Click this link, RightChange.com videos. It will take you to the video center for RightChange.com. Wait for the video Failed Leadership Timeline to appear in the big TV window. When it does, a link will appear with it in the lower-right hand corner of the window that says “CLICK TO WATCH THE VIDEO.” Click it and see one of the best political videos you have ever seen. It takes you through the major points along that timeline of failed leadership by President Obama in the British Petroleum oil spill in the gulf. In this video you will see why the BP oil spill is such a game changer for the political scene in America.

Note: I do not suggest you give money to RightChange.com until they make it clear who is behind their website

God allowed the BP oil spill to teach us a lesson

I believe God has allowed the BP oil spill to happen to America because nothing short of such a calamity would finally show the remainder of the American electorate who still believe in President Obama and his liberal agenda is not the best way to a free lunch. Liberalism (a.k.a. socialism, communism, Marxism) is wrong: dead wrong. The only people it helps is the ruling class. Not a single poor person has ever been given a leg up economically by liberalism. Many have been re-enslaved by liberalism, but none have ever seen their lot improved by liberalism.

A president badly needs business experience before he becomes president

How could anyone expect a man and a party composed of people, 90+% of whom, including the president, have never been the CEO of so much as a Kool-Aid stand, to be able to know how to manage an entity as large as America.

Add to that the man, the president in this case, had three strikes against his abilities to understand and be capable of being the CEO of U.S. government.

I confess I am wrong to say he had three strikes against him. He had a lot more strikes against him.

Here is a short list, though not an exhaustive list, of the strikes against him:

• He is an academic.
• He is an egomaniac.
• He grew up loving Marxism and Marxist leadership.
• He hates America.
• He hates white people, even though his mother was white.
• He attended a church where hate for America, white people, and the Constitution of the United States that was composed and voted on by white people, was loudly proclaimed by his pastor every Sunday and every chance he got outside of church.
• He is a product of Chicago gangster-style government.
• He is believes government is more munificent and intelligent, and, ipso facto, better knows than does the electorate, how to care for you and your needs from cradle to grave; and, as a bonus, it better knows when you should finally repose in your grave than you, your family, and your physician.

Instead of liberals like those, we would do well to listen to God and to those who would conserve His ways. The only way for us to bring back the American exceptionalism that we have lost is to follow the constitutional conservative way. The best hope for us to get started along that way is to elect Republicans—constitutional conservative Republicans—when and where possible. That means no more big spender Republicans like we have been electing for the last twenty plus years.

No more big spenders

We don’t need big spender Republicans in office who will triple the size of the federal government, as did George W. Bush. We need real conservatives.  Do you realize that Bill Clinton was the most conservative president we have had since Ronald Reagan

I think it good that Obama became our president

I must say that I was pleased that we elected Obama as president rather than the Republican John McCain. Had we elected John McCain he would have tried his best to ruined America, just as Obama has tried to do. And he would probably have forever ruined any chance that we would ever believe in the promises of Republicans again. Therefore, I was very pleased when Obama was elected president. He has given us a political enema like no one else could have given us.

God knows, we don’t

God knows when we need to suffer. He knows the right choice of the moment that is most beneficial for the soul. We don’t. We can pray that the coke machine will cough up a coke when we put our money in the slot and it usually will. But God isn’t a coke machine. When you pray to God for a coke, you may get one in answer to your prayer if God thinks it will be good for your soul. God answers our every prayer, He just does always give us the answer we want.

We must remember the lessons that God has taught America through the idiocy of President Obama. That remembrance will be the right change for us.

President Obama has mismanaged the oil spill on purpose

I can’t add this to the strikes list I gave above, but I am convinced that President Obama’s clumsy handling of the British Petroleum oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is not the result of his lack of managerial skills but is purposeful. I won’t take the time to go into why he would do such a thing here. But you can probably figure that out yourself. If many of you say you don’t understand why he might do such a thing, I will try to address that subject.  You might have noticed I am not doing much on this blog right now. That is because I am busy trying to make enough money to survive in this economy.

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By George F. Will

Thursday, July 8, 2010

The evening of Jan. 16, 1920, hours before Prohibition descended on America, while the young assistant secretary of the Navy, Franklin Roosevelt, drank champagne in Washington with other members of Harvard’s Class of 1904, evangelist Billy Sunday preached to 10,000 celebrants in Norfolk, Va., : “The reign of tears is over. The slums will soon be only a memory. . . .” Not exactly.

Daniel Okrent’s darkly hilarious “Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition” recounts how Americans abolished a widely exercised private right—and condemned the nation’s fifth-largest industry—in order to make the nation more heavenly. Then all hell broke loose. Now that ambitious government is again hell-bent on improving Americans—from how they use salt to what light bulbs they use—Okrent’s book is a timely tutorial on the law of unintended consequences.

The ship that carried John Winthrop to Massachusetts in 1630 also carried, Okrent reports, 10,000 gallons of wine and three times more beer than water. John Adams’s morning eye-opener was a tankard of hard cider; James Madison drank a pint of whiskey daily; by 1830, adult per capita consumption was the equivalent of 90 bottles of 80-proof liquor annually.

Although whiskey often was a safer drink than water, Americans, particularly men, drank too much. Women’s Prohibition sentiments fueled the movement for women’s rights—rights to hold property independent of drunken husbands; to divorce those husbands; to vote for politicians who would close saloons. So the United States Brewers’ Association officially opposed women’s suffrage.

