McCain Loses Fried
This is interesting. It seems to me that, with the exception of Kmeic, what the “Obamacons” all have in common is that they are not members of the Religious Right. It suggests the collapse of the Republican Coalition. In light of this exodus, it’s interesting that many in the Church’s leadership have decided to double down on the Republican nominee. If Obama hangs on and wins, exactly how much influence do the Catholic Bishops expect to have in an Obama administration? HT Cass Sunstein:
Charles Fried, a professor at Harvard Law School, has long been one of the most important conservative thinkers in the United States. Under President Reagan, he served, with great distinction, as Solicitor General of the United States. Since then, he has been prominently associated with several Republican leaders and candidates, most recently John McCain, for whom he expressed his enthusiastic support in January.
This week, Fried announced that he has voted for Obama-Biden by absentee ballot. In his letter to Trevor Potter, the General Counsel to the McCain-Palin campaign, he asked that his name be removed from the several campaign-related committees on which he serves. In that letter, he said that chief among the reasons for his decision “is the choice of Sarah Palin at a time of deep national crisis.”
” …. exactly how much influence do the Catholic Bishops expect to have in an Obama administration? ”
I’ll be generous and say slim to none.
No surprise here. Fried supports Roe, but Palin is pro-life. Same thing motivated Colin Powell.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/26/opinion/26fried.html?ex=1335240000&en=16b7f794dd80efcf&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss
It suggests the collapse of the Republican Coalition.
Could be. Or it could just be two guys that changed their minds and sided with a winner.
As Tom Smith says, “But it is obvious enough what this is really about. What it’s really about is what role Kmiec and Fried hope to have in next four or eight or God knows how many years of progressive ascendency. Not just what jobs, but what role. The wilderness looks so cold and lonely! Does anyone think for one moment that either of these two gentlemen would have come out this way if McCain had been leading Obama as much as Obama has been ahead of McCain?”
“Does anyone think for one moment that either of these two gentlemen would have come out this way if McCain had been leading Obama as much as Obama has been ahead of McCain?”
In that alternate universe, the Republican Party would have been cohesive, the sitting president would be half way competent, and McCain would have run on his good policies based on his 40 years of wise experience. You speak as though McCain’s upcoming loss is some sort of random event that these two men are simply taking advantage of.
As for what they can do during the forthcoming “progressive” ascendency, they can stay and help the conservative movement find itself again.
You didn’t think that Palin is going to do that, did you?
I get frustrated when the conversation about which Republicans have abandoned McCain ends up a conversation about life issues.
And I say that with the belief that life issues are the foundation of all, but sadly perverted in matters electoral – by all sides, IMO.
Perhaps Charles Fried, like others before him, could not support a candidate that would have Sarah Palin as possible president. Since that is what the VP role is primarily for, although Sarah herself seems confused about this.
Stuart Buck posits that it is the motivation to be on the winning side. Even if that is true for Fried, I don’t think you can say that about Kmiec with such ease. Kmiec was talking about Obama in February and by April had moved into a position of support.
I don’t know about any of you, but until recently, I am not sure that I would have described Obama-Biden as the winning team. And even now, I am simply cautiously optimistic.
“It is interesting that many in the Church’s leadership have decided to double down on the Republican nominee.”
Eduardo, does this surprise you that the Church’s leadership does not support Sen.Obama because, if elected, he would lift all restrictions on abortion and work to redefine Marriage and the Family as well as Fatherhood and Motherhood? Parents will no longer have the Right to raise their children according to their Catholic Faith which includes Christ’s definition of God’s intention for Sexual Love within a Holy Marriage.
Once again, I reference John Allen’s piece that , post-election, folks should work together at positive engagement with o political leadership.
None of that here though -same old divisions and frames.
Also note Joe Feuerhard’s NCR editorial on whether a Catholic can in conscience vote for McCain (citing Santorum?)
“A close call.”
and work to redefine Marriage and the Family as well as Fatherhood and Motherhood? Parents will no longer have the Right to raise their children according to their Catholic Faith which includes Christ’s definition of God’s intention for Sexual Love within a Holy Marriage.
Nancy,
Obama and Biden do not support same-sex marriage. They do support civil unions. You may be opposed to civil unions, but they do not redefine marriage, or motherhood, or fatherhood.
Even in California, Connecticut, or Massachusetts, where same-sex marriage is currently legal, Catholic parents have not lost the right to raise their children according to their faith. Divorce and remarriage is legal in all 50 states, and 50 percent of marriages end in divorce. This does not deprive Catholic parents of the right to teach their children that for Catholics, marriage is indissoluble.
As Barack Obama might say, you’re making stuff up.
“…single issue religious groups more closely resemble their non-religious counterparts than they resemble churches, political parties or government itself. They are more prone to fuse absolute moral principle and particular legislative provisions. They are likelier to mobilize members to vote for or against candidates given their stance on single issues and to rise or fall on their ability to win issue-specific fights.”
