Race issue realities must be discussed

This nation is mired in a housing market collapse. This nation is on the brink of a severe economic recession. This nation is faced with the largest gaps between rich and poor since the great depression. This nation is facing crumbling infrastructure, schools that do not work, and a rapidly deteriorating position in the world. This nation is now $9 Trillion in debt, and is bogged down in a war whose objectives are not clear, and whose costs now exceed $1 Billion per week. Yet in the midst of a Presidential election, for the better part of the last week we have scarcely debated these issues. We've instead spent an extremely large portion of our limited attention spans on the issue of Barack Obama and his pastor, Jeremiah Wright.

Why is it that the words from a fiery Black pastor have so stirred America that we seem to have little appetite for anything else? Candidly, I am non-plussed by the right-leaning media's assault over the past few days waged against Pastor Wright and Senator Obama. Their antagonism to this type of situation is both expected and predictable. But what is surprising and also interesting is the reaction of the so called liberals to the Reverend Wright situation. That is, the reaction of those who claim to be in "favor" of a more fair and just (or colorblind) America, but who are nevertheless somehow shocked and indignant by open expressions from the very people who have yet to see that fairness come to fruition.

What is truly fascinating to ponder is the reality of those who were previously supporting Senator Obama before this fiasco, but have decided against supporting him after.

How could a person who supports Barack Obama's vision for uniting America and the need for such a vision, ever be "shocked" by the comments of his inner city Pastor?

How remarkable it must be to believe that all African American leaders should be speaking in positive terms about America inside of our own churches, when our populations are experiencing unemployment rates of 40% in many of our urban centers.

How incredible it must be to feel that African American pastors should be speaking only in soft, reasonable and passive tones while their students are dropping-out of high schools at rates exceeding 50%.

How amazing it must be to be able disengage from an African American candidate simply because of the passion of a Pastor who, while watching the kids in his neighborhood be subjected to violent crimes at 3 times the average rates, openly and forcibly expresses his discontent.

How fascinating it is to see someone who claims to support a leader that is trying to bring us all together, balk at the evidence that we are actually far apart.

Please do not misinterpret my analysis. I am not condoning the more insidious statements of Pastor Wright. In fact, I found some of them, such as the "G-D America" comment, very hard to swallow indeed - especially coming off the lips of a man of God.

But that said, with any sober reading of the text of Pastor Wright's comments over the years, there is really very little about what he says about America (with the possible exception of aids as a deliberate invention), or about being Black in America, that is either factually incorrect, or inconsistent with the African American experience in this nation. This is precisely why he has such an enormous national following and why he is so highly respected by Black and White alike.

Take away the fire and brimstone of You Tube, and we are left with is a pastor who has simply, consistently and usually quite fairly focused on America's perplexing inequities. And he is not alone: He has a litany of contemporaries and predecessors who have done the same.

Perhaps in the end then, for the "Lip Service Liberal" at least, it is the image of the messenger that is more problematic and offensive than the actual message? Perhaps the image of a fiery African American Pastor who openly and tenaciously critiques the shortcomings of his own nation, is an image that still frightens those who would claim to have voted for a Black man, before they saw that?

I do not have the answers. But I do have a lot of questions. I also have a fundamental belief that this nation - Black and White, Liberal or Conservative - still has much to grapple with about the realities of race and poverty for many of her citizens.

One day, quite possibly many years after Senator Obama and most of us have come and gone, maybe these realities will not be quite so offensive to all of America. And perhaps therein is our collective hope.