrutiny, criticism and ridicule. When his remarks first surfaced, a lot of people perceived them as a direct attack against their values. Naturally, those offended fought back. Facing scathing criticism Rev. Wright appeared on your show and instead of defending of what he so passionately believes in on
the merits, he began to whine. As far as I know there is nothing in the Constitution that prohibits criticism of a clergyman's or layman's statements made in the public domain. I find this attempt to justify and advance one's political agenda using religion repulsive. Even worse, this took place on the publicly funded TV station, on your watch Mr. Moyers!

Alex Golubev

The good Reverend Wright speaks the truth and to many the truth hurts. The people who react out of anger, hate, and fear must be in an emission of guilt!

Without getting too much into the merits of Reverend John Hagee versus Reverend Jeremiah Wright, I still think that as it pertains to Bill Moyers, there is a remarkable double standard.

On the one hand, Bill Moyers actually did a story on Reverend John Hagee, and Moyers did the things that he chastised the corporate media for: he used soundbites of Hagee for his own editorial purposes. Moyers did not interview Hagee, and he did not give Hagee a chance to speak more openly and at length, as with Wright, to put himself "in context."

So beyond any serious question, Bill Moyers has acted precisely as a left-wing analogue to Fox News, baiting the opposition with sound bites for his personal benefit.

Speaking for myself alone, I find Hagee and Wright to be equally abhorrent. I'd take no pleasure in attending either one of their respective churches. But it is also clear to me that the soundbite versions of Hagee and Wright are plenty accurate enough. Neither one of them gets any better with hearing more of their comments. And it is a huge conceit on the part of Bill Moyers if he can't see what he's done on his own show that is "Un-fair and Un-balanced."

In his efforts to give Wright a fair and even-handed treatment, I feel Mr. Moyer's has perhaps bent a bit too far, so much that he's glossed over or ignored a few of the key issues. As but one possible example, I believe many people were in fact NOT all that shocked or insulted by the basic idea behind the "chickens coming home to roost" sermon. No intelligent person can argue with the premise that a country takes actions and must therefore expect certain consequences. What WAS shocking and insulting was that fact that Wright and at least a few in his congregation appeared almost joyous that chickens were coming home to roost. The applause and cheers were quite loud! What exactly were they applauding? This was the interesting and important question - and unfortunately one that Mr. Moyers chose not to ask.

In Bill Moyers' summary, he referred to the double standard in that white preachers such as Falwell, Robertson, and Hagee have made hateful and controversial comments but have not been treated like black preacher Wright. Moyers must have a poor memory, for every comment that has been hateful, outlandish, and divisive by these white preachers has also been renounced, opposed, chided, and covered by the media - much of the time in proportion to that person's relevance to national current events.
What is your purpose in distorting the facts, Mr. Moyers? Race-baiting benefits no one.

Elizabeth Sheppard -

Yes, it is true that whe pressed at the National Press Club, Wright evaded the substance of the direct question put to him, with his own flippant comment that the government was "capable" of doing such a thing. It would be nice, wouldn't it, if Wright would answer the question squarely and without equivocation.

For me, Wright gave away his position when he turned on the questioner at the National Press Club and asked, "Have you read Horowitz's book?" The reference was to a crackpot theorist who wrote a book alleging that there was in fact a government conspiracy and/or a major biological accident that created the HIV/AIDS virus. Wright doesn't have the personal command of those facts, so instead he tosses the notion out, with a wink, saying, "It might be true!", just as it might be true that the mafia killed John F. Kennedy, or it might be true that the Apollo mon landing was a hoax.

These kinds of theories are beneath the dignity of serious discussion.

But then, Elizabeth, we can go back to the original sermon in which Wright launched a whole handful of similar theories and charges, each of them as negligent and as devoid of factual support as the AIDS lunacy.

Rev. Wright:
********
"“The government lied about the Tuskegee experiment. They purposely infected African American men with syphilis. Governments lie. The government lied about bombing Cambodia and Richard Nixon stood in front of the camera, ‘Let me make myself perfectly clear…” Governments lie. The government lied about the drugs for arms Contra scheme orchestrated by Oliver North, and then the government pardoned all the perpetrators so they could get better jobs in the government. Governments lie.

“The government lied about inventing the HIV virus as a means of people of color. Governments lie. The government lied about a connection between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein and a connection between 9.11.01 and Operation Iraqi Freedom. Governments lie."
********
So let's work our way through that mess.
The government never "infected" anyone with syphillis in the Tuskeegee case, although it did not treat some of the patients, who were being studied as the disease pogressed.
Rev. Wright's accusation as to Cambodian bombing (the Viet Cong were of course responsible for taking the war to Cambodia in the first place) and Wright's bizarre imitation of President Nixon are almost impossible to put into any sensible context.
As to the "drugs for arms" story, Wright has it wrong. Arms were sold in order to raise funding for the Nicaraguan Contras which had been cut off by Congress. It was not a 'drugs for arms' deal. After Iran-Contra was investigated, and Colonel Oliver North was convicted, his conviction was overturned on appeal. North was never pardoned. President George H.W. Bush did pardon Caspar Weinberger, Elliott Abrams, Robert McFarlane and three lower level CIA employees in the Iran-Contra matter. Most of the charges were low-level "lying to Congress" charges for which the offenders were to have recieved suspended sentences and in Abrams' case, a fifty-dollar fine. Abrams is the only one of the six pardoned by the elder President Bush to have gone back to government service.
As for any "government lie" about a link between the Saddam Hussein government and the attacks of 9/11, I don't know what supposed "lies" that Wright was talking about. I've never heard a member of the Bush administration claim such a link. I have heard the Bush administration discuss links to terrorism within the old Baathist Iraqi regime, but nly becuase there were such links.

So it seems that Rev. Wright is not "misunderstood"; Rev. Wright is regularly, habitually wrong in his political pronouncements, which are almost too many to count.

Wright speaks truth about race and power relations in the U.S. and in how our power structure relates to the world. It is very disappointing to see Obama distance himself from Wright in such a transparently politician-like self-opportunistic way. White folks in this country still benefit from racism and white supremacy and refuse to acknowledge it. It really is as simple as that. This can truly be a turning point to get white liberals to come to grips with their own privilege in the U.S. and in a true telling of all of our history.

Thanks for your thoughtful follow up Friday night regarding The Rev. Wright. I have one slight correction; he did not say the US Government created the AIDS epidemic; he said, given some of their previous actions (he gave notable examples including the syphilis experiment), he believed they were CAPABLE of doing it. And that, for me, doesn't require such a stretch of the imagination, given their past performance.

I read the intro that illicited all of these comments on the issue of Rev. Wright. I read the Black Value System just now and that issue is twisted way before Rev. Wright. Manford Byrd's no. 1 value mention Commitment to God. And like I said in one of these comments before, the politics bleeding into the black church community makes for a very unhealthy body of Christ. I think there REALLY DOES need to be more unity within our community, more responsibility to each other and rearing up our black men in the fear of God. But starting with the Black Value System, for example, that's just a bad idea. Using the black church as black activism isn't all together good. Dr. King didn't do that. If TUCC decided to set up an black activism group outside of the ministries of their congregation, maybe it would stay separate from the Gospel of Jesus Christ from the gospel of Black Power. We are within our rights and quite justified for the anger we feel as a community, but it has gone too far and Obama's campaign is suffering for it.

THE CLASSIFICATION OF AMERICANS BY RACE AND ETHNICITY MUST END

The Racial and Ethnic classification of Americans is nothing more than institutionalized racism and must be ended. The United States of America has been known as a country of rugged individualism based on individual freedom and liberty. Why has America become a country obsessed with classifying its citizens into different racial and ethnic sub-groups?

The only groups that actively support the continued collection of racial and ethnic data are big government bureaucrats and "racial and ethnic special interest groups” that also happen to receive significant funding from the federal government. These organizations argue that identifying people by race and ethnicity is necessary in order to redress some past injustice and that the federal government must continue to collect and use this information in order to set up special racial and ethnic programs, affirmative action quotas and other set-asides for these groups, some of whom consist of new immigrants, illegal aliens and non-citizens. Nothing can be further from the truth. In a country where we can no longer ask people what religion they are, what their party affiliation is or what their sexual orientation is, why are we still asking them about their racial and ethnic background?

Americans are beginning to realize that racial and ethnic identification is more a matter of personal choice than anything else. In the 2000 Census, seven million American citizens refused to place themselves into a single category by refusing to describe themselves as only white, black, Asian, Latino or any one of the other specific categories listed, because they were of mixed race. Attempts by the government to create a “mixed race” box for the 2000 Census was met with resistance by racial and ethnic special interest groups like the NAACP and the National Council of La Raza, because they feared that a mixed-race box could pose a danger to the justification for their existence. The fuzzier such racial and ethnic categories become, the harder it will be for these racial and ethnic special interest groups and the government to traffic in them. If a mixed-race category were to be added, every brown-skinned person of mixed race registered in this category would shrink the government’s official count of Blacks, Latinos, Asians or American Indians, eventually reducing their political influence and ultimately the amount of money these groups receive from the federal government, which amounts to approximately $185 billion a year.

Through the mandated collection and use of racial and ethnic specific information, more and more of American taxpayers’ hard earned money is being routinely distributed to these racial and ethnic special interest groups at the expense of all other Americans who may or may not be members of these groups. Through executive orders, congressional legislation, affirmative action programs, racial set-asides, quotas and other programs based solely on race and ethnicity, our federal government is playing the key role that pits one racial and ethnic group against another, which could eventually lead to our destruction as a country.

Rather than helping a diverse population become assimilated and united as one nation, the Federal government is doing what the Nazi government of Germany did in the 1930’s and 40’s; creating government supported institutionalized racism by the intentional classification of it’s citizens by race and ethnicity.

With the support of racial and ethnic special interest groups, our federal government seems to view our citizens not just as Americans, but rather as “pawns” in some social science experiment to be classified and separated into different racial or ethnic sub-groups for some unknown purpose. By mandating the classification of Americans into specific racial and ethnic sub-groups, the federal government and the advocates of “diversity” are actually perpetuating institutionalized racism and keeping Americans divided. Maybe the real purpose of collecting this data is to justify the continuing flow of government money to these racial and ethnic special interest groups.

If we want to help poor Americans escape poverty, get better health care, find a job or get a good education, why should it matter what their race or ethnic background is? The answer is: It should not! Americans need to come together as members of one country and remember that we are all individual Americans, regardless of race or ethnic background. Martin Luther King, Jr., inspired a nation when he voiced his dream for a color-blind nation, a nation in which people would be judged by the content of their characters, "not the color of their skin." The answer to this government encouraged racism is the concept of Liberty with a limited, constitutional government that is devoted to the protection of individual rights rather than the claims of different racial and ethnic special interest groups. Where Liberty is present, individual achievement and competence are rewarded, not people’s skin color or ethnicity.

I will support legislation barring the federal government from the collection of racial and ethnic information about the American people and/or the classification of American citizens by race and ethnicity, including the collection of census information. Exceptions should be made for law enforcement, hospitals and medical research purposes.

I will also support legislation that bans affirmative action programs, racial set-asides, quotas and any other programs that give special preferences based on race and ethnicity.

By:
JOHN W. WALLACE
Candidate for Congress
New York’s 20th Congressional District
www.FreedomCandidate.com

THE CLASSIFICATION OF AMERICANS BY RACE AND ETHNICITY MUST END

The Racial and Ethnic classification of Americans is nothing more than institutionalized racism and must be ended. The United States of America has been known as a country of rugged individualism based on individual freedom and liberty. Why has America become a country obsessed with classifying its citizens into different racial and ethnic sub-groups?

The only groups that actively support the continued collection of racial and ethnic data are big government bureaucrats and "racial and ethnic special interest groups” that also happen to receive significant funding from the federal government. These organizations argue that identifying people by race and ethnicity is necessary in order to redress some past injustice and that the federal government must continue to collect and use this information in order to set up special racial and ethnic programs, affirmative action quotas and other set-asides for these groups, some of whom consist of new immigrants, illegal aliens and non-citizens. Nothing can be further from the truth. In a country where we can no longer ask people what religion they are, what their party affiliation is or what their sexual orientation is, why are we still asking them about their racial and ethnic background?

Americans are beginning to realize that racial and ethnic identification is more a matter of personal choice than anything else. In the 2000 Census, seven million American citizens refused to place themselves into a single category by refusing to describe themselves as only white, black, Asian, Latino or any one of the other specific categories listed, because they were of mixed race. Attempts by the government to create a “mixed race” box for the 2000 Census was met with resistance by racial and ethnic special interest groups like the NAACP and the National Council of La Raza, because they feared that a mixed-race box could pose a danger to the justification for their existence. The fuzzier such racial and ethnic categories become, the harder it will be for these racial and ethnic special interest groups and the government to traffic in them. If a mixed-race category were to be added, every brown-skinned person of mixed race registered in this category would shrink the government’s official count of Blacks, Latinos, Asians or American Indians, eventually reducing their political influence and ultimately the amount of money these groups receive from the federal government, which amounts to approximately $185 billion a year.

Through the mandated collection and use of racial and ethnic specific information, more and more of American taxpayers’ hard earned money is being routinely distributed to these racial and ethnic special interest groups at the expense of all other Americans who may or may not be members of these groups. Through executive orders, congressional legislation, affirmative action programs, racial set-asides, quotas and other programs based solely on race and ethnicity, our federal government is playing the key role that pits one racial and ethnic group against another, which could eventually lead to our destruction as a country.

Rather than helping a diverse population become assimilated and united as one nation, the Federal government is doing what the Nazi government of Germany did in the 1930’s and 40’s; creating government supported institutionalized racism by the intentional classification of it’s citizens by race and ethnicity.

With the support of racial and ethnic special interest groups, our federal government seems to view our citizens not just as Americans, but rather as “pawns” in some social science experiment to be classified and separated into different racial or ethnic sub-groups for some unknown purpose. By mandating the classification of Americans into specific racial and ethnic sub-groups, the federal government and the advocates of “diversity” are actually perpetuating institutionalized racism and keeping Americans divided. Maybe the real purpose of collecting this data is to justify the continuing flow of government money to these racial and ethnic special interest groups.

If we want to help poor Americans escape poverty, get better health care, find a job or get a good education, why should it matter what their race or ethnic background is? The answer is: It should not! Americans need to come together as members of one country and remember that we are all individual Americans, regardless of race or ethnic background. Martin Luther King, Jr., inspired a nation when he voiced his dream for a color-blind nation, a nation in which people would be judged by the content of their characters, "not the color of their skin." The answer to this government encouraged racism is the concept of Liberty with a limited, constitutional government that is devoted to the protection of individual rights rather than the claims of different racial and ethnic special interest groups. Where Liberty is present, individual achievement and competence are rewarded, not people’s skin color or ethnicity.

I will support legislation barring the federal government from the collection of racial and ethnic information about the American people and/or the classification of American citizens by race and ethnicity, including the collection of census information. Exceptions should be made for law enforcement, hospitals and medical research purposes.

I will also support legislation that bans affirmative action programs, racial set-asides, quotas and any other programs that give special preferences based on race and ethnicity.

By:
JOHN W. WALLACE
Candidate for Congress
New York’s 20th Congressional District
www.FreedomCandidate.com

I have an American friend who introduced me to that delightfully instructive book "The Power of Myth" - she also predicted that, in the next election, neither the white woman nor the black man would be allowed to win.
As a parent concerned over escalating american military tactics (overseas and at home) I fear that I see my friend's prediction coming true.
I don't usually watch american news but do read alternet and I did watch the entire sermon on youtube and as a white canadian, I could plainly hear Rev. Wright talking a lot of sense ...
Here in Canada we have been bent over a barrel by NAFTA, which has contributed mightily to our current unhappiness with the war in the middle east. The good ol' US is in fact sueing us for such outrages as our refusal legalize Bovine Growth Hormone.
Incidentally, our government has tried to patch things up by firing the Agriculture Canada scientists responsible for decrying BGH.
Once again, our only salvation lies in education. Thank you, Bill Moyers, for trying to educate us!

Mr. Moyers, regarding your essay on Rev. Wright: Thank you for saying what isn't being said elsewhere in the media and applying reason to help sort out the many influences underlying how the Wright controversy is covered in the media. In fact, the syndicated media is as controversial as Rev. Wright in its unending efforts to reinforce the legitimacy of linking the beliefs and policies of Obama to his paster. Clearly this line of reporting could get pretty messy if every public official was held to this standard of "association." I thought that we (as a society) had worked through that approach already with Sen McCarthy and found that it didn't serve the public's best interests? I'm looking forward to your thoughtful analysis of Rev. Wrights thesis on reconciliation and how this may be timely given recent events.

Bill Moyers,
I have always had great respect for you, and I didn't think I could like you more, but I do. We have banned tv from our home for many years, and I'm never a victim of the media situation; recently, I've been following the stories, videos, blogs online vociferously. It's astounding. Listening to you tallk is so refreshing, smart, thoughtful, and thought-provoking. Makes me want to at least have pbs.

Bill Moyers,
I have always had great respect for you, and I didn't think I like you more, but I do. We have banned tv from our home for many years, and I'm never a victim of the media situation; recently, I've been following the stories, videos, blogs online vociferously. It's astounding. Listening to you tallk is so refreshing, smart, thoughtful, and thought-provoking. Makes me want to at least have pbs.

To Ms. Joyce Allard. I will do my best to explain this anomaly from a young black american female perspective. It has been a long standing fact that since slavery and Jim Crow, that the dominating White majority applied the one drop rule to those who are known to have the one drop of African blood. This has lopped mulattos and light-complected people into this African American experience. The experience itself is something someone is brought up in. There are plenty of people out there who are passing for white or walking around without the knowledge of their African blood. But they may not know the black american experience. Wright's complexion is not a factor. How much white blood or black blood he has isn't the issue. He's been speaking from an African American experience because he has experienced it. It is an interesting observation, but the human genome and the many forms it takes is beyond our control and has nothing to do with a cultural experience. Now, I also want to make note that not all of Wright's broadcasted sayings speak for the African American community as a whole. Like any of race of people, the perspectives are complex, and it is unfair to make a blanket statement that all Blacks feel the way he's stated about us. BUT what I think he's done was to say what we all think in the back of our minds. It sounds crazier to say it in front of the majority (Whites), but some of his speeches (even though I disagree with them fervently) has even been going on in the back of my mind before I ever heard anyone boldly say them. I don't think what Rev. Wright has said behind the pulpit, in light of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, was right. The Gospel of Christ should be preached behind the pulpit, not the African American angers and conspiracy theories. There's another appropriate platform for that, and he should've found another way. I still don't wholeheartedly agree with everything he's done and said because of the convoluted effects.

To Ms. Joyce Allard. I will do my best to explain this anomaly from a young black american female perspective. It has been a long standing fact that since slavery and Jim Crow, that the dominating White majority applied the one drop rule to those who are known to have the one drop of African blood. This has lopped mulattos and light-complected people into this African American experience. The experience itself is something someone is brought up in. There are plenty of people out there who are passing for white or walking around without the knowledge of their African blood. But they may not know the black american experience. Wright's complexion is not a factor. How much white blood or black blood he has isn't the issue. He's been speaking from an African American experience because he has experienced it. It is an interesting observation, but the human genome and the many forms it takes is beyond our control and has nothing to do with a cultural experience. Now, I also want to make note that not all of Wright's broadcasted sayings speak for the African American community as a whole. Like any of race of people, the perspectives are complex, and it is unfair to make a blanket statement that all Blacks feel the way he's stated about us. BUT what I think he's done was to say what we all think in the back of our minds. It sounds crazier to say it in front of the majority (Whites), but some of his speeches (even though I disagree with them fervently) has even been going on in the back of my mind before I ever heard anyone boldly say them. I don't think what Rev. Wright has said behind the pulpit, in light of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, was right. The Gospel of Christ should be preached behind the pulpit, not the African American angers and conspiracy theories. There's another appropriate platform for that, and he should've found another way. I still don't wholeheartedly agree with everything he's done and said because of the convoluted effects.

Jeremiah Wright is lighter-complected than Barack Obama. Why has no one (Wright included) revealed his racial heritage? I deplore the fact that anyone with a drop of African blood is automatically considered black. That is just dumb, and generates racism on both sides. Someone please explain this to me. Thank you, Joyce Allard (Caucasian)

While I do not like everything that Rev. Wright has said, I cannot find it in my heart to condemn the man. What gives me the greatest sympathy for him is the fact that he is not altogether wrong. Just today, one James E. Woodard, a 55 year old black male was released from prison in Dallas Texas. He was falsely accused and imprisoned for 3 decades for murder. DNA evidence finally freed him, but the reality is that the evidence against him was never there.

To date 17 black men have been released from jail in Dallas after an examination of the DNA evidence. That's 17 out of 40 cases examined. That's a pretty high error rate by any measure; one, dare I say, driven by racism. No white men or women have been freed, none were imprisoned on the same kind of slim evidence that convicted Mr. Woodard; apparently our drive to imprison someone in every case only extends to black men.

Of course the black men in Dallas have it better than black men in other Texas cities. Dallas was the only city that made a substantial effort to save DNA from such cases. Tough luck if you're from Houston.

Is it so hard to see why men such as Rev. Wright are mad? Is it so hard to see why they don't feel that America is the best, why they might even want to curse her at times?

I was raised thinking that America was above such things as the imprisonment of a man for the color of his skin, Rev. Wright was not. That he should rail against the things that we do wrong is a testament to him as a human being, like him or not.

As long as we as people attempt to isolate ourselves as other than just american's or just religious we will never be united. Every underprivileged group who came to america either by their own will or in shackles was mis-treated or abused by the capitalist system. It is the nature of the beast. Get Over It. The Native Americans have been mis-treated and abused more than any other group and yet I see no special empathy toward them either. Our next president Barack Obama is living proof of opportunities in this great nation. The time has come for ALL americans to Get Over It already. Poor people of every race and ethnicity have had as much opportunity as anyone if they really desired to better their life. Instead of whining and claiming foul. I as well as others are the son & daughters of abandoned welfare mother's, although from drive & desire rose through the ranks to achieve the american dream after attending poor inner city schools. Go and make a better life instead of whining about the sins of america. America is the land of opportunity!

It is simplistic to describe opposition to Wright as “racial”. Wright joins others who are anti-scientific: this includes Falwell and Liberty “University”, the present Republican Administration, and Bryan “University” in Dayton, TN, to name three. Wright attributes Hurricane “Katrina” to causes other than scientific: Falwell and Liberty “University” and others teach that astronomy, geology, biology including evolution, physics, chemistry, and other scientific disciplines are wrong. What a strange contrast occurs when all want young people to participate in scientific education but no one denounces the anti-scientists!

It is simplistic to describe opposition to Wright as “racial”. Wright joins others who are anti-scientific: this includes Falwell and Liberty “University”, the present Republican Administration, and Bryan “University” in Dayton, TN, to name three. Wright attributes Hurricane “Katrina” to causes other than scientific: Falwell and Liberty “University” and others teach that astronomy, geology, biology including evolution, physics, chemistry, and other scientific disciplines are wrong. What a strange contrast occurs when all want young people to participate in scientific education but no one denounces the anti-scientists!

