What if John McCain had been elected president?

Before we throw Barack Obama under the bus for giving a prominent role to a conservative pastor, let’s imagine the reaction if things were reversed.

By Chris Crain

What if John McCain had been elected president? I know the idea is a bit of a throwback, considering the shellacking the Arizona septuagenarian got from the Illinois senator with the funny name. But just imagine for a minute.

Conservatives would be gleeful, Sarah Palin would be on cable news 24-7 (actually, that happened anyway), and President-elect McCain would be planning his inauguration. Then imagine, in a conciliatory gesture toward Obama supporters, McCain selects Gene Robinson, the openly gay Episcopal bishop, to give the invocation. In a nod to his own supporters, he chooses the evangelical leader Rick Warren to give the benediction.

We know what the response would be. The Republican right would be furious: What a kick in the teeth from McCain to choose a minister whose elevation was an indictment of their core religious beliefs, and who advocates the destruction of traditional marriage and the murder of millions of aborted fetuses!

Gay rights groups and bloggers, still reeling from Obama’s unexpected defeat, would be cheered by McCain’s unexpected and courageous attempt at reconciliation. Press releases from progressives would defend McCain against charges of betrayal, chastising conservatives for their intolerance and their insistence on dividing, not unifying. Besides, they would point out, the benediction will come from Rick Warren, who opposes gay marriage and supported Proposition 8 in California.

You see where I’m going here? We know that, happily for us, history unfolded in opposite fashion, and Barack Obama chose Rick Warren to give his inaugural invocation, and civil rights hero Joseph Lowery, who supports full marriage equality, to say the benediction.

Yet the response from many gay bloggers and rights groups has been every bit as reactionary and intolerant as the Republican right would have been toward Robinson. Aren’t we better than that?

Can’t we see how any meaningful attempt by President-elect Obama to unify the country must include McCain voters, including the 31 million who bought Warren’s best-seller “The Purpose-Driven Life,” and the additional millions who agree with gay marriage opposition?

Can’t we keep our eyes on the prize? This inauguration will install the most pro-gay president, by far, in the history of this country. If reaching out to conservatives buys Obama some additional political capital, that is to our great benefit.

Aren’t we the ones who have argued till we are blue in the face for the separation of church and state? It’s always been a core part of our movement to oppose any attempt by one set of Americans to demand their religious views receive official favor, or that those with contrary views be excluded.

And yet here we are, basically demanding the president-elect remove one minister from his role in a public ceremony because of his religious beliefs and replace him with one whose beliefs we find more acceptable. Are we proving we are no better, when we have access to power, than our conservative opponents?

The misuse of public ceremonies to show official favor for one group over another runs afoul of the First Amendment’s “establishment clause,” which prohibits the establishment of an official religion, or from sending signals that some faith groups or views are preferred over others by government.

That’s why the courts won’t permit sectarian prayers in public schools, and why we no longer have manger scenes at Christmas time in front of city hall. That’s also why Roy Moore, the virulently anti-gay chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, was booted from office after he insisted on a Ten Commandments monument in the courthouse rotunda.

To be fair, it is partly Obama and Warren’s fault that church and state are entangled here. The president-elect’s decision to include inaugural prayers at all, while noncontroversial and in keeping with tradition, opened the door to this debate. What’s more, marriage as an institution is a conflation of church and state, “vesting power” in ministers to officiate at a religious ceremony with civil legal effect.

Warren makes matters worse by basing his opposition to gay marriage and support for Proposition 8 on his own religious beliefs about homosexuality. If you think about it, exclusionary marriage laws are also contrary to the First Amendment, since the primary intent -- repeated by politicians and pastors alike – is to preserve “the sanctity of marriage.” The government ought not be choosing which faith group’s views about marriage will be enshrined in the law or excluded from public ceremonies.

Those of us so exorcised by the idea of Warren saying a two-minute prayer would be much better served by arguing for church-state separation, in marriage laws and public ceremonies, than by demanding the president-elect show favor to friendlier religious beliefs.

