Bluey Blog - Official Blog of Robert B. Bluey

It’s Not About Race, It’s About Honesty and Judgment

[Note: This post was written by Conn Carroll, Rob’s colleague at Heritage and editor of The Foundry.]

Barack Obama’s Philadelphia speech on race was an extremely deft pivot turning an issue about his honesty and judgment into an issue about America’s racism.

Obama correctly believes that any discussion about race benefits his candidacy. And judging by the positive headlines (some even altered to be more positive) the press is more than willing to play along.

The real news out of Obama’s speech is not that he is a gifted speaker; we already knew that. No, the real stories are that Obama changed his story yet again about his relationship with Rev. Jeremiah Wright and what Obama’s long association with him says about his judgment.

As late as this Friday, Obama was still sticking to his claim that he never heard any of Wright’s controversial statements while in the pews of Trinity church.

Today, Obama admitted that was not true: “Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes.”

But Obama’s admissions did not end there. Obama went on to describe what he knew to be Wright’s views:

But the remarks that have caused this recent firestorm weren’t simply controversial. They weren’t simply a religious leader’s effort to speak out against perceived injustice. Instead, they expressed a profoundly distorted view of this country. … As such, Reverend Wright’s comments were not only wrong but divisive, divisive at a time when we need unity; racially charged at a time when we need to come together to solve a set of monumental problems.

If Obama knew that Wright had such a “distorted view of this country” that is “not only wrong but divisive” then why did Obama make him a member of his African American Religious Leadership Committee? Would a President Obama also appoint people with distorted and divisive view to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights? To the Justice Department? To the Supreme Court? And if Obama has known all along that Wright has distorted and divisive views, then why fire him from the campaign and scrub him off the website now?

Obama has been dishonest about his relationship with Wright from the beginning. At first he thought a cooperative media would let his close association with Wright go unnoticed. Then he said he never heard Wright say anything controversial. Then Wright was like a crazy uncle. Now Obama claims he always knew about Wright’s controversial views and he hopes they will help America reflect on “the complexities of race in this country.”

Obama made a bad judgment when he chose to include Wright in his campaign. He made a bad judgment when he hoped the media wouldn’t discover Wright’s bigotry. When the issue came to light, Obama immediately began lying about what he knew about Wright’s views and distorting his relationship with him. So of course Obama wants the Rev. Wright issue to be about race, because otherwise the issue is about Obama’s dishonesty and lack of judgment.