Black Church vs Black Politics: The Double Duty Dilemma

Barack Obama has got his foot stuck deeply in a controversy from which it may very difficult to extract himself. He may yet, but I'm not holding my breath. What I do expect is that one way or another, 'white supremacist' conservatives will be blamed. But in fact the blame falls squarely on the role of the Black Nationalist Church in black politics.

• First of all, Jeremiah Wright is someone I've dealt briefly with before.
• Secondly, Jodi Kantor has written about the two of them before.
• Thirdly, Obama knows when to diss his boy.

I think it is unfortunate the Obama campaign has to bear the burden of an important discussion about the evolution (or not) of black nationalist politics in America and the role of the black church in it. But it's like that and that's the way it is, and in the end I think this, more than anything will be how Obama's blackness will be judged. That is because the rhetoric of Wright, decontexutalized as it may be, is immediately recognizeable as the subtext of black politics for the past 40 years. You cannot talk about 'Amerikkka' and be forgiven, but all black activists know somebody who talks just like that.  Dennis Prager was all over it this morning. Rush Limbaugh was all over it as well. I wonder if The Field Negro will be keeping his head down.

The problem is very simple. Pretty much all black church activism is liberal / black nationalist activism. The black church has bitten off more than it can chew, and every American who doesn't understand the subtleties of that nexus and where it does and does not break is going to be perplexed and skeptical about how (and if) Obama can wriggle out of it. I say he can't because Wright married the man, and Michelle Obama's UCLA speech is the first 1 of this equation. 1 + 1 = 2. Michelle Obama + Jeremiah Wright = Unpatriotic. And don't be surprised when Wright is labeled racist. There is no escape here, there is only confrontation. So how does one distinguish doing good for blacks from doing good for America when so much of the rhetoric of black self-help is unpatriotic? That's the question Obama, of all people, somebody very fresh to the scene, is going to have to answer. Or else.

What do I think he'll do? I think he'll pull a Cablinasian trump card out of his pocket. And I think people who already support him will grudgingly accept it, people who never did will dismiss it and people who oppose him will call it an evasion. That will substitute for a substantive discussion on race. However, somebody ought to get Jeremiah Wright an hour on primetime TV.

As for the duality of the black church where the meat of this discussion oought to lie, I am hopeful that Obama's inevitable concession to the mainstream will help black ministers recognize their insufficiency as political leaders. I hope black churchfolks' willingness to take political cues from black ministers is diminished by this episode. Here again is Obama doing the right thing the right way as a mainstream political candidate and he's going to have to focus. That means that Wright will get the same treatment as Tavis Smiley. It will be tougher, but if I know Barry as a BAP, this is exactly what he's going to do. And Jeremiah Wright is going to have to sit down, shut up, and hope for an invitation to the Rose Garden someday over the rainbow...