Obama's other spiritual mentors: Pfleger and Meeks

I saw this in a Christopher Hitchens article on Monday, but I didn't get around to posting about it until now. If the media bothers to confront Barack Obama on his other spiritual mentors, I'm sure he'll say he doesn't advocate their views, but Obama just keeps associating, if not seeking out, indidividuals with extremist ideas.

The thing that this gaggle of cranks and parasites has in common is the extreme deference with which it is treated by the junior senator from Illinois. In April 2004, Barack Obama told a reporter from the Chicago Sun-Times that he had three spiritual mentors or counselors: Jeremiah Wright, James Meeks, and Father Michael Pfleger—for a change of pace, a white Catholic preacher who has a close personal feeling for the man he calls (as does Obama) Minister Farrakhan. This crossover stuff is not as "inclusive" as it might be made to seem: Meeks' main political connections in the white community are with the hysterically anti-homosexual wing of the Christian right. If Obama were to be read a list of the positions that his clerical supporters take on everything from Judaism to sodomy, he would be in the smooth and silky business of "distancing" from now until November. And that is why he hopes that his Philadelphia speech, which dissociated him from everything and nothing, will be enough. He seems, indeed, to have a real gift for remaining adequately uninformed about the real beliefs of his "mentors."

Father Pfleger is a media gadfly in Chicago, and it's fair to call him a white Jesse Jackson, with whom he often attends protests. Two years ago, in a uniquely Illinois political firestorm, several members of a state hate crime panel resigned because a Nation of Islam was on that board. At that time there was significant pressure on Governor Rod Blagojevich to kick that person off the panel.

Pfleger defended the NOI member, Claudette Muhammad.

(Pfleger said) Blagojevich would generate enormous anger if he removed Muhammad from the commission.

"If you are not willing to stand up in difficult times, don't pretend to be a supporter of black issues, of the black community," Pfleger said. "Now is a test for him."

As for Meeks, in Chicago he's better known as a key cog in the Reverend Jesse Jackson's growing political machine that also includes his son and daughter-in-law.

Rev. Meeks, who holds a top leadership with Rainbow-PUSH, defeated William Shaw in 2002 to win the State Senate seat he now holds. Shaw, along with his twin brother, is a long time opponent of Jesse's South Side empire.

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Technorati tags: religion Chicago Catholic roman catholic Pfleger Jesse Jackson Obama politics Barack Obama Election Democrats