"You know, I have, ever since I've been a little girl, felt the presence of God in my life. And it has been a gift of grace that has, for me, been incredibly sustaining."

"But, really, ever since I was a child, I have felt the enveloping support and love of God and I have had the experiences on many, many occasions where I felt like the holy spirit was there with me as I made a journey. It didn't have to be a hard time. You know, it could be taking a walk in the woods. It could be watching a sunset. You know, I am someone who has [been] talked a lot about my life. You know more about my life than you know about nearly anybody else's, about 60 books worth... some of which are, you know, frankly, a little bit off-base. But I don't think that I could have made my life's journey without being anchored in God's grace and without having that, you know, sense of forgiveness and unconditional love. And I am not going to point to one or another matter. I mean, some of my struggles and challenges have been extremely public. And I have talked about how I have been both guided and supported through those, trying to find my own way through, because, for me, my faith has given me the confidence to make decisions that were right for me, whether anybody else agreed with me or not. And it is just such a part of who I am and what I have lived through for so many years that trying to pull out and say, oh, I remember, I was sitting right there when I felt, you know, God's love embrace me, would be, I think, trivializing what has been an extraordinary sense of support and possibility that I have had with me my entire life."

Now, let's not laugh with too much uproarious contempt. She — and you know who we're talking about — was prodded with an invasive question:

Let's talk about your faith. And we warned people the questions tonight would be pretty personal. 

She is responsible for showing up at the Compassion Forum, "an evening with the Democratic presidential candidates to focus on the issues of faith and compassion and how a president's faith can affect us all."

So I want to ask you. You said in an interview last year that you believe in the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit. And you have actually felt the presence of the Holy Spirit on many occasions. Share some of those occasions with us.

Oh, holy hell, no! She couldn't say that, could she? And she'd dug her own hole by having already claimed to have felt the presence of the Holy Spirit on many occasions. Was the Holy Ghost embracing her on this occasion?

The reason I'm resurrecting that old religiliciousness is that Hillary's possible 2016 opponent is getting kicked around for saying he would "punt" on some pushy question about religion (an effort to get him to misspeak about evolution). Scott Walker was in London, ostensibly to talk about foreign trade, and "asked... if he is comfortable with the idea of evolution," said "I'm going to punt on that one..." and: "That's a question a politician shouldn't be involved in one way or another."

Imagine letting politicians decline to talk about religion! Imagine sparing them the need to show up at a "Compassion Forum" and blather about God's constant companionship. Imagine getting absolutely serious about the United States Constitution, Article VI, Clause 3:

[N]o religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.

It's only the bullshitters and hypocrites who can nail these political probes into religious beliefs. That doesn't mean those who say they're "punting" — or it's "above my pay grade" — aren't bullshitting too. It's just that these really are questions a politician shouldn't be involved in one way or another.

"I’m just not very good at bullshitting," Obama bullshitted to David Axelrod.

The specific subject that prompted Obama to disparage his own bullshitting skills was same sex marriage, which — to get elected in 2008 — Obama claimed to oppose based on religion.

Axelrod writes that he knew Obama was in favor of same-sex marriages during the first presidential campaign, even as Obama publicly said he only supported civil unions, not full marriages. Axelrod also admits to counseling Obama to conceal that position for political reasons. “Opposition to gay marriage was particularly strong in the black church, and as he ran for higher office, he grudgingly accepted the counsel of more pragmatic folks like me, and modified his position to support civil unions rather than marriage, which he would term a ‘sacred union,’ ” Axelrod writes [in "Believer: My Forty Years in Politics"].

What Obama said was: "I believe that marriage is the union between a man and a woman... Now, for me as a Christian — for me — for me as a Christian, it is also a sacred union. God’s in the mix." I knew at the time he was lying, didn't you? I don't need an Axelrod book to say so. When Obama made that statement — at the Saddleback Presidential Forum, August 16, 2008 — I was live-blogging:

7:25: Define marriage. It's "the union of a man and a woman," and for him as a Christian, it's "sacred" and "God's in the mix." How about a constitutional amendment saying that? No. The tradition has been to leave this to state law. He admits that there is a concern about same-sex marriage, which he doesn't support, but he likes civil unions. He seems a little robotic intoning this position. I'm sure in his heart he supports full rights for gay people, but obviously, at this point, he can't say it.

And here's something I blogged right after the election in November 2008 (when some people were saying it wasn't fair that Obama's bullshit was used in robo-calls to prompt Californians to vote for Prop 8, which put the ban on gay marriage into the California constitution):

So Obama was instrumental in getting Prop 8 passed. What do you think of that? Some Obama supporters say it wasn't fair to use Obama like that. After all, Obama also said Prop 8 was "divisive and discriminatory." But that's absurd. Obama had to know that his words would be used by opponents of same-sex marriage. He himself is an opponent of same-sex marriage... except to the extent that he isn't, and I certainly think in his heart he's not, but that in his head he knew he had to say he was to get elected.

I don't blame him for this dishonesty. I think it's like the dishonesty of professing a belief in God if you don't have it. You're not going to get elected without that dishonesty, so we can just forget about all the good people who don't lie about such things. They're not going to make it to the presidency. Not in the near future anyway. But you can't have it both ways. You're responsible for the position you avow, and the Prop 8 proponents did nothing wrong using his voice like that. 

"It would be hypocritical to pretend civility for one evening only to have the name-calling return the next day."

Rick Warren, cancelling the presidential forum that would have corresponded to the Saddleback Forum in 2008.

The sun rises on the Obama presidency... in Washington... here, from my outpost in Madison, Wisconsin, I'm live-blogging.

1:01: This ends the live-blogging of the inauguration. Thanks for hanging out with me this morning. Thanks for experiencing this Great Moment in History here on the blog.

1:00: I listened again to the oath. In fact, Roberts puts "faithfully" after "President of the United States" the first time as well as the second. And I've set up a separate post to discuss the great Oath Botch of 2009.

12:53: The Obamas walk the Bushes to the helicopter. There are warm gestures and embraces. I wish the address itself had shown similar respect to Mr. Bush.

12:37: The Chief Justice in fact screwed up the oath. The Constitution requires:

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

Roberts left out the word "faithfully." (He also said "President to the United States.") Obama saw the mistake and stopped himself to give Roberts a chance to fix it. Roberts redid the line, remembering to throw in "faithfully," but putting it in the wrong place — after "President of the United States" — and, this time, Obama went along with the wording. Close enough, I guess he figured. I wonder what Barack Obama was thinking. Maybe: Some textualist you turned out to be!

12:28: "Someone is stitching up a hem"... someone is inflicting poetry on us.

12:26: To my ear, the address wasn't particularly interesting or inspiring. It listed problems, promised solutions, and then went on about an icy stormy journey to freedom. Eh. Anyway, my big question is: Who screwed up the oath, Roberts or Obama? Did Roberts get the words wrong, then compound the error by trying to correct Obama when Obama had it right?

12:25: Here's a new post to talk about the address — which had a lot of storm imagery.

12:18: To the world he says: "We are ready to lead once more." That's an unbecoming attack on George Bush.

12:14: "We will harness the sun" = first comically grandiose statement of the new Prez.

12:11: The inaugural address begins on a strikingly sour note. We have so many problems. In the election we chose hope over "fear" — rather harsh toward John McCain. And now it's time to "put aside childish things." That is a Biblical reference, but in context, he seems to be calling the previous administration childish. Or is he referring to the partisan squabbles, in which case it's most properly a swipe at his own party?

12:05: "I, Barack Hussein Obama, do solemnly swear..." Obama inverts some words, and there's some incongruous flubbing of the oath around the placement of the word "faithfully."

12:03: Sasha is fidgeting. Me too. CNN does a closeup on a black man's face in the crowd. He almost has a tear in his eye. You know they were trying their best to get a black face with a nice photogenic tear.

12:02: Wolf Blitzer whispers over the music: "Barack Obama is now the President of the United States."

12:01: Ahem!

11:59: In fulfillment of the Constitution, the new President must be sworn in at noon. But first, Itzhak Perlman and Yo-Yo Ma must saw out some notes written by John Williams. Get on with it guys. I want the oath in the right minute.

11:57: Justice John Paul Stevens administers the oath of office to Joe Biden.

11:55: Aretha Franklin, in a historically fabulous gray hat with a giant, jeweled bow, belts out "My Country 'Tis of Thee." Bells chime.

11:49: Rick Warren is called to give the invocation. I hear a boo from the crowd. Warren's prayer tells us that God is One and that Martin Luther King Jr. "shouting in Heaven" because an African-American has been elected President. Warren asks for forgiveness and guidance. He asks that all join together for a more just nation and a peaceful world. He commits Obama and his family to God's care. And now, as "Jesus taught us to pray": the Lord's Prayer. (So I was wrong at 7:29.)

