Skip to main content

What Race is Barack Obama? Barack Obama Age? Barack Obama Religion? Barack Obama Pro-Choice? Barack Obama Pro-Life?

These are some of the hot questions folks are typing into search engines according to Yahoo's Buzz log titled President Barack Obama? ever since Barack Obama's Sunday morning "Meet the Press" appearance where Barack hawked his new book, The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream, not the Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance that Obama previously discussed on Oprah.

Obama said he was open to thinking about a run for the White House in 2008. And that started a barage of questions.

Amazingly, some folks had never even heard of the junior senator from Illinois, nor his career-changing keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic Convention that set the political world ablaze for Barack.

People want to know about Obama's wife and the like.

I already know he was born August 4, 1961 (making him 46 as of this update), is biracial (with a Kenyan dad and white mom from Kansas who can trace her ancestry all the way back to Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederacy) and that his wife Michelle is an amazing lady.

All I wanted to know was:

Is Barack Obama pro-life?

Unfortunately, the Google-butt out there claims Obama's voting record shows he's "100% pro-choice, even including late-term, partial-birth abortions."

Say it ain't so, Barack... Please!! Hurry and say it ain't so!


...but looks like it is, according to excerpts from Barack's memoir.

And according to the October 23, 2006, issue of Time sitting open on my computer desk, all marked with black ball-point underlines, with a Barack Obama cover article and the excerpt from his book quotes Obama as telling a pro-life man that Obama is a Christian.

As far as supporting abortion, Obama said: "I told him I understood his position but had to disagree with it. I explained my belief that few women made the decision to terminate a pregnancy casually...that I feared a ban on abortion would force women to seek unsafe abortions..."

Barack is fair in his struggles over the issue, and I'm glad he gave the man time and heard him out. Barack admits to changing the staunch pro-abortion speak on his website, which he claims was written by his staff, but is still pro-choice. Such a nice word for such a horrific procedure...


Mr. Obama, may I lead you on over to my "We Had Abortions, Too...And Now We're Pro-Life" piece?

Oh man.

Barack is so intelligent, sooo well-read and well-versed in literature.

He's refined, he's an amazing writer. He's quick-witted and funny. He's everything you'd ever want in a president.

Why? Why? Why???!!!!! Must he be pro-choice!

Damn it all to hell, as my people used to say.

Oh well, I just may vote for Barack Obama anyway...though he believes in abortion.

I'm starting to trust that he's a Christian man who's thought thru the issue greatly.

We'll see come Election Day. After I pray and pray and pray...

Tags:

Comments

As much as this issue is talked about, it still confuses me.

This has gotten more Republicans elected in the past 12 years than anything else, yet what exactly have they done about it? What will another 12 years in total control of the gov't do about it?

I wish people didn't abort babies. I wish they didn't inject heroin. I wish they didn't start having sex at 13.

Thing is...they do. They do all three of these. And just saying "you can't do that" doesn't work.

Therefore we have theft to pay for illegal drugs, and jails are full, and the legal system costs us a fortune.

We have 13 year-olds having babies or abortions, many times because people thought it would be a sin to acknowledge that condoms might stop that, so we should be open and honest.

And if we didn't have legal abortions, there's the age old arguement that this would just be yet another reality made profitable to the underground, and therefore much less safe.

Plus there's the bottom line: "Outlawing" it is, according to the constitution, unconstitutional. Even IF Repubs stack the court and get that changed, it will still be available in most states.

So why vote in people who invade other countries, oppose Geneva conventions, take bribes from lobbyists, and over spend our nations tax money, JUST because one believes those people might outlaw abortion?

I just don't see it.
Anonymous said…
Personally against abortion, but, in a very few instances I understand why a person would consider such an act. (To save a mother's life, to save a twin so the other would live, etc.). In any event, the matter, in my opinion, should rest with input from a medical doctor, a spiritual advisor, and the couple, and not be a legal decision. Unfortunately too many abortions are done without serious justification. Then rises the question, 'Who are we to decide what goes on in the mind of and decision of another?' We are all given 'free choice', a gift to do the right thing or the wrong thing. The question that bothers me is that this is both an individual moral issue and a civil rights issue relating to the individual and to that of society. Doesn't it come down to asking whether or not society is harmed sufficiently to deny an individual his or her rights? I don't think so.
Paris David said…
Tell me what "free choice" a 24-week-old fetus is given when his head is suddenly bashed in?
K said…
So-called conservative politicians (the same ones who use tax dollars to allow logging by private companies on federal land, who encourage the use of limited resources instead of switching to renewable resources that not only create jobs (recycling paper is more labor intensive, for example then cutting down trees), but reduce our dependence on foreign resources, reduce our trade deficit and increase our GNP. Yes those same people use the partial birth abortion to win elections. The reality is that partial birth abortions make up less than one half of one percent of all abortions(.17%). That means for every million abortions, 1700 (less than the number of people who have died in Afghanistan, or in Iraq, or in the World trade center), are partial-birth abortions. It seems that the Republicans are more vested in bringing these lives into the world then in what happens to them once they're here.

