‘Barack, I Didn’t Do It for This’: An Homage to Andrew Goodman
Larry: Nothing good. But if you’re going to fix a mess, you have to get your hands dirty. I think Dick Cheney said something similar in a different context.
Black America isn’t running for President. Barack Obama is. However deplorable Wright’s views were, I don’t think they were bad enough to require Obama to refuse to participate in one of the most important institutions of the neighborhood and city in which he had chosen to become involved.
Wright didn’t call for violence against whites or anyone else. It’s a shame that so many people would think better of Obama if he had retreated back into a private life, or had switched to a small, uninfluential church, and squandered the accumulated social capital of Trinity just because of the imperfect worldview of its pastor.
But if the speech he delived today didn’t convince you, certainly I can’t.
