Obama never shrank from making policy or pronouncements regarding abortion, nor did he take the logical, compassionate and humane default position, which is to say that since I don’t know whether this being is human, I’ll err on the side of caution.
It’s interesting to hear the euphemisms bandied about in campaigns. After Barack Obama’s and John McCain’s appearance a week ago at Saddleback Church, for instance, the former’s ardent supporters were as effusive in their praise as ever. His stammering and copious “uhs” weren’t signs of a befuddled and muddled mind, but of “thoughtfulness” and “nuanced” thinking.
Yeah, sure, and when President Bush occasionally invents a new word, we can chalk it up to creativity.
The truth is that, sans teleprompter and prepared speech and contrary to myth, Obama is at best a mediocre speaker. (If you say that we’re electing a president and not a professional orator, fair enough. But given that Bush’s wanting speaking skills have made him the butt of jokes and have been used to paint him as an idiot, I think it bears mention.) Yet neither this nor “thoughtfulness” explains his fumbling tongue. After all, politicians are people who are supposed to live and breathe issues and policy, so there should be few things they haven’t been asked about or at least pondered before. Thus, they should have oft-rendered, memorized, standard responses at the ready. For sure, John McCain did, despite his supposed status as a septuagenarian with senior moments. And if politicians don’t have them – neither sublime answers nor slick dodges – what does it tell us? Well, perhaps it means they haven’t put much thought into things at all. For if a person makes it a practice to think deeply about issues, he doesn’t have to think about them on stage. It’s the difference between preparation and improvisation.
Speaking of which, we might want to take note of how the Senator’s “thoughtfulness” and “nuanced” thinking were on full display at the Saddleback forum. I refer to his answer to event moderator Rick Warren’s question about when a developing being (dare I call him a child?) inside the womb becomes human. Obama’s response was:
Whether you are looking at it from a theological perspective or a scientific perspective, answering that question with specificity is, you know, above my pay grade.
While this dodge was delivered artfully, its conception cannot be thus characterized (perhaps it should have been aborted). For starters, a thoughtful person might understand that science and theology are simply different methods for uncovering Truth, the former using the scientific method and the latter reason and divine revelation. Thus, if each one is applied correctly using adequate “data,” they will arrive at the same answer to a given question.
As to theology, there is an incongruence between the supposed seriousness with which Obama takes his faith and the ignorance he pled in his answer. While I’m not sure what the black liberation theology that influenced the Senator teaches on Warren’s question (unless it’s that whites become human when they assent to reparations), traditional Christianity holds that life begins at conception. Moreover, correct me if I’m wrong, I don’t know this to be some esoteric point such as the “law of double effect.” It’s Sunday school 101.
Transitioning from the theological to purely logical, when would human life begin if not at conception? If, like Obama, you cannot provide specificity, it doesn’t matter. Just pick a month – any one you wish – my follow-up will always be the same. I’ll ask, what week of that month would it be? Then, what day of that week? What hour of that day? What minute of that hour, second of that minute and nanosecond of that second?
This places the matter in perspective. Is it really tenable to claim that one moment the baby isn’t human but the next he is so, unless the moment is that seminal one called conception? There is a reason why “conception” has a definition of “origination” or “beginning,” for it is the nascence of new life, human life. And if some say this life only becomes human at some later point, we need to ask not only when that critical juncture might be, but what definition of “human” would be congruent with such an assertion. After all, if certain physical qualities are necessary to attain such status, can it be lost if those qualities are lost? If your heart stops beating and you receive a mechanical one or head trauma causes a cessation of brain waves, do you cease to be human? To think so is to cease to be humane.
In a way, it is much like fire. Once you have the necessary elements – flammable materials and a spark – and there is ignition, a fire is born. It then will exist until it burns itself out and its life ends . . . or until it is snuffed out.