11:47: Dianne Feinstein: "the renewed call to greatness."

11:43: "Barack H. Obama" is announced to the crowd. A chant breaks out: "O-ba-ma O-ba-ma..."

11:39: Barack Obama, looking a bit as though he's in a trance, with a blissful smile on his face. The weight of the world is about to be laid on his shoulders. Who can imagine how that feels?

11:36: "Hail to the Chief" plays for President George Bush — for the last time.

11:33: George Bush looks happy.

11:26: On CNN, there's a lot of talk about the way Jill Biden told Oprah that Joe Biden was given his choice of Vice President or Secretary of State. So, Mr. Gaffe is married to his soul mate!

11:24: It's Malia and Sasha! Malia has a beautiful, very adult-looking royal blue coat with a black scarf. Sasha is wearing a hot pink coat with a bright orange scarf and an orange layer underneath. I love the way the 2 girls have completely different styles — Malia, ladylike, and Sasha, girlish. I picture a million little girls gravitating toward one style or the other. How many little girls who love pink will be adding bright orange accents now? How many will move on to the sophistication of dark blue and black?

11:19: The official announcer mispronounces "Rosalyn" — in a loud booming voice. George H.W. Bush says "It's cold out here."

11:14: The former Presidents arrive. George H.W. Bush walks haltingly. Jimmy and Rosalyn look pretty sprightly. Bill and Hillary! Hillary's got a royal blue coat — similar to her 1993 inaugural outfit — sans the conspicuous hat.

11:06: They really need some fashion commentators. There are all these fabulous clothes, and the journalists are fumbling, asking the women journalists to say something — as if ovaries pump information about fabrics and designers. Duh... it's yellow. On one channel, someone was saying he'd consulted "the makeup ladies" and they said Michelle's dress was "brocade" so they were going with that. Embarrassing, inane, and sexist. Get an expert.

11:02: The Supreme Court Justices file out onto the stands. Chief Justice John Roberts is squinting in the sunlight. There's a hot mike somewhere, and we hear Justice Scalia comment: "I never saw so many people." Breyer's wearing wraparound earmuffs. Sandra Day O'Connor is there too. Clarence Thomas looks happy. Think he voted for Obama?

10:51: Motorcade!

10:48: Oh! Dick Cheney is in a wheelchair. I'm sure he'll walk again. It'll look like this:

10:42: Ted Kennedy! He looks good — in a big black fedora and a baby blue scarf. He's one of various people we've seen gradually filling up the VIP section of the stands. 10:08: "A lot of white people. A lot of Asians. This is really a diverse crowd." The wisdom of Wolf Blitzer. But, hey, cool — isn't it? — that "a lot of white people" ends up as a comment on diversity. Still, silly to think that anyone could imagine that Obama's fan base is mainly black people. Hello? There aren't enough black people to make it to the presidency on your popularity with black people. 9:54: A choir is singing. A red carpet is laid down. Barack Obama and Michelle Obama emerge from The Beast. They encounter the Bushes. Michelle has a ribboned box. Has she brought a cake? I hope she brought an assortment! 9:50: Barack and Michelle emerge from the church. The blessings of God are upon them — as they crawl back into The Beast. The next stop is the White House, for coffee with George and Laura. David Gergen intones that — in their manner of handing off the White House — the Bushes have been "classy." The Beast pulls up to the portico. 9:31: CNN news flash: Barack Obama is a human being and the laws of nature have not been repealed. Don't count on 100% magic. 9:15: On Wisconsin Public Radio just now, they were getting some man-on-the-street opinion in Madison. One woman enthused that it was the greatest day in her life, and some guy said today is the "epitome" of his whole life. Then, they told us, not everyone is caught up in all this bubbly good feeling and interviewed a young man who groused that he wasn't convinced we are really going to get change. Yes, this is Madison, Wisconsin, where the people who are pissy about the inauguration are the big lefties. Welcome to my world! 8:48: It's Barack Obama! The camera has been aimed at a green canvas enclosure for so long and then suddenly: It's him! And Michelle, in a glittery sunshine yellow coated dress. They're on their way to church. Episcopal Church. They get into a car that we're told is called "The Beast." 8:38: What would all this feel like if it were the inauguration of John McCain? Of course, some people would be happy, but it would look somber, if not profoundly depressing, on television. 8:32: In the comments, Paul Zrimsek says: "I don't know why no one's been commenting on this, but apparently Obama plans to leave the Office of the President-elect vacant after he's inaugurated! Can democracy survive with a power vacuum at such a high level?" 8:28: In the comments, Palladian is contrasting the media coverage of this inauguration and the last one. Sample comment: "Enjoy the lefties farting red, white and blue flowers while it lasts. As soon as the the correct candidate loses again, the flags will furl and the bile will flow once again in this Dark Empire." 8:21: An experiment with biological/chemical weapon goes gruesomely awry for al Qaeda. Yes, laugh all you want and speculate about whether this will make al Qaeda fans think maybe God's not on their side, but this is a glimpse of what they mean to do to us. George Bush did whatever he did to protect us from those devils, and some people fail to appreciate it when nothing happens. To make this properly part of this inauguration live-blog, do I need to add some message to Obama? I think the message is too obvious to need stating. 8:01: Speaking of change: I've rearranged the entries in this post, in reverse chronological order. Suddenly, after all these years of live-blogging, the scrolling down to get to the new stuff is annoying me. Please enjoy and don't be confused by the new format. 7:57: On CNN, Bow Wow says "It's beautiful" and "We can make the world a better place" and "I'm living in history — something I can tell my kids." 7:41: "Breaking News: Crowds Arrive Early." That just rolled onto the screen with silly urgency. But the silliness factor is high with the "Fox and Friends" people. One of them just said, to incoming White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs: "You've got big high heels to fill" and "You will be the first administration in HD." See? Those 2 things make his job hard. He's replacing a woman — Dana Perino — and the camera is going to show his every pimple and wrinkle. I hadn't focused — not even with low definition — on the new press secretary. It's funny that with all the earnest diversity of the new administration, the man chosen as the President's face to the media looks like the guy central casting would send over if you asked for a typical white man. Is it okay to use the phrase "typical white man"? 7:29: "Warren Invocation: Will he use Jesus' name?" That's the topic of discussion on Fox News. I had the sound off, so I don't know what they were saying, but I'll give my answer. He will not. He will be generous and inclusive and use his own trademark theme: that God has a purpose for us all and that it is for us to discern God's purpose for us and fulfill it. Here are some religion and the inauguration questions from me: Do you think God has a purpose for Barack Obama? If so, is it because you think Obama is a special gift to America and the world or because you — like Rick Warren — think that God has a purpose for each of us? Do you think Barack Obama tries to understand God's purpose for him and to fulfill it? Do you think George Bush did? Do you want the President to think like that? Do you think it violates the Establishment Clause? 7:14: "My hope for him is my hope for the country. If he fails, the country fails. He knows and he says, 'Not me, but you. Not us, but all of us.' " I heard that a few moments ago on NPR's Morning edition. The quote is from Ella Mae Johnson, a 105-years-old black woman who's attending the inauguration. I noticed the kind inclusiveness of all her words. She said: "I have experienced some of the terrible things that happened to groups, to us and to others. There are people who believe because you were different, you were less than." 7:09: I'm doing the time stamps in Washington time, which is not my usual style, as a tribute to our beautiful young President. I'm switching around amongst the cable news channels. They're all doing continuous coverage of the inauguration — with shots of various glowing buildings in the dawn light — required rephrasing: the dawn's early light — and smiling people — waving a flag is the way to get a closeup on CNN. 7:06 Eastern Time: Everything is fresh and new — except the wars, the economic disaster, and so forth — and let's hope — buzzword: hope — it's going to be good.

Rick Warren loves everyone -- as his religion requires.

But he must also tell you -- again, as his religion requires -- that any sex outside of a marriage -- which must be defined as between a man and a woman -- is sinful.



It's the familiar love-the-sinner-hate-the-sin attitude, and heterosexual fornicators are sinning too. He doesn't acknowledge the problem that if gay persons can't marry, they can never have sex without sin. Some people like to say that gay persons can still marry someone of the opposite sex, but -- within this traditional religious way of thinking -- can that be done without sin? Wouldn't Warren have to say that it is a sin to marry someone that you do not fully love in the way that traditional marriage represents?

Grande Conservative Blogresss Diva 2009.