Chris Crain is former editor of the Washington Blade and five other gay publications and now edits GayNewsWatch.com. He can be reached via his blog at www.citizencrain.com


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Presidential Pooch Bites Reporter

By BEN FELLER, AP

Talk about a biting critique of the press.



It seems President Bush's dog Barney wasn't much in the mood for friendly attention during his walk outside the White House on Thursday. So when Reuters reporter Jon Decker reached down to pet the Scottish terrier, the seemingly docile dog snapped at him and bit Decker's right index finger.

Barney won't have to worry about bothersome reporters much longer. The Bush administration ends in 75 days, and the president is headed back to Texas.

Sally McDonough, a spokeswoman for first lady Laura Bush, said of Barney: "I think it was his way of saying he was done with the paparazzi."

Mrs. Bush asked McDonough to call Decker and make sure he was fine. She reports that Decker "is being a good sport about it all."

The intrepid reporter got bandaged up by the White House doctor.
As he says in the YouTube clip: "I got bit by Barney, and unfortunately it broke the skin, and I have to be on antibiotics for the next few days."

Consider it a cautionary tale. The incoming president, Barack Obama, has promised to buy daughters Malia and Sasha a puppy.

Sarah Palin 2012 Website: http://sarahpalinusa.blogspot.com

McCain starts mapping out a new role in the Senate

Before resting from the grueling presidential race, John McCain began discussing with senior aides what role he will play in the Senate now that he has promised to work with the man who defeated him for president. One obvious focus will be the war in Iraq. After two years spent more on the campaign than in the Senate, McCain will return as the ranking Republican on the Armed Services Committee.



That will put the four-term Arizona senator in a position to influence Democrat Barack Obama's plan to set a timetable to withdraw U.S. troops from combat in Iraq.

During the campaign, McCain staunchly opposed setting such a time frame, even as the Iraqi government began working with the Bush administration to do so.

But in conceding the presidency to Obama Tuesday night at a Phoenix hotel, McCain pledged "to do all in my power to help him lead us through the many challenges we face."

He allowed that defeat was disappointing but said that starting Wednesday "we must move beyond it and work together to get our country moving again."

Aides said they believed McCain would work well with Obama as president because much of his best work in the Senate had been done with Democrats, including a landmark campaign finance law he crafted with Wisconsin Sen. Russ Feingold and an unsuccessful effort with Massachusetts Sen. Edward M. Kennedy to pass comprehensive immigration reform.

The day after Election Day quickly returned McCain to something much closer to normal life. After months of travel on his campaign bus or plane, McCain and his wife, Cindy, drove themselves to Starbucks for coffee near their Phoenix condominium.

McCain and his family planned to spend a few days at their vacation compound near Sedona, Ariz., to rest from the long contest.

Friends said that despite his disappointment, McCain also was relieved that the demanding campaign was finally over. Aides said he was relaxed Tuesday night — at peace with his loss and confident that he had done his best in a political climate where a failing economy, an unpopular GOP president and two lingering wars set steep odds against a Republican victory.

"We fought as hard as we could. And though we fell short, the failure is mine, not yours," McCain told supporters Tuesday night. "I don't know what more we could have done to try to win this election. I'll leave that to others to determine."

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Sarah Palin 2012 Website: http://sarahpalinusa.blogspot.com

What Does El Rusbo's Gut Say?

Let's hear what Rush has to say:

RUSH: Now, Mr. Snerdley mentioned to me at the top of the break, he said, "I don't understand, Rush. You wouldn't believe the phone calls."

They're people who don't want to go on the air, Democrat, liberal voters are calling and gloating, and they're saying, "Boy, Rush, we love listening to you now. We just love it 'cause we know our guy's got it in the bag. It's over with, and I don't care what Rush says. It doesn't bother me. I'm at peace. I'm in a state of calm." You had a couple calls like that, right? And of course they think this because they were watching television, and it's in the bag. We've got a Pew poll out today has it 53-38 Obama. We have a Rasmussen poll out, three points. We got a Gallup poll, two points. We have the IDB/TIPP poll at 2.8 or some such thing. Zogby, their numbers today, are a little under five. They're call it "static"; the race is static. AP most recent AP poll is two points. But you still have ABC/Washington Post up there at 15 and the Newsweek poll they're still pretty large. They're all over the place.

