Reinhold Niebuhr

This week NPR’s Morning Edition has run back-to-back interviews with Newsweek editor Jon Meacham discussing the memoirs of Barack Obama and John McCain. The idea is to get beyond sound bites and offer an analysis of the major people and events that have shaped the two men, at least according to their own published work.

The fascinating conclusion is that this country’s two major-party presidential candidates have both been strongly influenced by the same theologian, Reinhold Niebuhr.

My initial question is about the way it seems that Niebuhr was seized upon as a hidden, explanatory link between the characters of Obama and McCain. Is this just another example of an almost obsessive fascination with the interplay of politics and religion during this election cycle? Or is something else going on here?

In one sense, there’s nothing surprising about finding references to Reinhold Niebuhr in the writings of both candidates. Niebuhr is generally regarded as one…

Shirt picture courtesy of ObamaArtReport.com

I was intrigued by Anthony Bradley’s recent post “The Obama/McCain Messiah Complex.” A couple of things jumped out at me.  First, as with any broad-brush characterization, there’s clearly a mix of truth and generalities; the generalities wouldn’t stick without the hint of truth beneath them.  I’m thinking of how the late-night comedy hosts have had a good bit of fun with the “Messiah complex” that other people seem to have about Barack Obama, and it has indeed been funny.  Some of his followers (oops, I mean “supporters”) really do sound like they think he’s the Second Coming, and a little perspective is definitely in order.

But is there that much evidence that the candidates themselves have swallowed their own PR?  In my estimation, neither one appears to me to be a man who thinks that being the President of the United States is going to be an easy…

Photo courtesy NBC News, Augusta, GA

In today’s New York Times, William Kristol suggests that John McCain fire his entire campaign team because of the recent firestorm regarding McCain’s rallies and his shifting positions. Kristol writes,

“McCain should stop unveiling gimmicky proposals every couple of days that pretend to deal with the financial crisis. He should tell the truth — we’re in uncharted waters, no one is certain what to do, and no one knows what the situation will be on Jan. 20, 2009. But what we do know is that we could use someone as president who’s shown in his career the kind of sound judgment and strong leadership we’ll need to make it through the crisis.”

However, there is a deeper problem regarding the trajectory of both campaigns: they have become religious. Americans are expecting too much from both of Obama and McCain. As a result, both candidates have a profound…

All you have to do is drive up Big Bend Blvd. Something big’s happening at Wash U Thursday night.

And aside from her two exclusive interviews with Charles Gibson and Katie Couric, this will be the nation’s first real chance to see Governor Sarah Palin in an extended discussion of substantive issues.

It’s doubtful Gov. Palin and Sen. Biden will get into religion much. But we have gotten a glimpse into Gov. Palin’s Pentecostal faith.

Last week the Associated Press reported on the episode where a Kenyan pastor “prayed for her protection from ‘witchcraft.’” The video is on her former home congregation’s Web site.

And much has been made of the YouTube video of her at the same congregation, Wasilla Assembly of God Church. Recently, The New Yorker even weighed in.

Yet, for all the sound and fury, we still don’t know a whole lot. But I have found one of the YouTube soundbites to be very telling:

“I…

Despite the perilous state of American newspapers, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch advertising department took an ethical stand and refused to distribute the DVD of a film that for two years has troubled American Muslims.

The film, called “Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West,” was distributed to an estimated 28 million people via 70 American newspapers, primarily in states crucial to the coming presidential election. The only other newspaper reported to have refused the DVD was the News & Record in Greensboro, NC.

The Miami Herald reported that its own decision to distribute the DVD angered the Muslim community there:

We feel that it’s going to incite more hate and bigotry against our community,” said Altaf Ali, Florida chapter director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. The DVD does not do enough to differentiate between terrorists and mainstream Muslims, he said.

The Herald’s description of the DVD says it includes…

…montages of terrorist training camps and suicide bombers…