Whether or not you accept that reasoning, there is no denying that there are only two possible answers to Warren’s question: A, human life begins ____ , or, B, I don’t know. Obama’s answer was a more stylish version of the latter, and, generally speaking, a man deserves credit for admitting ignorance. Commentator Alan Colmes would certainly agree, as he recently said on Hannity & Colmes (I’m paraphrasing):
Obama may simply be saying that this is something for God to decide, not him.
While this at least shows that, unlike true Obamaniacs, Colmes hasn’t confused his political messiah with a divine one, he omits an important point.
God doesn’t make policy.
People such as Obama do.
Thus, no separation-of-church-and-state argument will fly here. Obama wasn’t being asked about his position on the Trinity or transubstantiation, but on a hot-button issue existing within a continual maelstrom of legislative battles. So if it is above his pay grade, I suggest that the presidency if not politics itself is also so.
Strangely, though, while Obama claimed that the question was above his pay grade, legislating in areas in which it must be answered never seemed to be. Why, he never shrank from making policy or pronouncements regarding abortion. He never said, “I’m, uh, sorry, but this issue is, uh, above my pay grade; I’ll have to withhold judgment and, uh, recuse myself from votes.” Nor did he take the logical, compassionate and humane default position, which is to say that since I don’t know whether this being is human, I’ll err on the side of caution. I won’t allow him to be killed. Instead, whenever Obama was called to weigh in, there was never any question as to where he stood: Shoulder to shoulder with the most radical elements of the pro-abortion lobby. And, as with them, we have to wonder not about when Obama believes human life begins, but whether he believes in the human right to life at all.
After all, in 1997 Obama voted “present” on two bills that would have prohibited partial-birth abortion (in the Illinois legislature, such a vote counts as a “no”). In the same vein, while a member of that body, he effectively blocked his state’s version of the Born Alive Infants Protection Act (BAIPA). This bill was proposed because some babies in Illinois who were meant to be aborted were born alive and then, unbelievably, were left to die in soiled store rooms. Now, to understand just how far off the rails Obama was on this issue, know that Senators Hillary Clinton, John Kerry and Ted Kennedy all supported the federal BAIPA, and even the radical NARAL Pro-Choice America went neutral on it.
So what are we to conclude from this? Is it that Obama isn’t sure if human life begins after birth, either? Perhaps, just as he once over-estimated the size of the U.S. and spoke of our “57 states,” he is under the impression there is a 4th trimester.
Yet, at the end of the day, a truly thoughtful voter will have no trouble interpreting Obama’s actions. It’s simple really: The Senator may not know when human life begins, but he sure knows that political life for a leftist Chicago politician ends when he fails to accede to blood sacrifice at the altar of the pro-abortion Baal. So I suspect that Obama has never actually put much thought into the nascence of human life for a simple reason.
He doesn’t really care.
To him, life – human or otherwise, born or unborn – all melts into political calculation. This is why he could render the poorly conceived “pay grade” answer. It bespoke of a complete lack of seriousness and understanding of the gravity of the issue. It was immature, flippant and disrespectful to the voter, the “I tried it but I didn’t inhale” response of the abortion debate.
Speaking of inhaling, before casting a vote for Obama, a deep breath and a 10 count may be in order. Because whatever his pay grade is, I’m quite sure that we cannot afford to have him in the White House.
SD@SelwynDuke.com
http://www.SelwynDuke.com
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Wow! That was very good.
I've heard the 57 states thing mentioned several times, but not directly from Obama. So, I went to YouTube and Snopes to see the video. I confirmed that he not only said it, but he can't add. He says "I’ve now been in 57 states. I think one to go. One left to go. Alaska and Hawaii.”
So my question is: Does that make it 58 (57 plus one left to go) or 59 (57+2)? I guess it’s “above his pay grade”
Comment by Ivan Ivanovich | August 28, 2008
57 States…I wonder how many Electoral votes that is? 19,972?
Comment by Last Angry Man | August 28, 2008
When Obama answered Rick Warren on the three most important people he would consult in a crisis and he answered his wife, and his mother as the first two , enough for me, he doesn't deserve a pay grade!
