Where O Dobson Is Thy Sting?

It was the day that the ram’s horn sounded:

June 24, 2008 marked the first major, deliberate attack on the credibility of Barack Obama’s faith by a mainstream Evangelical. Using his Focus on the Family radio address, Dr. James Dobson spent 18 minutes tirading against Obama - charging the candidate of conducting a “lowest common denominator” approach to morality and a “fruitcake interpretation” of the constitution. Alert the presses: The Quadrennial American Religious Political Holy War had begun.



Forget that Dobson vowed never to vote for John McCain only months ago, or that Obama is a former lecturer of Constitutional Law at the University of Chicago. In any event, the chattering class similarly readied their spectacles for the first shots in the 2008 Religious-Political Battle; for the other shoe to drop. Just as Dobson had assumably hoped for, Evangelical leader after Evangelical leader hit the presses and the airwaves adding their two-cents in response to the radio address.

The catch? The lion's share of Evangelical leaders that chose to speak up came quickly to Senator Obama's defense. Dobson took the hard end of the press cycle; he had pulled the trigger, and the gun had backfired.


The day following the address, this headline appeared across the blogosphere: "Dr. Dobson Has Just Handed Obama Victory", the summary of an editorial authored a fellow pro-life Evangelical, Frank Schaefer. Schaefer writes:

“the new generation of evangelicals is sick of . . . their association with fossils like Dobson. There are many evangelicals . . . who are not all about homophobia, nationalism, war-without-end and American exceptionalism or the Republican Party. . . . . they believe that America has a responsibility to do something about global warming, poverty, AIDS, human trafficking and other issues. They see through Dobson and the other so-called pro-life leaders,”


Schaefer wasn’t alone in his criticism; that same day, well known Texas Pastor Kirbyjon Caldwell launched the collaborative:

www.jamesdobsondoesntspeakforme.com

On the website, there is a side-by-side of Dobson's charges and Obama's actual statements. In addition to the rebuttal, Caldwell’s launch includes (as of today) over 12,000 signatures – growing daily - from cosigners to an anti-Dobson creed that includes the following:

“Dobson doesn’t speak for me . . . when he uses religion as a wedge to divide . . . when he speaks as the final arbiter on the meaning of the Bible . . . when he denigrates his neighbors views when they don’t line up with his. . . ."

Another political action committee - Matthew 25 - held a high dollar fundraiser condemning Dobson's action and seeking donations for a political response.


Throughout the press cycle that week, Dobson suffered a barrage of dissent from his Christian peers in the political arena. Pastor Jim Wallis, head of Sojourners Group in Washington D.C. was equally critical. Wallis contributed an editorial that echoed Schaefer and Caldwell, reminding viewers that Dobson wasn't in attendence at the 2006 Call to Renewal address he chose to attack, but that he himself was:



"Older Religious Right leaders are now being passed by a new generation of young evangelicals . . . [belonging to] part of a much wider and deeper agenda. That new evangelical agenda is a deep threat to James Dobson . . . evangelical votes are in play this election year, especially among a new generation, and are no longer captive to the Religious Right. Perhaps that is the real reason for James Dobson's attack”


The list went on. Peter Wehner, a self-described evangelical conservative and former assistant deputy to President Bush contributied material to the Washington Post:

“If Christian conservatives want to be taken seriously, they need to make serious arguments and speak with intellectual integrity. In this instance, Dobson didn't. He has set back his cause and made some of us who are evangelicals and conservatives wince.”


The number of not simply journalists or talking heads, but true Evangelicals that distanced themselves from Dobson and his stance against Obama has thusfar heavily outweighed those in Dobson’s corner. Pastors like Rick Warren and T.D. Jakes have spoken very warmly about Obama's candidacy; the candidate has received some criticism from the black church, but far more enthusiastic support. He has even received more donations from pastors and clergymen nationwide. This is all part of a far-wider phenomenon that Dobson either failed to calculate or has no problem with isolating.


