Obama says pastor controversy shook him up

Barack Obama talked with us honestly about race. Boston residents can do the same next week with fellow residents at a new dialogue series starting the evening of March 26 at a location adjacent to Back Bay Station. Read on…

=City-Wide Dialogues on Boston’s Ethnic & Racial Diversity=
Spring Dialogue Series Starting 3/26/08 - Join Us

Break Barriers & Make New Friends in a new dialogue series beginning March 26 at a location one block from Back Bay Station on the Orange Line (location provided when you register). We’ll engage in honest, respectful discussions that go beyond the superficial to discuss the difficult past and present as well as our visions for the future in a richly diverse city and country. We’ll talk about LIVING + WORKING together, plus inclusion, safety, changing neighborhoods, gentrification, etc.

This series begins Wednesday, March 26 and will meet for four consecutive Wednesdays, until April 16. All dialogue sessions will meet 6:30-8:30pm. Register online at www.bostondialogues.org or call 617-318-1257.

Participation is free but advance registration and a commitment to attending all 4 sessions are required. Group size is limited to 20 diverse participants, so register ASAP to assure a seat! If this group becomes oversubscribed, City-Wide Dialogues will be holding additional dialogue series this year, dates to be announced, and all registrants who did not get a chance to take part in the March 26 group will be invited to participate.

City-Wide Dialogues groups are composed of diverse Boston residents and co-facilitated by two trained volunteers of different racial/ethnic backgrounds. Participants increase understanding and build new trust, relationships and friendships across racial and ethnic lines. There are some uncomfortable moments as participants recognize their own long-held assumptions and stereotypes, but it works. Over 1300 people have participated, giving overwhelmingly positive feedback about the experience.

Our organizers recognize that an underlying key to achieving civic goals in a diverse society - in housing, jobs, schools, health care, public safety, etc. - is the quality of our human relationships as we try to live and work together. Facilitated dialogues on racial, ethnic and economic diversity helps forge better relationships. In the dialogues we acknowledge the painful past and share visions of a Boston and a United States that is respectful, fair and inclusive of everyone.

Register online at www.bostondialogues.org or call 617-318-1257.

Can you imagine,a speech hailed as one of the greatest has the following:

"I cringed at my white grandmothers words."

It seems that his grand mother is still alive! I wonder how old was Mr. Obama when he heard his grand mother say those words? Why, after so many years, has he not given his grand mother the same benefit of the doubt or forgiveness that he has given to Pastor Wright?

If Obama still holds her words accountable, than did he cringe when Wright said all those hateful words against white people which would include Obama's mother and grand mother?

In Asian culture, you do not say anything bad about your family members. You just do not do that. Is is so disrespectful and shows that you are really not a well cultured, polished person.

I cannot see this to be anything but a selfish speech. Essentially, putting down the family members and embracing the non-family. I wonder how easy it will be to put down america for the rest of the world.

Now everytime I think about my grand mother, the word cringe comes to mind. Thank you Mr. Obama!

I see your true color shining through...

When it's not right for Imus, then it's not right for Wright also. Reality check here:

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5ijClHoidEl8XEJMJoUooHU1R_nmgD8VGP6180

This white middle-class voter is not shaken at all by Sen. Obama's talk to the nation. It's the white middle-class voter who sits in our pews, who whisper prayers to the waiting ear of God, who recognize the grace of God in Sen. Obama's every word. His struggle and languaging of kindness. He has exhibit constant and continual kindness in all his dealings surrounding his campaign. He has deliberated with kind understanding at the sad weakness of others. Love is the most powerful word and expression and Kindness is a strength that comes out of Love. Kindness is a strength that our future President exhibits daily and nothing will change that because grace is his running mate and grace comes from God. It cannot be topped with crude deceptions, ugly mummerings, ungodly mocking and scoffing (i.e. "the clouds will open and the celestial chiors will sing and there will be light" I quote Hillary Clinton). First Commandment = Thou shalt not mock the Lord. Woe to she who mocks the Lord thy God.

My name is MissClarity and I approve this sermon! VIVA OBAMA

1.6 million and counting - wow!

Its really tough being an American, especially if you're Obama. Gee, I'm black, I'm Hispanic. I lived in NYC, I lived overseas while in the Army, I lived in Bama, and now in Kansas. There has been so much hurt, disbelief and disappointed on Reverend Wright's words, that even I find myself rethinking whether Mr. Obama would be not a good President, but a great President. It is sad, indeed very sad for so many of us who want to hope like he does.