Women campaigning for sobriety did not intend to give rise to the income tax, plea bargaining, a nationwide crime syndicate, Las Vegas, NASCAR (country boys outrunning government agents), a redefined role for the federal government and a privacy right—the “right to be let alone”—that eventually was extended to abortion rights. But

By 1900, per capita consumption of alcohol was similar to today’s, but mere temperance was insufficient for the likes of Carry Nation. She was “six feet tall, with the biceps of a stevedore, the face of a prison warden, and the persistence of a toothache,” and she wanted Prohibition. It was produced by the sophisticated tenacity of the Anti-Saloon League, which at its peak was spending the equivalent of 50 million of today’s dollars annually. Okrent calls it “the mightiest pressure group in the nation’s history.” It even prevented redistricting after the 1920 Census, the first census to reveal that America’s urban—and most wet—population was a majority.

Before the 18th Amendment could make drink illegal, the 16th Amendment had to make the income tax legal. It was needed because by 1910 alcohol taxes were 30 percent of federal revenue.

Workmen’s compensation laws gave employers an interest in abstemious workers. Writes Okrent, Asa Candler, founder of the Coca-Cola Co., saw “opportunity on the other side of the dry rainbow.” World War I anti-German fever fueled the desire to punish brewers with names such as Busch, Pabst, Blatz and Schlitz. And President Woodrow Wilson‘s progressivism became a wartime justification for what Okrent calls “the federal government’s sudden leap into countless aspects of American life,” including drink.

And so Prohibition came. Sort of. Briefly.

After the first few years, alcohol consumption dropped only 30 percent. Soon smugglers were outrunning the Coast Guard ships in advanced speedboats, and courts inundated by violations of Prohibition began to resort to plea bargains to speed “enforcement” of laws so unenforceable that Detroit became known as the City on a Still.

Prohibition agents cherished $1,800 jobs because of the bribes that came with them. Fiorello La Guardia taunted the government that it would need another “150,000 agents to watch the first 150,000.” Exemptions from Prohibition for church wine and medicinal alcohol became ludicrously large—and lucrative—loopholes.

After 13 years, Prohibition, by then reduced to an alliance between evangelical Christians and criminals, was washed away by “social nullification”—a tide of alcohol—and by the exertions of wealthy people, such as Pierre S. du Pont, who hoped that the return of liquor taxes would be accompanied by lower income taxes. (They were.)

Ex-bootleggers found new business opportunities in the southern Nevada desert. And in the Second World War, draft boards exempted brewery workers as essential to the war effort.

The many lessons of Okrent’s story include: In the fight between law and appetite, bet on appetite. And: Americans then were, and let us hope still are, magnificently ungovernable by elected nuisances.

Source: George F. Will of the Washington Post

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By Dick Morris & Eileen McGann

Why is President Obama suing to invalidate the Arizona law on illegal immigration? Why is he incurring the enmity of even his own Democratic Congressmen from the Phoenix and Tucson areas by trying to kill a law that two-thirds of Arizona and a similar proportion of America as a whole supports?

The answer: It is a desperate, last ditch attempt to rebuild his sagging popularity with America’s Hispanic voters.

Furious at Obama for failing to keep his election year promise to promote comprehensive immigration reform when he had a super-majority at his disposal, they are deserting the president and his party in droves. Unemployment, a sagging economy, and their sharp disagreement with Obama over social issues don’t help the president’s cause any.

So Obama has seized on the Arizona immigration law as a symbolic target, hoping to accomplish in a lawsuit the political task of rebuilding his base.

Remember that in 2008, Obama won precisely the same share of the white vote that Kerry won in 2004. There was a shift among whites as the Obama won more young whites and lost more older ones, but the white vote ratios as a whole remained constant. His entire margin of victory was based on two factors:

a) The African-American vote rose from 11% of the total in 2004 to 14% in 2008 and virtually all voted for Obama; and

b) Latinos, who had backed Kerry by only 10 points, supported Obama by fifty points.

For Obama to have a shot at keeping Democrats in control of Congress, he must replicate the enthusiasm of 2008 among minorities. But his Hispanic flank is definitely weakened. Hence the lawsuit to shore it up.

The answer on immigration reform is to adopt a three part program to dry up the jobs that attract illegal migrants in the first place. When there are no jobs, they will not come and those who are here will go back home without deportations or roundups.

We need to:

1. Strengthen penalties and enforcement of laws barring people and companies from hiring illegal immigrants. Those who do so should face prison time.

2. We need a fool proof national bio-metric ID card so employers can tell who is legal and who is not.

3. We should implement a broad guest worker program to bring upscale and manual workers into the US to fill our labor force needs. They must get at least the minimum wage and have health benefits. But, when the job is over, they must go home.

Democrats won’t embrace this program because the unions won’t let them and because they want illegals to stay here and become Democratic voters. Republican agri-businesses won’t go for it because they want to exploit illegal workers with low pay and bad work conditions.

But this is the solution. Trying to seal the border is good rhetoric but is a hopeless task. Drying up the jobs that bring illegal immigrants here is something we can and must do.

Source: Dick Morris

When Sarah Palin, in a rambling lakeside announcement last July in Wasilla, said she was quitting as governor of Alaska because of the abuse she and her family were taking from petty politicians and a feral press, she was written off as dead by the pundits.

“A quitter, can’t take the heat,” was the Beltway consensus.

Yet, it seems that was no more the end of Sarah than it was the end of Richard Nixon when, after losing to Gov. Pat Brown in California in 1962, he spat at the press: “Just think how much you’re going to be missing. You won’t have Nixon to kick around anymore because, gentlemen, this is my last press conference.”

Six years later, Nixon took the oath on the Capitol steps.

And though the media have painted Palin as a ditz, no politician in memory has conducted a more brilliant pre-presidential campaign, if that is what she is about, than the lady who calls herself “the Mama Grizzly.”

