Does Barack Agree?

ABC News reports instances of amazingly inflammatory rhetoric from Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama's pastor. Here is an example:

"The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, God damn America, that's in the Bible for killing innocent people," he said in a 2003 sermon. "God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human. God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme

."

Now, this is the man who married Barack and Michelle Obama, and who baptized their two daughters. Of course, few agree with everything one's religious leader might say, but given the over-the-top offensiveness of these comments -- and the fact that the Obamas have continued to attend Rev. Wright's church -- it's entirely fair for the press to ask Barack for his views on these remarks and others like them.

Finally, note that such an inquiry has nothing to do with probing Barack's religious beliefs. Notwithstanding the almost incidental invocation of the Bible and God, the rhetoric above has nothing to do with religion, and everything to do with a bitter, poisonous political view of America.

Note also that Barack has compared his minister to "an old uncle who says things I don't always agree with." The obvious difference, of course, is that one can't choose one's family; one does choose one's minister.