GayPatriot emails:

[W]e define a conservative blogress as a smart blogress who has earned the respect of gay men by expressing herself with eloquence and without kowtowing to the politically correct mavens of popular cultural and politics.

I don't think you have to be a gay man to vote, though. I'm one of the nominees along with 14 others, so choose wisely. This year, I'm not going to try to get a lot of people to vote for me. In fact, I think what I'll do is go to each blog and pick one representative sentence from the top few posts and quote it here. You could read these sentences, click to see who wrote it, and then go to the Gaypatriot poll and vote for that blogress -- that is don't vote for me.

"Yeah, those of us who call ourselves Christians say 'we believe.' But it’s one thing to 'believe' and quite another to 'surrender.' Believing is the easier of the two. But surrender is what makes us holy."

"I, of course, like to keep both sides equally pissed off, so I may ... eat a ham and cheese sandwich to warn the Islamo-Fascists not to mess with me. I may also, however, burn an American flag at the same time."

"Young people, immigrant, youth ......... by G-d these dhimmis turn themselves inside out to rephrase, retool, and obfuscate the truth. Muslims riot. Not immigrants, yoots, or 'young people.' Oh, the idiocy."

"The trash collectors serving my area sent a notice of the pickup schedule for 'holiday trees', so I mailed them a nasty letter. When did we become a nation of Grinches?"

"Just as is the Law of Gravity immutable, so is the Law of Giving. Of course, what we get back in return for our gift doesn’t always come in the form we expect, but this just proves that the Cosmos, in addition to having a set of Laws, also has a Sense of Humor. This can be quite hard on the humorless."

"What's actually romantic isn't committing to somebody because you see how lovable, sexy, and charming they can be, but because you find out how annoying, insufferable, and lacking in some basic table manner they are, and it's still not enough to chase you away."

"As we Jews face a bleak future with Islamic extremism and violence on the rise, we also face an enemy within, just as the Jews and their Maccabees fought in their own community back in the day. The Hellenists were Jews who wanted to forsake Judaism for the secularism of the Greeks. Today, those same Jews are the ones who've forsaken Judaism for liberalism. They're the ones who voted for Barack Obama, the ones who continue to pander and 'outreach' to our avowed enemies in the Islamic community. I've written about so many of them on this site over the years, and their names need not be mentioned on this holiday. We know who they are. And their views must be crushed, just as the Maccabees crushed Jewish Hellenism."

"No matter what anyone’s feelings are right now for Bush after the auto bailout he announced Friday, there’s no denying that this is as shoddy a piece of 'journalism' as can be found on the pages of the NYT, as they ignore the significant contributions of Christopher Dodd, Barney Frank, PEBO (President-elect Barack Obama), Franklin Raines, and other prominent Democrats/Democrat-friendly industry fat cats to the mortgage/lending industry collapse."

"Amy Winehouse appears to be winning her battle against drugs as she looked the picture of health during a winter break in the sun."

"I can't think of another evangelical leader who would have the gumption to call attacks upon him 'incendiary hate speech.' White evangelicals are by definition incapable of being oppressed, according to the liberal definition. They are the haters; hatred is justified. They are not inclusive; exclusion is justified. [Rick] Warren challenges that idea. After years of acquaintance with his liberal critics, Warren is not afraid to shame them with their own language."

"If your primal instinct isn’t to scoop up that puppy, cuddle him, and whisper to him don’t be angry, puppy, and then swallow him whole, then I don’t think we have much to talk about anymore. We’ve grown apart."

"As another GSA official who facilitated the convenient change in policy regarding change.gov exulted to the Obama campaign after the domain was granted, 'Rock and roll!'"

"I've been around a long time. I've been incarnating in this realm for so many aeons I call both gods and demons 'Sonny.' Yet even I don't know the answer to such questions. And I can't ever know, for to know while incarnate would mean I'm not subject to any human limitations."

"Oh, and A Christmas Story? One of the few things Arnie and I disagree on. I simply cannot bear it: all those bratty, bullying, yelling little boys running around getting in trouble instead of just behaving (just like that Hope and Glory movie about the English boy during the Blitz: son, there's a war on -- can't you be quiet instead of playing in other people's rubble? There is nothing fun about this situation. God.); that wimpy whiny mother, and that horrible horrible father with the goddamn lamp who I spend the running time daydreaming about murdering in his sleep. Would the lamp fit down his throat? Just the foot, maybe? Hard to say..."

IN THE COMMENTS: Meade proposes a new contest:

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Christopher Hitchens has a few more problems with Rick Warren as the inauguration prayer-leader.

He asked:

Will Warren be invited to the solemn ceremony of inauguration without being asked to repudiate what he has directly said to deny salvation to Jews?

Will he be giving a national invocation without disowning what his mentor said about civil rights and what his leading supporter says about Mormons?

Will the American people be prayed into the next administration, which will be confronted by a possible nuclear Iran and an already nuclear Pakistan, by a half-educated pulpit-pounder raised in the belief that the Armageddon solution is one to be anticipated with positive glee?

As Barack Obama is gradually learning, his job is to be the president of all Americans at all times. If he likes, he can oppose the idea of marriage for Americans who are homosexual. That's a policy question on which people may and will disagree. However, the man he has chosen to deliver his inaugural invocation is a relentless clerical businessman who raises money on the proposition that certain Americans—non-Christians, the wrong kind of Christians, homosexuals, nonbelievers—are of less worth and littler virtue than his own lovely flock of redeemed and salvaged and paid-up donors.

So who should do the invocation -- assuming we must have an invocation? "[L]et it be some dignified old hypocrite with no factional allegiance."

What Hitchens would prefer, it seems, is what Justice William Brennan called "ceremonial deism":

[G]overnment cannot be completely prohibited from recognizing in its public actions the religious beliefs and practices of the American people as an aspect of our national history and culture. While I remain uncertain about these questions, I would suggest that such practices as the designation of "In God We Trust" as our national motto, or the references to God contained in the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag can best be understood, in Dean Rostow's apt phrase, as a form a "ceremonial deism," protected from Establishment Clause scrutiny chiefly because they have lost through rote repetition any significant religious content. Moreover, these references are uniquely suited to serve such wholly secular purposes as solemnizing public occasions, or inspiring commitment to meet some national challenge in a manner that simply could not be fully served in our culture if government were limited to purely nonreligious phrases. The practices by which the government has long acknowledged religion are therefore probably necessary to serve certain secular functions, and that necessity, coupled with their long history, gives those practices an essentially secular meaning.

More recently, Justice O'Connor wrote:

Given the values that the Establishment Clause was meant to serve, ... I believe that government can, in a discrete category of cases, acknowledge or refer to the divine without offending the Constitution. This category of “ceremonial deism” most clearly encompasses such things as the national motto (“In God We Trust”), religious references in traditional patriotic songs such as the Star-Spangled Banner, and the words with which the Marshal of this Court opens each of its sessions (“God save the United States and this honorable Court”). These references are not minor trespasses upon the Establishment Clause to which I turn a blind eye. Instead, their history, character, and context prevent them from being constitutional violations at all.

In my Religion & the Constitution class, I like to say that no one believes in ceremonial deism. It's no one's religion, just a mode of using religion in the public setting. And yet, if anyone is a ceremonial deist, I'd say that person is Barack Obama. I air my suspicion -- and praise that religion of no religion -- here:

Long "in the comments" update...

... on last night's Obama-and-Rick-Warren post. You can start a new comment on the comments thread here.

ADDED: And Jack Hawkins collects some leftosphere reactions to the Obama's choice.

So Obama has chosen Rick Warren to give the invocation at the inauguration ceremony.

How interesting! A clever choice. It made me go back to my notes on the Saddleback Forum, the hour-long interviews that Obama and McCain gave to Rick Warren back in August. I liked Warren's style and thought Obama had a good little talk with him. Obama obviously has a problem going back to his own spiritual mentors, and this is a good chance to show some warmth to the Christian evangelicals that he offended with his unfortunate remark about bitter Americans clinging to religion.

Andrew Sullivan says "Ugh":

Warren is a man who believes my marriage removes his freedom of speech and cannot say that authorizing torture is a moral failing. Shrewd politics, but if anyone is under any illusion that Obama is interested in advancing gay equality, they should probably sober up now. He won't be as bad as the Clintons (who, among leading Democrats, could?), but pandering to Christianists at his inauguration is a depressing omen. More evidence that a civil rights movement needs to realize that no politician can deliver for us what we have to deliver on our own.

Who needs omens when Obama was always clear that he opposed same-sex marriage? He said so every time he was asked. It's funny that Sullivan is telling other people to "sober up," when he was the one who was most unsober about Obama during the campaign season.

