Pastor's rebuttals fuel troubles for Obama

Remarks on race help GOP camp

WASHINGTON - A series of high-profile appearances by Barack Obama's former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., defending some of his more racially charged remarks threatened to undermine Obama's campaign just when he is trying to connect with white, working-class voters on the eve of crucial Democratic primaries in North Carolina and Indiana.

Wright, whose defiant speeches criticizing America and race relations have become a central issue in Obama's campaign for the Democratic nomination, unapologetically defended his patriotism as well as his ideas before an audience at the National Press Club yesterday.

Rebutting what he called "an attack on the black church," Wright scolded his critics and jabbed at the news media for repeating only the most incendiary parts of his speeches and taking them out of context.

But political analysts say Wright has created fresh political headaches for Obama, who is struggling to distance himself from Wright. For the third time in four days, Wright's appearance in a national forum has kept alive a racially charged controversy while creating more sound-bite ammunition for Obama's opponents.

Republicans in North Carolina, which votes with Indiana on May 6, have already begun airing ads linking Democratic congressional candidates to Obama and Wright.

In a 25-minute speech at the press club that was part sermon and history lesson, Wright combined theology and African-American history to place his more controversial remarks into context and call for tolerance and understanding between minorities and "the dominant culture." But in a question-and-answer session afterward, Wright generally stood by his remarks, including one that has received the most attention: a forceful call that "God damn America," made during a 2003 sermon.

That remark was justified because "God damns some practices," like slavery, war, and inaction on injustice, Wright said. "And there is no excuse for the things that the government - not the American people - have done."

He also issued a challenge should Obama win the nomination and the presidency.

"I said to Barack Obama last year, 'If you get elected, November the 5th, I'm coming after you, because you'll be representing a government whose policies grind under people," Wright said.

Ron Walters, a University of Maryland political scientist and the former campaign manager for Jesse Jackson in 1988, said Wright is clearly attempting to address the "gross unfairness" in the way his remarks have been characterized. While Wright is understandably defending himself, Walters said, "it doesn't bode well for tamping down the story" that Obama probably wishes would disappear.

"This [controversy] is unlikely to go away any time soon," he said. And it will make it more difficult for Obama to wrest away disaffected white working-class voters from Hillary Clinton, Obama's Democratic rival. Clinton carried that constituency by wide margins over Obama in winning primaries in Pennsylvania and Ohio - wins that kept her candidacy alive and prevented Obama from wrapping up the nomination.

Obama, who spent 20 years as a member of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago with Wright as his pastor, has denounced some of Wright's comments that critics describe as anti-American. But in a speech last month on race and politics and since, Obama has taken pains not to denounce the man who performed his wedding and baptized his two daughters.

Asked about Wright yesterday, Obama said the pastor is "obviously free to speak his mind" but again tried to keep him at arm's length.

"I just want to emphasize that this is my former pastor," Obama said yesterday. "Many of the statements that he has made to trigger this controversy are not statements that I've heard him make previously. They don't represent my view, and they don't represent what this campaign is about."

Clinton declined to comment on Wright's remarks, while a spokesman for John McCain, the presumptive GOP nominee, said the campaign "takes Senator Obama at his word." Still, McCain "understands why millions of Americans have concerns about the comments of Rev. Wright and why they would have questions for Senator Obama," the spokesman said.

The Rev. Dwight Hopkins of the University of Chicago Divinity School said he has known Wright for a number of years. Though Wright was "speaking about his own experiences . . . I also think he spoke as a representative of a lot of black churches in America" who view the criticism of him as a collective attack. But the Rev. Eugene Rivers, a Boston community activist, was less impressed.

Though he called Wright "a good man" who has done lots of good in his 40 years in the ministry, Rivers said his speaking tour "has had the unintended consequence of throwing Senator Obama's campaign under the bus." Obama, Rivers said, has tried to be loyal by not disowning Wright, but Wright's decision to speak out is undermining Obama's message of unity.

Wright was only speaking for himself, and does not represent other black churches, Rivers said. "There are other voices," he said.

At the press club, Wright addressed a friendly audience consisting mostly of blacks gathered for a symposium on faith and social action. In prepared remarks, he suggested that the controversy over his speeches is because the "multilayered and rich tapestry" of the black church remains "invisible in a dominant culture."

Perhaps the controversy can spur "an honest dialogue about race in this country . . . a dialogue called for by Senator Obama," Wright said. If that happens, he added, "maybe that religious tradition will be understood, celebrated, and even embraced by a nation that seems not to have noticed why 11 o'clock on Sunday morning has been called the most segregated hour in America."

Asked why he was speaking out now, Wright repeated his charge that he was defending the black church, not advocating for or against a politician. And he likened his response, and his latest remarks, to "playing the dozens" - a game of verbal combat in the black community.

"If you think I'm going to let you talk about my mama," Wright said, "then you've got another think coming."

Wright used the platform, broadcast nationally on C-SPAN, to throw verbal barbs at the media and politicians for using only snippets of his sermons, and refused to condemn Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan because "he is not my enemy."

"Louis and I don't agree on everything" but noted that Farrakhan is influential enough to rally hundreds of thousands of African-Americans, Wright said. When Farrakhan speaks, he added, "all black America listens. Whether they agree with him or not, they listen."

Andra Gillespie, an associate professor of political science at Emory University, said Wright's comments put Obama in a tough political position, particularly since he has tried to run a campaign based on unity and racial reconciliation.

"I don't think Rev. Wright meant to put [the controversy] to bed," she said. "He upped the ante a bit by saying some things Obama couldn't say during his speech" because the Obama campaign "is going to talk about race as little as they have to. The only way Obama comes at this issue is when he's forced to."

"The GOP most assuredly will" make Wright an issue if Obama wins the nomination, Gillespie said, adding that Bill Clinton will probably do the same on behalf of his wife.

But Obama should get used to it, Gillespie added: Despite his best efforts, race "is going to be an issue for Obama as long as he is a candidate."

Globe correspondent Matt Negrin contributed to this report.