Consider Tuesday. Palin had gambled big by going into South Carolina to endorse Nikki Haley, a state legislator running last for the GOP nomination for governor — against the lieutenant governor, the attorney general and a congressman.

Haley instantly vaulted into the lead, taking 49 percent on primary day, and is headed for the governor’s mansion — in a Palmetto State that holds what is often the decisive primary in presidential nomination runs.

Nikki was Sarah’s kind of conservative with a populist touch.

But Terry Branstad is not. This ex-governor of Iowa, who served four terms ending in 1998, is a moderate. Yet Palin endorsed him in his comeback bid over a conservative backed by Dr. James Dobson and Mike Huckabee.

After his victory Tuesday, Branstad, too, is headed for the governor’s mansion in a state that hosts the first big battle of 2012 — the Iowa caucuses.

By bringing conservatives to Branstad’s camp, Palin can claim some credit for returning him to office, though Mitt Romney backed Branstad earlier and his and Branstad’s staffs are said to be wired.

The endorsement of Branstad suggests Palin, a politician of principle, has a pragmatic streak. She acts not only out of instinct but cold calculation. How else to explain the Branstad endorsement over a social conservative than a decision to befriend a future GOP governor in the first battleground state of 2012?

Other interventions this cycle reveal Palin to be far more savvy than the caricature drawn by the left.

Gov. Rick Perry of Texas, a colleague of Palin’s in the GOP Governor’s Association, was facing an uphill battle against Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, who had the backing of Dick Cheney — Mr. National Security and the most visible national Republican of 2009.

Cheney went to Texas for Hutchison. Palin went in for Perry, who had scrambled to the Tea Party right, even raising the specter of secession. Perry won in a walk. Palin 1, Cheney 0.

Perry will lead the second-largest bloc of delegates to the GOP convention in Tampa, Fla. The largest will come from California, where Carly Fiorina — another one of Palin’s mama grizzlies — won the GOP Senate nod on Tuesday. Palin had endorsed her over the more conservative Chuck DeVore.

In Kentucky, where the establishment backed Mitch McConnell’s handpicked successor to Sen. Jim Bunning, Trey Grayson, and Cheney went in for Grayson, Palin endorsed Rand Paul, son of Ron Paul, who has a loyal libertarian following.

With Palin and Tea Party backing, Rand won. The Pauls, too, owe a debt to Sarah. Palin 2, Cheney 0.

In Arizona, Palin, who is closer in her politics to J.D. Hayworth, came to campaign for embattled Sen. John McCain, who chose her as his running mate and made her a star.

McCain’s aides have been anonymously trashing Sarah as an airhead who had caused the ticket’s defeat. She repaid their disloyalty with unqualified loyalty to McCain, who is unlikely to forget what she did, at some cost to herself.

But it was Sarah’s first intervention, in New York’s 23rd Congressional District, where she showed a boldness that marks the better politicians.

Liberal Republican Dede Scozzafava was handpicked by the party to face Democrat Bill Owens in the Republican district. Doug Hoffman, endorsed by the Conservative Party, jumped in. Newt Gingrich urged Republicans to stand by the pro-choice, pro-gay-rights Scozzafava.

Palin went rogue and declared for Hoffman, who surged past Scozzafava, who fell to third, bowed out and endorsed Owens, who won by two. That was the first manifestation of Palin Power. Palin 1, Newt 0.

Looking over Palin’s endorsements — McCain over J.D., Fiorina over DeVore, Branstad over Bob Vander Plaats and Rod Roberts — the lady is not running for Mrs. Conservative. The one explanation that makes the most sense of all the seeming inconsistencies in endorsements is that Mama Grizzly is thinking about moving the Wasilla brood into the big house.

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Published May 30, 2010 | FOXNews.com

Friday: Rep. Joe Sestak, D-Pa. speaks to reporters on Capitol Hill. (AP)

A California congressman who called it an “impeachable” offense for the administration to offer Rep. Joe Sestak a job in exchange for his quitting a Senate bid said Sunday the cover-up, as usual, appears worse than the crime.

Republican Rep. Darrell Issa said the explanation for the Sestak affair — that former President Bill Clinton offered the Democratic congressman an unpaid position on an advisory board if he would drop his challenge against party-switching Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter — is not plausible because as a sitting congressman Sestak couldn’t have served on a presidential commission.

“It’s a crime because they’ve admitted that they offered this position … So that begs the real question. Do we believe this is a further cover-up because he’s — they’re now talking about a job that President Clinton himself should have known Sestak couldn’t take? ” he said.

“They’re now coming up with a nonplausible answer,” Issa said.

On Friday, the White House revealed that Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel had asked Clinton to talk to Sestak about a presidential appointment if Sestak would suspend his bid for the Democratic Senate nomination.

Sestak has said repeatedly since February that he was offered a job to drop out of the race, but he declined. He would not reveal the nature of the conversation until after the White House issued its report on Friday.

“If it’s not a crime — and I believe it is — it certainly is business as usual, politics of corruption. The fact is once you’re in power, if you can use our appointments, you can corrupt the process,” Issa said.

Appearing with Issa on Sunday, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell said Obama has cleaned up Washington, but he didn’t say “he was going to change every aspect of everything we’ve done.”

“I think Barack Obama has brought a new level of ethical standards to Washington. Has he changed some basic hard-knuckle politics? No. You need hard-knuckle politics to succeed,” Rendell said. “But he’s not perfect. And there are certain things that have to go on to make things work, and this is one of them.”

Rendell said offers of jobs for political cooperation have happened “for time immemorial.”

“I did the same thing in 2006 to ask a former congressman, Joe Hoeffel, to drop out of the race against Bob Casey in the primary,” Rendell said. “I said come back and see me if you do it. He came back and saw me, and he was out of public service. I appointed him as a deputy secretary of commerce. He did a great job.”

