"If/when McCain loses, their next step will be to form an overtly Christian party, with Sarah out front, and I think they will put the Republican Party out of business."

Good idea, fine with me. Except I don't necessarily want the Republican Party out of business; we need devil's advocates (pun loosely intended), we need other perspectives to challenge and think through our own. Instead, I'd like the Republican party AS IT IS NOW out of business. Extract the overtly Christian element. No more pandering to the baseness of their base. Let the so-called Christians fight for the prize on their own, with their own. They'll lose. Our country's founders sought to ensure that. I'm definitely a fan of our founders.

It would be hard to find more blatant, despicable instances of NON-Christ-like behavior than those exhibited through the recent months of the current Republican campaign. Go ahead and cast that stone. Lie and malign. Ms. Palin is particularly adept at that. Call me crazy, but I don't think Jesus would approve.

My hopes are with people like "Jason the Firefighter."

I'm just glad I no longer feel the need to explain nor apologize for the fact that, early on, I opted to support Obama. I no longer have to preface my comments on Salon with: "I am NOT a Hillary-hater..." Still, there's the "you're drinking the freakin' kool-aid" faction, and the "you're balming the feet of the Messiah" rabble. As if I have no brain. As if I'm waiting at the station for the train (would that be the straight-talk express?) to take me to the promised land.

The only shame I feel (My Sin! wasn't that a perfume?) is that I didn't put an Obama/Biden bumper-sticker on our not-fancy but very reliable car because it's our only car and I feared some marring of our vehicle. I guess I can spout all the words I want, and I haven't had a sip of Kool-Aid (TM) for about four decades, but I wasn't willing to risk the car for our candidate.

Two days.

Although I'm agreeing from a different vantage point.

"Invite Jeremiah Wright to guest-preach in the Colorado pulpit

and get a good dose of what Obama's mentor is all about."

-- terkoy

This is a wonderful idea! The pulpit would be exposed to a pastor who is indeed Christian and also involved in the real world where everything is not black-and-white (literally and figuratively).

Making calls for a candidate you don't support???

Makes for a paid writing assignment--is that the justification?

Speaking of which, whenever people mention that one candidate is "for" and one "against" abortion, I simply say that in fact both are "against." I say that the candidates differ only in their plan to reduce abortion. One wants to criminalize, the other wants to reduce through various health education initiatives.

That is one of the smartest, most succinct summations on this issue that I've ever read. Thank you.

We apparently have a few things in common. I was raised Catholic (six school years included), though I couldn't call myself "practicing" for quite some time. (However, your description of being Catholic "mostly in a cultural sense" could possibly apply to me. Is part of that still being able to sense-smell that pungent incense at Christmas Eve Midnight Mass?) I do have very positive experiences with parishes/Masses shepherded by Jesuit priests. That's later in life, when it wasn't because I "hadda go." Liberal, for sure, which to me signified acceptance for "all God's children." The lay teachers are another story. You are absolutely right about the true Jesuit's academic bent making the difference. Is it any surprise that I voted for Obama?

Thank you!

I can't take credit for the comments re: abortion--I was saying "ditto, ditto, and how" to poster "lateagain." But as for Rev. Wright, you and I are on the same page for sure. A pastor's whole life bludgeoned to a sound byte. If the right bothered to search even a tiny bit farther, they'd find some good stuff going on.

I wish I could come up with a more eloquent response to your posting(s), but I'm saddened by this news and down to the basics...a simple but heartfelt "Thank You" for your uplifting tribute to a fine woman and her fine grandson.

I'm missing my mom, too.

I couldn't agree more. Let human kindness and empathy prevail.

You're not crazy for your empathy--far from it. I just watched Obama (live) in NC, speaking of his grandmother, and he described her as a "quiet hero." He then spoke of how many quiet heroes (and heroines) we encounter in life. We do what we can, each day and in our own way, in their honor.

Gone From My Sight

I am standing upon the seashore.

A ship at my side spreads her white

sails to the morning breeze and starts

for the blue ocean.

She is an object of beauty and strength.

I stand and watch her until at length

she hangs like a speck of white cloud

just where the sea and sky come

to mingle with each other.

Then someone at my side says:

“There, she is gone!”

“Gone where?”

Gone from my sight. That is all.

She is just as large in mast and hull

and spar as she was when she left my side

and she is just as able to bear her

load of living freight to her destined port.

Her diminished size is in me, not in her.

And just at the moment when someone

at my side says, “There, she is gone!”

There are other eyes watching her coming,

and other voices ready to take up the glad

shout,

“Here she comes!”

And that is dying.

---Henry Van Dyke

Don't engage. Just don't engage!!!!!!!!! Nothing good will come from it. Let him spew while you scroll on to the next post.