Nobody wants people to have abortions. Nobody runs around and says, yes, I think an abortion would be a lovely thing to have today. For all but the most messed up women (and hello that alone says something) an abortion is a difficult decision, chosen amongst other difficult decisions. Yet the same people that want to eliminate abortions refuse to educate people on how to avoid having babies.

Abstinence only education doesn't work. Yes, people who are taught abstinence only have sex later (around age 19 as opposed to around 16-17 for general population) but when they do finally have sex they have no idea how to avoid pregnancy (and STD's). Isn't even one life saved worth it? Of course it is. Which is why my liberal Catholic high school taught us about birth control, STD's etc, (in health class), while in religion class we learned about waiting till marriage and the Catholic Churches official position on Birth Control (most forms are verboten). Because, guess what, even married women don't want to pop out babies every year, and your spouse may have an STD that you'll have to deal with.

This is, of course, where religious liberals and conservatives don't agree - we don't feel that we have the right to impose our morality on others. If God gives man free will who are we to take it away? The best we can do, and hope to do, is give people all the information and give them the opportunity to make the best possible choices. Yes it would be wonderful if people waited until they were married, or at least in a committed relationship to have sex - but it's not my (or anyone else's) responsibility to make the choice for the world. And I think you'd find that if more people were educated on how to avoid unwanted pregnancies, abortion numbers would drop - drastically. Republicans (and when I say Republicans I mean the politicians) don't really want the numbers to drop though, because it keeps getting them elected.

They talk as though they're the moral authority for the country, and as though believing in Christ makes on right. Why is it then that hotbeds of secular heathenism like Denmark and Norway have lower abortion rates than the US? These are the same countries, btw that decriminalize drug use, and have liberal social policies to reduce the number of very poor people they have. Hmmm could their be a link between poverty and abortions? nah.

As for Ann Coulter...I'm too lazy to get the specific links, but while I hesitate to call her a liar, she makes ish up and manipulates data to support her viewpoint. I have a statistical background and you can often make numbers say the opposite of what they mean.

Lastly, I'm sick, sick, sick of people basing party alliances on a single issue (like abortion). Our "War on drugs" has turned Colombia into a guerrilla state, turned poor peasants all over Latin America, even poorer thanks to our liberal spraying of pesticides on their crops (the marijuana plants however have become resistant to the pesticides), and turned Costa Rica from Eco-paradise into drug runner corridor. Instead of treating it as a public health issue, we've turned it into a moral issue.

Global warming is happening and we've locked ourselves into fuel cell technology that's still at least a decade away (au revoir new orleans) while viable alternative technology (better mass transit, bio diesel, solar in some places, wind in others, geothermal in still other places) exists. Cancer rates are soaring, in part because of chemicals like polyvinyl chloride that our government refuses to ban because they're in the pockets of big business. And don't even get me started on the war which is as much about our insatiable need for oil as it is about "bringing peace and stability to the region".

Yes abortion bugs me, but what bugs me more is that as big as the number of abortions is, the number of kids who die every day from lack of food,sanitation, or who die from easily treatable diseases. It bugs me that the same Walmart pharmacy clerk who refuses to sell me the morning after pill for moral reasons, is perfectly ok working for a company that hires illegal immigrants and locks them into the stores overnight to prevent "theft", which chases out smaller local businesses that often pay more and keep the money in the community (as opposed to funneling it up to some corporate billionaire) and which all but encourages producers to use sweatshop and child labor to give it the low, low, lowest prices, so that we can fill our growing homes and our three car garages with stuff that we never see, never mind actually use.

To me worrying about abortion right now, is like fretting over the living room wallpaper while the house burns down.
Paris David said…
You give food for thought, a million paths, but when you say "If God gives man free will who are we to take it away?" why do we never pose that question in terms of the unborn child's free will not to be slaughtered?
K said…
Why do you do that? Why do you ignore all the other problems I cited and focus on the one that you don't agree with. I already said that personally, I wouldn't have an abortion, and I'm all for decreasing the numbers of abortions, but the reality is that abortion has existed for the full length of human history.