Snerdley says, "Look, I know how to watch TV. You have taught me well, and I'm convinced, Rush. It's over. It's over. I mean, I look at their electoral maps, and I look at the whole thing and every state's blue! I don't see McCain winning but two or three electoral votes, two or three states. That's what they're showing me on TV." (sigh) You know, folks, people ask me all the time. "What do you think is going to happen?" and I don't know. And this is the first time in a lot of elections that my gut's not telling me anything, either. Now, normally I get instincts. Normally my gut says, "Go against the conventional wisdom." That's pretty normal for me. Normally my gut says, I think I know what's going to happen. When I have that gut instinct, then I pass it on.

I'm confused. My gut does not tell me anything here. The most honest thing you can tell you is, "I have no idea what's going to happen," but at the same time my gut does not say big-time Obama landslide. My gut also doesn't say a McCain surprise win. I just have no feeling for this, because it is way too far off the board. And there are other factors, too. We've been through them. I think the reason my gut is not giving me any guidance, as it were, is that I do believe this election is a referendum on Obama, up or down, and I don't know how that's going to play out. You know, I don't know how many people are actually going to vote for McCain because they're voting for McCain or voting for Palin, as to how many are voting against Obama. That's why I think my gut here is silent on this.

But I will tell you, I do have some gut human reactions. And I do have a traditional, highly respected view of the people of this country. Despite the devolution of pop culture and despite the rise of a lack of thinking and applied thought in our culture, having given way to a swarm of people who simply feel -- and I don't know how large either group is. I don't know which one's the majority, thinkers or feelers. I just don't know. But my traditional belief of the country tells me that average, ordinary Americans watch what's happening with the media in the coverage of this campaign and resent the hell out of it. The American people love fair, right? You can say what you want about the media, bias and all that. This is not even fair, and they expect fairness from the media.

Objectivity and all that, yeah, but they expect fairness. If you're going to go after people, go after everybody. I mean you've got two people here asking for the most power we ever give people, and they're only going after one. They're not investigating the other guy. I think most Americans think "fairness," which to me is an elusive concept anyway, but still most Americans have it, and this is not fair. I think most people know it. I think most people also are offended by anybody who gloats and is arrogant and is acting as though they've won, whatever it is, before it's over. I can't tell you the number of times I have watched a baseball or football game with people and one team's got a player or two that go up a touchdown with three minutes left to go, after coming back from being down two or three touchdowns.

The guy that scored the touchdown starts gloating and starts taunting other people, and the people watch that and say, "I hope that team loses." They don't like that kind of behavior being rewarded. They love people getting comeuppances. They love people who think they have it in the bag, finding out they didn't even have the bag, much less were they in it. Obama with his speeches in Berlin and running around the media and everybody acting like this is all over, and this 30-minute inaugural address tonight? I don't think it has anything to do with delaying the World Series. I just think, "Okay, Obama. We see. It's a little overkill here," a little backlash to the media, a little backlash to Obama, the arrogance and smugness of Obama.

Now, I still think that there are enough Americans that are repulsed by this that it can affect the way they vote. But other than that -- and I also really do not believe, and this is where I could be dead wrong; we're going to find out next Tuesday. I do not believe that a majority of voters -- not a majority of people in the country, that's a different equation. But I don't believe yet that a majority of voters are ready to give away their freedom. I don't believe that a majority of voters are ready to turn over the keys of this country to somebody about whom they don't know anything, about somebody who will not tell them anything about himself. I just don't believe there are people in this country -- a majority of voters in this country -- who are going to sign up for making The Government the most important aspect of their lives. We'll find out Tuesday.


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Republican Bumper Stickers

Here are some new bumper stickers that are making the rounds. Please print them out and circulate. There is not much time left.




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Christian right intensifies attacks on Obama

By Eric Gorski and Rachel Zoll

Terrorist strikes on four American cities. Russia rolling into Eastern Europe. Israel hit by a nuclear bomb. Gay marriage in every state. The end of the Boy Scouts.

