Whom will Obama renounce next?

I was thinking of writing a satire in which Obama’s sequential “renunciations” and “dissociations” keep being extended further and further, but Steve Sailer has beat me to it:

Obama disowns pastor, church, black community, and white grandmother

On a theme similar to Sailer’s, Scott of Powerline sums up the epic of Obama’s successive embraces and disownings of Rev. Wright and Trinity United Church over the last three months and concludes:

Every installment of this saga reveals Obama to be a deeply opportunistic politician, ready to beat a hasty retreat from yesterday’s statement of cherished principle in order to fight another day. Each installment of the saga also reveals the organs of the mainstream media to be Obama’s handmaidens. From March 18 forward they have cheered on Obama’s every step, even when Obama’s succeeding steps proved them fools.

In the aftermath of this saga, it should begin to dawn on attentive observers that Barack Obama represents a type that flourishes on many college campuses. The technical term that applies to Obama is b.s. artist. Obama is an overaged example of the phenomenon, but his skills in the art have brought him great success and he’s not giving it up now.

Exactly right.

Now, if Scott of Powerline would only state publicly what he indignantly said to me in an e-mail five weeks ago, that President Bush’s invitation of Al Sharpton to the White House was “disgusting,” while he added that it was also disgusting of me to suggest that Scott would not state publicly that Bush’s invitation to Sharpton was disgusting (see our exchange), I might be relieved of the sense that Scott is something of a b.s. artist himself, or, at least, a person who professes loudly his devotion to truth but is a devoted trimmer of truth in defense of Bush.

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Jonathan S. writes:

The satire that you thought of writing of Obama’s serial renunciations and denunciations, and that Steve Sailer has written, I too have taken a stab at.

Obama Disowns Grandmother, Puts Daughters on Notice

Hoping to put behind him the controversies that show him, in the eyes of many, a rank opportunist whose closest associates include racists, radicals, crooks, and terrorists, presidential candidate Barack Obama announced that he, and his family, are cutting all ties with his white grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, 86, of Honolulu.

“This is not a decision I come to lightly,” the Senator said at a new conference in Aberdeen, South Dakota where he was campaigning, “and, frankly, it’s one that I make with some sadness.”

Obama identified the cause of the break as being an incident, from some thirty years ago, in the home made for him by Mrs. Dunham, who was raising young Barack, and working to earn money to pay for his private school, after his mother had taken off for Indonesia.

As told in Obama’s autobiography Mrs. Dunham said she was accosted by a hostile, aggressive, panhandler whom she feared was close to hitting her; and mentioned the man was black. Obama concluded from her account of the incident, and her husband’s, that his grandmother was prejudiced against blacks.

Obama said that he and his wife, Michelle, had for “quite some time” discussed the possibility of renouncing his grandmother.

“It’s clear, he said, that now that I am a candidate for president, every time something is said by anyone whom I have even the slightest acquaintance, including family members, the remarks will be imputed to me, even if they totally conflict with my long-held views, statements, and principles.”

“I’m not denouncing my grandmother,” Obama said in reply to a question, “and I’m not interested in people who want me to denounce her. She’s not a grandmother worthy of denouncing.”

Obama said the elderly Mrs. Dunham was a friend and someone who “has done tremendous work at home; but her statements were offensive and have no place in our politics or in our living room.”

Mrs. Dunham, who lives alone, did not immediately return calls from reporters.

But with the nomination all but his, Obama is acting to forestall any further damage to his standing with the public by the unsavory characters of his inner circle. An advisor to the Obama campaign, speaking on the condition of anonymity, says that Obama, after hearing his two daughters complain, at the dinner table, that they “hated” the side of broccoli served to them, has ordered a thorough vetting of both girls, Malia Ann, 9, and Natasha, 7.

“As I have traveled this country,” Obama said in a statement made to the girls’ mother, Michelle, “I’ve been impressed not by what divides us, but by all that unites us. That is why I am deeply disappointed by Malia Ann’s and Natasha’s divisive, backward-looking rhetoric, which doesn’t reflect the country I see or the desire of people across America to come together in the common cause of eating everything on their plates, including the vegetables.”

Posted by Lawrence Auster at June 01, 2008 02:56 PM | Send