ADDED: "The rapid, angry reaction from a range of gay activists comes as the gay rights movement looks for an opportunity to flex its political muscle."

IN THE COMMENTS: Blake challenges me:

Wait, didn't Althouse also take similar stances as Sullivan? Not on gay marriage, but in terms of him saying one thing and meaning the exact opposite?

Am I misremembering?

I respond:

Blake, I wrote [the day after the forum]: "Obama garbled: "The reason that people believe there needs to be a constitutional amendment, some people believe, is because, uh, of the concern that, uh, uh, about same-sex marriage. I'm not somebody who's [sic] promotes same-sec [sic] marriage, but I do believe in civil unions. I do believe that we should not, um, that that for a gay partners [sic] to want to visit each other in the hospital, for the state to say, you know what, that's all right, I don't think in any way inhibits my core beliefs about what marriage are [sic]." I think all those little glitches, especially the glaring grammatical error "what marriage are," strongly suggest that he is hiding what he really thinks."

I thought about that when I wrote this post, but I think that privately Obama supports gay marriage, but as a political leader, he has chosen to take the more moderate position. I think he was lying about his "core beliefs" there, but I think he was telling us his official answer as he has consistently.

Now, I do understand why people who put gay rights first detest the symbolism of picking Warren. But who do they think he should have picked instead?

Now, here's why I'm not on the same page as Sullivan:

1. Though I voted for Obama, I didn't fall in love with him. Throughout the campaign season, I looked at him with a critical eye and often thought he was playing us. I was never set up for disillusionment.

2. I thought and continue to think that Obama is reasonably compassionate toward gay people, but that he's coolly practical about amassing and preserving his own political power. He has remained the same. I'm sure he'd be all for gay rights if he'd become a law professor, but he's got a more complex task at hand, and I respect that.

3. I think same-sex marriage is far down on the list of issues for the President to concern himself with and think gay people, like everyone else, need to be realistic about where politicians should be investing their political capital.

4. I reject the hostility that Sullivan shows toward "Christianists" who hold traditional values that he wishes would change. They are an important part of our culture, and Obama needs to relate to them in a positive way.

5. I don't believe the image of the angry, spiteful gay is helpful to the gay rights cause.

Back to the comments. Blake responds:

Yes, perhaps that's what I was thinking of.

I seem to recall other occasions -- non-gay marriage related -- where Obama said one thing and you were of the idea that he felt the opposite.

I'm not trying for a "gotcha" or anything. McCain may have been saying what he actually felt, but you never knew how he was gonna feel the next moment.

Definitely. I think the public Obama persona is an elaborate creation -- an impressive one. I try to imagine what the real Obama is like. For example, as I've said many times, I don't think Obama is religious (and that's why he's able to use religious rhetoric well).

Freeman Hunt says:

Where does the belief come from that Obama secretly supports gay marriage? Just a guess? Based on what? I'd be more likely to believe that he doesn't care in the slightest about gay marriage or any other gay issue. I bet such things barely register as blips on his mental radar, and that when they do register, it's only insofar as he has to handle such issues delicately in politics due to conflicting constituencies.

I tend to assume he's like all the liberal lawprofs I know, but I concede that these people may be chameleons. They are seeking power and prestige in their domain. (Why won't I say "our domain"?) But you have a point.

Peter Hoh says:

Though it's not perfectly apt for this situation, I'm reminded of Megan McArdle's First Rule of Politics:

small groups get favors from the politicians they support only to the extent that it does not annoy large groups who voted for those politicians.

I think he's still worth reading, but Andy's getting too worked up over this. Calm and steady wins the race. He admired that in Obama. He should take the same approach with regard to the effort to recognize same-sex marriage.

Yeah.

Palladian writes:

[Quoting Zachary Paul Sire:] "Inviting 'Rick' is not a slap in the face to gays as much as it is a disingenuous olive branch to evangelicals. And they're falling for it!"

So your candidate is a liar and a phony who makes false statements about his religious beliefs in order to garner political support? Classy!

"Obama is all about trying to please everyone with gestures and concessions."

Again, you admit that your candidate is a big phony, a big panderer and a big ass-kisser?

"Until he actually starts enacting policies and putting forth his specific agenda, no one should be freaking out."

So when this mythical policy-enacting phase begins, he'll eschew all these lies about religion and beliefs and his true, godless socialist qualities will shine forth?

"And let's be honest. Warren is, as everyone knows, a tool."

Wait, you just admitted that your candidate is a liar and a phony and only says things for political expediency and you're calling Rick Warren a tool? What makes you think you aren't the tool that Obama is using, my little salami-smoker? [NOTE: Both Zachary and Palladian are gay and have been talking to each other in such terms here for a long time. (Titus too.)]

"We should be proud of Obama for using him as well as he is."

We should be proud of Obama for lying about his beliefs and being too ashamed and afraid to admit his true beliefs and feelings about gay rights? So lying and slinking around in the shadows is now a point of pride? Wow. Furl your rainbow flags everyone! Gay pride now means hiding your true feelings and lying your way into high office!

"If this endears another couple hundred thousand evangelicals to Obama, and thus helps him out in 2012, then that's fine by me."

It's fine by you that Obama is lying, just because you think this will give him some political advantage in the next election, even though you don't actually know what he's going to do or whether you'll actually want him to be re-elected? Lying and selling out my true beliefs and double-crossing my countrymen for political gain is admirable? Wow. Reminds me why I don't belong to a political party. I'd rather be a loser than sell my soul to win.

"Trust me, Obama doesn't give a fuck about Rick Warren."

Wow, how admirable a quality in a President! He selects someone who he "doesn't give a fuck about" to give the invocation at his inauguration! Why that kind of cynicism sounds like CHANGE I CAN BELIEVE IN!

Zachary Paul Sire responds to Palladian:

So when this mythical policy-enacting phase begins, he'll eschew all these lies about religion and beliefs and his true, godless socialist qualities will shine forth?

One can HOPE!

Lying and selling out my true beliefs and double-crossing my countrymen...blah blah blah

You can drop the naive act. As if you, or anyone, ever believed that any politician in modern history didn't lie or mask their true intentions to get elected. Spare me the drama.

I have my suspicions of what he'll do (lead an incredibly balanced, pragmatic administration without ruffling anyone's feathers), and until I'm proven otherwise, I make no judgments about the man "selling out beliefs."

He's playing a game that all of them sign up for, not committing moral suicide.

Palladian says:

"He's playing a game that all of them sign up for, not committing moral suicide."

I don't trust the character judgments of those that are already morally dead.

Zachary Paul Sire says:

I love that Sullivan failed to mention how Rev. Joe Lowery, co-founder of the SCLC and a same-sex marriage supporter, is also on the bill for inauguration day, overseeing the benediction. I guess acknowledging that balance would've undercut his blog post and made his whining look even more childish than it already is (if that's possible).

Titus says:

I am a gay and I don't give a shit if Rick Warren gives the invocation.

How's that for the how some in the gay mafia feel?

None of my gay mafia friends give a shit either.

Now if it was Pat Boone I may feel a little bad... but still wouldn't give a shit.

Rick Warren is physically very repulsive though and for that I do feel bad. I hate seeing a fat man.

He is too fat. He has no chin and he thinks he is funny.

Well, you know, Obama used to be fat. Now, he makes a huge point of keeping rail thin.

I play the race card on Obama for all but playing the race card on Clarence Thomas.

"Why are we talking about why one black man is smarter than another black man?"

As this clip begins, I'm saying I'm impressed by the way Rick Warren framed questions at the Saddleback Civil Forum:



IN THE COMMENTS: Amba makes a prime witticism: "Obama threw Clarence Thomas under the back of the bus."

What did Rick Warren have in mind when he asked does evil exist and what do we do about it?

A segment from my new Bloggingheads with Bob Wright is almost all about evil (but look at the tags to get an idea of the subjects covered):

Barack Obama on the Born Alive Infant Protection Act.

Let's start with the video, in which Obama gets mad, calls people liars, and insists that this is the kind of politics we need to get beyond:



Now, I think his anger is not helpful to his case. He's been asked a civil question by Rick Warren — this is just after the Saddleback Forum — and has an opportunity to reach the very people who are being stirred up by those who are going around saying he voted in favor of infanticide. He should have explained clearly why the Born Alive Infant Protection Act was not what his opponents say it was. I can understand why he's angry at those who present it in a form that makes him look monstrous, but the only workable remedy is to convince us to believe his interpretation of the law — and at least to teach us exactly what it was. He was a law professor. He should be able to bring us along so we can all understand.

