Obama declares Wright is wrong

‘Outraged’ senator severs ties with controversial pastor

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. Barack Obama said last month he couldn’t disown his former pastor. Turns out he could — and did.

Obama, trying to tamp down the political uproar over the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, went before the cameras yesterday to denounce the minister’s comments as “giving comfort to those who prey on hate.” He also took exception to Wright’s contention that Obama has made certain comments in the presidential race simply because he’s a politician.

He said their relationship had been damaged to the point that it will never be the same.

“If Reverend Wright thinks that that’s political posturing, as he put it, then he doesn’t know me very well,” a visibly angry Obama said in a news conference. “And based on his remarks yesterday, well, I may not know him as well as I thought either.”

Obama was reacting for a second straight day, this time stepping up his criticism of Wright after the minister’s appearance Monday at the National Press Club in Washington. Wright’s remarks revived the issue of his relationship with Obama — over two decades as pastor of a church in Chicago — just as the Illinois senator is coming off a loss in Pennsylvania to Democratic rival Hillary Rodham Clinton and trying to win over white working-class voters in Indiana and North Carolina in next Tuesday’s primaries.

“I am outraged by the comments that were made and saddened over the spectacle that we saw yesterday,” Obama said.

His strong words come just six weeks after Obama delivered a sweeping speech on race in which he sharply condemned Wright’s remarks but did not leave the church or repudiate the minister himself, who he said was like a family member. “I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community,” Obama said of Wright at the time.