Issa said the difference between Rendell’s scenario and the White House action is that Rendell didn’t have a specific offer in exchange in the deal, so therefore did not violate the U.S. law signed by then-President Clinton.

“Ed Rendell is saying this happens all the time. Sure, it happens all the time, things like this. But it’s usually carefully crafted so it doesn’t fall under this kind of quid pro quo,” Issa said.

Issa said Sunday candidate Obama pledged to conduct a transparent administration so he should submit to an FBI review.

“The question is, has this been transparent? No. Has there been stalling? Yes. Is there a possibility that what we’re being told now is not true because it’s not so plausible? Yes. Should there be independent investigation so we can move on? Yes,” Issa told “Fox News Sunday.”

“I don’t want to be investigating this. I don’t want the White House investigating itself. The FBI or the attorney general should see that it’s investigated so the American people can feel they can put this behind them,” he said.

Issa added he would accept the result if an FBI investigation exonerates the White House of an illegal bribe.

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By Dick Morris

05.27.2010

By Dick Morris and Judge Andrew Napolitano

With a Democratic Attorney General in Washington, a Democratic president, and both houses of Congress solidly in Democratic control, it is obviously futile to hope that the possible bribery of Joe Sestak to induce him to withdraw from the Senate race against Arlen Specter will be fully investigated.  But, as the facts of this scandal grudgingly emerge from the White House and from Congressman Sestak, there is an alternative way to pursue justice.

The Pennsylvania Attorney General, Tom Corbett — who is the Republican nominee for Governor this year — has ample jurisdiction to convene a grand jury to get to the bottom of the scandal and answer the key questions:

1. Who offered a job to Sestak?

2. What job was proffered?

3. And did the president know of the offer?

Full Story

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Traffic flows along the Pasadena Freeway May 14 in Los Angeles. (AP Photo)

If Los Angeles wants to boycott Arizona, it had better get used to reading by candlelight.

That’s the message from a member of Arizona’s top government utilities agency, who threw down the gauntlet Tuesday in a letter to Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa by threatening to cut off the city’s power supply as retribution.

Gary Pierce, a commissioner on the five-member Arizona Corporation Commission, wrote the letter in response to the Los Angeles City Council‘s decision last week to boycott the Grand Canyon State—in protest of its immigration law—by suspending official travel there and ending future contracts with state businesses.

Noting that a quarter of Los Angeles’ electricity comes from Arizona power plants, Pierce threatened to pull the plug if the City Council does not reconsider.

“Doggone it—if you’re going to boycott this candy store … then don’t come in for any of it,” Pierce told FoxNews.com.

In the letter, he ridiculed Villaraigosa for saying that the point of the boycott was to “send a message” by severing the “resources and ties” they share.

“I received your message; please receive mine. As a statewide elected member of the Arizona Corporation Commission overseeing Arizona’s electric and water utilities, I too am keenly aware of the ‘resources and ties’ we share with the city of Los Angeles,” Pierce wrote.

“If an economic boycott is truly what you desire, I will be happy to encourage Arizona utilities to renegotiate your power agreements so Los Angeles no longer receives any power from Arizona-based generation.”

Appearing to tap into local frustration in Arizona over the raft of boycotts and threatened boycotts from cities across the country, including Los Angeles, Pierce warned that Arizona companies are willing and ready to fight boycott with boycott.

“I am confident that Arizona’s utilities would be happy to take those electrons off your hands,” Pierce wrote. “If, however, you find that the City Council lacks the strength of its convictions to turn off the lights in Los Angeles and boycott Arizona power, please reconsider the wisdom of attempting to harm Arizona’s economy.”

Pierce told FoxNews.com that he was speaking for himself, not the entire commission, though he has the support of at least one other member. But Arizona has some serious leverage over Los Angeles, as well as the rest of California. The state and city get electricity from a nuclear power plant outside Phoenix, as well as from coal-fired power plants in northern Arizona and two giant hydroelectric power generators along the Colorado River.

Despite that, the Los Angeles City Council voted overwhelmingly last week to ban future business with Arizona—a decision that could cost Arizona millions of dollars in lost contracts.

Los Angeles officials were furious with the Arizona immigration law passed last month and joined local officials in cities across the country in pushing boycotts to register their dismay. Critics say the law will lead to racial profiling and civil rights abuses.

Arizona officials have defended the law, saying the state needed to take its illegal immigration problem into its own hands. Pierce said he’s “supportive” of the state’s efforts to control the border.

The law requires local law enforcement to try to verify the immigration status of anyone they have contact with whom they suspect of being an illegal immigrant. It empowers them to turn over verified illegal immigrants to federal custody. The legislation explicitly prohibits screening people based solely on race or national origin.

Source: Fox News

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First, the events leading up to Archbishop Chaput’s Repudiation of Professor Diotallevi’s Reply

A short while ago, March 6, to be exact,  I published an article entitled John F. Kennedy’s Crime, which concerned John F. Kennedy’s a campaign speech before the Greater Houston Ministerial Association some 50 years prior on September 12, 1960, and Archbishop Charles Chaput’s speech before the Houston Baptist University this past March 1, wherein he addressed Kennedy’s crime, its affect on the American political process, and in particular its affect on American Christians of every stripe.

In his speech Kennedy had tried, as politicians are so often want to do, to have it both ways without offending people on either side of an issue. After all, he was trying to get as many votes from those pastors and their flocks as he could, and truth be damned. To do that, he proclaimed that he would not betray his faith as president of the United States, and it if came to it that he would have to act against his faith to remain loyal to his office as president, he would resign the office rather than betray his faith. He was sure it would not come to that however because he believed in adhering strictly to the mandate of the Constitution of the United States of complete separation of Church and state. That was his doctrine and he was going to stick to it no matter what; never mind that the First Amendment contains no such doctrine.

