Dear Sen. Obama,
I’m sure this isn’t my last letter to you, but I would have preferred my first to be written under more auspicious circumstances. It’s not a secret that I support you, although I haven’t decided if I’m going to vote for you come February. No matter what I decide, I will probably always like you because of what you represent, as both a politician and a man.
Your recent scandal involving Donnie McClurkin has been disappointing, not entirely because of the fact that you invited him on your gospel tour (I assume if you had anticipated or understood the reaction you would get, you would not have done it), but mostly because of the way you have handled the subsequent backlash. If “handle” can even be the word. Everything you’ve done since — your dinky Web site statement on gay rights, the addition of a white gay minister to the tour, and your last ditch interview with the Advocate — have sort of screamed of political incompetence.
Look, senator. I’m not a political operative. I understand that I am pointing out problems without offering solutions. But what can I say? You are supposed to hire people who are much better at this than your people actually are. I also understand that this is not “your” problem. It’s a problem with the primary system, which requires candidates to pander disproportionately to specific groups in specific places — black churchgoers in South Carolina, farmers in Iowa, etc — in order to secure a lead. And it’s also the problem with the Democratic party, which, by default, is the major party of choice for blacks and gays, two groups whose core issues don’t always align and sometimes even run counter to each other. Hence gospel superstar and homosexual-converter Donnie McClurkin being a great choice for a South Carolina black church gospel tour and a terrible, horrible choice for a candidate trying to win over the gay community. And I know you are not the only one to engage in this sort of hypocrisy. This is a presidential election! Hypocrisy is the name of the game. But you are the one being called on it directly, and, frankly, you should have been better prepared. Maybe next time?
If there is one.
Best wishes (and I really mean that),
Lauren
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By the way, you’ve pretty much summarized above by thoughts about the Donnie McClurkin “scandal”. It makes Obama’s campaign seem inept and unprepared.
I guess I haven’t followed it enough because I was unaware of many of these facts. I’m not voting for him anyway. I was also not aware that Donnie McClurkin was a homophobe until this story broke. I think Obama is a member of the UCC which means his exposure to McClurkin’s work is likely limited. Still, someone (not Obama himself, but someone on his team) should have done their research.
My question for all the current senators and governors campaigning: are you doing your current job well? I can’t imagine that McCain, Clinton, Obama & the others have seen much of the Capitol in the last 8 mos.
I don’t think Obama did anything wrong. He just can’t wrangle the press the way the white candidates can. Gay activists obviously did not listen to Donnie McClurkin. He said that he does not believe in discrimination against gay people. He also doesn’t want to be gay himself, although he acknowledged that he had been for the last 20 years, and that prayer helped him not be gay. Now as wack as that might sound, he still said he did not believe in discriminating against gays. Since that is the party line, how did his personal perspective disenfranchise him from singing for Obama? White gays need to dial it back some.
I agree that white gays need to dial it back a bit on this. They are playing the old “I want you to disavow your brother” game with us and I, for one, am sick of it. White gays should know that by demanding that Blacks disavow one another they are risking gaining our opposition to other aspects of their political agenda. They are risking gaining the enmity even of those Black progressives who now support them.
That said, I utterly disagree with any church that would reject people because they are gay, including the white Catholic Church, the white Bapist Churches, the white Mormon Church and Black churches. If all of the gay people at their churches suddenly disappeared, those churches would suddenly realize how much they needed the choir members and leaders, musicians, deacons, pastors, priests and bishops who were absent.
Hillarity says above of Obama,
If so, doesn’t that mean that the Democrats are less likely to win if Obama is the nominee?
Sorry. Hillarity said above about Obama, “He just can’t wrangle the press the way the white candidates can.”
If so, doesn’t that mean that the Democrats are less likely to win if Obama is the nominee?
White gays are not the only ones that have an issue with McClurkin. McClurkin is essentially saying that gayness is something that can and should be “cured” through prayer, which is not something most gay folks (whatever race) would agree with. There are a million other really good, popular, non-controversial gospel singers Obama could have chosen. I think McClurkin was just not a good pick.
Obama is pandering to black Christians. Just like repubs pander to the Christian right. Nothing new here. I just guess all you Obama supporters thought he was above that sort of thing, huh?
Clinton did the same thing — in concept… pandering to anti-gay folks, but no one is making that much of a ruckas about it.
SeaFlood, I doubt that. My two local Clinton ambassadors are middle aged white men.
Obama and Clinton are quite different and appeal to different kind of Dems. I am slightly left of center and my views are closer to that of Romney and Giuliani than they are to Obama. As far as winning votes go, it’s about getting more of those in the middle to your side. IF the 08 elections were tomorrow and it was Romney vs. Obama, I seriously don’t know who I’d vote for. If it were Giuliani vs. Obama, I’d vote for Obama. I agree with Giuliani on more issues but at the end of the day, he’s a horrible person.