Category: Politics

Steve Mansfield as written a book entitled “The Faith Of Barack Obama.” On his blog he complains that people are consigning him to the nether realm for writing this book. He claims that this is unjust since nobody has yet read the book. But, even given his blog explanation for the book, one wonders what Mr. Mansfield was thinking unless he intended to write a book telling us about the pagan faith of Barack Obama.

Before we get into that though, people need to realize that Mansfield is the same guy who wrote a book entitled, “The Faith Of George Bush.” Now, if Mansfield could, with a straight face, write a book finding the Christian faith of George Bush, what makes anyone think that he couldn’t similarly find the Christian faith of Barack Obama? If a guy can write a book telling me about that the beauty of Congressperson Nancy Pelosi, I suspect he can write a book telling me about the beauty of Senator Barbara Mikulski.

Mansfield starts his defense of by saying he wanted to take a “fairly objective look at how Obama came to faith.” The problem already, is that this assumes that Obama has come to faith. Can we really conclude that someone has come to faith who wants to violate with repeated regularity the 6th (support of abortion), 7th (support of homosexual civil unions) and 8th (wants to increase confiscatory taxation) commandments? The fact that Mansfield can suggest that Obama has come to faith raises questions about Mansfield’s clarity of understanding as it pertains to what it means to “have faith.”

Next Mansfield says that he believes that “Obama’s story of faith captures the current religious trends in America just as George W. Bush’s did five years ago when I wrote The Faith of George W. Bush.” Certainly nobody can disagree that it may be the case that Obama’s faith may capture the religious trends in America, but all that means is that the religious trends in America are decidedly not Christian, just as Obama’s faith, to date, is decidedly not Christian.

Mansfield then suggests that not having had a brain bypass he is interested in how ideas shape culture. Great! Many of us share that interest. The evidence of Mansfield having a brain bypass surgery comes to the fore though when he suggests that Obama’s ideas have a relation to Christian faith. That is almost as bad as suggesting that George Bush’s ideas have a relation to the Christian faith. When Mansfield makes these kind of correlations it is not a wonder that some people might question his Christian or conservative credentials.

Mansfield insists that in his book he was just trying to objectively understand and explain Obama. That is a noble undertaking, but it can be done without suggesting that there is anything Christian about the candidate. Indeed, one could write such a book by opening up declaring that,

“It is not my intent in this book to speak to Barack Obama’s faith. My intent instead is to simply try to explain and understand the man. I have come to my own conclusions regarding Obama’s faith but I want to allow the reader to come to their own conclusions as I explain and seek to understand the candidate. My book seeks to be even handed, so readers should expect to find here me giving Senator Obama every benefit of the doubt that I can. To give someone the benefit of the doubt should not be mistaken with agreeing with them even after the benefit of the doubt has been extended.”

It doesn’t look like Mansfield wrote that kind of book, therefore Mansfield’s head is being handed to him on a platter by much of his readership.

Finally Mansfield seems put off that people could be upset with him since in the book he plainly said he would not vote for Obama. Mansfield seems to think that whatever perceived favorable treatment he gave to Obama in the book would be finally negated by the omission that he could not vote for Obama. This communicates a lack of understanding on the part of Mansfield on how people are influenced. If I write something that can be taken as a favorable reflection on somebody, but finish by saying that I can’t vote for them, the effect may very well be that my written work provides a bridge for some people to cross to support the candidate even though I myself as the author might not be able to. Such a written work, could communicate how it would be understandable that Christians would vote for Obama and so could very well lead to be a work that would influence Christians to vote for Obama or at least make doing so seem reasonable.

Overall, I think the problem here is that you have a guy (Mansfield) writing a book about another guy’s Christian faith who is himself confused on what the Christian faith really is or looks like.

Back when Barack Hussein Obama was a lowly Illinois State Senator he did an interview with the Chicago Sun Times that was resurrected recently at a Dispensational News Service. In that interview Obama spoke freely of His ‘Christian’ faith.

“So, I have a deep faith. I’m rooted in the Christian tradition. I believe that there are many paths to the same place, and that is a belief that there is a higher power, a belief that we are connected as a people.”

Barack Hussein Obama’s deep faith rests in the idea that there are many paths to the same place. How is that faith rooted in the ‘Christian tradition?’

That there are values that transcend race or culture, that move us forward, and there’s an obligation for all of us individually as well as collectively to take responsibility to make those values lived.”

This would suggest that Obama is not Post-modern. Keep in mind that some of those values that transcend race or culture that all of us as individual and as a community have a obligation to take responsibility for in order to make those transcendent values live is the murder of the unborn, theft in the way of confiscatory taxation, advocacy for the Nanny Government, and socialized health care.

When queried about the exclusive claims of Christianity when compared to his many paths understanding Barack offered,

That depends, Obama says, on how a particular verse from the Gospel of John, where Jesus says, “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but by me,” is heard.

Now this would suggest that Obama is post-modern. The text has no meaning except for how the reader or listener reads or hears the text.

Still, Obama is unapologetic in saying he has a “personal relationship with Jesus Christ.” As a sign of that relationship, he says, he walked down the aisle of Chicago’s Trinity United Church of Christ in response to the Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s altar call one Sunday morning about 16 years ago.