In this video clip, all he does is vouch for his own interpretation and demand that we accept it. This is like the way he insists that we not "question his patriotism" when what we're doing — some of us — is trying to learn about and process some things we have questions about. It's delusional to think that millions of people will obey a command to put this behind us. We want to know the details of his relationship with former terrorist Bill Ayers. We want to know the details of the text of the Born Alive Infant Protection Act and the politics that surrounded it. The campaign season, for many Americans, is just getting started. It won't do to get pissed off and say that you've already explained this and we need to move on. Move on to what? These are the questions that concern us! And you won't deign to answer.

Obama supporters like to label John McCain McSame, but right now, it's Obama who is reminding me of George Bush. George Bush's greatest failing was his refusal or inability to explain why his judgment was sound and to continually persuade us that the course he had chosen was best. He seemed sure he was right and a little annoyed that we didn't understand it yet. Couldn't we just trust him and stop all this needless questioning? I'm thinking: not "McSame," Obushma.

***

I went looking for an accurate explanation of Obama's position on the Born Alive law. There's nothing on abortion on the much-touted "Fight the Smears" page of his website. Starting at the front page, I find the "issues" drop-down menu and go to "Women for Obama Issues" to find his material on abortion. There is a brief note of his support for abortion rights. The only outreach to abortion opponents is the line: "Barack Obama understands that abortion is a divisive issue, and respects those who disagree with him."

Google "Born Alive Infant Protection Act," and you mainly get links to the kinds of writings that Obama is angry about. This isn't surprising since his supporters are not so likely to use the term Born Alive Infant Protection Act when they write about it. Yet this is the natural search term to use if you want to learn more, and it's the search term that people he needs to persuade will use.

Here's a recent news article from the Catholic News Agency that, I think a lot of pro-lifers would find and read with trust:

Sen. Barack Obama has repeatedly insisted that he opposed the passage of an Illinois law that would protect infants who survive an abortion on the grounds that it lacked a “neutrality clause.” However, Obama’s explanation was undermined when the National Right to Life Committee revealed “smoking gun” evidence showing that a neutrality clause had in fact been added to the Illinois bill by the same Obama-chaired state Senate committee which quickly voted down the amended bill.

National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) spokesman Douglas Johnson summarized the revelations, saying:

“Newly obtained documents prove that in 2003, Barack Obama, as chairman of an Illinois state Senate committee, voted down a bill to protect live-born survivors of abortion -- even after the panel had amended the bill to contain verbatim language, copied from a federal bill passed by Congress without objection in 2002, explicitly foreclosing any impact on abortion.

“Obama's legislative actions in 2003 -- denying effective protection even to babies born alive during abortions -- were contrary to the position taken on the same language by even the most liberal members of Congress. The bill Obama killed was virtually identical to the federal bill that even NARAL ultimately did not oppose.”

The federal Born-Alive Infants Protection Act (BAIPA) was first introduced into Congress in 2000. A two-paragraph bill, it was intended to clarify that any baby who is entirely expelled from his or her mother and shows any signs of life is to be regarded as a legal person for all purposes of federal law, whether or not the baby was born during an attempted abortion.

A “neutrality clause” was added to state explicitly that the bill expressed no judgment about the legal status of a human being prior to birth.

“Nothing in this section shall be construed to affirm, deny, expand, or contract any legal status or legal right applicable to any member of the species homo sapiens at any point prior to being ‘born alive’ as defined in this section,” it read.

The bill passed Congress in 2002 without any dissenting votes and was enacted in August of that year.

As a member of the Illinois State Senate, Barack Obama opposed a state version of BAIPA in three successive regular legislative sessions. Even after the pro-abortion group NARAL withdrew its opposition, Obama reportedly continued to oppose the bill, which did not pass the Illinois Senate until 2005, after Obama had left that legislative body.

During his 2004 U.S. Senate campaign, Obama’s Republican opponent charged Obama with supporting “infanticide” for opposing the bill, which charge Obama countered by claiming the proposed Illinois law substantially differed from the federal version of BAIPA.

According to an October 4, 2004 article in the Chicago Tribune, “Obama said that had he been in the U.S. Senate two years ago, he would have voted for the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act, even though he voted against a state version of the proposal. The federal version was approved; the state version was not. …The difference between the state and federal versions, Obama explained, was that the state measure lacked the federal language clarifying that the act would not be used to undermine Roe vs. Wade, the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court opinion that legalized abortion.”

However, the NRLC claims that newly obtained documents “demonstrate conclusively” that Obama’s defense is based on a “brazen factual misrepresentation.”

"Brazen factual misrepresentation" is a polite way to say lying. Barack Obama's answer is no, you're lying. And somehow, we're supposed to see him as representative of a new, harmonious kind of politics.

So let's read Dana Goldstein in Tapped. This is a strong attempt to defend Obama's position, published yesterday:

Today the New York Times weighs in with a piece parsing the language of the two separate "born alive" bills that Obama opposed in the Illinois state senate: The first, which NARAL did not oppose and which has a federal antecedent, would have defined as a "child" any fetus "born alive" during either a birth or abortion, making it a crime for doctors to withhold medical care from such babies, regardless of their eventual viability outside of the womb. The second bill would have allowed legal action against hospitals, doctors, and nurses that did not provide such care, and is the one pro-choice groups were more concerned about. They worried it would create a climate of fear in which practitioners would not perform abortions or complicated births because of the legal risks.

... Undoubtedly, NARAL made a smart political move when it decided not to oppose BAIPA; nobody wants to be painted as the cold-hearted group or individual who opposes life-saving interventions for babies. But if you're scratching your head about the intent of these bills -- wouldn't any doctor be compelled to save the life of any baby? are fetuses really "born alive" during abortions? -- you're not alone. It's worth going into some detail to clarify how BAIPA operates as a classic anti-choice strategy, distorting the very nature of abortion in order to horrify the public and erode support for choice.

In order for a fetus to be "born alive" during an abortion, that fetus would have to be removed from the womb relatively intact. But 90 percent of abortions are performed through aspiration (usually in the first 16 weeks of pregnancy), in which a surgical vacuum is used to empty out a woman's uterus. The vast majority of the remaining 10 percent of abortions consist of dilation and evacuation, which is usually performed after 16 weeks of pregnancy, often when a woman's health or life is at risk. Under that procedure, the aspiration process is sometimes preceded by an injection into the abdomen that ensures fetal demise.

The kind of abortion BAIPA really targets is so-called "partial birth abortion," or dilation and extraction, which accounts for less than one-fifth of one percent of all American abortions. It is used most often to end wanted pregnancies in which expectant parents learn their baby will not be viable outside of the womb. During the operation, the fetus' skull is collapsed inside of the woman, after which labor is induced and she delivers the fetus. Difficult stuff, and not a procedure any woman or doctor undergoes lightly or happily. That's why so few of these operations take place each year. But here the fetus is removed intact. Under BAIPA, this would open up doctors and nurses performing dilation and extraction to accusations of delivering "live" babies. It would be almost impossible to make such a claim when the result of an abortion is an aspirated mass of blood and tissue.

What is BAIPA? It's not a bill about babies at all -- doctors are already required to save babies' lives, and any ethical doctor would do so. BAIPA is a bill meant to reshape the language we use to talk about abortion and mislead the public about the possible outcomes of typical abortion procedures.

Maybe Obama thinks that any discussion of the details will only make it worse. Goldstein's explanation prompts follow-up questions. "So few"? But how many? "Any ethical doctor would do so"? But why can't we criminalize the behavior that is unethical? We don't say there should be no laws about murder because it's already unethical to commit murder. Now, I understand that the point is that hospital personnel don't want to have to live under the threat of criminal prosecution and that may be reason enough to vote against the law, but why can't Obama find a way to say it persuasively or at least well enough to fend off the uglier accusations?

***

Proofreading this post, I suddenly hear the resonance with "How Kerry Lost Me":

Six days later, I got irked at him for the first time, for saying "You're not listening" to a man who wanted to know what his position on Iraq was. Back then, Kerry was saying things like "We shouldn't only be tough, we have to be smart. And there's a smarter way to accomplish this mission than this president is pursuing." My question was: "If you still don't know what he would do differently from Bush, do you deserve to be snapped at for 'not listening'?" I've linked back to this old post of mine a number of times, because I never forgot that he got testy and accused a man of not listening, when in fact Kerry had never expressed himself clearly about what he would do in Iraq. I had been willing to wait a long time for a clear answer, yet here he was criticizing us for not having heard his answer yet. All I had heard was "smarter way," which just seemed like a placekeeper for a plan to be submitted later.

