When remarks made by Rev. Jeremiah Wright moved from YouTube to the boob tube back in March, Barack Obama’s religious beliefs came into question and took the sting. But what about John McCain’s religious beliefs? McCain is a long-time Episcopalian who now claims to be Baptist, despite having never been baptized in a Baptist church. Was a big hoopla ever made of this tidbit? No.

Sarah Palin was placed on the McCain ticket for a number of reasons, and surprisingly, the most important of them has nothing to do with lipstick. Or pitbulls. Or minivans. It’s the G-factor. She’s down with G-O-D. As previously discussed, however, Palin has a rather interesting affiliation with a curious and somewhat controversial congregation. Her religious history, a boon to the McCain campaign, is also a minefield of stories for the telling. But where is the media?

Reverend Jeremiah Wright is now a household name, thanks to the work of camera crews and newspapers and bloggers. But what about David Brickner, the “Jews for Jesus” leader who spoke at Palin’s Wasilla Bible Church and declared the ongoing persecution of the Jews to be the work of an angry God? That is, a God who wants the Jews to give it up and convert to Christianity, already.

Sarah Palin was in the audience the day Brickner gave his sermon, but claims that she simply showed up to church that day, unaware that “Jews for Jesus” would be there. Rick Ross, who serves on national committees regarding cults and missionaries for the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC), finds this hard to believe:

It is my experience that “Jews for Jesus” carefully plans and promotes every church program, and that the sponsoring churches often have a history of supporting and/or associating with ministries devoted to converting Jews.

Typically, “Jews for Jesus” plan their scheduled appearances long in advance and it is announced through church newsletters, bulletins and frequently a blurb appears within the local newspaper religion section calender of coming events.

We’ll never know for sure what Palin was up to that day, but the fact that she sat through Brickner’s anti-Semitic speech is telling in and of itself.

Brickner’s remarks didn’t go unnoticed by the media, but they certainly weren’t plastered across everyone’s forehead for the uptake and played on CNN’s spin cycle as were the rants of Reverend Wright several months ago.

So what gives?

Janelle Wong, an Associate Professor of Political Science and American Studies and Ethnicity at USC, attributes the discrepancy in coverage to the fact that Obama is at the top of the ticket, while Palin is not.

I can’t say that I agree with Wong because it seems that McCain gets more overshadowed by his running mate every day. The two “rock stars” in this race—the two who energize crowds at the drop of a speech — are Barack Obama and Sarah Palin. No doubt about it.

But Wong makes another interesting point:

[Obama's] black liberation theology seems to be much more threatening to the American public compared to Pentecostalism. This is not surprising, as Pentecostalism is much more widespread and Pentecostal adherents are not associated with a particular racial group. There are black and white Pentecostals.

Hmmm . . . could all the criticism surrounding Obama’s religious background be a proxy for the racial criticism we want to discuss so badly but can’t for fear of political incorrectness? Nicholas Kristof at the New York Times thinks so. And I think so too.

If it walks like a (white) duck, talks like a (white) duck, and calls itself a Christian—Americans are cool with it, regardless of what it may actually be. But if it walks like a (black) duck, talks like a (black) duck, and calls itself a Christian—we want more information.

And the media does a good job of giving us exactly what we want.

Tags: david brickner, jews for jesus, racism, Religion, rev. richard wright, sarah palin