The other issue here is that white people were often lulled into a sense of false security by the blacks' love of religion, and by those "Spirituals" the slaves would sing all day long since they weren't allowed to talk with each other. What white people didn't realize was that there was code in the spirituals. For instance Moses=Harriet Tubman. Jordan River=the Atlantic Ocean (hence my home is over Jordan). There were songs to communicate times when a slave escaped (these were happy songs). So the slaves were really singing about political stuff and the white people never suspected. Is it any wonder that this tradition was continued in the church?
So when the GOP and some in the Democratic Party hoped to scare people with Rev. Wright it worked only because so many white people had been unaware that black people were so politically hip. So many whites have been unaware that blacks always knew exactly what was going on and they talked about it constantly, even in code. -But not in front of white people generally. Whether you agree with Rev. Wright or not much of what seems shocking about him may be based on the fact that many whites don't understand how politically aware many blacks are. At least I speculate that this is part of what is at work here.
Now if we choose to continue on this subject we should go to John Hagee (John McCain's buddy) and Douglas Coe (Hillary's spiritual mentor). John Hagee has advocated bombing Iran to bring on Armageddon. Douglas Coe admires Hitler and other dictators. Rev. Wright damns America for killing innocents abroad (and at home). Let's vote for the candidates' spiritual mentors instead of the candidates themselves. Pick your poison.
And even if he were, so what. This is America, and people get to choose their own spiritual mentors or their own personal reasons. If there is evidence that these relationships are affecting their public policy positions, bring it out, otherwise please stop spreading this vile innuendo.
I was steadfast in my defese of Barack Obama and Rev. Wright (even as a strong Hillary supporter) that once Obama condemned Wright's remarks, the inquiry should stop. One can find meaningful spiritual guidance from someone quite separate from their political beliefs. I still maintain that, although Obama obviously has a tactical problem now.
As for McCain and Hagee, it's all fair game. Hagee is not a spiritual advisor to McCain, but apolitical supporter.
But now, the "whole preacher thing" is ridiculous and "treacherous for those who engage in it," and I don't get it and should lighten up?
As for your statement, "If she never wanted this to come out then she should never have joined in with the pile on about Rev. Wright," what on Earth are you talking about? As you well know, Jeff Sharlet covered this "story" in Mother Jones in September 2007, and because he has a book coming out soon, it received more attention recently from Barbara Erenriech at the Nation, all of that completely unrelated to Clinton's getting involved in the Wright controversy (for which I strongly criticized her, by the way).
As for hypocrisy, I always object on this site to allegations leveled without any factual support without regard to whether it is a candidate I support or not, and I will continue to do, in part because it annoys me, but mainly because I am sick and tired of our political discourse being hijacked by people, whether on the left or the right, who feel free to grossly spin out of contect, or worse, concoct from whole cloth, "facts" to suit their existiing ideologies. I am firmly on record here as opposing any type of guilt by association, even when it involves ideas I find offensive, whether it is Obama and Wright, Wright and Farrakhan, Rendell and Farrakhan.
This isn't an attack on anyone's ideology or position, by the way. If you want to think Hillary Clinton is evil incarnate, you certainly don't need my or anyone's permission for that. And if there are credible facts to support that perspective, well, have at it.
But when I can, I will call out allegations based on rumor, innuendo, guilt by association and logical flaws where I think they exist.