Rock the Vote Poll Underscores How Many Young Blacks Feel Empowered by Obama’s Run

By: Sherrel Wheeler Stewart

Young black voters have the greatest sense of empowerment in the upcoming presidential election and the greatest appreciation of its historical significance, according to survey results released Tuesday by Rock the Vote.

The poll also showed that Democratic nominee Sen. Barack Obama is the first choice of young people because they are attracted to his campaign theme of change. But his GOP rival, Sen. John McCain, holds the advantage on experience and has narrowed the gap on some other traits, the survey showed.

The results from the survey reflect the energy seen throughout the country among voters 18 to 29, said Stephanie Young, a spokeswoman for Rock the Vote.

“We’ve always had faith in young voters. They have energy and they want their voices to be heard,” Young told BlackAmericaWeb.com.

Rock the Vote Poll Underscores How Many Young Blacks Feel Empowered by Obama’s Run....

Echoing AP Poll, Anti-Racism Activist Says Obama ‘Faces Huge Barrier’ with Many Whites

By: Michael H. Cottman and Jackie Jones

A leading anti-racism activist says Sen. Barack Obama could lose the presidential election in November because many whites will never vote to put a black man in the White House -- even if they tell pollsters and friends they are color blind.

“Senator Obama faces a huge racial barrier,” Dr. Joe Feagin, a sociology professor at Texas A&M University and author of more than 20 books on race and racism issues, told BlackAmericaWeb.com Monday.

“Whites have learned to hide their feelings about African-Americans,” he said. “Race for whites is a highly emotional concept in our minds. There is so much hidden racism in this country.”

Feagin, who is white, said his research indicates that many whites are not truthful in polls about how they feel about blacks. They still maintain racist, age-old stereotypes about blacks and “in the privacy of the voting booth” probably won’t support Obama.

The notion that many whites say they are “color blind” -- whether Democrat or Republican -- is a farce, he said.

“Whites don’t want to look racist when asked about Obama [in polls] but if they vote for Obama, they would have to lie to their friends and say they voted for McCain,” said Feagin, an Obama supporter.

Echoing AP Poll, Anti-Racism Activist Says Obama ‘Faces Huge Barrier’ with Many Whites....

Black Journalists Scoff at Suggestions That Coverage of Barack Obama Tests Their Objectivity

By: Jackie Jones, BlackAmericaWeb.com

The role of citizen journalists and the presence of journalists of color on the campaign trail and covering the White House are all common fodder for journalist conventions. The elephant in the room is usually the issue of whether minority journalists are held to a different standard of objectivity than white reporters.

The issue broke open during a panel discussion about campaign coverage at the UNITY convention in Chicago Sunday.

Alicia Shepard, ombudsman for National Public Radio, asked whether journalists should applaud or cheer a candidate’s appearance, an obvious foreshadowing of the appearance of presumptive Democratic nominee Sen. Barack Obama, which followed the panel.

“It’s analyzing as if we’re under a microscope,” responded NABJ founder and former president Les Payne, saying the question suggested to minority journalists, “You cannot do what we do routinely, what we do universally and have been doing for centuries.”

Payne noted that white journalists have relationships with sources and socialize with them, maintaining that even the American Society of Newspaper Editors applauded President Bush both metaphorically and literally.

Through their coverage of the events leading up to the war in Iraq, American editors essentially applauded Bush’s handling of the war. “Just ask Judith Miller,” Payne said, referring to The New York Times reporter whose close ties to White House sources resulted in coverage that some said essentially endorsed the Bush administration.

Black Journalists Scoff at Suggestions That Coverage of Barack Obama Tests Their Objectivity....

Barack Obama Talks Immigration, Intolerance with Journalists of Color at First Post-Trip Forum

By: Jackie Jones, BlackAmericaWeb.com

Last year, when Sen. Barack Obama was making the circuit of conventions for journalists of color, the question was whether the prospective candidate was black enough. This year, when he appeared before the UNITY: Journalists of Color convention in Chicago, the presumptive Democratic nominee joked, “I’m too black.”

Obama appeared Sunday at the close of the convention in a session aired live on CNN to talk about his observations from his trip to the Middle East and Europe, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. economy and questions from the journalists about faith, affirmative action, immigration and apologies for slavery and to Native Americans.

About 6,000 journalists convened in Chicago last week to discuss coverage of communities of color and the status of journalists of color in the news industry, particularly given a recent wave of buyouts and layoffs that cost 1,000 jobs in June alone, according to some estimates.

UNITY: Journalists of Color, Inc. is a coalition of four national associations -- NABJ, the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, the National American Journalists Association and the Asian American Journalists Association -- that places its total representation around 10,000. The organization challenges the journalism industry to make its staffs reflect the country’s diversity, and it advocates for fair and accurate news coverage about people of color.

Obama originally had been expected to appear at a town hall session on Thursday at the convention, but the overseas trip and other commitments by Republican opponent John McCain’s campaign disrupted those plans.

Barack Obama Talks Immigration, Intolerance with Journalists of Color at First Post-Trip Forum....

Full script of Obama's speech

Thank you to the citizens of Berlin and to the people of Germany. Let me thank Chancellor Merkel and Foreign Minister Steinmeier for welcoming me earlier today. Thank you Mayor Wowereit, the Berlin Senate, the police, and most of all thank you for this welcome.

I come to Berlin as so many of my countrymen have come before. Tonight, I speak to you not as a candidate for President, but as a citizen - a proud citizen of the United States, and a fellow citizen of the world.

I know that I don't look like the Americans who've previously spoken in this great city. The journey that led me here is improbable. My mother was born in the heartland of America, but my father grew up herding goats in Kenya. His father - my grandfather - was a cook, a domestic servant to the British.

At the height of the Cold War, my father decided, like so many others in the forgotten corners of the world, that his yearning - his dream - required the freedom and opportunity promised by the West. And so he wrote letter after letter to universities all across America until somebody, somewhere answered his prayer for a better life.

That is why I'm here. And you are here because you too know that yearning. This city, of all cities, knows the dream of freedom. And you know that the only reason we stand here tonight is because men and women from both of our nations came together to work, and struggle, and sacrifice for that better life.

