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Pastor row sees white voters slip away from Obama

Philadelphia/Washington: Listen for a few minutes to Joey Vento, owner of a south Philadelphia institution that serves sandwiches, and the scale of U.S. presidential hopeful Barack Obama’s problems become apparent. Mr. Obama is having the worst week of his campaign. It is, some believe, a week that threatens his chances of becoming President.

“That minister, that was terrible, all his sayings. He’s preaching hatred,” Mr. Vento said. “The thing I didn’t like about Obama; you’re telling me for 20 years you been going to that church and you never heard that?”

Mr. Vento (68), was speaking about Mr. Obama’s former pastor and spiritual adviser, Jeremiah Wright, whose sermons have been aired repeatedly on U.S. television denouncing the U.S. as racist.

The clips have alienated the white voters, such as Mr. Vento, that Mr. Obama needs in his next contest with Hillary Clinton, to be held in Philadephia and the other towns and cities of Pennsylvania on April 22.

But it goes further than that. The danger for Mr. Obama is not just that he could lose badly in Pennsylvania but that senior Democrats will wonder whether the loss of white votes could cost him the November general election.

The latest poll in Pennsylvania by Public Policy Polling puts Ms. Clinton on 56 per cent and Mr. Obama on 30 per cent. The same polling organisation showed her having overtaken Mr. Obama in North Carolina, which is also still to hold its primary: she has 43 per cent to his 42 per cent.

Phil Singer, spokesman for Ms. Clinton, told reporters: “It’s no secret that the Obama campaign is in political hot water.”

Mr. Obama attempted to defuse the escalating row with a speech in Philadelphia in which he spoke in detail about his relationship with Rev. Wright and race in the U.S.

It was widely acknowledged as one of his best. Although acclaimed by the media and political activists, his speech has failed to win over voters such as Mr. Vento.

Mr. Obama has since redoubled his efforts. But the sight of Rev. Wright calling on his congregation to sing “God Damn America” instead of “God Bless America” is not one from which Americans are going to be diverted easily. A theme that emerges from the bars and diners of white Philadelphia is suspicion that Mr. Obama’s failure to disown Rev. Wright and his presence in his church for almost two decades suggests that he himself is secretly resentful towards white people. A stray comment during an interview may have helped contribute to that suspicion when he referred to his grandmother, who had voiced her concern about being mugged by a black person, as a “typical white person”.

Mr. Obama, who announced his candidacy in February last year, managed to get through most of 2007 without race surfacing as an issue.

African-Americans in Philadelphia have been largely supportive of Mr. Obama’s handling of the Wright row. — © Guardian Newspapers Limited, 2008

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