Don't get mad at us for not already knowing the answers! Explain it. Even if you've explained it before. In Kerry's case, I felt that he was pretending he'd already explained it because he had no explanation or because if he said what he really thought, we'd object on the merits.

And now, I notice that I've already written a post called "Obama echoes the phrase that made me turn against Kerry." I was reacting to a news article "Obama Says His Critics Haven’t Been Listening."

Come on, Obama. You've got a long way to go. And if you get elected, it's even longer. If you want to be President, abandon the dream of getting past our endless questioning and onto peaceful, happy harmony time.

"Despite Assurances, McCain Wasn’t in a 'Cone of Silence.'"

Says the NYT. McCain wasn't enclosed in a soundproof room when Rick Warren began asking Obama the questions he would later ask McCain. He was on his way to the forum. So what does this mean?

If McCain was not held in an isolation chamber at Saddleback....
	McCain cheated.
	Don't you dare say anything like this about a man who was held in isolation in a cell in Vietnam.
	McCain a busy man, he was still en route, and he probably honorably declined to listen.
	The Obama campaign has started this meme to distract us from Obama's bad performance.
	Maybe McCain listened to the questions, but I don't care, it wouldn't have helped that much.
	We don't know if McCain "cheated," but the accusation of cheating is worse anyway, so Obama loses.
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Bill Kristol on the Saddleback Forum.

He makes 3 points:

1. Rick Warren was great:

Warren’s queries were simple but probing. He was fair to both candidates, his manner was relaxed but serious, and he neither went for “gotcha” questions nor pulled his punches. And his procedure of asking virtually identical questions to each candidate during his turn on stage paid off. It allowed us to see the two giving revealingly different answers to the same question.

I agree. I can't think of anyone I've seen do a better job of probing prospective Presidents. He did a brilliant job of demonstrating the way and the extent to which religion belongs in politics. If Warren is to be the new face of Christian evangelism in America, we are experiencing a great advance.

2. McCain won.

Obama made no big mistakes. But his tendency to somewhat windy generalities meant he wasn’t particularly compelling. McCain, who went second, was crisp by contrast, and his anecdotes colorful.

I agree that McCain was crisp. McCain kept launching anecdotes, which ought to have made him seem windy too, but they were such good anecdotes, he kept them very short, and he acted like he thought it was stretching the format to include them, so I never got the feeling that he was padding and running out the clock.

But I think Obama was good too. He does tend to drift about abstractly, but he seems to be thinking out loud, and this often makes him seem real and compelling. Sometimes, such as when he talked about same-sex marriage, we think we can see him dissembling. Now, you might think it would be great to have a President whose dissembling shows, but he's going to have to engage in world diplomacy on our behalf.

Kristol bolsters his opinion that McCain won by pointing to Andrea Mitchell on “Meet the Press,” who said “the Obama people must feel that he didn’t do quite as well as they might have wanted to in that context. ... What they’re putting out privately is that McCain ... may have had some ability to overhear what the questions were to Obama.” Ha ha. Thanks to Andrea Mitchell for revealing that the campaign is prompting the press to take that line.

3. Obama and McCain "have different 'worldviews'":

Obama said ... “Now, the one thing that I think is very important is for us to have some humility” as we confront evil. Why? Because “a lot of evil has been perpetrated based on the claim that we were trying to confront evil.” After all, “just because we think our intentions are good doesn’t always mean that we’re going to be doing good.”...

But here as elsewhere, Obama stayed at a high level of abstraction. It would have been interesting if Warren had asked a follow-up question: Where in particular has the United States in recent years — at home or especially abroad — perpetrated evil in the name of confronting evil? Hasn’t the overwhelming problem been, rather, a reluctance to effectively confront evil — in Darfur, or Rwanda, or pre-9/11 Afghanistan?

John McCain appears to think so. Unlike Obama, he took the question about evil to be in the first instance about 9/11. McCain asserted that “of course evil must be defeated,” and he put “radical Islamic extremism,” Al Qaeda in particular, at the top of his to-defeat list. In this context, McCain discussed the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and concluded by mentioning “the young men and women who are serving this nation in uniform.”

They were different in response to the question about whether evil exists and, if so, what we ought to do about it. We all know McCain thinks much more readily of the military and that he'll doggedly go for victory once we've engaged. Obama, by contrast, tends to mull over America's failings. There were many other differences on display at the forum. Compare their answers on abortion and their efforts to put a number on "rich." It's this displaying of differences that matters far more than any conclusions about who won.

6 things I noticed when I rewatched the Saddleback Civil Forum.

1. It was called the Saddleback Civil Forum, and Rick Warren stressed the importance of the word civil, which for him, connotes politeness and respect. I'm sure I blinded myself to the word last night because, being a lawprof, when I see civil, I think: not criminal.

2. When Warren asked Obama to name the 3 individuals he'd consult most often, Obama began by excluding Warren, Warren then said "and your wife," reflecting an assumption that, of course, Obama wouldn't use the question to pay his respects to his wife, but Obama proceeded to name his wife.

3. After naming his wife and his grandmother, Obama went on to actual political advisors, and the first person he named was Sam Nunn — suggesting possibly that Sam Nunn could be his VP choice.

4. Obama garbled: "The reason that people believe there needs to be a constitutional amendment, some people believe, is because, uh, of the concern that, uh, uh, about same-sex marriage. I'm not somebody who's [sic] promotes same-sec [sic] marriage, but I do believe in civil unions. I do believe that we should not, um, that that for a gay partners [sic] to want to visit each other in the hospital, for the state to say, you know what, that's all right, I don't think in any way inhibits my core beliefs about what marriage are [sic]." I think all those little glitches, especially the glaring grammatical error "what marriage are," strongly suggest that he is hiding what he really thinks.

5. Asked about evil, McCain immediately and only talked about al Qaeda, but what came to mind for Obama? 3 things, in this order: Darfur, violence on the streets of our cities, and parents abusing their children.

6. By implication, Obama said that Clarence Thomas wasn't smart enough to sit on the Supreme Court. He says he wouldn't have nominated Thomas because he wasn't qualified and he also disagrees with his constitutional interpretation. Then he says he also wouldn't have appointed Scalia, but there's "no doubt about his brilliance... he's clearly smart." Add it up.

Asked at the Saddleback Forum "when does a[n unborn] baby get human rights," why did Obama say the answer is "above my pay grade"?

Roger Kimball finds Obama's "above my pay grade" feint on abortion "insulting and mendacious."

It is insulting because it ostentatiously evades the question while giving a little wink to his home team: “Oh, these religious morons and their obsession with abortion! Of course, I could care less about it, but I also know it’s impolitic to say so, so I’ll emit a brief rhetoric fog and hope no one will notice.” And it’s mendacious because when it comes to “pay grades,” no one’s is higher than the President’s.

"Above my pay grade" does seem like an awful expression in this context. It made a bad impression on me when I heard it last night. (I said it sounded "cold.") But thinking about it this morning, I'm pretty sure he meant to refer to God.

"Above my pay grade" is an expression of humility and submission to God: I don't purport to answer the question that belongs to God. He's trying to be folksy, coining a phrase akin to "the man upstairs." When someone says "the man upstairs," you don't start railing about how we're on the top floor, but that's because we know we're dealing with a folksy expression. People are too touchy on the subject of abortion to process the less common "above my pay grade" as an expression.

Obama may have thought that, in a church, talking to a pastor, with religion hovering around every question, listeners would understand that he was putting himself beneath God. But I didn't pick that up last night, Roger Kimball isn't picking it up, and, scanning the articles on the subject this morning, I'd say almost no one heard it as a religious statement, so we must judge "above my pay grade" as a rhetorical misfire. But we shouldn't say it's "insulting and mendacious."

***

Now, let's also look at Rick Warren's rhetoric. He asked, after a preface about abortion, "when does a baby get human rights in your view?" And, most obviously, his use of "baby" instead of "fetus" or at least "unborn baby" conveys a lot of opinion. But look at what else Warren is doing. He is not asking when does life begin?, a question that is much more susceptible to Obama's answer that only God knows. Warren is asking when do rights begin? That makes it a legal question. And Warren even appends the phrase "in your view."

So Obama's answer — that it's not for him to say — is inapt. Obama answered the question he expected to hear. But Warren had the wit to frame the question in terms of a legal opinion that Obama was fully equipped to give. When does the baby have legal rights?

And we know Obama's answer to that question, don't we? I think his answer is: When it is completely outside of the mother's body. Is it any more subtle than that? If it is, it's not much more subtle, and it's no wonder Obama chose not to answer the question asked.

