By Mike Whitney
"Yes, there
have been death
threats on both
myself and on
Pastor Moss. And
bomb threats at
the church."
Reverend
Jeremiah Wright
on the media's
incitement; "Bill
Moyers Journal"
PBS
28/04/08 "ICH"
-- -
Reverend
Jeremiah Wright
appeared on PBS
Bill Moyers
Journal on
Friday night and
delivered a
knockout punch
to the
bully-boys in
the corporate
media. It was an
impressive performance
that left the
political
assassins over
at FOX News
choking on their
sausage-rolls. Wright
showed that he
is neither a
fanatic nor an
“America hater”;
just an
extremely
well-read and
principled man
with an
unshakable
commitment to
justice. Wright
has also paid
his dues; he's
an ex-Marine who
served in
Vietnam
when most of
his critics
were either
hiding behind
their student
deferments or
languishing in
the "Champagne
Unit" of
the Texas
National Guard.
He's earned the
right to say
whatever he
chooses.
Rev. Jeremiah
Wright:
"And the
United States of
America
government, when
it came to
treating her
citizens of
Indian descent
fairly, she
failed. She put
them on
reservations.
When it came to
treating her
citizens of
Japanese descent
fairly, she
failed. She put
them in
internment
prison camps.
When it came to
treating
citizens of
African descent
fairly, America
failed. She put
them in chains.
The government
put them on
slave quarters,
put them on
auction blocks,
put them in
cotton fields,
put them in
inferior
schools, put
them in
substandard
housing, put
them in
scientific
experiments, put
them in the
lowest paying
jobs, put them
outside the
equal protection
of the law, kept
them out of
their racist
bastions of
higher education
and locked them
into position of
hopelessness and
helplessness.
The government
gives them the
drugs, builds
bigger prisons,
passes a
three-strike
law, and then
wants us to sing
God bless
America? No, no,
no. Not God
bless America;
God damn
America!
No one disputes
Wright's summary
of
US history. His
comments have
simply been
taken out of
context to beat
up on Barak
Obama; everyone
knows that. Just
like everyone
knows that the
media has been
retooled to
destroy
political
enemies, which
means anyone
who poses a
challenge
to America's
unelected
corporate
oligarchy.
That's why it
is so
frustrating to
hear people say,
"The media is
not doing its
job."
That's just plain wrong; the media IS doing its job. It's cheerleading the country to war, it is diverting attention from the main political and economic issues of the day, and it is destroying its political enemies. That's what it's paid to do. Its foolish to think the media should perform differently because of the PR nonsense about a “free press”. The media gets its marching orders from its corporate managers; that's who issues the paychecks on Fridays. It's their agenda that counts, not ours. The political assassination of Barak Obama just happens to be on the top of their list this week. That's why the media is zeroing in on Rev. Wright; he is the sacrificial lamb.
What the media is trying to do by singling out Wright is to make it look like blacks are outside of the mainstream and hostile to white American society. It's all pretty straightforward. They're trying to create the impression that blacks conceal a deep sense of grievance which expresses itself in rage. This generates feelings of fear among whites which, of course, is all part of the strategy. The message is simple; "blacks are angry, blacks are dangerous" and, oh by the way, Obama is black.
Is it fair to say that that is essentially a racist message?
What's so clever about the attack on Wright is that it was set up in a way to make it look like the Reverend—a man whose entire career has been devoted to social justice—is a racist. That took a bit of maneuvering. In fact, the media, and their friends at the right-wing think tanks, had to dig through 15 years of Wright's sermons to find just the right snippets they needed to destroy Obama. Now that's determination! The attacks on Wright bear all the earmarks of a well-engineered Karl Rove-type operation. Nothing has been left to chance. All the mud-slinging and poisonous innuendo has been arranged with the greatest attention to detail and with real professionalism. These guys are pros. They know what it takes to ruin people and they are good at it.
They
decided the best
way to go-after
Obama was by
using his
"blackness"
against him. It
took
considerable
skill to invoke
the "race card"
without being
discovered. The
tables were
turned in a way
that made it
look like Wright
and his
parishioners
were the racists
and whites were
merely blameless
bystanders.
That's the real
genius of the
Wright
smear-campaign.
For more than 5
months Obama had
been able to run
on a campaign on
issues and
experience, but
the attacks on
Wright have
changed all of
that. Now the
public sees Obama
as a black man;
at least that's
the intention.
Race has
become one of
the dominant
issues on the
campaign-trail
and Obama
routinely fends
off charges
that blacks
foster a hidden
resentment
towards whites
because of the
way they have
been mistreated.
Obama is no
longer just a
man running for
office; now he's
a black man.
That's how
swift-boating
works. Like they
say in the
Godfather; “It's
not personal;
it's just
business”. The
business of
personal
destruction.
Fortunately,
Bill Moyers, one
of the giants of
journalism, decided
to give Wright
a chance to
acquit himself before
the public.
Wright took the
opportunity and
made the most of
it.
Rev. Wright:
“God is the
giver of life.
Let me tell you
what that means.
That means we
have no right to
take a life
whether as a
gang-banger
living the thug
life, or as a
President lying
about leading a
nation into war.
We have no right
to take a life!
Whether through
the immorality
of a slave
trade, or the
immorality of
refusing
HIV/AIDS money
to countries or
agencies who do
not tow your
political line!
We have no right
to take a life!”
Wright showed
that
the doctrine he
preaches, Black
Liberation
Theology,
is neither
discriminatory
nor racist as
the media has
suggested.
