July 02, 2008

7/2: Out-Bushing Bush?

Barack Obama on 7/1 surprised supporters and opponents alike when he announced that he wanted to expand Pres. Bush's efforts to fund religious groups with social-service money -- what Bush instituted as the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives.

Steve Benen: "I was working at Americans United for Separation of Church and State when Bush was pushing this, and I worked specifically on this project. So when I saw this Associated Press feed this morning, I nearly fell out of my chair.

'Reaching out to evangelical voters, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is announcing plans that would expand President Bush's program steering federal social service dollars to religious groups and -- in a move sure to cause controversy -- support their ability to hire and fire based on faith.'

"Thankfully, this AP feed was wrong, it's being corrected, and Barack Obama has not completely lost his mind. I obtained a copy of the speech Obama is going to deliver today, and he specifically outlines a faith-based agenda that in no way resembles Bush's approach. In fact, it's largely the opposite. ... Obama has identified the pre-Bush safeguards and wants to strengthen them, not abandon them. By all appearances, Obama's vision is consistent with what Bush's plan would have been, if Bush cared about constitutional law, the interests of taxpayers, the rights of families in need and the integrity of religious institutions."

Liberal bloggers -- beyond the initial outrage over the false pretense that Obama wanted to impose religious tests -- were generally subdued over the announcement. Much of that reticence was a "wait and see" attitude, since Obama has yet to outline many details of his plan.

• Atrios: "I don't actually have a problem with money going to church-linked organizations as long as they aren't exempt from oversight or anti-discrimination laws and don't proselytize. ... As with all of these things the devil is in the details, but there's nothing wrong with supporting good programs."
• Mother Jones's Jonathan Stein: "There is no mention of the goals of the faith-based organizations who receive federal grants through the council, except for a stated desire to close the summer learning gap between poor, minority students and rich, white students. Outside of that, presumably, faith-based groups will be able to set their own agendas. Perhaps more importantly, there is no mention of money -- neither Obama's speech nor the campaign's factsheet discuss what sort of funds the council will have to work with, both to run itself and to administer in the form of federal grants to faith-based groups. We don't know if Obama will give more or less than Bush currently does. The plan is already winning plaudits, despite its lack of details."

But some liberal bloggers were more skeptical. AMERICAblog's John Aravosis: "Expanding the faith-based initiative at first glance gives me the willies. When I think faith-based initiative, I think 'government funding the religious right.' ... I'm a Christian. I'm not afraid of religion. I am however afraid of many of its adherents. ... I'm also squeamish about any government involvement in religion -- funding religion, in essence. That's creepy. This entire program is creepy. What wouldn't be creepy? Funding small politically-benign religious groups in the inner city to do outreach to at-risk kids. Not to convert them to Christianity or Islam, but to help get them off the street, midnight basketball, whatever. That is an idea that intrigues me. But to date this program has come across as little more than a government funded teat for the religious right."

While many bloggers viewed Obama's announcement as yet another pander to the political center, others viewed his nuanced stance on religious initiatives as a predictable continuation of his religious rhetoric. Andrew Sullivan: "You could see this coming a while back. Obama has long been comfortable talking about his moderate to liberal Christianity, and has long been very much at ease with the social Gospel and mixing religion with politics. George W. Bush, meanwhile, went a very long way toward integrating his religious faith with big government, providing conservative legitimacy to the notion of religiously infused state-funded services. Obama, for his part, has noticed that John McCain is extremely awkward when talking about religious faith in a political context, not terribly comfortable around holy rollers, and altogether a more secular figure. So put all that together and ... ta da! ... If that happens (and I can't see how it will because of Obama's abortion record), we're talking about a historic landslide. But if only a fifth of them move over to the Democrat, we have a serious realignment -- and possibly real movement in a few Southern states."

And TNR's Noam Scheiber suspects that Obama may have a motive beyond appealing to evangelical voters: "For the Obama campaign, I'd guess the targets of the [announcement] are moderate, downscale whites who aren't evangelicals themselves -- and probably not even especially religious -- but for whom Obama's rapport with white evangelicals might be reassuring, especially amid all the false rumors of his secret Muslim identity."

OBAMA II: Standing Proud

The other big news for Obama on 7/1 was the release of a letter he wrote to the Alice B. Toklas LGBT Democratic Club over the weekend. Obama:

"I am proud to join with and support the LGBT community in an effort to set our nation on a course that recognizes LGBT Americans with full equality under the law ... that is why I oppose the divisive and discriminatory efforts to amend the California Constitution, and similar efforts to amend the U.S. Constitution or those of other states. ... For too long, issues of LGBT rights have been exploited by those seeking to divide us."

