Redstate

Posted at 8:59am on May 1, 2008 The Theology of Barack Obama

By Ben Domenech

RS's own Dan Spencer (California Yankee), who now blogs over at the Examiner, was kind enough to host a piece I wrote on what the Rev. Wright debacle tells us about the theology of Barack Obama. An excerpt:

Barack Obama is the evangelist of the betterment of man. His religion is one of an almost overriding humanism, to the exclusion of the divine: hope is his signet, change his golden cross. He brings salvation to the masses via the empowerment of government, government under his leadership. His followers are not the Southern pro-American Carter voters, and they may carry iPhones instead of the hoes of the agrarian south, but the message is striking for its similarities. Where Carter constantly used Protestant religious terminology to describe the healing that needed to take place in the wake of Watergate, Obama's solution for the Iraq war and the other sins (as he sees them) of the George W. Bush administration is to say: trust in me – untested, inexperienced, poll-driven me – as you trust in yourself.

Yet there are small differences as well, and those are key to understanding the Senator. The language Obama uses may still be that of prayer, but it is prayer not directed toward a creator, but to his audience itself. Faith turns inward, and becomes an infinite loop. So Carter's "We can neither answer all questions nor solve all problems" becomes "Yes we can." And so the old sung tones of "Wait upon the Lord" morphs into "We are the ones we've been waiting for." From Obama's perspective, as opposed to Carter's, it is only the bitter, the nervous, the threatened, or the uneducated who cling to religion.

We know how this ended the first time: the infamous malaise speech of 1979. As the eloquent Steve Hayward put it in his biography of President Carter, the man ran for office promising "a government as good as the people" ultimately ended his term in office by saying that the people were no good. If they took such bets in Vegas, one could get a fine margin on picking the month of his term where President Obama would announce the same realization.

Read it all over at Right Side Politics.

Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | Obamafiles | religion | Rev. Jeremiah Wright — Comments (0)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 12:17pm on Apr. 27, 2008 Rejecting religion by imitating it

By Neil Stevens

You're doing it wrong:

The Institute for Humanist Studies, an Albany, N.Y.-based nonprofit, is calling attention to its calendar of atheist holidays on it Web site, www.secularseasons.org. The group wants nonbelievers (or at least people who don't celebrate religious holidays) to have a handy reference guide of the calendar of holidays honoring free-thinkers, banned books and nature, among other themes.

Posted at 1:37pm on Apr. 24, 2008 Speaker Pelosi, would you kindly *stop* reinforcing that stereotype against Catholics?

It's personally embarrassing.

By Moe Lane

Look, I'm sure that it's a favorite quote and everything, but it's not in the Bible.

Biblical Scholars Challenge Pelosi's 'Scripture' Quote
By Pete Winn
CNSNews.com Senior Staff Writer
April 23, 2008

(CNSNews.com) - House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is fond of quoting a particular passage of Scripture. The quote, however, does not appear in the Bible and is "fictional," according to biblical scholars.

In her April 22 Earth Day news release, Pelosi said, "The Bible tells us in the Old Testament, 'To minister to the needs of God's creation is an act of worship. To ignore those needs is to dishonor the God who made us.' On this Earth Day, and every day, let us pledge to our children, and our children's children, that they will have clean air to breathe, clean water to drink, and the opportunity to experience the wonders of nature."

Cybercast News Service repeatedly queried the speaker's office for two days to determine where the alleged Bible quote is found. Thus far, no one has responded.

And this isn't the first time that you've used it - nor is this the first time that you've been called on it, either. Unless you have the chapter and verse from Isaiah that this is supposedly from?

Look, it's really simple. Like it or not, we Roman Catholics have a certain reputation for not being Bible scholars, or even being fully Bible literate. It's highly unfair, of course - but you are not helping matters any by repeatedly getting this wrong. Seriously, you're only reinforcing the stereotype, and making the rest of us look bad.

So stop, already. Go talk about Tibet or something, instead.

Posted in Book of Hezekiah | Democrats | Fake-but-Inaccurate | religion — Comments (19)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 10:00am on Mar. 18, 2008 Previewing Obama's Speech

If You Can't Say Something Nice, Don't Say Anything At All

By Mark I

Sen. Barack Obama is about to deliver a major speech in response to the controversy surrounding the recent revelations of the teachings of his church's pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright. While the press, which has largely ignored the entire controversy, is destined to praise whatever Obama says and declare the matter settled, it is worth a look at what Obama could possibly say that would accomplish that end.

UPDATE: Drudge has the text of the speech posted. Snipets below.

Read on...

Posted in 2008 | Barack Obama | Democratic Primary | Liberals | religion | Rev. Jeremiah Wright — Comments (137)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 2:13pm on Jan. 30, 2008 The Oprah in bronze

By Jeff Emanuel

That's a whole lotta bronze . Think she's happy with it?

Posted at 11:26am on Dec. 21, 2007 Nailing Huckabee To The Cross

By California Yankee

Like others, I've written about Mike Huckabee playing the religion card and the fact that I think as a presidential candidate he will “scare the living daylights” out of moderates and independents. I even wrote about Huckabee's warm and fuzzy Christmas greeting.

