The separation of Obama and state
Posted 43 weeks 2 days ago byBarack Obama spoke this morning from the pulpit at Martin Luther King's church -- leading to suggestions of hypocrisy on the right and tempered discomfort from some quarters on the left.
Both reactions are silly. Barack Obama isn't Mike Huckabee.
Faith is a fact of life that is, no matter the desires of Christopher Hitchens, unlikely to ever go away. Social conservatives seem to think that progressives want to chase mentions of God from public life; I don't think that's generally true (though there are some exceptions).
No: What progressives want -- reasonable ones anyway -- is to ensure that acknowledgments of God are not a requirement to participate in public life. There's a profound difference.
And in any case, Obama didn't -- like Huckabee -- promise to bring the U.S. Constitution in line with "God's law." The speech, if you read it, was more of a cultural appeal than a faith-based one. But it is, I think, sometimes difficult to tell the difference between the two.
Thoughts
liberals bug me
Submitted on January 20th, 2008 by alicescheshirecatI'm totally a big ol liberal - but sometimes they really piss me off when it comes to stuff like this. If liberals honestly think that liberals who require that candidates look exactly like they do are just as bad as right wing nut-bars who require the same.
No - BO isn't Huckabee who speaks freely in pulpits (see video here: http://link.brightcove.com/services/link...)
but I think he should feel free to play by the same rules. Republicans opened up this door - if Dems feel comfortable talking in churches (which they should) they should do it.