~ Steven M. Typton, “Public Pulpits”
(From Fr. John A. Coleman’s review of this book in America.)
http://www.americamagazine.org/content/article.cfm?article_id=11048
Unagidon said: “As for what they can do during the forthcoming “progressive” ascendency, they can stay and help the conservative movement find itself again.
You didn’t think that Palin is going to do that, did you?”
Why does the GOP losing political power mean the conservative movement has lost itself? I think you are conflating the conservative movement and the GOP – one is a political philosophy, or a collection of political philosophies, and the other a political party whose sole purpose is to accumulate political power on behalf of its voters. Conservative political philosophy is continuing its inevitable decline among the electorate. It’s the GOP which needs to abandon the conservative movement if it wants to compete with the Democratic party to exercise its will over the citizens, And Governor Palin is a perfect person to help the GOP jettison the old conservative remnants.
No David, I am not making things up. Why would I do that? If it were not true that Sen.Obama said he would use the bully pulpit to urge states to treat same-sex couples with full equality which would include Adoption Laws, there would be no need for concern regarding that issue. Rather than assume that you are making things up in regard to this issue, I will assume that you are simply misinformed.
“Sen.Obama just released an open letter to LGBT equality in America, reaffirming his steadfast committment to equal Rights for all Americans.”
As I have already stated, I find it mind boggling that some of the same people who claim that there does not exist compelling evidence for the personhood of a baby in their Mother’s Womb despite the Dna evidence that exists supporting such evidence of personhood, would then claim that there exists Dna evidence that supports the existence of gender other than Male and Female, and that such persons, somehow are entitled to some special consideration in regards to the Constitution.
Obama wants the repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, which is the federal act that is protecting states from the judicially-imposed gay “marriage” that exists in other states. To be against DOMA is to be pro-gay “marriage”. DOMA also defines marriage as a man and woman for the federal government’s own laws–Obama wants to repeal that definition. In other words, he insists that marriage not be defined as man and woman for the federal government. Obama wants civil unions–liberal judges in California and Connecticut have ruled that because the state allowed civil unions, it must allow gay “marriage”. Obama will appoint the exactly same kind of liberal justices to the US Supreme Court, which will force gay “marriage” on the entire country.
No one can support these things and claim to oppose gay “marriage”.
The letter can be found on the Obama Blog. Some excerpts:
“As your President, I will use the bully pulpit to urge states to treat same-sex couples with full equality in their family and adoptive laws. I personally believe that civil unions represent the best way to recieve that equal treatment. But I also believe that the federal government should not stand in the way of states that want to decide how best to pursue equality for gay and lesbian couples, whether that means a domestic partnership, a civil union, or a civil marriage.”-Sen.Obama
“I support the appeal of the Defence of Marriage Act.”-Sen.Obama
“We should have age-appropriate sex education.”-Sen.Obama ( What would such sex education be if it were to include equality for all according to Obama’s definition?)
Is it news that a Harvard Law Professor supports Mr. Obama? Or rather dis-supports Mrs. Palin? Those who shocked by this have little experience of Harvard.
Gabriel, this particular Harvard professor was an adviser to the McCain campaign. So presumably they were surprised.
“” …. exactly how much influence do the Catholic Bishops expect to have in an Obama administration? ”
As Abp Chaput put it, the Church talks to the voters. It is up to the voters to talk to the politicians. If the voters will not listen to the Church, one does not say “too bad for the Church”. One says too bad for the voters.
Ms. O’Reilly:
One should eschew presumable opinions. I’d suppose that he wasn’t offered a high enough position by Mr. McCain; but perhaps that it is my sceptical New York Irish background which had a high dose of politics.
Oh, now. I know the old saw about assuming, but is it really going out on a limb to propose that, when a presidential campaign asks someone to be an adviser and names them to committees, they are operating under the assumption that said person will at the very least vote for that campaign’s candidate? I don’t think so. Maybe you’re right, and the campaign staff just didn’t know enough about the ways of Harvard elitists. But Fried certainly waited long enough to show his true colors — even Reagan was fooled!
Stuart Buck:
You wrote:
Just curious: is your best guess that this is the true reason why they’re supporting Obama? Are there reasons – based, say, on their past actions – not to take them at their word when they say they think Obama is the best candidate? If there are no such reasons, what could be the basis for Smith being so sure that he knows “what this is really about”?
Well, to take Kmiec’s case, it’s very curious — is it not? — that the guy was well-known for being a movement conservative for decades, for having worked for Reagan, and for having worked on Romney’s campaign up until Romney didn’t win. It would be one thing if there had been a public evolution over a period of years, but a last-minute 180-degree conversion? Imagine if McCain were leading at this point, and if Hillary Clinton suddenly endorsed McCain while speaking derisively of most of the Democratic principles that had supposedly motivated her entire public career until yesterday. Wouldn’t that seem odd?
You make it sound, Stuart, as though Kmiec is jumping to the Obama ship because Obama is winning on the basis of some kind of random chance. People have been noticing that the Republican’s so-called Pro-Life agenda has been failing for quite a while now and it was most evident in the 2006 Congressional elections where the culture war stick failed to get the voters to support a corrupt party.