Ours is a partnership that truly began sixty years ago this summer, on the day when the first American plane touched down at Templehof.

On that day, much of this continent still lay in ruin. The rubble of this city had yet to be built into a wall. The Soviet shadow had swept across Eastern Europe, while in the West, America, Britain, and France took stock of their losses, and pondered how the world might be remade.

This is where the two sides met. And on the twenty-fourth of June, 1948, the Communists chose to blockade the western part of the city. They cut off food and supplies to more than two million Germans in an effort to extinguish the last flame of freedom in Berlin.

The size of our forces was no match for the much larger Soviet Army. And yet retreat would have allowed Communism to march across Europe. Where the last war had ended, another World War could have easily begun. All that stood in the way was Berlin.

And that's when the airlift began - when the largest and most unlikely rescue in history brought food and hope to the people of this city.

The odds were stacked against success. In the winter, a heavy fog filled the sky above, and many planes were forced to turn back without dropping off the needed supplies. The streets where we stand were filled with hungry families who had no comfort from the cold.

But in the darkest hours, the people of Berlin kept the flame of hope burning. The people of Berlin refused to give up. And on one fall day, hundreds of thousands of Berliners came here, to the Tiergarten, and heard the city's mayor implore the world not to give up on freedom. "There is only one possibility," he said. "For us to stand together united until this battle is won...The people of Berlin have spoken. We have done our duty, and we will keep on doing our duty. People of the world: now do your duty...People of the world, look at Berlin!"

People of the world - look at Berlin!

Look at Berlin, where Germans and Americans learned to work together and trust each other less than three years after facing each other on the field of battle.

Look at Berlin, where the determination of a people met the generosity of the Marshall Plan and created a German miracle; where a victory over tyranny gave rise to NATO, the greatest alliance ever formed to defend our common security.

Look at Berlin, where the bullet holes in the buildings and the somber stones and pillars near the Brandenburg Gate insist that we never forget our common humanity.

People of the world - look at Berlin, where a wall came down, a continent came together, and history proved that there is no challenge too great for a world that stands as one.

Sixty years after the airlift, we are called upon again. History has led us to a new crossroad, with new promise and new peril. When you, the German people, tore down that wall - a wall that divided East and West; freedom and tyranny; fear and hope - walls came tumbling down around the world. From Kiev to Cape Town, prison camps were closed, and the doors of democracy were opened. Markets opened too, and the spread of information and technology reduced barriers to opportunity and prosperity. While the 20th century taught us that we share a common destiny, the 21st has revealed a world more intertwined than at any time in human history.

The fall of the Berlin Wall brought new hope. But that very closeness has given rise to new dangers - dangers that cannot be contained within the borders of a country or by the distance of an ocean.

The terrorists of September 11th plotted in Hamburg and trained in Kandahar and Karachi before killing thousands from all over the globe on American soil.

As we speak, cars in Boston and factories in Beijing are melting the ice caps in the Arctic, shrinking coastlines in the Atlantic, and bringing drought to farms from Kansas to Kenya.

Poorly secured nuclear material in the former Soviet Union, or secrets from a scientist in Pakistan could help build a bomb that detonates in Paris. The poppies in Afghanistan become the heroin in Berlin. The poverty and violence in Somalia breeds the terror of tomorrow. The genocide in Darfur shames the conscience of us all.

In this new world, such dangerous currents have swept along faster than our efforts to contain them. That is why we cannot afford to be divided. No one nation, no matter how large or powerful, can defeat such challenges alone. None of us can deny these threats, or escape responsibility in meeting them. Yet, in the absence of Soviet tanks and a terrible wall, it has become easy to forget this truth. And if we're honest with each other, we know that sometimes, on both sides of the Atlantic, we have drifted apart, and forgotten our shared destiny.

In Europe, the view that America is part of what has gone wrong in our world, rather than a force to help make it right, has become all too common. In America, there are voices that deride and deny the importance of Europe's role in our security and our future. Both views miss the truth - that Europeans today are bearing new burdens and taking more responsibility in critical parts of the world; and that just as American bases built in the last century still help to defend the security of this continent, so does our country still sacrifice greatly for freedom around the globe.

Yes, there have been differences between America and Europe. No doubt, there will be differences in the future. But the burdens of global citizenship continue to bind us together. A change of leadership in Washington will not lift this burden. In this new century, Americans and Europeans alike will be required to do more - not less. Partnership and cooperation among nations is not a choice; it is the one way, the only way, to protect our common security and advance our common humanity.

That is why the greatest danger of all is to allow new walls to divide us from one another.

The walls between old allies on either side of the Atlantic cannot stand. The walls between the countries with the most and those with the least cannot stand. The walls between races and tribes; natives and immigrants; Christian and Muslim and Jew cannot stand. These now are the walls we must tear down.

We know they have fallen before. After centuries of strife, the people of Europe have formed a Union of promise and prosperity. Here, at the base of a column built to mark victory in war, we meet in the center of a Europe at peace. Not only have walls come down in Berlin, but they have come down in Belfast, where Protestant and Catholic found a way to live together; in the Balkans, where our Atlantic alliance ended wars and brought savage war criminals to justice; and in South Africa, where the struggle of a courageous people defeated apartheid.

So history reminds us that walls can be torn down. But the task is never easy. True partnership and true progress requires constant work and sustained sacrifice. They require sharing the burdens of development and diplomacy; of progress and peace. They require allies who will listen to each other, learn from each other and, most of all, trust each other.

That is why America cannot turn inward. That is why Europe cannot turn inward. America has no better partner than Europe. Now is the time to build new bridges across the globe as strong as the one that bound us across the Atlantic. Now is the time to join together, through constant cooperation, strong institutions, shared sacrifice, and a global commitment to progress, to meet the challenges of the 21st century. It was this spirit that led airlift planes to appear in the sky above our heads, and people to assemble where we stand today. And this is the moment when our nations - and all nations - must summon that spirit anew.

This is the moment when we must defeat terror and dry up the well of extremism that supports it. This threat is real and we cannot shrink from our responsibility to combat it. If we could create NATO to face down the Soviet Union, we can join in a new and global partnership to dismantle the networks that have struck in Madrid and Amman; in London and Bali; in Washington and New York. If we could win a battle of ideas against the communists, we can stand with the vast majority of Muslims who reject the extremism that leads to hate instead of hope.