BHO relates that his sacramental aisle walk (thank you Billy Graham) was not the result of an epiphany but rather the confirmation of a long simmering faith.

Can’t you just here the Sermon from Racist Wright before the altar call?

“All you that want Jesus to save you from white oppression, all you who want to be saved by Jesus from the government’s plot to infect you with AIDS, all you who want to be part of the remnant that is saved from God damning America, He be, and we be waiting here at the altar for you.”

“Part of the reason I think it’s always difficult for public figures to talk about this (his Christian Faith) is that the nature of politics is that you want to have everybody like you and project the best possible traits onto you,” he says. “Oftentimes, that’s by being as vague as possible, or appealing to the lowest common denominators. The more specific and detailed you are on issues as personal and fundamental as your faith, the more potentially dangerous it is.

Every time BHO talks about ‘hope,’ and ‘change’ that emboldened quote ought to be a hammer that hits people between the eyes.

“The difficult thing about any religion, including Christianity, is that at some level there is a call to evangelize and proselytize. There’s the belief, certainly in some quarters, that if people haven’t embraced Jesus Christ as their personal savior, they’re going to hell.”

Does this therefore mean that BHO believes that evangelizing and proselytizing is bad?

“I don’t presume to have knowledge of what happens after I die,” he says. “When I tuck in my daughters at night, and I feel like I’ve been a good father to them, and I see in them that I am transferring values that I got from my mother and that they’re kind people and that they’re honest people, and they’re curious people, that’s a little piece of heaven.”

I think Obama is the disciple of that great Christian Saint John Lennon,

Imagine there’s no heaven
It’s easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today…

I wonder if Obama has a Motown version of this song he does?

Interviewer

So you got yourself born again?

OBAMA:

Yeah, although I don’t, I retain from my childhood and my experiences growing up a suspicion of dogma. And I’m not somebody who is always comfortable with language that implies I’ve got a monopoly on the truth, or that my faith is automatically transferable to others.

I’m a big believer in tolerance. I think that religion at it’s best comes with a big dose of doubt. I’m suspicious of too much certainty in the pursuit of understanding just because I think people are limited in their understanding.

His views on tolerance could allow him to sing along with St. John Lennon’s Second verse,

Imagine there’s no countries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace…

Do you suppose his Harvard graduate is also disturbed by people who are absolutely certain that there is no certainty and who have no tolerance for those who who don’t agree with them about tolerance?

I think that, particularly as somebody who’s now in the public realm and is a student of what brings people together and what drives them apart, there’s an enormous amount of damage done around the world in the name of religion and certainty.

Is he certain about that? Can certainty about uncertainty bring us all together?

OBAMA:

What I believe (about heaven) is that if I live my life as well as I can, that I will be rewarded. I don’t presume to have knowledge of what happens after I die. But I feel very strongly that whether the reward is in the here and now or in the hereafter, the aligning myself to my faith and my values is a good thing.

How is it possible for one not to be aligned to their faith and values? If one is not aligned to their faith and values doesn’t that mean that their faith and values is something besides what they say they are thus showing they are indeed aligned with their faith and values? I am so confused.

When I tuck in my daughters at night and I feel like I’ve been a good father to them, and I see in them that I am transferring values that I got from my mother and that they’re kind people and that they’re honest people, and they’re curious people, that’s a little piece of heaven.

I actually agree with this. The problem though is the question of what standard Obama is using to measure honesty, kindness and curiosity. One has serious doubts that he is using a Christian standard to measure those transferred values. For example, how kind is it to be one of the biggest supporters of killing unborn babies?

GG:
Do you believe in sin?

OBAMA:
Yes.

GG:
What is sin?

OBAMA:
Being out of alignment with my values.

Bret:

What are your values?

OBAMA:

Abortion, Confiscatory Taxation, Wealth Redistribution, Black Nationalism, Global Government, Global Warming, Reparations, Friendship with Bombers, Racists, and Assorted fruitcakes… to name only a few.

Yesterday in my Lansing State Journal there was a long piece on how Black Conservatives may end up voting for Barack Hussein Obama this year because of the historic opportunity to have a Black man as President. They interviewed several well known and not so well known Black Conservatives to put meat on the bones of the story.

So, I have a few questions…

Can you really be a conservative and vote for a guy you know is virulently against your alleged convictions? (Yes, Yes, I know… Evangelicals do this all the time.)

How is it that voting for somebody because of their race helps to get us beyond race? Isn’t that kind of counter-intuitive?

What is it in the injured psyche of some people (White and Black) that can only be healed with the election of Barack Hussein Obama?

If Black Conservatives will vote for Barack Hussein Obama only because he is Black isn’t that a form of identity politics that Conservatives otherwise rail against?

Some commentary I read suggested that this article was a spin piece put out by the Obama campaign and pointed out the article also named some Black conservatives who, while saying they were proud of Obama as a Black Man reaching these heights, they were going to do everything they could to defeat him.

