Columnist.
I've been getting emails from bewildered colleagues asking about a survey of presidential scholars that determined that Barack Obama is the 12th best president in the history of the United States, putting him near the top quartile of our presidents. How can this be? I, too, was mystified, especially given that I participated in the survey.
The story of Christian higher education in America is a sad saga. Once upon a time, the nation's premier universities were run by religious people or founded with religious missions, or at least were respectful of the Christian faith. That sharp reversal has been a painful long march, with a marked turn early in the 20th century. I'm often reminded of the sardonic words of Thomas Merton, who at radical Columbia University in the 1930s became a communist. He ultimately escaped that god that failed, instead becoming a Trappist monk. Columbia had become a toxic environment where Dewey-ism rather than Christianity was the prevailing *zeitgeist*.
"We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America." So declared Barack Obama in Columbia, Missouri on October 30, 2008, on the cusp of his historic presidential election.
You may have noticed an unusual amount of renewed attention being given to the Rosenbergs — that is, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. That's because there's an aggressive push by liberals to try to exonerate the Rosenbergs, especially Ethel. This campaign has been going on for a while, but the hopeful are counting on one Barack Obama to come up big with a pardon for the two glorious comrades in these closing weeks of his presidency of fundamental transformation.
Our Profound Ignorance of the Crimes of Communism
Fidel Castro is dead. To say those words is so strange. I've never known a moment when he wasn't alive.
"Secretary Clinton, I want to explore how far you believe the right to abortion goes," asked Fox News Channel's Chris Wallace, moderator for the third and final presidential debate. "You have been quoted as saying that the fetus has no constitutional rights. You also voted against a ban on late-term, partial-birth abortions. Why?" Mrs. Clinton's answer was precisely what we've come to expect. She bristled, her voice turning sharp, her tone unyielding: "Because Roe v. Wade very clearly sets out that there can be regulations on abortion so long as the life and the health of the mother are taken into account…." It was her canned answer, one I've heard countless times in my years writing about her.
When asked in the last presidential debate what she wanted in a Supreme Court justice, Hillary Clinton did not hesitate to go to abortion. "I want a Supreme Court that will stick with Roe v. Wade and a woman's right to choose," affirmed Mrs. Clinton, to no one's surprise. There is nothing more sacrosanct to Hillary Clinton than a "woman's right to choose." It is her alpha and omega, beyond doubt her highest priority. I wrote an entire book on the faith of Hillary Clinton, and the one thing that struck me above all else, from start to finish, was her absolute fealty to Roe v. Wade. It is Hillary's hill to die on. I believe Hillary Clinton would give her life for Roe v. Wade.
Two very different women on the minds of Christians right now are Mother Teresa, with her canonization on Sept. 4, and Hillary Clinton, with her name on the presidential ballot in November. Hillary stands as the most influential woman in America. Someone who might have foreseen such prominence for Hillary was Mother Teresa. Perhaps that's why the bold nun from Kolkata, India, persistently challenged the then-first lady's push to make abortion more widely available. Let's back up to where it all began.
When many conservatives first learned back in 2007 that I had the temerity to write a book on the faith of Hillary Clinton, especially after books on the faiths of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush, they looked at me with a mix of amazement and annoyance. *Why would you do that?* My response, however, often surprised them. Yes, I told them that Hillary was, largely, a fairly standard Religious Left Protestant, though with a striking stridency on abortion far to the left of most of the Religious Left. But I always grabbed their attention with two particularly interesting things I stressed in the book: For one, Hillary Clinton supported natural, traditional, biblical marriage, with her faith a primary reason. Second, I noted that Hillary was a solid defender of religious freedom.
There is real danger in Donald Trump's statements and attitude toward Vladimir Putin and Russia. "Putin likes me," glowed Trump in a July 25, 2016, tweet. On ABC's "This Week" on Sunday, Trump basked in the warmness that he's apparently feeling from the Russian authoritarian: "He has said nice things about me over the years," Trump admired of Putin. "I remember years ago, he said something, many years ago, he said something very nice about me." Trump reciprocates the love he believes he feels. He seems to genuinely like Putin, given that, as he says, "Putin likes me." And we've come to painfully see that there's nothing that Donald Trump likes more than people who like him. (Conversely, there's nothing that Donald Trump dislikes more than people who don't like him, or merely criticize him.)
What was Ben Carson talking about?
In my previous piece in this series, I quoted a Ronald Reagan speech to CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Conference, from February 6, 1977, where Reagan defined conservatism. Among his crucial points in that speech — a point he would reiterate for years to come — is that conservatism was an ideology of principle, grounded in principles, and thus conservatives, too, must be grounded in principle. Looking to win the White House for conservatism after the wilderness years of Nixon and Ford and now amid what would be a disastrous Jimmy Carter presidency, Reagan said it was time at last for a principled politics for conservatives. They needed "to present a program of action," one that included both social conservatism and economic conservatism.
Many of Donald Trump's supporters have compared him to Ronald Reagan. It is quite instructive that Trump himself picked up the 1980 Reagan campaign slogan, "Let's Make America Great Again." Trump speaks positively of Ronald Reagan, and, like Reagan, claims to be a conservative.
The 2016 presidential race, like all presidential races, has raised questions and controversies regarding the religious faiths of the candidates. Donald Trump's beliefs have been questioned, as were Ted Cruz's. And trying to pin down Bernie Sanders' views on God is very difficult. But that said, recent developments just occurred with the United Methodist Church that should focus the spotlight on Hillary Clinton's religious thinking. They constitute two crucial moves that stand in direct opposition to Clinton's longtime militancy for "abortion rights" and her growing radicalism for the "LGBTQ" political agenda, including her recent full-fledged support of same-sex marriage after years of insisting that marriage is between one man and woman in accordance with tradition and Scripture.
Back during Memorial Day 2014, I wrote a piece on five brothers who served in World War II. I was blown-away impressed by the Bailey boys, from my neck of the woods in Western Pennsylvania, and still am. Imagine my surprise when a reader responded with a package of clippings informing me of his family, which had *seven* brothers in the war. Yes, seven. His name is Ted, and his parents were Stella and Walter Pietkiewicz, Polish immigrants in Pittsburgh.
Do you remember the name Daniel Berrigan? Berrigan was a Jesuit priest well-known for his protests of the Vietnam War. He became a household name in the 1960s, along with his brother, Philip Berrigan, also a priest. They were the "Berrigan Brothers," leading lights in the anti-war movement. He died last week at age 94.
Students at Indiana University-Bloomington recently went into panic mode at the sight of a Dominican friar, who they mistook for a Ku Klux Klan member. Funny? Yes, but also sad. It is a further sign of the state of our universities, and what is and isn't being taught. For starters, let's get this on the blackboard: For a really long time, there have been religious guys in robes, flatly unmistakable in their appearance. This year, 2016 A.D. (*Anno Domini*, Latin for "In the Year of Our Lord"), just happens to mark the 800th anniversary of the Dominicans.
Dealing with the Mouth of the Republican Front-Runner
I was watching a Republican presidential debate as my eight-year-old, John, sat next to me. Donald Trump, the front-runner, looked left and ripped Ted Cruz as a "liar" before seamlessly pivoting right and skewering Marco Rubio as a "sweating choke artist." "Lying Ted!" Trump barked. "Choking Marco!" he shouted. My eight-year-old son laughed at the buffoonish spectacle, as if we'd just tuned in to Cartoon Network. "No, John," I told him. "That's not funny. We shouldn't treat people that way."