This is the moment when we must renew our resolve to rout the terrorists who threaten our security in Afghanistan, and the traffickers who sell drugs on your streets. No one welcomes war. I recognize the enormous difficulties in Afghanistan. But my country and yours have a stake in seeing that NATO's first mission beyond Europe's borders is a success. For the people of Afghanistan, and for our shared security, the work must be done. America cannot do this alone. The Afghan people need our troops and your troops; our support and your support to defeat the Taliban and al Qaeda, to develop their economy, and to help them rebuild their nation. We have too much at stake to turn back now.

This is the moment when we must renew the goal of a world without nuclear weapons. The two superpowers that faced each other across the wall of this city came too close too often to destroying all we have built and all that we love. With that wall gone, we need not stand idly by and watch the further spread of the deadly atom. It is time to secure all loose nuclear materials; to stop the spread of nuclear weapons; and to reduce the arsenals from another era. This is the moment to begin the work of seeking the peace of a world without nuclear weapons.

This is the moment when every nation in Europe must have the chance to choose its own tomorrow free from the shadows of yesterday. In this century, we need a strong European Union that deepens the security and prosperity of this continent, while extending a hand abroad. In this century - in this city of all cities - we must reject the Cold War mind-set of the past, and resolve to work with Russia when we can, to stand up for our values when we must, and to seek a partnership that extends across this entire continent.

This is the moment when we must build on the wealth that open markets have created, and share its benefits more equitably. Trade has been a cornerstone of our growth and global development. But we will not be able to sustain this growth if it favors the few, and not the many. Together, we must forge trade that truly rewards the work that creates wealth, with meaningful protections for our people and our planet. This is the moment for trade that is free and fair for all.

This is the moment we must help answer the call for a new dawn in the Middle East. My country must stand with yours and with Europe in sending a direct message to Iran that it must abandon its nuclear ambitions. We must support the Lebanese who have marched and bled for democracy, and the Israelis and Palestinians who seek a secure and lasting peace. And despite past differences, this is the moment when the world should support the millions of Iraqis who seek to rebuild their lives, even as we pass responsibility to the Iraqi government and finally bring this war to a close.

This is the moment when we must come together to save this planet. Let us resolve that we will not leave our children a world where the oceans rise and famine spreads and terrible storms devastate our lands. Let us resolve that all nations - including my own - will act with the same seriousness of purpose as has your nation, and reduce the carbon we send into our atmosphere. This is the moment to give our children back their future. This is the moment to stand as one.

And this is the moment when we must give hope to those left behind in a globalized world. We must remember that the Cold War born in this city was not a battle for land or treasure. Sixty years ago, the planes that flew over Berlin did not drop bombs; instead they delivered food, and coal, and candy to grateful children. And in that show of solidarity, those pilots won more than a military victory. They won hearts and minds; love and loyalty and trust - not just from the people in this city, but from all those who heard the story of what they did here.

Now the world will watch and remember what we do here - what we do with this moment. Will we extend our hand to the people in the forgotten corners of this world who yearn for lives marked by dignity and opportunity; by security and justice? Will we lift the child in Bangladesh from poverty, shelter the refugee in Chad, and banish the scourge of AIDS in our time?

Will we stand for the human rights of the dissident in Burma, the blogger in Iran, or the voter in Zimbabwe? Will we give meaning to the words "never again" in Darfur?

Will we acknowledge that there is no more powerful example than the one each of our nations projects to the world? Will we reject torture and stand for the rule of law? Will we welcome immigrants from different lands, and shun discrimination against those who don't look like us or worship like we do, and keep the promise of equality and opportunity for all of our people?

People of Berlin - people of the world - this is our moment. This is our time.

I know my country has not perfected itself. At times, we've struggled to keep the promise of liberty and equality for all of our people. We've made our share of mistakes, and there are times when our actions around the world have not lived up to our best intentions.

But I also know how much I love America. I know that for more than two centuries, we have strived - at great cost and great sacrifice - to form a more perfect union; to seek, with other nations, a more hopeful world. Our allegiance has never been to any particular tribe or kingdom - indeed, every language is spoken in our country; every culture has left its imprint on ours; every point of view is expressed in our public squares. What has always united us - what has always driven our people; what drew my father to America's shores - is a set of ideals that speak to aspirations shared by all people: that we can live free from fear and free from want; that we can speak our minds and assemble with whomever we choose and worship as we please.

Those are the aspirations that joined the fates of all nations in this city. Those aspirations are bigger than anything that drives us apart. It is because of those aspirations that the airlift began. It is because of those aspirations that all free people - everywhere - became citizens of Berlin. It is in pursuit of those aspirations that a new generation - our generation - must make our mark on history.

People of Berlin - and people of the world - the scale of our challenge is great. The road ahead will be long. But I come before you to say that we are heirs to a struggle for freedom. We are a people of improbable hope. Let us build on our common history, and seize our common destiny, and once again engage in that noble struggle to bring justice and peace to our world.

Obama Blasts Conservative Attacks Against Wife: 'Debate Me Not Her'

ABC News' Jennifer Parker reports: Presumptive Democratic nominee Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., said conservative criticism of his wife, Michelle, infuriates him.

"I don't have a thick skin when it comes to criticism of my wife," Obama told the women's magazine Glamour in an interview to run in the magazine's October issue. "And you know, the problem is that rarely do these folks have the guts to say it to your face."

Obama, who is vying for the support of women voters who flocked to Sen. Hillary Clinton's campaign during the primaries, argued his wife and Clinton have been the target of similar conservative attacks.

"Hillary Clinton was subject to this, others have been subject to this in the past," Obama told Glamour editor -in-chief Cindi Leive Wednesday, "It is part of our political environment that I'd like to change."

Obama Blasts Conservative Attacks Against Wife: 'Debate Me Not Her'....

COMEDIANS CAN'T FIND THE FUNNY WITH OBAMA: NY Times article exposes unease with poking fun with candidate.

People are talking about a New York Times article published Tuesday that points out how difficult it is for comedians to make jokes about Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama.

