There goes that historic, transcendent, life-changing, not since the Gettysburg Address, “I have a dream,” must-be-taught-in-every-school race speech. It didn’t hold up three months, let alone the time it would take to print up new textbooks.

The charitable explanation: Barack has belatedly discovered that no one person or church symbolizes “The Black Community.” Not a pastor, an athlete, singer, dancer, or blues man. We should be judged on the, dare I say it, content of our character.

The less-charitable explanation (which, ironically, his defenders will rush to offer) is that he’s preempting the unfair attacks that will bombard him from the right once the general is underway. The unenlightened public cannot be expected to understand the complexity of “The Black Church” which Trinity exemplifies. He must clear the path of unfair “distractions” that his affiliation with Trinity raises. In other words, he’s dumping his church of twenty years so that he can be president. He’s a politician and that’s what politicians do. Why should he be held to a higher standard? Right? Wright?