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September 11, 2008

Obama's other minister problem

Ed Lasky
Barack Obama has discarded Pastor Jeremiah Wright, Jr., a man he had previously described as a "moral compass", "sounding board" and "confidant".  But he has been cozying up to another minister who was less "incendiary" and would be more likely to be able to help Obama bolster his support among white evangelicals: Jim Wallis.

Wallis is a leader of the so-called religious left. He is a political activist who cloaks his radicalism in religion. He founded and is the editor of "Sojourners" magazine. His relationship with Obama began to loom as Obama's ties with Wright were "disappeared".

Wallis has given an award to Obama; Obama has spoken at a Sojourners Forum. At the recent Saddleback Forum, Wallis was one of the few people involved in writing questions to pose to both Barack Obama and John McCain. Obama also tapped Wallis to help draft the Democratic Party platform.

I have written about Jim Wallis in the past. He and Sojourners have an anti-Israel animus -- just as did Pastor Wright. The magazine and church bulletins published under the aegis of Pastor Wright carried manifestos from a Hamas leader    ; Sojourners magazine has also carried pro-Hamas pieces.

But Pastor Wright and Jim Wallis share much more: a stark anti-Americanism and a radicalism sharply at odds with the vast majority of religious figures in America.

Investors Business Daily has been running a superb series of editorials on Barack Obama. The paper continues its insightful series by examining the ties between Barack Obama and Jim Wallis:

Like Wright and Obama, Wallis believes that biblical faith compels radical social action. Their political ministry is called the "social gospel," but it's really just socialism dressed up in a cheap tunic. They refuse to separate personal faith from political activism, whether at home or abroad.

In the '80s, for example, Wallis and Wright rallied to the cause of the communist regime in Nicaragua, and protested the U.S. arming of the Contra rebels. Wallis, in fact, marshaled thousands of "Witnesses for Peace" and joined them in Nicaragua, making it known they were willing to take a bullet to stop the anti-communist insurgency.

Wallis is more eloquent than Wright, but he preaches the same anti-American message. According to discoverthenetworks.org, he once called the U.S. "the great power, the great seducer, the great captor and destroyer of human life, the great master of humanity and history in its totalitarian claims and designs."

Like Obama, Wallis got his start in Chicago, where he too was involved in community organizing. He forged ties with black gang leaders, including at least one known cop-killer. [....]

Wallis agrees with Obama that American racism and capitalism are to blame for inner-city poverty, and echoes his oft-repeated call for "economic justice." They share a spread-the-wealth vision, including subsidizing the working poor beyond expanded tax credits and minimum-wage hikes. [....]

Wallis may couch his Bolshevist views today. But in 1979, he was quoted in the journal "Mission Tracks" saying he hoped that "more Christians will come to view the world through Marxist eyes." [....]

Wallis says Obama is the kind of leader he's been searching for, one who's "responsive to social movements." "Barack Obama talks about 'being our brother's keeper' and how he finds a faith that does justice to be compelling to him," he said in a recent interview.

Americans should ask themselves why Barack Obama seeks out "religious" leaders who are more radical than religious and who share a disdainful attitude towards America. Why does Barack Obama look to these people for guidance and succor? Or is he looking to them for something more radical?

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