"Jay Leno, David Letterman, Conan O'Brien and others have delivered a nightly stream of jokes about the Republican running for president — each one a variant on the same theme: John McCain is old," the article states.

"But there has been little humor about Obama: about his age, his speaking ability, his intelligence, his family, his physique. And within a late-night landscape dominated by white hosts, white writers, and overwhelmingly white audiences, there has been almost none about his race."

COMEDIANS CAN'T FIND THE FUNNY WITH OBAMA....

Obama Tells NAACP Confab He’ll Keep Talking About Black Fathers, Personal Responsibility

By: Michael H. Cottman

Sen. Barack Obama told thousands of NAACP members Monday that as America's first viable black presidential candidate, he is following in the footsteps of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and many other courageous civil rights activists who were staunch advocates for social justice and equality for African-Americans.

"It is because of them; and all those whose names never made it into the history books -- those men and women, young and old, black, brown and white, clear-eyed and straight-backed, who refused to settle for the world as it is; who had the courage to remake the world as it should be -- it's because of them that I stand before you tonight as the Democratic nominee for President of the United States of America," Obama told a capacity crowd attending the 99th annual convention of the NAACP in Cincinnati.

"And if I have the privilege of serving as your next president, I will stand up for you the same way that earlier generations of Americans stood up for me -- by fighting to ensure that every single one of us has the chance to make it if we try," Obama said. "That means removing the barriers of prejudice and misunderstanding that still exist in America. It means fighting to eliminate discrimination from every corner of our country. It means changing hearts and changing minds and making sure that every American is treated equally under the law."

Obama Tells NAACP Confab He’ll Keep Talking About Black Fathers, Personal Responsibility....

Obama campaign calls New Yorker cover offensive

(CNN) -- Sen. Barack Obama's campaign has sharply criticized The New Yorker magazine over the publication's latest cover illustration, which appears to portray the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee and his wife as terrorist enemies of the United States.

The cover, published Sunday, shows Obama in the Oval Office dressed in traditional Muslim attire. His wife, Michelle, wears an Afro hairstyle and has a machine gun slung over her back. An American flag can be seen burning in the fireplace, and a picture of Osama bin Laden hangs on the wall.

"The New Yorker may think, as one of their staff explained to us, that their cover is a satirical lampoon of the caricature Sen. Obama's right-wing critics have tried to create," Obama spokesman Bill Burton said in a statement. "But most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree."

Obama campaign calls New Yorker cover offensive....

Jackson Barks, but Does He Still Have Bite?

By PATRICK HEALY

It used to be called “the Jesse Jackson problem”: Democratic presidential candidates fearing they would lose black votes if they got on Mr. Jackson’s bad side, given the influence he accrued as a civil rights activist and his history-making races for the White House in 1984 and 1988.

But if his recent critical comments about Senator Barack Obama prove anything, Democrats and political scientists said Thursday, it is that a Jesse problem these days can actually help a candidate like Mr. Obama — with white voters who have questions about whether Mr. Obama shares their values, and with black voters who see Mr. Jackson as a figure of the past.

Even Mr. Jackson’s 43-year-old son, Representative Jesse Jackson Jr. of Illinois, went beyond repudiation to excoriate him — a poignant reminder that a real generational shift in power and leadership is under way in African-American politics. Mr. Obama, 46, has already overshadowed former President Bill Clinton, once a deeply popular figure among black Americans; if anything, Mr. Obama seems likely to gain political dividends from Mr. Jackson’s vulgar criticism of him for, as Mr. Jackson put it, “talking down to black people” in speeches about the responsibilities of absent black fathers.

Jackson Barks, but Does He Still Have Bite?....

Commentary: When It Comes to Obama, Looks Like Black Catholics Will Abort Their Beliefs and Support Him

By: Gregory Kane

Fr. Edward Miller, pastor of St. Bernardine’s Roman Catholic Church in Baltimore, Md., made it clear he made the remark to make the point, not to endorse any particular presidential candidate.

But the reaction of St. Bernardine’s black Catholics was revealing. They shouted, applauded and cheered when Miller began his sentence with “When President Obama invites you to his inaugural ball.”

I’ve been churching it up quite a bit lately, figuring the Lord would want me to pray for Baltimore’s many reprobates and scofflaws as opposed to my kneecapping them. I can’t really call myself a devout Catholic, but I wondered how devout black Catholics could bring themselves to vote Obama, or any other Democrat, into the White House.

The last I checked, the Catholic Church had this big thing about abortion. To be brief, the church is against it. Abortion is considered one of the gravest mortal sins by the church, and has been for years.

COMMENTARY....

Obama Forgoes Public Funds in First for Major Candidate

By ADAM NAGOURNEY and JEFF ZELENY

WASHINGTON — Senator Barack Obama announced on Thursday that he would not participate in the public financing system for presidential campaigns. He argued that the system had collapsed, and would put him at a disadvantage running against Senator John McCain, his likely Republican opponent.

With his decision, Mr. Obama became the first candidate of a major party to decline public financing — and the spending limits that go with it — since the system was created in 1976, after the Watergate scandals.

Mr. Obama made his announcement in a video message sent to supporters and posted on the Internet. While it was not a surprise — his aides have been hinting that he would take this step for two months — it represented a turnabout from his strong earlier suggestion that he would join the system. Mr. McCain has been a champion of public financing of campaign throughout his career.

Obama Forgoes Public Funds in First for Major Candidate....

Priest who mocked Clinton told to take a leave

By SOPHIA TAREEN

CHICAGO (AP) — Cardinal Francis George asked a Chicago priest on Tuesday to temporarily step down from his post to "reflect on his recent statements" regarding Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and her bid for the White House.

Last week, the Rev. Michael Pfleger mocked Clinton at Sen. Barack Obama's former church, saying the New York senator felt "entitled" to the Democratic nomination for president.

In a guest sermon at Trinity United Church of Christ, Pfleger pretended he was Clinton crying over "a black man stealing my show."

Pfleger's sermon, along with past controversial statements by Trinity's former longtime pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, led Obama to resign his membership at Trinity. Pfleger apologized for his comments Sunday.

ARTICLE....

CLINTON EXPECTED TO END RACE TONIGHT: But it'll cost Obama millions.