This is not to say that no one applauded Dobson's opinions. Most notably, Pat Buchanan gave the Doctor a nod with an editorial and press appearances in his support. Buchanan defended the Focus on the Family radio address, declaring that:

“Obama . . . is now preaching a kumbaya Christianity where leaders who believe abortion is the killing of the innocent unborn are to set their convictions and cause aside in the name of ecumenical amity.

There can be no peaceful coexistence in a cultural war because it is at root a religious war. Far into the future, Americans seem fated to face each other again and again at some disputed barricade.”

But the irony of Dobson's response is how well it represents the divisive, single-sided religiosity that many in the Evangelical church have become embarrassed by, and tired of defending at the behest of their own convictions.





It is because pro-life leaders have maintained a rhetoric of life, yet set those convictions aside on issues like war, genocide in Darfur or poverty, that the Evangelical community is waking up to a perceived insincerity of their former allegiances.

It is because leaders like Buchanan themselves choose to wage a cultural war - against not only members of other faiths - but sadly their brothers and sisters in the Christian faith - that many Evangelicals are waking up instead to a gospel of peace, justice and altruism.


Plenty of Evangelical voters will (and certainly do!) scoff at the idea that Obama has a chance to gain traction with the conservative factions of the white church in America. Another four and a half months will pass before any ballots are counted. This type of lost loyalty will be described today and tomorrow by many as a product of a liberal media with an anti-Evangelical agenda. Many others - themselves Republican candidates or operatives - know the fuller truth. To Obama’s advantage lie two related streams of momentum that are exponentially working against McCain, neither the consequence of his own doing, but at the core of why he's already running a number of negative ads.


First, as is heavily documented above, the conversation on “values” has changed drastically, and the political tables have turned against our current President - a man who promised us all a compassionate conservatism.

Bush set the bar for Dobson's political reccomendations, and he set it pretty low. Further, the failures of the Bush Administration have only reminded values voters how much they have failed to deliver on.

The unforgivable response to Hurricane Katrina cemented the picture of Bush’s administration as not simply incompetent, but as unconcerned with those in the shadows of our nation. Bush’s non-response to Darfur has outraged a huge number of Evangelicals – especially in the younger generations who pray daily for those suffering there.

There is plenty of evidence of torture and human rights abuses, captured powerfully by the photos at Abu Ghraib and the admonition of human rights abuses against the United States from the international community. All have exposed the hypocrisy of Bush’s "compassionate" conservatism.





There is more anger over the staunch injustice of Scooter Libby’s pardon and Valerie Plame’s outing, not to mention the perceived cover-up in its aftermath within an Evangelical community believing in a just God. Jack Abramoff and Tom Delay have become icons of the GOP’s marriage to corporate financing and electioneering that has shaken both older, fiscally conservative Republicans and young observing minds alike.

Bush’s exit from the recent G8 Summit on climate change and his infamous benediction: “Goodbye from the world’s Biggest Polluter” underscore the arrogance of the Administration elected by those who believe the earth to be God’s own creation; themselves stewards of it. These in concert have exposed the hypocrisy of Bush’s compassionate "conservatism" .



There is a reevaluation of what it means to vote with moral values taking place across this country, opening a window for Barack Obama’s intersection of faith, values and action. Likewise, his message of change understandably resonates to voters of conviction, liberal and conservative alike.


The second front in McCain’s losing battle is the obvious result of the aforementioned: the deflated base of support McCain begins with.

For example, in 2004, 22% of Americans said “moral issues/values” (defined as opposition to abortion & gay marriage primarily) was their top concern for Presidential pick; in 2008, when asked the same question only 8% of Americans respond the same way – a deep cut of nearly 2 in 3 voters.

McCain also faces the challenge of running in the wake of a tremendously unpopular President. Bush’s approval rating – in the mid to high twenty percent range for months now – is roughly half what it was when Bush himself faced re-election. Just think: the last time a President’s approval rating was (almost) as low in election time was 1980.

