Posted March 21 2008 – It looks like the Rev. Jeremiah Wright has rubbed elbows with President Bill Clinton.   A Web site wanting to set the record straight about their beloved pastor has posted a picture from Wright’s 1998 White House visit. 

<

By Pamela Gentry, Senior Political Producer

Posted March 21, 2008 – Sen. Barack Obama’s (D-Ill.) speech on race must have hit the mark, it was the most popular video on the internet and folks apparently liked what they heard, but it’s unlikely that story will get much press today. That’s because the Obama campaign was slammed with a bombshell last night that shook the national airwaves. The State Department announced that the Illinois senator’s very private passport file had been accessed at least three times over the past three months by a contract employee.   The first breach, on Jan. 8, was shortly after Obama defeated Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) in the Iowa caucus.  The second time somebody tapped his file was on Feb. 21; it was accessed again on March 14.

“This is an outrageous breach of security and privacy, Bill Burton, spokesman for Obama said.  “We demand to know who opened Sen. Obama’s file,” he said.  For now a senior State Department official will only say the “curious” officials opened the file but there was no political or malicious intent.

Obama learned of this latest infraction while on the campaign trail in West Virginia.  This isn’t the first time a passport file of a presidential candidate has been peeked at.  In 1991 the then-Gov. Bill Clinton’s passport file was compromised while he waged a campaign for the White House against President George H. Bush. 

Before the passport problem was discovered, the popular YouTube Web site reported the Obama speech on race in America had been clicked 1.6 million times.  The speech, which lasted close to 40 minutes, was greatly anticipated to see how Obama would handle the controversy surrounding his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. 

Wright, who is now retired, made news last week when clips from a 2001 sermon showed him saying, “God damn American” in reference to the United States policies he linked to the Sept. 11 bombings.
This latest development may get the attention of the FBI, and Obama’s folks may call for an independent investigation into the numerous breaches, understandable since security issues have been a high priority and the junior senator from Illinois was given Secret Service protection just months into his presidential campaign.