From various published reports, it appears that the race between Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton for the Democrastic presidential nomination is about to come to a merciful end.

We've also learned that part of the process calls for Obama to help payoff Clinton's campaign debt which is estimated to be between $20 and $40 million dollars.


Apparently, once that happens Clinton is prepared to step aside and put in place plans to endorse Obama. To that extent, it's being reported that she has asked her key donors and backers to be in New York city tonight where she is expected to make a speech to announce the above items.


The Huffington Post.com says "that Obama and Clinton spoke Sunday night and agreed that their staffs should begin negotiations over post-primary activities, according to reliable sources. In addition to seeking Obama's help in raising money to pay off debts, Clinton wants Obama to assist black officials who endorsed her and who are now taking constituent heat, including, in some cases, primary challenges from pro-Obama politicians."


“It’s not about the vice-presidency or any other position she might get. It’s about the money – in particular the Clinton family money,” a source close to a Clinton donor told the UK's Telegraph.


In other words, yes, it boils down to what you're thinking. If Obama wants Bill and Hillary Clinton's support in the general election, he'll have to pay for it. Literally.

FULL STORY....

Black Superdelegates in Congress Who Support Clinton Resisting Calls to Switch to Obama

By: Sherrel Wheeler Stewart, BlackAmericaweb.com

The 14 Congressional Black Caucus members who support Sen. Hillary Clinton are standing firm on their commitment as Sen. Barack Obama approaches the number of delegates needed to clinch the Democratic nomination and national discussion continues over her statements on race.

In an interview last week Clinton said, “working, hardworking Americans, white Americans” would support her instead of Sen. Barack Obama, suggesting a racial split among Democratic voters that favored her. She said she was referring to information previously published and the comments were not intended to be divisive.

Rep. Charles Rangel of New York, a longtime Clinton supporter, had sharp criticism over the weekend for Clinton’s remarks, calling the comment “the dumbest thing she could have ever said,” according to an article published in Newsday. Also in that article, he acknowledged that there are certain groups of voters that politicians realize they will not attract.

But still while speaking at a New York fundraiser for the senator, he encouraged support for her, according to an article published in Newsday.

“We have worked with Hillary Clinton, and we need Hillary Clinton now more than ever,” Rangel said.

STORY....

Is the Democratic Race Essentially Over? Voters, Pundits Alike Await Clinton’s Exit Strategy

By: Michael H. Cottman

With Sen. Barack Obama’s landslide victory in North Carolina and only a two-point loss to Sen. Hillary Clinton in Indiana, some Democrats said Tuesday that Clinton may now need something that was unthinkable just two months ago: An exit plan.

A senior Democratic strategist familiar with the Clinton campaign’s plans told BlackAmericaWeb.com Wednesday that shortly after the June 3 primaries in Montana and South Dakota, if a number of party figures known as superdelegates are switching their allegiance to Obama, then she would probably cut her losses and drop out of the race.

"She’s not going to tear the party apart," the strategist said Wednesday, "and she’ll be the first person up on the stage supporting Senator Obama."

READ ENTIRE STORY....

Commentary: Like a Bad Penny, Obama’s Links to Rev. Wright Will Continue to Revisit Him in the Campaign

By: Joseph C. Phillips, BlackAmericaWeb.com

A brief recap of some of the highpoints from the Rev. Jeremiah Wright resurrection tour:

The former pastor of the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago reiterated his belief that America has been a terrorist nation from its inception, defended his damning of America, stood by his belief that the American government created the HIV virus and placed drugs in the black community in order to exterminate black people, then further derided the country as a place where "I can worship God on Sunday morning wearing a black clergy robe and kill others on Sunday evening wearing a white Klan robe." Finally, Wright dismissed the entire controversy over his words as an attack on the black church.

Just a guess, but I am betting he did himself no favors. I would add that rather than pen op-eds telling us all how ignorant we are because we don’t understand black liberation theology, the reverend’s supporters would do better to simply produce a tape where the former pastor is heard preaching something along the lines of “God bless this great and good country.”

The problem for Wright’s supporters and ultimately for presidential hopeful Barack Obama, a 20-year congregant of Trinity, is that there is no such tape because no such sermon was delivered. Rather, what was heard on video clips across the world wide web and then repeated in the speeches and interviews before the National Press Club and the NAACP is left to stand as representative of Wright’s views. The judgment of any candidate intimately associated with such views is a legitimate political issue and one that, like a bad penny, will continue to revisit Obama over and over again.

Considering the number of “good liberals” that essentially agree with the spirit, if not the substance, of Wright’s words and have rushed to his defense, it is also one that should haunt the Democratic Party as well.

A few questions to Wright and those that subscribe to a view of America as “Ameri-KKK-A” are in order. Let us concede that everything you say about America is true: America is a terrorist nation, the government has indeed sought to destroy black people through the introduction of man-made race-specific diseases and addictive, soul-destroying drugs, and racism is running rampant throughout the nation. Given the abject evil of the American government, why do you look to that same government to provide you with health care, retirement benefits and an education for your children? Wouldn’t it make more sense to support policies that limit such a government’s involvement and power over its citizens?

The solutions proffered by the party Wright supports to each and every issue confronting Americans is an expanse of federal involvement. Both Obama and Hillary Clinton support government regulated health care; both have rejected personal ownership of retirement accounts and instead endorsed an expansion of the social security tax. Both Democratic candidates have expressed support of further government regulation of the insurance, oil and pharmaceutical companies. Both want federal funding of a universal pre-school program. If we can’t trust government not to clandestinely plan for the annihilation of the black race, why on earth would we send our toddlers to federally financed (and ultimately run) pre-schools?

Or is it that the election of Barack Obama to the presidency would restore moral legitimacy to this nation’s institutions and traditions and put us on track to reconciliation and redemption? And if that is the case wouldn’t it be better for you to, well, -- to put it bluntly -- sit down and shut up?

To this last question, Wright answers that he is defending the honor of the black church. Ain’t nobody gonna talk about his mama! With all do respect, the reverend neither speaks for the black church nor do I believe his scurrilous and idiotic theories speak for the majority of black church-goers. His continued allocutions do, however, raise his national profile and increase his speaking fees.

