loveisgreaterthan[dot]com

a few months back, i had a crazy friday that i dubbed “politics-friday.” it was a crazy day, where i posted five different times stating where i stand on certain political issues. one of which, was abortion. i talked about how in my heart, i am pro-life, but i struggle with the wild hypothetical’s (rape, incest).

i still feel the same way.

it’s no secret that am supporting barack obama. working at a evangelical church that averages around seven thousand people in attendance every weekend, i get asked a lot how i can call myself a christian and support someone who does not want to make abortion illegal.

well, i read this post on one of my favorite new blogs the other day, and i must say that from here on out, i’m just going to direct people to that entry. it is quite possibly the most well-written explanation on why a christian can vote for obama and not feel guilty, at least in regards to the abortion issue. if you have other issues with obama, that’s just fine…. this is just one issue. here’s a portion of his post, but be sure to visit to check out the rest.

My purpose in endorsing Obama publicly is simply to give comfort to other Christ-followers who wish to vote for a pro-choice candidate. For so many, this is the singular issue in determining a candidate. I felt that way myself for so long, but today I am no longer handcuffed by this issue. Here are a few reasons why.

Pro-choice ≠ Pro-abortion. It’s ignorant for anyone to think that a pro-choice individual is pro-abortion. Although I hold the stance that all abortions should be banned, the issue is extremely complicated. I can’t think of anybody that is actually a proponent of abortion. And that includes Barack Obama.

It’s Political. This issue is just another way to garner votes on either side. Don’t get sucked into the trap. Ronald Reagan, George Bush Sr., John McCain, Mitt Romney. They all changed their opinions on this issue. Do you think it had anything to do with them running for office?

Other Issues. Are there no other issues in the world today? Do no other issues effect lives? I believe that there are quite a few “life altering” issues that sit on the presidents plate. To narrow it to one is shortsighted. Life may begin at conception, but it doesn’t end at birth.

No Options. If you vote strictly pro-life, all you need to do is show up on a cold day in November, close your eyes, and vote Republican. There is no need for you to follow politics, debates, news, read books. Your decision has already been made.

Nothing Has Changed. When was Roe vs. Wade again? Have we ever had a majority Republican Senate and House with a sitting Republican president? Why hasn’t the law changed? Do you really think their stance even makes a difference?

George W. Bush. For starters he said up front that he didn’t think America was ready for a law banning abortion so he wasn’t going to pursue it. He also believes that abortions should be allowed in the case of incest, rape, and harm to the mother. That isn’t a very consistent stance if you are valuing ALL life. Like I said, it’s a complicated issue.

Adoption. I personally feel like a hypocrite for criticizing pro-choice individuals, all the while not offering an alternative to those mothers who need assistance. If Christ-followers would talk less and adopt more, this wouldn’t be the issue it currently is.

…but i can’t go to bed without knowing who wins texas. ohio and rhode island have been called for hillary, vermont for obama.

not that any of it matters, when we all wake up tomorrow, obama will still have roughly the same delegate lead he had before the polls even opened. i hate this proportional system the democrats use.

what do you think about the primary election process?

seriously, if i hear one more person talk about how obama is a chump for using some quotes from another guys speech, especially when those people think that hillary is in the right for attacking obama on it… i’m going to lose my mind.

the whole idea is flat out stupid. see for yourself how far the plagiarism topic will get you…

so far i count two for me, zero for hillary fans.

hillary does not have more elected official experience than barack.
hillary is an idiot for calling out someone on plagiarism.

this morning… me and some friends; whitlow, mark and i headed to charlie’s diner on route 25 in perrysburg, ohio. whitlow found out last night that senator john mccain would be stopping there for a meet and greet sometime around 9am. thankfully, mark got there stupid early, like 7am, and got us a booth.

now for some full disclosure, i openly support barack obama, and hope to convince as many other people as i can to vote for him on march fourth, as well as the general election. nevertheless, i’m completely in love with politics and the process as a whole, so i’ll listen to any major candidate regardless of who it is… it’s history one way or another.

so whitlow and i showed up around 8am, and the place was just starting to fill up. by the time we got there, there were only a few open seats… thankfully a few of them were being held for us by mark.

senator mccain showed up around 10am, and by then the place was PACKED. outside as well as inside. here’s some bullet points from what stuck out to me:

