Wrightmania

The controversy over Rev. Jeremiah Wright appears to have driven some of Sen. Barack Obama's supporters over the cliff, from messianic fervor into outright lunacy.

Exhibit A, a young Obamaphile writes to Andrew Sullivan:

If Obama is done in by this whole Wright thing I am done with politics. I can't invest myself in something that is so sure to disappoint me time and time and time again.

Nice to have the starring role in your own adolescent melodrama, isn't it? Pouting and sulking are not effective strategies, and neither is denial. Which brings us to Exhibit B:

The only reason there is a "furor" as the press likes to say, is because the Repubs and the press who are so firmly snuggled up in their pockets have created one. And the only credibility Obama has lost in my eyes is due to him feeling that he has to address it as if it is valid.

Once you stop laughing at the contention that the "Repubs" have the press "in their pockets," consider the fierce denial involved in this Obamaphile's refusal to grant the validity of Wright as an issue in the Democratic primary.

That's the key point. Democratic voters (and superdelegates, too) are being asked to evaluate whether Obama's 20-year association with Wright -- and the revelation of Wright's radicalism -- creates a political vulnerability that will hurt Obama's chances of being elected in November.

It doesn't matter whether the Wright issue is "valid" in some objective, logical, bird's-eye-view perspective. What matters is how it will be perceived in the general election by independent voters. The Wright issue matters because of its potential to sink Obama in November.

If Sullivan and his sulky young e-mailer want to ignore Wright and keep pushing for Obama's nomination, nobody's stopping them. And if any other Obama supporters want to blame the media for the "furor," go right ahead. But if Obama does get the nomination, and then his association with Wright contributes to a loss in November, don't say you weren't warned.

On the other hand, maybe all this "furor" will be forgotten in a few days, and Obama will sail to a great triumph in November. Somehow, though, many people seem to think such a scenario is less likely now than it was before Wright decided to go on his media tour -- and you can't blame that decision on "Repubs and the press."

BTW, it's May 1, and we just finished the month of April -- best month ever for The Other McCain, with 16,174 visitors and a daily average of 780 page-views. During the best 7-day period of the month (April 19-25) the daily average page-views was 1,046. Thanks to all the bloggers who linked here during April, and thanks to the regular readers (and regular commenters, like SueK) who've contributed to a 137% increase in traffic in a single month.