Were Wright a black separatist or even a (gasp!) conservative with these convictions, it would make some sense, but to be a liberal Democrat preaching these theories makes him appear lunatic. A lunatic that, alas, will not go away.

The Rift Between Barack Obama, Rev. Wright Creates Divided Loyalties in Black Churches

By: Eric Gorski, AP Religion Writer

Sen. Barack Obama's break with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright is putting black pastors and their congregations in a difficult position, their loyalties divided between a politician who could be the first black president and a celebrated preacher who many believe has been vilified.

The situation is complicated, ministers say, because there's a sense that both men have been treated unfairly -- and that both have made mistakes.

Many black ministers defended Wright when clips of his more incendiary sermons became an Internet sensation in March, saying context was needed to understand the black church's tradition of challenging injustice.

But Wright lost some of that support after his Monday appearance at the National Press Club in Washington, during which he claimed the U.S. government was capable of planting AIDS in the black community, praised Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan and suggested that Obama was acting like a politician by putting his pastor at arm's length while privately agreeing with him.

The performance was enough for Obama to denounce Wright's comments as "divisive and destructive." That was just six weeks after he portrayed Wright, in a well-received speech on race, as a family member he couldn't disown.

"What I am disappointed in is Rev. Wright's continuing to be in the public eye," said Bishop Charles H. Ellis III, senior pastor of 6,500-member Greater Grace Temple in Detroit. "If he has a point to get across, make your point. We as ministers have to be very careful about our timing."

Another pastor in Detroit -- where Wright received a standing ovation Sunday at a dinner for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People -- directed his anger at the Democratic senator.

The Rev. William Revely, pastor of 300-member Holy Hope Heritage Church, questioned Obama's truthfulness in claiming he had not heard some of Wright's contentious remarks from the pulpit.

"Anybody who has heard Jeremiah preach has heard that," said Revely, who has known Wright since the 1970s. "Jeremiah, he's a pastor, and as a pastor you have to see things as they are. Politicians see things as they want them to be."

The punches and counter-punches thrown by Obama and Wright are leaving black churchgoers angry at both, said the Rev. Bennie Whiten, a retired United Church of Christ minister.

People want to embrace Obama's candidacy but worry about recent stumbles and wonder whether he fully understands racial divides still exist, Whiten said. They admire Wright but question his timing and tone.

"I think we've got two very good men, two very strong men, who find themselves in an almost impossible situation from which neither can extricate himself," said Whiten, who lives in Chicago and has worshipped as a visitor at Trinity United Church of Christ.

The Rev. Herbert H. Lusk II, a conservative black pastor at Greater Exodus Baptist Church in Philadelphia, expressed sympathy for Wright but said he relates more to Obama. He compared Obama's situation to his own, as a Republican pastor of an overwhelmingly Democratic congregation. His members get angry over his support for President Bush but remain because of family, friends and other ties, Lusk said.

Obama "doesn't appear to me to be hypocritical or disingenuous," Lusk said. "He's just another parishioner who struggles with what happens in his church, what the pastor says and all the other intangibles."

Wright's Press Club performance forced Obama's hand, said the Rev. Byron Williams, a pastor and columnist in Oakland, Calif. Here was a candidate who built a movement on the notion of America's better self, yet he was being defined by his pastor's rhetoric.

Wright is savvy enough to know that anything positive said about Farrakhan -- known for past anti-Semitic remarks -- will be portrayed negatively in a 24-hour news cycle, Williams said.

Yet Obama's public rejection of his pastor carries risk. In February 2007, Obama abruptly disinvited Wright from delivering the invocation at the kickoff of his presidential campaign. That move suggests Obama has long known Wright could be a liability and only disowned him when forced, Williams said.

"He is going to have to account for what is perceived as this air of disingenuousness," Williams said.

The Rev. Dwayne A. Walker also confessed to mixed emotions over the rift between Obama and Wright.

Walker, pastor of 1,000-member Little Rock AME Zion Church in Charlotte, N.C., said he admires both men. Yet he understands why Obama broke ties with the minister who helped lead Obama to Christianity, married him and baptized his children.

Walker said what angers him most is how Obama, unlike other presidential candidates, has been defined by what someone else has said rather than by his own words and record.

"Overall, I don't think Obama should be defined by his pastor, nor should Dr. Wright be defined by that moment," he said of the Press Club exchange. "It was a bad moment, and it came at a bad time."

As a pastor, Walker said he has another wish: That politician and pastor eventually reconcile.

Pained by Wright’s Comments, Suggestion of Pandering, Barack Obama Blasts Former Pastor

By: Jackie Jones and Sherrel Wheeler Stewart, BlackAmericaWeb.com

In the strongest language to date, Sen. Barack Obama denounced the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, saying his former pastor’s recent statements “contradict everything I have been about.”

Obama’s remarks came a day after Wright delivered a speech at the National Press Club in Washington. In a question-and-answer session afterward, Wright said criticism of his previous remarks were not an attack on him, but the black church. He also criticized the U.S. government as imperialist and stood by his suggestion that the United States invented the HIV virus as a means of genocide against minorities.

"Based on this Tuskegee experiment and based on what has happened to Africans in this country, I believe our government is capable of doing anything," he said.

And perhaps even worse for Obama, Wright suggested that the church congregant secretly concurs.

"He was presenting a world view that contradicts who I am and what I stand for," Obama said at a news conference in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. "And what I think particularly angered me was his suggestion somehow that my previous denunciation of his remarks were somehow political posturing. Anybody who knows me and anybody who knows what I'm about knows that I am about trying to bridge gaps and I see the commonality in all people."

Wright’s speech was one of a series of public appearances, including an extensive interview on PBS with Bill Moyers aired Friday and a speech before the NAACP on Sunday, that the minister said were aimed to clarify remarks in his sermons that he said have been taken out of context.

At the Press Club, before reporters and a supportive audience of black church leaders beginning a two-day symposium, Wright said the black church tradition was not understood by the "dominant culture" in the United States.

Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, which he formerly pastored, has a long history of liberating the oppressed by feeding the hungry, supporting recovery for the addicted and helping senior citizens in need, and some of its members have fought in the military, including in Afghanistan and Iraq, Wright said.