The First Amendment to the Constitution states:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Did you see anything in there about the separation of Church and state? The First Amendment only of “religion,” stating that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” The remainder of that amendment speaks of freedom of speech, of the press, the right of people to peaceably assemble, petition the Government for redress of grievances. There is nothing there about separation of Church and statement no matter how you slice it; it just isn’t there.

In saying he was a believer in the separation of Church and state he was proclaiming that he was a Christian first, except…except when his faith contradicted the needs of the state; in which case he would act as a member in good standing of the godless society.

The primary reason for my publishing that article was to showcase the speech by Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, The Vocation of Christians in American Public Life, on March 1, 2010 at the Houston Baptist University wherein he registered his complete disagreement with John F. Kennedy concept of the separation of Church and state.

Sadly, at the time I wrote that article, which included the text of Archbishop Charles Chaput’s speech, I did not know of the existence of a video of that speech on YouTube. I am including that video here. Rather you read the archbishop’s speech earlier or not, I highly recommend you watch this video. I think you will find the presentation of the speech captured in this video will add immensely to your understanding of the proper Orthodox Catholic Christian perspective of the place of God and the Church in the United States in light of the First Amendment of the Bill of Right of the U.S. Constitution. The question and answer session that follows the archbishop’s speech included at the end of this video will add to your general understanding of the man and his positions on the matter at hand.

A reply to the good archbishop’s speech was not long in coming. The reply was from one Professor Diotallevi, a sociologist of religion, student of American society, and adviser to the Italian bishops’ conference. The professor’s reply was delivered on April 12, on www.chielsa.

Separating Church and State Isn’t Just an Option, It’s a Must

by Luca Diotallevi

The remarks by Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, who asserts a connection between the famous 1960 speech by John F. Kennedy in front of an audience of Protestant pastors in Houston and the subsequent wave of “secularism” that hit American culture in the late 1960′s and 1970′s, deserve comment.

For the sake of brevity, I will limit myself to presenting two critical observations and two avenues of research. (continue reading)

Here follows the complete text of the archbishop’s reply. Or, you may read it, if you choose on www.chiesa. Should you choose to go to that website to read archbishop’s refutation of Diotallevi’s criticisms, you will also be able to see a rather good further reply to Diotallevi by James Hitchcock.

A Reply to Professor Diotallevi

By Charles J. Chaput

I’m grateful to Professor Diotallevi for his comments on my March 1 talk at Houston Baptist University. He and I clearly differ in our interpretation of John Kennedy’s 1960 Houston speech on the role of religion in American public life. We also differ on the proper understanding of the “separation of Church and state” in light of my nation’s founding documents and history. I offer here a few thoughts in response to his remarks.

First, Professor Diotallevi suggests that Jesuit John Courtney Murray‘s influence on the Kennedy speech is “easy to trace.” Regrettably, Father Murray, by his own account, had little influence on the Kennedy speech. In fact, if Murray had played the role Diotallevi suggests, it would have been a different and far better speech. It’s true that Murray, along with John Cogley and others, was consulted in the development of the Kennedy text. But as Murray himself later noted, most of his counsel was ignored. In Murray’s words, Kennedy “was far more of a separationist than I am.” Anyone steeped in Murray’s writings who reads the Kennedy speech will see why Murray distanced himself from the 1960 text. Kennedy’s view of religion as an essentially private matter, with little bearing on a leader’s public duties, differs sharply from Murray’s beliefs about the relationship of Church and state, and faith and public life.

Second, Diotallevi suggests that Kennedy would never have preached a radical separation of faith and the public square to an audience of Protestant ministers accustomed to “the Christian experience manifesting itself in every aspect of public life.” But again regrettably, the professor has misread my March text. As Jesuit scholar Mark Massa notes in his own essay (which I quote at length in my talk) the 1960 Kennedy speech, in the context of the times, sounded quite congenial to Protestant ears because it neutralized worries about Kennedy’s Catholic roots. But it had a stealth content with far-reaching and drastic implications, alien to the American historical experience. The damage became clear only with the passage of time. Whether Kennedy intended the harshly secularist consequences of his speech or not, is irrelevant. The important thing is that he took the American “faith and public life” discussion in a very new direction, and he set the stage for two generations of Catholic political leaders to separate their religiously-informed moral beliefs from their political witness in a convenient but morally destructive way.

Third, in taking issue with my use of the word “Church” throughout my talk, Diotallevi unfortunately seems to have overlooked key sections of my actual remarks. Perhaps this is an issue of translation, and I have misunderstood his concern. To reprise what I actually said:

“Christianity is not mainly – or even significantly – about politics. It’s about living and sharing the love of God. And Christian political engagement, when it happens, is never mainly the task of the clergy. That work belongs to lay believers who live most intensely in the world.” Several lines later, I note that “Christians individually and the Church as a believing community engage the political order as an obligation of the Word of God.”

Contrary to what the professor seems to be saying, there is nothing “very complicated” in these ideas. They are plain and straightforward, flowing rather obviously from the Gospel. Nowhere do I suggest that the hierarchical structure of the Church is the preferred manner for Catholic interaction with the political order. In fact, I say just the opposite. Diotallevi seems to infer from my comments a kind of crypto-integralism. Given a European frame of reference, this may be understandable. But nothing in the actual text of my remarks supports that curious view, and for good reason: Like nearly every other citizen of the United States, including the late John Courtney Murray, I believe strongly in the separation of Church and state, properly understood and as the American Founders intended it.

