Many of us don't know much about Rev. Jeremiah Wright. We've heard the Bill O'Reilly soundbites. We've seen his 40-year legacy reduced to him being incorrectly labeled a "hater" on Barack Obama during the 2008 presidential election. As educated Americans, I encourage us to move beyond the nonsense and make a serious attempt to understand the complexity and impact of Wright's socio-political contribution. It's time that we all get the facts straight.

Wright is the son of Dr. Mary Henderson Wright, a woman who earned her master's degree from the University of Chicago at the age of 19. For a black woman to achieve such a thing in the 1930s was simply astonishing. His father, Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright Sr., has an equally impressive set of credentials. An educationally empowered home life, mixed with a passion for doing God's work, was the fuel for highly intellectual, fearless social activism that served as the foundation of Wright's long career in public service.

He is fluent in several languages and has four earned degrees. His church, the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, has long been one of the leading churches in the city, attracting a broad audience of progressive African Americans, including Oprah Winfrey and Barack Obama. The interesting right-wing accusation that he is "unAmerican" is conflicted by the fact that, unlike some of his most prominent critics, Wright has actually served in the military. I seriously doubt that Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh or Bill O'Reilly would be willing to risk their lives to support the views that they profess on the radio. The truth is that they are far more damaging to our great nation than Pastor Wright ever could be. To use hip-hop vernacular, Limbaugh, Hannity and O'Reilly are "studio gangsters" - men who sit behind a microphone and talk a big game but are far too cowardly to ever back it up.

To read Dr. Jeremiah Wright's bio in more detail, please click here. I encourage you to also listen to his sermons and read more about this man's astonishing legacy.

Barack Obama is a great man, but Wright goes pound for pound with the president when it comes to the scale of his social contributions. Wright was fighting against apartheid long before it was popular to do so. He has created ministries for HIV/AIDS and incarcerated Americans, established housing for senior citizens and helped poor children get tutoring after school. The United Nations has issued reports on American racism that agree with the positions of Dr. Wright, but unlike President Obama, he is willing to address these issues in public. While I cannot in one paragraph do justice to all of Dr. Wright's contributions, it is quite clear that this man was fighting for black people when Barack Obama was still in diapers. This does not disparage the growing legacy of President Obama, but one must make sure that we don't throw away all of our freedom fighters just because we have a president with black skin. As I mentioned in a separate article, racism forces us to choose between our leaders. The truth is that we don't have to choose between Barack and Jeremiah; we can support them both.

When it comes to Jeremiah Wright, the bottom line is this: Dr. Wright, in my opinion, is a living example of the old saying, "What would Jesus do?" Pastor Wright fights for the poor. He speaks truth to power. He allows his life to be guided by principles that transcend the warped incentives created by the pressures of man. While I am not one to say that Wright is perfect, the truth is that none of us are. But one thing we CANNOT do as people of color is to allow this man's empowered and productive legacy to be destroyed by one media incident and one presidential election. The world needs a Barack Obama. We also need a Jeremiah Wright to help keep President Obama honest.

I had a conversation with Karen Wallace, a prominent Chicago attorney who is very close to Rev. Wright. She also knows President Obama quite well and has been a member of Trinity United for several years. Karen and I were able to separate the truth from the madness, to ensure that America is able to get a clear picture of the legacy of Dr. Jeremiah Wright. The audio from that conversation is presented below.

Dr Boyce Watkins is a finance professor at Syracuse University. For more information, visit www.BoyceWatkins.com. To get his commentary sent directly to your inbox, click here.