ABC Exclusive: Former Obama Pastor Admits to Being 'Arrogant...Evil...Devious'

ABC Exclusive: Former Obama Pastor Admits to Being 'Arrogant...Evil...Devious'

By Ken Shepherd (Bio | Archive)
January 19, 2009 - 12:49 ET

In a January 18 ABC News exclusive interview, former Obama pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright confessed to, but did not repent of, his inflammatory rhetoric directed at the media. Wright's excuse:

"They were arrogant, they were evil, they were devious and I responded in kind," Wright said. "I just talked to you about a 500-year tradition but you don't ask me one question about that because that's not your interest, your interest is to taint Barack Obama. So no, I'm not going to be conservative, I'm not going to kiss anybody's behind and if I'm standing up straight you can't ride my back.

In other words, Wright sees himself as repaying evil with evil and insult with insult. Hmm, I seem to remember Scripture warning Christians not to do that and that pastors and preachers have a higher standard for the words they speak, particularly publicly from the pulpit. And that's a 2000-year old tradition!

Yet apparently ABC staffers Tahman Bradley and Ferdous al-Faruque failed to question Wright on whether his demeanor from the pulpit exhibited more the gospel of class and race warfare than the gospel of Jesus Christ. What's more, Bradley and al-Faruque failed to point out that some print journalists such as Newsweek's Eleanor Clift have hailed Wright as a "prophetic" voice, something that cuts against Wright's view that the MSM has had it in for him.

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Indeed, as an MRC study from August 2008 showed that the mainstream media, including ABC News, ignored for roughly one year the Wright controversy well after it was first reported on Fox News Channel on March 1, 2007 on the "Hannity & Colmes" program and that even in reporting the controversy, they left out the loopiest soundbites wherein the preacher spouted conspiracy theories:

The broadcast networks took an entire year to locate Reverend Wright. Despite a feisty interview on Fox News Channel’s Hannity & Colmes back on March 1, 2007 about Obama’s church’s controversial commitment to a "black value system," the name of Jeremiah Wright didn’t surface on the Big Three networks until CBS first broached it on February 28, 2008. The first story with Wright sermon soundbites aired two weeks later, on ABC on March 13. By then, 42 states and the District of Columbia had already voted.

[...]

The networks completely refused to air soundbites of Wright’s conspiracy theory about the U.S. government inventing AIDS to kill blacks, and mostly ignored his comments about the September 11 terrorist attacks being "America’s chickens coming home to roost." None of the network morning or evening shows found one opportunity to air Wright’s 2003 sermon accusing the federal government of hiding the truth about their "inventing the HIV virus as a means of genocide against people of color." His attack on America’s alleged record of terrorism was ignored by all three evening shows, as well as by CBS’s The Early Show.

—Ken Shepherd is Managing Editor of NewsBusters

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This odious creature is no more a Christian...

January 19, 2009 - 13:35 ET by heldmyw

...than Islam is "The Religion of Peace".

Ken, Clift had also said..

January 19, 2009 - 13:39 ET by Gary Hall

Ken, Clift also said.. (I believe you did a post on this):

"Rev. Jeremiah Wright was a voice crying in the wilderness.."

..then why on earth was Eleanor Clift not carrying Wright's message to the electorate during the heat of the Democratic primary this past season? The Democratic party needed a lively debate, did they not?

After all, this voice crying in the wilderness was preaching to the church, that one President Bill Clinton had screwed over the black community [Wright's and Obama's communal community], as he had done Monica Lewinski - and further, that Hillary Clinton would do the same thing, if she were to be elected.

Should not the MSM have played that discussion out, and in full fanfare, prior to and during the Democratic convention? If a conservative religous preacher had made such a claim, that a Republican president had screwed over the black community - well, we'd never heard the end of it.

