The primary season moves fast now -- Pennsylvania was just a week ago, but Indiana and North Carolina are eight days ahead. Obama desperately needs to hold on to North Carolina, Hillary desperately needs to pull out Indiana.... You can't prove it, but somehow you feel that if Obama wins Indiana he has the nomination, and if Hillary wins it her momentum will be unstoppable.
So a critical eight days begins with Hillary pushing for debates, and Obama saying no. Hillary wants a gas tax holiday, Obama says no, and he adds another little piece to the out-of-touch-with-the-workingman narrative Clinton is trying to build. And, at the most unhelpful time possible for Obama, Rev. Wright is on tour.
We've seen him off and on over the weekend -- he spoke at an NAACP dinner last night, and was at the National Press Club this morning. Impressions are everything, and the impression he gives is of someone coming from a rather different place than most people, who is nonetheless supremely -- even smugly -- confident that he is right.
He managed, at this critical political moment, to remind everyone that he prayed privately with Obama prior to his presidential announcement, but was kept out of the public spotlight at that time. And then, this passage on Obama's response to the controversy:
"We both know that if Senator Obama did not say what he said he would not get elected. Politicians say what they say and do what they do based on electability ... based on polls."
And this: "He did not denounce me. He dismissed himself from some of my remarks. Like most of you not having heard the sermon. He had to distance himself because he's a politician from what the media was saying I had said which was anti-American. He said I didn't offer any words of hope -- how did he know? He didn't hear the rest of the sermon."
It's the Wright-centric view of the world. He is not contrite about saying inflammatory things that have caused much trouble for his old friend. Far from it! Instead, the attitude is: People have no right to react to my saying "God damn America!" or reciting a conspiracy theory of AIDS without immersing themselves in the full brilliance of my sermons.
Wright said he was emerging now to defend the traditions of the black church, but First Read nails the impact:
"At this point, no matter one's political inexperience, Wright has to know he's not helping his friend; his decision to go public and defend his reputation at this point in the campaign is doing nothing to help Obama, if anything, it's leading some to believe he's actually trying to sabotage him. He's hurting him and hurting him very badly. Frankly, it’s as selfish of a move as we've seen in some time."
But, it is what it is. Obama picked his church, and he lives with it. And who knows: Maybe those rural folk in southern Indiana will dig it.