Rather, it
integrates the
teachings of
Jesus Christ
with the
real-time
struggle for
social justice
and equality.
Compassion is
not possible if
one does not
have a grasp
of one's
own culture and
identity. That's
why Wright tries
to reconnect
his congregation
to their roots,
so they can be
proud of who
they are and
have more
productive
lives.
Rev. Wright:
"You know, you
come into the
average church
on a Sunday
morning and you
think you've
stepped from the
real world into
a fantasy world.
And what do I
mean by that?"
He said pick up
the church
bulletin. You
leave a world,
Vietnam, or
today you leave
a world, Iraq,
over 4,000 dead,
American boys
and girls,
100,000, 200,000
depending on
which count,
Iraqi dead.
Afghanistan,
Darfur, rapes in
the Congo,
Katrina, Lower
Ninth Ward,
that's the world
you leave. And
you come in; you
pick up your
church bulletin.
It says, there
is a ladies tea
on second
Sunday. He said,
"How come the
faith preached
in our churches
does not relate
to the world in
which our church
members leave at
the
benediction?”
This is the
essence of Black
Liberation
Theology; how to
make sense of
the world we
live in so the
word of Christ
can be applied
in
practice. Wright
thinks that
faith should
be a
transforming
experience
that changes
behavior and
shapes lives,
not just a few
hours of prayer
every week at
Sunday
services. Does
that make it “a
race-based
theology? (as
Moyers asks)
Rev. Wright:
“No, it is not.
It is embracing
Christianity
without giving
up Africanity.
...We're not
givin' up who we
are as black
people to become
somebody
else...No mas.
Nada mas. We're
gonna be
ourselves. We're
gonna be our
culture. We're
gonna be our
history. And
we're gonna
embrace it and
not say one is
superior to the
other. Because
we are
different. And
different does
not mean
deficient. We
talk about God
of diversity?
God has diverse
culture and
we're proud of
who we are and
that's not a
race-based
theology.”
Wright has also
been skewered in
the
media for suggesting
there may be
a connection
between American
foreign policy
and the attacks
of 9-11. The
media considers any
analysis that
doesn't square
with Bush's
crackpot "they
hate our
freedoms” theory to
be either
anti-American or
outright
heresy. In his
most famous
sermon,
Wright elaborates
on
the "blowback"
theme as well as
the so-called
war on terror:
"We took this
country by
terror away from
the Sioux, the
Apache, the
Arawak, the
Comanche, the
Arapaho, the
Navajo.
Terrorism! We
took Africans
from their
country to build
our way of ease
and kept them
enslaved and
living in fear.
Terrorism! We
bombed Grenada
and killed
innocent
civilians,
babies,
non-military
personnel. We
bombed the black
civilian
community of
Panama with
stealth bombers
and killed
unarmed
teenagers and
toddlers,
pregnant mothers
and hard-working
fathers. We
bombed Gadafi's
home and killed
his child.
"Blessed are
they who bash
your children's
head against a
rock!" We bombed
Iraq. We killed
unarmed
civilians trying
to make a
living. We
bombed a plant
in Sudan to
payback for the
attack on our
embassy. Killed
hundreds of
hard-working
people; mothers
and fathers who
left home to go
that day, not
knowing that
they would never
get back home.
We bombed
Hiroshima! We
bombed Nagasaki,
and we nuked far
more than the
thousands in New
York and the
Pentagon, and we
never batted an
eye! Kids
playing in the
playground,
mothers picking
up children
after school,
civilians - not
soldiers -
people just
trying to make
it day by day.
We have
supported state
terrorism
against the
Palestinians and
Black South
Africans, and
now we are
indignant?
Because the
stuff we have
done overseas
has now been
brought back
into our own
front yards!
America's
chickens are
coming home to
roost! Violence
begets violence.
Hatred begets
hatred and
terrorism begets
terrorism."
America has
blood on its
hands. America,
as Martin Luther
King said, "is
the greatest
perpetrator of
violence in the
world today." So
what else is
new?
What's new, is
the media is
using every
soapbox in the
country to
preach uber-nationalism
and vilify
America's
critics as
unpatriotic.
Their "Love it
or leave
it" gibberish is
being used to
tar
a presidential
candidate who
hasn't sufficiently
prostrated
himself before
his corporate
overlords to
make them feel
that he can
be trusted to
carry out their
directives. That
is what's really
happening. Obama
is just
unpredictable
enough to make
the parasite
class nervous
that he might do
something crazy,
like serve the
public interest.
That would be a
real disaster.
It'd be better
to install the
appalling Ms.
Clinton than
take a chance on
the “populist”
Obama. That's
why the wrath of
the media has
descended on
Obama like a
Texas hailstorm;
they're afraid
he doesn't
understand who
really
runs things in
America.
Wright means
nothing to the
media or to the
men behind the
curtain. If he
didn't
provide an
avenue for
denigrating
Obama, he'd be
treated with the
same indifference
as the thousands
of other blacks
who were herded
at gunpoint into
the Superdome
during Hurricane
Katrina. It's
Obama's scalp
they
want; that's the
real
prize. This is a
turf war; the
big-wigs are
defending their
fiefdom from
interlopers.
They're
even rolling out
the heavy
artillery expecting
a full-blown
conflagration. The
election season
is shaping up to
be a real
donnybrook.
Better buckle
up. Obama has
entered the
crosshairs of
America's
criminal
oligarchy
and things
are bound to get
nasty.