After weeks of reading commentary and hearing inflammatory rhetoric about Obama and Wright on the Internet, it is frustrating to find that - as usual - the real issues aren’t being addressed. The reason most of you responding negatively to Wrght and to those who are supportive and in agreement with him is so you can divert attention from these bigger issues.

It's easy to ignore the context of Wright’s speeches and answers and focus on a comment or two. God forbid one actually get the big picture. To focus on and denounce Wright's belief about U.S. involvement in creating AIDs or that he appears "hateful" or wouldn't denounce Farrakhan certainly helps to keep the focus OFF all the other pointed comments he made and we all should know about this country's legacy of slavery and injustice - though some pretend not to. From genocide of Native Americans and theft of their land, imperialist wars, from the Mexican-American War to Iraq today, government corruption can all be ignored when the focus is on Wright's "arrogant attitude" or some of his angry responses to absurd questions. After all, what's he got to be angry about? We know Jesus never got angry, or did he? For those who don’t believe Christians should never become angry, read in the New Testament how Jesus drives the moneychangers out of the temple. I don’t think he was smiling at the time.

I'd especially love to hear how the ones who call Wright crazy address the facts surrounding the Tuskegee Experiments.

“The United States government did something that was wrong—deeply, profoundly, morally wrong. It was an outrage to our commitment to integrity and equality for all our citizens. . . . clearly racist. “
—President Clinton's apology for the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment to the eight remaining survivors, May 16, 1997

The CIA had to admit their involvement in the Crack Cocaine epidemic of the 90's after journalists documented and exposed them. The more famous books documenting the CIA and drug trafficking are “Dark Alliance” by Gary Webb - now deceased - and "Whiteout" by Jeffrey St. Clair and Alexander Cockburn. If it's a conspiracy theory these folks have constructed, it's certainly a detailed one with plenty of documentation from a myriad of journalists. Could it be they all just wanted to cater to black paranoia?

This country has a well-documented, widely acknowledged history of racism. If you don’t want to hear from African-Americans, just ask the Arab-Americans who were hauled off to prison under the Patriot Act after 9/11/2001 and deported to countries that they originally fled from under fear of imprisonment and torture.

This country is now in a economic crisis that is ostensibly connected to the impossibly expensive wars we wage in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as to deep corruption in Washington. Our wars in the Middle East are illegal, violate international law and are based on massive lies. Most of the private contractors (weapons manufacturers, suppliers, mercenary groups) the government hires - with our tax dollars - make hundreds of millions from these wars. If Wright speaks to the blood on our hands and includes all of us in this statement, why react with disbelief, when so many of us know this to be fact?

Whether you believe in God or not, whether you believe this country has gotten past racism or not, if you disagree or hate what he said, please go beyond the AIDs and Farrakhan statements that Wright made (Farrakhan is the usual strawman the MSM tosses out at all prominant blacks who talk about white racism). It's too easy. It lets you off the hook from seeing the overall picture: We have not stopped our quest for Empire (which is why McCain wants 100 years more in Iraq), and we all are slowly losing our rights - both civil and human - as a result. Regardless of skin color, we all have very big issues to be concerned about.

We have a media that continuously lies to us and has lied to us for a long time. There's no reason to cater to a power that crucifies anyone - regardless of skin color - that doesn't tow their line. How could we possibly suppose we have the absolute truth on anything, if we base what we know on their reports? They prove over and over again how unreliable they are. They exist to turn a profit, not to give us the truth. They will villify and extol anyone if it gets people to watch and to distract us from the real problems that exist on this planet.

When was the last time we saw weeks of headlines screaming about Climate Change? How much play do they give to the Bush Administration's secret signing statements and dismissal of Constitutional Law? How many times have the presidential candidates been asked by the media about the increasing privatization of the government and military? How about the corporate fraud that created the home foreclosure crisis? What would they do to reign in the power of lobbyists in Washington? What looping soundbites have they given over the growing economic disparity in this country between rich and poor, the increasing surveillance of our population, our disappearing civil liberties, our unaffordable healthcare, the many hundreds of billions of dollars given to the Pentagon and agencies like the NSA? How well are we performing in this endless War on Terror?

Governments lie. They always have and always will. To dismiss assertions that they have lied in the past requires proof that they always tell the truth. You won't find any documentation of that: real journalism uncovers the lies that those in power tell all the time. To focus on one unorthodox belief and label the believer insane is nonsense. Most of us hold some unorthodox or controversial belief. It’s called independent thinking. If you’ve never done it before, you might want question your own sanity.

To call people who question this county’s motives and bring its “sins” to light as anti-American or haters of America presumes that our leaders are all-good and beyond questioning. It presumes our policies - domestic and foreign - have at their source and heart some sort of divine guidance or indisputable good. That belief is not a democratic one - it’s one that supports a dictatorship, a monarchy or a theocracy. That belief opposes the 1st Amendment, which guarantees free speech and an open forum for all opinions to be stated. Divisions are what make us human: we can’t possibly agree on everything - but why be intolerant and dismissive of those who don’t believe or act the way we do? That is the essence, IMO, of what Wright was saying. He didn’t call anyone names. He didn’t threaten anyone with violence, unlike our government. He didn’t simplify his argument, unlike the mainstream media. The real work ahead for all of us as citizens is to keep the presumed leaders focused on making the U.S. a real democracy, one that welcomes all voices - critical or not - and to stop expecting simple answers to complex problems.

"Jeremiah is a bullfrog and he's a friend of mine."

Thank you, Bill Moyers, for your courage once again to express the painful truth about the Wright controversy in your follow up piece on May 2nd.. The diatribe spewed by a majority of the media was certainly the politics of personal destruction and a very sad commentary on their ability and willingness to hold an intelligent conversation on race.
On the other hand, Senator Obama has the intelligence, willingness and ability to have this conversation and many other conversations that would move the people of the United States in to a higher and more conscious vibration. Hopefully, we can count on enough people to have the discernment to recognize a very capable leader when they hear one.

Jeremiah Wright is obviously a self-hating member of the Mulatto Elite whose anti-white ravings mask his belief that he's not good enough for the honor of this European ancestry. His skin is lighter than Obama's and I'll bet at least one of his parents looks as white as Obama's mother.

Dear Mr. Moyers:

If there is a time when someone should be commended for taking a stance against hypocrisy in the field of journalism, it is you! I applaud your sentiments expressed on your show, which aired Friday, May 2nd, 2008 on PBS in a eloquent rebuttal to the controversy involving Reverend Jeremiah Wright. My husband and I believe that there is not enough 'true' journalistic individuals in today's mainstream media spectrum, but you, sir, have undoubtedly shown to the public why we, the general public, regardless of our race, ethnicity, religious beliefs, or geographic origin of birth, that our maligned ignorance that is often taught early in life by sheer covert & overt racism bred from generation to generation, will in the long-run become a self-actualization of spiritual demise with an ultimate goal of achieving disunity for many many years to come in America.

Your 'on-point' introduction to the foul air of discontent spewed by mainstream & cable media outlets to continue feeding negative and overt overtones of straight & reverse 'psychological racism' that is designed to foster fear mongering of racial discord in America among American born men, women, and children from every spectrum of the hu[e]man race is so transparent that it is no wonder that our country is in a tizzy economically, academically, financially, spiritually, etc.

Thus, too many of us still cannot accept, embrace, nor fathom the sheer notion of having a Black Man as the President of the United States of America! Instead, the idea of having a Caucasian man or woman to lead a country, which many believe deep down in the hearts and souls that such a person may not suit our country's needs in a positive way is preferable than having a man who has proven exceptionally well despite, and in spite of the tumultuous controversial news-lynchings Senator Barack Obama have faced in the media circus.

But you know what? The majority of people in America, most of whom were Caucasians, wanted the current President Bush to govern this country believing that "they" will dominate in every way in this country, and as a result, have not done so. Hence, the majority of people who are hurting in this wacky economy, recession, home foreclosures, bad health exhausting their pensions, etc. are the same Caucasians who are feeling what many Blacks, Hispanics, and poor Whites have already experienced for years!

So, now, here we are again . . . preferring to have another Caucasian man, or a Caucasian woman, both of whom have NEVER felt, nor experienced what it is liked to be Black, Hispanic, or poor, but yet, who will most likely become nominated and/or elected as President of the U.S.A. because of the sheer pure unadulterated inherent fear of having a Black Man who knows and understands the communities and cultures of folks who are Black, Caucasian (White), Hispanic, Asian, Native American, and who can relate to the economic woes we are facing in America. However, I guess it is easier to believe that Senator Obama is not Presidential material because of Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the so-called "bitter comments" (most of which a myriad of Whites AGREED with Sen. Obama), the so-called 'elitist' farce, and on, and on, and on! I guess that is easier to blame these lame excuses instead of facing the sheer cold facts that having a Black Man is NOT acceptable!

Thank you Mr. Moyer's for showing other journalists where they lie very short in their chosen field of journalism. However, I haven't heard or read any of your show's "sound bites" on any of the other so-called journalist shows. Hhmmmm, I wonder why?

May you continue to do good work for a long time to come.

I think even Bill Moyers has not had the opportunity to see the videos of Pastor Wright's appearances at the National Press Club or at the NAACP.

If he had seen them, then he would not give the slightest bit of credence to the smear campaign being waged against Wright.

You do not have to be a psychologist to analyze behavior that did not happen. The behavior that did happen was the media once again distorting Wright's remarks.

I know a lot of you are thinking, "Surely the media cannot be blatantly distorting these recent events after they have been called to task for distorting his sermons."

Well you would be wrong. You should be thinking, "If they did it once, why wouldn't they do it again?"

For all the wailing there is in support of Rev. Wright "spekaing truth to power," it remains that Barack Obama and the highest-level leadership in his campaign have decided that Wright was toxic.

I wonder how much it was that Wright's "AIDS conspiracy" comments were the straw that broke the camel's back in this instance. Because the AIDS support community, a mjor force in Democratic politics must have been rightfully outraged and offended (Obama said "all Americans" would be "rightfully offended" by Wright's comments) by the scientifically and morally deceptive theory that AIDS was the product of a government conspiracy.

Liberal Democrats are good at railing against racism and injustice as long as they don't step on the toes of any of their own special interests in the process.

Consequently, while Democrats might talk about past racism, they'll rarely mention the past racism of the labor unions. And while Democrats might talk about limiting the influence of the wealthy and powerful, it's not likely that they'll mention the wealthy and powerful trial lawyers.

It is obvious the reason Barack Obama remained in a setting/church community that gives him an identity, of which the racism of America robs people like him!

Barack Obama was conceived in a white womb.
Barack Obama fell from white loins.
Barack Obama played 'hide and seek' under a white skirt as a toddler.
Barack Obama grew up in a white household as a youngster.

Then tadaa!
Barack Obama began to grow into a young man.

And Barack is reminded that he (COMING FROM A WHITE HOUSEHOLD) needed to learn to accept the racist-ASSIGNED identity that he was now a Black man in America!

And so Barack Obama fortunately found acceptance, in a Black Chicago community/church, of his pigmentation and WHITE UPBRINGING.

All the racists Americans who continue to wail on Obama over his association with a Black church, which helped to cement the RACIST-ASSIGNED Black identity in America, will surely be damned! lol

The good rev has said during his remarks before the National Press Club that his comments were edited. Moyers and company should post the entire, complete interview without editing on this web site so that all may watch and judge for themselves. To do less is to suggest that Moyers and staff are preventing this man from making his case in full. On the air there are the restrictions of time, online, here, there is not. Please post the entire uncut interview. It's the only right thing to do. Thank you

As long as people attempt to isolate ourselves as other than american we will never be united. Every underprivileged group who came here either by their own will or in shackles was mis-treated and abused. The Native Americans have been mis-treated and abused more than any other group and yet we feel no special empathy toward them either. Our next president Barack Obama is living proof of opportunities in this great nation. The time has come to get over it already. Go and make a better life instead of whining about the sins of america. America is the land of opportunity!

Rich Kirk

One senses that you are trying to be sincere in your position on Moyers' insightful comment.
However, generations of mis-education seems to get in the way.

The hoopla over Rev Right RELIGIOUS RHETORIC says more about Americans' racism and IGNORANCE than it does about Rev Right, AN OLD MAN!

THREATS (which are the precursors of actions) ARE the kinds of words on which Americans should be wasting so much time, energy and attention!

When maniac muslims THREATEN to destroy Americans and DO demonstrate that they follow through with ACTION, then those are the kinds of words that deserve the kinds of attention Americans are wasting on the RELIGIOUS RHETORIC of Rev Right!

No one who is virtuous, honest and effectively educated will blame Rev Right for the much ado over mere HARMLESS AMERICAN RELIGIOUS RHETORIC!

For anyone who thinks even slightly on the hoopla surrounding Rev Right, the CONSTANT REPLAYING of particular clips of sermons by the media morons, should be a DEAD GIVE AWAY that replays were done by racists.

The clips were OVERPLAYED to polarize Americans by taking advantage of their ignorance and racist disposition?

It is not like Rev Right words were real threats and the precursors of destructive actions to any American?
So why waste so much time, effort and attention, when REAL THREATS (not mere religious rhetoric) to Americans are outstanding in Afghanistan and Pakistan, etc?

The real problem with the Rev Right affair is neither with the OLD MAN, Rev Right, or with Obama.

The real problem with the OVERBLOWN Rev Right affair IS with the fertile ground of AMERICA'S RACISM, in which mere RELIGIOUS RHETORIC is given a life by racists that is much much bigger than the HARMLESS RELIGIOUS RHETORIC is worth!

"I tremble for my country when I think God is just and justice does not sleep forever". Thomas Jefferson

Wright spoke about: As you sow, so shall you reap. Wright, then is the fruit sown by Jim Crow and RIP, Emmett Till who could be celebrating turning 67 this year along with Wright.

Obama had it right he first time~he understood Wright and his character and did not agree with him on many things.

If there were no white supremacists there would be no Rev. Wrights. Why would a Supreme Court Justice (Sandra Day O'Connor) rule in favor of the Ku Klux Klan over 14th Amendment rights of "equal protection under the law" of those being terrorized in 1998 by the Klan. Case decided in 2001, I believe letting the terrorize off the hook.

Moyer, sir, you have it right, the commenters will never "get it". They are part of the problem.

Bill Moyers has written a touching lament for the tragedy of Barack Obama and Jeremiah Wright.

"All the rest of us should hang our heads in shame for letting it come to this in America..."

All the rest of us, specifically everyone except Barack Obama and Jeremiah Wright, should hang our heads in shame?

Shame on us... for anything and everything that happens anywhere ever in the history of the world? For every stupid, hateful thing that anyone may ever say or do?

This garbage sounds like a parody of "bleeding heart" liberals by Rush Limbaugh on one of his really bad days!

We should "hang our heads in shame for letting it come to this in America," when a black Senator can become the leading candidate for President of the United States?

We should "hang our heads in shame for letting it come to this in America," when the only thing that can keep Barack Obama out of the White House is his own cowardice for not confronting Jeremiah Wright?

I feel so ashamed that Barack Obama didn't have the balls to confront his hate-freak pastor for 20 years!

But look, says Bill Moyers! Jeremiah Wright doesn't scream hate-speech every second of every day!

Jeremiah Wright actually managed to talk to Moyers for a whole hour without screaming hate at whitey!

What a wonderful guy!

And when David Duke or some other KKK lunatic comes on Bill Moyers and manages to avoid the N-word for an hour...

Is Bill Moyers going to tell us how ashamed we should be for condemning the KKK?

This is a new low in low standards!

If you can act sane for 60 minutes, then anything else you may have ever said or done was probably just a freakish aberration!

Hurrah for Barack Obama and his hate-freak pastor!

But none of Moyers' excuses kept Obama from throwing Jeremiah Wright under the bus!

"He finally leaves Obama no choice but to end their friendship..."

Poor little Obama! No choice! Whitey made him renounce his dear friend! We should all be so ashamed!

Now let's all sing "God damn America!" along with Barack and Jeremiah and Bill Moyers, and spend the next 4 years wondering how the Democrats lost another election.

So let's make it a little less simple:

First: Obama makes the most condescending defense of Jeremiah Wright that it is possible to imagine, even including racist language from the days of Jim Crow... He's my crazy old "uncle."

Then Obama gets exposed by his own advisor for bullshitting about NAFTA.

The Obama decides it's a wonderful idea to undermine every gun-control law ever written, and make it almost impossible to write new gun-control legislation.

Then Obama votes to fund the war in Iraq every chance he gets and then he throws Jeremiah Wright under the bus for saying exactly the same things he has been saying for 20 years.

Maybe some of us are just too simple-minded to understand how Barack Obama could be anything other than an absolutely unscrupulous politician and all-around bullshitter, and I'm sure Bill Moyers would want us to be very ashamed...

And meanwhile Moyers and all the other Obamabots and Obama himself can just go on shamelessly bullshitting forever!

Reverend Wright speaks his truth. If white America (I am white by the way) can not hear or understand his truth, it is only because they are living in denial of what race in America means. Having white skin means having the privilege of not having to think about race. Reverend Wright is right about so many things he said. Even his comments about the US government being complicit in bringing HIV to the black (and I would add, gay) community, is not that off-base. I remember hearing an ex-CIA agent, named John Stockwell who went public with all he knew about what the CIA has done in the interest of "national security" - horrifying experiments that have been done on unsuspecting Americans. I do not trust our government today - the government that lied to us about Iraq, any more than I trust the government of Ronald Reagan, that traded arms for hostages and lied to us about it. Blind faith in our leaders just makes us blind. Because Wright is speaking the truth, he is seen as a threat, and that is why the media is so intent on discrediting him. How about discrediting the real threats to our safety - George W. Bush, Dick Cheyney and the axis of evil that inhabits our very goverment. Wright is not the threat, those in power who will stop at nothing to secure their power are.

I wonder whether this needs to be the racial issue that many are making it.

Former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Newt Gingrich had this to say about the matter:
**********
GINGRICH: Well, let me say, first of all, I think that there are a lot of other issues that matter. I think health matters, the environment matters, the economy matters, a lot of -- energy matters. But where I think it's hard to even explain this, and you're going to hate this answer...

COLMES: Thanks for letting me know ahead of time.

GINGRICH: ... is Jeremiah Wright is actually not so much representative of the black church as he is representative of the hard left. He's much closer to -- to Noam Chomsky. He's much closer to Bill Ayers. He's much closer to a tradition that sees America as the center of evil in the world. And that's actually an ideological base.
**********
I think that there is great merit to what Gingrich says. The more I hear of Wright, the more I am convinced that the soundbites, the snippets, are actually in keeping with Wright's overall message. Wright hasn't been misquoted. He's been one of the most carefully quoted people in public life today. And the sermons of Wright don't have all that much to do with theology or the Soutside Chicago community; they could just as easily have been deliverd by disgraced Colorado professor Ward Churchill, or by Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, or by white radicals in Berkeley, Claifornia; Cambridge, Massachusetts, or Madison, Wisconsin.

I was unable to view your program in which you interviewed Rev. Jeremiah Wright but did catch your follow-up comments last Friday night. For perhaps the first time in memory, I found myself taking issue with what you were saying.
Like Nixon, the Rev. Wright was arrogant enough to have himself recorded making statements that to say the least, prudence would have dictated that he should not have done. I was in very white Oregon (I live in central Philadelphia) when the tapes were played nationally, and I found myself explaining to folks there that it is impossible to be black in America and NOT be exposed to this kind of rhetoric incessantly, and not just in church, either. If you are black, this kind of rhetoric can and will come from some of your dearest friends and not all of them are Reverends.
Of course, the folks in Oregon had not construed the remarks as particularly anti-American, as the press always reports it. They had construed the remarks as anti-white. There is a difference.
I have to agree that the Rev. Wright’s bitterness and frustrations are totally and completely understandable. Those of us who have really studied American history with an open mind are still learning more about the extent of atrocities committed against our fellow African American citizens, and at times they seem to never end. Just this year, the Jenna Six incident showed all too clearly that the centuries-old racialist traditions are far from extinguished deep in the white psyche. No one is more aware of that than African Americans.
But it is also true that the same time, in the last forty years, the race dynamic in America has inextricably changed. That is not to say that the problems have been solved, they have not, but race issues have become far more plastic and dynamic now for a whole generation in America. It is also true that a lot of honest effort has been expended in white America in unlearning and unloading some of the worst biases and oppressive behaviors of our past in an effort to at least include African Americans equally in the “privileges” of today’s America, such as they are. We still have a long way to go.
Then, along comes Barack Obama, who is the very embodiment of what so many of us have yearned for but never thought we’d see in our lifetimes. Obama has completely captured the hearts of African Americans to a degree which surprised even me, but he is also clearly someone with whom tens of millions of white Americans feel totally comfortable, and probably 90% of them have never before even contemplated voting for an African American, let alone actually done so. If this isn’t a breakthrough, I just don’t know what is. Obama represents a bridge which could do more for crossing America’s racial gap and making us whole than any person who has come before him in our entire history. He has put America at a historic crossroads, ready or not. And when will a second opportunity of this sort present itself again?
It is in this context that I must disagree with your defense of Rev. Wright, however muted. The first “outing” of Rev. Wright, with its grotesque rhetoric and the revelation of his mentorship of Obama, was ill received by the white population that still knows too little about our African American fellow citizens, and it had a chilling effect. The one race skill that most whites in America have mastered best is when to interpret black rhetoric as anti-white, but with too little understanding or patience with what underlies the rhetoric to which they are so sensitized. Hence, Obama, who is so remarkably free of this rhetoric and thinking himself, got tainted with a harsh stigma as a matter of guilt by association with his mentor and pastor, Rev. Wright.
The telling issue with Rev. Wright, however, is not what happened in the first round, although it was stupendously regrettable, but rather, the issue is with his astonishing follow-up. He showed no repentance for the serious damage he had done. He was self-righteous while slickly dodging question after question. Worst of all, the whole nation saw him utter the word “politician” in reference to Obama with the same now infamous snarly contempt that he used in hissing “America the Beautiful”, but now aimed directly at his own black pupil whom he once brought to Jesus Christ. Oh, the irony of it! Oh, where does it end? The Rev. Wright, and those few who so ardently applauded his second round of demagoguery, thus managed to worsen the already irreparable damage they have done and are possibly destroying one of the greatest opportunities of the entire historic American experiment. Since I do not think the man stupid, I can only conclude that for reasons that are inexplicable, the Rev. Wright and his followers do not want the status quo of adversarial race relations to change one iota in America. Perhaps too comfortable in their current mind-set, too fearful to step outside the cloak of their own oppression, they are unable to see beyond their own biases and frustrations to the real possibilities for a better America. What the Rev. Wright has done is clearly harmful to the whole of America, and as usual, it is more harmful to blacks in America than to whites, and yet in his self-righteous delusion he has completely failed to grasp it. Instead, Wright saw fit to quote the Bible: “That which ye have sown, that shall ye also….” And to add to the drama, he let his followers finish the quote.
Indeed? Well, congratulations and right back at you, Rev. Wright. A few choice Bible verses might be thrown at you, too, but you probably are deaf to that sort of thing.
I see no reason for anyone to feel any need to apologize for Rev. Wright. I appreciate that you interviewed him, it is important, even, since it is what it is, but there is no need to defend him when he is helping no one. And while I’m on the subject, not all white Americans, not even all white Christian Americans, either overlook or excuse the bigoted pronouncements of the Rev. Pat Robertson, the Rev. Jerry Falwell, the Rev. Billy Graham, and their pathetic ilk, with their fundamentalist venom and fraudulent Christian quackery. They do indeed fool a lot of people, but they do not fool everyone. They are in fact, along with the Rev. Wright, all members of the same fraternity. The question before us all now lingers heavily in the spring mists: can enough Americans of all colors find a way to overcome all the demagoguery and race-baiting and do the right thing, just this once, together, for a better America at THIS historic moment?
Thanks for listening. I still have hope.
Rich Kirk

Well, Bill, I was watching Reliable Sources and they played a clip where you said "BILL MOYERS, PBS: This is crazy and wrong. White preachers are given leeway in politics that others aren't. All the rest of us should hang our heads in shame for letting it come to this in America, where the gluttony of the nonstop media grinder consumes us all and prevents an honest conversation on race."

