should everybody lay off barack about the farrakhan connection?

scott thinks so; i'm not so sure. my comment is as follows:

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yeah [tim russert was outta line with his farrakhan line of inquiry during the last debate], except that obama's long-time minister and spiritual advisor, the rev. jeremiah wright--the guy who married him, baptized his children, counseled him on his runs for both the senate and the presidency, inspired the title of his book, and I could go on and on--this guy thinks farrakhan walks on fuckin water.

look, I don't give a rat's ass what color obama is and will respond to any and all attacks against him on that basis with the scorn they deserve; however, the backstory of his exceptionally close allegiance to a spiritual leader who, among other things, just gave louis farrakhan a "lifetime achievement" award named after himself are, far as I'm concerned, more than fair game for close scrutiny.

that's where russert's questions should've gone--and this is an area where hillary could've legitimately hit him as well, rather than cravenly circulating chickenshit pictures of him in somali-elder garb.

the problem, of course, is that we as a nation are so hamstrung by political-correctness that anybody (well, anybody white or, god forbid, jewish) who dares raise this issue to the level of public awareness it deserves will be immediately and loudly decried as a racist, and the questions that should be asked and answered lost in all the mud.

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to date, i haven't researched this issue thoroughly--i've seen some hyperbolic fear-mongering from conservative sources and a lot of whitewashing and "rehabilitation" of rev. wright from liberal sources--so i'm far from coming to any conclusions one way or the other. what i really want is objective, unvarnished, truthful answers to the following questions:

• how honest-to-god tight is barack obama with this rev. wright character;

• how much honest-to-god influence has said reverend had on the development of obama's political philosophy;

• what would be the future role of said reverend (and his several organizations) in an obama administration; and
  

• how honest-to-god closely aligned are this reverend and his church to the doctrine of louis farrakhan?

inquiring minds wanna know.