The Lou Dobbs problem

While I was getting ready to submit my latest entries to the fair, which included baked goods and a gift basket, I had the occasion for watching CNN. Among the questions of the hour posed by Jack Cafferty included whether the news media was biased in favor of Senator Obama. What Cafferty also related was that much of the news media coverage of Obama had in fact been tough, IE negative. Yes, to include Lou Dobbs show as well as "Anderson Cooper 360." However, when it came Dobbs turn to cover the same issue, he covered one newspaper, The Washington Post and generalized from the WP admission of giving Obama front page coverage that the news media was itself in the tank for Obama. However, Dobbs did not bother saying whether the WP had given Obama consistent positive coverage or not. Which would put him in the category of being highly biased as well as unbalanced and misleading in his own reporting.

One of Cafferty's e-mails was from a respondent regarding how important it would be to cover McCain more thoroughly, to include his gaffs, flip flops and etc. Speaking of, did McCain pad his POW resume with a "cross in the dirt" story between himself and a Viet Cong captor? I really don't believe there were ever at any time that many Christians among the Vietnamese considering that they were mostly Buddhists. Or Communists. A Viet Cong captor would be highly unlikely to draw a "cross in the dirt" on McCain's behalf. Which would beg the question of were this story really supposed to be true, then McCain didn't know the first thing about his captors with whom he spent as a prisoner for some 5 or more years. From AOL news, did McCain make up such a story; I'd have to argue that he did. So we would have to assume that McCain said what he did to "impress his audience." But that doesn't make him more qualified, or experienced or having better judgment if he proceeds to lift a story from some book and makes it his own. That is called plagiarism and the last politician to borrow like that also got into hot water on a political level. Well, CNN did cover it, as they did not really cover McCain trolling for votes among bikers. Yeah, McCain isn't covered as thoroughly as Obama, yet McCain whines and attacks that he isn't. He should be happy that his less than straight talk remarks don't get more exposure or analysis. Nor was McCain in an isolated room waiting his turn to talk to his base at Saddleback Church, being instead in a motorcade... Cafferty had no problem questioning why McCain wasn't already at the church. Indeed, despite McCain's and his campaign staff's attempts to deny it, McCain could easily have switched on a radio or had other means of gaining access to Obama's answers to the questions posed. Or why leave when he did for the church, instead of arriving at the same time as Obama and being escorted to an isolated room to wait his turn? But Dobbs did.

Indeed, Dobbs brought on his show Tony Perkins and a Roman Catholic priest, both of whom pretty much sing from the same page on the abortion issue. No, not Perkins' ideological opposite, no minister who may hold a different view on abortion from that of the priest... Even though such people could likely be found. Either Dobbs was uninterested or simply too lazy. He wanted to "stick it to" Obama as it concerned the "Faith & Values" forum. And so, he selected two people who could give Obama varying but generally snarky comments about Obama's comment that discussing when life begins was above his pay grade. I guess Dobbs, Perkins, as well as the priest don't spend much time taking a close look at their respective bibles.

Deuteronomy itself details that before a chosen people can truly have their lives for themselves and their descendents, they must first be righteous. The Old Testament prophets fully detailed what fates were in store for a chosen people and their children once they rebelled against God. The churches go by a scripture that is in Psalms, I believe regarding God who "knows you" long before your mother did. Which makes it interesting, to say the least, God "knows you" and then has you spontaneously aborted because of the sins of the father. Or dashed to death, or carved out of the mother's womb. Or in the case of Jeremiah, a sword should have made his mother's womb his tomb. How about Job? A fellow who decided that being still born was better than the current suffering that he endured. McCain's crisp and clear answers that life begins at conception is as devoid of a biblical basis as is any church doctrine on the same subject. The bible itself renders the argument highly murky. And because of that, it would indeed be well beyond anyone's pay grade to make that sort of presumption. But leave it to the church to presume on the basis of a scripture in Psalms to tell God his business. And the religious activists on the message boards at AOL to further taunt Obama for being truthful. Which also puts them in the singular bind that if they can't stand now the man running for president, for any number of rationales, especially some terribly ludicrous and hysterical ones, then why are they opposed to abortion? If not Obama, then some other child who was lucky enough to survive pregnancy, grew up, entered the Senate and decided to run for president, as a Democrat. Basically, they mocked their own doctrine as well as Christ's teachings of love and what hatred meant... the same as murder. And because Obama isn't a white man, he was attacked specifically as a fellah hating all of white America. Which sounds like a case of projection, that the "white America" that won't vote for Obama because of his name and skin color just happens to be bigoted. I saw no family values at the AOL forums, nor any sense of Christian among those posting. Just pure hate. But you see, God knew Obama before his birth and what he was destined to be. Which puts the same bigots in the hypocritical bind of their own making concerning the fellah they don't want for president and why. But not "pro-life" by any stretch of the imagination.

McCain's "crisp clear answers" on the abortion issue didn't take into consideration the hash the religious activists at AOL proceeded to make of it as they used the blogs to smear and attack, again and again. How very disgusting. I'd have to say that when "life begins" is definitely above their pay grades too, given the mockery they make of their canons. Dobbs couldn't be bothered to have a real debate on this. Or he might have gotten an earful. Dobbs whining about Obama has been particularly consistent, it is just a matter of on who's behalf he will whine. First, Clinton, and now that poor, poor guy, McCain. Who's worst mistakes really aren't covered at all.