November 2, 2007

For Those Still Dismissing the Obama-McClurkin Flap, Paul Schindler Explains It All for You. Again.

Worth the full read at the link:

Obama Squanders the High Ground

As he mounted the stage to deliver the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, Barack Obama was really only just becoming known in his own home state, despite the fact that he was poised for election three months later to the US Senate from Illinois. The speech, of course, was a tour de force, eloquent in delivery and in substance, instantly branding him as America’s apostle of “the audacity of hope.”

. . .

But for LGBT Americans, the past week has been marked by Obama’s crushing of hope. And for every American concerned about the bitterness and divisiveness of our politics in the past generation, the episode raises troubling questions about whether the Illinois senator has the courage and grace to prove the uniter he postures to be.

In this issue and last, Doug Ireland reported in detail about Obama’s engagement of an “ex-gay” gospel singer and preacher as part of a vote push among evangelical African Americans in the critical early South Carolina primary.

Laying his years of active homosexuality to two childhood rapes, Donnie McClurkin has declared “war” against “the curse” of gay life. In an appearance on Pat Robertson’s “700 Club” several years ago, he said, “I’m in no mood to play with those who are trying to kill our children.”

Making a call about this guy should be easy. He’s a divider - an unusually ugly one at that. He’s got no place in a political campaign, certainly not one predicated on hope.

. . .

What is equally troubling to me has been the defense by Obama since the controversy first exploded. He has dug in, deciding to weather the storm rather than back down.

. . .

No serious gay political leader thinks our community or the Democrats can afford not to engage evangelical blacks or any other voting group reluctant to view the world the way we do. But there are all manner of African-American faith leaders, gay and not, fully supportive of LGBT rights and more agnostic, who could play a wide variety of roles in helping Obama frame a dialogue across these cultural lines.

But to offer up Donnie McClurkin as a take-it-or-leave-it proposition, and then suggest that gay Americans unhappy at the prospect of him being a ringleader in Obama’s “big tent” are culturally insensitive is flat out wrong. It is clumsy. It is insulting. And it is cynical.