TNR 's Jamie Kirchick, a long-time critic of Obama's, was impressed by the gesture: "Barack Obama is a better candidate than his predecessor John Kerry in at least one important sense: he opposes a state constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, namely, in California. ... That's quite a departure from the position Kerry and his runningmate, John Edwards, took in 2004. Indeed, the two couldn't find an anti-gay marriage amendment that they didn't support, swooping into states and urging Democrats to vote against civic equality. ... In many ways, Barack Obama is just another politician. Here's an exception."

Other conservative bloggers were less impressed. Commentary's Peter Wehner: "Why is it that Obama, who promises to be 'post-polarizing' figure, is using this issue to attack the motivations and integrity of those with whom he disagrees? This is the embodiment of the kind of politics we were told Obama stands against. If Obama believes same-sex unions are the right position, let him make his arguments. But to portray those who want to preserve the traditional meaning of marriage ... as 'divisive and discriminatory' is itself divisive and deeply unfair. It is an effort to sideline an important discussion of the issue by branding the advocates of traditional marriage as bigoted."

The release of the letter also sparked debate over Obama's precise stance on gay marriage and other LGBT issues, since many of his nuanced statements seem to conflict somewhat.

• The Volokh Conspiracy's Dale Carpenter: "Assuming that Obama's opposition to gay marriage is not simply 'personal,' but is also a matter of public policy, I find Obama's current position perplexing. He opposes a referendum that would simply enshrine his purported public-policy view that marriage is between a man and a woman because, he says, it is 'discriminatory.' But how is the proposed amendment any more "discriminatory" than his own position? His position is that marriage is between a man and woman; the proposed amendment says that marriage is 'between a man and a woman.'"
• NRO's Ramesh Ponnuru: "I think the only way to square these positions would be for Obama to say that he opposes same-sex marriage as a religious or moral matter, but supports it as public policy. He is, that is, 'personally opposed.' But I don't know whether Obama actually takes that position, or is simply muddled. (The other possibility, of course, is that I am wrong and there is some other way to make these views consistent.)"
• TNR's Josh Patashnik responds: "One possibility is that Obama opposes same-sex marriage as a matter of policy, but also thinks it would be unwise for Californians to amend their state constitution in order to prohibit it retroactively and nullify marriages that have already taken place (which could easily be construed as "divisive and discriminatory"). This isn't totally illogical: There are lots of people who dislike the rights conferred by, say, the Second or Fourth Amendments, but think as a matter of prudence it's a bad idea to amend constitutions frequently unless there's an exceptionally compelling reason to do so. Granted, it doesn't seem very likely this is what Obama believes ... but his statements on the issue, while in tension, aren't necessarily irreoncilable.
• Ponnuru: "If that's his view, though, you'd think he would support the initiative while also opposing its retroactive application. Anyway, if it's unjustly discriminatory to take away the marriage licenses of same-sex couples who already have it, then it is unjustly discriminatory not to give it to them in the first place."
• Sullivan: "I think the only plausible explanation is that Obama supports marriage equality but has decided not to say so for purely political reasons. Even his own ex-church supports it, for goodness' sake. For the record, this isn't a new position, tacking to the center. He has long held this incoherent position. And Obama knows what coherence is."

Dogged by charges that Obama is pandering to conservatives to better position himself for the general election, Obama raised eyebrows with the Toklas letter, which better positions himself with the liberal left. Time's Time's Michael Scherer mused about the issue of shifting positions after the primaries:

"Both of these candidates are now pandering heavy to the general election body politic, just as they pandered heavy to the primary public. ... But all panders are not created equal, and not everything that can be called a flip-flop is a mark of shame. The world is not so simple that every politician should always stick by their old positions, regardless of the world's changes around them. If anyone needs evidence of this, they need only look so far as the stubborn failures of the current White House occupant."

McCain: Who Let The Dogfight Out?

The controversy over Gen. Wesley Clark's comments on McCain's Vietnam service continued into a second full day on 7/1, fueled by Clark's refusal to back down from his comments, Obama defending them as "inartful," the McCain camp taking offense, and Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) telling McCain to "calm down."

Wake Up America's Susan Duclos: "Despite Barack Obama's rhetoric to the contrary, calling Clark's words 'inartful' and distancing himself from them in his 'patriotism' speech, Clark doesn't back away from them and today Obama denies that his comments pertained to Clark in yesterdays speech. ... Obama cannot control his surrogates and continues to have his 'messages' derailed by them and either he really doesn't want them to stop, depsite his campaign issuing a statement saying they 'rejected' Clark's comments, or even worse... Obama cannot get them to stop because they do not respect him enough to listen. Either option puts Barack Obama in a very bad light."

