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Obama-rama

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A friend who noticed I signed on to the “Nobama, Nope” group on Facebook just wrote me to ask this:

I know he’s really liberal on abortion, but is he all bad?”

For the purposes of a pro-life blog–Obama ain’t all that. I think anyone could understand that. But here’s what I told my friend.

Obama, Obama. I realized something today. He himself doesn’t bother me. He’s a liberal politician. I can deal with that. The media double standard bothers me a whole heck of a lot. They absolutely fawn over him. And then go back to a pretense of being really critical thinkers–above the fray.

I don’t like wealth distribution. I don’t like Obama’s naivete on conflict in the Middle East (Let’s talk it out!) I don’t like remarks about how he’d love to visit the President of Canada. I don’t think he is solid on trade. He said he’ll raise taxes for small business owners. I don’t like his association with Ayers. Finally, on my biggest issue, abortion, he is MORE pro-abortion than Planned Parenthood.

The only positive thing I can say is that he represents in particular to so many African Americans a hope that they too can prosper. And that is positive, even if it is only a representation. Appearances are sometimes more important than reality in politics, so if he appears to offer hope, he may in fact do it. And I’d be glad for that.

Abortion is a litmus test for me. He lost me on the “above my pay grade” answer to when life begins. It was the height of disrespect to the millions of Americans for whom this is situation critical and showed that beyond the talking points he got from the Abortion Rights Action League–he has never actually thought about the issue.”

So not ALL bad, no.

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Brigitte adds: Re media bias – he better not do anything they dislike. They’ll turn on him faster than you can say “double standard”.

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Tanya seconds Brigitte: I think he definitely allowed them to raise the bar too high for the sake of winning the presidency, but now they sort of own him. A bit of a pickle, I’d say.

If Spiderman is still available…

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Those who write in from time to time suggesting a focus on defining marriage makes me into a fundamentalist? You are right. I concede defeat. Move along–there’s nothing to see here.

I am no longer interested in three dimensions. I would even like to become a resident of the two-dimensional world,” he wrote. “However, that seems impossible with present-day technology. Therefore, at the very least, would it be possible to legally authorise marriage with a two-dimensional character?“

Never again?

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It’s Holocaust Education Week. Two good articles. From The Star :

In what he deemed a perversion of the Hippocratic Oath by which doctors pledge to put the health of their patients’ first, doctors in Nazi Germany believed they were caring for the health of the nation – even mankind – by taking part in the Holocaust.

and the National Post:

But it is particularly important for physicians to be aware of how easy it is to be socialized toward evil, toward becoming willing participants in a process of destruction.

I’ll let readers come to their own conclusions on what lessons to glean from these citations.

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Tanya sees many parallels like this since yesterday. I can’t even count how many times I’ve heard that 100 years ago in the US, a black man wasn’t even recognized as a person.

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Rebecca adds: The very first group slated for death in Nazi Germany were the chronically ill and the disabled, under the T-4 programme, after the address of the hospital where the killing were first carried out. The doctors who did the deed sincerely believed that they were ending intolerable suffering for incurable patients, who were otherwise condemned to “life not worth living,” and that by euthanising the sickest patients, they were freeing up scarce resources in an overburdened healthcare system. Any Canadian who doesn’t feel a slight chill down his spine at that hasn’t been paying much attention lately.

A providential Sunday afternoon

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Yesterday afternoon I went to work. Yes, that’s too bad. But if I had not gone to work, I would not have been in downtown Ottawa. And when the reminder (bing!) of the conclusion of 40 Days of Life came up, I might have said–it’s too far away, I’m not going.

I might not have met, then, with about one thousand others, standing silently in the cold night with candles outside the Bank Street abortion clinic at six pm last night.

The long procession wound it’s way in complete silence to St. Pat’s church on Kent. There will be no room for wondering about how many came, because the church was full. So however many people fit into St. Pat’s–that’s how many came out to stand up for an end to abortion at the Bank Street clinic, in Ottawa, in Canada.

There’s a strength and a peace in silent protest, in the unity of people, young, old, families–shuffling forward. And the Mass inside the church was beautiful–guitar music and singing, a call for humility, for continued prayers to end abortion, and a welcome for all who are not Catholic. (Speaking as one of those, I did feel welcome.)

This was an encouraging event. (Interesting, as a small aside, was the man wearing a large Barack Obama t-shirt, with a cross around his neck, too. I think he was making some sort of point.)

And the point of my story, is, of course, that we should all work on Sundays. Ok, not really. My point is that we should, at least in small moments, feel hopeful because an end to abortion is possible.

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Andrea updates: Fair report of the event, here.

A change in our attitudes toward disability

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This story from the UK highlights how a woman felt after she aborted her first pregnancy, because of a diagnosis of Trisomy 13. She regrets her actions, and I’m sorry about that, and I do feel for her. But of equal interest to me is the societal implications–where I believe she is correct:

But the real issue is that ordinary society has changed in its attitude towards disability. After all, antenatal testing (and its consequences) is now so commonplace and standardised that when it was revealed last month that a new blood test has been developed to detect Down’s syndrome – the most common form of trisomy- the news was greeted with seemingly universal delight.

I often am forced to convince on this point: Why would a private decision–abortion–affect anyone else?

It does–it changes the community we live in, visually, because we see fewer different people. It changes our attitudes all told toward pregnancy, too, not just disability. (But that fundamental change has already occurred.)

Knock me over with a feather

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I really like Licia Corbella. And I’m not going to stop liking her. But I heartily disagree with this column, slamming McCain mainly because of his choice of Palin for running mate.

