We're still waiting for an honest converstion about race from Obama

Juan Williams:

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Mr. Obama's strategies for dealing with the racial demagogues in his past have failed. The first strategy for dealing with Rev. Wright's proclamations – including damning America and offering baseless charges that the government was spreading AIDS among black people – was to say he was absent from church. Then Mr. Obama equated Rev. Wright with a crazy uncle to be found in every family. Then he asked for a pass, saying that everyone has heard their pastor, priest or rabbi make statements they don't agree with.

When this didn't work, the senator made a major political speech on race relations – a subject he'd avoided, to prevent being boxed in as the "black" candidate. The Philadelphia speech in March was most notable for what it did not do. Mr. Obama did not condemn Rev. Wright as a racial provocateur. Instead, he made it a point of virtue to stand by his minister of 20 years. He said Rev. Wright was a member of an older generation of black people still stung by their years of humiliation under segregation.

Incredibly, the speech was celebrated by supporters and most of the press. Julian Bond, chairman of the NAACP, said it would "go down as one of the great, magnificent and moving speeches in the American political tradition." The New York Times editorialized that "Mr. Obama's eloquent speech should end the debate over his ties to Mr. Wright since there is nothing to suggest that he would carry religion into government."

Well, that speech didn't end the controversy, either – because Mr. Obama never spoke honestly about Rev. Wright's sermons as destructive and racist. Instead he offered soaring talk about the nation, as a matter of faith in God and one another, needing to "move beyond old racial wounds." His only criticism of Rev. Wright was to chide him for a "profound mistake," of speaking "as if no progress had been made" on race.

And his poor judgment in remaining a member of Rev. Wright's church? Mr. Obama skated by with appeals for other people to have serious conversations about race. Instead of turning his fire on racial pandering in his own church, he criticized those who would "make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with [Rev. Wright's] most offensive words."

Allies rallied to the senator's side, arguing that the controversy was really all the fault of TV news programs that played the reverend's bellicose "sound bites" too often and out of context. But in a matter of weeks, Rev. Wright went on another rant, this time at the National Press Club in Washington. Only then did Mr. Obama condemn him for racially offensive jeremiads. And last week, Father Pfleger – with his mocking of Sen. Clinton and claims that whites all over America are crying because they feel a black man has stolen the nomination – has renewed the bitterness. His rant has also called a new round of attention to Mr. Obama's long ties to unsavory racial characters both inside and outside the church. In response, the senator has resigned from the church.

He has to do more.

The heart of Mr. Obama's problem is that he risks being defined by Rev. Wright and Father Pfleger....

To deal with this controversy effectively, Mr. Obama needs to give another speech. This time he has to admit to sins of using race for political expediency – by knowingly buying into divisive, mean messages being delivered from the pulpit. He has to say that, as a biracial young man with no community roots, attaching himself to Rev. Wright and the Trinity congregation was a shortcut to move up the ladder in the Chicago political scene. He has to call race-baiting what it is, whether it comes from a pulpit or calls itself progressive politics. And he has to challenge his supporters, especially his black base, to be honest about real problems at the heart of today's racial divide – including out-of-wedlock births, crime, drugs and a culture that devalues education while glorifying the gangster life.

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He will not do it.

This controversy exposed the hollowness of his "unity" message. I am not sure that any black politician is willing to separate himself from the "we're owed" message of Wright and Pfleger.

They can make fun of Hillary's sense of entitlement, but not see their own. They are locked into a belief that slavery has made blacks entitled and they are willing to support racist means to achieve their entitlement. It is a message that is holding back American born blacks much more so than discrimination ever could. When you see African born blacks immigrate here and achieve great things you know that any discrimination can be overcome with the right attitude instead of the Wright attitude.