For all the speeches he has made, for all the reasons he has given, and yet I find myself asking why he hasn't said this or that. Why he repudiates, rather than flatly condemn his Pastor. He was flying high until Wright 's views and sermon's were shown for America to see.

Yes, I have been told we don't like your kind in our town after being ran off the road. Yes, I have witnessed or being told that I get a free pass because I'm a minority. They say those things and don't know I was at the top 5% of my class, or that I had a resume of an experience executive before I graduated college. It is tough being Obama. For all your accomplishments and all the hard work, sometimes all it takes is one speech, not your own but of someone who happens to have a relation with you. Mitch Romney for all his talents, was quickly put on notice by Huckabee about his Mormon beliefs.

So I guess Obama and Romney should be the dream ticket. For Mormon have understood what is like to be a minority. When the Mormon founder J. Smith was lynched, tarred and feathered a black man who was a Mormon convert was also lynched with him. His was named Willard.

So, yes black and white Americans have suffered injustices. For Reverend Wright's generation being black in America is not a nightmare, but a nightterror. During the Civil Rights movement black marchers, unarmed men, women, children sufferred high pressured hoses that would take their clothes and skin off, attacked dogs were let lose on unarmed men, women and children. Blacks were denied of every form of human dignity most of us take for granted. Until the 1970's (as recently as Star Wars I) being black in America was a socially imposed handicap. I don't say this to make anyone feel guilty. I say this because I want to understand Wright's sermon. The man just went overboard. He is a very angry, desperate, isolated man. He remembers the civil rights era like it was yesterday. He had to spend his life being humiliated because he was black, this, that, and lastly an American with selective rights. So, in this respect I just see his words as angry rant from a man caught in the moment. His words say more about him than white America, or Obama. I guess we're all guilty to a degree. Which brings me back to Obama and Romney.

The founder of the Mormon Church, his brother, and a Black Mormon convert were all lynched together by a mob. Mr. Wright's speech never mentioned the white martyr's of the Civil Wright's movement, it said nothing about how the Clinton's supported, and made blacks part of the Clinton family. It didn't mention the number of Jewish Americans who walk along blacks during the civil rights movement. It never thanks the white's who risked their lives during the days of the underground railroad. Yes, racism exist in America. It is being overcome by new generations of Americans, who embrace black America, its contributions, and want to make this part of America part of their own, regardless of religion, color or ethnic background. Many of us pride ourselves in celebrating OUR black brothers, and share their pain, their joy, their culture,At the end when it counts whether it is a tornado, a hurricane, or an act of terrorist mob we all go through it and come together as Americans.

Yes, I was ran off the road by someone who wasn't to happy with the color of my skin. I have friends who are family of mine who happen to be white. A lot of us are quick to accuse a whole lot of people like cattle and define the whole group, and it is just wrong. There are prejudice people, but not everyone is. Some people practice discrimination, some understand that character and strength of heart defines you. I know that many Americans are not prejudice, some are.

The relation of Pastor Wright and Obama. Well, if he was my preacher I'd publicly put him on notice on his personal rants.I would make him apologize to those who happen to be white and innocent. Generation X's and Y's were not the ones who cause the hurt on black Americans and they surely didn't deserve to be condemned and label by Wright. He has no right or reason to treat people the way he did. I would go line by line and explain why candidate Obama disagrees. Yes, he talked about his grandma, yes he awknowledged witnessing prejudice and discrimination. Many of us have to, whether you're Mormon, Baptist, Jew, Muslim, Catholic, man, woman, gay, kinny, fat, rich or poor.

Obama needs to communicate that he intends to be a President for all Americans, and that his presidency will not be one that will be a puppet or pulpit for people like Wright to torment those who would put him in office, but one that will build a nation. Yes, in a pluralistic society it can be difficult, but it is time to forge ahead, honestly, respectfully, and enthusiastically. No one wants a President who think he is a product or his only reason is to be the champion for just black Americans but for all Americans. I haven't heard him say much about white Americans, in a way that clearly contradicts his Pastor. He is wrong to let him ride. If Obama doesn't do this I can't vote for him. I'm stil waiting for him to come through for us, and for Romney too.