All are plausible scenarios if Democrat Barack Obama is elected president, according to a new addition to the campaign conversation called "Letter from 2012 in Obama's America," produced by the conservative Christian group Focus on the Family Action.

The imagined look into the future is part of an escalation in rhetoric from Christian right activists who are trying to paint Obama in the worst possible terms as the campaign heads into the final stretch and polls show the Democrat ahead.

Although hard-edge attacks are common late in campaigns, the tenor of the strikes against Obama illustrate just how worried conservative Christian activists are about what should happen to their causes and influence if Democrats seize control of both Congress and the White House.



Like other political advocacy groups, Christian right groups often raise worries about an election's consequences to mobilize voters. In the early 1980s, for example, direct mail from the Moral Majority warned that Congress would turn a blind eye to "smut peddlers" dangling pornography to children.

"Everyone uses fear in the last part of a campaign, but evangelicals are especially theologically prone to those sorts of arguments," said Clyde Wilcox, a Georgetown University political scientist. "There's a long tradition of predicting doom and gloom."

But the tone this election year is sharper than usual and the volume has turned up as Nov. 4 nears.

Steve Strang, publisher of Charisma magazine, a Pentecostal publication, titled one of his recent weekly e-mails to readers, "Life As We Know It Will End If Obama is Elected."

Strang said gay rights and abortion rights would be strengthened in an Obama administration, taxes would rise and "people who hate Christianity will be emboldened to attack our freedoms."

Separately, a group called the Christian Anti-Defamation Commission has posted a series of videos on its site and on YouTube called "7 Reasons Barack Obama is not a Christian."

The commission accuses Obama of "subtle diabolical deceit" in saying he is Christian, while he believes that people can be saved through other faiths.

But among the strongest pieces this year is Focus on the Family Action's letter which has been posted on the group's Web site and making the e-mail rounds. Signed by "A Christian from 2012," it claims a series of events could logically happen based on the group's interpretation of Obama's record, Democratic Party positions, recent court rulings and other trends.

Among the claims:

A 6-3 liberal majority Supreme Court that results in rulings like one making gay marriage the law of the land and another forcing the Boy Scouts to "hire homosexual scoutmasters and allow them to sleep in tents with young boys." (In the imagined scenario, The Boy Scouts choose to disband rather than obey).
A series of domestic and international disasters based on Obama's "reluctance to send troops overseas." That includes terrorist attacks on U.S. soil that kill hundreds, Russia occupying the Baltic states and Eastern European countries including Poland and the Czech Republic, and al-Qaida overwhelming Iraq.
Nationalized health care with long lines for surgery and no access to hospitals for people over 80.

The goal was to "articulate the big picture," said Carrie Gordon Earll, senior director of public policy for Focus on the Family Action. "If it is a doomsday picture, then it's a realistic picture," she said.

Obama favors abortion rights and supports civil unions for same-sex couples, but says states should make their own decisions about marriage. He said he would intensify diplomatic pressure on Iran over its nuclear ambitions and add troops in Afghanistan.

On taxes, Obama has proposed an increase on the 5 percent of taxpayers who make more than $250,000 a year and advocates cuts for those who make less. His health care plan calls for the government to subsidize coverage for millions of Americans who otherwise couldn't afford it.

Last-minute push?

In an interview, Strang said there are fewer state ballot measures to motivate conservative voters this election year and that the financial meltdown is distracting some voters from the abortion issue. But he said a last-minute push by conservative Christians in 2004 was key to Bush's re-election and predicted they could play the same role in 2008.

Kim Conger, a political scientist at Iowa State University, said a late push for evangelical voters did help Bush in 2004, "but it is a very different thing than getting people excited about John McCain," even with Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his vice presidential pick.

Phil Burress, head of the Ohio-based Citizens for Community Values, said the dynamics were quite different in 2004, when conservative Christians spent some energy calling Democrat John Kerry a flip-flopper but were mostly motivated by enthusiasm for George W. Bush.

Now, there is less excitement about McCain than fear of an Obama presidency, Burress said.

