Obama Pathos Part 2: Disciple of Hate

By Mark Alexander · Friday, April 18, 2008

"Man, once surrendering his reason, has no remaining guard against absurdities... With such persons, gullibility, which they call faith, takes the helm from the hand of reason and the mind becomes a wreck." --Thomas Jefferson

This is Part 2 of 3 on Barack Hussein Obama Part 1: Barack who? Part 3: Another Marx brother

Part One of this series, "Barack who?, provided insights into how Obama's tragic childhood formed the pathological foundation for his narcissistic ambition.

This essay examines how Afrocentric Liberation Theology and its message of hate have wedded Obama's anger and ambition and defined his worldview. This radical belief system is, after all, a hybrid of black supremacist doctrine and "social gospel" Marxism.

In advance of the Pennsylvania primary, Obama displayed his disdain for middle America's faith and values at a closed-door San Francisco fundraiser: "You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest ... it's not surprising they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."

In other words, according to Obama, their faith is a byproduct of bitterness. While this sentiment might have been a hit with the chardonnay-sipping elite of Marin County, it hasn't played well in Peoria. Or in Pennsylvania, which holds its crucial presidential primary on 22 April.

In the parlance of psychology, this assessment would be classified as projection. Indeed, Obama's "faith" does have bitter origins, and he assumes, errantly, that such bitterness is the root of all faith.

He also alluded to bitterness in mid-March: "We've got a tragic history when it comes to race in this country. We've got a lot of pent-up anger and bitterness.... The anger is real. It is powerful, and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races."

To date, Obama has passed on charm alone, all fragrance, no substance. So little is known about Obama that when it was discovered that his mentor, the man he identifies as most influential in his life, has discipled him in Afrocentric Liberation Theology for more than 20 years, that presented an excellent opportunity to gain real insight into Barack Hussein Obama.

Obama is the protege of Jeremiah Wright, just retired as head holy man of Trinity United Church (TUC) of radical black political theology. Wright officiated at Obama's wedding, baptized their two daughters and is credited by Obama for the title of his book, The Audacity of Hope. In that book, Obama describes Wright and his church as the "vessel carrying the story of a people into future generations and into a larger world."

So who is this mentor, this chief spiritual advisor to Obama?

Here is a portrait of Wright in his own words from the pulpit: "The government lied about inventing the HIV virus as a means of genocide against people of color. The government gives [black people] drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strikes law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, g*d d*** America, that's in the Bible for killing innocent people. G*d d*** America for treating our citizens as less than human. G*d d*** America for as long as she acts like she is god and she is supreme."

Wright calls America "the US-KKK-A" and says the nation is "controlled by and run by rich white people. Racism is how this country was founded and how this country is still run. We believe in white supremacy and black inferiority and believe it more than we believe in god. And. And-and! God! Has got! To be sick! Of this sh*t!"

"We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and black South Africans, and now we are indignant because the stuff we have done overseas is now brought back to our own front yards. America's chickens are coming home to roost."

Lest anyone mistake who he felt was to blame for 9/11, and who he felt deserved punishment, Wright elaborated in 2005: "White America got a wake-up call after 9/11. White America and the Western world came to realize that people of color had not gone away, faded into the woodwork or just disappeared as the great white West kept on its merry way of ignoring black concerns."

How did Obama respond when asked about his pastor's false and vicious tirade? "It sounds like he was trying to be provocative," he said.

It worked.

On Israel, Wright claims: "The Israelis have illegally occupied Palestinian territories for over 40 years now. Divestment has now hit the table again as a strategy to wake the business community and wake up Americans concerning the injustice and the racism under which the Palestinians have lived because of Zionism."

Perhaps that explains Hamas' endorsement of Obama?

In December 2007, Wright presented the TUC's "Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. Trumpeter Award" to a man who "truly epitomized greatness," Louis Farrakhan, head of the Nation of Islam and a consummate anti-Semite. "When Minister Farrakhan speaks, Black America listens," says Wright. "His depth on analysis when it comes to the racial ills of this nation is astounding and eye opening. He brings a perspective that is helpful and honest."