I believe why Obama has done so well in the Mormon states of the Mountain and Upper West Coast is because Mormon's understand discrimination and character. I guess it is weird that we have white American's who suffer discrimination the way blacks have but no one has a ruckus over it. So, see not everyone who is white has it made. They just tell themselves, "YES WE CAN".

I think Demo is going to lose. Obama will be nominated by Demo, because MI FL voters will be striped. Even not striped, it still hard for Clinton to catch obama with delegates. Then with rekzo trial going, Republicans will have more ammunition to defeat obama in GE.
Before, due to the media, we really did not know Obama too much. Now it seems to me he is a POLITICIAN as USUAL.
I only speak of FACTS:
Obama claimed superior JUDGMENT on Iraq War Vote, which he did not have right to vote at the time. But from his JUDGMENT to Rekzo and his Pastor, I don't think he has the judgment to be command-in-chief. HE SAID I TRUSTED REKZO-- that's his own words. That's FACT.
Obama corrected Rekzo donation from $150,000 to $250,000 over the weekend. Now he gave a speech. Every media is focusing on his great speech, who cares his Flip-Flop on donation issues? But that is bad. That is the same calculation media used to accuse Clinton. So HE IS A POLITICIAN AS USUAL.
His judgment and his words on his pastor, is hard for anyone to SWALLOW.
I think he is smart but naïve politically, just like he will meet leaders from evil countries without preconditions.

segregation is not the issue now. the issue is get a job and work. its available. go get it.

I read the lame speech before I heard Obama the orator speak it. He appears to me to be playing the race card for all it's worth. His argument is that he's disadvantaged as a candidate by reason of his blackness; factoring in such a fact is pure bigotry on the part of whites, but on his part it's intelligent realism. His dream is to cure whites of our bigotry by infiltrating the US government at the highest level as a closet Muslim and "unifying" everybody on earth. Wake up, guilt-ridden idealists! You're being gulled by a gifted orator. So far, he appears to have no Hitler-like will to power, just counting on his sob story of being black to con you into voting for him. Clearly, he's an ardent supporter of affirmative action Being editor of the Harvard Law Review is impressive. I wonder if he got this coveted prize by the same tactices -- i.e., I'm more entitled than others because I'm black?

black?

On "Glowing Reviews":

Until the Wright debacle Obama got a free pass from the media. To cover for their intoxication with Obama and his sudden downfall they have no choice now. They must site his "historic" speech, give him "glowing reviews", and cheerfully hold up score cards in order to prove they were "right after all !!!" about their man Obama.

Thing is, Americans aren't stupid and don't want to be dragged back into Wright's World and the 1970s. America has done an enormous job at moving forward and changing over the past several decades. Despite what Wright spews, we have evolved into the most tolerent nation on earth. And despite what Obama's Wright preached, THAT is the very reason for Osama's 9/11. In that regard Obama sadly just doesn't get it. That's why HE's preaching to America about "unity" & "change".

And most voting Americans realize deep in their hearts what he simply doesn't get. That In the end, his speech was that of a self-serving man clinging to political life using cute arguments and fanciful words regardless of how many Kos Kidz download and email his YouTube Speech.

Obama's pastor's comments should have shook him up years ago. It is obvious that Obama clearly knew Wright was going to be trouble for him when he disinvited him to appear with him at the kick-off rally for his campaign. Perhaps Obama didn't have much of a choice because most likely this was his wife's church and she wears the pants in the house so he had to obey her or else. Despite the Princeton (Michelle), and Harvard Law (Barack) have received, they both were indoctrinated by Wright. That is why God planted in every human the conscience so they could distinguish Right from Wrong. One of the books Barack would definitely bring to the white house is the Bible. However, like many individuals, who attend church, they never read the Bible for themselves but instead rely on what the Pastor says. From the clips, I don't see Jeremiah Wright inviting his parishioners to follow along from the Bible, but they all accept whatever he said and "Praised the Lord." It is sad, that despite all the community work that Reverend Wright has done,it doesn't seem to matter as much as his rants against America. If as Obama says he's been so close to this preacher who led him to Christ, why couldn't he politely tell him that he wasn't in agreement with his preaching? I know when I was about teenager, my mother would always encouraged us to attend church, but after a while I refused to go. That is because I noticed the hipocrisy of the minister. He was having affairs with a couple of the young women, while he was engaged to someonelse. My point is at a certain age we have the ability to know right from wrong, and make the right decisions. One doesn't not have to go to Harvard, Yale or Princeton to make good decisions.