The Jeremiah Wright issue has become all pervasive. Not only has Barack Obama finally become so desperate that he brought himself to break with the Reverend Wright, Ralph Peters, who ordinarily dovotes his New York Post columns to military affairs, has felt it appropriate to comment on the Obama-Wright issue.
I haven't sat through 20 years of Wright's sermons, but the most striking aspect of the pastor's rants that I have heard is that - like demagogues on every inhabited continent - he prefers assigning blame to making progress.
Blame is delicious. And easy. Progress takes work.
Nor is it in the interest of demagogues to see their followers graduate from society's margins toward the center. Social, economic or political success undercuts their fundamental argument that their poor will always be with us.
It gets tricky to portray your followers as eternal victims when you live in a multimillion-dollar mansion (smack dab in the midst of your oppressors), one of your flock is a likely presidential nominee of the most powerful nation in history - and his spouse holds an Ivy League law degree and earns over $300K a year.
In a situation like that, any demagogue has to renew his call to arms - to dismiss any success he can't spoil outright.
It's not the problem that the Most Reverend Wright poses for Obama that attracts Peters to his topic. It is Wright's predictable preaching of victimhood that draws his attention.
And just to remind us that we aren't fully immune to the seductive appeal of blaming others for our personal disappointments, in marched the Rev. Wright, fists clenched and rhetoric ringing.
His name is Legion. Wright is part of a global phenomenon plaguing every major faith and every civilization. He's not a problem for any one race, but for every race - for all of us who believe in a loving God and who maintain that every man and woman deserves a chance to succeed.
Preaching hatred and vengeance in the name of religion: Heard that from anyone else recently?
