Posted on 02/16/2008 8:18:03 AM PST by jdm
People mocked Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney for their religious backgrounds often during the presidential campaigns, but at least they never claimed to be on a mission to save the souls of Americans through government action. Oh, people accused them of wanting to do so -- to impose Southern Baptist or Mormon theology on an America that wants relentless secularism, but in point of fact both men gave stirring speeches on how their faith informs them personally but not their governance.
One campaign really has explicitly claimed to be on such a mission, however. Michelle Obama gave a speech at UCLA earlier this month in which she told supporters that her husband was the only man who could fix American souls -- if we elect him President first. Here's the transcript:
In 2008, we are still a nation that is too divided. We live in isolation, and because of that isolation, we fear one another. We don't know our neighbors, we don't talk, we believe our pain is our own. We don't realize that the struggles and challenges of all of us are the same. We are too isolated. And we are still a nation that is still too cynical. We look at it as "them" and "they" as opposed to "us". We don't engage because we are still too cynical. ...
Americans are not in debt because they live frivolously but because someone got sick. Even with insurance, the deductibles and the premiums are so high that people are still putting medications and treatments on credit cards. And they can't get out from under. I could go on and on, but this is how we're living, people, in 2008.
And things have gotten progressively worse throughout my lifetime, through Democratic and Republican administrations, it hasn't gotten better for regular folks. ....
We have lost the understanding that in a democracy, we have a mutual obligation to one another -- that we cannot measure the greatness of our society by the strongest and richest of us, but we have to measure our greatness by the least of these. That we have to compromise and sacrifice for one another in order to get things done. That is why I am here, because Barack Obama is the only person in this who understands that. That before we can work on the problems, we have to fix our souls. Our souls are broken in this nation.
It's hard to know where to start in with this speech. First, what evidence does Mrs. Obama have that the largest part of credit card debt goes to health care? Second, if she has seen the standard of living get progressively worse during her lifetime, she needs new glasses. The living standard of even those classified as poor now have per-person expenditures of the American middle-class of the early 1970s, according to the Census Bureau. Eighty percent of the poor live in air-conditioned housing, 43% of them own their own homes, and the average poor American has as much living space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna, and Athens. Only 3% don't own a color TV.
But it's the notion that only Barack Obama can save our souls that is the most offensive part of the speech, by far. Government doesn't exist to save souls; it exists to ensure domestic tranquility and provide for the common defense. If I feel my soul needs saving, the very last place I'd look (in the US) for a savior would be Washington DC or Capitol Hill. I'll trust God and Jesus Christ with my soul, and I'm not going to mistake Barack Obama for either one.
This, though, is the religion of statism distilled to its essence. Only a government can rescue people from the consequences of their own decisions. Only government programs can provide for your every need, and only government can use your money wisely enough to ensure that your needs get covered. Individuals cannot possibly manage to help their neighbors through their churches or community organizations, let alone encourage people to do for themselves.
And all you need to enter the statist Utopia is to sell your soul. So that it can be fixed.
No, thank you.
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.” CS Lewis
It’s nice to see that a theocracy is suddenly a bad thing.
Theocracy of Marxism...
We ain’t seen nothing yet.
As usual- a perfect summation by Lewis:)
B. Hussein Obama on the other hand thinks he is God.
Regards
It’s getting creepy with this talk of saving souls from the Obama campaign. I was going to say “a little creepy” but it is not — it’s very creepy. I think that you’ll get a good read on the nature of your acquantences and coworkers and neighbors relationship with God, whether extant or latent, by watching how they react to this cult of Obama. If they get chills and thigh thrills and start talking about Obama being the “New Testament” you’ll know where they are coming from. Not a good place to be when a political figure is your hope for a messiah.
Michelle Obama may be capable of doing more harm to this campaign than the Clintons.
True!
We thought we had problems before, just wait until this islamic imposes his idea of theocracy upon the sheeple.
Sounds like Oprah-speak to me. Many more Americans are in debt from buying junk they don't need than from "putting medications and treatments on credit cards" and you & I (and Mrs. Obama) know that! We don't want to wait and save for that big screen television, that mega barbeque grill, those expensive shoes, the stainless steel kitchen, etc. I do home loans as my main gig, and I see how people get into debt, and believe me, it's not usually medical bills!
Pretty much- given there is only one skeptical looking face in a crowd of adoring faces- the fellow in the bright blue shirt sitting down appears to be asking WTH?!
Anyone have the pic of the Katrina victim (sic) and her ½ acre plasma display.
Think, Sanjaya.
Same difference.
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