The latest slugfest between Obama and Clinton should remind those of us who find either candidate upsetting, that we have much work to do if we are to not only win the White House in November but also pick up some seats in the House of Representatives.  As the Democratic nomination winds its way through toward the summer months, we need to be registering voters, organizing the grass roots and identifying the key issues that will compel the American people to support the mature, responsible and experienced candidate, Senator John McCain.

As the Senator continues to hone his message to the American people, we who are active in the party and in conservative and pro-life circles, must connect with our constituencies and develop the networks and the people power to get out the vote for the primary and general elections. Now is not the time to weary or lose hope. The needs of the nation call upon us to stand in the gap against the pro-abortion, anti-American, collectivist mentality espoused by either democrat.

But our leaders must not be timid either. Republican senatorial leadership must demand up and down votes on judicial candidates.  The House leadership must propose a real and tangible response to the energy crisis. The American people must know that the Democratic leadership in this Congress has FAILED to respond to the pressing needs of the day.

Winning in November is not an option. To protect this nation from those who dismantle it and curtail our freedom, it is an imperative.

It has been the conversation of the last few days and really asks the serious question if this freshman senator from Illinois is so smug to not care that he is insulting working and middle class  Americans or if he is so clueless as not to know that he is doing so. I think the former. Obama is a smart politician and people who take him lightly do so at their peril. He is smooth when he has to be and can give a speech that says nothing and still has everyone talking about how masterful  he is with the English language. So why the misses? Why the comments that turn off the very voters he will need now during the primary and  later in November?

Here are some thoughts.

Obama has an agenda that heretofore has been covered with platitudes and slogans. He has not been very specific. What most people see is an energetic young man of color who offers "change."  And the first thing he is offering up to the voters is that he is NOT Hillary Clinton.
The excitement palyed to his strengths and the media found a new darling to dote on. Add a ruffled Bill Clinton and the media decided that the Clintons were history. So the so-called  "mainstream" or "old" media has hitched its wagon to the young Obama. and cast off the tried old shoe we call Hillary Clinton.

Not that Hillary is going quietly into that good night.

No, her people have pulled out the race card and publicly insinuated that the public will not vote for ....dare I say it.... a black man.

The reaction has been predictable.

but what does this have to do with Obama saying things that at first glance are very dumb. Well, he was speaking to a certain  group of elites. He still has to pass their muster. And the real truth - unstated as it is -about rich white liberals, is that many of them are more "racially biased" ( I will be polite and not say "bigoted") than the stereotypical white southerner as portrayed in liberal white newspapers.
And there is a pecking order in society that Obama has to chart. So by playing the fellow who can explain the problems of those people who are "bitter" to his new rich white San Francisco liberal friends, he make a contact and establishes a bond. He has studied at the exclusive schools. His comments infer the notion that "he has dedicated myself to activating the "poor."  He is telling them that we are so much different as we pity these people who do not know. After all he infers, "we Democrats know best. " 

So he will take the slings and arrows for a few days. But the press will cover for him. He will lose Pennsylvania but it won't be by too much, he figures, and by the way, he is meeting with Casey ands Roemer to work out a Catholic strategy. 

Of course he is also banking on McCain being a gentleman in the general. He figures that press will keep McCain off guard answering all the old questions once again and no one will look behind the curtain.

An interesting strategy. However it is not over until it is over. Hillary is not going to let him with the nomination without a fight to the finish. He probably knows that by now.  Yet the scrutiny will continue and the more that America sees that this freshman Senator with the racist pastor, the rich lawyer wife who was never proud of America until now, the business connection who is on trial in Chicago,  is the same fellow who rad into an autobiographical book on tape profanities and foul language, the same fellow who calls pregnancy a punishment, who is the most liberal member of the Senate, who wants to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, and whose only vote he regrets was the one that tried to help save a medically dependent women's life, the more America will reject such extremism.

Obama thinks that he can be smug and above it all.

However Obama does not understand the American people. They are a decent people. They have a heart. They have a soul. They may not want to address some issues because they are repelled by them, but for the most part they are a caring people.  These are the people who make America work every day. They are believers and they trust in their fellow citizens. Yes there are problems, but they believe thatthe solutions come form hard work and a willingness to be invested in the fabric of the community.

The American people will not want a smug arrogant freshman who will need on the job training . Once the American people see the real Obama, they will reject him and his failed liberal divisive polices. The media will claim it is because of race.  But it will be a choice between McCain's experience under fire and the incompetence of a youth without wisdom.