Comment by jcscuba | August 28, 2008
"Obama may simply be saying that this is something for God to decide, not him."
What a supreme waffle that was. Obama takes it on himself to determine that an infant not successfully aborted (and thus alive by any meaning of the word) is not actually alive. Yet here, when skewered in a public forum, he loses the ability to make the same determination?
This guy's position(s) are rather like trying to catch a handful of fog. Lotsa luck.
Comment by Last Angry Man | August 29, 2008
"To him, life – human or otherwise, born or unborn – all melts into political calculation."
Well, how very pot-kettle. It's the same with just about all of the political parties, the "right" "conservative" ones included. When someone advocates a policy decision be made in which all abortions would be illegal, that is basically forcing their beliefs on everyone. I disagree with that view no matter who is making it.
It's really too bad that the current republican platform incorporates so many religious views as part of its promise-making. Talk about going backwards…
Comment by AMAI | August 30, 2008
"When someone advocates a policy decision be made in which all abortions would be illegal, that is basically forcing their beliefs on everyone."
Substitute "X" for "all abortions", where X could be any "policy decision" [prohibiting insider trading, making it illegal to throw trash out a car window, making the poll tax illegal, etc.] Now read the sentence again.
According to this logic, by proposing that it is illegal to throw trash out your window, etc. you are "forcing your beliefs on everyone".
This is why the hyperbolic Left cannot be taken seriously. There is a difference between advocating a policy (like an end to abortion), and (a) bringing that policy into being through the legislative process (where it belongs) or (b) bringing it about through an appointment to the Supreme Court (where it was hijacked), and saying — as AMAI did — that an "advocated" policy you disagree with means that policy is "forced" on you.
The Left wants to criminalize thought. The Right wants to criminalize behavior through the legislative process (which requires public consent). Where the legislative process is hijacked, we’ll make the correct SCOTUS appointments (again secured through the proper legislative/consent process).
When we win by playing by the established ruses, the Left defines this as fascism. When they win by hijacking the legislative process and having the courts impose a decision (which we’re forbidden to change by changing the Courts through elections and the legislative process), the Left defines this as fairness.
Comment by Phillip Ellis Jackson | August 30, 2008
"ruses" is "rules"
Comment by Phillip Ellis Jackson | August 30, 2008
AMAI,
You are misstating the conservative position on abortion. Yes, many (though not all of us) are against abortion; and some would go so far they would outlaw it top-down no differently than liberals have protected it top-down. However, the conservative position is fundamentally about how the issue is determined; whether it is the prerogative of the people enacted through elected representatives or the prerogative of nine men in robes to determine. The conservative principle would throw out Roe v. Wade so that we would return to where the country was in 1973, neither all pro-abortion nor all pro-life. Rather, at that time, it was left to each state to determine through their elected representatives. Several states already had strong abortion statutes, and many had special circumstance (rape, survival of the mother, &c) provisions in their laws. Women determined to have an abortion at that time, could cross state lines to get one; refuting the contention they were trapped. The trend was increasingly to allow abortion with more states passing provisions allowing doctors to perform abortion. But that wasn't good enough for the pro-abortion forces, who wanted it all and were willing to trash the Constitution to make it happen faster and to eliminate any and all barriers.
Were Roe thrown out today, we would not automatically revert to 1973, because every state in the union has since enacted abortion-right provisions; and each of these would also have to be overturned. That is unlikely to happen in more than a handful of states and may take a generation or two to sort out. If I were to guess, I'd say the country would eventually become 70-80% abortion legal, but without federal pressure it would no longer be 'abortion on demand' and, perhaps, no longer taxpayer-funded except in extreme cases (e.g., rape, illness, extreme-poverty). A handful of states where strong anti-abortion sentiments dominate may restrict abortion to rape and survival. Women would still have the choice, it just wouldn't be a federal freebie nor an unassailable right.
Comment by Bob Stapler | August 30, 2008
Bob: Exactly right. Overturning Roe V. Wade simply returns the issue to the 50 state legislatures to decide individually through the legislative process.
