Christians and other conservatives quickly stepped in to denounce the clumsiness of the language he used, but why should we, at this late date, punish Obama for merely saying what the rest of the Democratic party has believed to its core since 1973?

Democrats want abortions. They want them safe, they want them legal. They constantly claim to want them rare, but that could only mean that they don't want them well-done, because if they really wanted them to be rare, in the sense of "not frequent," they could not possibly take the positions they do.

Obama, for example, is one of the most extreme liberals on the question of abortion. Despite his alleged allegiance to the Bible (which permits him to have a normal squeamishness when faced with the issue of gay marriage, but otherwise does not disturb his conscience), Obama in Illinois was one of the unborn's most dangerous foes.

In his disastrous 2004 campaign, Alan Keyes drew attention to Obama's vote against Illinois' proposed ban on partial-birth abortion. Obama's response was anything but reassuring:

Obama said he voted against the late-term abortion ban as a state senator because it contained no exception to protect the life of the mother. He noted that Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor and federal appeals Judge Richard Posner, both appointed by President Ronald Reagan, had voted to strike down laws banning late-term abortions.

Obama said he didn’t question the sincerity of those who are deeply concerned about abortion, but he said he believed there are many other issues on the minds of voters.

“As I travel around this state, I don’t get asked about gay marriage, I don’t get asked about abortion,” Obama said. “I get asked, ‘How can I find a job that allows me to support my family?’ I get asked, ‘How can I pay those medical bills without going into bankruptcy?”’

In other words, he's sure people who don't agree with him are nice enough people, but abortion is just not an important issue to him.

Now we know why.

Obama, like all good liberals, likes his own children and those who are useful to him politically (like the ones who were "taken to war" by President Bush, or the ones who scampered over Nancy Pelosi at her installation as Queen of the House, to convince America that Democrats love families and children.). He has no patience for the "unwanted" children whose parents he wants to "help" by permanently removing them from this earth.

Moreover, his statement is telling in and of itself. For example, one is led to wonder what kind of "values and morals" Obama is teaching his children in the first place. After all, he has allowed them to be brought up their entire lives under the weekly preaching of a man who not only swears from the pulpit, but blatantly violates the IRS tax code, waxes fanciful on American foreign policy, and equates the Ku Klux Klan with the American government that went after it and ended its reign of terror over the South. Oh, but not to worry there--Obama now claims that he didn't hear any of that while spending twenty years in church. Perhaps he's given his daughters the kind of "values and morals" that lets you sleep through church and remain untainted by anything said in it.

That's a comfort.

And what kind of behavior would Obama be referring to by "a mistake?" I thought referring to children as "mistakes" was passe a long time ago--like the term "bastard child." I thought we were more enlightened than those blue-blood snobs of the 1950s that mysteriously sent their slightly chubby daughters away for an "extended vacation" when they became pregnant.

Guess not.

And, as if to somehow make the statement less offensive, he follows the "baby punishment" with an even more vile equivalence. "I don't want them punished with an STD at age 16"--which, of course, is exactly the same thing as a baby, right? Except, of course, there are STD's you can't kill. Which also can't be stopped by an abortion--so what's his point here?

Initially, the point actually was about STDs and HIV/AIDS. Which makes the introduction of the baby even more puzzling. Wouldn't one assume that the mistake of not hearing the "values and morals" message would result in contracting HIV/AIDS? Not to be crude, but just where did this baby come from?

Alas, for a Democrat, there is always an unwanted baby lurking somewhere, waiting to interfere with the sexual revolution's "if it feels good, do it" dogma, preparing to rain on the promiscuity pride parade that Hef set in motion all those years ago.

To liberals (who mostly make their home in the Democratic party), there is nothing more important than unfettered sexual activity. And there is nothing that irritates them more than having their promiscuity fettered (except for those who like that sort of thing). Nothing spoils utopia like children. They're noisy and messy and always in the way. If you don't have them trained to be just like you, they can be very embarrassing. Just try following the Dead for a year with a toddler in tow. Bummer, man.

Liberal parents teach their children the "values and morals" of the sixties, then consider them "punished" when they have the gall to behave like--well, like children.

Children aren't good at remembering things. Homework, gloves, where they put their shoes. It is folly to expect them to remember pills and prophylactics, and cruel to offer them. The values of the Democratic party are the values of Hugh Hefner and Larry Flynt (it goes without saying that the morals are the morals of an alley cat.) Obama, in this small snippet, manages to expose his party for what it has become, and reveal what he really thinks.

His wife has said she has never before been "proud" of America. His pastor has damned America in the Name of God. Now he has referred to the miracle of life, another of God's wonderful gifts, as "punishment." These are the "values and morals" Obama teaches his children. These are the "values and morals" he wants to bring with him to the presidency.

Obama's followers sure are an ungrateful bunch, aren't they? Perhaps they would be happier just staying in Illinois.

At least the taxes are high there; that should cheer them up.