Obama renounces pastor's remarks
The candidate writes a Huffington Post column condemning his church leader's incendiary statements.
Sen. Barack Obama took the unusual step Friday of posting an online column to further distance himself from his longtime Chicago pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, whose incendiary sermons have spurred renewed controversy in recent days.
Obama's relationship with the minister has come under fresh scrutiny as videos of Wright's sermons have appeared on television and been posted on YouTube -- including one from last Christmas when he railed against Obama rival Hillary Rodham Clinton.
"Hillary was not a black boy raised in a single-parent home -- Barack was," Wright said in the Christmas sermon, delivered from the pulpit at Chicago's Trinity United Church of Christ.
"Barack knows what it means to be a black man living in a country and a culture that is controlled by rich white people. Hillary! Hillary can never know that. Hillary ain't never been called a nigger! Hillary has never had her people defined as non-person."
In another recently aired video, Wright referred to the United States as the "U.S. of K.K.K.A." He also drew parallels between the tragedy of the Sept. 11 attacks and the suffering of blacks through years of American history. The remarks have drawn intense criticism from conservative bloggers and commentators.
In a column published Friday afternoon on Huffington Post, Obama noted that Wright is retiring from his pulpit and added that he has drawn attention recently because of "some inflammatory and appalling remarks he made about our country, our politics, and my political opponents."
"I vehemently disagree and strongly condemn the statements that have been the subject of this controversy," Obama wrote.
The Illinois senator added that he had not heard Wright make the controversial statements from the pulpit or in private conversation.
Still, Obama acknowledged that he had been disturbed by the minister's comments before, and previously condemned remarks made by Wright, but "because Rev. Wright was on the verge of retirement, and because of my strong links to the Trinity faith community, where I married my wife and where my daughters were baptized, I did not think it appropriate to leave the church."
Obama spokesman Bill Burton declined to offer further details. Mario Ruiz, Huffington Post spokesman, said the column was written exclusively for the site but would not say how Obama came to publish it there rather than release it as a statement through his campaign.
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