I doubt seriously that all 50 states would outlaw abortion, although I think 80-90% might. California, Massachusettes, NY to name three probably won't.
Even bad laws made properly must be respected unless and until the public can be educated sufficiently to overturn them. The only entity "imposing/forcing" its will on the people is the Liberal Court.
Comment by Phillip Ellis Jackson | August 30, 2008
Yea, he was in 47 states and got the number wrong. WOW, is that really all you got.
Phillip, you never cease to amaze me. 80-90% of states would outlaw abortion.. that is one of the (if not the) most out of touch statement i have seen from you. and there is an entire library of moronic quotes from you to choose from. HILLARIOUS. sure shows how out of touch the GOP lemming foot soldiers are.
Comment by Taguba | August 31, 2008
For those of you unfamiliar with Taguba, who was the SUBJECT of SOME OF my OBSERVATIONS in “Has the Left Become Completely Deranged?”, his comments contain a lot of CAPITALIZED WORDS and multiple exclamation points to show that the author of these remarks is a SERIOUS GUY!!!! But he can’t understand why all the guys won’t take him seriously when he tries to “debate”.
See below for a few additional pearls of wisdom from his comments after I submitted my article on why Obama won’t win the 2008 election:
*** Tag: ”is the pope "gullible" ?? he believes in Global Warming and that we should be good stewards of Gods creation. You and your ilk can keep pizzing on it, if you like, i choose to help the POPE. … You can find your big oil paid weather men and faux news paid "climate shills" to claim different, but the scientific communtiy says otherwise. So does that LIAR (as you call him) the Pope.”
Translation: The pope … I mean POPE … must be accepted as a scientific authority on the matter of global warming, or else you’re calling him a LIAR (no hyperbole here!!). However, when it comes to defining human life at the moment of conception and therefore abortion as murder, well, reasonable people can certainly disagree because, after all, the POPE is no scientific authority.
*** Tag: “ALL the peer reviewed studies on climate change Agree that People DO CONTRIBUTE to it. Not half or three quarters of all peer reviewed studies, ALL OF THEM. 100% agree.”
Translation: Taguba said ALL OF THEM (he even capitalized the words to show he's serious — SERIOUSLY!!) ALL OF THEM agree 100%. EVERY peer reviewed article, EVERY ONE!! NO EXCEPTIONS!! And yet some of us may still doubt the piercing analysis and evidence he’s offered?? This is SERIOUS!! SERIOUSLY!! What would the POPE say now that you’ve called him a LIAR?? What?? You didn’t read his peer-reviewed article?? SERIOUSLY!!
*** Tag: “People DO CONTRIBUTE to [global warming]. … Do you really think all the factories, all the cars, all the ships, trains, and trucks ont he planet dont contribute ?? seriously ??”
Translation. This is really serious. Just try not to think about the fact that "cause" and "contribute to" are two different concepts. People contribute to lots of things without necessarily "causing" something, or even being the primary contributor. One good Mexican meal won't hold a candle to your average bovine flatulence, in terms of carbon-based natural methane production. And you don’t even need a 100% peer reviewed article to understand this. Well, most of us understand this, anyway. Only a complete idiot could view something like cyclical climate change from the perspective where people are the constant, and nature is the independent variable, when looking at the notion of causality. Seriously!!
If none of this fails to convince you of the wisdom of tagboy’s analysis, then he has only one thing left for. You’re nothing but a “douchbag stinking retarded vermin with a nose full of coke,” or something like that (see “Why John Edwards’ Affair Matters”). And he says this because he’s SERIOUS. Really!! SERIOUSLY!
There are more tag-isms just as funny, and just as sad, but you get the idea.
Don't waste any time treating him seriously.
Doh!!
Comment by Phillip Ellis Jackson | August 31, 2008
You’re nothing but a “douchbag stinking retarded vermin with a nose full of coke…”
Yeah, I hate it when that happens.
Comment by Last Angry Man | September 1, 2008