Obama's Non-Answer

I didn't see too much of Rick Warren's political party in church last weekend. Most of what I saw was in replays and news clips. However I would have to agree with a lot of people who have said that Rick Warren may have missed his calling. As much as I disagree with the majority of his theology, he really did ask the two candidates some of the best questions I have ever heard asked. The most famous and talked about of these questions has to be when Warren asked when a baby gets human rights. McCain simply answered that they did at conception. As far as how honest he was in this I'm not sure given his support for the use of embryonic stem cells. But it is at least a good answer.

Obama's answer was fairly disturbing. He said:

"Well, uh, you know, I think that whether you're looking at it from a theological perspective or, uh, a scientific perspective, uh, answering that question with specificity, uh, you know, is, is, uh, above my pay grade."

I am amazed at how terrible of an answer this is. I wouldn't have really had a problem with him answering something like "at birth" or even "after a planned birth." I would certainly have disagreed with it, but at least it would have been a truthful answer. Obama seems to have said that it is either a theological or scientific issue, and that he is not qualified in those fields so he cannot answer (i.e. it is above his pay grade). The ironic thing of course is that Human Rights is not really a theological issue (although theology may influence human rights) and it is certainly not a scientific issue. Human Rights is primarily a governmental issue, in fact I would say that government's primary purpose is to protect the human rights of its citizens. If that is not what the government is doing, then there is no purpose for it.

The job of the executive branch, at its most fundamental level, is to ensure that the laws protecting human rights are followed and that Human rights are preserved. This means that a presidential candidate is someone who without a doubt needs to know who human rights apply to, otherwise how can he be trusted with the job of protecting human rights? Sorry Obama, but this issue is right at your pay grade. Ignoring the question all together is unacceptable.