I thought the point was important enough to watch the entire clip. I was not disappointed.

I think your brand of journalism is on decline. The soft news has taken over and has made fools of the American public. We don't want a media personality interpreting the story for us. We just want the facts on a 24 hour basis. If people want to slant our opinion, why not leave that type of opinion on a network devoted to a particular brand of politics.

The decline in media's ability to give us basic information means our democracy has eroded beyond belief. The Fourth Estate is not in that position to give us propaganda. It is in that position to give us the who? the what? the where? and how it impacts me, a member of the public? The media is so fawning in its self reverential treatment that it can't admit that it is leading the American public to ruin.

I don't blame you for giving Rev. Wright an opportunity to explain himself nor do I blame the National Press Club for giving him a forum to disparage the media. I do think it is pretty disingenuous to have the media turn around and condemn Wright for the platform they've given him.

At some point, where is the shame?

Bill and D. -
The Civil War "argument", which it was not, was an effort to point out that during the Civil War, more people were killed in trying to secure the right of all men to be free, to be treated equally; as many as were killed in all our other major wars. Anyone who really read the post knows it wasn't a "we saved your butt" comment.
If fighting and dying over every man's freedom was that important to those men - then it should be at least of "equal importance to us now." I hope that helps clear up that comment for you.
Wright, is right in what he points out but since your interview with him he has been negative in his presentation.
Obama is coming from a positive direction. Wright's remarks in regard to Obama, are negative and regressive.
It appears that Obama would present the problems with less rancor and move us "all" forward.

I see that there are still some people who are deluded and think that racial strife in America is something that is just a minor annoyance. They wax eloquently like a Rodney King, talking about can't we all just get along. They don't see it, the insidious and destructive way that racism has entrenched itself in the very being of some people and perpetuates itself generation after generation. These people with blinders are lamenting the same old song since the beginning of slavery, "Hey, everybody else has it bad too, what's your beef?" If you think that the Indians aren't feeling the pains of the past, read a book, visit a reservation. Last hired, first fired, police racial profiling, or just straight up police brutality, being dragged behind trucks, are just some examples that racism is alive and well. Rev. Wright is not racism, Rev. Wright is a response to racism. You can't just wish something away. If you want racism to end, then find out what it is, define it, talk about it, don't do it yourself, and make sure when it shows up in your presence, you let it know it's not welcome. Stop suffering from naivete, misinformation, ego, and hurt feelings, or you'll be stuck in that circle of perpetual slave and master. The person who hasn't been burned by the fire shouldn't be telling the one who has how to feel. Empathy, try it on, see how it fits.

I liked the Bill Moyers interview, especially the first part. I don't think it was wrong to softball the questions after parts of Wrights sermons were looped. Maybe PBS should take the opportunity to revisit the origins of aids question. That is the title of Tom Curtis' 1992 Rolling Stone article. Is he still around? Edward Hooper could be interviewed as well. No vaccine has been developed so far - does that have anything to do with the origin of AIDS?

Trish your eloquent and 100% correct statement reveals the "real" truth that even a marginal commentator like bill moyers refuses to admit

Thank you for being you!

Bob, I am not a left-wing propagandist. I do not understand the terms 'left-wing' and 'right-wing,' any more than I understand the terms 'liberal' and 'conservative.' I know a fair amount about war because of the course I developed and taught for an Honors Program, which was called "Documentary Film and Literature of Modern War.' What I learned from extensive research for the course is what led to my closing comment about America's perhaps unwitting slide into corruption and danger.

The United States, historically, has been-and remains-naive about war in comparison with European countries, which have had far too much direct experience of it. I have lived in Paris and London; I have spent a great deak if time traveling in Europe; I was in Britain when the Israeli-Lebanese war broke out; I was convinced we were on the brink of World War Three. I remain convinced that we are moving toward that potentially apocalyptic conflict. Anyway, I regret that you miscontrused my remarks. Regards, M A Wimsatt

Bill Moyers did this whole discussion a great disservice by not asking the hard questions in his "conversation" with Rev. Wright. I the Reverend says that his words were taken out of context then ask him what he meant in context. Bill didn't even go that far. His questions were softball and his approach was to advocate for his interviewee rather than to ask any informative question. Bill showed no journalistic instincts in this situation and we all have lost out because of it.

Reverend Wright is the perfect example of why we still have the KKK, we still need the EEOC, and every other program that we have been subject to since Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves. There have been and continue to be massive divides in our country that we've never been able to breach simply because we can't seem to move past the issue of color, religious differences, sex and every other issue that makes us all unique and different which is how God created us. People like Wright are the reason that we cannot unite as one people and move past the issues that we have allowed to divide our nation.

Wright’s inability and unwillingness to move beyond the bitterness of the civil rights violations, the battles of the past, battles that continue today. Battles that never see the light of a press announcement or merit an obscure story line on page 13 of any paper published. Wright and others like him just re-enforce the belief of a minority of people that our nation can never work past our differences, and move on as a nation of ONE, which we should have done years ago.
As a child and young adult in the 1960s, 70s I witnessed the segregation that was still practiced, the separate dining areas and entrances, the “less than” treatment that blacks were subject to that their ancestors experienced before Lincoln freed the slaves. I experienced first hand the outrage that my father displayed when I brought twin black girls from my school home because they were my friends. Generations have been taught that we don’t cross the racial divide, its unacceptable behavior yet no one could explain why other than “I said so.”

I don’t understand the “African American experience”. I don’t believe that we are in Africa and the majority of blacks that mention it couldn’t trace their ancestry back to Africa within the last 300 years if they tried. Why is this something that is advocated not just by the people, but is permissible and acceptable behavior that is touted by the press? This is America, not Africa so it should be the American experience with no reference to Africa or any other nation or color involved. Do other minorities have a version of every media outlet that the blacks have? No, because it’s not “politically correct or acceptable.” Do we apologize to the Indian Nations for the treatment that they were and are still subject to when we invaded American and herded them on to reservations? Why do we dwell in the past, never letting old wounds heal, and working as hard to bridge the differences between us as a people as we have to separate the races? Because of people like Wright, and as long as people like Wright are allowed the access to media we will never move from the past into the future. As long as the media gives the radical, disenfranchised, bitter people a platform, we will always be a nation divided.

Who is Barack Obama? The first thing that comes to MY mind is: “right rap, right look, right conman”. Americans look to Obama or any other smooth talking politician to tell them what they want to hear, whether it be regarding hope, change or more perks. Americans have proved themselves naive before and will prove themselves once again dumb as dishwater after being sucked into another politicians self serving smooth talk. Regardless of who wins the election we will not prosper, the politicians get richer and we will keep dreaming until death due us part.

Thank you Mr. Moyers for further clarification that you my friend are not a non-biased responsible journalist. It now is rather evident that you my friend have out lived your usefulness as a "marginal" commentator, perhaps you could return to the shameless promotion of Joseph Campbell's Myth's & Mysticism (Opiatic religious mumbo jumbo and general brainwashing for the common masses)? You have now officially turned PBS into the FOX network. I can only hope they keep you off of NPR. I have always supported and loved PBS because of the truly non-biased opinions. Due to this love I would not comment on last weeks obvious sympathetic caressing of Rev. Wright. Now however after your nine (9) minute (viewer paid for) uncalled for justification of the Rev Wright interview and subliminal bias toward anyone not supporting Rev. Wright's views I must chime in. I can only hope next week Mr Moyers will spend as much time and effort promoting Sen Clinton's campaign as his obvious desceptive promotion of Sen Obama's campaign this week. Good Night Bill and turn off the lights on your way out.

5/1/08
Who is Barack Obama? The first thing that comes to MY mind is: “right place, right time, right man”. Americans by the millions are looking to Obama to LISTEN their calls of HOPE and CHANGE.

ALL the senses are stimulated. A political organizers dream candidate.
People who’ve NEVER gotten INVOLVED before let alone VOTED, are coming TOGETHER calling themselves “Concerned Citizens”. DEMANDS for ethics, responsibility and accountability are becoming more & MORE prevalent on the American. The INTERNET is burning up with the MESSAGE (and Obama support and donations “mybarackobama.com”) CHANGE IS IN THE AIR!

The second thought that enters my mind: WHY the #*~/ is the media and a varying 38-46% of Democrats trying SO HARD to ruin that kind of PARTICIPATION… the Obama phenomenon? It IS still about the PEOPLE, right? Y’know, all that about “Of, By, For”, Life Liberty, Happiness, Equal Rights and JUSTICE!

This Rev. Wright, Bill Ayers “guilt by association” game is just NUTS! THIS is NEWS? So out-of-touch Republicans, Reagan Democrats and Hilary supporters ARE, they believe ALL THIS PETTY BS, will sway the Concerned Citizens from their DEMANDS.
No NO, not NOW! Not in this time of Bush Administration foreign policy BLUNDERS, reckless economics, waste, fraud, abuse, incompetence, scandal, corruption, arms dealing, war profiteering, torture, Constitutional VIOLATIONS! (It’s as though the JUSTICE sic Department NEVER heard of the R.I.C.O. Act)

Not when Republican, Reagan Democrat VOTERS refuse to admit they made a HUGE mistake VOTING for George W. Bush, not once but TWO TIMES? And want MORE OF THE SAME PAIN WITH John McCain…

It’s up to Indiana and North Carolina to make this RIGHT! And kick to the curb all these roadblocks in the way of HOPE & CHANGE…

NOTE: (Here in New Mexico we’re working (volunteering) HARD with our Gov. “big” Bill Richardson to turn this state from Republican Red to Democratic blue. Not only get rid of McCain but “Bush Republicans” Heather Wilson, Steve Pearce and Darrin White)

Thank you, thank you, thank you Bill Moyers for your sane and balanced comments on your May 2 program.

I was extremely saddened by the Obama/Wright split earlier this week and your words helped immensely. I particularly appreciated your candid remarks that the Wright "controversy" is all about race. We have a terrible double standard in this country.

I am white and liberal Christian, an Obama supporter, mid 50's middle class. And for the most part, I agree with Rev. Wright.

And I'm a big Bill Moyers fan!

Thank you, thank you, thank you Bill Moyers for your sane and balanced comments on your May 2 program.

I was extremely saddened by the Obama/Wright split earlier this week and your words helped immensely. I particularly appreciated your candid remarks that the Wright "controversy" is all about race. We have a terrible double standard in this country.

I am white and liberal Christian, an Obama supporter, mid 50's middle class. Just so you know...

And a big Bill Moyers fan!

Mr. Moyers, thank you for your courage to speak the unspoken.
Unfortunately, race is still used, however subtly, as a divisive factor in our national politics. One only needs to read the polls conducted by AP, CNN, etc., the press treats as headline news polls showing Sen. Obama having difficulty attracting white voters over age 50 who do not have college degrees. Neither McCain nor Clinton seem to warrant an equivalent level of electoral parsing from news media. AP issues no headlines reading "McCain Falters with Southern Black Voters".

Thank you Mr. Moyers, as per usual, you get it right. There's another angle that isn't being looked at. conveiniently, as it were it's being used to Swift Boat a great opportunity for our country to take back some of the pride it has lost over the past 8 years of corruption and defamation we have endured under this debacle of an administration.

I am not a black man. I believe that what Rev. Wright said and in the context to which he said it was clearly understable and plausable... It takes a real Patriot and an American to the core to defy the mediocrity we are handed these days from the media elite who is solely responsible for our utter demise in-sync with cronism and full out corruption from this administration and their ilke for over the past 40 years period.

There are a slent majority of good American peoples that exist who feel exactly like what Rev. Wright spoke up about. I believe that if the media was doing it's job, like when Watergate broke... We'd have the kind of journalism that would give us the adult facts about the real chaos and backroom dealing that is prevailent in todays self-serving politics.

This subject, when taken apart so surgically, can only prove that the sheer and utter disgust of people who see day in and day out (FOR 400 years) in America?! that deception and wholesale criminality just cannot stand any longer in this great sociological ongoing experiment called the united States of America!

This statement is (If you can handle adult and big boy and big girl truth) is the opitime of Patriotism and U.S. Pride actually... To Rail at the top of ones voice ... In a pulpit, to a congregation and in front of one's savior to beseach His aide through your own disgust and discovery... that your land, which you were brought to as slave and have suffered for so long as a people, that you have come to love and call your own... Is in dire straights and callmity from the decisions of a handful of deceptive and self-serving men. Who actually disclosed their plan to wholesale off this great country and entirely at your expense in more pain and sufferage. Only to make you look like the bafoon that is the unpatriotic one...

Truth and reality these days are a BITCH...

Can you handle the truth???

Teri laverne---Mr. Moyers is your Hero? Please get a life! In all due respeckt s. Laveerne we have many hero's out there and if that's the best you can do then you need to do your homework.

Thank you Bill Moyers for your outstanding comments on Rev. Wright. Employing history for context (imagine that) and comparing him to some reverends on the right made for a "fair and balanced" look at what has become a huge missed opportunity to look at race with some honesty.(Obama's March speech was a great beginning on this, and gave one hope. How did that get stifled? DId the press response have a rolet?)

Now it has become just more of the horse race. Is Obama up or down now because he said this or Wright said that?What a tiresome conversation?

There are real problems in this country and the world. Are Obama and Clinton so undifferentiated on the real issues that only sensationalized issues are going to get the attention of the press?

If so, broaden the coverage and allow us to hear about third party candidates. Nader,for instance, has a different idea on health care policy, Palestine and Israel, nuclear energy, and corporate malfeasance.

Bill Moyers,
Thank you for the opening piece concerning the Rev. Wright & Sen. Barak Obamma fiasco. You brought a keen insight, compassion,& an open "Heart" to your piece, which is rare these days in media journalism.

You also brought something else to your piece, "nuance", which seems to be lacking in our public discourse now days.With the dumbing down of the American public with info-tainment, I see why, & that to me is very sad !

As our world grows so ever more complexed & convoluted, being able to bring a nuanced perspective, should become the norm ( this is one of the gifts about Sen, Obama I love, he brings "nuance") that seems to be lost on a large segment of the American population.

Instead people become suspicious, untrusting, shut-down,& confused.We need more elevated discourse instead of less, in my humble estimation.

Again, thank you Bill Moyer & PBS for being that oasis for those of us who thirst! Sincerely, Robert Hill

Mr. Moyers,
Thank you for this insightful and brave essay on the Rev. Wright "problem".To watch this gave me hope that not all the media is propagating more of the misunderstandings that keep us all so far apart.

In the midst of this Wright controversy Sean Bell's NYPD killers were acquitted ; one of them had fired off at least 31 rounds into an unarmed Sean Bell celebrating the night before his wedding day . Yet where is the coverage of that?or the outrage? THe truth that many white americans cannot face is the truth that Wright has described about this nation.It is the truth that conitnues to be palyed out in the lives of many balcks such as Sean Bell.

AMerican culture says criticism of govt/country is unpatriotic and this has led us where we are today: in an illegal war without end, paying record prices for gas while jobless and homeless in record numbers and generally in dire straits.

Somehow the coverage of a black preacher who has a right to his anger and outrage managed to trump all these other issues. Racism indeed.

Mr. Moyers,
Thank you for this insightful and brave essay on the Rev. Wright "problem".To watch this gave me hope that not all the media is propagating more of the misunderstandings that keep us all so far apart.

In the midst of this Wright controversy Sean Bell's NYPD killers were acquitted ; one of them had fired off at least 31 rounds into an unarmed Sean Bell celebrating the night before his wedding day . Yet where is the coverage of that?or the outrage? THe truth that many white americans cannot face is the truth that Wright has described about this nation.It is the truth that conitnues to be palyed out in the lives of many balcks such as Sean Bell.

AMerican culture says criticism of govt/country is unpatriotic and this has led us where we are today: in an illegal war without end, paying record prices for gas while jobless and homeless in record numbers and generally in dire straits.

Somehow the coverage of a black preacher who has a right to his anger and outrage managed to trump all these other issues. Racism indeed.

Bill:
You are my hero and I am glad I can depend on your honesty and integrity, but I feel you are giving Reverend Wright a pass on his very bad behavior at the Press Club and NAACP. This man makes his living (whether money or just the spotlight) on the currency of hate, resentment, bitterness and lies. He may have done good things in the past, but last week he took vengence on a parishioner for dissing him and he torpedoed the hopes of Americans of all ethnicities whose support for Obama demonstrates the desire to get past this and work on our future together. The last thing he wants is for us all to get along. Selfishness on this scale should not be explained away.

Mr. Moyers,
Thank you for this insightful and brave essay on the Rev. Wright "problem".To watch this gave me hope that not all whites are propagating more of the misunderstandings that keep us all so far apart.

In the midst of this Wright controversy Sean Bell's NYPD killers were acquitted ; one of them had fired off at least 31 rounds into an unarmed Sean Bell celebrating the night before his wedding day . Yet where is the coverage of that?or the outrage? THe truth that many white americans cannot face is the truth that Wright has described about this nation.

THe culture that says criticism is unpatriotic is what has led us where we are today: in an illegal war without end, pauying record prices for gas,while jobless and homeless and in dire straits.

Somehow a black preacher who has a right to his anger and outrage managed to trump all that. Racism indeed.

Dear Mr. Moyers,

Your essay on Reverend Wright is one of the best essays I've ever heard you do. I think you're right on about the double standard and the pass Bush, McCain, and their preachers get. So Obama is forced to distance himself from a man who has done a lot of good things for human rights. Wright may be a little "bombastic", but, as you said (I'm paraphrasing) he never shot or lynched anyone, nor did he ever set a bomb off in someone else's church. I think that oppressed people need a safe place to support each other, make each other stronger, and (sometimes) use strong words (admittedly, I don't watch a lot of mainstream media, so I may have missed some of the sound bites that people are finding so offensive). After hundreds of years of slavery and oppression, I think it's a little unfair to expect oppressed people to talk nice 100% of the time. Their oppressors surely do not. The sermon Wright did that appeared in all the sound bites had completely different meaning when I heard the more complete version on your show last week. And it's a message I happen to agree with: That neither the US, nor any other nation, should go around playing God and Judging people and killing them. I teach my son that violence is only for self defense. When George Bush talked us into invading Iraq, he told us it was self defense. But he was completely wrong. He either knew and he was lying, or didn't and made one of the worst mistakes in the history of the world. Whether it was a lie or a colossal blunder is the only question to which we still need an answer. But we know for 100% certainty that he was wrong. We were not being attacked, nor were we being threatened. But because Bush can't own up to being wrong, he's got the military trying to solve disputes that go back hundreds of years. However, the job of the military is protecting or attacking, not solving problems. The only thing that can solve disputes that are hundreds of years old is talking.

And all this "controversy" hasn't changed my opinion at all about Barack Obama. I personally think he is the best candidate in this race because I like his politics the best. And a big part of why I like Obama's politics is because I know he has worked hard for human rights. And I wouldn't be surprised if Reverend Wright inspired Obama to do a lot of what he did for human rights. I couldn't help feeling inspired by a lot of what I heard Wright say on your show. What I hate about these "controversies" is that they imply that we expect our politicians (of all people) to be perfect and say and do the right thing all the time. So they're all too scared to do or say what they really believe, to focus on what their jobs should be: Making sure all Americans have food, safety, healthcare, and a place to live. I feel confident that both Clinton and Obama entered politics because they truly believed that everyone has the right to those things. I personally believe that is the main difference between the left and the right. People on the left tend to feel that everyone should have food, safety, healthcare, and a place to live, and that people who need help should be helped. Interestingly, the founders of the US, and most religions agree with this view. People on the right tend to think that only those who are strong enough (or have the means) deserve to have these things. Of course I'm over-generalizing here, but I do see this as a defining difference. My personal opinion is that Obama has the best record and credentials in helping people who need help and in being against using violence for anything but self-defense, and is most likely to try solving problems (ours and other nations') through talking. But I originally liked Edwards the best, because I felt like he said all the things he believed in without trying to be perfect. And I feel that all the over-scrutinization that's been going on has made both Obama and Clinton into political machines. And the media seem to be doing the same thing. This bizarre, post-911, "bring 'em on," support-the-troops-by-keeping-them-in-Iraq patriotism seems to have made everyone too afraid to ask if we're really doing the right thing. Is the military really the right tool for helping the Iraqis--and their neighboring countries--solve their disputes? And maybe we do need to look at the kinds of things we've done to other people around the world when we're trying to figure out why people want to attack us.

I want to thank you for not joining the "throw Wright under a bus" bandwagon. I want to thank you for bringing some reasoned discussion and analysis to this issue. As a nation, we should be focusing on finding real solutions for the human rights abuses that are happening here, and using our power as a nation to bring people of other nations together to solve their disputes. And I don't care if Obama's former pastor has a "bombastic" rhetorical style. I'm voting for Obama because I think he is most likely to help this nation to re-focus on what is really important.

Pastors, pundits, and flag pins--OH MY!

I can hardly believe most of the posts here. I haven't seen people so indignant, so self-righteous, and so self-deluding since the Bush administration began drumming up support for the war back in 2003.

By the by, my favorite post thus far is the "civil war" argument, reminding me of the "we saved your a**es in WWII!" statements reserved by nationalists who weren't anywhere near WWII. Just for the record, it's myopic logic like yours that required an unbelievably costly war like the civil war to liberate the slaves.

So many scared bigots, who don't think they're bigots. So many scared folks who can't even read an article exploring why Wright said the things he did without accusing the author of "excusing" what he said. That's where we are these days--if it isn't a 24 hour op/ed piece, it's suddenly not "news". If an interview consists of someone guiding a conversation as opposed to conducting an interrogation, it's a "bad" interview.

I for one thank Moyers for, God forbid, interviewing Wright (who, for the record, I disagree with in a multitude of ways) without condemning him. I'd love to see him interview Hagee ("How are gays responsible for Katrina, exactly?", and for that matter, I wish he could've interviewed the pope ("Why does the catholic church hide pedophiliac priests from justice?"). I want to hear THEIR sides of their scandals, their hate rhetoric, and their justifications for inspiring paranoia among their congregations. I want to hear what THEY have to say about it, and what they have to say about the good they do for their congregations, more than I want to hear the interviewer condemn them. In this respect, Moyers has been brilliant in his dealings with 'ol Rev. Wright. I happen to think his follow-up statement was on the money as well.

