Willie Horton Reprise? Wright Damage Uncontained, Democrats Worry

I've known it all along: Reverend Jeremiah Wright's black liberation hatred's left a lasting stain on the presidential campaign of Barack Obama.

Oh sure, polls show Democrats holding the "God Damn America" preaching as insignificant in their long-term voting preferences. Media reports, moreover, confirmed that Obama's Philadelphia address on race and religion put the Illinois Senator back in good stead with the electorate.

But no, hold your horses, doggy!!

The Wall Street Journal reports that unpledged Democratic superdelegates are thinking twice about Wright's toxic black pulpit preachings:

Sen. Barack Obama's Philadelphia speech on race relations last month seemed to put the controversial remarks of his former pastor behind him. But three weeks later, there is evidence of lingering damage.

"It has not been defused," says David Parker, a North Carolina Democratic Party official and unpledged superdelegate. He says his worries about Republicans questioning Sen. Obama's patriotism prompted him to raise the issue of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr.'s remarks in conversations with both the Obama and Clinton campaigns.

"I'm concerned about seeing Willie Horton ads during the general election," Mr. Parker says, referring to campaign ads that Republicans widely credited for helping defeat Michael Dukakis in 1988. Mr. Parker said the Wright controversy didn't hurt his opinion of Mr. Obama.

National polls show the Illinois senator hasn't suffered among Democratic primary voters. Contests in Pennsylvania on April 22, Indiana on May 6 and West Virginia on May 13 could serve as an important test. His performance among largely white, less-urban voters could show how well he can secure critical swing states in November.

Sen. Hillary Clinton has argued that she can better withstand Republican attacks. One of her senior advisers last week told the Talking Points Memo blog that he had raised the Wright issue with superdelegates. The campaign didn't dispute the report. "[C]ertainly, as you recall, it was very heavily in the news and people, you know, sometimes have it on their minds," Sen. Clinton told reporters last week.

Recent polls suggest that, in key swing states, the New York senator fares better in head-to-head matchups with Republican nominee Sen. John McCain than does Sen. Obama. In Ohio, Sen. Clinton led Sen. McCain 48% to 39%, while Sen. Obama led Sen. McCain 43% to 42% in Quinnipiac University polls conducted in the last week of March.

In Pennsylvania, Sen. Clinton had a 48% to 40% lead against Sen. McCain while Sen. Obama was ahead 43% to 39%. The polls credit Sen. Clinton's advantage to her strength among white voters. No Democrat has won the presidency with a majority of white voters since 1964, and no president from either party has been elected without winning two of the three swing states of Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida since 1960. In those three states, some 23% of white Democrats would defect to Sen. McCain in a matchup with Sen. Obama, compared with 11% who would abandon Sen. Clinton, according to the Quinnipiac polls.

Well, it's no wonder...

Americans should not have to listen to lame defenses of Wright-style America-bashing and hatred.

But I think about the context here. Over the weekend Democratic party activists in Washington State voted down a recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance, and these caucus goers were overwhelmingly Obama backers. In Texas, one announced Obama delegate argues that:

I kept hearing about how his pastor had blamed America for 9/11 and had spent all my time insisting that it wasn't relevant to Obama ... In fact, not only have I been saying the same stuff, but feel that any liberal who isn't saying this stuff doesn't deserve to call themselves a liberal. This stuff is just a no-brainer.

Maybe these Obama supporters are low-level hacks, and they've lowered standards for caucus participation or something? On the other hand, given the recent polling, it's more likely that the worried superdelegates are anomalous:

The Pew Research Center unveiled a poll ... that found the Wright controversy “does not appear to have undermined support for Obama’s candidacy.”

The survey, conducted March 19-22 with 1,503 adults, still puts the Illinois senator in the lead for the nomination, 49%-39%, largely unchanged from the 49%-40% lead Obama held a month earlier. Both Democratic candidates continue to hold small leads over presumptive Republican nominee Sen. John McCain. The findings were similar to a Wall Street Journal/NBC poll released Wednesday.

The results of the Pew survey are of particular note because it also found that the Wright controversy, and Obama’s subsequent speech on race, has attracted more public attention than any other matter so far this campaign cycle—51% said they had heard “a lot” about Wright’s sermons and an additional 54% had heard a lot about Obama’s speech.

“The new polling suggests that the Wright affair has not hurt Obama’s standing, in part because his response to the controversy has been viewed positively by voters who favor him over Clinton,” Pew states. “Obama’s handling of the Wright controversy also won a favorable response from a substantial proportion of Clinton supporters and even from a third of Republican voters.”

The survey similarly finds that the Wright matter has not significantly dented Obama’s popularity with voters, and he maintains an edge against Clinton among white Democrats as well.

Basically, Obama's statements were accepted as sufficient by his backers, many of whom - we might infer from anecdotal evidence - may even endorse black theology anti-Americanism.

The polls do indicate that the controversy could come back to haunt an Obama general election campaign.

But frankly, Obama's never put the controversty to rest, so that makes him vulnerable. Had he thought better of saying he could no more "disown" his pastor than he could the black community, he might have put this to bed

Who knows? Obama needs to go futher, in any case, as Victor Davis Hanson has suggested, with some statements along these lines:

You have all heard the racist and anti-American outbursts of my pastor Rev. Wright. They are all inexcusable. His speeches have forced me to reexamine my long association with Trinity United Church of Christ. And so it is with regret that I must now leave that church.

He still can.

Wright's retired, but it's not too late to make the big announcement of separation from theTrinity Unity hate preaching. It would send a message to both rank-and-file Demcrats and top party officials that when Obama says he's for racial transcendance, he means it.