Here is the question that begs to be asked. What would Black conservatives think of White conservatives if the Presidential race was one where the Republican, Thomas Sowell was running against the Democrat, Ted Kennedy, and White Conservatives were being interviewed saying they were going to vote for Ted Kennedy because he is one of us?

The 2008 election cycle isn’t really an election. It is a referendum on Barack Hussein Obama.

Consider that all indicators now suggest that being a Republican in this election cycle is like being a white guy at a Nation Of Islam rally. President Bush’s disapproval ratings are sky high. The dollar and gas prices are sinking and rising like they are on the opposite ends of some giant global playground teeter totter. The war in Iraq remains unpopular with a large segment of the US population. So here we have the Democratic party breaking records in terms of fund raising, and with the state of the economy and the reality of a major foreign policy blunder by the Bush administration the Democrats can run not only one one but two issues that historically have been the means that the out of power party has used to turn the party in power out of office. Given this election scenario the Democrats should be able to run Donald Duck at the top of their ticket and win going away. Yet, though we are still five long months away from the election, current polls indicate that Barack Hussein Obama is only 5 or so percentage points ahead of John “I’m the Democrat in this election you can trust” McCain.

This can only be explained by the fact that the Democrats have put at the top of their ticket a candidate that is so flawed that not even the perfect political storm for his opposing party can guarantee a win. Consequently this election, to date, is shaping up to be a referendum on Barack Hussein Obama. The Republicans could pick the worst candidate imaginable (and they have) and it wouldn’t make any difference since that Republican candidate could run on the campaign platform of “I’m not Barack Hussein Obama,” and it would be enough to cause Americans to consider voting for him.

What is interesting is that this is exactly the campaign theme that McCain is going to use when he speaks to Republican ‘conservatives.’ McCain is spending his time appealing to White Independents and Democrats by supporting ‘cap and trade’ legislation and by visibly turning his back on constituencies that they hate (Dobson) but when he pauses to turn and speak to the traditional Republican base his basic messages is, “Vote for me or you’ll get Barack Hussein Obama.” Hence we see that even McCain’s campaign is seeking to make the campaign issue Barack Hussein Obama. When McCain speaks to Independents and Democrats he essentially says, “I’m the non-radical Democrat in the race,” and when McCain speaks to Republicans he essentially says, “You’ve got nowhere else to go, vote for me or live in Black Marxist hell for four years.”

What Barack Hussein Obama has to do this election cycle is to continue to try and deceive the American electorate because the man cannot win with the McGovern coalition that he has thus far put together nor can he win if he and his past is what voters are thinking of when they head into the voting booths.
So the election boils down to this. McCain is going to campaign in such a way as to try and make the election a referendum on Barack Hussein Obama, and Obama is going to campaign in such a way as to try and make the election a referendum on the economy and the war. Voters thus will either pull a lever for Barack believing that his past associations don’t really reflect the person he is or they will vote against Barack believing that a man with connections to Black Nationalism with its Marxist overtones cannot be allowed near 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. McCain of course will get the anti-Barack votes but there is a difference between winning because people voted for you and winning because people voted against your opponent.

Republicans should realize that this election cycle is one that pits the two wings of the Democratic party against one another. John McCain represents the incremental socialist wing of the Democratic party while Barack Hussein Obama represents the revolutionary Socialist wing of the Democratic party. This November is thus a choice between two flavors of Socialism.

Yes indeed, voting is a great privilege.

For the past two weeks there have been rumors on the net that a videotape exists that captures Michelle Obama kvetching about the sins of ‘Whitey.’ The rumor has now even made it on to some of the major news networks and talk radio. For my purposes it is irrelevant whether or not the tape exists. What is relevant is that so many people find that report believable and so believe it likely that the tape could exist.

If rumors were being reported that Michelle Obama owed a million dollars in gambling debts to the mafia that would not be found to be credible without a great deal of substantiation. But when rumors circulate that Michelle Obama was caught on a tape lecturing ‘Whitey,’ people find it believable without a great deal of substantiation because of a developing track record for such things emanating from the Obama campaign.

This track record includes now things like the Obama’’s contribution over the years of $20,000.00 in charitable donations to Jeremiah Wright who was caught complaining about Whitey’s ‘US of KKK A.’ The track record includes Michelle saying that ‘for the first time in her adult life she is proud of America.’ One can’t help but wonder if it is ‘whitey’ who was the reason for her lack of pride until recently. The track record includes Senator Obama’s comments about people being ‘bitter, who cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.’ It doesn’t take any genius to realize that Senator Obama was talking about poor ‘Whiteys.’ The track record includes Senator Obama equating his ‘whitey’ grandmother’s actions of avoiding black people with Jeremiah Wright’s racist vitriol. The track record includes Michelle’s complaining about how down right mean America is. Does anybody believe that Michelle thinks it is the minority community that is ‘down-right mean?’

Quite simply the reason that a rumor is believable that Michelle Obama has been caught on videotape chastising ‘Whitey’ for his sins is because there is already mountains of evidence suggesting that would not be out of character for the Obamas. As far as I’m concerned it is irrelevant whether or not the tape exists since the tape would only confirm what is already manifestly true and that is that the Obama’s don’t like ‘Whitey.’