Democrat Barack Obama said on Saturday he had quit his long-time Chicago church after months of controversy over racially laced pulpit rhetoric that still threatens to tarnish his White House hopes. The Illinois senator said he and his wife, Michelle, were withdrawing from the 8 000-strong congregation of the Trinity United Church of Christ.
Barack Obama’s campaign on Friday tried to contain a new ”pastor disaster” prompted by a video of a Catholic guest preacher at his Chicago church mocking Hillary Clinton’s tears.In a sermon last Sunday, Father Michael Pfleger, a long-time ally of Obama, accused Clinton and white voters of believing she deserved to be president because she is white.
He has been a near-constant presence at hundreds of Barack Obama rallies across the United States over the past 15 months. David Axelrod, a melancholy, dishevelled figure with a drooping moustache, is Obama’s campaign strategist, and has overseen his rise from political obscurity to the verge of the White House.
Danica Patrick endured sexist remarks and disappointment through 49 starts without a victory over more than three years in the male-dominated world of IndyCar racing. But the 26-year-old American kept her poise and that’s why the lady is now a champion, becoming the first woman in a century of open-wheel racing to win an event.
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/ 6 February 2008
Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama will have no time to pause after yesterday’s Super Tuesday performances before they head off into a fresh 72-hour marathon of coast-to-coast contests. Seven states are at stake, worth 467 delegates, almost a quarter of the 2 025 delegates needed for eventual victory.
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/ 24 December 2007
A heavy snowstorm pelted the American Midwest, causing deadly road accidents and power failures and grounding flights for Christmas holiday travellers, United States media reported on Monday. The storm left at least 11 dead in car crashes across the central US over the weekend, local papers said.
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/ 27 November 2007
The wife of American adventurer Steve Fossett has asked a court to declare him legally dead, nearly three months after his small plane vanished over the Nevada wilderness, a newspaper reported on Tuesday. Peggy Fossett filed a court petition in Cook County, Illinois, on Monday asking that the millionaire aviator’s assets be distributed according to his will.
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/ 23 October 2007
Turkey reassured Iraq on Tuesday that it wants a diplomatic solution to the problem of Kurdish rebel rear-bases but rejected a conditional ceasefire offer made by the guerrillas. ”Politics, dialogue, diplomacy, culture and economy are the measures to deal with this crisis,” Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan told a news conference in Baghdad.
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/ 23 October 2007
The United States is considering air strikes against Kurdish PKK rebels operating in northern Iraq in an attempt to head off a Turkish incursion, the Chicago Tribune reported on Tuesday. US President George Bush told Turkish President Abdullah Gul that US officials were seriously looking into options beyond diplomacy.
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/ 24 September 2007
The United States Episcopal Church is in the middle of a debate that could end with its departure from the Worldwide Anglican Communion over disagreements about gay clergy and same-sex unions. The conflict was prompted when the US church consecrated Gene Robinson as the first bishop in an openly gay relationship.