The political climate then could be summarized as facing deeply strained relationships in Middle East tied to a fuel crisis accompanied a sweeping national mood against the incumbent because of a sinking national economic outlook.

Thus, a good-looking candidate from seen as a Washington outsider cloaked conservative policy in a soaring centrist rhetoric and crushed Jimmy Carter by a 10-1 electoral advantage. The most significant moment in that election for many in remembrance was the eventual victor’s question to America: “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?” If this situation doesn’t illustrate trouble for John McCain, I’m not sure what could.

Dobson doesn’t seem to understand any of this. Democrats lost the 2004 election because they didn’t understand the importance of communicating, in a way that didn’t sound politically charged, their understanding of how faith and politics collide. Ironically, 2008 might spell the same future for the Republican party.





McCain is already sinking under the collateral damage of the Bush Presidency. While Republicans accuse Obama of playing politics with faith to win an election, it is their own bid for the Presidency that remains at stake for lack of a sound, inspiring message based on the principals of faith.


One of the most lasting legacies that Bush may end up with is the overwhelming burden he has become for McCain. The AP/Pew Research Center reported in late 2007 that Bush’s approval among white evangelicals aged 18-29 has sunk from the high 80s in 2002 to the low 40s in 2007. Of course, this problem has become a compound one now that Obama is the nominee, and is more popular among this age group than any candidate in my lifetime.

This represents half of a generation of voters who have been brought through adolescence and into adulthood under the marriage of the Bush Presidency and the GOP, only to become of political consequence in within the storm of Barack Obama.

Thus, the Bush/GOP relationship becomes a marriage they no longer remain interested in adherence to. The future of the Evangelical church is seeing other people, seeing little in common with John McCain besides their marriage status: divorced.

Hey Dr. Dobson - what did Jesus have to say about that?

Pro-Life-Span (A political memoir)

Winston Churchill once suggested that if you are not a liberal when you are young you have no heart, and that if you are not conservative as you grow older you have no brain. And as much as I cherish many of Mr. Churchill’s installments in history’s great quotations, I will admit that my life (so far) has been a testimony to just the opposite.


Eight or nine years ago, when I first began to digest my political surroundings I was a sworn conservative – or so I thought. As all good political ideologies, mine was informed by a deep moral imperative, perhaps the most common to bond young conservatives today: the issue of life.

As had been explained to me by a fair number of mentors early on, abortion was not only wrong, but abhorrently so in the eyes of the Lord. If we as a population did not defend life, what could we defend?

But I will admit that the more I looked around, the more confused I became regarding my bedfellows in the GOP. I was pro-life; thus, I was rather stunned to find out that such a political commitment also made me against gun control and against properly funding education. I realized being "pro-life" meant supporting a health insurance industry that profits off dropping coverage to the sick and elderly. "Pro-life" meant brewing a firestorm to keep Terri Schaivo alive, but staying quiet while our judicial system sentences black defendants to death four times as frequently as their white counterparts. The world I was standing for didn't exactly add up to one that valued and defended the principles I associated with true life.

My confusion did not settle with a Bush presidency. It almost seemed as if I'd been lobbying against the essence and opportunity of life by cutting taxes for the rich, and programs for the poor. Why did my political allies work for big oil and pharmaceutical companies while those I was taught to bemoan supported our social services and non-profits? And why even try defending an executive branch that suspended Habeas Corpus to prisoners of war held without charge, while to a tried and convicted felon on pay-roll, it instead extended a pardon? All the while, my peers in the community held mostly their pro-life values at the forefront of their votes, while those they fought to elect never got around to doing anything about it.

Year after year, pro-life groups represent perhaps the most well-funded and highly mobilized special interest in politics with hardly anything to show for their movement except thousands of down-ticket Republican-elects. Since its passing, four Republican Presidents have presided over 23 years of Roe v Wade, with rarely a serious challenge considered. If pro-life voters have the audacity to demand a young woman have a child she may not be able to support, they shouldn't let their elected officials off the hook in not carrying their own campaign promises through their full terms.