And what do I mean by a “proper” understanding of Church-state separation? I mean exactly what the American bishops meant when speaking about our nation’s constitutional legacy in their excellent 1948 pastoral letter, “The Christian in Action.” For very shrewd pragmatic reasons, John Kennedy selectively referenced – and also selectively ignored – the content of that pastoral letter in his 1960 Houston speech. Professor Diotallevi seems unaware of it. But as a scholar, he might find it useful to complete his understanding of the American political tradition – and Kennedy’s departure from it.

Finally, the professor seems to worry that my remarks run the risk of encouraging “some of the ‘evangelical’ or neoconservative positions most widespread in the American Protestant world, but also in some fringes of the Catholic world.” Let me respond simply by noting that the pro-life and pro-family witness of American evangelicals is commendable. I only wish that it were emulated more fully by many of those American Catholics who describe themselves as “liberal” or “progressive.” Evangelicals and Catholics who (along with Eastern Orthodox Christians, Latter-day Saints, many observant Jews, and others) speak out in defense of the sanctity of life and the dignity of marriage, deserve praise, not derision. They labor in the tradition of activists for civil rights – a moral cause led by religious believers — who refused to “privatize” their faith. Their witness may be out of harmony with John Kennedy’s remarks in Houston; but they are fully in the spirit of Martin Luther King’s actions in Selma.

Of course, every political movement has its zealots and opportunists. Political engagement will sometimes be marked by excesses of enthusiasm and a lack of prudence. And some people will inevitably seek to use the Gospel and the Church for their own partisan advantage. But Christians are called to be the best of good citizens. We have a duty to work for justice and the common good. We may not excuse ourselves from that obligation by citing the foolishness, selfishness, or hypocrisy of others, or the human imperfections of the political causes that deserve our energetic support.

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Recently Rush Limbaugh took President Obama at his word, telling him, thank you, Mr. President, for many of the things President Obama has done since he took office. This was in response to the president’s deriding of the American Tea Party patriots at a Democrat fund raiser in the home of Gloria Estefan when he said they should be thanking him for the tax cuts he gave us rather than complaining about too many taxes.

Here is a video of Rush thanking the president for all he has done for us so far. You’ll notice that kindly ole Rush thanks him for a lot.

The last few days I have been reading Sean Hannity’s excellent new book Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama’s Radical Agenda. In it, Sean details a list of some things President Obama could be thanked for or, perhaps better said, driven out of office for. Here’s a top 10 list of a few of some of the more easily recognizable gifts Obama has perpetrated on the American people whom he so despises:

1. David Axelrod—chief adviser, a radical leftist publisher
2. Anita Dunn—White House communications director, whose favorite philosopher is Mao
3. Van Jones—“green czar,” a self-identified communist.
4. Kathleen Sebelius—Health and Human Services secretary, this former governor of Kansas enjoyed a close personal and financial relationship with later-term abortionist, Dr. George Tiller.
5. Mortgage Bailout Plan—cost $75 billion.
6. The Stimulus Bust—cost $787 billion.
7. ObamaCare (RomneyCare 2.0?)—cost untold trillions of dollars and the American spirit of freedom. As Reagan said, “One of the traditional methods of imposing statism or socialism on a people. . . .”
8. Obama’s World Apology Tour—self-explanatory name for Obama’s international tour confessing America’s flaws and the sins we have committed against the rest of the world.
9. The Death of the Three-legged Stool—strong defense, strong economy and strong social values.
10. And the list goes on and it growing minute by minute. Obama will just keep on giving unless we stop him.

The time to stop Obama’s gift-giving campaign for the American people is, first, the 2010 elections, then in 2012 we can get him off our backs completely, if we constitutional conservatives stick together and vote en masse.

Hint: Electing Mit Romney as president in 2012 is not the answer. There are probably several good answers but he is not one of them. The man is a RINO. Of the really good answers out there, to me the most electable right now is Newt Gingrich.

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I had intended to write a longer article to go with this list but chose not to, as I feared such an article would take away from the full impact of this list itself. I will just say that the votes for or against this bill where votes for or against socialism. I say that because nationalized healthcare has always been the last nail in the coffin of freedom.

It is imperative that in order to avoid this free fall into the abyss of slavery to want that we elect leaders and legislators at all levels of government who are strong Constitutional Conservatives and who will bring us back to the path of freedom our founders intended us to follow when first they gave us a Democratic Federal Republican form of government unlike any other the world has ever known.

I firmly believe, as did Ronald Reagan that the goal can be attained only by revitalizing the carcass of the Republican Party. Yes, I said carcass and that is what I meant, for our Republican leadership over the years since Reagan have consistently lead us down the road of socialism that was being charted by the modern day liberal Democrat Party.

If we do not turn our country around in the 2010 elections, we stand to completely lose the freedom our founders. That is to say, the 2010 elections are our last chance, short of armed rebellion, to take back our country and put it on the path of freedom as outlined in our founding documents, the Declaration of Independence and the United States Constitution.

If you do not have a copy of these documents, you will find good copies of them here. Read them. Other than the Holy Bible, they are the most important documents for our guidance as a nation. The world needs us to win this battle, else where will they be able to look for leadership. We must restore our status as the shinning city on the hill.

As further reading in the interests of maintaining our freedoms, I recommend Sean Hannity’s Conservative Victory and David Barton’s Original Intent. Both of these are very informative, relatively short, easy reads. The former is about Obama and defeating his radical agenda, and the second is about the intent of our founders, regarding the courts, the constitution, and religion. I believe that at the cost of very little time and money these two books will inform you without wearing you out.

Educate yourselves. Your elected political leaders and legislators and, with one lone exception, the entrenched national media will not properly educate you. That lone exception is Fox News.

