One of Hillary Clinton's biggest supporters, Lanny Davis takes a few shots at Barack Obama and Jeremiah Wright in a Wall Street Journal op-ed. Read below:
I have tried to get over my unease surrounding Barack Obama's response to the sermons and writings of his pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. But the unanswered questions remain.
I am a strong supporter of and a substantial fundraiser for Hillary Clinton for president. I still believe she should and will be the Democratic nominee. But if Sen. Obama wins the nomination, he needs to understand that this issue goes well beyond Clinton partisans. Now is the time to address these questions, not later.
Clearly Mr. Obama does not share the extremist views of Rev. Wright. He is a tolerant and honorable person. But that is not the issue. The questions remain: Why did he stay a member of the congregation? Why didn't he speak up earlier? And why did he reward Rev. Wright with a campaign position even after knowing of his comments?
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Mr. Obama made a choice to join the church and to ask Rev. Wright to marry him and his bride. He said for the first time a few weeks ago that had Rev. Wright not recently resigned as pastor of the church, he would have withdrawn. But that only reraised the same questions: Why didn't he act before the resignation?
If he did not want to withdraw from the church - and I truly try to understand his personal difficulty doing so - then why not at least speak out publicly and say, in the famous phrase of the late Sen. Robert F. Kennedy: "No - this is unacceptable."
Furthermore, after knowing about some of these sermons and having serious problems with some of their messages, why did Mr. Obama still decide to appoint Rev. Wright to his official presidential campaign religious advisory committee?
The whole editorial is here. Let's be clear here. If Obama is the nominee, the Wright issue not only won't go away it will become even more of a big deal. Count on it.