It’s been a long time since I’ve heard the issue of abortion lengthily discussed on either the evening news or the floor of congress. But since we’ve got a Presidential election to survive, I’d bet that Republican operatives are banking on the wedge issue going center-stage in John McCain mailings and television advertisements everywhere.

Therefore, as a pro-choice voter cut from pro-life cloth and strong advocate for a culture of true life and wellness in our local communities and national dialogue, I have two prayers for my pro-life friends this year.

My first is that people on both sides of the fence can find leadership that brings both respect and maturity to such a sensitive and emotional issue like reproductive rights and the ethical dilemmas surrounding it. I long for a population that stops speaking in black and white and realizes that this issue more than almost any other exists for most voters in delicate shades of gray.

I hope for a pro-life movement that, unlike its manifestation in South Dakota recently, refrains from trying to plow through an abortion ban that does not even make exceptions in cases as morally depraved as rape or incest. I hope that pro-life voters reject such attempts as no less than insulting to what protecting a life should mean.

I hope for an awakening that the label “pro-life” demands more than nine months of maternity and a successful operation in the birthing units of our hospitals; yes, a movement that knows being pro-life also calls us into our children’s classrooms ensuring quality funding for teachers and schools, safety in their parks and playgrounds, affordable health-care for every child and opportunity regardless of their economic backgrounds.

And I firmly reject the label “pro-abortion Senator” that the Right to Life news so often placed upon Senator Kerry’s head, and will inevitably plaster against the eventual Democratic nominee: I've never met someone who considered themselves "pro-abortion" – it’s by definition erroneous, and it’s logically absurd. so please keep the political discourse honest, and at an adult level.

Likewise, I search for a political alternative to the more militant activists who write off their opponents as either loony crusaders or culturally primitive. In the mind of many a critical thinker, a pretty accurate difference between partial birth abortion and infanticide might be about ten minutes. And it's still a radical sound just to call a spade a spade.

Can we move beyond the bumper sticker politics of, “Against Abortion? Get a Vasectomy!” It may be kind of funny to some, but it’s kind of offensive to others. The movement doesn't grow if people don't feel welcome - and it's hardly bulletproof. How does "Against War? Don't Start One!" or "Against Slavery? Don't own one!" sound? It's not helpful to say dissenting voices should surgically remove themselves. And it's not democratic. And it's not smart. And it's not nice.

I hope for a consensus that most of us exist far from either extreme and closer to one-another. I long for an expression of politics that reflects how similar our dreams for a healthy, sustainable and diverse community truly are.

That is my first hope for the coming typhoon of an election.

My second, is that the well-funded scream machine of the Republican National Committee is strenuously examined critically by the voters that have tirelessly found membership in it.

I seek a break from the fear fest and amnesia that inspires a constant majority of white protestants to forget how with a Republican President, Supreme Court and Congress in both 2005 and 2006, no one made a serious effort to ban abortion at all. I would ask pro-life voters to stop supporting puppets that both publicly oppose and publicly ignore the issue. And I applaud the Catholic pro-life organization that ran ten critical radio ads in the districts of ten pro-life representatives condemning their refusal to fund a federal health insurance initative towards children who had none and to this day remain without, including the assertion: "that's not pro-life".

It will be interesting to see to whether the past 8 years continues an endless forgiveness for impotently pro-life politicians, or an inevitable flight away from them. It's interesting to note that the number of white protestant voters who supported a Democrat at the top of their ticket in 2006 had tripled since only two years prior. Thusfar in 2007 and 2008, Pastors & Clergymen nationwide have joined a coalition ranging from college students to Ivy-league faculty in financially supporting Democrats in greater volumes than Republicans.

And regardless of voting or donor trends, can we agree that morality has yet to be monopolized by either political party, and activists on both ends should refrain from suggesting so?

Since I understand that it’s difficult to take political advise from those who seem ideologically different from ourselves, I am choosing to invoke the words of one of the pro-life communities most adored orators (and one whose short-term memory actually impresses) in summarizing my own hope for a new American discourse.