• first impression when i saw him up close… dude is seriously old.
• there were ron paul supporters with signs up in front of the restaurant. they certainly are tenacious.
• in the pictures i’m linking below, the first one shows a red circle over a guy. this kid fake-fainted his way up to senator mccain, and when he finally got mccain’s attention, what did he have to say? “ron paul, i’m a huge fan.” idiot.
• in the second photograph, you’ll see a man wearing a brown shirt to the right of john mccain. he was a reporter for channel 11, the cbs affliate here in toledo. as mccain was speaking (and the rest of the room hushed) this guy takes the mic back from mccain and starts talking, loudly, into it. so, in a moment that made me actually forget about all the reasons i dislike mccain, the senator took the microphone (not in a rude way or anything) from the reporter and said into it “i’m john mccain, and we’re here at charlies, and this guy is interrupting me.” the crowd went nuts. it was absolutely hilarious.
• listen, there are a few things about mccain i like. he seems to be very straight forward, and his plan for veterans healthcare is quite good (which he spoke about this morning). his plan is to give all veterans a card that will allow them to get whatever medical care they need at whatever physician they so choose. but i cannot get behind his war policy, or the fact that he’s more of the same. i just don’t see enough change from the current administration in him.
• the new york times article, about the alleged affair with the telecom lobbyist was not brought up. i don’t want to jump to conclusions here, but if there is a “dress in the freezer” type moment in this investigation, mark my words… mitt romney will get back in the race. as it stands now, he is probably somewhere banging his head against a table wishing he wouldn’t have dropped out when he did.
• we got interviewed by the columbus dispatch and toledo free press. wonder if we’ll get quoted in either.
• all in all, mccain was pretty civil. he didn’t spend any time slamming other candidates… he didn’t mention them once.
• he spent his time talking solely about the economy, healthcare, and a little bit about the war.
• there was a serious pandering moment though, when he started talking about the ohio state buckeyes. i mean seriously, if that’s not pandering to a crowd, i don’t know what is.
• here’s an interesting fact… out of the hundreds of people i saw there, other than a couple press people, there was not a single black person in attendance. in addition, i only saw a few other minorities.
• we guessed the median age of people there (not counting kids and people too young to vote) at 56.

see the rest of the set on my flickr by clicking here.

well, it’s come to my attention that my blog has become increasingly political. i will not apologize for this, as it is indeed a personal blog that will ebb and flow along with whatever is important to me at the time. of course, you can always count on a few regular things here on my corner of the web; pop culture, weight loss, sports, jesus, and yes… politics. who knows what will strike my fancy on any given day.

that being said, this is NOT a political blog. however, with yesterday being super-tuesday, things have leaned heavily in that direction lately. this isn’t the norm, i promise you. to prove it to you, i’m going to stay away from politics for at least two weeks. this is even easier for me seeing as how my “blog-fast” is coming up in a few days.

to close it out, i wanted to share some thoughts about super-tuesday.

• didn’t start out super. i woke up at 4am unable to breathe i was so congested. took some medicine but was unable to fall back asleep till around 7am. i slept till about 9 before i decided to start my day.
• my voice is really shaky. it comes and goes at will.
• i probably stretched it a little hard by engaging in some political debates over at marks, but it was worth it, even if i can’t talk tomorrow.
• special thanks to mark for hosting our little geek party. bigger thanks to his wife jodi for putting up with us. she thought we were all silly.
• in attendance; jason, whitlow, mark, sean, gorey, myself, and jess was paying attention as well at times. hooty even stopped in for a little while.
• anyone know the statistics on people who vote for american idol vs. the 2004 presidential election? that came up tonight…
• special thanks to my mom as well for providing some tasty snacks for the party.
• great night for obama. i know he didn’t get california, but i really think that’s ok. he got 11 states (as of this writing, missouri is still up in the air, but it looks like he’s going to get that as well, so 12) and a few of them by a landslide. conversely, he managed to stay pretty close in most of the states hillary won, so the delegate count will be extremely interesting once it’s fully realized.
• i think, this plays very highly in obama’s favor. he’ll probably finish within 100 delegates of hillary, and he’s definitely got the momentum. the more time he has, the more dangerous he is in the long run.
• who saw huckabee coming? wow did he have a great night. i lost count of how many times the reporters said the phrase “vice president” when talking about him after he started winning states. i think it’s pretty much a solid bet that mccain will select him for vp.
• despite what romney says… he’s done. put a fork in him.
• i thought cnn’s coverage was extremely well done. especially cnn-hd on mark’s television.
• hillary’s speech made everyone in the room cringe… except for the republican who is salivating at the possibility of her being the democratic candidate. why? because mccain/huckabee would CRUSH her. if the democrats don’t get their head out of their rears and start thinking about the general election (much like the smarter republicans have done with mccain) we’re going to have another republican for president. hillary is so completely polarizing. the proof is in the statistics, the independents and moderate to left leaning republicans will not vote for her. and the young vote that obama has drawn that has been so incredible to watch? they are DEFINITELY not voting for her. if it comes down to hillary vs. mccain… i’ll be praying for a bloomberg/gore ticket, even though it won’t happen, and in which case… i may just spend the next four years crying.
• a lot of people seem to not mind mccain so much. well, the democrats i hang out with anyway. i don’t agree. i can’t get behind someone who changes the words to “barbara ann” by the beach boys to sing a song with lyrics “bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb iran” or someone who thinks it’d be ok to stay in iraq for “a hundred years.” he’s too much the “status quo” for me. i don’t see any change from bush to him.
• that’s it… here’s some pictures from the evening. taken on the camera phone, so the quality sucks. you can see jason in one pointing to whitlow and giving the “thumbs down,” that’s because whitlow was the only republican in the group