There has always been knowledge of abortives. My parents grew up in Haiti and people there have always known what plants a person can take to stop a pregnancy. Furthermore, breastfeeding is an abortive did you know that? Should women not breastfeed because they risk terminating a pregnancy? Also, women who are pregnant with dominant dwarf babies (that is the genes are coming from both babies) will have spontaneous abortions. It's also not so cut and dry an issue where life begins and ends. Those pictures right to lifers like to show of babies the size of a thumbnail are very beautiful - but that baby couldn't survive outside of the womb. That's a possibility at of a life. And, if you value life so much, how can you support a president who killed 34,000 iraqi's in a year, and maimed how many soldiers so that we can drive SUV's?

It seems that people are less intent on saving lives (i.e. reducing the number of abortions) as in controlling sex. I'm not in the business of controlling who a person sleeps with as long as both parties are consenting (and children and animals can't consent).
Paris David said…
I just like to cut to the marrow of the matter.

It's funny that when I say a person's abortion stance is of utmost importance to me, folks say I'm a single-issue voter.

But then when folks singly focus on stopping the horrible war on terror, they never pull out the single-issue dialogue.
Anonymous said…
Go get 'em Paula!!!!
Anonymous said…
Paula,
I am a Catholic religious brother here in France. I have put off the duty of informing myself about the candidates until now. It's hard to know how to sift through French media. My brothers and sisters from around the world in my house here all ask me about Obama. I took some time from my studies, prayer, and bike-fixing do a search this afternoon. I was afraid to search the web. Already, magazines and papers can be a zoo of misleading persuasion. But my seach fell right away upon your blog, and you raise all the same questions that I hold at heart, especially the questions of personal character and of the value of human life.
Now, I feel informed. Can you write me an update in the coming months?
franthony@catholic.org
Anonymous said…
wow, you searched every kind of question possible related to Obama. You know I love the energy which you show while searching for your content. I just love this passion

Popular posts from this blog

Paula's List of Blogger Salaries...Are you on the list?

Update: For those who continue to enjoy this post, check out my website about 50 real online people making more than $50k per year , and my page where I update my online salary . UPDATE: Before you read any further or especially link to this old list, please check out "Paula's New List of Blogger Salaries (and Webmasters, Affiliate Marketers, Content Scrapers, Domainers and any other title you can think of) June 2007" by clicking here! ~ Thanks, PAULA NEAL MOONEY by Paula Neal Mooney One of my favorite features in Parade magazine is the issue where they grab a random sampling of people and report their incomes -- from the millionaires to the working poor. Since I'm fascinated with how much money bloggers and webmasters are making nowadays, I've created a similar list -- a random sampling of people making money on the net. Who's on Paula's List of Blogger and Webmaster Salaries? I spent hours and hours scouring the internet for the last-reporte

Paula's New List of Blogger Salaries (and Webmasters, Affiliate Marketers, Content Scrapers, Domainers and any other title you can think of) June 2007

FIND OUT HOW MUCH BLOGGERS REALLY MAKE ONLINE -- CHECK OUT THIS NEW WEBSITE ABOUT MONEY-MAKING ONLINE CALLED 50 OVER $50K... by Paula Neal Mooney The time has come. The time is now. Paula N. Mooney will you please publish that list now?! (Yes, I fancy Dr. Seuss' iambic pentameter.) My WebMaster blest me with a viral post called "Paula's List of Blogger Salaries," and the response was so wonderful, here lies an update. It's bigger and better than ever before with more pics, and double the amount of bloggers, webmasters, domainers, affiliate marketers (or a smidgen of some or all of those titles) and their reported incomes. How Much Do You Make? Money is funny. The abundance of it, the lack of it, the subject of cash in general gets attention. While some invoke their choice not to post their online income nor discuss it at all, I've always been of the Suze Orman mindset ever since I read her first book. Suze encourages people to talk ab

Digg.com's Autobury Secret Blacklist...Are you still being banned by automatic burying?

UPDATE: PLEASE CLICK THIS LINK TO DIGG THIS STORY AND TELL DIGG TO PLAY FAIR... by Paula Neal Mooney Many of us know the power of Digg.com, dreamed up by Kevin Rose, who touted it as a "user driven" site that says it allows the general public to determine the stories they want to see make it to the front page by voting for interesting articles they find across the web. The more votes the public gives an article, the better chance it should have to make it to the front page. Theoretically... The power of Digg's front page Digg.com -- according to Alexa -- is now more popular than The New York Times. Getting one of your articles or blog posts to the front page of Digg.com will get your website seen by plenty of eyes. John Chow experienced a one-day traffic record of 55,856 page views when one of his posts hit the front page of Digg. Digg Bans Domains...then Supposedly Unbans Them One day, Digg banned me -- I'm still not clear why. I found out they banned a whole bun