Obama Denounces Wright...

... a little more forcefully this time.

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – For the second day in a row, Senator Barack Obama sought to distance himself from the remarks made by his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., and forcefully denounced the incendiary comments he feared would provide “comfort to those who prey on hate.”

“I’m outraged by the comments that were made and saddened over the spectacle that we saw yesterday,” Mr. Obama said, speaking to reporters here today. He added, “I find these comments appalling. It contradicts everything that I’m about and who I am.”

Seeking to quell the political damage the controversy is dealing to his campaign, Mr. Obama called a press conference after a town meeting here this afternoon to raise the volume of his criticism of his former pastor. In his speech on race last month in Philadelphia, where he tried to put the matter behind him, Mr. Obama said he gave Mr. Wright the benefit of the doubt. But after watching three days of Mr. Wright’s commentary in televised speeches and interviews, Mr. Obama said, “there are no excuses.”

“They offend me, they rightly offend all Americans and they should be denounced,” he said. “That’s what I am doing very clearly and unequivocally here today.”

I was having a debate with a family member about this issue yesterday. He felt I was siding with the spin of the media on the Wright issue and that Wright had said nothing wrong. But the difference here is, that Wright made appearances and comments over the weekend in direct contradiction to Obama's defense of Wright with the speech in Philadelphia last month.

For Wright to say that Obama did not denounce his comments and infer that Obama said what he said because he's a politician, basically calling him a liar - wink, wink - was the equivalent of throwing Obama under the bus. And what made things worse, in my opinion, was the arrogance with which Wright made his statements.