President Barack Obama
Posted on 07/24/2009 6:26:05 AM PDT by NYer
.- Catholic commentator Deal Hudson says the Obama administration is engaging in "smart" outreach to Catholics by offsetting concerns about abortion with unifying rhetoric and compelling stories. In his view, this outreach also benefits from Republican inaction towards Hispanics and Catholics.
Speaking with U.S. News & World Report writer Dan Gilgoff, Hudson questioned President Barack Obama’s "common ground" rhetoric about abortion.
"It's very smart for Obama to actually take the advice of his Catholic outreach team. They have done a good job navigating the challenges they face among Catholics over their policy positions," Hudson, Catholic outreach director for Republican George W. Bush’s 2000 and 2004 presidential campaigns, told Gilgoff.
He said that the common thread among Catholic nominees such as Judge Sonia Sotomayor and prospective surgeon general Regina Benjamin is that they are presented as Catholics but the White House highlights a part of their story that is "compelling from another direction."
"The administration knows in both cases that, once the Catholic issues are explored, there are going to be problems," he explained.
However, members of the Obama administration have worked to "offset" questions about abortion by putting forward nominees like Dr. Benjamin,who rebuilt a clinic to help the poor, or Judge Sotomayor, a minority woman.
"They have thought carefully about how they are going to offset the expected criticism of these pro-choice Catholic nominees by having stories ready that they know will appeal to Catholics and blunt criticism from the pro-life side," Hudson commented.
Hudson then criticized the Republicans’ 2005 anti-immigration campaign as a "huge mistake" that helped drive away Hispanic voters. He also said the Republican Party "just hasn’t done anything" to reunite the religious conservative base and to "reanimate" Catholic supporters.
He also said that Republicans had not offered Catholics anything to "rally behind" like President Obama has in his meeting with Pope Benedict XVI and his speech at Notre Dame.
Claiming that Obama’s Notre Dame speech cost the president support among some Catholics, Hudson said that Catholics are nonetheless receptive to appeals to "common ground" and "working together."
According to Hudson, Catholics don’t like "a lot of confrontational and aggressive speechmaking in politics" or "the old evangelical, more stringent-type message."
"Common ground" rhetoric also has resonance among Catholics because it was used by Cardinal Joseph Bernardin, the late Archbishop of Chicago.
However, Hudson himself was skeptical of the Obama administration’s rhetoric in light of its policy actions.
"The policy itself is the funding of abortion, the appointment of pro-choice Catholics, and the repealing of the Mexico City policy, and that's the narrative people need to pay attention to."
Speaking with CNA in a Thursday e-mail, Hudson expanded on his comments to Gilgoff.
"Catholics can and do see issues like immigration in a special light," he commented. "Many American Catholics are descended from immigrants. Thus, Catholics understand the often harsh circumstances that drive people from one country to another."
Asked whether he believed the "common ground" initiatives to reduce abortion were sincere, Hudson replied:
"I see no evidence it is anything other than a political strategy to offset the image of Democrats and Obama as abortion supporters. The present health care bill with its abortion benefits tells the true story."
“Smart Obama....”
Oxymoron alert. Oxymoron alert!
No *genuine* Catholic would touch this amoral scumbag with a 12 foot Hungarian.There are many,*many* individuals in this country who *call* themselves Catholics but who are,in fact,Unitarian/Universalists.
Excuse me...and what gives them the idea he is ACTUALLY telling them the TRUTH. The hand that is patting them on the head, actaully has a knife in it.
HELLO, since when does anyone that has absolutely NO respect for LIFE..... from conception to death....really care what Catholics say.
Hey,we need to understand one important thing.Hussein is smart.In fact he's not just smart...he's brilliant.It's his intelligence that makes him as dangerous as he is.
I wouldn't be at all surprised if his IQ,for example,is in the "genius" range (130+).But I know for a fact that his Morality Quotient is zero...zilch...nada....nothing.
Many? And who are the non-Catholics descended from?
Obama is an abject liar on abortion.
You cannot ever listen to what this man says. Watch what he does.
