"I knew him and know him as somebody in my church who talked to me about Jesus and family and friendships."

Barack Obama uses the roiling Jeremiah Wright controversy to present himself to us as utterly ordinary (and completely Christian).

And — as if it's your problem if you're hung up on Wright — he demands that we transcend race altogether:

"We have to come together," he told a town-hall meeting at a high school....

"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," Obama said.

"It reminds me: We've got a tragic history when it comes to race in this country. We've got a lot of pent-up anger and bitterness and misunderstanding. ... This country wants to move beyond these kinds of things."

Criticize me and you are part of the forces of division. You're the one with the anger and bitterness and misunderstanding if you dwell on Wright's fomenting anger and bitterness and misunderstanding.