An Interview with Barack Obama

Have you talked to Reverend Wright?
No.

I understand that you were reluctant to even watch the video of him at the National Press Club, and I wonder if you can just take your mind back to when they handed you the transcript.
... My relationship with Reverend Wright and the church ... and the fact that it became such an enormous issue, took me somewhat by surprise. Not entirely, but somewhat, first of all because it's a very conventional black church in a lot of ways. This whole thing about black liberation theology and black value system etc., etc., that's an overlay of some names that are given to very traditional aspects of the black church—preaching the social gospel, emphasizing your obligations to the community. Nine out of ten of Rev. Wright's sermons would stir no controversy whatsoever. He was not a public figure in Chicago beyond the church; he was not somebody like Jesse or Farrakhan who sought the public eye. He wasn't considered a firebrand. The church ministries are similar to church ministries all across the country. The membership is indistinguishable from the membership of most black churches.

I think that the first time that I got an inkling that this could be a problem was the day of the announcement, which has already been reported, where there was this article in Rolling Stone that my team showed to me that had some pretty incendiary language in it by Rev. Wright. The truth is that, like most busy people, I wasn't going to church every week, and he preaches three sermons a week. So particularly in the last two or three years, we hadn't been going that often, in part because I was campaigning and would be at other people's churches all the time. And what I understand from friends who are also members of the church was, after 9/11, Rev. Wright really ratcheted up some of the rhetoric, was a fierce critic of Bush, so some of his sermons became much more fiery. So I ... that's when ... when I [saw] that on the page, I thought to myself, "This doesn't sound real good." But my concern was not just the political ramifications; my concern was to figure out a way to protect the church from becoming a political issue. So that's the point where I called Rev. Wright, and I said, "You know what, you probably shouldn't introduce me, there's going to be 500 press credentials there, you don't want a whole bunch of mikes suddenly stuck in your face without any preparation or expectation." I know that that disappointed him, and I think he may have felt some anger about that.

Did he express any?
I know it, and also [it's] what I heard from others ... Shortly thereafter, there was an article by Jodi Kantor in The New York Times in which this was reported, and where [Wright] characterized our conversations. That put a further strain on the relationship because I didn't particularly appreciate him talking about a conversation that he and I had together, and suddenly it appearing in the Times. But my view at that point was that he was retiring, I had a strong commitment to the church community, he had gone through some very difficult times over the last several years, a number of his close friends had passed away, and the fact that he was retiring, [that] this is what he had built ... his life of preaching, and now he was about to leave. So my instinct was to simply let him stay out of the limelight and to not make a bigger deal out of it. I was, that was, though, the first time I learned about the quote surrounding 9/11, it was in that Times article. And at that point I think both myself and my team anticipated that this will be a big problem at some point.

Fast forward, after Iowa, I don't know exactly when ...[Sean] Hannity had played this up initially, his perspective on it was so ignorant, of black history, black traditions, black culture, black church. ... His attempt to make this innocuous statement of the black value system [into] some statement of black separatism was so ludicrous that it didn't get a lot of traction, and we didn't expect it would. But, I'll be honest with you, this is an example of a failing, a shortcoming in our campaign. Immediately after that New York Times article came out, I, and a number of our senior folks, said to our research team, "Let's pull every single sermon that Rev. Wright's made, because it could be an issue, and it could be attributed to me, and let's at least know exactly what we're dealing with." That never got done. So that when the loop came, that did take us by surprise, packaged in that fashion, how offensive it was, I think [it] caught all of us off guard. I had just come back from Washington, [and] I had to immediately draft a statement. I had to appear that night on the cable shows to denounce the words but try to place them in some context, and it was that weekend that I prepared to write the race speech and was able then to deliver it in Philadelphia. And at that point, I don't think there was any question that this was going to be very damaging politically. On the other hand, I felt it was important to not disown somebody who I've known for a long time, who'd always treated me with great courtesy and kindness, and had treated my family very well, who was at the center of the church community that I valued, and who, for all his flaws, had done very good work. And that's what I tried to express in the speech, was this sense that people are complicated. They're a mixture of good and bad.

... I was shocked by a number of the things [Wright said]. I think the thing about AIDS was probably the most shocking, because that's classic sort of conspiracy theorizing in the African-American community. It's not uncommon, but for somebody of Rev. Wright's education, it's not something that I would have expected. So I was very surprised by that. I did have a conversation with him after I delivered the speech in Philadelphia, and I told him in no uncertain terms how profoundly I disagreed with what he had to say, how offensive it was both to me and the American people, and I suggested to him that he needed to internalize and understand why people would be offended. And so, to see him then not process any of that, or engage in any self reflection, but to go out three consecutive days in an escalating fashion, culminating in a performance at the National Press Club that showed very little regard for the sensibilities of the American people, very little regard for my own sensibilities, that defended [the] indefensible statement, and that did so in a way that was often rude and mocking of people in the audience and in the viewing audience, was something very painful.

You take a lot of pride in your roots as a community organizer, in being not far removed from the sort of everyday American experience. And I'm sure you know as well as anyone that there's no bubble quite like the presidency; there's nothing that insulates you from the rest of us like the presidency. Do you think much about this? Do you worry at all about this?
Absolutely. I worry about it all the time. I benefit from the fact that Michelle and her family are very rooted, and almost prototypical Americans, and [from] my friends—like Marty Nesbitt and Eric Whitaker and Valerie [Jarrett], or my friend who I just saw in Oregon, Greg Orme, who was traveling with me, my friend from high school who now works as a contractor—[from the fact that] most of my good friends are not in politics and are not in the political world. I feel that they help me stay tuned in to what's going on with people. But I do worry about it. More than anything what I worry about is the fact that I now change the atmosphere in any room that I walk into, or any conversation that I enter into. That people are going to speak to me differently now than they might have five years ago, even people whom I'm close to. That is something I worry about. And how to prevent that is going to be one of the most important challenges of the presidency.

From "A Long Time Coming" by Evan Thomas and the staff of Newsweek. Excerpted by arrangement with PublicAffairs ( www.publicaffairsbooks.com ), a member of the Perseus Books Group. Copyright © 2009.

© 2009