He voted for partial birth abortion, voted against stopping live birth abortion, he reinstituted federal funding for abortion, his is for the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA) the most pro-abortion legislation ever crafted, there are abortion on demand aspects of the health care plan.
No, this man is the most radically pro-abortion President in history, and despite his words, all his actions serve to radically increase abortions in America and around the world...at your and my expense.
Anyone blind to the sick, evil irony of all of this has accepted a deparved set of circumstances and strong delusion.
A perfect example of this is Obama's characterization of Dr. Tiller...as some kind of hero and martyr. Well, I mourn for Tiller's family at their loss because I doubt seriously that they knew the full and graphic nature of what he was involed in.
But I absolutely refuse to mourn the fact that he, Dr. Tiller, a bloody, gruesome killer of fully formed babies (60,000 abortions by his own admission)...who were alive, who could FEEL THE PAIN of being literally ripped asunder, will himself murder no more.
THE GRUESOME TRUTH OF THE ABORTION HOLOCAUST & THE DEATH OF DR. TILLER [Warning: A graphic photo of death & dismemberment]
“It is the grimmest of ironies that one of the most savage, barbaric acts of evil in history began in one of the most modernized societies of its time, where so many markers of human progress became tools of human depravity: science that can heal, used to kill; education that can enlighten, used to rationalize away basic moral impulses; the bureaucracy that sustains modern life, used as the machinery of mass death, a ruthless, chillingly efficient system where many were responsible for the killing, but few got actual blood on their hands.”–Barack Obama April 24, 2009, Holocaust Remebernce Day, Chicago Sun Times.
Some Catholics will be happy with free abortions.
No jobs, no health insurance, no homes, no national security, but abortion YES.
In February 2004, US Senate candidate Barack Obama's wife, Michelle, sent a fund-raising letter with the "alarming news" that "right-wing politicians" had passed a law (prohibiting doctors from stabbing half-born babies in the neck with scissors, suctioning out their brains and crushing their skulls).
Michelle Obama called partial-birth abortion "a legitimate medical procedure. " She urged supporters to pay $150 to attend a fund-raising luncheon for her husband, who she promised would fight against "cynical ploy[s]" to stop it.
BACKGROUND Legislation was presented on the federal level and in various states called the Born Alive Infants Protection Act. It stated all live-born babies were guaranteed the same constitutional right to equal protection, whether or not they were wanted. BAIPA sailed through the U.S. Senate by unanimous vote. Even Sens. Clinton, Kennedy and Kerry agreed a mother's right to "choose" stopped at her baby's delivery. The bill also passed overwhelmingly in the House. NARAL went neutral on it. Abortion enthusiasts publicly agreed that fighting BAIPA would appear extreme. President Bush signed BAIPA into law in 2002.
But in Illinois, the state version of BAIPA repeatedly failed, thanks in large part to then-state Sen. Barack Obama. Obama worried aloud that legislation protecting live aborted babies might infringe on women's rights or abortionists' rights.
In 2003, as chairman of the next Senate committee to which BAIPA was sent, Obama stopped it from even getting a hearing, shelving it to die much like babies were still being shelved to die in Illinois hospitals and abortion clinics.
BAIPA passed in 2005.........after Obama left.
I think it’s spelled ‘0xymoron.’
;)
Are Catholics this gullible?
“Are Catholics this gullible?”
There are many Catholics and Christians of all sects who worship at the altar of liberalism and socialism who think these philosophies have something to do with God. They have nothing to do with Christianity and are secular humanistic teachings from man derived from atheist/anti-God types like Marx, Engles, Nietzche, Kant. They are usually ignorant or rebellious or both.
If Catholics fall for this, then maybe Bishop Trautmann is right and “Joe and Mary Catholic” really are dumber than a bag of rocks.
There was an article this week at Fox News about Oregon’s health care program. A man with cancer applyed to the State for help covering the cost of his treatment. He received back a letter turning down his request but offering him assisted sucide. He was not offered hospice...he was offered to be killed by the State of Oregon.
The death movement will get a whole new killing field with socialized medicine.
ONLY CINOS will fall for Obortion Obama’s lines.
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