don’t adjust your monitor, or your bookmarks. you’re still at …love is the movement.in honor of super-tuesday, i am taking my civil liberty to heart, and imploring you all to go out and vote. you don’t even have to vote for my (obvious) choice of candidate. we as americans are blessed beyond belief to be able to play a part in the political process… don’t be too cynical and think your voice doesn’t count.

so, for tuesday, february fifth two-thousand and eight… this website will be obama-central.

tomorrow, i’ll be over at marks with some other politics-nuts watching the results of super-tuesday come in. i was even thinking about making some cookies and frosting them with red and blue frosting, but then i remembered; i’m a dude. maybe i’ll get some red and blue food coloring to put in our beer instead.

god bless digg. i found this little ditty a couple days ago and kept it saved, knowing i’d want to blog about it at some point. it’s a blog from a swedish archaeologist, blogger, journal editor, public speaker, so on and so forth, about u.s. politics. here’s a quote, and the link to read the whole thing (worth the two minutes it’ll take you)

From a European perspective, US politics are an ongoing battle between the extreme Right and the middle Right. The Republican presidential candidates are really, really scary people in my view. So all of us in the world at large who live under the shadow of US political hegemony are holding our breaths, hoping that Clinton or Obama will make it into office. They’re pretty bad, but the alternative would be unspeakably dreadful.

you be the judge… my thoughts are below, but watch the video first.

i really don’t like it when people think that just because someone is famous, specifically musicians and actors, they shouldn’t have an opinion. it’s as if they believe that once someone gets famous, they have no more intelligence to add to the national conversation. they have no more passion they are allowed to exude for things other than bling and ho’s.

i don’t buy it.

sure, they have a platform to use their power for bad and to influence people in the wrong direction. but they also have platform to use their power for good, and influence people in a positive direction. obviously, people are going to be biased either way after watching this video being as how it’s reflective of barack obama.

here’s what i think. regardless of how you feel about obama as a politician, i don’t believe ANYONE can deny the man inspires people. he is one of the most gifted and eloquent speakers to come around in a long time. and whether or not you believe he can live up to some of the changes he promises when or if he enters the whitehouse, that doesn’t change the fact that the man has some serious skills behind the microphone. i like to believe (because i am an obama supporter) that the talk will be backed up by a walk, but that is my opinion and i am not telling you that you need to agree.

what i am saying, is that i believe this video will stir people, one way or another. i believe we are going to see the biggest outpouring of people my age voting in this election than ever before. for the first time, we have an election where the “youth” of the nation feels compelled to go out and vote. more than ever, we feel like our voices MUST be heard.

in barack obama, we have a politician we actually believe in… someone my generation feels has not yet been corrupted by washington politics, someone who is naive (or optimistic, depending on how you look at it) enough to believe that he can and will carry through on these ideals.

i hear a lot of people put obama down because of his lack of experience. the fact that he has more elected official experience than hillary aside, the fact that he is young and a first-term senator are PRIME reasons why i AM voting for him. he’s still got the fire! and more than anything else i believe america needs a president who is on FIRE for this nation. he can surround himself with all the experienced advisors anyone could ever wish for… so i don’t buy that excuse either.

2008 is a year for hope. a year for change. in my short life i have never felt more hope from a politician than i have from barack obama.

yes we can.

bring on the comments…