A college psychology professor's observations about public policy, mental health, sexual identity, and religious issues
The headline says it all. There can be little doubt that the Fellowship Foundation condemns the bill. They provided one of the most powerful platforms possible to offer specific condemnations of the bill.
In Clinton’s keynote address and Obama’s prepared remarks, they both condemned the bill.
When I saw this ad, I thought of the statements of Hillary Clinton’s former OB-GYN, William Harrison when he told me that a physician conducting an abortion does God’s work because the abortion “cancels a luckless human soul.” Here is his statement:
“Do you ever regret that part of the decision? How do you come to terms with that, or do you not see the fetus as a life or a person? I don’t want to see either one die, and would do my best to save both. But your work on the other hand, seeks the end of one of these lives. How do you justify that decision?”
Here is my answer: Anyone who has delivered as many babies as I have, and has seen hundreds of living and dead embryos and fetuses being spontaneously aborted as have I, knows exactly what we are doing when we provide an elective abortion for our patient. We are ending the life of an embryo or a fetus. Not the life of a person, but certainly a creature that might have become a person under other circumstances. When I am asked this question, I always go back to two of the most insightful and beautiful verses of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khyyam.
Oh, if the world were but to recreate
That we might catch ere closed the Book of Fate
And make the Writer on a fairer leaf
Inscribe our names, or quite obliterate.
Better, oh, better cancel from the Scroll
Of universe one luckless Human Soul,
Than drop by drop enlarge the Flood that roars
Hoarser with Anguish as the ages roll.
When Omar wrote his beautiful and treasured poem over a thousand years ago, mankind had no way of safely canceling “from the scroll of universe one luckless human soul” whose numbers make up that flood of howling anguish; at least, no way of canceling it without risking also the life of the woman carrying it. In this day of medical marvels and, hopefully, ever increasing social justice, we possess such a way.
Embryos and fetuses spontaneously aborted – most, but not all of those “canceled” by “God” – are just such luckless human souls. But a few spontaneous abortions occur in desired pregnancies with no discernable abnormalities. For those girls and women and their families whose circumstances would make their babies “luckless human souls,” I “cancel” them before they become babies.
Physicians who save wanted babies from being spontaneously aborted (and we can save a few now that God once seemed determined to abort), and we who cancel “luckless human souls” are doing God’s work.
This video invokes President Obama’s difficult life as a backdrop for the message, “imagine the potential.”
Modification, that is.
In about an hour, Coach Obama will roll out his team. While he is in charge of the vision-thing, he has assembled a team of independent minded people who barely resemble the change-thing he campaigned on. More like a Modification Squad.
If any PUMA’s and Just Say No Deal folks are still reading, how is the appointment of Hillary as SoS playing with your camps?
Now that the election is over, the New York Times notes that the Bush administration had some initiatives of merit, even if unrealized. In fact, after bashing “the failed policies of the Bush Administration,” Obama is going to make a go at pursuing one of them in Afghanistan.
Several times during his presidency, Mr. Bush promised to alter that strategy, even creating a “civilian reserve corps” of nation-builders under State Department auspices, but the administration never committed serious funds or personnel to the effort. If Mr. Obama and his team can bring about that kind of shift, it could mark one of the most significant changes in national security strategy in decades and greatly enhance the powers of Mrs. Clinton as secretary of state.
Mrs. Clinton may find, as her predecessor Condoleezza Rice and others in the Bush administration discovered, that building up civilian capacity is easier to advocate than execute. [my emphasis]
That problem will be no less acute for Mr. Obama in Afghanistan, where the building projects and job-creation activities that Mr. Bush promised in 2002, soon after the invasion, and then again in late 2005, have ground to a halt in many parts of the country because the security situation has made it too dangerous for the State Department’s “provincial reconstruction teams” to operate.
The security situation must be resolved in order for the statecraft to have a chance to work. To his credit, Obama proposed more troops on the ground in Afghanistan. Given the defense team he has assembled, the change he campaigned on seems less change and more modification. Probably, chanting “the modification we need” would not have been as catchy. I pray it works.
Via Drudge, this news comes in. With an eye to 2012 perhaps, Barack Obama offered the Secretary of State position to Hillary Clinton and according to the Guardian (UK), she will accept.
UPDATE: There has been little follow through on this announcement from the Guardian. Politico.com is reporting that the deal is not yet done and is upsetting Progressives.
Undecided? Still open to hearing more?
I will be listening in.
Hillary Supporters, PUMAs & Fence Straddlers,
You’re Invited To Join: Just Say No Deal’s Closing Argument Conference Call
Sunday, November 2, 5:00 PM ET
Dial: (218) 486-1662
Access Code: 82114#
Or Listen Online @ BlogTalkRadio hosted by NoQuarterUSA
for immediate release
LIVE LISTENING ONLY – NO CALL-INS
ONLINE, WASHINGTON DC & NATIONWIDE – The Just Say No Deal Coalition, a group of Senator Hillary Clinton’s most ardent supporters, is hosting Closing Arguments a nationwide conference call, Sunday, November 2, 5PM EST. High-profile Democrats Lady Lynn de Rothschild and Dr. Lynette Long join Moderate Republicans Charlie Crist and Rudy Giuliani in an appeal to Hillary Supporters, PUMAs and Undecided Voters to get out the vote for the McCain/Palin ticket during this 1 hour 30 minute call, which will also be streamed live over the internet. (see link above).
Since its inception, on the weekend of Hillary Clinton’s suspension speech, Just Say No Deal has consistently put Country Before Party by vocalizing strong opposition to thuggery on the ground and in the blogosphere, overt sexism, mainstream media bias, voter disenfranchisement, caucus fraud, ACORN fraud and corruption within the Democratic Party.
The distinguished guests will specifically make their case to former Hillary Clinton supporters, who are still on the fence, as to why they should cast their votes for John McCain and Sarah Palin on Tuesday, November 4th.
The panel will cover a host of topics based on questions posed by Just Say No Deal members via email.