Obama: “God bless” Planned Parenthood

April 29, 2013 By 22 Comments

Rev. Michael Schuermann calls out the president for confusing his office and for taking God’s name in vain:

President Obama spoke to Planned Parenthood this morning (Friday, April 26th). He said all sorts of things. Yet what was most galling, at least in my mind, is how he ended his speech. Here’s what he said:

“As long as we’ve got to fight to make sure women have access to quality, affordable health care, and as long as we’ve got to fight to protect a woman’s right to make her own choices about her own health, I want you to know that you’ve also got a president who’s going to be right there with you, fighting every step of the way,” said Obama. “Thank you, Planned Parenthood. God bless you.”

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Church, Government, Life Issues, Vocation Tagged With: , , , , 22 Comments

Watergate journalist vs. Obama

March 1, 2013 By 15 Comments

President Obama and his administration have picked a fight with the legendary reporter who broke the Watergate story, Bob Woodward.  The journalist criticized the way the president is handling the “sequester” issue–including pointing out that the automatic spending cuts were the president’s idea in the first place–whereupon all the president’s men put him on the enemy list.  Are there other ways that Obama is like Nixon? [Read more...]

Filed Under: Government, Media, Politics Tagged With: , , 15 Comments

Best commentary on the sequester issue

February 28, 2013 By 22 Comments

From Peter Wehner:

In the Great Sequestration Debate, here’s what we know: (a) The president has paternity of an idea he now characterizes as a brutal and senseless assault on America. (b) The president and his then-chief of staff, Jack Lew, misled the public about their role in giving birth to the sequester idea. (c) House Republicans have twice passed legislation to avoid the sequester cuts with carefully targeted ones, but Senate Democrats refused to act. (d) Mr. Obama has brushed off a Republican plan to give him flexibility to allocate the $85 billion in spending cuts, which makes no sense if the president wants to replace reckless cuts with responsible ones. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Economics, Government Tagged With: , , , 22 Comments

Discuss the State of the Union Address here

February 13, 2013 By 24 Comments

I missed it!  I had a class.  How was it?  What was said?  What new programs do we have to look forward to?

Here is a copy of the text.

Filed Under: Government Tagged With: , 24 Comments

The State of the Union

February 12, 2013 By 36 Comments

Tonight at 9:00 p.m. ET, President of Obama will give his State of the Union address.  He is expected to propose policies and legislative measures to flesh out the ideology set forth in his Inaugural address.  What proposals do you think he will put forward?  (I usually watch these things, but I have a class tonight.  If you want to live blog it, be my guest here.)

Filed Under: Government Tagged With: , 36 Comments

Obama as the liberal Reagan

January 30, 2013 By 37 Comments

E. J. Dionne, Jr., says that President Obama–in his goals, tactics, and leadership style– is the liberal Reagan:

To understand how Barack Obama sees himself and his presidency, don’t look to Franklin Roosevelt or Abraham Lincoln. Obama’s role model is Ronald Reagan — just as Obama told us before he was first elected.

Like Reagan, Obama hopes to usher in a long-term electoral realignment — in Obama’s case toward the moderate left, thereby reversing the 40th president’s political legacy. The Reagan metaphor helps explain the tone of Obama’s inaugural address, built not on a contrived call to an impossible bipartisanship but on a philosophical argument for a progressive vision of the country rooted in our history. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Government, Politics Tagged With: , , , 37 Comments

Checking and balancing the President

January 26, 2013 By 12 Comments

The Constitution’s separation of powers and checks and balances at work:  A federal appeals court has said President Obama’s practice of recess appointments to avoid congressional approval is unconstitutional.  Presidents have had the authority to appoint people to office temporarily between Congressional sessions, but Obama has construed that to include holiday breaks and other pauses in the ongoing sessions. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Government, Law Tagged With: , , , 12 Comments

Obama’s Second Inaugural Address

January 22, 2013 By 7 Comments

A president’s inauguration address can indicate his vision for his next term, rally the country, and make his play for the history books.  President Obama’s speech had no soaring JFK moments (“Ask not what your country can do for you. . . .”) and even extracting significant lines to discuss was rather difficult.  The speech was unified by a “journey” metaphor and by repeating “we, the people.”  The president brought God into the climate change debate (he referred to God quite a bit, actually, mostly to his advantage), upheld the role of government as a collective entity of the people, made gay rights a part of our civil religion, and alluded to gun control without mentioning it in terms of “the safety of our children.”  What follows after the jump are some excerpts, a link to the whole speech, and a rhetorical analysis of its style.   [Read more...]

Filed Under: Government, Literature Tagged With: , 7 Comments

Inauguration Day

January 21, 2013 By 84 Comments

Today is the second inauguration of Barack Obama, who will be sworn into his second term at 11:30 a.m. ET.  (Actually, he took his oath of office on Sunday, in accordance with the date specified in the Constitution, in the White House, but the public ceremony will be on Monday, in commendable respect for the Lord’s Day.)

The Bible tells us to pray “for kings and all who are in high positions” (1 Timothy 2:2).  That would include President Obama.  As would the command to “honor the emperor,” (1 Peter 2:17).  Many of us, especially those of us who aren’t big fans of the president politically, are probably guilty of violating those particular passages.  How should we honor him, even if we don’t like his policies (as Peter surely didn’t like the policies of the Roman Emperor)?  What should we pray for on behalf of the President?

(Meanwhile, see after the jump how the President is being hailed on the cover of Newsweek.) [Read more...]

Filed Under: America, Government, Politics, Vocation Tagged With: , , 84 Comments

The divinized President

December 27, 2012 By 90 Comments

It’s the most natural thing in the world, paganism being the natural religion, to turn one’s king or emperor–or now, one’s president– into a god.  From the American Spectator‘s George Neumayr:

Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign inspired a level of euphoria that almost seemed cultish. Obama was going to “usher in a new way of being on the planet,” gushed San Francisco Chronicle columnist Mark Morford. He is a “Lightworker, a rare kind of attuned being.”

After Obama won, the cult moved from pundits to public schools. At a New Jersey elementary school, second-graders were taught to sing the spiritual “Jesus Loves the Little Children” with Obama’s name substituted for Jesus’s. “He said red, yellow, black, or white,” chanted the kids. “All are equal in his sight: Barack Hussein Obama.” Parents couldn’t believe their ears and expressed outrage to the press. “We don’t want to praise this guy like he is a god,” said one.

Another public school showed students a video that urged them “to be a servant to our President.” Arne Duncan’s Department of Education even organized a day on which all public school children had to listen to a speech by Obama and answer such questions as: “What is President Obama inspiring you to do?” and “How will he inspire us?” . . .

No sooner was he reelected than liberals resumed the gushing. Appearing at the Soul Train Awards in Las Vegas recently, actor Jamie Foxx said, “It’s like church in here. First of all, give an honor to God and our lord and savior, Barack Obama.” . . .

The press reported this week that a painting on display at the Bunker Hill Community College Art Gallery in Boston depicts a crucified Obama with a crown of thorns standing before the presidential seal. . . .

When the state replaces God, politicians are the only beings left to worship.

via RealClearReligion – Is the Cult of Obama Back?.

Filed Under: Government, Religions Tagged With: , , 90 Comments