Saddleback Civic Forum: Obama & McCain
If you didn’t have a chance to watch the two-hour Saddleback Church/Rick Warren questioning of presidential candidates Obama and McCain, you can find the transcript here.
The chattering class had plenty to say about the evening, including the following:
McCain and Obama Face Questions About Faith - Associated Press
McCain Shines at Saddleback Forum - Michael Gerson, Washington Post
The Importance of Saddleback Church - Alan Wolfe, The New Republic
McCain, Obama at Saddleback Church - Carrie Budoff Brown, The Politico
John McCain, Barack Obama Display Abortion Divide at Evangelical Forum : LifeSite News
Are We Now Officially a Christian Nation? - Joan Walsh, Salon
McCain’s Back in the Saddleback - Chuck Todd, NBC News
McCain’s Depth & Experience Stood Out - Byron York, National Review
Obama’s Purpose-Driven Gamble - Mike Madden, Salon
Kristol: Showdown at Saddleback
Of special note are a couple of claims:
The New York Times reports that McCain was traveling by car to the broadcast and could easily have heard Warren’s questions asked of Obama: NYT: McCain Not in Cone of Silence .
Columnist Kevin McCullough and others complain Obama got his facts wrong about U.S. abortion rates during the Bush years:
…..His most outright lie was his claim that abortion rates had gone up over the last eight years.
Within minutes bloggers at TownHall.com, pro-life groups like Americans United for Life, and even the analyst panel on Fox News Channel had the stats in front of the American public.
Abortion rates have actually decreased over the last eight years, and have done so in significant fashion.
In fact in January of 2008 it was reported by the Guttmacher Institute and repeated in U.S. News and World Reports that abortions had reached a three decade low….
In a parallel, developing story, candidate Obama is continuing to draw heat for his Illinois ‘Born Alive’ votes we reported on late last week.
Today we have the Russell Berman/New York Sun story that states, in part, that
…..The dispute flared again last week when a leading opponent of legalized abortion, the National Right to Life Committee, posted records from the Illinois Legislature showing that Mr. Obama, while chairman of a Senate committee, in 2003, voted against a “Born Alive” bill that contained nearly identical language to the federal bill that passed unanimously, including the provision limiting its scope.
The group says the documents prove Mr. Obama misrepresented his record.
Indeed, Mr. Obama appeared to misstate his position in the CBN interview on Saturday when he said the federal version he supported “was not the bill that was presented at the state level.”
His campaign yesterday acknowledged that he had voted against an identical bill in the state Senate, and a spokesman, Hari Sevugan, said the senator and other lawmakers had concerns that even as worded, the legislation could have undermined existing Illinois abortion law. Those concerns did not exist for the federal bill, because there is no federal abortion law.
…..Told of the campaign’s explanation, the legislative director of the National Right to Life Committee, Douglas Johnson, was dubious. “These are newly manufactured and highly implausible excuses,” he said. “There is no way that the bill would have had any effect on any method of abortion.” Mr. Johnson said the version Mr. Obama voted down clearly applied only to fetuses that emerged from the womb alive.
In addition to the outrage from abortion opponents, a five-minute YouTube video now making the rounds highlights Mr. Obama’s opposition to the legislation. The clip, which has been viewed more than 230,000 times, features a testimonial from Jill Stanek, a former nurse who spearheaded the push for the bill in Illinois after witnessing a live infant discarded and left to die at the hospital where she worked. Ms. Stanek appeared at the White House ceremony in 2002 when President Bush signed the federal bill into law.
The McCain campaign yesterday added its voice to the criticism of Mr. Obama. “Americans can differ on the issue of abortion, but Senator Obama’s extreme record on this issue and his willingness to misrepresent that record should concern any American who believes that we should be working towards a society where there are fewer abortions, not more,” a spokesman for Senator McCain, Brian Rogers, said.
Stay tuned.
Sherry Tyree, 66, a graduate of John Burroughs School and Washington University, is a founding member (1984) and Vice President of Women for Faith & Family, a national Catholic women's organization that supports and defends traditional church teachings. Sherry is married to Dr. Donald A. Tyree, professor emeritus, School of Business, St. Louis University. 
Politics again? I’m done here.
