I have been saying all along that media types are suckers for Sen. John McCain, (R-AZ), especially over at Newsweek. I don’t know why he wastes money having a media relations staff when most people in the industry are more than happy to be his toady.
Now, Neal Gabler explores the issue on the op-ed page of the Times.
‘Audacity to Hope,’ pt. 1
The full text of Jeremiah Wright’s “Audacity To Hope” sermon in 1990:
Several years ago while I was in Richmond, the Lord allowed me to be in that city during the week of the annual convocation at Virginia Union University School of Theology. There I heard the preaching and teaching of Reverend Frederick G. Sampson of Detroit, Michigan. In one of his lectures, Dr. Sampson spoke of a painting I remembered studying in humanities courses back in the late ’50s. In Dr. Sampson’s powerful description of the picture, he spoke of it being a study in contradictions, because the title and the details on the canvas seem to be in direct opposition.
The painting’s title is “Hope.” It shows a woman sitting on top of the world, playing a harp. What more enviable position could one ever hope to achieve than being on top of the world with everyone dancing to your music?
As you look closer, the illusion of power gives way to the reality of pain. The world on which this woman sits, our world, is torn by war, destroyed by hate, decimated by despair, and devastated by distrust. The world on which she sits seems on the brink of destruction. Famine ravages millions of inhabitants in one hemisphere, while feasting and gluttony are enjoyed by inhabitants of another hemisphere. This world is a ticking time bomb, with apartheid in one hemisphere and apathy in the other. Scientists tell us there are enough nuclear warheads to wipe out all forms of life except cockroaches. That is the world on which the woman sits in Watt’s painting. Read More
I posted yesterday a video of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s post 9/11 sermon that some are trying to hang Sen. Barack Obama, (D-IL), for. Andrew Sullivan posted this text of the sermon a week ago. I offer it here again. As Mr. Sullivan said, Read it and make your own mind up:
“Every public service of worship I have heard about so far in the wake of the American tragedy has had in its prayers and in its preachments, sympathy and compassion for those who were killed and for their families, and God’s guidance upon the selected Presidents and upon our war machine, as they do what they do and what they gotta do — paybacks.
There’s a move in Psalm 137 from thoughts of paying tithes to thoughts of paying back, A move, if you will from worship to war, a move in other words from the worship of th God of creation to war against those whom God Created. And I want you to notice very carefully this next move. One of the reasons this Psalm is rarely read, in its entirety, because it is a move that spotlights the insanity of the cycle of violence and the cycle of hatred.
Look at the verse; Look at the verse; Look at verse nine: [rising voice] “Happy shall they be who take your little ones and dash them against the rocks.”[lower voice] The people of faith are the rivers of Babylon. How shall we sing the Lord’s song? If I forget the order … The people of faith, have moved from the hatred of armed enemies [rising voice]–these soldiers who captured the king; those soldiers who slaughtered his son, that put his eyes out; those Read More
Chief Judge Judith Kaye administers the oath of office to Gov. David Paterson at right is Paterson’s son, Alexander (Newsday, J. Conrad Williams Jr. / March 17, 2008)
. . . asked me a question in a comment to my last post. My response:
I have not written much on Eliot Spitzer (I’ve left that to others) and I’ve said even less about David Paterson’s incredible ascension to the governorship. I have been working on a redesign of the website (everyone, keep an eye out for that!) and I’ve been working on a very long post (I am sorry to say that it is very, very boring).
My take on the drip, drip, drip of revelations about Gov. Paterson since he took office is that the media in New York City is probably the most racist in the nation. When the media in the South and other parts of the nation came to terms with their own role in this nation’s history, newspapers and other media outlets in the Northeast never had to.
It was good enough for them to condemn the South without any self-examination.