I just watched the Hagee Video- I'm not outraged, I'M TERRIFIED!!
Why is his sociopathic Doctrine not being played on EVERY media Loop for Weeks, the topic on every show???
Hagee Presents far more of a Threat to US and the Rest of the World than Wright. And considering 'Public Servants' who support him (Leibermann, Mac...) his Terrorist doctrrine has far more ability to be carried out with Nukes then the Islamic extremeist with Box Cutters (they don't ahve an arsenal of Weapons/Nukes). Hillary's Proclaimation of her willingness to 'Obliterate Iran' baffled me- It doe not any more. I was foolish enough tot think she was merely a Covert Corp Operative willing to enslave mankind for Greed. Now I realize she was signaling she is fully iniatied into this 'End of Days' philosophy and will be a 'Warrior for God'and being Armegeddon. This doctrine is as twisted as Jim Jones et al, but has far more capability of actually coming to fruition. NOw I AM UTTERLY TERRIFIED!

I just watched the Hagee Video- I'm not outraged, I'M TERRIFIED!!
Why is his sociopathic Doctrine not being played on EVERY media Loop for Weeks, the topic on every show???
Hagee Presents far more of a Threat to US and the Rest of the World than Wright. And considering 'Public Servants' who support him (Leibermann, Mac...) his Terrorist doctrrine has far more ability to be carried out with Nukes then the Islamic extremeist with Box Cutters (they don't ahve an arsenal of Weapons/Nukes). Hillary's Proclaimation of her willingness to 'Obliterate Iran' baffled me- It doe not any more. I was foolish enough tot think she was merely a Covert Corp Operative willing to enslave mankind for Greed. Now I realize she was signaling she is fully iniatied into this 'End of Days' philosophy and will be a 'Warrior for God'and being Armegeddon. This doctrine is as twisted as Jim Jones et al, but has far more capability of actually coming to fruition. NOE I AM UTTERLY TERRIFIED!

For those of us enlightened by Moyers from his “World Of Ideas” series, to “Power Of Myth” with Joseph Campbell, it’s sad to see Moyers fall so hard, so fast. His struggle to justify Jeremy Wright’s venom (and we’ve seen the whole sermon now) shows Moyers to be no different than Rush Limbaugh in failing to apply critical reason if doing so refutes his dogma. Wright does what all good liars do, intermingles their flat-out lies or half-truths that may as well be, with truth we all know. We all know the crimes of Tuskegee, but that doesn’t make government creation of the AIDS epidemic directed at blacks true, or acceptable grounds for Wright’s charge. We all know the cavalier nature with which blacks were enslaved 150 years ago, and Natives were simply exterminated, but that does not put the bomb on Hiroshima in the same category, “Without bating an eye” as Wright claims. But Moyers won’t challenge Wright and already forgot what Shelby Steel taught him and the rest of us on Moyers’ program mere months ago. As eloquent as Moyers sometimes was in his defense of Wright, Moyers only served to descend to the ranks of conservative talk radio.

Having watched the first interview with rev Wright and then hearing his speech given a few days later-I'd have to say, you Bill Moyers, my Hero, were PUNKED...The person on your show speaking in that quiet soft voice was replaced with that disgusting ranting self serving person who gives ministers a bad name-he is not doing Gods work-he is doing his own work, I believe his bursting out of the closet NOW is a direct result of a publicity stunt to boost sales of his soon to be released book. Who is going to by the nice version of Rev. Wright-Were you not amazed at his difference in speech and content from your interview-to his speech later to ministers???Did it not cross your mind to question his motives in using you? the fact that you gave a follow up defense of him on your show friday nite was unbelievable to me. I have certainly lost some respect for you. Please regain your perspective and again give us some great unbiased stories

It's obvious why you've made a fortune playing a liberal on TV. You've got just the right unctously caring and sorrowful tone. But for those paying attention, you define yourself by how you actually use your power.

I don't know whether Barack Obama will survive your leading the pack in reviving the Jeremiah Wright story. I hope he will. But then he'll have you to revive it again at just the most damaging time. And you'll probably bring back your friend Shelby Steele for a third crack this election season at pitching his book defining Obama as a "Bound Man."

But to me, what you don't do with your power as top dog TV liberal is much more telling. As a Texan you know all about GWB's apparent perjury, obstruction of justice, and influence peddling at the heart of the lawsuit against him known as Funeralgate. Yet you went along with the NYT and the rest of the national media in suppressing it during the 2000 campaign and the first several months of his presidency while it was going through the normal discovery process before being secretly settled -- using taxpayer funds -- after 911. Had the public known about it, W wouldn't even have gotten the nomination, much the power of the presidency for 8 years to make war, loot, and pillage.

And now, unless I've missed it, you haven't done any stories about how McCain lied about his lobbying ties. Nor will you.

Instead, you'll smile sorrowly about the big bad corporate media and how "they" are cheating this nation.

Mr Moyer:

While I agree somewhat with some of the comments you make about race in our country the unfortunate thing is that you're only talking usually about one particular race. If you spoke about all of us then I might appreciate your wisdom more in depth. I'm Caucasian and Native American and I've never heard you talk about the racist ideology being perpetuated against these particular groups. You only talk about supposed African Americans. The lines of race become nebulous at best when you call Obama a black American. He mixed and calling him a black American is like referring to me as a Native American. 20% of children born in this country today are of mixed marriages or arrangements. It's one thing to talk of predjudice against one group, it seems more pertinent to put a proper perspective on what is real and what is many times a matter of conjecture and fantasy. To assume that black Americans are not prejudiced is folly and a ludicrous notion at best. I enjoy your show very much but your appraisal of relations in our country is being portrayed in a limited fashion. I understand though that you don't have time to be that inclusive in your thoughts always.

Mr Moyer:

While I agree somewhat with some of the comments you make about race in our country the unfortunate thing is that you're only talking usually about one particular race. If you spoke about all of us then I might appreciate your wisdom more in depth. I'm Caucasian and Native American and I've never heard you talk about the racist ideology being perpetuated against these particular groups. You only talk about supposed African Americans. The lines of race become nebulous at best when you call Obama a black American. He mixed and calling him a black American is like referring to me as a Native American. 20% of children born in this country today are of mixed marriages or arrangements. It's one thing to talk of predjudice against one group, it seems more pertinent to put a proper perspective on what is real and what is many times a matter of conjecture and fantasy. To assume that black Americans are not prejudiced is folly and a ludicrous notion at best. I enjoy your show very much but your appraisal of relations in our country is being portrayed in a limited fashion. I understand though that you don't have time to be that inclusive in your thoughts always.

620,000 people.

This country is the only country in modern or ancient history which fought a war to end slavery.

America is a participatory democracy and non-christian men often lead this country and its industries.
Those circumstances should not be used to distance any group of people or christians from the fact that if we participate if we struggle for the right we can change the country to the better.

That gift, the ability to change this country was twice given - by those who fought Revolutionary war, 25,324 killed and those who fought the Civil War,620,000 killed.

It takes the combined total of Americans killed in WI, WWII, Korea and Vietnam to pass the Civil War losses.

Maybe before that next fire filled, prophetic sermon fills the air, "we" should think on these things.

Dear Bill,

DEEPEST THANKS for your commentary last night re: Jeremiah Wright. What you said was so TRUE, DEEP, HONEST, and HISTORIC!

Wishing every person in the nation and the world could hear what you said, I have sent it to all my friends.

You are truly an amazing Southern White Guy.

Please know how much I appreciate your depth of knowledge and understanding of where Rev. Wright was coming from in his preaching.

THANK YOU! THANK YOU!!

Thank you Mr. Moyers for further clarification that you my friend are not a non-biased responsible journalist. It now is rather evident that you my friend have out lived your usefulness as a "marginal" commentator, perhaps you could return to the shameless promotion of Joseph Campbell's Myth's & Mysticism (Opiatic religious mumbo jumbo and general brainwashing for the common masses)? You have now officially turned PBS into the FOX network. I can only hope they keep you off of NPR. I have always supported and loved PBS because of the truly non-biased opinions. Due to this love I would not comment on last weeks obvious sympathetic caressing of Rev. Wright. Now however after your nine (9) minute (viewer paid for) uncalled for justification of the Rev Wright interview and subliminal bias toward anyone not supporting Rev. Wright's views I must chime in. I can only hope next week Mr Moyers will spend as much time and effort promoting Sen Clinton's campaign as his obvious desceptive promotion of Sen Obama's campaign this week. Good Night Bill and turn off the lights on your way out.

Congratulations Mr. Moyer for saying it so clearly and for PBS allowing you the time to do so. I see layers of complexity in your explanation: I watched the full and required 6+ minutes on YouTube; but at least one viewer gave up after a minute and 36 seconds - - - probably because he has accepted the concept that a sound bite is enough to summarize any complex issue. Equally disturbing is that your argument may simply be too complex for even those who listen to the entire segment - - - the viewer who condensed the essay into "not the rehashed issues from 400 years past". Like it or not, this is representative of the electorate of the country we live in; and probably a majority of those voters.
I will make one subtle distinction that you sort of gloss over. You equate Wright with Robertson and his ilk; and you are perfectly correct in doing so and in your conclusion that white preachers are given a pass in allowable political rhetoric - - - that a Black man is being judged far more harshly then his white counterparts. There is a distinction, however, when trying to compare McCain's embarrassing and unabashed solicitation of right wing evangelical support and Obama's involvement in the very congregation from which the comments originated. McCain can fairly be accused of pandering and even passively endorsing the reprehensible comments made by the white ministers. Obama will be, and has to be seen as more directly involved. I can understand why he befriended Wright, why he joined and remained a member of the church, how he could (and probably still can) put the minister's comments into context and proportion. But a wise political decision, when first establishing himself as a liberal member of the black community in Chicago, may prove disadvantageous in a National Campaign. Those who are informed and can remain objective will understand this lapse in judgment (but it still must be seen as a lapse in judgment), and those who are neither, will be reminded by Republican replays of the sound bites. And, we can count on a repetition of Michelle Obama's questionable statements about lack of pride in being an American that will also attract significant, if short-span and unsophisticated, attention.
I do not believe that there is anything unique about an American public that relies on simplicity before complexity, but there is something very ugly going on when this same populace accepts vitriol before seeking out optimism. I think that there are very complex reasons as to why this country has lost its bearings: a system of justice that is patently unfair, a culture of entitlement that is unreasonable, amongst them. Of course, this is essentially what the entire campaign has been about. Obama wants to establish a dialogue, Clinton wants to play to all the old (and probably current) prejudices, and McCain is basically clueless (walk 30 minutes a day, watch your diet, and find your own health plan). I think we have seen a glimpse of how willing America is willing to engage in debate when the "other side" is represented by Reverend Wright. Too many Americans live in a country and a world where it's all about "us" and "them" rather than simply "us".

Dear Mr. Moyers:
In reference to the Rev. Wright situation and the negative pouncing from the media, you’re mentioning MNSBC, and other media on your program was so vital to our National Morality.
From the moment I heard your interviews with Joseph Campbell, which has influenced my life greatly; I follow your programs and am truly grateful you are a voice for many and me.
You in so many words and programs express the importance of “Virtue”, which grounds the human in moral behavior. I am not a researcher or scholar, but know the great philosopher, leaders, journalists, politicians and theologians who are humanitarian go to “virtue” a source for guidance. Jesus embraced all of mankind, which defines him as great of all humanitarian. Jesus, so often misunderstood, was the greatest model a virtuous life.
Not to equate suffering with virtue, but to point out how the human needs to destroy the good in nature. To point out how we need to “take down what is good”?
Mr. Moyers, why? What is this “destroyer factor” in the human that “good” cannot rise?
Mary Ann Greco

Bill Moyers you are my hero!!! You are the voice of reason and sanity amidst all the political operatives, rabble rousers and self aggrandizers. Your opening comments were right on point! The media took hold of this story and ran with it and everyone jumped on their moral high horse without examining the facts or having ANY knowledge of history and viewing these events through their limited experiences. Your southern background gives you an insight that most wouldn't have or at least acknowledge and the collective amnesia that this country exhibits allows them to engage in a feeding frenzy and painting someone guilty by association. I appreciate your show and your thoughtful rational observations while avoiding the typical histrionics.

Thank you Thank you Thank you Mr. Moyers for further proof that you my friend, are not a non biased responsible reporter. I have always supported and loved PBS because of the truly non-biased opinions. Due to this love I would not comment on last weeks obvious sympathetic caressing of Rev. Wright. Now however after Mr. Moyers nine (9) minute (viewer paid for) uncalled for justification of the Rev Wright interview and subliminal bias toward anyone not supporting Rev. Wright's views I must chime in. I can only hope next week Mr Moyers will spend as much time and effort promoting Sen Clinton's campaign as his obvious desceptive promotion of Sen Obama's campaign this week. You my friend have out lived your usefulness as a marginal commentator, Good Night Bill and turn off the lights on your way out

Thank you
James Jones
Senior Manager, Customer Service Programs

Thank you thank you thank you Mr. Moyers. Your comments at the beginning of your program (May 2, 2008) dealing with the 2000 responses on the Controversy of Rev. Wright, your program. You hit it on the nail. I was so happy to hear everything you said. That speech to all of us should be written down and passed around for all to read on a daily basis. as a mantra. We need to hear the truth and really look into our minds and hearts about judging without really looking at all value systems. Thank you Mr. Moyers. I am wanting more of your insightful thoughts. Mary Helen Moore

Mr. Moyers thank you very much for the program on Rev. Wright. At the beginning of the controversy I was not sure about Rev. Wright but during and after your program I felt good about who and what Rev. Wright is. He had some important issues to address. I think many persons do not know about American Black preaching and how they address the everyday issues. I thank you for providing me with a better understanding of Rev. Wright through your program. I am just sorry about how so many people have not understood or accepted who Rev. Wright is. Mary Helen Moore

Mr. Moyers thank you for having Rev. Wright on your program. When the controversy surfaced

Thank you, thank you, thank you for your direct response to the furor over Jeremiah Wright. Your insightful analysis of the conflict between race, religion, politics, and hypocrisy of us all should be the starting point for further discussions in an effort to understand ourselves and each other.

Thank you for phrasing the issues succinctly and in such a way that I was able to determine the source of my anger and irritation at the continued superficial coverage of these issues by headline and soundbite.

Dear Mr. Moyers,

Thank you for your response to the comments since the Rev. Wright interview - they were clear-eyed and insiteful. I agree with Margaret Randall's assessment in her post.

There seems to be a huge fixation on the Aids issue and what I got from your commentary is that, while not validating or dismissing the conspiracy question, you allowed that, in view of such as the Tuskeegee experiments, it is understandable how a people would consider such a thing. This idea seems to just freak some people out, that our government would willingly subject us to something dangerous or even lethal and cover it up or lie about it.

Let me remind you all that our government has done just that, and has been racially inclusive about it, as well. In 1951 and over the next 12 years, 126 atomic bombs were detonated into the atmosphere at the Nevada test site. Radiation spred over the entire country. Radiation injured workers and infantrymen at the site, and beyond the site killed or burned sheep, horses and cattle, and caused men, women, and children to die of cancer, and caused severe birth defects, as well. For 30 years the American nuclear weapons industry waged a secret medical and scientific struggle to cover up the contamination of vast amounts of North America. The truth began to emerge in 1978 when Pres. Jimmy Carter ordered the Atomic Energy Commission's operational records to be made public.

It can't happen HERE, not to US...

One more comment, in response to Charles Brown, who asserts there is no involvement in all this by corporate media - Rev. Wright's church recorded the sermons, as many churches do, but it was the corporate media that endlessly played the selective clips from those sermons, in no sort of context other thans its own spin. According to one count I read of, these bytes were played more than 3,000 times on TV over the following 30 days and in fact the count was given up at 3,000, so it was likely much more. Meanwhile, important issues regarding policies and civil liberties, like the Yoo memo regarding torture that came out in the same period, where played in the tens and hundreds of times according to this count.

Thanks again, Bill. Fight the good fight.

Mr. Moyers, I was an Obama supporter until this situation unfolded on the public stage. Surely this current generation still places some value in loyalty to long time relationships, especially those that involve their faith. Obama could have ended all this early on by supporting his religious mentor’s right to have an opinion, or is that another right that has been taken out of the Constitution ? Once again, the political wranglers in the Democrat party and the Main Stream Media have sided with a vigilante mentality that feeds the ongoing division in this country.

Reverend Wright expressed opinions that had previously been put forth by a large segment of Americans from both political extremes. For example, the sixty year history of the CIA is that of clandestine intervention in the affairs of foreign countries and the agency has long been aware of the Chickens-Coming-Home-To-Roost scenario which it calls Blowback. The policies of the World Bank, United Nations, and other U.S. backed international organizations, have resulted in economic oppression, starvation, and millions of deaths in various third world countries; hardly what FDR and his supporters envisioned 65 years ago.

Professor Noam Chomsky was recently asked about the harsh response from our politico when this subject of the ultimate foreign retaliation was discussed and his paraphrased reply was, ‘If you want to draw the full unbridled wrath of the establishment, turn the mirror toward them !’.

Mr. Moyers,
Thank you for being, as always, the voice of truth and illumination.

Everyone should send this transcript to every media outlet and demand this kind of journalistic integrity. If we are at sea in a fog of deception and the politics of personal destruction, we are partly to blame for allowing it to go on unchallenged.

Why can't Kathleen Hall Jamieson run for president?...She undoubtedly has the 'common sense' that seems so lacking in everyone that's come to the plate...Regardless, I'm glad to hear her comments concerning this matter, as well as any other...What a level-headed, cut-thru-the-crap persona...She's got my vote.

As far as Barack goes...he's shown (more than anything else), that he's another wealthy politician that will say what 'his team' feels necessary to get your vote...The reverend wright mess (as an example) Barack makes the comment that 'it happened to him'...This isn't anything that 'happened to him' at all, but a part of the truth as to 'who' he is and good or bad, it's just that: part of the truth. Instead, he takes the 'victim mentality' way out and in my mind it reinforces what I had suspected about his tactics...He'll say what he needs to, what 'the team' thinks the voters want to hear...One week, reverend wright has the same importance as the grandmother who raised him and the next week he's dupped barack for over 20 years...So which is it?...Who's confused?...Him?...I know I am. I also think 'the job' is too big for him. The Washington machine will continue as business as usual and Barack DOES NOT have (the necessary) experience...
On the other hand we have Hillary...she's been put through the ringer and come out basically 'unscathed', proof that she's tough-enough (and then some) for 'the machine'...At no other time in history (aside from WW2) has the US needed tried and true experience...When President Clinton took office, he inherited the screwey bush politics and our highest deficit ever (at the time) and he turned it around...America was doing quite well...Even the 'forgotten middle-class and our poor' had a voice...The alternative (McCain is an insane idea)...Any other choice, other than the Clintons, is too great a chance at this critical time in history...We NEED the experience or I'm afraid we're all headed to hell in a lead-painted, chinese-made plastic handbasket...I hope America is smart enough to put Hillary in office and lets get this country back on the track to recovery after the worst leadership (or lack of) ever...

Bill Moyers' editorial of May 2nd was one of the finest assessments of morality and US politics I have heard. It should be must listening for everyone in this country. One just doesn't get that depth and complexity anywhere else. Thank you!

Mr. Moyers,

Thank you.

T

Thank You Mr. Moyers for the interview with Rev. Wright as well as your follow up
commentary of the Corporate Media response. I appreciated all the media time that
was given to Rev. Wright because it allowed me to hear him speak directly. I found
his remarks and assessments to be honest and courageous. He clearly spoke from a
foundation of his study, practice and understanding of Liberation Theology. Your
interview of Rev. Wright was valuable for me in that it illuminated the subject of
Liberation Theology and it's function in the American Black Community. I am a caucasian
naturalized citizen. I have never been to a Black Church. I found Rev. Wright to be an unapologetic free thinker. Following your interview I took the time to read and watch Rev. Wright's subsequent two presentations. I learned much from both.

What continues to amaze me is the characterization of Rev. Wright's responses to the press as being outlandish or inappropriate. Given the context, the questions presented by the press to Rev. Wright were down right insulting and mocking of his intelligence. As a viewer
I felt insulted by the hollow baiting of the questions. I applauded Rev. Wrights retorts to the press. He responded to each question for what it was worth and he made no apology about it. Rev. Wright, from my perspective, refused to be the "polite" man who would let himself be punched down. I saw him refuse to be intimidated by the press. I saw him let his
Blackness (being different not deficient) dance and I loved it. He exposed them and they did not like it. So they went after him.

In my opinion it is a shame that Barack Obama chose to participate in the Wright bashing that followed. The three appearances by Rev. Wright offered an opportunity for our political discussion to go deeper and broader and for once move beyond corporate media as well as party control. Many of the issues that Rev. Wright spoke to in each of his appearances were not shocking to me - but I did recognize that these subjects are not accorded a forum in our national media. There is an unspoken censorship surrounding an open discussion of these issues.

As to the Aids remarks - I heard Rev. Wright refer to several authors works that he was basing his statement on. We do know that our government in the past has willingly and knowingly exposed without forewarning our military to harmful levels of radiation in our testing of nuclear weapons. This is a well documented fact. Our government was involved in the production of biological weapons. Were was the testing for these weapons done? Does anyone know? What I heard Rev. Wright say (in his vernacular), is that some of our government's policies abroad and at home have created harmful and dangerous consequences for us and that we as citizens have a responsibility to hold our government accountable for it's abuses of power. We as citizens have a responsibility to monitor our government. Freedom without Responsibility breeds tyranny.

It is time for us to recognize and name the elephant in the room: "who is defining for us which Blackness is safe and how much Blackness is safe." Rev. Wright pulled the rug of this elephant and the media pundits lost control.

I hope that you will afford us another interview with Rev. Wright before the November election. Rev. Wright appears to be a man who is not afraid to be wrong in his pursuit of what he believes to be right. Many blessings to him!

Respectfully,
Anasko

If you accept that Rev. Wright--and, indeed, Bill Moyers, according to his May 2 commentary--are correct when they assert that the AIDS virus may have been visited upon black people because of the history of the Tuskegee experiments, then one must:
assume that all Japanese Americans who were sadly arcerated during the war assume that their imprisonment must be imminent today;
that Jews must blame all colleges today because at one time there was a quota system against Jews;
that all Irish must suspect employment discrimination because of the want-ads that said, "No Irish need apply"...well, you get the idea.
Yesterday's history is not necessarily a bellweather of today's truths. Rev. Wright,I would think, would do better to spend his time working on the unmet needs of African Americans, particularly the youth, and by extension, to the election of the first African-American who can wield the ultimate power to improve the way blacks, whites, Latinos, Asians--live. Orwould that put Rev. Wright out of a job?