Fox News, like Americans in general and much like our founding fathers before us, is right-leaning, and conservative to out-right libertarian. It is because Fox is a conservative network that prides itself on covering all the more popular sides of the issues in depth that it is the lone national network we can trust to give us most of what we need to know or gives us an idea where to find what is lacking, so we can better preserve the patrimony given us by our founders.

It must be said that we, the people, have not always done a good job of preserving our patrimony, but then we have not always had a network that tells-it-like-it-is as does Fox News.

Inform yourself, then vote your conscience in 2010. A vote for a Constitutional Conservative is a vote for freedom.

Remember in November how your legislators voted.

Failure is not an option. The time is the 2010 election. The 2012 election is too late.

(Y=Yes, N=No)

ALABAMA

Democrats – Bright, N; Davis, N.

Republicans – Aderholt, N; Bachus, N; Bonner, N; Griffith, N; Rogers, N.

ALASKA

Republicans – Young, N.

ARIZONA

Democrats – Giffords, Y; Grijalva, Y; Kirkpatrick, Y; Mitchell, Y; Pastor, Y.

Republicans – Flake, N; Franks, N; Shadegg, N.

ARKANSAS

Democrats – Berry, N; Ross, N; Snyder, Y.

Republicans – Boozman, N.

CALIFORNIA

Democrats – Baca, Y; Becerra, Y; Berman, Y; Capps, Y; Cardoza, Y; Chu, Y; Costa, Y; Davis, Y; Eshoo, Y; Farr, Y; Filner, Y; Garamendi, Y; Harman, Y; Honda, Y; Lee, Y; Lofgren, Zoe, Y; Matsui, Y; McNerney, Y; Miller, George, Y; Napolitano, Y; Pelosi, Y; Richardson, Y; Roybal-Allard, Y; Sanchez, Linda T., Y; Sanchez, Loretta, Y; Schiff, Y; Sherman, Y; Speier, Y; Stark, Y; Thompson, Y; Waters, Y; Watson, Y; Waxman, Y; Woolsey, Y.

Republicans – Bilbray, N; Bono Mack, N; Calvert, N; Campbell, N; Dreier, N; Gallegly, N; Herger, N; Hunter, N; Issa, N; Lewis, N; Lungren, Daniel E., N; McCarthy, N; McClintock, N; McKeon, N; Miller, Gary, N; Nunes, N; Radanovich, N; Rohrabacher, N; Royce, N.

COLORADO

Democrats – DeGette, Y; Markey, Y; Perlmutter, Y; Polis, Y; Salazar, Y.

Republicans – Coffman, N; Lamborn, N.

CONNECTICUT

Democrats – Courtney, Y; DeLauro, Y; Himes, Y; Larson, Y; Murphy, Y.

DELAWARE

Republicans – Castle, N.

FLORIDA

Democrats – Boyd, Y; Brown, Corrine, Y; Castor, Y; Grayson, Y; Hastings, Y; Klein, Y; Kosmas, Y; Meek, Y; Wasserman Schultz, Y.

Republicans – Bilirakis, N; Brown-Waite, Ginny, N; Buchanan, N; Crenshaw, N; Diaz-Balart, L., N; Diaz-Balart, M., N; Mack, N; Mica, N; Miller, N; Posey, N; Putnam, N; Rooney, N; Ros-Lehtinen, N; Stearns, N; Young, N.

GEORGIA

Democrats – Barrow, N; Bishop, Y; Johnson, Y; Lewis, Y; Marshall, N; Scott, Y.

Republicans – Broun, N; Deal, N; Gingrey, N; Kingston, N; Linder, N; Price, N; Westmoreland, N.

HAWAII

Democrats – Hirono, Y.

IDAHO

Democrats – Minnick, N.

Republicans – Simpson, N.

ILLINOIS

Democrats – Bean, Y; Costello, Y; Davis, Y; Foster, Y; Gutierrez, Y; Halvorson, Y; Hare, Y; Jackson, Y; Lipinski, N; Quigley, Y; Rush, Y; Schakowsky, Y.

Republicans – Biggert, N; Johnson, N; Kirk, N; Manzullo, N; Roskam, N; Schock, N; Shimkus, N.

INDIANA

Democrats – Carson, Y; Donnelly, Y; Ellsworth, Y; Hill, Y; Visclosky, Y.

Republicans – Burton, N; Buyer, N; Pence, N; Souder, N.

IOWA

Democrats – Boswell, Y; Braley, Y; Loebsack, Y.

Republicans – King, N; Latham, N.

KANSAS

Democrats – Moore, Y.

Republicans – Jenkins, N; Moran, N; Tiahrt, N.

KENTUCKY

Democrats – Chandler, N; Yarmuth, Y.

Republicans – Davis, N; Guthrie, N; Rogers, N; Whitfield, N.

LOUISIANA

Democrats – Melancon, N.

Republicans – Alexander, N; Boustany, N; Cao, N; Cassidy, N; Fleming, N; Scalise, N.

MAINE

Democrats – Michaud, Y; Pingree, Y.

MARYLAND

Democrats – Cummings, Y; Edwards, Y; Hoyer, Y; Kratovil, N; Ruppersberger, Y; Sarbanes, Y; Van Hollen, Y.

Republicans – Bartlett, N.

MASSACHUSETTS

Democrats – Capuano, Y; Delahunt, Y; Frank, Y; Lynch, N; Markey, Y; McGovern, Y; Neal, Y; Olver, Y; Tierney, Y; Tsongas, Y.

MICHIGAN

Democrats – Conyers, Y; Dingell, Y; Kildee, Y; Kilpatrick, Y; Levin, Y; Peters, Y; Schauer, Y; Stupak, Y.