There must be something about February that brings out the weird, the unusual and the strange in politics.  Wait a minute – those words all mean the same thing. Ah, but it sounded poetic. You all remember your English teacher reminding you to set up your speech with triads. After all, half the battle in giving a speech is to make sure that it resonates with the audience. For those who have purchased a vacuum cleaner at your front door or the today’s version of the Yugo, you know what I mean. He was nice and it all sounded so good!

 

Well, that my friends is my reaction when I read Doug Kmeic’s article in Slate, claiming that Barack Hussain Obama is a “natural for the Catholic vote.” Now I know and respect Doug as a brilliant legal mind and a good man. But, I must take issue with him on his ability to take such talents and apply them to the current situation in this crazy and often mixed up world of politics.  I will defer any comments on his selection during the primary. Mr. Romney was gracious in realizing that he could not win and as I am preparing this article, he is releasing his delegates to Senator McCain and announcing his support for the Arizona Senator.

 

Doug’s first error is in comparing the substance and style of Ronald Reagan with Obama. Certainly anyone who can give a good speech can be hailed has a great communicator. But the reason that Reagan attracted so many Catholics and Democrats was because they knew him. They knew him as the actor who played George Gip in “Knute Rockne.”  They knew him from the days when he introduced the stories on Death Valley Days. They knew him as the governor in California who stood up to the student sit-ins, and did all of this with a smile. They remembered the days when he traveled the country giving speeches on economic freedom and against communism. So when he ran for president and repeated principles based upon respect for the sanctity of life, economic and personal freedom, and national security, the much of the Catholic population responded positively. When he spoke of a shining city on the hill, and that America’s best days were ahead, he reminded many Catholics of the hope that comes from God. Reagan never tired of reminding people that our rights are a gift from the Creator, especially the right to life.

 

Ronald Reagan spoke a language that Catholics and those who believed in God could understand.

 

Now let us look as Senator Obama. He is an attractive articulate voice for secular liberalism, wrapped up in a mantle that eschews labels and speaks about hope, and unity and the future.  He creates energy, much like a movie star or celebrity. How much of it is a reaction to Hillary is a legitimate question. After all a year ago, all of the pundits were telling the great unwashed (and those of us who do bathe) that the general election was going to be between Hillary and Rudy. We pro-lifers were told to get use to it. When we objected, we were ridiculed.  Such are the vagaries of life.  Obama to his credit has run a positive campaign (notwithstanding his positions on issues which are not very positive at all). People like positive messages. They may not have much substance but the people like them. Hillary represents the scandals of the previous Clinton era.  A lot of people are simply tired of the Clintons. Obama gives them an excuse to vote for “change” and break with the tired policies of the Clintons.

 

But that does not translate into Catholic support for Obama.

 

When Catholics learn how violently pro-abortion Obama is, they will ask how he can argue for hope and the future when he supports killing the least of our brethren.

 

The teaching of the Catholic Church is clear. You cannot vote for a person who thinks that killing children is permissible when there is a reasonable alternative.

 

And most Catholics will not be turned off by McCain’s support for the death penalty. It is not a non-negotiable like abortion. Catholic teaching permits the use of the death penalty in certain situations. This argument is a liberal canard used to excuse voting for someone who is pro-abortion.  Educated and practicing Catholics are not going to vote for a person who supports partial birth abortion and voted against a bill similar to the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act while in the Illinois Senate.

 

Barack Obama is a co-sponsor of the Freedom of Choice Act, a proposed federal law to nullify virtually all federal and state limitations on abortion. As this information is brought to the public’s attention, the luster will soon dim from the media’s latest darling.

 

As for Catholics “giving up McCain for Lent,” the truth is that many who were not originally keen on McCain are and have been giving him a second look. Some pro-life advocates are still concerned about his lack of understanding on the stem cell issue, but the latest scientific discoveries may render that discussion moot. He is and has been for the 24 years of his political life, pro-life.  There are some who are concerned about the Iraq question. His knowledge and understanding of national security will serve him well. But where McCain will score well is on his love of his country and the story of his life. If he can translate that story into one of one that promotes the best interests of the United States in a very dangerous world, if he can remind people that it is in freedom that we as a people can accomplish the greatest good, and if he can defend the rights of all persons, born and unborn, to live in dignity and opportunity by scaling back the destructive growth of government, then Catholics and others will be drawn to his message.

 

I do not see anyone who knew and appreciated Ronald Reagan joining the band wagon of a pro-abortion, pro-homosexual, anti-family radical like Obama once they know his positions and can envision what he intends to do to this country. Indeed the clash of ideas and the clear differences in position once again may be the best avenue for our country to take as we move toward the election in November.  To that end more Catholics will find it “natural” to vote for the candidate that chooses life and will protect the lives of all Americans.