Wright also clearly enjoyed zinging some reporters whose questions, he said, showed the mainstream media understood neither the black church nor his positions about a variety of issues. Playing to a clearly supportive audience, Wright laughed, pointed to audience members and even slapped five with someone after getting off particularly good lines.

“I am outraged by the comments that were made and saddened by the spectacle that we saw yesterday," said Obama, who noted that in the first news cycle following the release of excerpts seemed a “simplification” and a “caricature” of who Wright was, but that after his appearance at the Press Club, “yesterday I think he caricatured himself.”

The Illinois senator said of Wright's statements: "All it was was a bunch of rants that aren't grounded in truth."

"Obviously, whatever relationship I had with Reverend Wright has changed," Obama said. "I don't think he showed much concern for me, more importantly I don't think he showed much concern for what we're trying to do in this campaign."

Obama said he heard that Wright had given "a performance" and when he watched news accounts, he realized that it more than just a case of the former pastor defending himself.

"His comments were not only divisive and destructive, I believe they end up giving comfort to those who prey on hate," Obama said. "I'll be honest with you, I hadn't seen it" when reacting initially on Monday, he said.

Obama tried to put controversial snippets of a Wright sermon, shown on a seemingly endless loop of sound bites, behind him in a major speech on race in March. The presidential candidate said Tuesday that he spoke to Wright afterwards, and “I was very clear that what he had said in those particular snippets I have found objectionable and offensive and that the purpose of the speech was to provide context for them, but not excuse them.”

Obama appeared to be personally pained by Wright's assertion that "politicians say what they say and do what they do based on electability, based on sound bites, based on polls, Huffington, whoever’s doing the polls," a statement that raised eyebrows about Obama's authenticity as a candidate running on campaign of change.

He was saddened, he said, that Wright chose to portray his disagreement with the minister’s remarks as pandering.

“If Rev. Wright thinks that’s political posturing, as he put it yesterday, then he doesn’t know me very well,” Obama said.

Obama said he has not spoken to Wright since the cleric began his public tour, but was speaking out yesterday to make clear that Wright did not speak for him or the Obama campaign.

“In some ways, what Rev. Wright said yesterday directly contradicts everything that I’ve done during my life. It contradicts how I was raised and the setting in which I was raised,” Obama said. “It contradicts my decisions to pursue a career of public service. It contradicts the issues that I’ve worked on politically. It contradicts what I’ve said in my books. It contradicts what I said in my convention speech in 2004. It contradicts my announcement. It contradicts everything that I’ve been saying on this campaign trail.”

Obama has been a member of Trinity UCC for about 20 years. Wright, as its senior pastor, performed the Obamas' marriage rites and baptized the couple's two daughters. The title of Obama's second book, "The Audacity of Hope," came from a Wright sermon.

When young blacks move to Chicago to work, Trinity is one of the churches recommended by other professionals because of its ministries and opportunities to network, MSNBC anchor Tamron Hall said on "Hardball" Tuesday. She visited the church several times, she said, but maintained that she had not heard the kind of speech that has placed the Wright in a national spotlight.

Hall said following Wright’s Monday interview at the National Press Club, some of the members expressed their dismay to her, saying they thought Wright "was showing out.”

Receptionists at the 8,000 member church told BlackAmericaWeb.com that they were being flooded with calls on Tuesday. Still, they diligently took messages and promised to pass them on to the church spokeswoman, who was traveling back to Chicago from Washington, D.C. on Tuesday and could not respond immediately to questions.

Trinity has stood firmly behind Wright, a man who, for over more than three decades, led the church in becoming the largest in the predominately white denomination. He will be officially replaced in June by the Rev. Otis Moss III, 37, who is known for his ability to dialog with youths and attract them to church and ministry.

The flap has given the young minister an unfortunate inaugural challenge as Trinity's leader, observers say.

"Pastor Moss has inherited the repercussions of an attack he had nothing to do with," said Brenda Salter McNeil, president of an Oak Park-based company that works on diversity issues in Christian organizations. "He has to pastor a people through it."

Moss, an assistant pastor at Trinity for two years, is a Yale Divinity School graduate whose father also is a prominent preacher and a former adviser to the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. His sermons often feature quotes and stories of the late civil rights leader, who officiated at his parents' wedding.

“What's amazing to me is the fact so many don't get why Wright is taking his time in the spotlight to defend himself in this Obama flap. Basically, it's about his ego,” Milwaukee Journal Sentinel columnist Eugene Kane said in an online discussion of Obama’s remarks.

“He's done great work for 40 years, but nobody outside Chicago really knew who he was. NOW everybody does,” Kane said of Wright, who was well known in religious circles, but not many secular ones. “It's not a trait uncommon to preachers, politicians or even journalists who get a bit of national attention and suddenly they start to believe everybody needs to hear their opinions all the time. Frankly, Wright is just doing what everybody in America does when they experience fame; they strike while the iron is hot.”

Obama said he was distressed that controversy over Wright’s remarks has created a distraction from the real issues of the campaign.

“People want some help in stabilizing their lives and securing a better future for themselves and their children. And that’s what we should be talking about,” Obama said.

Fredrick C. Harris, a Columbia University professor and author of "Something Within: Religion in African American Political Activism," said the impact of Wright’s weekend speeches and Obama’s response will vary among voters.

“Wright has his legacy, and he has a right to defend it. But if, in any way, his performance is seen as diminishing the possibility of Barack Obama becoming America’s first black president, he will go down in history as one black man who dragged another black man down,” Harris told BlackAmericaWeb.com.

As for Obama’s response, Harris said, “In his speech in Philadelphia, Obama said he could not disown Wright. Now it seems like he is finally distancing himself.” But some in the black community may take issue with his choice, he said. “They may see this as Obama not showing loyalty to his pastor."

David Bositis, a senior analyst for the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a black think tank, told BlackAmericaWeb.com in an interview after Wright’s PBS appearance that the episode was a distraction, and voters were tired of it.

“Will there be people who take advantage of it, who would use that, including Clinton? Yes, but things are really bad right now, and I don’t think that this election is going to be about Rev. Wright,” Bositis said. “It’s going to be about people afraid of losing their jobs, losing their homes, with not enough money to pay their energy bills and put food on the table.”