After following Rev Wright's escapades over the past two or three weeks, watching and reading all the media coverage of the whole business; after reading the many responses and opinions on this suject, and finally, after listening to most of Jamieson's comments on the candidates, the campaign, etc., I despair. Friedrich Nietzsche was correct: History is the eternal recurrence of the same thing [der ewige Wiederkehr des Gleichen]. It is enough to make one cycnical.

Mr. Moyers in his commentary tonight said very definitively that all the furor over Reverend Wright's appearances was all about race. I do not agree. I think it is about religion and politics, church and state. On another forum I said that had such appearances transpired after John Kennedy made his speech about his Catholic faith - had a representative of his family church spoken as Reverend Wright did in public on contraversial issues - whatever they might be - casting blame upon a segment of the American population, or America itself in general - I think we would have the same difficulties as we have been trying to deal with since last week's interview. It's too easy to say that the problem is race, that different standards are applied to white preachers, so there is indeed this inherent division we all ought to recognize. I don't believe this is so. I think we have been sensitized to the misuse of religion by the far right, and I for one am very glad that Barack Obama steps away from any suggestion that this could also be happening on the left.

It has nothing to do with race.

I really don't need to wonder why some folks in this country think racism is a figment of African Americans overactive imagination. These same folks don't even know the definition of the word. They think that if the Indians, and the African Americans have a suspicious nature, then they are just living in the past, never mind the absurdity of that observation since we all reach conclusions based on our past experiences. If a belief in a HIV conspiracy exists it's because of, right or wrong, past experiences. History, real history, has countless stories of the mass killings and unwarranted murders of Indians and Africans alike. Even today, in 2008, there are still those in America who would deny me the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, simply because I'm an African American. They are far less numerous now than in the past, but even a few hundred thousand is still too many. Rev. Wright is not talking like a fanatic, indeed, the fanatics are after him. The hatred that Americans are feeling from other countries is the same hatred African Americans have felt here at home. Ain't nothing worse than being hated in your own home. There are a lot of comments posted in this and many other blogs that don't appear to be based in sound logic. What has my thoughts, Rev. Wright's thoughts, or even the Grand Pubah's thoughts got to do with Obama? What are his positions on the issues in the campaign? Concentrate on that because, even though you may not like what the Reverend said, there's a still a lot of folks out there that bear watching and those that say racism is through bear the most watching.

What a whining, befuddled, useless commentary from Bill Moyers as a follow up to the Wright "interview."

Moyers didn't say why he failed, in his chance to interview Wright, to ask about the AIDS "conspiracy." We are left to the presumption that such a question was not asked because it did not fit in with Moyers' greater goal, which was not to pursue truth, explanations, or clarity. Moyers' true goal was to try to sell America on Wright, and, by extension, Obama.

In the end, the Moyers interview of Wright will go down in journalism history as one of the great, glaring, non-interviews of all time.
This episode becomes the touchstone of the Moyers career in using the nation's public broadcasting network for the slanted, soft-leftist preachings of Moyers himself.

How disappointed I am in your response to Rev. Wright.
He spoke more truth than all three candidates. I heard no racism. i heard only the disgust for the same policies that I share. As a white Catholic Republican, I find more credibility in Wright than in Bill Moyers. Like Tuskegee, the truth about AIDS is hard to take. Still, I believe Wright closer to the truth that you cannot handle. Whose side are you on?

Mr. Jones,

I don't believe congressman Conyers' record says anything about the government (CIA) creating viruses. It only addresses the issue that the CIA, during the Iran Contra affair, did supply drugs to the USA. This is an issue that blacks are particularly peeved about.

However, if you are interested in genome specific weapons of mass destruction, you will find the neo-con "Rebuilding America's Defenses" a good read. You may find it on William Kristol's website http://www.newamericancentury.org/.

The Wright connection of Aids and the US government is probably not as believable as this unabashed neocon call for genome specific biological weapons appearing on the neocon website. All the other neocon goals mentioned in this document have pretty much been implemented by the Bush administration.

The question is can we really continue our Imperial Hegemony with the mounting debt? The dollar is declining. If it falls from grace, we face hyper-inflation due to need to reduce debt. This says nothing about moral considerations.

In defense of Rev. Wright

PUBLIC LAW 106–398—OCT. 30, 2000

NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION,
FISCAL YEAR 2001

See pages 119 ff for a description of what the government knew about the attacks on Pearl Harbor. These writers are convinced that the commanders at Pearl Harbor were wrongly accused of negligence, since the government knew an attack by Japan was imminent.

So based on the below data we are to believe the CIA created the AIDS virus and further justify Rev Wrights spewing of venum? eh hem, That was your intent? Thank you for the insightful information ;-)

Information concerning Rev. Wright

Congressional Record May 7, 1998
Entered by John Conyers

A Tangled Web: A History of CIA Complicity in Drug International
Trafficking

WORLD WAR II

The Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and the Office of
Naval Intelligence (ONI), the CIA's parent and sister
organizations, cultivate relations with the leaders of the
Italian Mafia, recruiting heavily from the New York and
Chicago underworlds, whose members, including Charles
``Lucky'' Luciano, Meyer Lansky, Joe Adonis, and Frank
Costello, help the agencies keep in touch with Sicilian Mafia
leaders exiled by Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.
Domestically, the aim is to prevent sabotage on East Coast
ports, while in Italy the goal is to gain intelligence on
Sicily prior to the allied invasions and to suppress the
burgeoning Italian Communist Party. Imprisoned in New York,
Luciano earns a pardon for his wartime service and is
deported to Italy, where he proceeds to build his heroin
empire, first by diverting supplies from the legal market,
before developing connections in Lebanon and Turkey that
supply morphine base to labs in Sicily. The OSS and ONI also
work closely with Chinese gangsters who control vast supplies
of opium, morphine and heroin, helping to establish the third
pillar of the post-world War II heroin trade in the Golden
Triangle, the border region of Thailand, Burma, Laos and
China's Yunnan Province.

1947

In its first year of existence, the CIA continues U.S.
intelligence community's anti-communist drive. Agency
operatives help the Mafia seize total power in Sicily and it
sends money to heroin-smuggling Corsican mobsters in
Marseille to assist in their battle with Communist unions for
control of the city's docks. By 1951, Luciano and the
Corsicans have pooled their resources, giving rise to the
notorious ``French Connection'' which would dominate the
world heroin trade until the early 1970s. The CIA also
recruits members of organized crime gangs in Japan to help
ensure that the country stays in the non-communist world.
Several years later, the Japanese Yakuza emerges as a major
source of methamphetamine in Hawaii.

1949

Chinese Communist revolution causes collapse of drug empire
allied with U.S. intelligence community, but a new one
quickly emerges under the command of Nationalist (KMT)
General Li Mi, who flees Yunnan into eastern Burma. Seeking
to rekindle anticommunist resistance in China, the CIA
provides arms, ammunition and other supplies to the KMT.
After being repelled from China with heavy losses, the KMT
settles down with local population and organizes and expands
the opium trade from Burma and Northern Thailand. By 1972,
the KMT controls 80 percent of the Golden Triangle's opium
trade.

1950

The CIA launches Project Bluebird to determine whether
certain drugs might improve its interrogation methods. This
eventually leads CIA head Allen Dulles, in April 1953, to
institute a program for ``covert use of biological and
chemical materials'' as part of the agency's continuing
efforts to control behavior. With benign names such as
Project Artichoke and Project Chatter, these projects
continue through the 1960s, with hundreds of unwitting test
subjects given various drugs, including LSD.

1960

In support of the U.S. war in Vietnam, the CIA renews old
and cultivates new relations with Laotian, Burmese and Thai
drug merchants, as well as corrupt military and political
leaders in Southeast Asia. Despite the dramatic rise of
heroin production, the agency's relations with these figures
attracts little attention until the early 1970s.

1967

Manuel Antonio Noriega goes on the CIA payroll. First
recruited by the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency in 1959,
Noriega becomes an invaluable asset for the CIA when he takes
charge of Panama's intelligence service after the 1968
military coup, providing services for U.S. covert operations
and facilitating the use of Panama as the center of U.S.
intelligence gathering in Latin America. In 1976, CIA
Director George Bush pays Noriega $110,000 for his services,
even though as early as 1971 U.S. officials agents had
evidence that he was deeply involved in drug trafficking.
Although the Carter administration suspends payments to
Noriega, he returns to the U.S. payroll when President Reagan
takes office in 1981. The general is rewarded handsomely for
his services in support of Contras forces in Nicaragua during
the 1980s, collecting $200,000 from the CIA in 1986 alone.

May 1970

A Christian Science Monitor correspondent reports that the
CIA ``is cognizant of, if not party to, the extensive
movement of opium out of Laos,'' quoting one charter pilot
who claims that ``opium shipments get special CIA clearance
and monitoring on their flights southward out of the
country.'' At the time, some 30,000 U.S. service men in
Vietnam are addicted to heroin.

1972

The full story of how Cold War politics and U.S. covert
operations fueled a heroin boom in the Golden Triangle breaks
when Yale University doctoral student Alfred McCoy publishes
his ground-breaking study, The Politics of Heroin in
Southeast Asia. The CIA attempts to quash the book.

1973

Thai national Puttapron Khramkhruan is arrested in
connection with the seizure of 59 pounds of opium in Chicago.
A CIA informant on narcotics trafficking in northern
Thailand, he claims that agency had full knowledge of his
actions. According to the U.S. Justice Department, the CIA
quashed the case because it may ``prove embarrassing
because of Mr. Khramkhruans's involvement with CIA
activities in Thailand, Burma, and elsewhere.''

June 1975

Mexican police, assisted by U.S. drug agents, arrest
Alberto Sicilia Falcon, whose Tijuana-based operation was
reportedly generating $3.6 million a week from the sale of
cocaine and marijuana in the United States. The Cuban exile
claims he was a CIA protege, trained as part of the agency's
anti-Castro efforts, and in exchange for his help in moving
weapons to certain groups in Central America, the CIA
facilitated his movement of drugs. In 1974, Sicilia's top
aide, Jose Egozi, a CIA-trained intelligence officer and Bay
of Pigs veteran, reportedly lined up agency support for a
right-wing plot to overthrow the Portuguese government. Among
the top Mexican politicians, law enforcement and intelligence
officials from whom Sicilia enjoyed support was Miguel Nazar
Haro, head of the Direccion Federal de Seguridad (DFS), who
the CIA admits was its ``most important source in Mexico and
Central America.'' When Nazar was linked to a multi-million-
dollar stolen car ring several years later, the CIA
intervenes to prevent his indictment in the United States.

April 1978

Soviet-backed coup in Afghanistan sets stage for explosive
growth in Southwest Asian heroin trade. New Marxist regime
undertakes vigorous anti-narcotics campaign aimed at
suppressing poppy production, triggering a revolt by semi-
autonomous tribal groups that traditionally raised opium for
export. The CIA-supported rebel Mujahedeen begins expanding
production to finance their insurgency. Between 1982 and
1989, during which time the CIA ships billions of dollars

[[Page H2956]]

in weapons and other aid to guerrilla forces, annual opium
production in Afghanistan increases to about 800 tons from
250 tons. By 1986, the State Department admits that
Afghanistan is ``probably the world's largest producer of
opium for export'' and ``the poppy source for a majority of
the Southwest Asian heroin found in the United States.'' U.S.
officials, however, fail to take action to curb production.
Their silence not only serves to maintain public support for
the Mujahedeen, it also smooths relations with Pakistan,
whose leaders, deeply implicated in the heroin trade, help
channel CIA support to the Afghan rebels.

June 1980

Despite advance knowledge, the CIA fails to halt members of
the Bolivian militaries, aide by the Argentine counterparts,
from staging the so-called ``Cocaine Coup,'' according to
former DEA agent Michael Levine. In fact, the 25-year DEA
veteran maintains the agency actively abetted cocaine
trafficking in Bolivia, where government official who sought
to combat traffickers faced ``torture and death at the hands
of CIA-sponsored paramilitary terrorists under the command of
fugitive Nazi war criminal (also protected by the CIA) Klaus
Barbie.

february 1985

DEA agent Enrique ``Kiki'' Camerena is kidnapped and murder
in Mexico. DEA, FBI and U.S. Customs Service investigators
accuse the CIA of stonewalling during their investigation.
U.S. authorities claim the CIA is more interested in
protecting its assets, including top drug trafficker and
kidnapping principal Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo. (In 1982,
the DEA learned that Felix Gallardo was moving $20 million a
month through a single Bank of America account, but it could
not get the CIA to cooperate with its investigation.) Felix
Gallardo's main partner is Honduran drug lord Juan Ramon
Matta Ballesteros, who began amassing his $2-billion fortune
as a cocaine supplier to Alberto Sicilia Falcon. (see June
1985) Matta's air transport firm, SETCO, receives $186,000
from the U.S. State Department to fly ``humanitarian
supplies'' to the Nicaraguan Contras from 1983 to 1985.
Accusations that the CIA protected some of Mexico's leading
drug traffickers in exchange for their financial support of
the Contras are leveled by government witnesses at the trials
of Camarena's accused killers.

january 1988

Deciding that he has outlived his usefulness to the Contra
cause, the Reagan Administration approves an indictment of
Noriega on drug charges. By this time, U.S. Senate
investigators had found that ``the United States had received
substantial information about criminal involvement of top
Panamanian officials for nearly twenty years and done little
to respond.''

april 1989

The Senate Subcommittee on Terrorism, Narcotics and
International Communications, headed by Sen. John Kerry of
Massachusetts, issues its 1,166-page report on drug
corruption in Central America and the Caribbean. The
subcommittee found that ``there was substantial evidence of
drug smuggling through the war zone on the part of
individuals Contras, Contra suppliers, Contra pilots,
mercenaries who worked with the Contras supporters throughout
the region.'' U.S. officials, the subcommittee said, ``failed
to address the drug issue for fear of jeopardizing the war
efforts against Nicaragua.'' The investigation also reveals
that some ``senior policy makers'' believed that the use of
drug money was ``a perfect solution to the Contras' funding
problems.''

january 1993

Honduran businessman Eugenio Molina Osorio is arrested in
Lubbock Texas for supplying $90,000 worth of cocaine to DEA
agents. Molina told judge he is working for CIA to whom he
provides political intelligence. Shortly after, a letter from
CIA headquarters is sent to the judge, and the case is
dismissed. ``I guess we're all aware that they [the CIA] do
business in a different way than everybody else,'' the judge
notes. Molina later admits his drug involvement was not a CIA
operation, explaining that the agency protected him because
of his value as a source for political intelligence in
Honduras.

november 1996

Former head of the Venezuelan National Guard and CIA
operative Gen. Ramon Gullien Davila is indicted in Miami on
charges of smuggling as much as 22 tons of cocaine into the
United States. More than a ton of cocaine was shipped into
the country with the CIA's approval as part of an undercover
program aimed at catching drug smugglers, an operation kept
secret from other U.S. agencies.
Mr. DICKS. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.
The CHAIRMAN. All time for general debate has expired.
Pursuant to the rule, the amendment in the nature of a substitute
printed in the bill, modified by striking section 401 and redesignating
the succeeding sections, shall be considered as an original bill for
the purpose of amendment under the 5-minute rule. Consideration shall
proceed by title, and each title shall be considered read.
No amendment to the committee amendment is in order unless printed in
the Congressional Record. Those amendments shall be considered read.
The Chairman of the Committee of the Whole may postpone until a time
during further consideration in the Committee of the Whole a request
for a recorded vote on any amendment, and may reduce to not less than 5
minutes the time for voting by electronic device on any postponed
question that immediately follows another vote by electronic device,
without intervening business, provided that the time for voting
by electronic device on the first in any series of questions shall not
be less than 15 minutes.

Information concerning Rev. Wright

Congressional Record May 7, 1998
Entered by John Conyers

A Tangled Web: A History of CIA Complicity in Drug International
Trafficking

WORLD WAR II

The Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and the Office of
Naval Intelligence (ONI), the CIA's parent and sister
organizations, cultivate relations with the leaders of the
Italian Mafia, recruiting heavily from the New York and
Chicago underworlds, whose members, including Charles
``Lucky'' Luciano, Meyer Lansky, Joe Adonis, and Frank
Costello, help the agencies keep in touch with Sicilian Mafia
leaders exiled by Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.
Domestically, the aim is to prevent sabotage on East Coast
ports, while in Italy the goal is to gain intelligence on
Sicily prior to the allied invasions and to suppress the
burgeoning Italian Communist Party. Imprisoned in New York,
Luciano earns a pardon for his wartime service and is
deported to Italy, where he proceeds to build his heroin
empire, first by diverting supplies from the legal market,
before developing connections in Lebanon and Turkey that
supply morphine base to labs in Sicily. The OSS and ONI also
work closely with Chinese gangsters who control vast supplies
of opium, morphine and heroin, helping to establish the third
pillar of the post-world War II heroin trade in the Golden
Triangle, the border region of Thailand, Burma, Laos and
China's Yunnan Province.

1947

In its first year of existence, the CIA continues U.S.
intelligence community's anti-communist drive. Agency
operatives help the Mafia seize total power in Sicily and it
sends money to heroin-smuggling Corsican mobsters in
Marseille to assist in their battle with Communist unions for
control of the city's docks. By 1951, Luciano and the
Corsicans have pooled their resources, giving rise to the
notorious ``French Connection'' which would dominate the
world heroin trade until the early 1970s. The CIA also
recruits members of organized crime gangs in Japan to help
ensure that the country stays in the non-communist world.
Several years later, the Japanese Yakuza emerges as a major
source of methamphetamine in Hawaii.

1949

Chinese Communist revolution causes collapse of drug empire
allied with U.S. intelligence community, but a new one
quickly emerges under the command of Nationalist (KMT)
General Li Mi, who flees Yunnan into eastern Burma. Seeking
to rekindle anticommunist resistance in China, the CIA
provides arms, ammunition and other supplies to the KMT.
After being repelled from China with heavy losses, the KMT
settles down with local population and organizes and expands
the opium trade from Burma and Northern Thailand. By 1972,
the KMT controls 80 percent of the Golden Triangle's opium
trade.

1950

The CIA launches Project Bluebird to determine whether
certain drugs might improve its interrogation methods. This
eventually leads CIA head Allen Dulles, in April 1953, to
institute a program for ``covert use of biological and
chemical materials'' as part of the agency's continuing
efforts to control behavior. With benign names such as
Project Artichoke and Project Chatter, these projects
continue through the 1960s, with hundreds of unwitting test
subjects given various drugs, including LSD.

1960

In support of the U.S. war in Vietnam, the CIA renews old
and cultivates new relations with Laotian, Burmese and Thai
drug merchants, as well as corrupt military and political
leaders in Southeast Asia. Despite the dramatic rise of
heroin production, the agency's relations with these figures
attracts little attention until the early 1970s.

1967

Manuel Antonio Noriega goes on the CIA payroll. First
recruited by the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency in 1959,
Noriega becomes an invaluable asset for the CIA when he takes
charge of Panama's intelligence service after the 1968
military coup, providing services for U.S. covert operations
and facilitating the use of Panama as the center of U.S.
intelligence gathering in Latin America. In 1976, CIA
Director George Bush pays Noriega $110,000 for his services,
even though as early as 1971 U.S. officials agents had
evidence that he was deeply involved in drug trafficking.
Although the Carter administration suspends payments to
Noriega, he returns to the U.S. payroll when President Reagan
takes office in 1981. The general is rewarded handsomely for
his services in support of Contras forces in Nicaragua during
the 1980s, collecting $200,000 from the CIA in 1986 alone.

May 1970

A Christian Science Monitor correspondent reports that the
CIA ``is cognizant of, if not party to, the extensive
movement of opium out of Laos,'' quoting one charter pilot
who claims that ``opium shipments get special CIA clearance
and monitoring on their flights southward out of the
country.'' At the time, some 30,000 U.S. service men in
Vietnam are addicted to heroin.

1972

The full story of how Cold War politics and U.S. covert
operations fueled a heroin boom in the Golden Triangle breaks
when Yale University doctoral student Alfred McCoy publishes
his ground-breaking study, The Politics of Heroin in
Southeast Asia. The CIA attempts to quash the book.

1973

Thai national Puttapron Khramkhruan is arrested in
connection with the seizure of 59 pounds of opium in Chicago.
A CIA informant on narcotics trafficking in northern
Thailand, he claims that agency had full knowledge of his
actions. According to the U.S. Justice Department, the CIA
quashed the case because it may ``prove embarrassing
because of Mr. Khramkhruans's involvement with CIA
activities in Thailand, Burma, and elsewhere.''

June 1975

Mexican police, assisted by U.S. drug agents, arrest
Alberto Sicilia Falcon, whose Tijuana-based operation was
reportedly generating $3.6 million a week from the sale of
cocaine and marijuana in the United States. The Cuban exile
claims he was a CIA protege, trained as part of the agency's
anti-Castro efforts, and in exchange for his help in moving
weapons to certain groups in Central America, the CIA
facilitated his movement of drugs. In 1974, Sicilia's top
aide, Jose Egozi, a CIA-trained intelligence officer and Bay
of Pigs veteran, reportedly lined up agency support for a
right-wing plot to overthrow the Portuguese government. Among
the top Mexican politicians, law enforcement and intelligence
officials from whom Sicilia enjoyed support was Miguel Nazar
Haro, head of the Direccion Federal de Seguridad (DFS), who
the CIA admits was its ``most important source in Mexico and
Central America.'' When Nazar was linked to a multi-million-
dollar stolen car ring several years later, the CIA
intervenes to prevent his indictment in the United States.

April 1978

Soviet-backed coup in Afghanistan sets stage for explosive
growth in Southwest Asian heroin trade. New Marxist regime
undertakes vigorous anti-narcotics campaign aimed at
suppressing poppy production, triggering a revolt by semi-
autonomous tribal groups that traditionally raised opium for
export. The CIA-supported rebel Mujahedeen begins expanding
production to finance their insurgency. Between 1982 and
1989, during which time the CIA ships billions of dollars

[[Page H2956]]

in weapons and other aid to guerrilla forces, annual opium
production in Afghanistan increases to about 800 tons from
250 tons. By 1986, the State Department admits that
Afghanistan is ``probably the world's largest producer of
opium for export'' and ``the poppy source for a majority of
the Southwest Asian heroin found in the United States.'' U.S.
officials, however, fail to take action to curb production.
Their silence not only serves to maintain public support for
the Mujahedeen, it also smooths relations with Pakistan,
whose leaders, deeply implicated in the heroin trade, help
channel CIA support to the Afghan rebels.