 

John Jakubczyk is a lawyer and past President of Arizona Right to Life. He has been involved in the pro- life movement for the last 32 years.

 

 

I often wonder why certain politicians seem overly fascinated with defending the status quo on the subject of abortion. Some have bought into the whole canard that somehow protecting the right to kill unborn children empowers women and gives them equality with men. Some want it legal so they can have it as a backup means to birth control. Others seem to reflect a deep seeded hatred for the role of women as child-bearers – that, somehow it isn’t fair that women should have to bear the burden. Then there are some who are so selfish so as to want it available in the oft chance that they will have need of it fro themselves or a family member. Finally there are those who want abortion as a tool of population control and as a means to curtail the growth of certain ethnic groups and races.

So why does someone like Janet Napolitano want abortion to remain legal?

If she studied her biology in high school, she knows the “fetus” is a human being from the moment of conception.

As a law student she should have studied the case law that provided support for the protection of the infant “in ventre sa mare” and the statutes passed by the various states protecting the life of the unborn child. She also would have read the dubious arguments attacking the humanity of the unborn child. Yet if she was like the many feminist law students I recall in my days at the university, she may have had a resentment toward the law and toward those men who wrote the laws that protected women and children. She may have been like so many women who knew but did not care that the child was human but only cared if the child was wanted. Perhaps she had a misplaced sympathy for those children who grew up in poverty or neglect, whose lives were not perfect as the American dream.

But Janet Napolitano embraced abortion throughout her legal and political career. She was a part of a liberal law firm and acted as one of the attorneys for Anita Hill when the pro-abortion and pro-homosexual liberals were trying to destroy Clarence Thomas. You will recall that liberals do not like people to leave the liberal plantation. And when Clarence Thomas was nominated to the Supreme Court, it was not enough that as an African-American, he had achieved so much. He was not one of them. He was a conservative. He was a Christian. He had to be destroyed. And so the left took out one of the most disgusting plays from the racial playbook and Janet Napolitano was in on the ground floor advising Anita Hill.

Thomas survived the “lynching” as he called it and now sits on the Supreme Court. Napolitano continued her law career until Clinton offered her an appointment as a U.S. Attorney in Arizona. A shrewd appointment, because it would give her the cover as a prosecutor and provide her with access to the criminal justices system and all the confidential information that includes.

When she was elected attorney general after defeating Tom McGovern in a close bitter dirty race, we all knew she was following the Bruce Babbitt advance track for government advancement. What many of us did not know was how badly she was going to wreck the attorney general’s office and permit a series of scandal-ridden events to detract from the important work being done by that agency.

I have not the time to address the CPS scandals and the problems in juvenile court. But I will recall that event seven years ago in the fall of 1999 when a 14 year-old girl and her unborn child were made pawns of a pro-abortion mindset that has infected the legal system and this country.

Today an event such as this one probably would not even make the Arizona Republic. After all the paper continues to run interference for Janet and her minions. But in 1999 they saw a story and actually wrote about it. Here is what happened.

A 14 year-old ward of the court was pregnant. She had been in the custody of CPS since the age of five (another failure of our state foster case and adoption system). She had been a run away. In fact she used to run away a lot according to the state. She was pregnant. The state wanted her to have an abortion. She did not want an abortion according to her relatives. Then she was picked up again and now she was over 20 weeks along. The authorities wanted her to disclose the father. She refused, alternating stories between being in love with him and having been assaulted. He court appointed lawyer them files a motion to allow her to go out of state to have a later term abortion. The state does not object. The state is represented by the attorney general’s office. Janet is the attorney general. The juvenile court judge William Sergeant grants the motion and the state begins to make arrangements to transport her to California for this later term abortion (makes you wonder how many other abortions were approved by the juvenile court). At this point someone balks. Not a judge, not a lawyer, not a caseworker at DES. No the person who balks is someone involved in the process. An unknown who makes something very wrong known to the world – and who created a national firestorm.

The public outcry over the idea of sending someone out of state to kill her child on the state’s dime was too much - even for the Arizona Republic. They reported the story. The public reaction was loud and clear. They opposed it. People offered to adopt the child. Agencies offered to take her in through and after the pregnancy. One politician offered her a scholarship to college if she would reconsider. But we will never know if she ever knew of the offers of aid. Because at first Janet’s office refused to even ask the judge to reconsider. When the pressure did not subside, the AG’s office filed a motion to reconsider. After a few days the judge ruled again in favor of killing the child. The AG’s office said it was over. The public pressure soon even found its way to the governor’s office. After at first ignoring it, Governor Hull told Napolitano that if she did not appeal the ruling, the governor would appoint special counsel. Napolitano relented and filed an appeal. The case was argued before Appellate court judge Michael Ryan who reversed the lower court ruling and sent the case back with a mandate to answer some serious questions. It looked like the child’s life would be spared.