Kmiec hasn’t been “converted”. That’s a Republican view wherein one is either for the Republican agenda or against it. Kmiec is saying nothing more than that we have to have a different political strategy because the one that the GOP has been using doesn’t work (and this means that it won’t work). It’s not a conversion. It’s realism.
U–that’s only true if the McCain choice is an “anti-Roe-only” strategy, and Obama, while maintaining Roe, will otherwise reduce abortions by economics. But McCain will leave in place pro-life laws that haev been working to save hundreds of thousands of babies, and Obama and the Democratic will massively expand abortion by striking those laws through FOCA and Hyde, and through other policies (including guaranteed pro-abortion judges).
Tough call and it depends on whether Obama is any more likely to pursue a radical pro-abortion rights agenda any more than the GOP has been willing to pursue a radical (in these sense of total and strident) anti-abortion rights agenda.
Most people seem to want restrictions without an outright ban. I have long felt that perhaps what we need is one side or the other pushing one of the full agendas earnestly. I think that to really deal with the problem, we need to start with the sort of broader restrictions that the general public is willing to tolerate and work from there.
Unagidon — you’re getting twisted in knots over semantics. Call it “conversion,” call it a 180-degree flip, call it whatever you want, it’s still odd when someone who has dedicated his entire public career to supporting certain principles suddenly flips and starts ridiculing those principles (and makes unbelievably ridiculous arguments in the process, such as Cafardi/Kaveny/Kmiec’s suggestion that the Supreme Court isn’t affected by who is president, or that it is merely “hypothetical” to ask about Democrats’ support of government funding of abortion).
Again, it would be as if Hillary Clinton suddenly announced that she was endorsing McCain because she now thought that universal health care was a mirage, and that private accounts would be a clearly superior solution. People might expect, at the least, for Hillary to give a full explanation of “here’s why I was so wrong for so long, and here’s why I suddenly realized that the truth is 180 degrees opposite.” I doubt people would be content if all Hillary could do was spout Republican boilerplate.
Stuart, I’m not sure and I am willing to be proven wrong, but have these three people said that they now support full abortion rights in the United States? Because that is the position that is 180 degrees from Kmiec’s prior position. If it is the case that they have come to this then I am willing to stand corrected.
If it is not the case that these people have become abortion rights advocates, then we go to the realm of political strategy, which is what these people seem to me to be doing.
The Supreme Court may not, in fact, be affected by who is president in the way that either pro-life or “pro-choice” people think. And this for the reason that some of the justices themselves have explained. One can be anti-abortion and yet believe that Roe v Wade is nonetheless the law of the land that has to be viewed in terms of points of law rather than points of morality. It may also be the case that the GOP has not, in fact, wanted to overturn Roe v Wade in terms of their wider political strategy and that they themselves have been nominating people to the Court that cannot be expected to overturn the law.
If the above is the case, if what Kmiec et al is really arguing for is a change in political strategy that treats abortion not as a black and white issue (which it is on a moral plain) but as an issue where we are going to have to start with some compromising at least in the short term, as one does in a democracy with all other issues, then what they are rejecting is not an abortion ban, but an abortion ban whose supporters require be married to a strategy that has clearly not worked.
I’ll say again that I am not afraid of the emergence of some hard line Democratic attempt to remove all impediments to abortion in the United States. They could have settled this with a Constitutional Amendment of their own or some significant Federal laws of their own making in the past 30 years. But they would have never found the support. Both sides have always acted, at the grass roots level, as though the other side was within an ace of taking the field. Both sides have always operated in a climate of fear. And the opportunists who are actually using the issue on both sides have hidden in this smoke. At the very least, should Obama try to come out strong for something like FOCA, it will bring it all out in the open and maybe we can then begin to make some progress.
Stuart — that’s not exactly what I see going on with Fried, though. He’s not suddenly saying he was wrong to support conservative policies and candidates; he (like some of these other “Obamacons”) is saying he’s dissatisfied with the way the GOP candidate represents the ideals he expects from the party. It seems like he’s saying the McCain campaign left him, and not the other way around. It’s fine to be cynical about his motives, but I don’t think the Hillary hypothetical is an accurate analogy.
Well, I wasn’t talking about Fried quite yet (disclaimer: I know him personally from a seminar). But his explanation isn’t quite satisfactory either . . . he was happy to be a Republican when Dan Quayle was the VP, but not Palin? Hmm.
Unagidon — I’m just saying that Kmiec now seems 180 degrees opposite on the efficacy of legal reform as to abortion, just as if Hillary flipped 180 degrees on the efficacy of universal healthcare (in other words, the flip-flops in both cases would be as to the appropriate means to achieve a particular end). And again, it’s very odd when someone makes arguments that he himself would easily have recognized as transparently disingenuous just a few months ago. That indicates to me that something other than rational argumentation is what changed his mind.
Stuart, perhaps you will find the answer to your question by reading Doug Kmiec’s post on Slate Magazine on May 15, 2008, titled, “In RE: California Marriage Cases-Something Old, Someting New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue.”