Imagine how lively the national debate might have become between the Hillary Clinton camp and the Obama camp during the heat of the primary season, had the MSM asked the candidates, and one of the candidate's mates, Bill Clinton, to discuss this charge from the Rev. Wright:

Jeremiah Wright on Bill Clinton:

Rev. Wright: Hillary is married to Bill and Bill have been good to us? No, he ain't! Bill did us [as he pumps his pelvic to and fro] just like he did Monica Lewinsky!

Congregation: (cheers)

Rev. Wright: He was riding dirty!

While the MSM would do plenty to make sure the Democrats would win in November, and that in the end, that their favorite candidate would be "the one;" the MSM would never allow news like this to enter the national discussion - for it would have damaged their party. (;~/ gary

Watching the "reverand" wright

January 19, 2009 - 13:57 ET by MOONSTRUCK

in action at his "church" forever changed my opinion of African Americans.

IMHO racism is alive and kicking because of person's like the "reverends". Listening to that audience at that church sent a cold shiver down my spine. (no,not up my leg). Talk about hate!

→ Eye Opening to be sure

January 19, 2009 - 14:01 ET by Cool Arrow

I was sickened at the number of people who told me they had heard this same rhetoric against whitey in church also.

Granted, there were some who said they had never heard it at their church.

Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country - Muslim, Khalil Gibran

Yes, the term "hubris"

January 19, 2009 - 16:11 ET by celator

Yes, the term "hubris" comes immediately to mind when thinking of Wright.

Wright and all the rest of the race baiters want to put racism into turbodrive, I'm afraid. Very sad.

For liberal Democrats and the Old Media, everything is crisis, chaos, calamity and catastrophe. That justifies stealing your property and liberties.

→ America's Chickensss

January 19, 2009 - 13:41 ET by Cool Arrow

Are fixin' to get plucked!!!

Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country - Muslim, Khalil Gibran

Black Theology

January 19, 2009 - 13:53 ET by Robersire

Evidently Black Theology is different from the Bible. Since I can only judge by Wright's words I must assume (Ass'U'Me) so.

Wright is a vile

January 19, 2009 - 13:57 ET by HelenS

Wright is a vile abomination and Obama is an amoral puppet with a massive ego. It is his arrogance and his obsession with himself that is so disgusting to me. And their association with each other is sufficient to tell me all I need to know about either of them.

I despise them both and am battling with my God to even be able to pray for BO as the leader of this country (a phrase that makes me gag). I know I need to remember Romans 13:1, 2 (and on) but I can't seem to forget Romans 1:24, 26, 28 (in which God gave them up because of their depravity.)

I still can't help but think the U.S. as a nation has brought this obscenity on itself and God has chosen to respect our choices.

I can't listen to Obama or see his face on TV without feeling seriously angry and nauseated so being able to pray for him is my own battle. Still can't do it.

Me - "The libs/dems of today are the Quislings of former years. The cowards who would vote a fraud into office in exchange for handouts from the devil."

Yes You Can Helen

January 19, 2009 - 16:08 ET by mizgenie2u

The Bible does instruct us to pray for our leaders. Although I did not vote for Mr. Obama,and I am a black woman, I have to be obedient to what God says and it is HARD for me as well. There are a lot of us out there who are sick and tired of this idol worship and not all churches,black churches, preach about slavery and hate. Please don't think that. I sometimes wonder when I am in public if they think I voted for Mr. Obama. Just waiting for someone to ask me that question. As for tomorrow, let's see I will find something to do. I have NO PLANS to watch television. Others like me think it's so sad. You don't hear about us in the MSM. We are out there. You can be sure of that!

Swearing the Oaf

January 19, 2009 - 14:03 ET by Jack Bauer

Does anyone think the new President will swear the oath on the rare Rev. Jeremiah Wright Bible, 2001 Edition?

That's the one with actual swearing...

"G-ddamn ... I do solemnly (expletive) swear that I will faithfully (expletive) execute the (expletive) office of President of the United (expletive) States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the (expletive) Constitution of the United States."

"The nature of an ideology is not determined by majority vote—but by logic... The logic of environmentalism leads to a society without technology... even if various environmentalists would deny this." Ayn Rand, 1971