Frank Schaefer is the son of Francis Schaefer; the senior of the two is considered by many as pratically the Hercules of the pro-life movement in the 1970s. His son (also a mega-spokesperson for the pro-life movement) has re-framed the issue bravely and eloquently:

In explaining what many would call the contradiction of being both “pro-life” and a vocal endorser of Senator Barack Obama's bid for the Presidency as a Democrat, Francis Schaefer writes these words:

In 2000, we elected a president who claimed he believed God created the earth and who, as president, put car manufacturers and oil company's interests ahead of caring for that creation. We elected a pro-life Republican Congress that did nothing to actually care for pregnant women and babies. And they took their sincere evangelical followers for granted, and played them for suckers.



The so-called evangelical leadership -- Dobson, Robertson et al. also played the pro-life community for suckers. While thousands of men and women in the crisis pregnancy movement gave of themselves to help women and babies, their evangelical "leaders" did little more than cash in on fundraising opportunities and represent themselves as power-brokers to the craven politicians willing to kowtow to them.

Similarly the Republicans have also been hypocrites while talking big, for instance about their pro-life ethic. But what have they achieved? First, through their puritanical war on sex education they've hindered our country from actually preventing unwanted pregnancy. Second, through the Republican Party's marriage to the greediest and most polluting earth-destroying corporations they've created a climate (both moral and physical) that has scorched the earth for-profit, with no regard to future generations whatsoever.

A leader who believes in hope, the future, trying to save our planet and providing a just and good life for everyone is someone who is actually pro-life.

It is my opinion that Senator Obama stands for a far truer version of being “pro-life” than the cheap imitation so many conservative voters have been supporting for decades. Yet I also understand that it’s not my place to tell you how to vote. In fact, no one should tell you how to vote (especially not if their name is Dr. Dobson.)

When it comes to issues of faith and moral imperatives, it is difficult to publicly suggest that one idea absolutely trumps another. The truth is just the opposite – issues such as this one require a quiet meditation over our personal convictions and a learned and deliberate vote for what that quiet voice inside us has advised, regardless of what any one party activist says.

So if you’re a pro-life voter, and you deeply disagree with the suggestion that a Democrat offers the best path towards creating a nation and a culture that truly values life, please understand that I actually value that perspective, assuming it is one informed by both thought and conviction. (And one that understands there is more to news coverage than the Right To Life tabloids).

And please understand that, in addition, I deeply disagree with and outright admonish the suggestion that President Bush – or Senator McCain – fits that same bill. It is a decision I have come to after a deep investigation of the candidates and the political landscape, and one that is informed first and foremost by what I believe to be upright and full of integrity. The tragedy of so many pro-life voters is their failure to understand that most liberals vote the way that they do because of conviction. Incredible how much we have in common, really.

Thus, as of here and now, I do believe with conviction it would be both a moral error to flat-line illegalize abortion, and I have many religious allies in that conclusion. Yet I charge our politicians on both sides of the aisle to aggressively sort out how we can make that practice less necessary. Coincidently, I believe this is the page that most of America is on, including the Democratic candidate that Francis Schaefer has endorsed. When asked his position on the issue in a debate last year, Obama responded:

“I think that most Americans realize that this is a profoundly difficult issue for the women and families that make these decisions. They don’t make them casually, and I trust women to make these decisions in conjunction with their doctors, and their families, and their clergy – and I think that’s where most Americans are . . . [but] there is a broader issue here, which is that – can we move past some of the issues on which we disagree, and can we start talking about the things we do agree on? Reducing teen pregnancy; making it less likely for women to find themselves in the circumstances where they’ve got to anguish over these decisions; those are areas where I think we can all start mobilizing, and move forward – rather than look backwards.”

I know what you're thinking: building a coalition between the pro-life brigade of the right and pro-choice militias of the left isn’t predictable or easy.

But I swear I have found myself with stranger bedfellows before.