A reader observes:
The point has been made before, but we need a reminder. Obama did not have a strong model of masculinity, a father figure to know intimately and revere, in his earliest years. He yearned desperately for it; somehow, finding the patriarch would make him whole and normal in a way he thought others felt.
So he found Wright a few decades ago. But he's flying blind. If we're lucky enough, and our fathers live long enough, we can see them for the humans they are. We don't love them less, but in the process of maturing we begin to grow independent by seeing them with new eyes. We separate, and in doing so, enter a new ambivalence about what the father-son role means as it transforms. We might be watching a limnal process for Obama in real-time here. The sad thing is that (and I believe Obama is sincere) I don't think any of us could know the inner turmoil this causing Obama. Sometimes its easy to forget how privileged those of us who know well the father-son dynamic are; its just too easy to yell "throw Wright under the bus." Obama is human, too.