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Douglas Kmiec was a familiar legal expert during the Clinton impeachment. He would argue the case in favor of impeachment and, as far as I was concerned, defend the indefensible. I considered him an unprincipled hack who would conjure up sophisticated legal rationales for anything and everything the Republicans chose to do on that and other issues. I frankly didn’t know that he was also a prominent Catholic.

Now, I learn he has endorsed Obama and atributes his endorsement to his dedication to Catholic teaching. Of course, that forces me to totally re-evaluate my opinion of him. I now realize he is an honorable scholar.

It’s times like these when I have to ask myself, am I the political hack?

Could it be????

Nah!

Here’s his very persuasive answer on the question of abortion in a column by the Times Religion correspondent, Peter Steinfels:

Q. Given those views, why do you support Barack Obama?

A. There is a widespread misconception that overturning Roe is the only way to be pro-life. In fact, overturning Roe simply returns the matter to the states, which in their individual legislative determinations could then be entirely pro-abortion. I doubt that many of our non-legally-trained pro-life friends fully grasp the limited effect of overturning Roe.

Secondly, pundits like to toss about the notion that the future of Roe depends on one vote, the mythical fifth vote to overturn the decision. There are serious problems with this assumption: first, Republicans have failed to achieve reversal in the five previous times they asked the court for it; and second, it is far from certain that only one additional vote is needed to reverse the decision in light of the principles of stare decisis by which a decided case ought not to be disturbed. Only Justices Thomas and Scalia have written and joined dissenting opinions suggesting the appropriateness of overturning Roe.

So given those views, the better question is how could a Catholic not support Barack Obama?

Senator Obama’s articulated concerns with the payment of a living wage, access to health care, stabilizing the market for shelter, special attention to the needs of the disadvantaged and the importance of community are all part of the church’s social justice mission.

Applying this to the issue of abortion, the senator has repeatedly indicated that he is not pro-abortion, that he understands the serious moral question it presents, and, most significantly, that he wants to move us beyond the 35 years of acrimony that have done next to nothing to reduce the unwanted pregnancies that give rise to abortions.

Interestingly, Kmiec has been denied communion by at least one priest for his apostasy. He has become a hero of mine.

John McCain loves a good fight. He even loves a bad fight. Is that what we need in the White House? More fighting using other people’s blood?

Good column in the Times today by Rachel Kleinfeld. Key quote:

Senator McCain’s temper, renowned in Washington, may occasionally be principled when he is speaking as one of 100 senators, but it’s dangerous in higher office. A man who enjoys fighting as much as John McCain does, who is combative in his personal relations within his own country, that is not a temperament we need in the Oval Office. He wanted Thursday’s speech to be about character — and Americans should pay attention to his. A reckless man is a danger in a volatile world.

The selection of Sarah Palin as McCain’s VP is the most depressing development I’ve seen in politics in a long, long time. I’m depressed, not as an Obama supporter, but as an American. The fact that this decision by McCain is not seen by every thinking person as a cynical, dangerous and hypocritical move by McCain just makes me very sad. I fear that it is further evidence of our ultimate decline as a country. Democracy reveals both the best and worst in a society. In this time of global crisis, a time that McCain call one of transcendant threat, the fact that the thought of “President Sarah Palin” doesn’t terrify every thinking American is deeply, deeply depressing.

I though Richard Cohen got it right:

Probably the most depressing thing about Palin is not her selection but the defense of it. It has produced a parade of GOP spokesmen intent on spiking the needle on a polygraph. Looking right into the camera, they offer statement after statement that they hope the voters will swallow but that history will forget. The sum effect on the diligent news consumer is a feeling of consummate contempt for the intelligence of the American people — a contempt that will be justified should Palin be the factor that makes McCain a winner in November.

The best example of an outright lie offered by a Republican in defense of Palin is Governor Pawlenty saying on NRP that the fact that she is a woman had nothing to do with her selection.

This video almost makes me cry. It’s an interview with Barak Obama in 1995 about his book, Dreams of My Father. He’s the same then as he is now, sincere, articulate and thoughtful. To think that McCain and his gang of bullies and no-nothings are having success caricaturing him just makes me sad. God help us. We’ll get the president we deserve. I’d like to think we deserve Obama, but I’m not sure.