But in a move that defied the law, the rules of court, the mandate issued by Judge Ryan, and all common sense, the state attorney general Janet Napolitano, agreed to the unprecedented request to argue an appeal of Judge Ryan’s ruling BY TELEPHONE on a SUNDAY morning WITHOUT any BRIEFS or WRITTEN ARGUMENTS or RECORD for the Supreme Court to review. That the Court agreed to even take it was unbelievable. But that Janet agreed to allow it to happen and did not object but went out of her way to accommodate the court appointed lawyer who was pushing for the abortion, violated her duty to the people. All she had to do was object to any expedited appeal. All she had to do was argue that the rules had to be followed. All she had to do was argue that Judge Ryan’s order s were reasonable. She could have demanded briefs be filed and an in person argument be made before the court. All the mother and baby needed was time.

You see the girl by this time was 28 weeks pregnant. No one in California would do the abortion now. Even the notorious Planned Parenthood would not do a late term abortion. The only abortionist in the country who would be delighted to kill the baby for a huge fee was an abortionist known as George Tiller. His office is in Wichita Kansas. Now Planned Parenthood was helping Janet behind the scenes. Their employees arranged for the flight to Kansas. They told the AG that they had to have her on the plane by Sunday because the abortion is a three-day procedure. Janet had to look like she was fighting to protect the girl and the baby and then lose at the Arizona State Supreme Court. Then everyone could be upset at the State Supreme Court.

So on a Sunday morning when most people were getting up for church, the State justices were hearing by telephone without any record, with a directive to get them an answer in an hour, a case about a 14 year old ward of the court and whether the lower court judge’s ruling should be upheld as within his discretion or whether the appeals court judge was correct to reverse the trial court.

One additional wrinkle: one of the justices was Stanley Feldman. Justice Feldman was the lawyer for Planned Parenthood when he was in private practice. He argued for the reversal of Arizona’s laws criminalizing abortion. To his credit and consistent with the canons of judicial conduct, he offered to recuse himself, that is, to not hear the case and get a replacement. Did Janet accept this offer? Did Janet realize that he would rule against the state? Did Janet want to lose so the baby would die?

The AG did nothing to remove Feldman from the case. They did not accept his offer to recuse himself.

The court ruled 3-2 against the state, reversed the appellate court ruling and returned it to the juvenile judge. The girl was on a plane that same day. Within the next three days she would undergo an abortion and her baby would be dead.

Janet meanwhile launched an investigation as to how this information became public. With a vengeance she sought to uncover the hero who refused to go quietly into that good night. “A climate of fear,” was how one DES employee referred to her reign. She knew that she could not have something like this go public again.

As I recall these events, I am amazed at the “blood lust” and how it was fueled by the pro-abortion elements in the city. Former abortionist and current convicted felon Brian Finkel lost no time getting his personage on the news and in the papers as he attacked pro-lifers who wanted to save the mother and her baby. The attitude by so many in the legal system was utter hatred at being exposed to the public scrutiny. Even after the baby was killed the Republic, never a friend to the unborn, called for an investigation to root out the leaks.

Years later, one sees the same anger and hatred toward pro-lifers and those who work to offer alternatives to abortion. Why?

Why is it so hard to love a child?

Why does that child or any child pose such a threat to these people that they want the children dead?

And how is it that these same people claim to care about the state, or the nation, and yet can without any pangs of conscience embrace the killing of children?

There were many lives affected by that one child who lived only briefly before being legally executed with the sanction of the state. His or her life offered many people many choices. These choices will ring through eternity. You too have a choice. On November 7, 2006, election-day, you can choose those who support and want to protect all innocent human life or you can choose to back those who view abortion as a means to solving unplanned problems permanently. And while you are thinking about it, remember this, that little child who was killed in that Wichita abortion clinic, would be six years old and sitting in a first grade class.

But because of Janet Napolitano, that child is dead.

Well I have set up another means of expressing my thoughts on the day's events as they relate to the culture of life.

I will continue to comment through the Arizona Right to Life website and invite you to check that site for the latest in news and information on Arizona related pro-life events.  

And since it is very late, I will leave you with a link to LifeNews.com for the latest in pro-life information.