http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jun/24/barackobama.uselections2008
Obama accused of twisting the bible to confuse US voters
* Suzanne Goldenberg in Wa****ngton
Barack Obama today came under fire from James Dobson, founder of the
conservative Focus on the Family organisation, who accused the likely
Democratic nominee of twisting the Bible to confuse people.
The attack from Dobson, a leading figure of the Christian Right, was
framed as a wholesale rejection of Obama's views on faith, and
appeared intended to thwart his efforts to reach out to evangelical
Christians.
It was delivered in Dobson's regular radio programme as a line-by-line
dissection of a speech that Obama gave to a liberal Christian
organisation two years ago on the role of religion in public life.
Dobson's organisation also emailed links to the programme out to news
organisations.
"I think he is dragging biblical understanding through the gutter,"
said Dobson. "I just don't know whether he is doing it deliberately or
accidentally."
Dobson seemed particularly incensed that Obama had compared him to the
Reverend Al Sharpton. He revisited the controversy over the Reverend
Jeremiah Wright, whom Obama renounced as his pastor earlier this year.
Dobson also took issue with Obama's suggestion that religious
organisations opposed to abortion make their case in terms accessible
to secular organisations. Dobson called that a "fruitcake"
interpretation of the law.
"Am I required in a democracy to conform my efforts in the political
arena to his bloody notion of what is right with regard to the lives
of tiny babies?" Dobson said. "What he's trying to say here is unless
everybody agrees, we have no right to fight for what we believe."
The attack on Obama comes at a time when some established evangelical
leaders -- especially those on the right like Dobson -- are
confronting the waning of their influence over American politics.
Religion remains a force in American life. More than 90% of Americans
believe in God and more than half pray at least once a day, according
to a study this week by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.
However, the evangelical community has grown disillusioned with the
performance of George Bush, who failed to live up to their
expectations as a born-again president.
Evangelicals are also unenthusiastic about the coming elections.
John McCain emerged as the likely Republican nominee -- despite
suspicion from evangelicals and outright hostility from figures such
as Dobson. Dobson has said he would not vote for McCain in November
because he is not a true conservative.
"This is a year when we have a lot of frustration with the major
political parties," Dobson said today.
Obama and other Democrats have been working hard since 2004 to win
over a younger and more liberal generation of evangelical voters
through Christian radio programmes and blogs.
Today, the Obama campaign offered a relatively muted reaction to
Dobson's comments, choosing instead to go after McCain on the issue of
terrorism. Obama's communications director, Robert Gibbs, dismissed
Dobson's comments as "odd and curious".
However, the campaign laid on a telephone conference call to try to
prolong a controversy over remarks by a senior McCain adviser, Charlie
Black.
The Obama campaign accused Black of indulging in scare mongering after
he said a terrorist attack would help McCain in the elections.
The Obama campaign wheeled out a former member of the commission that
investigated the 9/11 to help make its case against Black.
In the call, Richard Ben-Veniste stopped short of calling on McCain to
sack Black for comments that seem to politicise terrorism.
But he said: "I think the remarks were so out of place that they call
for some recalibration in the thinking and perhaps a greater adherence
to principle here in staying away from the politics of fear."
Meanwhile, Bill Clinton today moved to lay to rest doubts that he
would work for the next Democratic nominee by releasing a statement
pledging to help Obama win the White House.
"President Clinton is obviously committed to doing whatever he can and
is asked to do to ensure Senator Obama is the next president of the
United States," a spokesman said in a statement.
--
"Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government
talking
about wiretap, it requires -- a wiretap requires a court order.
Nothing has
changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists,
we're
talking about getting a court order before we do so"
-George W. Bush, April 20, 2004
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