Barack Obama is in a serious bind, but it’s not because he has a "pastor problem." Obama’s problem is that he’s up against religous bigotry, racism and militarism in America, worsened by a corrupt media. But it’s not just his problem; it’s our problem. Bigorty, racism, militarism and media corruption are strangling America, and we have to find a way to beat them.

As best I can tell, Obama has concluded that the only way he can both win the nomination and govern with a sufficient mandate to move the country forward is to seek unity by asking Americans to rise above their own history of biases and hatred. Rather than trying to be a black President focused on the evils of racism, he’s asking Americans to rise above the issues that divide them and that have prevented the country from moving forward. He apparently believes that our nation must simply let go of the anger that has torn the country apart and made it essentially ungovernable.

What this tells us it that it is the redemption and forgiveness messages that Obama has embraced from his Christian pastor, not the anger he’s now found it necessary to renounce. Here is how Obama explained it in a speech in Indiana this weekend, referring to Bobby Kennedy’s speech after Martin Luther King’s assasination:

I think about those words often, especially in the last several weeks – because this campaign started on the basis that we are one America. As I said in my speech at the convention in 2004, there is no black America, or white America, or Asian America, or Latino America. There is the United States of America.

But I noticed over the last several weeks that the forces of division have started to raise their ugly heads again. And I’m not here to cast blame or point fingers because everybody, you know, senses that there’s been this shift…

We’ve got a lot of pent-up anger and bitterness and misunderstanding. But what I continue to believe in is that this country wants to move beyond these kinds of divisions. That this country wants something different. . . .

I just want to say to everybody here that as somebody who was born into a diverse family, as somebody who has little pieces of America all in me, I will not allow us to lose this moment, where we cannot forget about our past and not ignore the very real forces of racial inequality and gender inequality and the other things that divide us.

We have to come together. That’s what this campaign is about. That’s why you are here. That’s why we’re going to win this election. That’s how we’re going to change the country.

It may be a brilliant strategy or hopelessly naive assessment of American politics. It works for some — his success shows that — but not for others. It is not a message likely to appeal to those who want accountability for past crimes, let alone retribution. And as Jane observed in this post yesterday, it’s also about how Obama views America compared to how those in another generation would view it. It is not about getting even. It’s about moving on and moving ahead.

I don’t know whether his strategy can work; much of what ails American politics is working against it. But it explains why he might have concluded he had to distance himself from his pastor, even if he recognizes the validity of much of what his preacher is saying. Aside from the "inflammatory rhetoric," Obama could believe that Wright is essentially correct in his critique of America, but Obama has to say, "let go, come together, because that is the only way out of this cesspool."

So I come back to a question I’ve raised before. Obama has said he not only wants to end the war in Iraq but also wants to "end the mindset that got us into this war." I hear that, but I want to know how it translates and squares with Obama’s renunciation of Pastor Wright’s statements. Putting aside views about what constitutes "inflammatory rhetoric," in essence, I hear the Pastor saying, "Jesus and the Christian God would condemn the militarism, indifference to the plight of others, America’s own militarism and the religious bigotry that helped lead America into an unjust war in Iraq." How does Senator Obama, then "end the mindset" but reject that underlying message?

And by the way, I think Senator Clinton should answer the same question, because if the media succeeds in destroying Obama’s campaign, as they appear intent on doing, she’ll be stuck with the same dilemma.