Associated Press contributed to this story.

Rev. Wright Has His Say, Speaking On the Black Church, His Sermons – and Barack Obama

By: Jackie Jones, BlackAmericaWeb.com

Just as many critics and pundits who have attacked his remarks based on excerpts of a sermon have not listened to the entire sermon, neither has Sen. Barack Obama, who distanced himself from the remarks, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright said Monday.

Wright delivered a speech at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. that was partly a brief tutorial on the prophetic tradition of the black church and an attempt to clarify remarks in his sermons that he said have been taken out of context.

Asked during a question-and-answer period after the speech why he waited nearly a month before responding to charges that he was bigoted, unpatriotic and inflammatory, Wright said he felt the need to speak out now because the characterization of his critics' remarks were less about him and more about a faulty definition of the black church.

“This is not an attack on Jeremiah Wright; this is an attack on the black church,” Wright said.

Television pundits suggested that Wright came off as flippant, even petulant at times, but Richard Prince, author of Journal-isms, a regular e-column about the journalism industry, said Wright found a receptive audience at the Press Club.

“I have to say that the sentiment in the room -- black clergy, divinity school types, bishops, etc. -- was entirely in Wright's favor,” Prince told BlackAmericaWeb.com in an e-mail interview. “As he said, he does not see himself in relation to Obama's campaign. He will be a pastor on Nov. 5 and Jan. 21 and has his own reputation to protect and own work to do, he said. He saw himself as speaking for the black church, not for Obama.”

There were a number of non-journalists in the room, including clergy and such notables as Cornel West, who enjoyed some of the lines Wright delivered during the question-and-answer session, which seemed to highlight his earlier points about the mainstream media not understanding neither the black church nor his positions about a variety of issues.

“He could be called flippant,” Prince said, “but the audience was eating it up. He was among his own. ‘You on it! You on it!’ one woman near me said.”

“Dr. Wright's interview with Bill Moyers and today's speech at the NPC were very beneficial in fleshing out who Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright is as a person and pastor, in addition to putting into context the sound bites looped repeatedly through various mediums,” said the Rev. Susan Newman, PhD, adjunct minister at Peoples Congregational United Church of Christ in Washington.

“The two-day ‘Teach-In on the Theology of the Black Church’ held in D.C. today and tomorrow is sponsored by The Samuel Dewitt Proctor Conference, Howard University Divinity School and the United Church of Christ. For these two days, our nation’s leading black theologians, historians and sociologists are gathering to discuss the prophetic tradition of the black church and how it is viewed by society today. As Jeremiah has pointed out, what we have witnessed recently has not been an attack on Pastor Wright, but an attack on the black church,” Newman said in an e-mail interview from Kansas City, where she is attending another conference.

“The black church has always spoken truth to injustices in our society -- wherever it shows up -- racist people, systems, policies, government, private clubs, education, housing, employment, sports, media, entertainment and even in the church. The degree of heightened awareness and reaction to Jeremiah Wright only happened because he was the pastor of a man running for the president of the United States,” Newman added.

“For me, it didn’t detract from Obama’s perspective on race in this country,” said Maria Garriott, author of “A Thousand Resurrections,” which chronicles her and her minister husband’s assignment to build a multicultural ministry in Baltimore.

Garriott, who is white, also lectures about racial reconciliation in the church. She said that while she is able to put Wright’s remarks in context, it may not be so easy for others.

“I think these remarks are more difficult for those who work in a mono-cultural setting,” Garriott told BlackAmericaWeb.com.

She relayed the story of a close relative who believed she had demonstrated sensitivity to black co-workers and who felt wounded by Wright’s remarks.

“She was kind of hurt, and she said, ‘It made me wonder if that’s what my African American co-workers think of me,’” Garriott said. “I would hope people would see the whole controversy as an opportunity to have an honest discussion about race.”

Garriott added that she wished that Obama’s speech on race had gotten as much play as the original excerpts of Wright’s sermon because it was illustrative of Obama’s ability to build bridges between different communities.

“That’s the harder work, to be a bridge builder,” Garriott said.

While Wright spoke, a small group of protestors outside the National Press Club marched with picket signs that read “Wright Wrong” and “God Damn Wright,” and some media and political observers say the minister’s public remarks made things worse instead of better.

“Wright's recent appearances will continue to hurt the candidate, because the reverend is the radical Obama never was, and he's close enough to give skeptical white voters an excuse,” St. Petersburg Times media critic Eric Deggans said in his blog, posted minutes after the conclusion of Wright’s remarks. “Right now, Wright is holding court before the world's TV cameras and an admiring audience at the Press Club. His dismissive attitude toward the moderator's questions -- which basically articulate the concerns many white voters have about Wright's public statements and positions -- are playing well in the room, but will likely stoke anger among the assembled press and probably among some white viewers.”

“If this man cares one whit about getting an African-American elected, he ought to get off the national stage,” David Gergen, a White House adviser to Presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton and political analyst told CNN.

Author, columnist, radio host and CNN contributor Roland Martin agreed with Gergen and told CNN that Wright has created a distraction from the issues that voters are genuinely concerned about, such as the war, HIV/AIDS and the economy.

Denise Savage, a consultant based in Washington, is one such voter.

“Nobody follows anybody totally, and I wish the press would stop talking about it,” Savage told BlackAmericaWeb.com.

“If every Catholic were following all the tenets and all the dogma set forth by the pope, there would be trillions of Catholics because no one would be practicing birth control. So why are we holding Obama to such a higher standard? He does not follow every tenet of Wright, and no one follows every tenet of their pastors," said Savage, a former Clinton supporter who switched to Obama just before the D.C. primary in February.

In an effort to end on a light note, moderator Donna Leinwand, National Press Club vice president, repeated part of a joke originally told by Chris Rock about Wright.

“Of course, Rev. Wright’s an angry 75-year-old black man. All 75-year-old black men are angry,” Leinwand quoted from the joke.

Asked by Leinwand “Is that funny? Is that true? Is that unfortunate?” the 66-year-old Wright replied: “It’s just like the media. I’m not 75.”