ADDED: Rick Warren is asked whether the "above my pay grade" answer was good enough:

No. I think he needed to be more specific on that. I happen to disagree with Barack on that. Like I said, he's a friend. But to me, I would not want to die and get before God one day and go, 'Oh, sorry, I didn't take the time to figure out' because if I was wrong then it had severe implications to my leadership if I had the ability to do something about it. He should either say, 'No scientifically, I do not believe it's a human being until X' or whatever it is or to say, 'Yes, I believe it is a human being at X point,' whether it's conception or anything else. But to just say 'I don't know' on the most divisive issue in America is not a clear enough answer for me.

Some reactions to the Saddleback Forum.

My live-blog post on the Saddleback Forum has almost 200 comments, and after 200 comments, they get a little hard to read. (You have to click on "post a comment," then scroll to the bottom and click "newer.") So let me start a new post.

For substance, I'll point to Andrew Sullivan's live-blogging at the end of the McCain part:

9.57 pm. McCain's evolution into a candidate who knows how to stroke the Christianist base is somewhat impressive. It was a little canned at times, but it will work with evangelicals. All in all, this struck me as pretty much a draw....

And here's a segment of the Obama part:

8.42 pm. ... So far, this is a masterful performance. Having watched nothing but ads and soundbites and speeches for the past few weeks, I'd forgotten a little bit what a class act he can be.

8.34 pm. What a great moment in the history of race relations that a black presidential candidate can say that he would not have nominated Clarence Thomas - because he wasn't qualified enough!

Here's what Glenn Reynolds said about that:

OBAMA JUST SAID CLARENCE THOMAS DIDN'T HAVE ENOUGH EXPERIENCE TO SERVE ON THE COURT: Kinda ironic, huh?

Allahpundit notes that he didn't complete the word "experience" and has the video:



So Obama had the wit to perceive the irony and squelch it.

It seems that disrespecting Clarence Thomas is going to be getting a lot of attention.

Let's check out FireDogLake:

... So far, Obama's won the night.

And let me add -- I fucking hate Rick Warren....

Most annoying to me, McSame refused to define what rich is and what middle class is. Warren asked this for a reason, and McSame weaseled it. Obama, who gave a very direct answer, looked like the straight-talker.

Obama wins the night, by a big margin.

Strange emotional venting. Seems to me that they both fudged the meaning of rich, and that the definition is not such a big deal.

ADDED: In fairness to FireDogLake, I think the line "I fucking hate Rick Warren" is probably meant as a wisecrack in response to his repeated calls for civility and as such, I find it amusing. If it's the usual random spew, then it's not funny.

MORE: Power Line reads the transcripts and likens Obama to Jimmy Carter.

Let's watch the Saddleback Presidential Forum together.

Saddle up!

7:00 CT: CNN's John King pauses to let other networks join, and when he does, we can hear a voice saying "God who gave us life, gave us..." King drowns that out with the info that this "is not a debate... but the candidates will be questioned about their faith... about their compassion..." Bizarre.

7:01: Rick Warren tells us "we believe in the separation of church and state" but not "the separation of religion and politics." [CORRECTION FROM THE TRANSCRIPT: "... we do not believe in the separation of faith and politics..."] A coin was flipped and Barack Obama is going first, so John McCain will be kept "in a cone of silence." Warren wants us to disagree without demonizing each other and to restore civility to our political discourse. Now, here's Obama, with an open collar and no tie, and he hugs Warren, then finds his way over to the desk for the interview. [ADDED: Warren is also tieless.]

7:04: Warren wants to know who are the 3 wisest people he's known in his life [ADDED: to whom he will turn for advice]. First: Michelle. She can "get up in [his] face." Second: His grandmother. (Hauling her out from under that bus.) Grounded. Common sense. Third... No, now he's talking about political advisors, and he's not going with rankings anymore. He wants "a table where a lot of different points of view are represented."

7:07: Asked about his own failures, Obama talks about his troubled youth: drugs, drinking, "I couldn't focus on other people." But growing up, he realized "it's not all about me." Failure comes when he's selfish and doesn't think about "God's work." America's failure comes when we "don't abide by that basic precept in Matthew, that whatever you do for the least of my brothers, you do for me." For the uninitiated: the "me" is Jesus, but he's quoting, people, so please don't say he's talking like the Messiah.

7:09: Obama looked overpowdered and unnatural when he came out. (Except his ears, which looked shiny.) But he's sweating a little now, so he looks more normal. The Hawaiian tan is becoming.

7:11: Asked about "flip-flopping"/changing his mind, Obama talks about welfare reform, which worried him back when Bill Clinton signed it into law. But it worked better than he'd thought. "We have to have work as a centerpiece of any social policy." I think he sounds lucid and fluent. He's gotten the message that he shouldn't say "uh."

7:14: What tough decision has he had to make? He decided to oppose the war in Iraq. His critics can say he's never really had to make a tough decision. Certainly, there were no consequences (except to his own political future) of opposing the war, so this answer exposes his inexperience.

7:19: What does faith in Christ mean to him? He believes that "Jesus Christ died for my sins." He's "redeemed." He knows he doesn't "walk alone" and can carry out "in some small way, what He intends." Deeds matter, but he knows he'll fall short each day. It gave him the confidence to run for President.

7:21: Warren notes that there are 40 million abortions and asks when the unborn should be considered human. [ADDED: More specifically: At what point do the unborn have "human rights"?] Obama says that sort of decision is "above my pay grade," which sounds too cold for most people, I would guess, and then he moves quickly to the idea of the "moral difficulties" of abortion and the need for the woman's choice. "I don't think women make these decisions casually." And then on to the "common ground": reducing the number of abortions. He wants to provide resources and support that help women decide to keep a child. [ADDED: I revise my opinion here.]

7:25: Define marriage. It's "the union of a man and a woman," and for him as a Christian, it's "sacred" and "God's in the mix." How about a constitutional amendment saying that? No. The tradition has been to leave this to state law. He admits that there is a concern about same-sex marriage, which he doesn't support, but he likes civil unions. He seems a little robotic intoning this position. I'm sure in his heart he supports full rights for gay people, but obviously, at this point, he can't say it.

7:28: Stem cell research. Go ahead and use those embryos that you'd be throwing out otherwise. People don't think "boy, let's go destroy some embryos."

7:31: Warren asks "Does evil exist?" and what do we do about it. And it's at this point that I decide Warren is doing a terrific job. But of course, Obama says evil exists. But then what? "Confront it." But he must be thinking about how George Bush talked about evil, and he goes on to add that we have to be "humble" about what we do, because harm can be done confronting it. He doesn't have anything to say about how he'd balance between confrontation and humility in the face of evil. And in fact, I don't think he says anything here that George Bush himself wouldn't say.

7:32: Warren really wins me over with his phrasing of the Supreme Court question: "Which existing Supreme Court Justice would you not have nominated?" Obama knows he's been boxed in, as he says "That's a good one." He says: "Clarence Thomas. I don't think that he was a strong enough jurist or legal thinker at the time for that elevation, setting aside the fact that I disagree with his interpretations of a lot of the Constitution. I would not nominate Justice Scalia, although I don't think there's any doubt about his intellectual brilliance, because he and I just disagree..." John Roberts? He says that's a tougher question. Oh come on. You voted against his confirmation! Obviously, you wouldn't nominate him.

7:33: Would you make faith-based organizations give up discrimination based on religion in their hiring for social programs that receive government funding? In a lot of words, the answer is: yes.

7:37: Merit pay for teachers? Yes. (But pay all teachers more.)

7:45: When is war justified? He sounds dry and cold answering this. "Well, uh, obviously, American freedom. American lives. America's national interest.... We also have forged alliances...." When would you end a genocide? He says there's no "hard and fast line." We "should act" when we can, if we have the "international community" with us (but not necessaily the U.N.).

7:47: "Define 'rich'?" $150,000 or less — for a family — is middle class (or lower). If you're making more than $250,000, "you're doing well." I'm not sure what happens to all those in that gap between $150,000 and $250,000 or those who are not supporting a family with their income.

7:48: What will he do for the world's 148 million orphans? Obama indicates that he will look into it and shifts over to talking about preventing orphans. What will he do about religious persecution around the world? Obama would: 1. "speak out," 2. "lead by example."

7:51: There are 27 million slaves in the world. What will he do about that? Give prosecutors "the tools to crack down" in this country. As for the rest of the world... I'm not sure he has anything other than concern.

7:53: Warren asks the question asked by that 7-year-old girl the other day: Why do you want to be President? His answer is that his mother would get mad at him if he was ever mean. He wants to apply that standard to America. We're "slipping." We're "at a critical juncture." He wants to bring people together to find common sense solutions to problems.