Steve Benen: "With the assistance of a press corps willing to play along, [McCain] feigning outrage and manufacturing a controversy out of Wesley Clark's questions on McCain's presidential qualifications. It involved twisting the words of a four-star general a bit, and a pliant press corps willing to redefine the word 'attack,' but the McCain/GOP spin machine was in high dudgeon and it got precisely the result it was looking for. Fine. But sometimes, once a campaign has had some success with a given stunt, it gets greedy, and returns to the same stunt, hoping for another cheap score. This is just such an occasion. ... Note to the McCain camp: You scored a cheap goal. Be happy and move on. The whining is unbecoming."

Time's Michael Scherer: "Why, you ask, does McCain want to keep alive the idea that his military service does not qualify him for the White House? Four words: The cultivation of victimhood."

Commentary's Jennifer Rubin: "It is not surprising that the McCain camp is going after Barack Obama on the continuing spectacle of Wesley Clark and the slurs on John McCain's service. Letting Clark go out on the morning shows with non-apologies gave the unmistakable sign that Obama isn't serious about halting this line of attack. Aside from wrecking his own patriotism message and giving the disillusioned MSM some more material to ponder, Obama has in a sense revived memories of the Reverend Wright affair. There, too, he was slow to react, indecisive and unwilling to denounce someone ostensibly on his side (until his sincerity was questioned). This is hardly a model of moral leadership or an example of great executive management skills. It is however a gift to the McCain camp, which could not, with unlimited funds, have done nearly as good a job undermining Obama's claim to offer an era of New Politics."

TPM's Greg Sargent: "Now the McCain campaign is accusing the Obama campaign of coordinating with Jim Webb to 'attack' McCain's war service. On MSNBC last night, Webb told McCain that he should 'calm down' with the use of his military service in the campaign, adding that it was time to 'get the politics out of the military.' Now the McCain campaign is responding to Webb, arguing that Webb's comments prove that Obama 'can't control his surrogate operation.' ... The truth is that there's zero evidence that there's any coordination going on or that the Obama campaign wants this conversation to be taking place. Not that this matters: The McCain campaign is very determinedly pointing to anything it can -- Webb's comments included -- to drive the message that Obama is demeaning McCain's military service. But no one -- not Obama, not Clark, not Webb -- has done this. No one."

OpenLeft's Chris Bowers: "The McCain campaign is really, truly, and desperately seeking people who will attack his military service. It now appears that this is the one thing that the McCain camp desires for this campaign to be about, above all else. In fact, not only do they utterly, feverishly, and passionately hope that people will attack McCain's military service, they even believe that there is a conspiracy underway to do so. Check out this unhinged comment from the McCain campaign, breathlessly arguing, in the manner of a frustrated teenager, that there is a conspiracy to attack his military service."

TalkLeft's Big Tent Democrat: "My advice to Obama is to let McCain keep spittling outrage about it. No one except us and the Right blogs and the Beltway bloviators really cares about this story."

THOUGHT OF THE DAY:

The Stranger's Eli Sanders: "Sounds to me like the strategy Geraldine Ferraro and Hillary Clinton used when Ferraro made those remarks about how Barack Obama would never be where he is if he wasn't black.... Here's the strategy: You have a point to make. [S]ay, that John McCain's wartime service is not, per se, an automatic qualification to be president. It's delicate because making this point has the potential to piss off ... every veteran in the country.... But the upside to winning these arguments is huge. ... If you win, you kick a huge part of McCain's rationale for being president out from beneath him. So your surrogate makes the point, takes the heat, restates the point, takes more heat, restates again, takes maybe a little less heat because now people understand what's being said, and eventually it becomes an acceptable argument. At least that's the idea. It didn't work for Ferraro because both her point, and the way she went about making and restating it, were outlandish. But so far it seems to be working for Wesley Clark. He's not backing down, and the debate about whether McCain's service is an automatic qualification for being president is now in its second day. So just to be clear: Wesley Clark isn't trying to Swift Boat John McCain. That's so 2004. He's trying to Ferraro John McCain. And so far he's proving to be more skilled at it than Ferraro ever was."

LEST WE FORGET:

Right Wing Watch: "In addition to blocking traffic from websites they don't like, it looks like the web-geniuses behind the American Family Association's OneNewsNow site have a few other tricks up their sleeves, such as automatically replacing any use of the word 'gay' with the word 'homosexual' in any of the AP stories they run ... leading to instances in which proper names are reformatted to meet their ridiculous standard, such as this article about sprinter Tyson Gay winning the 100 meters at the U.S. Olympic track and field trials in which he is renamed 'Tyson Homosexual'"

Posted by Chris Bodenner at July 2, 2008 01:39 PM