"This reminds me of when I was a school kid, when I had to go out in the hall and bury my head in my hands because of the atom bomb," he said.

Sarah Palin 2012 Website: http://sarahpalinusa.blogspot.com

A Question of Barack Obama's Character

By Charles Krauthammer

WASHINGTON -- Convicted felon Tony Rezko. Unrepentant terrorist Bill Ayers. And the race-baiting Rev. Jeremiah Wright. It is hard to think of any presidential candidate before Barack Obama sporting associations with three more execrable characters. Yet let the McCain campaign raise the issue, and the mainstream media begin fulminating about dirty campaigning tinged with racism and McCarthyite guilt by association.

But associations are important. They provide a significant insight into character. They are particularly relevant in relation to a potential president as new, unknown, opaque and self-contained as Obama. With the economy overshadowing everything, it may be too late politically to be raising this issue. But that does not make it, as conventional wisdom holds, in any way illegitimate.

McCain should months ago have begun challenging Obama's associations, before the economic meltdown allowed the Obama campaign (and the mainstream media, which is to say the same thing) to dismiss the charges as an act of desperation by a trailing candidate.

McCain had his chance back in April when the North Carolina Republican Party ran a gubernatorial campaign ad that included the linking of Obama with Jeremiah Wright. The ad was duly denounced by The New York Times and other "deep thinkers" as racist.



This was patently absurd. Racism is treating people differently and invidiously on the basis of race. Had any white presidential candidate had a close 20-year association with a white preacher overtly spreading race hatred from the pulpit, that candidate would have been not just universally denounced and deemed unfit for office but written out of polite society entirely.

Nonetheless, John McCain in his infinite wisdom, and with his overflowing sense of personal rectitude, joined the braying mob in denouncing that perfectly legitimate ad, saying it had no place in any campaign. In doing so, McCain unilaterally disarmed himself, rendering off-limits Obama's associations, an issue that even Hillary Clinton addressed more than once.

Obama's political career was launched with Ayers giving him a fundraiser in his living room. If a Republican candidate had launched his political career at the home of an abortion-clinic bomber -- even a repentant one -- he would not have been able to run for dogcatcher in Podunk. And Ayers shows no remorse. His only regret is that he "didn't do enough."



Why are these associations important? Do I think Obama is as corrupt as Rezko? Or shares Wright's angry racism or Ayers' unreconstructed 1960s radicalism?

No. But that does not make these associations irrelevant. They tell us two important things about Obama.

First, his cynicism and ruthlessness. He found these men useful, and use them he did. Would you attend a church whose pastor was spreading racial animosity from the pulpit? Would you even shake hands with -- let alone serve on two boards with -- an unrepentant terrorist, whether he bombed U.S. military installations or abortion clinics?

Most Americans would not, on the grounds of sheer indecency. Yet Obama did, if not out of conviction then out of expediency. He was a young man on the make, an unknown outsider working his way into Chicago politics. He played the game with everyone, without qualms and with obvious success.

Obama is not the first politician to rise through a corrupt political machine. But he is one of the rare few to then have the audacity to present himself as a transcendent healer, hovering above and bringing redemption to the "old politics" -- of the kind he had enthusiastically embraced in Chicago in the service of his own ambition.

Second, and even more disturbing than the cynicism, is the window these associations give on Obama's core beliefs. He doesn't share Rev. Wright's poisonous views of race nor Ayers' views, past and present, about the evil that is American society. But Obama clearly did not consider these views beyond the pale. For many years he swam easily and without protest in that fetid pond.

Until now. Today, on the threshold of the presidency, Obama concedes the odiousness of these associations, which is why he has severed them. But for the years in which he sat in Wright's pews and shared common purpose on boards with Ayers, Obama considered them a legitimate, indeed unremarkable, part of social discourse.

Do you? Obama is a man of first-class intellect and first-class temperament. But his character remains highly suspect. There is a difference between temperament and character. Equanimity is a virtue. Tolerance of the obscene is not.



Sarah Palin 2012 Website: http://sarahpalinusa.blogspot.com

Wow.