Republicans – Camp, N; Ehlers, N; Hoekstra, N; McCotter, N; Miller, N; Rogers, N; Upton, N.

MINNESOTA

Democrats – Ellison, Y; McCollum, Y; Oberstar, Y; Peterson, N; Walz, Y.

Republicans – Bachmann, N; Kline, N; Paulsen, N.

MISSISSIPPI

Democrats – Childers, N; Taylor, N; Thompson, Y.

Republicans – Harper, N.

MISSOURI

Democrats – Carnahan, Y; Clay, Y; Cleaver, Y; Skelton, N.

Republicans – Akin, N; Blunt, N; Emerson, N; Graves, N; Luetkemeyer, N.

MONTANA

Republicans – Rehberg, N.

NEBRASKA

Republicans – Fortenberry, N; Smith, N; Terry, N.

NEVADA

Democrats – Berkley, Y; Titus, Y.

Republicans – Heller, N.

NEW HAMPSHIRE

Democrats – Hodes, Y; Shea-Porter, Y.

NEW JERSEY

Democrats – Adler, N; Andrews, Y; Holt, Y; Pallone, Y; Pascrell, Y; Payne, Y; Rothman, Y; Sires, Y.

Republicans – Frelinghuysen, N; Garrett, N; Lance, N; LoBiondo, N; Smith, N.

NEW MEXICO

Democrats – Heinrich, Y; Lujan, Y; Teague, N.

NEW YORK

Democrats – Ackerman, Y; Arcuri, N; Bishop, Y; Clarke, Y; Crowley, Y; Engel, Y; Hall, Y; Higgins, Y; Hinchey, Y; Israel, Y; Lowey, Y; Maffei, Y; Maloney, Y; McCarthy, Y; McMahon, N; Meeks, Y; Murphy, Y; Nadler, Y; Owens, Y; Rangel, Y; Serrano, Y; Slaughter, Y; Tonko, Y; Towns, Y; Velazquez, Y; Weiner, Y.

Republicans – King, N; Lee, N.

NORTH CAROLINA

Democrats – Butterfield, Y; Etheridge, Y; Kissell, N; McIntyre, N; Miller, Y; Price, Y; Shuler, N; Watt, Y.

Republicans – Coble, N; Foxx, N; Jones, N; McHenry, N; Myrick, N.

NORTH DAKOTA

Democrats – Pomeroy, Y.

OHIO

Democrats – Boccieri, Y; Driehaus, Y; Fudge, Y; Kaptur, Y; Kilroy, Y; Kucinich, Y; Ryan, Y; Space, N; Sutton, Y; Wilson, Y.

Republicans – Austria, N; Boehner, N; Jordan, N; LaTourette, N; Latta, N; Schmidt, N; Tiberi, N; Turner, N.

OKLAHOMA

Democrats – Boren, N.

Republicans – Cole, N; Fallin, N; Lucas, N; Sullivan, N.

OREGON

Democrats – Blumenauer, Y; DeFazio, Y; Schrader, Y; Wu, Y.

Republicans – Walden, N.

PENNSYLVANIA

Democrats – Altmire, N; Brady, Y; Carney, Y; Dahlkemper, Y; Doyle, Y; Fattah, Y; Holden, N; Kanjorski, Y; Murphy, Patrick, Y; Schwartz, Y; Sestak, Y.

Republicans – Dent, N; Gerlach, N; Murphy, Tim, N; Pitts, N; Platts, N; Shuster, N; Thompson, N.

RHODE ISLAND

Democrats – Kennedy, Y; Langevin, Y.

SOUTH CAROLINA

Democrats – Clyburn, Y; Spratt, Y.

Republicans – Barrett, N; Brown, N; Inglis, N; Wilson, N.

SOUTH DAKOTA

Democrats – Herseth Sandlin, N.

TENNESSEE

Democrats – Cohen, Y; Cooper, Y; Davis, N; Gordon, Y; Tanner, N.

Republicans – Blackburn, N; Duncan, N; Roe, N; Wamp, N.

TEXAS

Democrats – Cuellar, Y; Doggett, Y; Edwards, N; Gonzalez, Y; Green, Al, Y; Green, Gene, Y; Hinojosa, Y; Jackson Lee, Y; Johnson, E. B., Y; Ortiz, Y; Reyes, Y; Rodriguez, Y.

Republicans – Barton, N; Brady, N; Burgess, N; Carter, N; Conaway, N; Culberson, N; Gohmert, N; Granger, N; Hall, N; Hensarling, N; Johnson, Sam, N; Marchant, N; McCaul, N; Neugebauer, N; Olson, N; Paul, N; Poe, N; Sessions, N; Smith, N; Thornberry, N.

UTAH

Democrats – Matheson, N.

Republicans – Bishop, N; Chaffetz, N.

VERMONT

Democrats – Welch, Y.

VIRGINIA

Democrats – Boucher, N; Connolly, Y; Moran, Y; Nye, N; Perriello, Y; Scott, Y.

Republicans – Cantor, N; Forbes, N; Goodlatte, N; Wittman, N; Wolf, N.

WASHINGTON

Democrats – Baird, Y; Dicks, Y; Inslee, Y; Larsen, Y; McDermott, Y; Smith, Y.

Republicans – Hastings, N; McMorris Rodgers, N; Reichert, N.

WEST VIRGINIA

Democrats – Mollohan, Y; Rahall, Y.

Republicans – Capito, N.

WISCONSIN

Democrats – Baldwin, Y; Kagen, Y; Kind, Y; Moore, Y; Obey, Y.

Republicans – Petri, N; Ryan, N; Sensenbrenner, N.

WYOMING

Republicans – Lummis, N.