June 1980

Despite advance knowledge, the CIA fails to halt members of
the Bolivian militaries, aide by the Argentine counterparts,
from staging the so-called ``Cocaine Coup,'' according to
former DEA agent Michael Levine. In fact, the 25-year DEA
veteran maintains the agency actively abetted cocaine
trafficking in Bolivia, where government official who sought
to combat traffickers faced ``torture and death at the hands
of CIA-sponsored paramilitary terrorists under the command of
fugitive Nazi war criminal (also protected by the CIA) Klaus
Barbie.

february 1985

DEA agent Enrique ``Kiki'' Camerena is kidnapped and murder
in Mexico. DEA, FBI and U.S. Customs Service investigators
accuse the CIA of stonewalling during their investigation.
U.S. authorities claim the CIA is more interested in
protecting its assets, including top drug trafficker and
kidnapping principal Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo. (In 1982,
the DEA learned that Felix Gallardo was moving $20 million a
month through a single Bank of America account, but it could
not get the CIA to cooperate with its investigation.) Felix
Gallardo's main partner is Honduran drug lord Juan Ramon
Matta Ballesteros, who began amassing his $2-billion fortune
as a cocaine supplier to Alberto Sicilia Falcon. (see June
1985) Matta's air transport firm, SETCO, receives $186,000
from the U.S. State Department to fly ``humanitarian
supplies'' to the Nicaraguan Contras from 1983 to 1985.
Accusations that the CIA protected some of Mexico's leading
drug traffickers in exchange for their financial support of
the Contras are leveled by government witnesses at the trials
of Camarena's accused killers.

january 1988

Deciding that he has outlived his usefulness to the Contra
cause, the Reagan Administration approves an indictment of
Noriega on drug charges. By this time, U.S. Senate
investigators had found that ``the United States had received
substantial information about criminal involvement of top
Panamanian officials for nearly twenty years and done little
to respond.''

april 1989

The Senate Subcommittee on Terrorism, Narcotics and
International Communications, headed by Sen. John Kerry of
Massachusetts, issues its 1,166-page report on drug
corruption in Central America and the Caribbean. The
subcommittee found that ``there was substantial evidence of
drug smuggling through the war zone on the part of
individuals Contras, Contra suppliers, Contra pilots,
mercenaries who worked with the Contras supporters throughout
the region.'' U.S. officials, the subcommittee said, ``failed
to address the drug issue for fear of jeopardizing the war
efforts against Nicaragua.'' The investigation also reveals
that some ``senior policy makers'' believed that the use of
drug money was ``a perfect solution to the Contras' funding
problems.''

january 1993

Honduran businessman Eugenio Molina Osorio is arrested in
Lubbock Texas for supplying $90,000 worth of cocaine to DEA
agents. Molina told judge he is working for CIA to whom he
provides political intelligence. Shortly after, a letter from
CIA headquarters is sent to the judge, and the case is
dismissed. ``I guess we're all aware that they [the CIA] do
business in a different way than everybody else,'' the judge
notes. Molina later admits his drug involvement was not a CIA
operation, explaining that the agency protected him because
of his value as a source for political intelligence in
Honduras.

november 1996

Former head of the Venezuelan National Guard and CIA
operative Gen. Ramon Gullien Davila is indicted in Miami on
charges of smuggling as much as 22 tons of cocaine into the
United States. More than a ton of cocaine was shipped into
the country with the CIA's approval as part of an undercover
program aimed at catching drug smugglers, an operation kept
secret from other U.S. agencies.
Mr. DICKS. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. GOSS. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.
The CHAIRMAN. All time for general debate has expired.
Pursuant to the rule, the amendment in the nature of a substitute
printed in the bill, modified by striking section 401 and redesignating
the succeeding sections, shall be considered as an original bill for
the purpose of amendment under the 5-minute rule. Consideration shall
proceed by title, and each title shall be considered read.
No amendment to the committee amendment is in order unless printed in
the Congressional Record. Those amendments shall be considered read.
The Chairman of the Committee of the Whole may postpone until a time
during further consideration in the Committee of the Whole a request
for a recorded vote on any amendment, and may reduce to not less than 5
minutes the time for voting by electronic device on any postponed
question that immediately follows another vote by electronic device,
without intervening business, provided that the time for voting
by electronic device on the first in any series of questions shall not
be less than 15 minutes.

Thank you for pointing out the hypocrisy of the media's portrayal of Rev. Wright vs. Rev. Hagee or Pat Robertson. There is no other way to view the obvious difference except to express outrage at the overt racism in coverage.

Tonight for 9 long viewer paid for, wasted minutes Mr Moyers attempts to justify his obvious sympathetic cuddling of Rev Wright. Bill get over it already. You and all of the PBS sponsors know you lips were chapped after that obvious butt kissing session last week.

When people claim that this story was somehow created by "corporate media," I truly wonder what it is they are talking about.

First, the video recording of Wright's sermons was done by his own church, not the corporate media. The networks used portions of those recordings, of course, but the original capture was done by Trinity. So, far, no "corporate media."

When Obama decided to speak out ultimately, he did it on his own terms, in a speech in Philadelphia, which I heard on an NPR radio station, not "corporate media."

Next, Wright goes to Detroit, at the invitation of the NAACP branch there. And he gives his speech, without intereference from the "coporate media."

Finally, Wright goes to Washington and the National Press Club, which is broadcast on C-SPAN. C-SPAN! Is that what counts as "corporate media?"

This is so weird. Even when your candidate, your hoped-for leader of the free world says that his fellow Americans are "rightly offended" by Wright's comments (and not by "corporate media"), some of the Bill Moyers faithful are still defending Wright and thanking Bill Moyers for not having asked him any hard questions when he had the chance.

I was extremely disappointed with Bill Moyers and this interview. He spent more time coddling Wright than holding him accountable to any of the ridiculous and insulting things that he has said...

Just a couple comments/questions here:

Can Rev. Jeremiah Wright's church retain it's tax free status? Where is the ACLU? They must still be busy with last years Christmas nativity scenes. If comments like this were made in a white church, there would be hell to pay. White churches can barely hand out voting registration cards - wow the ACLU wouldn't be ignoring this story - would they? I find that hard to believe.

Here is a pastor that supports abortion, and nobody is saying a word. Do I need to remind him that the founder of the abortion movement - Margaret Sanger's goal was to target and eliminate minorities. Oh - by the way, when did Jesus Christ become pro-abortion? Excuse me - pro-choice? Did I miss it in the Bible or in one of my pastor's sermons?

All of you naive people that still believe Rev. JW comments were taken out of context should continue to support his ministry and his new 10,000 SF home in his new white neighborhood. Did I say white neighborhood - oh the horror! Don't forget to throw in some gas money for his Mercedes. I had no idea the people of this Chicago community had so much money to keep their (X)pastors living in luxury. His sermons must have made them all rich. God Bless America!

I feel for the black church goers that are being subject to this kind of hate speech every week. I hope & pray that its not wide spread. No wonder its taken so long for blacks to get past the blame game. I understand that wrongs were committed, wrongs have been committed in every corner of the globe! but lets work together and move on.

Final word: America is still the hope of the world. No - we're not perfect. But look what we've done in our history compared to any other country in the world. We've had the chance to control the world - but we didn't. I think that speaks volumes. Look at the mess in Africa now. Is anyone else to blame except America? Is there any negative Muslin influence - hmmmmmm. I've read history. The whole world was filled (and in many parts is still) with slavery. The Japanese hated Koreans, Chinese. Blacks hate other Blacks, Whites hate whites, Iraqis hate Iranians. Shites hate Sunnis. It goes on & on. You fill in the blanks. Pull out your history books, read it for yourself.

Conclusion: Listen to the words of Jesus Christ & Start thinking for yourself.

The Journal interview with Wright was Moyers at his best: presenting us with the depth of context, giving a man who had been vilified for utterly partisan reasons the opportunity to focus on his life overall, a life of great merit. Wright's subsequent appearances at the Press Club and elsewhere, however, and particularly the timing of those appearances, do make me wonder what his goals are. It is sad to see such self-serving arrogance on the part of someone who clearly has contributed to society. Wright's comments, offensive to some while plausible to others, are no longer the primary focus. The corporate press's insistence on keeping this story alive, and Wright's own stoking of the fires, only diverts attention from the very serious issues at hand, and the campaign of perhaps the only candidate committed to addressing those issues head on.

I wish I could do more, I wish I could write more, and create work that makes a difference, and inspires people to think, to accept truth and question the lies that we are being fed by media that is so obviously controlled by corporations, who’s sole interest is to sell and make money at what ever cost.
I wonder if I’m just wasting my time right now and instead of trying to think these things through, and question in my mind the issues that matter in our world, for our own well being and the well being of our children, I shouldn’t be out there enjoying the sun, drinking, dancing, laughing, and ignoring the blister that impedes me from walking with grace. Is it all the same? Will the powers that have a hold on our psyche always get away with murder and treason, until that day arrives, that unfortunate end, when it’s too late and we all are forced to suffer the consequences. I can’t stand the idea that so many wonderful people out there believe that nothing is wrong, as long as they are comfortably numb, and that the only topic of importance is whether Obama should be punished for having accepted the controversial pastor Rev. Wright into his life. But we’re okay because have a generous candidate who is offering us a bit of money for all the hiked prices and low pay. So I ask myself, why can’t Hillary Clinton understand Obama’s predicament in having accepted the Doctor, Minister, Pastor and Reverend into his life even with all his imperfections, and extreme views that don’t’ seem so extreme when you really listen to them, as he interprets the Bible, a book that is so full of extremes anyway. At least Obama didn’t marry the guy. It’s worse I think, that Hillary married a man who ended up betraying her for something so meaningless as a moment of sexual pleasure, he broke his vows to his wife and to the country he lost an awful lot of respect. But I guess she thinks this is different, and continued to stay with this man, the president of the country. Obama went to this preacher in order to give and support a Church who’s actions demonstrated compassion and activism. For me, Hillary stayed with Clinton for personal interests and now she denounces Obama with such righteousness. I’ve liked Hillary, I’ve been struggling with myself for not being completely convinced about her as our future president, but I just can’t help seeing her phoniness, and lack of sincerity and commitment with what she is really going to do. Maybe I’m too naïve, and only someone like her is capable of making some sort of change, by way of negotiating with the evil, greedy powers. Why can’t we accept Obama who is willing to really take risks and not play the game? If Clinton is so adamant that Obama can’t handle the political machinery of the White House, then what is she really saying? There is no hope for uncovering the lies and moving forward in the interest of the people. That the powers are simply too strong and that we need to sell out in some way? Otherwise we will be considered a national threat. I’m not happy that Bill Clinton passed a bill to privatize the media, I’m actually very upset about it. Big mistake that has now turned us into uninformed and passive citizens, who cannot take action because we don’t know what really is going on and what to respond to, because journalists do nothing more than to feed a delusional image of our reality. I am so tired of hearing the same news on every channel, and being forced to give importance to issues I really don’t care about because I know that there are things out there, going on that are impacting my life so much more, and will affect the life of future generations. I don’t want to live through a war, I pray every day that I don’t. I already know enough of what so many people suffered in our recent past, and now it would be so much worse, because with the press of one button all of us are left in the fumes of a horrific misery. But in the meantime I don’t want to live on my knees, like Passionaria would say. I want my rights as a citizen to be respected, and I don’t want to compare this country with other places of the world where there is ignorance and imperialistic power. We have come this far as a nation for a reason, no need to feel like “It could be worse”, why not feel like we are working to make it better. A country that takes serious responsibility in educating our youth so that the future brings up contributing thinking citizens, with bright ideas and revolutionary concepts for living in congruence with the environment and other nations. A future that has enthusiastic, caring people who want to reach out to those with less opportunities so that in the end we all benefit. We need to stop teaching our children that money and material things are essential to happiness, when we know that it’s not true and can prove that the time spent making money takes away from the attention and love we need to give to them, which is what they will have to build up and strengthen. The United States is a beautiful, majestic country with the most powerful minds in the world, lets use this power to empower our nation not diminish and destroy. We need to focus on what really matters, and who’s going to make it happen, who’s going to do something about our educational system, our prison system, and in between? We are responsible for preparing our children for life. If they don’t have options for them, except what’s made available; drugs and envy from all the advertising, what can we expect.
I agree with Obama in that we need to communicate with our enemy, and like Abraham Lincoln said himself: “Am I not destroying my enemy by befriending him?”

Without an open honest dialogue, we are forced to fight, and this may be very good for the arms and petroleum business for a while, but afterwards there will be a huge bill to pay, and the people will have nothing to lose but to fight for their existence tooth and nail.
www.begonyaplaza.com

Just imagine if Rev. John Hagee went on television before a national audience and said, "Hurricane Katrina was visited upon New Orleans because of its sinful embrace of homosexuals, transvestites, prostitutes and all other manner of vice. And the Roman Catholic Church is nothing but a cult."

Imagine further in the course of that interview, Rev. Hagee talked about the importance of morality in our public discourse, preventing teen pregnancy and drug abuse, discouraging divorce and domestic violence.

Does anyone among the Bill Moyers loyalists think, for even a moment that the "Katrina" and "Catholic" comments would not draw the most attention? And would the faithful be saying, "He may be controversial, but he has a right to his opinions, and he has a message worth listening to"?

No way. And Bill Moyers would not be inviting Hagee onto his program to "explain" his views in some kind of greater context.

Commenter Lyn-MD wrote this about Wright:

"Wright is in part basing his distrust of the government, concerning his views on the HIV virus and the black community, on the Tuskegee syphilis experiment. No one really knows if it is a valid fact or not."

Say what? "No one really knows" if the spread of AIDS was a U.S. government conspiracy? That's not just a foolish statement, it is an insult to our intelligence and an offense to civilized society. It is not much different from a bigot's saying that Jews control the world's money, Asians ar untrustworthy or that blacks are inferior. The statement that the U.S. government is responsible for the spead of AIDS is one that is borne of ignorance and, presumably, hatred for the U.S. government.

Bill Moyers apparently took great pleasure in taking Wright back in history to the time that Bill Moyers was Lyndon Johnson's press secretary in the Democratic White House and Wright was a Navy medical corpsman. Maybe Moyers should have taken Wright back a little less far in history, to the time that the AIDS virus began its vector in central Africa, when the President of the United States was -- Jimmy Carter. Did Carter approve a CIA plot to spead the AIDS virus?

This would be a ridiculous discussion, but for the fact that there seem to be an oddly large number of people who are so consumed with partisanship that they want to defend or at least defelect even the most ludicrous and dangerous comments from Wright.

Will the real J. Wright please stand up!

Dem. have some good issues, but the noise filtering out intended communication has rarely, if ever, been louder!

J. Wright's snippets became a problem for Obama & then an attempt to justify them was made, the hope was that the issue was over.

J. Wright appeared on Moyers' & smiled, was mild mannered, was calm, but said Obama was just speaking politics & did not distance hinself from his ole mentor & pastor. Ooops!
This renewed "the issue" & enlarged the coverage.

Obama had justified Wright & to now denounce him would be a flip-flop--which would be an equally large problem. What to do?

The National Press Club allowed J. Wright to speak & his weird appearance allowed Obama the needed "change" he has been looking for & then was able to say Rev. Wright was not the man he thought he knew for 20 yrs.

Did this solve the Wright issue or did the right issue come to the surface? Did Obama just admit to having such poor judgement that after spending 20 yrs. with a man that he was not able to judge his message? How will Obama judge how to deal with terrorist, North Korea, Iran?

Obama has less executive experience, has less quality judgemental skills, is not as well known, nor as highly respected as Oprah!

Forget the 3 main candidates before us, and let us find a better qualified person for President. I don't care--white, brown, yellow, black, male, or female--just qualified!!!!!!

Respectfully,
Billy Bob, Florida

I have now listened to the Moyers interview and I found the National Press Club interview to watch. It is true that Rev. Wright was the most effective when he stuck to his prepared remarks. He got silly and mocking when he did the quesion and answer period but even then his answers were very considered and worth listening to. If, as I often do, I was judging a High School debater I would have chided him for his attitude which ultimately detracted from his message. But his message even in his question and answer period was well worth listening to. Rev. Wright may say that this is not about him, it's about an attack on his church, but I would beg to differ. I think the attack has been quite personal and aimed at him. I think his cockiness was a response to that.

Last impression: the question and answer period did evoke Jesus and the Pharisees for me. ANd I totally loved it when he they asked the question, quoting scripture, how he viewed Islam in the light of no one can come to God except through Jesus...and he answered scripturally noting that not all of his sheep were of his flock.

It's interesting, how the Republicans react to what Rev. Wright Said, but say nothing about the Lie Bush told, that caused Thousands to Die.

I would like to see a roundtable discussion with Wright, Hagee, and Parsley - with input from Dr. Marty and Joan Campbell Brown - on the role of religion in American politics. And a complete "airing" and explanation of the statements made: Wrights contention about AIDS, Hagee's proclamation about the Catholic Church; and Parsley's edict on Islam.

Judi,

What's scary is the idiot that won two terms in office, and happens to be our current president.

The PBS, Bill Moyers interview with Wright, was neither brilliant nor despicable. It was preferable to the tabloid journalism "gotcha" theatrics that we've grown accustomed to.

I hope Wright does not go away. You may not agree with everything that he says, but he has a right to his opinion, just like you and others have the right to blindly follow along with everything our government tells us.

Most of the country, for the sake of being patriotic, fell for the pathetic, unfounded reasons Bush and Co. gave on the run up to the Iraq invasion. The corporate run media, proudly fell in line.

Anyone who questioned it, was deemed unpatriotic and were told, if you're not with us then you're with the terrorist.

Wright is in part basing his distrust of the government, concerning his views on the HIV virus and the black community, on the Tuskegee syphilis experiment. No one really knows if it is a valid fact or not.

Wright cannot prove it, but can anyone disprove it?

It does seem odd that a virus that was once prevalent among gay white men, is now running rampant with black Americans and Black Africans in Africa.

Barack is our best hope. He may be a little green, but look at where the experienced politicians have gotten us.

Judi,

What's scary is the idiot that won two terms in office, and happens to be our current president.

The PBS, Bill Moyers interview with Wright, was neither brilliant nor despicable. It was preferable to the tabloid journalism "gotcha" theatrics that we've grown accustomed to.

I hope Wright does not go away. You may not agree with everything that he says, but he has a right to his opinion, just like you and others have the right to blindly follow along with everything our government tells us.

Most of the country, for the sake of being patriotic, fell for the pathetic, unfounded reasons Bush and Co. gave on the run up to the Iraq invasion. The corporate run media, proudly fell in line.

Anyone who questioned it, was deemed unpatriotic and were told, if you're not with us then you're with the terrorist.

Wright is in part basing his distrust of the government, concerning his views on the HIV virus and the black community, on the Tuskegee syphilis experiment. No one really knows if it is a valid fact or not.

Wright cannot prove it, but can anyone disprove it?

It does seem odd that a virus that was once prevalent among gay white men, is now running rampant with black Americans and Black Africans in Africa.

Barack is our best hope. He may be a little green, but look at where the experienced politicians have gotten us.

Judi,

What's scary is the idiot that won two terms in office, and happens to be our current president.

The PBS, Bill Moyers interview with Wright, was neither brilliant nor despicable. It was preferable to the tabloid journalism "gotcha" theatrics that we've grown accustomed to.

I hope Wright does not go away. You may not agree with everything that he says, but he has a right to his oppinion, just like you and others have the right to blindly follow along with everything our government tells us.

Most of the country, for the sake of being patriotic, fell for the pathetic, unfounded reasons Bush and Co. gave on the run up to the Iraq invasion. The corporate run media, proudly fell in line.

Anyone who questioned it, was deemed unpatriotic and were told, if you're not with us then you're with the terrorist.

Wright is in part basing his distrust of the government, concerning his views on the HIV virus and the black community, on the Tuskegee syphilis experiments, done on men without their knowledge. No one really knows if it is a valid fact or not.

Wright cannot prove it, but can anyone disprove it?

It does seem odd that a virus that was once prevalent among gay white men, is now running rampant with black Americans and Black Africans in Africa.

Barack is our best hope. He may be a little green, but look at where the experienced politicians have gotten us.

Beware of the Jabbertalkers; they will create death and destruction where ever they go. They remind people of why others should hate other people and undermine their human status so that they can be punished while at the same time exalting themselves. They not only want an eye for an eye; they want a life for a minor mistake or a life just in case "Their Enemy" might be thinking of doing something wrong while at the same time they are doing plenty of evil themselves.
Blessed are the peace makers because they will be crucified and all of that for people who are self-righteous bigots. We all fall short of the glory of God and our righteousness is as filthy rags. When will we see the light as Christ taught it and have compassion for our fellow human beings? We are here to live our life and tend the earth not create hell on earth. No religion is better than false pretense.

"He who bears the interests of humanity in his breast, that man is blessed."
Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi

I don't know why we are wasting time still making statements about this farce of an interview. Maybe if we stop talking about Wright he will go away. But the same things are being repeated daily on here. Let's move on to more important issues. Wright is a lunatic and Obama is a follower. Has been for twenty years. No getting around it. He admitted it himself. Now it's up to the American people who the want for there next President. My personal opinion is that I don't think any of these candidates are capable of running our Country which is so sad. But this topic here has to end. It's tiresome. Wright has only made a fool out of himself. I will make this my last comment on here but I have to say just one more thing about Wright. I think what is even more disturbing is that there are people out there who believe in him and he gets applause. Scary! Let's move on!

As I continue to read the posts of this blog, I'm beginning to think that "some" here are actually against the "truth" contained in Rev. Wright's infamous sermons and his recent rants. While most of us had a huge problem and level of discomfort with recent speeches of Rev. Wright, I do think that there were granules of truth to many of his statements. I also noticed he was quick to disclaim agreement with all of Farrakhan's beliefs as well. So, I thought the Moyer's interview was ok considering.

On the other hand, like others, I DID NOT like the melodramatic mannerisms of Rev. Wright in his recent National Press speech. I DID think he appeared as some sort of stand-up, comic grief, not relief, and he so reminded me of the old caricatures of the Black Face. It was awful.

The Rev did in fact state things in his sermons and in his recent speeches which I've heard ordinary White and Black citizens have said...especially regarding the 911 crisis.
I've heard people of all backgrounds, (yes White too) say that the U.S.A has in some ways placed us in harm's way by our international policies and we have become vulnerable to terrorism.

Notwithstanding the truisms contained in many of the Rev's statements, I've taken offense at several of his perspectives. I definetly feel he is out of touch....out of time...stuck in a time warp....and obsolete in his thinking. His thoughts remind us of the past... the time in which he perhaps grew up and in which he earned his degrees.

I certainly had problems with his points on the educational differences in White and Black children. On the face of it, those statements were racist, exclusionary, and defeatist. They affronted the efforts of successful Black children who do well in school...They also go against the efforts of good Black parents who read to their children, take them to school, take an interest in their educational progress. His theories presupposed that Black chuildren only want to learn street culture, i.e, "rap and hiphop", and not the larger, more diverse world around them. What a shame. He set up others who might not have positive "push/pull" factors in their environments for future failure. His was offbase, antiquated, philosophical reasoning extracted from obsolete theorists and those who found it necessary to "racialize" learning and developmental theories during the 50s, 60s, and 70s.

Despite personal qualms with a number of issues he related, I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt on a few things. Wright did bring up the whole AIDS crisis issue and unheard of accusations against the U.S government. It was aburd! I researched out this topic myself. Didn't find anything to support his opinion per se, but I did find information that indicated that at least in so-called Third World countries (particularly from the African continent) there were concerns in the early AIDS diagnosis days for testing of human subjects...and the careless handling of this contagious virus among professionals who did specific testing in clinics and treatment centers. Many of these testing and treatment programs were in fact funded and operated by American and European pharmeceutical companies in the early days. This may be where the old Rev got his perspective...not sure?