Recently, Wright compared Obama to Jesus, saying, "Barack knows what it means to be a black man living in a country and a culture that is controlled by rich white people. Hillary can never know that. Hillary ain't never been called a nigger."

TUC's mission statement, since removed from its website, noted the congregation's "Commitment to the black values system," or as Wright notes, "Similar to the Gospel movement in Nicaragua during the whole liberation theology movement." The statement continues, "Commitment to the black community ... black family ... adherence to the black work ethic ... supporting black institutions ... pledging allegiance to all black leadership who have embraced the black values system."

That is a very dark mission statement.

A current mission statement notes, "Our roots in the Black religious experience and tradition are deep, lasting and permanent. We are an African people, and remain 'true to our native land,' the mother continent, the cradle of civilization."

Wright was, himself, a disciple of James Cone, one of the original champions of Black Liberation Theology, who wrote the following in his seminal work, Black Theology and Black Power: "Black theology refuses to accept a God who is not identified totally with the goals of the black community. If God is not for us and against white people, then he is a murderer, and we had better kill him. The task of black theology is to kill Gods who do not belong to the black community. Black theology will accept only the love of God which participates in the destruction of the white enemy. What we need is the divine love as expressed in Black Power, which is the power of black people to destroy their oppressors here and now by any means at their disposal. Unless God is participating in this holy activity, we must reject his love."

Wright quotes Cone on TUC's website: "The time has come for white America to be silent and listen to black people. ... All white men are responsible for white oppression. ... Theologically, Malcolm X was not far wrong when he called the white man 'the devil'."

When asked if he would leave TUC (as if that would make everything copacetic), Obama said, "This is somebody who I have known for 20 years [who] led me to Christ. He is a biblical scholar. He is a well regarded preacher and somebody who is known for talking about the social gospel."

In other words, "No."

But when pressed, Obama invoked his own version of Bill Clinton's "I didn't inhale" defense. Indeed, after 20 years of being fed the Wright stuff, Obama said, "I did not hear such incendiary language myself, personally, either in conversations with him or when I was in the pew." Yeah, right.

Clinton's disclaimer registers much higher on the truth meter.

A prominent member of Wright's congregation says, "He has impacted the life of Barack Obama so much so that he wants to portray that feeling he got from Rev. Wright onto the country because we all need something positive."

Wright himself told The New York Times, "If Barack gets past the primary, he might have to publicly distance himself from me. I said it to Barack personally, and he said 'yeah, that might have to happen'."

Translation: Any distance between Obama and Wright is contrived purely for political expedience. All the bitterness and hatred is seething right under the surface.

Perhaps the most important domestic policy issue the next president will undertake is the nomination of one or two Justices to the Supreme Court. Here is where Wright's mentorship of Obama really shines! Obama says he will nominate judges "who got the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it's like to be a young teenage mom, the empathy to understand what it's like to be poor or African-American or gay or disabled or old -- and that's the criteria by which I'll be selecting my judges." This from a lawyer who has sworn to uphold our Constitution.

Obama's psyche is framed by abandonment and hatred. But he is very charismatic and his populist socialist message will get him elected.

This is Part 2 of 3 on Barack Hussein Obama Part 1: Barack who? Part 3: Another Marx brother

Quote of the week

"There is [a] class of colored people who make a business of keeping the troubles, the wrongs and the hardships of the Negro race before the public. Having learned that they are able to make a living out of their troubles, they have grown into the settled habit of advertising their wrongs -- partly because they want sympathy, and partly because it pays. Some of these people do not want the Negro to lose his grievances, because they do not want to lose their jobs. ... There is a certain class of race-problem solvers who don't want the patient to get well, because as long as the disease holds out they have not only an easy means of making a living, but also an easy medium through which to make themselves prominent before the public." -- Booker T. Washington in his 1911 book, My Larger Education