Posted in 2008 | 2008 Presidential Campaign | Cross | Mike Huckabee | religion — Comments (63) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 5:15pm on Dec. 14, 2007 On Religious Tests

No Open Books?

By Mark I

The great Charles Krauthammer has a piece in the Washington Post that I have to take issue with. (I’m sure Mr. Krauthammer will live) Titled "An Overdose of Public Piety", the piece makes the case that candidates for office are making too much of their religious bona fides or the relative lack of them in their opponents.

In support of his conclusion, Krauthammer cites recent examples like Mike Huckabee apparently crediting Jesus for his rise in the polls, Mitt Romney’s Faith in America speech, and the CNN debate in which the Republicans were asked if they believed every word of the Bible literally. Krauthammer would like the candidates to stop talking about themselves in terms of their religious beliefs and confine their appeal to their positions on issues. I take no issue with that. But he goes too far when he suggests that voters, too, should have no interest in the religious beliefs of the candidates. On that point I disagree.

Read on…

Posted in 2008 | Charles Krauthammer | Mike Huckabee | Mitt Romney | Presidential Primary | religion | Rudy Giuliani — Comments (29)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 3:25pm on Dec. 6, 2007 Romney's Kennedy Moment

Successfully Defusing that Mormon Thing

By Hunter Baker

I have not seen the speech, but I have read it. Religion and politics is my academic specialty. While I would quibble with the way Romney presents the founding of the Republic and what it did or didn't settle about religious liberty, I think he did an outstanding job of framing the overall discussion.

1. The United States has traditionally been a nation that recognizes freedom must be paired with religion and morality if it is to persevere in political society. Mitt said it. Libertarians need to hear it. So do secularists. When Mitt embraces that point of view, he puts himself squarely in the conservative camp, not only the religious conservatives, but the traditionalist Burkeans, too.

2. Though his faith has some unique features (so unique that thinking of it as "Christianity, but different" is a BIG stretch), he plants his flag on American values such as freedom, democracy, human rights, religious liberty, and limited government. He is right to do so. It is perhaps imperfectly understood that Mormonism is an American religion with a major preference for American values. Mormon missionaries spread their faith and its unique doctrines, but they also spread pro-Americanism. I think you'd be hard pressed to find Mormons abroad who hate America.

3. He correctly recognizes that while the church must always seek to encourage the state, to critique the state, to urge the state toward justice, it must never be part of the state. When the church is part of the state, it either becomes a useless Department of God, as is the case of European established churches, or it becomes a dangerous theocracy of the sort we find in many Muslim lands.

Overall, this speech showed tremendous sophistication on religion and politics. I'm not a Mitt supporter. But he listened to someone who understands the issues well.

A+++ for this one. Attaboy, Governor Romney.

END.

Posted in 2008 | politics | religion | Romney — Comments (50)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 2:00pm on Dec. 6, 2007 Romney Blew It

By California Yankee

Promoted by Jeff. Ben's opposing viewpoint can be seen here.

I watched Romney's "Faith in America" speech.

It was mercifully short, it was decent and there was no point in Romney giving it.

As Romney said in advance, it wasn't a JFK-esque speech. So why give it? In essence all he said is that there should be no religious test for president, and we should follow the separation of church and state as designed by the founders:

Read on.

Posted in 2008 | 2008 Presidential Campaign | Faith in America | JFK | Mitt Romney | religion — Comments (19) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 9:55pm on Aug. 12, 2007 I Still Think He Won't Win

But then again, I don't think any of them should

By Thomas

Full disclosure: I have no dog in the 2008 Presidential brouhaha, am unlikely to develop a dog in the immediate future, and frankly, share a sentiment with a commenter/diarist whose handle rhymes with MeveFellBay, to-wit: None of the above. Part of this is because I have a hard time getting enthusiastic about political campaigns (yes, a great guy indeed to have a Director of RedState); part of it is because, with or without Fred! I'm underwhelmed by the current candidate pool, which ranges from a liberal New Yorker to a nativist to a crazy libertarian to some guy named Cox, with not a lot of improvement or fall in between; and part because, as I've said so many damned times, we are taking our eye off the ball of Congress, the State elections, and 2007, and royally hurting ourselves in the process.

Believe it or not, however, all of that was a digression. The point of this post was to say, for pretty much the only time in over a year, Mitt Romney blew my socks off (go to 9:30):

Now, the mandatory carping: I disagree with the old Mittster on a few things, not least of which being that if you're going to put faith in the public square -- an enterprise of which I'm an enthusiastic supporter -- you need to be prepared to discuss and defend it there. I'm fully aware of why Romney isn't interested in that conversation, but Catholics have had to do it for decades; I see no reason why this should be different. There's more, but it's just nit-picking.

With that said, Wow. If you could get him to drop the Ken-doll approach that he insists on adopting when the mike is on, I'd have been on this guy's team for a year now. That you can't concerns me in many of the same ways Al Gore concerned me, and the parallels are disturbing; but if this was how Mitt Romney was 24/7, I'd be a Romneybot too.

Posted in 2008 | bungee jumping | culture | Life | off-the-cuff | primaries | religion | Romney — Comments (96)/ Email this page » / Read More »