The bottom line, Rev. Wright should be more than careful about what he preaches in his pulpit. It would be better for him to set up community seminars and discussion groups...bring in health/medical experts...and let us all become aware of these things together. It's not like the American people would deny facts when brought face-to-face with them. He went way over board with this and other issues period in most of the sermons and speeches. So Wright shouldn't be surprised that people are greatly offended and angry.

While watching Bill Moyer's interview of pastor Wright, my wife and I were in agreement that he spoke as an intelligent man who has given much serious thought to the positions he has taken on a variety of subjects. He has also taken on the responsibility of making the black community of his church whole, self respecting and involved in the larger community in which it is located.

The video tapes of his sermons chastising the U.S. for the actions which may have indeed led to 9/11 was only alarming in the respect that this is not a sermon that takes place in more Christian places of worship.

Where are the spiritual leaders who take their flocks to task for committing sins against other humans? Why is there no uproar concerning the church's blind eye to this country's financial and military imperialism as has been and is practiced on many poor countries in the world?

As to his accommodation, not acclamation, of Farrakhan, Wright pointed to the good Farrakhan had done with young black men while stating he did not agree with many of his philosophical positions.

Jeremiah Wright has now done in Detroit and at the Press Club what he needed to do to free Barack Obama from negative ties to him, his statements and positions. He has not only fallen on his sword for Barack, he made sure that sword was honed to razor sharpness so there could be no misinterpretation on Obama's part as to what the candidate had to do.

One brave and compassionate man has sacrificed his public (and possibly private) self so that another brave man can continue to pursue his dream and goal of becoming the president of this country and hopefully making it a better place for people of all stripes.

Look beyond the sound bites. Discover some truths beyond the mainstream media and start thinking for yourself. Bill Moyers has offered us these opportunities for years. It is still disappointing that so few citizens of this country have taken up the mantle of free thinkers and explorers of the truth.

Only by becoming a truly free and informed populace will we save our country from the fate of past failed empires. Only then can we become our promise as a democratic beacon of light in a world more and more controlled by money and money's distractions.

Bogart

Ultimately, Rev. Wright may slowly vanish from the public debate and be discounted as a mere distraction, and an irrelevancy to serious discussion. Pretty clearly, he will be kept as far away from the Obama campaign as humanly possible.

Then the focus will turn to Obama himself. And whether his dismissal of Wright has been as earnest and yet as painful as some suggest.

James Taranto, of the Wall Street Journal's OpinionJournal.com webpage and the Editor of the "Best of the Web" oline column, has pointed out that almost exactly a year ago, the New York Times reported this fascinating exchange:
======
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."

The New York Times, April 30, 2007.
======

In other words, the political calculation between Wright and Obama was never any sort of arduous personal exploration by the two of them; rather, it is just part of a long and drawn-out matter of expediency in a campaign.

When Wright shrugged off Obama's Philadelphia speech, saying that Obama just does what politicians have to do to get over, Wright probaly meant it just as it sounded, and it is as true as Obama's critics are now claiming. Obama was happy to have been a 20-year member of Wright's church as Obama worked his way up in Chicago ward politics. Now that Wright is a campaign liability, Obama is discarding him like an old campaign button.

Somehow, I don't think this story is going to be followed up on the next Bill Moyers program.

Moyers did not explore Wright's racism. Moyers failed to ask Wright why he has called Italian Americans "garlic-nose," and why from the pulpit he has repeatedly badmouthed whites in general. Apparently, Moyers' job was to sanitize the man for the sake of the Obama campaign. Shame on Moyers. How he has fallen.

Wright is a fitting albatross hanging from the neck of the junior Illinois senator of ever-so thin credentials. Express all the politic outrage he may, Obama cannot account adequately for a twenty-year close association of "lamb" to pastor, with Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Voters are not idiots. And they know what Obama and Wright know, and what Moyers failed to point out: that you are known by the long-term company you keep.

Hi Bill

I am ready for my next interview. Please call me when I should give me next interview on PBS.

JW

BEWARE: continued use, over and over again, of long answers, by the same individual/s, is an attempt to SABOTAGE this blog. Those in power are scared of losing their power. The worst thing that could happen to them is for individuals from the MIDDLE CLASS to rise up, and be heard.

Lyn-MD--In all due respect don't quit your day job. They only person confused here is you. Mr. Brown is right on target. Maybe you weren't paying attention to what Obama had said in his last speach.

Just a couple more brief points, John...

You said that Moyers extends the same kinds of courtesies to conservative guests as he does his many liberal guests. I think you're mostly right about that, as far as it goes. Moyers doesn't do much "tough questioning" of ANY of his guests. Moyers' style is to attack persons who are not his guests, but to only invite the persons with whom he can ask nice questions.

So Moyers invited the great and fascinating black conservative Shelby Steele, and they had an illuminating conversation.

But then there's the case of the radical fundamentalist, Rev. John Hagee. The left loves to claim that the same scrutiny that has applied to Wright should apply to Hagee. I mention Hagee here only to point out that Moyers actually did an attack-piece story on Hagee and his ministry and some of HIS inflammatory outbursts (none of which I defend), but he never invited Hagee onto the show. That's really the Moyers modus operandi. An appearance of journalism, but with a very, very soft lens.

Now, John, with respect to the Moyers transcript portions in my post immediately below, those are as close as I could find to "hard questions." If I had been in a courtroom with Moyers and Wright, I'd have said, "Your Honor, he's leading the witness!"

The closest thing to a challenge of Wright was Moyers' observation that Farrakhan's anit-semitic remarks had been "inexcusable." But Wright evaded that, and then went on to talk about the good of the Nation of Islam. Personally, I find Farrakhan's role in all of this to be mostly irrelevant. Obama long ago denounced Farrakhan, and rejected Farrakhan's political endorsement. But for his own reasons, apparently, Obama brought it up again this week, probably becuase the National Press Club audience asked Wright a more pointed question about Farrakhan, a better and more insistent question than Moyers' slow-pitch softball, and Wright called Farrakhan one of the great men of the 20th and 21st centuries.

But more than anything, Moyers didn't ask Wright, "Why did you claim that there was a U.S. government conspiracy to spread AIDS?" Do you really believe it? Why make the claim if you have no proof to back it up? Isn't it a dangerous notion to even suggest it?

Those would have been good "tough questions" don't you think, John?

John,

It was pretty easy for Bill Moyers to ask, and for Jeremiah Wright to answer, a lot of softball questions like these:

BILL MOYERS: Let's start with first things. When did you hear the call to ministry? How did it come?

...
BILL MOYERS: So, when Trinity Church says it is unashamedly black and unapologetically Christian, is it embracing a race-based theology?

...
BILL MOYERS: So, God is not, contrary to some of the rumors that have been circulated about Trinity, God is not exclusively or totally identified with just the black community?

...
BILL MOYERS: What does the church service on Sunday morning mean in general to the black community?

...
BILL MOYERS: Are you saying that the members of Trinity leave the world of unemployment, leave the world of discrimination, leave the world of that daily struggle and come to church for-

...
BILL MOYERS: Lots of controversy about black liberation theology. As I understand it, black liberation theology reads the bible through the experience of people who have suffered, and who then are able to say to themselves that we read the bible differently, because we have struggled, than those do who have not struggled. Is that a fair bumper sticker of liberation theology?

...
BILL MOYERS: When I hear the word "black liberation theology" being the interpretation of scripture from the oppressed, I think well, that's the Jewish story--

...
BILL MOYERS: Yeah. But talk a little bit about that. The prophets loved Israel. But they hated the waywardness of Israel. And they were calling Israel out of love back to justice, not damning--
REVEREND WRIGHT: Exactly.
BILL MOYERS: Not damning Israel. Right?

...
BILL MOYERS: One of the most controversial sermons that you preach is the sermon you preach that ended up being that sound bite about Goddamn America.
BILL MOYERS: What did you mean when you said that?

...
BILL MOYERS: Well, you can be almost crucified for saying what you've said here in this country.

...
BILL MOYERS: What is your notion of why so many Americans seem not to want to hear the full Monty - they don't want to seem to acknowledge that a nation capable of greatness is also capable of cruelty?

...
BILL MOYERS: You preached that sermon on the Sunday after 9-11 -- almost 7 years ago. When people saw the sound bites from it this year, they were upset because you seemed to be blaming America. Did you somehow fail to communicate?

...
BILL MOYERS: What did you think when you began to see those very brief sound bites circulating as they did?

...
BILL MOYERS: What can you tell me about what's happened at the church since this controversy broke?

...
BILL MOYERS: There had been death threats?

...
BILL MOYERS: Did you ever imagine that you would come to personify the black anger that so many whites fear?

...
BILL MOYERS: I think of how important music is to your church at times like this, that's intentional isn't it?

...
BILL MOYERS: So what blues are you singing right now?

...
BILL MOYERS: You know, you mentioned Senator Obama. In the 20 years that you've been your pastor, have you ever heard him repeat any of your controversial statements as his opinion?

...
BILL MOYERS: Here is a man who came to see you 20 years ago wanting to know about the neighborhood. Barack Obama was a skeptic when it came to religion. He sought you out because he knew you knew about the community. You led him to the faith. You performed his wedding ceremony. You baptized his two children. You were, for 20 years, his spiritual counselor. He has said that. And, yet, he, in that speech at Philadelphia, had to say some hard things about you. How, how did it go down with you when you heard Barack Obama say those things?
REVEREND WRIGHT: It went down very simply. He's a politician, I'm a pastor. We speak to two different audiences. And he says what he has to say as a politician. I say what I have to say as a pastor. Those are two different worlds. I do what I do. He does what politicians do. So that what happened in Philadelphia where he had to respond to the sound bytes, he responded as a politician. But he did not disown me because I'm a pastor.
BILL MOYERS: But even some of your admirers say it would be wrong to gloss over what Martin Marty himself called- who loves you- called your "abrasive edges." For example, you know, Louis Farrakhan lives in the south part of Chicago, doesn't he? You've had a long complicated relationship with him, right?
REVEREND WRIGHT: Yes.
BILL MOYERS: And he, you know, he's expressed racist and anti-Semitic remarks. And, yet, last year-
REVEREND WRIGHT: Twenty years ago.
BILL MOYERS: Twenty years ago, but that's indefensible.
REVEREND WRIGHT: The Nation of Islam and Mr. Farrakhan have more African-American men off of drugs. More African-American men respecting themselves. More African-American men working for a living. Not gang banging. Not trying to get by. That's not indefensible in terms of how you make a difference in the prisons? Turning people's lives around. Giving people hope. Getting people off drugs. That we don't believe the same things in terms of our specific faiths. He's Muslim, I'm Christian. We don't believe the same things he said years ago. But that has nothing to do with what he has done in terms of helping people change their lives for the better. I said direct quote was what? "Louis Farrakhan is like E.F. Hutton. When Lewis Farrakhan speaks, black America listens. They may not agree with him, but they're listening.

...
BILL MOYERS: What does it say to you that millions Americans, according to polls, still think Barack Obama is a Muslim?

...
BILL MOYERS: Our denomination, the United Church of Christ has called for a sacred conversation on race in America. What are the steps that you think from all of your experience can be taken to move race relations forward?

...
BILL MOYERS: Jeremiah Wright, thank you very much for this opportunity.

Charles,

Moyers asked Wright to explain his "God damn America" comment, his relationship with Louis Farrakhan, etc.

The point of this interview was obviously to give Rev. Wright the opportunity to provide the context, beliefs, philosophy, etc. that lies beneath the ubiquitous sound-bites.

Bill Moyers gives the same opportunity to all of his guests, many of whom are on the other end of the ideological spectrum from Jeremiah Wright. Could you name other journalists, or news programs, that offer the same sort of respectful dialogue?

If you like "journalists" who aggressively corner and shout down individuals they disagree with, while giving corporate and government power structures a free ride, then you have plenty of sources to choose from. But for those, like myself, who appreciate someone who has the mind, spirit and character to have an intelligent conversation with a wide range of guests, and the courage and perspective to expose power abusers, there are few if any like Bill Moyers.

In one of your postings, you said that Bill Moyers "role in all of this...(is) a sterling example of journalism as propaganda."

I'm sorry, but I find that absurd. What is your opinion of the pro-war propaganda served up by all of the major networks before the war started?

Here is how the word is defined on Wikipedia: "Propaganda is a concerted set of messages aimed at influencing the opinions or behavior of large numbers of people."

The Bush Administration and their cheerleaders in the media presented a textbook case of just this behavior, at the cost of tens of thousands of lives (at the very least), suicides and mental affliction for countless vets, and over a half a trillion dollars and counting. Bill Moyers recent documentary cogently documented the role of the mainstream media in aiding and abetting this disaster.

Propaganda journalism serves to cheerlead for the interests of power and greed, while ignoring the human, environmental, financial and other costs. In that light, Bill Moyers is the anti-propaganda journalist.

Ironically, "journalists" such as those found at Fox News who are first-order propagandists, attempt to disguise their subservience to power by harshly grilling and cross-examining individuals who express ideas they find disagreeable (like Jeremiah Wright), but who otherwise are not in positions to abuse power with the consequence of misbegotten wars or programs of torture, for ex.

Then, guess what? We all end up having endless conversations about celebrities, sports stars and even controversial pastors, while we pass on a mounting pile of debt to our children, to pay for the killing of other people's children in war authorized by "patriots" who dodged all service themselves, and cheered by "journalists" who work for media corporations driven not by the pursuit of the truth, but by profit margins. And showing the realities of war doesn't sell ads, but "gotcha" journalism keeps em coming back for more.

Long live Bill Moyers.

John, what "tough questions" did Bill Moyers put to Rev. Wright?

When the corporate media was endlessly looping Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld-Rice soundbites about the need to attack Iraq, Bill Moyers was a visionary voice in the wilderness doing what journalists are supposed to do: ask the tough questions.

On the fifth anniversary of Bush declaring "mission accomplished", imagine the death, destruction and deficits that could have been spared if more "journalists" had sought the truth, rather than beating the drums for war.

Now, the same corporate media feeds us endless loops of Rev. Wright snippets, while barely mentioning the escalating violence in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Administration drum beats for war in Iran, direction of torture by Condi Rice and co., endangerment of public health caused by Administration meddling into EPA science, on and on.

Barack Obama's campaign is about a deep change in direction from the lies, corruption and incredible damage perpetrated by the Bush Administration, which Bill Moyers has unflinchingly chronicled from the beginning of their reign.

The interview with Rev. Wright gave a context for his sound-bites, that showed that his main message is speaking of God as an ally of the oppressed, the poor, a force for peace. It is no doubt this Rev. Wright that attracted Barack Obama and thousands of others at his church.

Barack Obama addressed the deeper issues, and the complexity of Rev. Wright himself, in his speech in Philadelphia. But faced with another cycle of sound-bites, he had no choice but to speak clearly against statements that he disagrees with. It was obviously a lose-lose position to be in.

Now, will all those who have been beating their chests in righteous indignation over Wright and Obama now insist that the media grill John McCain about seeking his support from John Hagee?

In the final analysis, this is another in a round of giant distractions from the crucial question of whether our country is going to continue on the road to ruin charted by Bush-Cheney, or undergo the "revolution of values" that MLK, Jr urged us to have 40 years ago.

It's easy to get discouraged reading the rants of the haters on this forum, but there is too much at stake for my baby girl and the children of the world to give in to the "triple evils of militarism, materialism and racism" (MLK) that escalated over the past 7 years in this country.

It's not about whether we agree or disagree with every utterance of Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama or Bill Moyers. It's about our values and what we are willing to do to make sure that what is done in our name by those who claim to represent us reflects those values.

In his Philly speech, Barack Obama said, "What is called for.....is that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. " Call it chickens coming home to roost, call it the cycle of violence, call it revenge, call it what you will, but I don't want done unto my child what the Iraq War has done unto the children of Iraq.

Thank you Bill Moyers for continuing to shed light into the dark corners of the American soul, so that we can redeem ourselves in peace and justice for all.

But Lyn -
Surely you understand that among the "soundbites" were excerpts in which Wright theorized that AIDS was a government conspiracy. Another "soundbite" (a photo-op, in fact) was Wright honoring Louis Farrakhan. And as to the "coming home to roost comment," even Barack Obama found Wright, IN CONTEXT, to have crossed into an area of disgust and offense when Wright compared the U.S. military to terrorists.

Those are only three examples where the "soundbites" appear to have spoken the truth. I chose those three because Obama himself itemized those three in his formal rejection of Wright. what could possibly be clearer? In context, in his own words, Wright repeated his earlier outrageous comments without any editing whatsoever. Barack Obama watched it, and says he was offended.

You are of course free to support Rev. Wright if you wish. But there is some kind of schism going on, wherein first Obama and now Northwestern University seem to regard Wright as radioactive. (NU just announced that it is withdrawing its offer of an honorary degree to Wright.)

I don't propose to change the minds of devoted liberals. But I do propose to challenge the view that unfair "soundbite media" is what brought down Wright, and I further propose to challenge Bill Moyers' role in all of this, as highly suspect, and a sterling example of journalism as propaganda.

Charles Brown,

I don't know if you are genuinely confused or if you are deliberately trying to confuse others.

The "soundbite media" did make Wright a scapegoat because the soundbites were taken out of context. When you thought you heard Wright saying "Goddam America", on the soundbite, What he really said was "God Damned America", for our past actions against others. "GOD damned America", not Wright asking God to damn America or Wright cursing in church.

When you heard " The Roosters are coming home to roost", on the soundbite, what you heard is Wright quoting Peck, the ambasador of Iraq, who happens to be a white man. Mr. Peck made that statement on the Fox network, after 9/11, and there was no uproar about it. The uproar came after Wright quoted Mr. Peck, during a 2001 sermon that was taped. Portions of that video was leaked to the media for obvious reasons.

When you observed Wright at subsequent events, after the PBS, Bill Moyers, interview, He was being Pastor Wright, speaking and preaching and answering questions as himself. That is what he does.

I guess he could have turned down the rhetoric, but maybe he felt that since Barack, didn't go out of his way to clear up the misconceptions in the media, based on the soundbites, accusing him of being a racist and anti-america, why should he go out of his way to turn down his personality and beliefs.

Some people say God bless Bill Moyers. I say God damn Bill Moyers.

It seems to be an article of faith that Rev. Wright was done wrong by "soundbite media." And that the Bill Moyers interview was so much better than that kind of media.

But it was not Bill Moyers' interview that exposed Rev. Wright to Barack Obama. It was the events of the subsequent days -- the Wright speech in Detroit, and the appearance at the National Press Club -- that seem to have exposed Rev. Wright to Obama as a person that Obama had somehow not known for the previous 20 years.

Judging by what Obama has determined, the soundbite version of Wright is the more accurate one than the one that was seen on warm and fuzzy Moyers interview. In retrospect, Obama would have done well in his Philadelphia speech to have drawn the lilne in the sand between himself and Wright then and there, instead of saying that he could no more disown Wright than he could disown his white grandmother. Because now, he has disowned Wright.

Why is it that "soundbite media" is continually made the scapegoat in the case of Rev. Jeremiah Wright?

Thanks so much, Bill Moyers, for once again giving us a bigger context for the inflammatory sound bites fed to us by the corporate media.

I found the interview to be extremely enlightening about the history of race/religion/culture/politics in the US in our time. Reverend Wright is obviously very well educated in these issues and has lived them. I was very inspired by the humanitarian work they're doing in his congregation, that's what churches should be about.

I also totally agree with the statements he made that were clipped out of context. I think it's pretty common knowledge that U.S. foreign policy is bringing us back only misery. What goes around, comes around.

It's sad that in the name of politics, Barack can't talk about these issues as easily as he can talk about race. Nothing is going to change for the US if we can't confront these issues head-on without being marginalized as America-haters. The wealthy military-industrial complex counts on our "patriotism" to stay in power (over us).

Barack Hussein Obama is indeed doing what politicians do as Rev Wright said. He is distancing himself from Wright now that it is all out in the open.

The fact is that BHO and his wife (Michelle O could do stand-up with Wright, she is no different)were comfortable with Wright for 20 years - they knew who he was and what he was about. They could have changed church a long time ago if they weren't comfortable. Why suddendly now? He a running for President, that's why.

Don't be hookwinked America - and don't make excuses for the politician BHO.

I may be wrong but I believe that true patriots are always few. That's why they have special recognition in our society and in our history books. That's why they are marked as courageous. If your easy patriotism causes you to believe what the masses believe then you should make sure that you're still a patriot.

The issue is will PBS continue to enable Bill Moyers to continue his leftist agenda using public funds? Barack Obama’s action validated my opinion of Mr Moyers journalism. Moyers had the unique opportunity to illuminate Wright’s comments and their underlying message. He failed to do that, not because he is inept, he is very astute and subtle, but… because he has an agenda. I believe Reverend Wright’s misguided beliefs have been shaped by years of honest, empathetic work in a parish with lots of disadvantaged people. But there is no excuse for Moyers dishonest approach to journalism.

What surprises me is that so many racists (mostly men with curt names) pretend to be surprised and outraged by Jeremiah's conspiracy accusations. The same power and ruthlessness you seem to admire in "your team", the United States, he is describing from "below the deck." (Maybe he ain't personally "below the deck" these days but as a U.C.C. pastor he speaks for the victims current, past and present at home and abroad.) He feels compelled to do this by his faith, and is even disappointed that Obama refuses to sacrifice his campaign by going the distance.
I really wish Jeremiah could join with people like myself who are convinced 9/11 was an inside job. I am disappointed that Jeremiah has not gone the distance because the United States has become an organization of covert secrecy and ruthless, cruel behavior in pursuit of profit and suzeranity for its wealthy class.
It shows the self-defeating nature of the Nazi mind that they embrace sadistic heirarchy, and undermine their immediate personal interests, by attacking any party accusing their "betters" of crimes against the American people and humanity. Maybe they do it in hopes that the Big Man will pat their little bottom or head and throw them a cookie.
Real American patriots are not lap dogs, but are dissident critics of our sick system where only 10% or fewer can be successful at the expense of the others and the poor around the world. As a victim of medical experimentation as a child I learned the lesson of the cruel wealthy and their ruthlessness early. This week we learned how the users of tax money and grants might want to dump sewage and toxic waste where minority children play in order to study (not treat) lead poisoning. Yes, it happened right at the opulent scientific jewel hospital complex, Johns Hopkins, where Arab oil magnates and their relatives receive kidneys harvested by suspect means. That is not aberrant behavior in our country, but the "gold standard" of elite perogative.

