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A leading conservative reflects on Saddleback and makes the life-affirming case for Obama

Writes Frank Schaeffer, "Who will help us to become a nation that values life -- abortion rhetoric aside? Obama. The contrast could not have been more clear than on August 16 in the interview between pastor Rick Warren of the Saddleback Church and Obama and McCain. Obama gave real and thoughtful answers, often trying to explore a moral question deeply. McCain offered nothing more than canned applause lines and anecdotes from his tired simplistic stump speech." more »

McCain contemplates VP choice with conciliatory position on abortion

Speaking about abortion, Sen McCain said, "Americans want us to work together. You know, Tom Ridge is one of the great leaders and he happens to be pro-choice. And I don't think that that would necessarily rule Tom Ridge out." more »

Democratic Platform asks voters: reduce abortions under Obama, or just rail against them (guess who)

At the Saddleback forum, Obama took credit for pushing platform changes indicating that the nation's goal should be to reduce the number of abortions. He reminded the audience that he supported limits on late-term abortion, and added, "Are there ways that we can work together to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies?" more »

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Please Read: US Catholic Bishops' "Faithful Citizenship"

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Catholics across America are standing up to policies and practices of a second Bush Administration that profoundly violate Catholic ethics. Click to expand »

Catholics across America are standing up to policies and practices of a second Bush Administration that profoundly violate Catholic ethics. Click to hide »

Mr Bush vetoed Democratic abortion reduction legislation in October 2007, along with the Health & Human Services appropriation bill. There was no comment from any of the national anti-abortion groups. Meanwhile, new CDC abortion statistics were released by the Bush Administration in the dark of night over the Thanksgiving holiday last fall, as is their custom, on the slowest news day of the year. This secretiveness offers perhaps the best evidence that the Administration was fearful of the public knowing how little progress had been made on their watch with regard to abortion. The newest CDC statistics released 11/23/07 showed an increase in the abortion rate, from 15/1000 women to 16/1000 compared to data froim the year before. The absolute number of abortions declined slightly, but represented a continued flattening of the curve on total abortions across the US compared to the significant progress that was made during the Clinton Administration. The CDC statistics also show that abortion ratios among girls 19 and under rose during the first three years of the Bush Administration, and remained steady for the most recent year available (2004). Even last spring's Guttmacher data validated this stagnation of progress against abortion under Bush. Mr Bush has truly made himself "the Abortion President" by exploiting the tragedy of abortion to further polarize our society on this issue, and Catholics in particular. Overall, abortion rates are on track to fall by about 3/1000 women of reproductive age under Mr Bush, compared with a decline of 4.5/1000 during the two Clinton terms, representing about a 50% higher success rate under the Democratic Administration.
Budget priorities that target the most vulnerable in society--Pope Benedict has issued an encyclical focused almost exclusively on Jesus' call to reach out to those in need (Mt 25:40). In July 2008 Mr Bush vetoed a Medicare bill that sought to preserve services for millions of elderly, in the name of fiscal responsibility. As the economy has gone markedly downhill with home foreclosures, job losses and fearfulness about bank solvency, many Americans are stuggling to make ends meet. Census data in 2005 showed that since Mr. Bush took office, family median income had fallen by $1669.00, child poverty had increased by 1.4 million to almost 13 million in the preceding 4-1/2 years, the total number of people in poverty up by 5.4 million, and 6 million more Americans without health insurance. The numbers have dramatically worsened since then, with the Bush recession and the home foreclosure crisis.
Exploitation of Christianity for political gain--Former assistant director of the White House's Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, David Kuo, wrote a book detailing how the Bush Administration privately derides Conservative Christians while harnessing their political power to advance an economically-based agenda.
"Preemptive War"—the most profane imaginable violation of Jesus’ injunction in the Sermon on the Mount to “Love your enemies,” now enshrined as official US policy in the 2006 National Security Strategy Assessment. More than 4100 US servicemen and women are dead and more than 25,000 injured in the name of the pre-emptive war principle in Iraq. The British medical journal The Lancet published data in 2006, from researchers at Johns Hopkins, indicating that probably 655,000 people had died as a result of President Bush's war in Iraq at that point. Imagine children living in total fear, with virtually all the Christians in Iraq forced to leave their homes--in part because President Bush is so closely identified with Christianity (according to an Oct 17, 2006 story in the New York Times).
Continued justification of the use of torture-The Administration worked surreptitiously to pass legislation forgiving their previous use of torture in secret CIA prisons Mr. Bush finally acknowledged, by undermining the War Crimes Act of 1996. Click here for more details.
Politicking in Catholic churches divides Catholics. The McCain Campaign's Catholic Outreach surrogates announced on July 11, 2008 that they intended to seek votes in Catholic churches, replaying the situation in 2004 when they plumbed parish donation lists and paid Catholic “organizers” to register voters after Mass in Catholic churches.
Despoiling the environment—Pope Benedict has made environmental stewardship a centerpiece of his papacy, speaking on this subject at the World Youth Day July 17, 2008 in Sydney Australia. Meanwhile the Administration continues to obstruct US participation in setting any international goals for curbing greenhouse gas formation, and is quietly upending environmental regulations that have long protected our air, water, forest and soil quality across the US.
Sabotaging the Assault Weapons Ban, after Mr. Bush claimed to support it, and handing broad legal immunity to the Gun Industry, with incumbent rewards to criminals, drug traffickers and international terrorists.

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"Now more than ever, we must stand up for our enduring principles and values. We can't lie low while the Republican Party tries to pass itself off as the party of 'moral values,' at the very time when it shortchanges America's children, neglects the nation's needy, and leaves America with trillions of dollars in debt for future generations to pay off. We must not give the time of day to a party that mobilizes the hateful reactionary forces of bigotry, greed, and fear and tries to win elections by fomenting irreconcilable divisions in our people." - Senator Edward M. Kennedy

Thursday, August 21, 2008