7:54: How does he like this forum? Obama thinks it's good.

7:56: What would you tell Americans if you knew there'd be no repercussions? Answer: It's going to be hard to solve our energy problems and we should sacrifice for the next generation. That's the end, and the audience is told to give him a standing ovation, which it does pretty enthusiastically. Now, welcome John McCain. McCain comes out. He's tieless. John and Barack hug. They wave.

8:01: Leadership. The 3 wisest people you know, whom you'll rely on. First: General Petraeus, "who took us from defeat to victory in Iraq." So McCain starts off in a much more serious way. Second: John Lewis. He can teach us about "courage and commitment." Third: Meg Whitman, the CEO of eBay. She represents free enterprise to him "in these economically challenging times." That was a much more presidential answer than Obama's. Really, why would a President have the members of his family as his main advisors? And Obama's political advisors were an unmemorable jumble of — what was it? — Senators? You know, I initially thought it was an advantage to go first, but second is interesting, because we immediately contrast each statement to Obama's. Knowing that McCain didn't hear Obama's answers makes it even a bit thrilling. If they had been on the stage together, McCain would have had to think about whether to honor at least one family member to match Obama. This way, we see that the notion doesn't seem to have occurred to him.

8:03: Your and America's greatest moral failure. His greatest moral failure is his first marriage. He doesn't expand on that, but listening at home, we can't help thinking of all the talk about John Edwards in the last week and how it made many people bring up McCain's old failings. America's greatest moral failure, McCain says, is not being devoted to more than our own interests. After 9/11, instead of saying we should go shopping, we should have encouraged people to join the Peace Corps or join the military. "Serve a cause greater than your self-interest." I note that he didn't talk about the U.S. government there. For him, "America" signified Americans. But Obama took it the same way. Serve others. Don't be selfish. One distinction: the military springs right to mind for McCain, but not Obama.

8:06: When did he go against his party's interest for the good of America? He has a long list, but he concentrates on saying that, despite Reagan's preference, we shouldn't send a few hundred Marines into Beirut to keep the peace.

8:07: What has he changed his mind about in the past 10 years? He pauses a while, then jerks to attention with his idea: "Offshore drilling! We gotta drill now and we gotta drill here." This gets the biggest applause of the night (to my ear).

8:08: McCain grabs some time to say we need to develop nuclear power.

8:09: What is the most "gut-wrenching" decision he's ever had to make? He says it was facing the offer to leave the prison in North Vietnam, which he refused because the code of conduct forbade leaving before an earlier-captured comrade, though he was in "bad physical shape" and the refusal meant that it would not "be easy" for him after that and it wasn't. He adds, "It took a lot of prayer." This corresponds to Obama's tough decision to oppose the war in Iraq.

8:15: What does it mean for you to be a Christian? "It means I'm saved and forgiven." He gets through that super-fast, then claims time to "tell a little story." The story is about how the North Vietnamese tied him up tightly in ropes, and a particular guard loosened the ropes, then hours later retightened them. Later, on Christmas, that guard marked a cross in the dirt for him.

8:18: At what point is an unborn child entitled to human rights? Without hesitation, McCain says: "At the moment of conception." (Remember, Obama said, that's "above my pay grade.") Big applause in the Saddleback Church. "I have a 25 year pro-life record."

8:19: Define marriage. "A union between a man and a woman." Then he pushes to talk about the Supreme Court. (McCain, unlike Obama, tries to break out of the questions.) Warren adjust by asking about whether the California Supreme Court was wrong to find a right to gay marriage in the California state constitution. McCain says they were. He believes the states should make the decisions — "I'm a federalist" — but he wants to preserve traditional one-man-one-woman marriage. If a federal court were to say the states must recognize same-sex marriage, then he would support an amendment to the U.S. Constitution, but until then, he would leave it to the states.

8:21: Stem cell research. It's "a terrible dilemma," but he supports it.

8:22. Evil: "Should we ignore it, negotiate with it, contain it, or defeat it?" "Defeat it." He repeats his old statement that he'll follow Osama bin Laden "to the gates of Hell." He speaks passionately about defeating al Qaeda. Obama spoke only abstractly about evil, while McCain instantly limited the question to al Qaeda.

8:24: "Which existing Supreme Court Justice would you not have nominated?" "With all due respect, Justice Ginburg, Justice Breyer, Justice Souter, and..." — with some hesitation — "Justice Stevens."

8:26: Faith-based organizations and religious discrimination in hiring if they accept federal funding. He "absolutely" rejects imposing this non-discrimination requirement. Speaking with some passion, he says it would mean "a severe crippling" of their ability to function. He speaks of the work of Baptists in New Orleans after Katrina. Again, McCain is both more specific and more passionate than Obama (who is more cool and abstractly cerebral).

8:28: Merit pay for teachers? Sure. And he's shoehorns in the topic of school choice. "Choice and competition" works. "Give everybody the same opportunity."

8:30: At what point is someone rich? He doesn't state a number but a standard — fuzzily about taking care of the next generation. A good line: "I don't want to take any money from the rich. I want everybody to get rich." He adds that he doesn't believe in "class warfare" and "redistribution of the wealth." Clearly, this is a big difference from Obama. Obama wants to say there are these rich people over there, who are not you, and we can safely tax them more and give more to you. McCain says he's not dividing people up, but wants to keep taxes low for everyone and encourage moneymaking. He also shoehorns in an opinion on health care (a subject Obama never got to address). Finally, he comes up with a number for rich: $5 million. Compare that to Obama's $150,000 or $250,000! But he was kind of kidding. Now, he's shoehorning in the issue of spending.

8:40: What is worth fighting a war for? "Freedom. National security.... We can't right every wrong, but we can... be a beacon of hope... a shining city on a hill." What about stopping genocide? We need to stop genocide "when we can." It's "complicated," but we could supply the equipment for to be used by Africans in places like Darfur. McCain also speaks in detail about Georgia.

8:46: Religious freedom around the world. The President has "the bully pulpit."

8:48: The world's orphans. Warren is pushing for spending, I think, but McCain stresses adoption. Make adoption easier. He tells the story of his wife surprising him with a baby she brought home from Bangladesh.

8:51: "What would you say to people who oppose me asking you these questions in a church?" "Our nation was founded on Judeo-Christian values. I'm happy to be here.... I'm honored to be here." And that's the end. Another standing o.

8:55: Rick Warren lectures us again on the importance of civility and blesses us. Back to John King. Analysis to follow. But that's all for me for now. I'll just say the forum — and I was skeptical — was very nicely handled by Rick Warren and the 2 candidates.

IN THE COMMENTS: Lots of folks think McCain won clearly. A telling comment from XWL: "McCain has the advantage of just being able to say what he thinks."

Are Obama and McCain having a debate tonight?

I'm trying to figure this out:

The Rev. Rick Warren, author of the best-seller "The Purpose-Driven Life," will spend an hour interviewing each candidate at his 20,000-member Saddleback mega-church in Southern California.

On CNN's "The Situation Room" earlier this week, Warren said he won't play the role of a political pundit or ask "gotcha" questions, but rather tackle four areas of interest: the role of the presidency in government, leadership, the candidates' worldviews and America's role internationally.

The Saddleback Civil Forum on the Presidency will be carried on CNN TV and CNN.com/Live. It will be the last time the two candidates share the same stage before their parties' conventions. Three debates between the two are scheduled after the conventions.

The Purpose-Driven Life.... When did politics go all Oprah? I can't believe we're finally going to see the 2 candidates side by side and some spiritual author is doing the questions.

So: "share the same stage."Are they going to be there at the same time or is this one interview and then another? You know, I got all excited about this for a minute, but if they aren't going to be on stage together, I'm not even going to watch. I'm going to assume that's why I haven't heard about it. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Ah, no, I'm right. Funny how it makes such a big difference, isn't it?

I missed this, from Alan Wolfe in TNR a few days ago:

Regardless of which candidate benefits the most from this joint appearance, ... the biggest winner is Warren himself. A wildly successful author and church planter, Warren is leading an effort to focus the attention of Christian conservatives on questions of social justice....

[T]he most important [thing Warren does] is severing a link between conservative religion and conservative politics....

The joint appearance ... is ... a significant antidote to the poison that the religious right injected into American politics. The United States is unlikely ever to be as secular as Western Europe. If a better balance between religion and politics is to come about, it will because of what religious leaders do, and not because of what non-believers such as myself want to happen.

UPDATE: Actually, I am going to watch this. I want to blog it... and maybe bloggingheads it.