What I can't understand is that Bill Moyers, who so succinctly dissected the "Secret Government" in 1987, perfectly placing Irangate and Contragate in the context of an accelerating bipartisan betrayal of the American people, could fail to recognize where the trajectory has led.
The profitable wars of lies in Iran and Afganistan, the 9/11 conspiracy which led to it, and the frivolous manipulated and rigged election of game show host leaders are the obvious outcome of a runaway criminal locus of raw power, the illegitimate U.S. government. And now that it is trapped by its financial and strategic errors, expect it to turn desperate and bloodthirsty on its own people. The erosion of our civil and human rights should be no surprise, as coming from a renagade, wounded, desperate state, ripe for comuppence.
Jeremiah harps on the old crimes in hopes of alerting you to crimes in progress, to wake you from a dream. Maybe he doesn't even fully recognize what he is attacking, maybe he is fixated on the racism elites use to divide us.
Human beings are all perceptually incomplete and must operate as a collectivity to get an accurate picture. I can see how Jeremiah, who once was a Marine, who held Lyndon Johnson's life in his hands, who raised a church from 87 souls to 87 hundred could be a little grandiose and seem demented, but he is not unusual. (I see him as a gifted actor and comedian.)
The primary effect of the unnatural concentration of power in any nation state operated for minority advantage is that the resultant inevitable oppression fills us with awe and anxiety and we are isolated in an unfortunate way. The limitation of not really being able to talk openly about our political doubts with people we trust is the outcome. Jeremiahs substitute for free communication by exorcizing our pent up socio-political anxieties.
What are your "friends", people you drink and drug and sexually carouse with, relatives you didn't choose, people in the same church, workmates? With whom do you share your fears of big corporate forces and the government promoting and protecting them? It would be unusual if you didn't feel this common burden.
You are in denial if you don't realize every one of us is a Jeremiah Wright, moving deftly around gargantuan crimes, afraid of being crushed by circumstance, finding a little crack where we can operate.

Some react by defending a mythical ideal and some ask questions and demand accountability. There have been too many cover-ups for me to act out of loyalty or gratitude, too many rubber-headed commissions and too much stonewalling. Let the United States come clean, no matter who holds office, and let us correct its structural flaws so that more people can live a worthy, meaningful life and lift up the weak and fallen. We had a Civil War once to make the first part of the correction. Maybe now we are ready for a "people power" solution. (I know most people are afraid yet to take the first step, but that is changing.)I think all of us are tired of living a lie.
It's gonna be a prettty day in Takoma Park. I'll walk Molly and try to engage people in meaningful conversation, listen to WPFW.

Janet, the generosity and understanding that you are apparently willing to show me and to demonstrate to others appears to be something that Rev. Jeremiah Wright is incapable of in the political context. (And as a now-retired minister and future author on societal and political issues, politics seems to be where his bread is buttered these days.) Wright seems to hold his political enemies ("the government," the Bush Administration, etc.) with such an unusual degree of contempt and hatred that he is willing to perpetrate outlandish and despicable lies, like an "AIDS conspiracy" in order to advance his ajenda and influence his credulous congregants.

Janet, I don't think this is a matter of Christian understanding. What Christian purposes are served by spreading an enormous lie about a devastating disease?

Persons on the left of the political spectrum seem to like to talk about speaking truth to power. Well Rev. Wright is a powerful man; a wealthy church leader who commands a large enough media audience so that his address to the Detroit Branch of the NAACP was broadcast live on two national television networks. Wright had (now discharged) a prominent position in a national presidential cmpaign.

Now, I am speaking truth to power. I am saying, "No, Rev. Wright's lies are inexcusable, and Senator Obama now, belatedly, agres."

While I don't expect to re-educate any of Bill Moyers' faithful left-wing audience, I find it disturbing and disappointing that he and his producers would have had no comment whatsoever on an interview that so poorly served the PBS audience.

There are violent comments about Senator Obama on iVillage. One poster has a thread running entitled "I found Obama. He was under a bus" in which he talks about a knife in Obama's back.

http://messageboards.ivillage.com/iv-elpoliticsto

Yes the statements turn out to be metaphorical if you read the post. This is still unacceptable and inappropriate. iVillage has refused to take down this inappropriately titled thread. I suggest posters get on iVil and express their outrage. These kind of statements need to be stopped and removed. Casual words can lead to action.

Rodney King in 1992:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jgc6vOjCiE

(don't read too much into this, I'm just pointing out the call for peace)

I found a an interesting advice on the following blog to which I posted an interesting advice of mine here is the link and my advice:

Always "put yourself in the shoes of the other side/the adversary to see if you would like your treatment of others/other-nations. For example see if you would appreciate the manipulative playings (for cynical and illegitimate political gains) with the ancient name (thousands of years old) for a very famous Gulf; the Persian Gulf. Listen to this truthful logic (even from a horrible kicked-out dictator:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=hQgZ3oLp_WY&feature=related

Shah of Iran on Persian Gulf, and American Jewish Lobby

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Frannie Em - 5/1/2008 1:05 AM
M Morgan - huh? what kind of shoes did the Shah wear?

reply
M Morgan - 5/1/2008 1:12 AM
Listen to it (click the link) to find out that he had been wearing the magic shoes of the always-truthful Iranians/Persians. At that moment he had become one with the rest of truth-telling people of the world.

reply

A demogogue mixes truth with lies. Rev. Wright has a valid cause to be upset, but his reactions do not always make much sense. The point is that he is not helpful to Senator Obama, to voters, or to himself. Sad.

Charles, I see that you are a person who finds it hard to live with uncertainty. I don't much like it myself but in truth there is little alternative.

Once upon a time I was taught an "affirmation"--a statement that you can make to yourself or others that simultaneously acknowledges an individual's imperfection and their inherent worth. It goes like this. "You are a precious, worthwhile, mistake-making person."

You, Charles...you, Rev. Wright...all of us are precious, worthwhile, mistake-making persons.

So, yes, Charles I can live with it. I can tolerate knowing that Rev. Wright does not have to generate perfection to be able to teach me something.

I work with families all of the time and they tell me profoundly silly things about their health conditions. Sometimes it occurs because of miscommunication between physician or health care provider and patient. Sometimes I am dealing with someone who has a limited understanding of their body and its' function. But these folks teach me all sorts of things and I can live with the dissonance even though it bothers me sometimes.

So while I do not believe that the government spread AIDS among people, I believe the government's deliberate policy neglect of poor folks makes it worse. So I don't have to exactly agree with Reverend Wright to have the patience to hear him out and listen to what else he says.

And since I view Barack Obama's dilemma with Reverend Wright through a different prism, I do not have to select one person to be wrong and another to be right. In my prism, it is just a sad car wreck of an incident in those two men's lives. That divisiveness hurts all of us and turns our attention away from the real crises in this country.

But, wow, it sure makes for good tabloid journalism.

Mr. Moyers: You asked the wrong question, unfortunately, of Rev. Wright. The question is not why say "Damn America" but rather why say "America" as opposed to some Americans, or some American leaders or some individuals. Why does he damn America instead of individuals? Unless, of course, if is appropriate to condemn all for the actions of some.

I apologize to Mr Moyers. Your interview was before Rev Wright told us that blacks have different brains and learn subjectively , not objectively. You did know that he thought the US government created and spread AIDS to kill blacks.

I wonder if Trinity UCC give advice to their congregants to not identify their race on social security applications. That would be risky because the Dept of Health and Human Services would know where to find the blacks. Granted they probably used AIDS so it could be done passively. But what if that specific government department (maybe it was the Defense Advance Research Project Agency) decided to get a little more aggressive. You'd have to be very careful about identifying your race.

Posted by: Charles Brown | April 30, 2008 07:12 PM
"The third option is that Obama 'condemned' Wright for pure political expediency, but he doesn't really mean it. In which case Obama is a remarkably duplicitous figure.)" [you were responded to Posted by: Janet | April 30, 2008 06:14 PM]

RESPONSE:
Barack Obama took too long to come out stronger against Reverend Wright's controversial and divisive remarks. Reverend Wright just echoed what Barack Obama has heard previously. Really, nothing new. My conclusion is that political expediency drove Barack Obama to distance himself more from Reverend Wright on Tuesday, April 29, 2008. And, that's why I am appalled.

Amazing to see all the good reasonable moderates just ‘enabling away.’

Apparently Bill Moyer's agrees with Rev Wright that little black children learn differently from whites...God bless their different brains. I guess Bill Moyer's agrees that those black children are 'subject' oriented. As Wright said they just love climbing all over their teachers (the subject) and just can't get into those pesky 'objects' like books. And as Wright implied those teachers were just freaked out that the black children could not stay in their seats. That cracked up the NAACP convention. Whooweee funny.

Wake up people. I heard this growing up in Miss. And of course they provided schools for the distinct learning style of all the little black children.

My aunt and sunday school teacher stuck my nose in the bible, made me sit there, and taught me, from the Book, that 'Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world...' That propositional truth from the Bible showed me I could never be a racist. Racism did not comport with the reality of creation, as revealed to us in God’s revelation. (I think T. Jefferson had the same source).

One additional point, janet, because you used a phrase that I find troubling.

In civilized discourse, there are statements about which I cannot "agree to disagree."

You wrote, "okay, I'm going to agree to disagree on HIV as a plot against blacks..."

No. I won't "agree to disagree" on that. I might "agree to disagree" with you on whether Bill Moyers is a good journalist, or who should be our next President. But I shall not "agree to disagree" on 'AIDS as a US government conspiracy. I likewise won't "agree to disagree" with anyone who denies there was a holocaust in 1936-45. I won't "agree to disagree" that 'one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter,' and I won't "agree to disagree" that one racial group is superior to another. Those things are, to use another popular metaphor, "Non-starters." They are non-negotiable. I will not "agree to disagree," and I respectfully suggest to you that you should not either.

I don't understand, Janet.

It is one of two things. Either Barack Obama is right, and Wright's comments "rightly offend all Americans, and they should be denounced,"* or else Wright is an important, valid voice in public affairs who has been wrongly denounced by Obama.

Which is it for you?

(I suppose there is a third option, but I suspect that few of Bill Moyers' loyal viewers would bite. The third option is that Obama 'condemned' Wright for pure political expediency, but he doesn't really mean it. In which case Obama is a remarkably duplicitous figure.)

*Per Obama's statement yesterday

Well, Susan, your disingenous and I'm dishonest but all in all, I feel like I'm in good company.

Charles, you are absolutely fixated on two points and with that you indict the entire credibility of a man and his life's work. I am under no illusion that I am going to change that for you.

My point, which apparently was too nuanced, was that when the first wave of AIDS cases arrived, the national response under Reagan was to ignore. However, gays are as a group more well educated and thus better paid. ANd they used all of their clout to bring attention to the issues. And some of their most strident activists were likewise branded as crazies. But they did an amazing thing. They did get funding for HIV/AIDS research and treatment that made a difference. They were pretty activist with their own people and for a time waged pretty effective safer sex campaigns. Now I claim to be no expert on HIV/AIDS health policy but a widely impacted group who is not particularly well funded or activist is IV drug users and women. Blacks are disproportionately represented in this group. These are facts. These are facts that have a face and a name to probably Reverend Wright and many others.

The systematic skewing of how health care gets parsed out in the US has disproportionately impacted lower income folks and working poor. Again, blacks are disproportionately represented in that number. Now you can pretend whatever you want...that the trends are not real, don't impact important people, do not disproportionately affect blacks (and women and immigrants and children) but all of us this is nonetheless true. Reverend Wright speaks to those real inequities. He obviously does it at times in a ham fisted way. SOme would say he's not the best spokesman but like others before him, he has the podium for right now.

It is very entirely predictable that some folks will choose to villify him and discredit wholesale his message. That way nothing has to be done.

But people who are not so closed off should say, "okay, I'm going to agree to disagree on HIV as a plot against blacks. And I'm going say that I don't like his friends. But what does this man who has been working in the trenches with disenfranchised people know that I need to know?" There is plenty.

And as for Obama. And the Reverend. What a sad situation for both of them. Obama will disavow him because for the black and white thinkers in the US (here well represented) there is not one other thing he can do to try to save his political life.

I've had my issues with Obama and I was behind John Edwards. I have not made up my mind about what I will do in November. But this incident is clearly the swift-boating of Obama and it is also a smackdown to any one who would talk about the issues of the poor and the disenfranchised.

Susan, you're being disingenuous. Rev. Wright brought up the Tuskegee experiment in order to scare his listeners into thinking that it was quite likely that the U.S. government similarly created the AIDS virus. It is a hateful lie to suggest that, no matter how nuanced you may want to be.

Barack Obama knew that, and that is why he condemned Rev. Wright in the strongest possible terms.

Rev. Wright's suggestion of a government AIDS conspiracy to his listeners (one poll suggests that 26% of black Americans share that view) is, in my humble opinion, very near to a form of hate-speech, so offensive it is to our civilized society and to rational discourse.

Let's be clear about why Wright would do such a thing. It is utterly inexplicable on theological grounds to scare a susceptible audience and plant such falsehoods with them. But it is explainable if Wright views himself as a quasi-politician, a local kingamker in Chicago ward politics, where he is saying to his congregants: "Don't believe what you hear in the news. I know better. The U.S. government is evil and it is out to get you, but there is hope for you with my church. I'll help you decide who to vote for, and you can believe that those candidates will be here to pay tribute to me and this congregation. I had breakfast with Bill Clinton. I am friends with Jesse Jackson. Every Democrat running for President, or Governor, or Senator, will call me to ask for my support."

That is the utterly corrupt world of Wright's theology.

Once again we are not aware of the destruction we are causing. Some of us know better, other don't even care. Here we have two people representing others, acting like children. We all know racism still exist. Among our own races and against others. Because ignorant adults taught their children how to hate. I think if we focus more on what God's plan for our lives then what this person thinks,has or done; this world would definitely be more peaceful. We take too much time trying to satisfy everyone. That is God's job. People stop playing GOD and let his will be done. If we could come together in prayer as much as we come together to tear one another down, the world would be a better place. But the book of Revelation prepares us for this time. Be wise in your decision making and listen to GOD not just what you hear and see!

Lyn from MD - well said. Have you considered running for office? :-)

To Appalled, to address your views: As to the AIDS statement in Rev. Wright's sermon, when I first heard in the sound bite, I was appalled, too. I couldn't believe a learned man like him would say something so ludicrous. However, when I saw the context in which he said it, I understood. He was saying that instead of putting our trust in government, we should put our trust in God. He cited the infamous Tuskegee experiment where black men were infected with syphilis. He said he wouldn't be surprised if AIDS had been planted, etc. He wasn't saying it had happened - just that, governments can do bad to people. So don't put your trust in governments. Put your trust in God.

It is our faith in Christ that leads us to speak up on behalf of the downtrodden, the exploited, the poor, and the oppressed. Please see Luke 4:18-21. Also interesting to note: After Jesus preached that sermon, they tried to throw him off a cliff! Folks haven't changed much over the centuries, it seems. A church that has gone from 87 to 8000 members must be bringing people to Christ. As I said, I know people who go there and the church has a marvelous ministry.

Mr. Brown, as for Louis Farrakhan, Rev. Wright said he was a great voice because so many people listen to him - like the old E.F. Hutton commercials. He said he doesn't agree with him, but if someone can get a million folks to stand on the Washington Mall, then you can't discount the power that person has.

As for "terrorism" in war -if you were an innocent civilian and a bomb landed on your house, killing your family; or your loved ones were hauled away and tortured by commandos trained in the United States (School of the Americas in GA), wouldn't you feel like you'd been terrorized? If that happened here in the US, we'd be the first ones to scream "terrorism."

So many people want to say that we're a Christian nation. OK, assuming for argument that that is true, then what happened to confession of national sin and repentance? What kind of Christian goes around saying they have done no wrong, that they're morally superior to all others, use up a huge chunk of the world's resources, launch pre-emptive strikes on others? Would we think that person was acting as a Christian should? No! The Bible is replete with national calls to repentance. Please see Hosea, Amos, Micah, Joel, Obadiah, Jonah, Nahum, and many other biblical books.

I would like to say one main point. I am of African American decent. None of had a choice on what our race would be God did when he created us. He created us each different. But why must we as a people continue to find faults in others be it Pastors, Politicians, everyday people. I wish many of us could just keep our free minds we had as children. Ignorant adults teach our children were different. Whether it is your color, a disability or whatever.We all have a history and a past. Talk about it, yes. Dwell on it NO. Learn from it. When will we learn from it? Life is too short to discuss the small stuff...I feel sorry for us all, because believing this, believing that. Believe in God, pray about the decisions you make and the RIGHT person will be our PRESIDENT!

Brava, Lyn, for your thoughtful comments, in particular "The problem is, most of Barack's supporters ended up embracing Pastor Wright, after seeing the PBS, Bill Moyers interview, and with Barack now, rejecting Pastor Wright, it is surely looking like Barack is just a politician."

I admit that I assumed that the Rev. Wright must be a "wackadoodle" until I listened to the Moyers interview and two of the Rev's sermons; I saw that the inflammatory soundbites (chickens coming home to roost, G-D America), were part of an argument more nuanced and supportable when heard in context.

I'm not yet ready to join the Jeremiah Wright Fan Club, but I do wish that we'd stop demonizing the man, stop forcing Barack Obama to defend or denounce him, and get on with life. The Rev himself can get back to ministering to his congregation.

Dr, The thing that scares me the most is someone like you is in a position to teach our children your leftwing propaganda.By the way, I'm black !

The only people who don't believe that America could even possibly be damned are those who are causing it to possibly be damned.

I watched and listened carefully to Bill Moyers' interview with the Reverend Jeremiah Wright, and I also watched the segment with Wright on 'The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer' for April 28, 2008. The Reverend Wright is a charming, charismatic person who says exactly what he thinks. In the main I agree with his statements. I am Caucasian, but I have taught African-American literature for decades, and I also have many African-American friends. On the basis of what I have learned from them, and also from the writing of Richard Wright, James Baldwin, Ralph Ellison, and other black authors, I understand why the Reverend Wright said what he did. Were I black, I would say 'G-d damn America' as well. I'll say it anyhow, because the country with its insatiable appetite for war is rapidly becoming the most corrupt and dangerous nation in history.

"The whole commerce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions, the most unremitting despotism on the one part, and degrading submissions on the other. Can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his justice cannot sleep forever."

-Thomas Jefferson damning America (1781)

Thank you PBS for this great interview.

Fox News has people convinced that the litmus test for a good interview is how often the host badgers or interrupts the interviewee. Thank you for reminding us that a lot can be learned by listening.

First, I definitely differ with the Rev. on certain points on the spread of HIV/AIDS, drugs etc. They are all very conspiratorial. But, by the same token, anything, though improbable, is still possible. Overall, I see a good man in Rev. Wright who harbors a few dissenting opinions with which I vastly disagree. I also think Mr. Moyers could have been a lot tougher on those issues. This was not a horrible interview, not an A, but not horrible.

Oh come on, Janet. Your response is practically dishonest in its non-responsiveness. What Rev. Wright said about AIDS wasn't nuanced. He wasn't making any sympathetic points about gay life in America. you'd have to question the gay rights credentials of anyone who so enthusiastically praises Louis Farrakhan anyway, wouldn't you? Wright CHOSE to exploit a comparison to the infamous "Tuskegee experiment" in his mention of AIDS and the government. He referred the National Press Club to a book by a notorious conspiracy theorist. Those aren't nuanced, intelligent responses by Wright. What it is, is pandering, to the lowest and least-informed among Wright's select audience. It is shameful, intolerable. Barack Obama said so; do you somehow not agree with Obama's pronouncement on the subject?

First, I definitely differ with the Rev. on certain points on the spread of HIV/AIDS, drugs etc. They are all very conspiratorial. But, by the same token, anything, though improbable, is still possible. Overall, I see a good man in Rev. Wright who harbors a few dissenting opinions with which I vastly disagree. I also think Mr. Moyers could have been a lot tougher on those issues. This was not a horrible interview, not an A, but not horrible.

I peruse the blogs almost everyday since Barack began his campaign. I love Barack and I will support him in the General, but I think Barack has made a BIG mistake in the way he handled the Jeremiah Wright issue.

I thought his speech on race relations was needed and the right thing to do, but I feel that when those sound bites first appeared, Barack should have immediately diffused the situation by stating adamantly, that his former pastor is not a racist, and he does not hate America. He should have followed that up with, he is just very passionate and concerned about the state of black America, and he teaches and preaches black pride, and how to better the black family and community. There is nothing racist in that. Just like Jews, and the Irish, and other nationalities take pride in and celebrate their ethnicities, and help their communities.

He should have made it clear that Pastor Wright never preached black supremacy, or hate for any other race. He should have made it very clear that as far as the sound bites were concerned, not only was he not in attendance on those days, but he would have to first view the sermons for context before he could make a comment on them. He should have ended it with, Pastor Wright may seem a little eccentric and he is very animated, but he is also an American patriot who voluntarily served his country, and if you give him a chance and get to know him, you may actually like him.

He should have stated the above, and when repeatedly asked about Pastor Wright, he could have said, I already addressed that issue and I have no further comment. That would have killed two birds with one stone. It would have saved Pastor Wright's standing and reputation, and it would have eliminated the powder keg that Hillary, the media, and the GOP thought they had, thereby saving Barack's and Pastor Wright's relationship and any drama surrounding the campaign. It also would have eliminated the need for Pastor Wright, to have to come out and clear his name and his church.

Instead, now we have utter chaos and it's really sad. The black community is surely feeling slighted now. But I myself, personally took an affront, when Barack first denounced and rejected Louis Farrakhan. Not because I am a member of his organization, but because Barack originally stated that he didn't need to reject Farrakhan because he neither sought Farrakhan's support and Farrakhan didn't offer any support. Why didn't he just stick to that statement, which was true, and didn't offend anyone, and end it with I will not discourage any person or group from voting for me, and I have no further comment. Next question? Barack does not have to have an answer for every absurd or racially biased question the media or Hillary throws at him. He certainly doesn't have to answer to Hillary at all. He also should start answering the cookie-cutter, corporate run media with: I don't know, what did the other candidates say when you asked them this question? If black America can forgive for 400 years of slavery and discrimination and oppression, then white or Jewish America can forgive Louis Farrakhan for sentiments that he held over 20 years ago. After all, no one died, at the hands of Louis Farrakhan, and he is trying to redeem himself, and has been for some time, now.

The problem is, most of Barack's supporters ended up embracing Pastor Wright, after seeing the PBS, Bill Moyer’s interview, and with Barack now, rejecting Pastor Wright, it is surely looking like Barack is just a politician. With 90 percent of African Americans voting for Barack and with Bararck denouncing Farrakhan with his thousands of supporters, and Jeremiah Wright, he may be jeopardizing some of his black support, trying to woo a segment of whites who support Hillary, but will never support him, a black person. It is also making him appear wishy-washy, which leads to his integrity being tested. Pastor Wright could have and should have been an asset to Barack and his campaign. He didn't place himself in the lime-light, the media did. Barack needs to stand firm, go with his first instincts, and stop second guessing his decisions. That will show him as a strong leader. He can't please everyone, so, stop stepping on the toes of those who do support you, trying to win over those who will never support you, if only because of your race.

He should have introduced Pastor Wright to the American public at the onset of his campaign, like he originally intended to do. Barack needs to remember that there was an outcry over the statement that his wife made about being proud for the first time in her adult life. I personally thought there was nothing wrong with her statement. No one can claim ownership of another's feelings, or life experiences. Demanding that she owed America an apology was ludicrous. She was called anti-American, uppity, and some people still to this day, don't