It is more than that, though, she likes Obama’s rhetoric:

But it’s not just McCain’s negatives that lead to an endorsement of Obama. If the pen really is mightier than the sword, then how and what a leader says is of great importance in a world filled with bloodthirsty, warmongering men. Obama’s pen isn’t just mightier than a sword, it is a howitzer to the heart.

Critics of Obama keep saying his words are indeed beautifully delivered, but when they are dissected, they don’t say much. What is it, I am asked, besides his words that makes me think he deserves to hold the most trying and important public office in the world? Well, what else does any other politician offer, but words? Problems and ideas have to be articulated before they can be solved or brought to life.

So when it comes right down to it, Licia likes Obama’s proposed policies, as much as she dislikes Palin. Which makes her reason for hoping Obama wins twofold, actually. Is it really about Palin, or just support for Obama? Which would be fine, if still surprising to me, from her.

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Rebecca adds: I just don’t understand the dislike so many conservatives seem to feel for Palin. She’s not highly polished, nor at the very top of her game in foreign policy, but until two months ago it wasn’t her job to be – she’d probably be remiss as governor of Alaska if she’d spent her time studying counterinsurgency and guerilla warfare and diplomacy. If she’d been grooming herself for the job for decades she’d know it, but I see it as a plus that she hasn’t been.

She’s 44, has 5 kids, is a governor, seems to have a happy marriage, lives her values, and has an approval rating of 80% in Alaska, which is always impressive, I don’t care how small the state is. (Not many Canadian premiers are that popular.) Why aren’t more people, but especially women, admiring of that, even if they don’t agree with her completely on policy?

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Andrea found another naysayer: Mark Milke writes here about all the bad choices, but starts with Palin, this also at the Calgary Herald.  I like his concluding assessment, however, because lets face it, love her or hate her, Palin ain’t running for President. So Milke rightly concludes with an assessment of Obama:

Similar to Carter, Obama thinks differences between nations are often about misunderstandings. The remedy for that is communication. But the divide between nations is more often about differences in real interests. Such interests can occasionally be bridged (Carter, in one of his rare successes, brokered the Israeli-Egypt peace accord) but not without first recognizing what is at the core of disputes.

This is why French president Nicholas Sarkozsky has been privately critical of Obama on Iran. The Israelis leaked Sarkozsky’s musings and they’re not positive: the French president apparently views the Democratic candidate’s stance on Iran as “utterly immature” and sees Obama’s rhetoric as “empty of all content.” Sarkozsky is worried that once in power, Obama might break the united front on Iran which now exists among the UN’s five Security Council members by starting an Iran-America dialogue without preconditions.

If Obama believes international differences are more ephemeral than real, then he and the world are in for a rude shock when the realities of different interests are again made obvious. The Democratic Party’s protectionist bent combined with Obama’s foreign affairs naïveté has ramifications for Canada, and for the current sweet hope many Canadians have for the Obama presidency.

The few words I bolded remain my gravest concern about Barack Obama–yes, on par with his views on life. Because you can’t resolve global problems if you don’t understand what they are. That’s where hypocrisy has taken hold, largely in the media. Because a woman who is not running for President is being torn to shreds for a naivete that will in two days be the norm in the White House.

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Rebecca adds: Mr. Crittenden chimes in, and largely gets it right:

As readers of this space know, I have been very critical of the selection of Sarah Palin. Yet I do not regard her as a reason to cast aside the principles of my life on voting day. She may not bring much knowledge to this ticket. Yet she is obviously no fool. Indeed, using the favored metric of Joe Biden (”I think I have a higher IQ than you”), my guess is that she would probably outscore the Democratic vice presidential candidate on a standardized aptitude test. To his credit, Biden has conscientiously worked to familiarize himself with the great questions of national policy. To her discredit, Palin has not. But on Tuesday, I will trust that she can learn. She has governed a state – and she did risk her career by defying the corrupt leaders of the Alaska Republican party.”

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Andrea chortles: “Mr. Crittenden.” Good one.  (Readers should be aware if they aren’t already that David Frum and Danielle Crittenden are married.)

Prop 8

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Californians will be voting on Proposition 8, come election day. This confirms that marriage is between a man and a woman, after California’s courts recently struck down Proposition 22–where 60 per cent of Californians affirmed that marriage is between a man and a woman back in 2000. I highlight this because it’s interesting–California is not a conservative state. And yet not eight years ago, they affirmed opposite sex marriage. (Homophobes, all of them? The whole state? I think not.)

Anyway, people like Jennifer Roback Morse have been working hard on this issue. And my colleague and I (for the day job) wrote this a while back. Marriage–it’s complicated–but in the end, that’s good. (ie. It was never so simplistic as to say “hey–what does someone else’s marriage have to do with me?” which seems pretty consistently to be the argument of those in favour of same sex marriage.)

And the special animus reward goes to…Sarah Palin

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Most interesting in this column is the small comparison toward the end between Sarah Palin and Nancy Pelosi of “the Catholic Church isn’t sure when life begins” fame. (She can, of course, believe whatever she wants, however ill informed. To claim the Catholic Church isn’t sure, however… might leave many a pro-choicer confused: Call back the hounds! They’re ON OUR SIDE!)

The contrast with Nancy Pelosi, another mother of five, is instructive. The first woman Speaker of the House, she holds a position more powerful than the vice-presidency. By all accounts, she is no great thinker and a woman of modest accomplishment. Yet she comes from the ruling class — her father was a congressman, her brother a mayor and her husband fabulously wealthy. She belongs. Governor Palin — a newcomer to political office who married a blue collar man and went to university in Idaho — does not. The difference in how they have been treated is instructive.

Instructive, yes.

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