I’m with you, slam. This COULD have led to a conversation about the differences and similarities between McCain and Obama on fundamental faith questions, and on the role of someone like Rick Warren in today’s environment.
It probably won’t.
Instead, it’s another anti-abortion rant, and another attempt to paint one candidate and one party as the anti-christ.
The pro-life endeavor will prevail. No one can stop the inexorable march of technology. The spirit of truth will find a way to keep any healthy baby alive, even from the time of conception. The question that nags me is “If an aborted baby is born alive, who will pay to support the child to maturity?”. Will the parents have a change of heart and nourish new life in a respecting and loving way or will the child be handed over to faceless government?
It also appeared that McCain forgot that the Saddleback Church forum was about faith because he too only campaigned and his talk about faith was very shallow, and we didn’t learn anything about his faith or even owning up to regretting that he was an adulterer, he only stated he regretted his fail marriage. Not admitting to his sin of why his marriage failed, because he was an adulterer and walked out on his crippled first wife and children to be with his present wife Mrs. Cindy.
Yes, all sins are forgiven, but one must acknowledge their sins. McCain still can’t admit that he is an adulterer, is what I gathered from his answer to, “what do you regret most in your life?” He only stated, “my failed marriage to my first wife.”
“Conservative Religious Right” only needed and wanted to hear:
“A LIFE BEGINS AT CONCEPTION”
“I WILL DO EVERYTHING IN MY POWER TO END ABORTIONS”.
“I WILL DO EVERYTHING IN MY POWER TO CAPTURE AND BRING BIN-LADIN TO JUSTICE”.
Will the “Conservative Religious Right” ever tire of being LIED to? A more important question is, why do the religious right as Christians lack discernment?
Just like the state of California, the judges (Conservative Republicans) that these ones all wanted were the very ones who overturned the will of the people to ban gay marriages in California. These same Republican judges the religious right approve of will be the very ones to keep abortions legal.
Do they ever ask the Lord, “What are we doing wrong that is not within your will?” If they are, I don’t think they are listening to anything but their own thoughts, not God’s answer.
D Walker - just what makes you so sure that Obama is not an adulterer.
McCain cleaned Obama’s clock. Get over it. At least now we know why Obama refuses to debate McCain at a townhall-style forum.
A CENTRIST,
You can’t be that sure of no man or woman. The only thing that a Christian can do is to pray that a fellow Christian not fall into that adulteress trap.
So obvious that some of us see differently than night and day. Christians are also in a divide in this country on just about everything it appears, although A CENTRIST, I realize that you identify yourself as an Agnostic, where we already know that the world is in a divide.
What can a Christian do, other than be obedient to God’s word and pray and keep praying in times such as these?
D. Walker says McCain should acknowledge his sins, apparently in public. I came across this article in Vanity Fair by Michael Wolff, June 2008. He writes about the sex lives of middle aged politicians and suggests they should be more shameless in their sexual exploits:
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/06/wolff200806
In picking a president, it is true that past may be prologue with regard to sex. Candidates may be circumspect about their past sex lives but we should elect people based on what they will do in the future.
Statements like “I WILL DO EVERYTHING IN MY POWER TO END ABORTIONS” and “I WILL DO EVERYTHING IN MY POWER TO CAPTURE AND BRING BIN-LADIN TO JUSTICE” are about the future. Do we really expect candidates to promise what their future sexual exploits will be?
Making too much of politicians sex lives may be giving incumbent government executives too much power, since they now have the legal tools to pry into internet activity and cameras are becoming omnipresent.
davel,
Funny how sex did not cross my mind once when I wrote my statement. All I was able to think about was the cruelty to McCain’s first wife’s and their children.
D. Walker,
I am sorry. I truly do not know what you are thinking but what were you thinking about when you typed “McCain still can’t admit that he is an adulterer”? My Merriam-Webster dictionary defines adultery as “sexual unfaithfullness of a married person”. How can you think about adultry without thinking about sex?
For clarification on the “cruelty to McCain’s first wife’s and their children” pursue the following link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carol_McCain
deval,
Sounds like she had a habit of choosing adulteress men. Makes one wonder if she was marrying the likeness of her own father. What is your point here?