Barack Obama's on the make for evangelicals - specifically the conservative, registered-to-vote variety.  The same type of voters he previously referred to as being "bitter" and who "cling to guns or religion".

A few weeks ago he told such voters that, if elected, he would expand and overhaul President Bush's federal faith based initiatives, announcing his own "Council for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships".  He has begun regular attempts to appeal to evangelicals, speaking to them on multiple occasions in recent weeks as part of what his campaign terms its "Joshua project".

Of course this is all well and good.  Candidates who expect the votes of any Americans should make an attempt to address their concerns.  The reality however is more blatantly political in that, on the fundamental cultural and moral concerns of evangelicals, he has very little in common with them at all.

The differences are greatest on two fundamental issues: abortion and gay marriage.

On abortion, Obama just became only the second presidential candidate in American history to be endorsed by Planned Parenthood, which referred to him in its announcement as a "passionate advocate" for the right to abortion.

In a speech to the group last July, Obama stated that, "...on this fundamental issue, I will not yield...", and that, "the first thing I'd do as President is sign the Freedom of Choice Act", (an act that would overturn hundreds of state abortion laws, including those regarding parental notification, and would guarantee public funding for abortion).

A hint as to just how "passionate" he is on the subject, as a state senator in Illinois, he actually opposed legislation, (known as "Born Alive Infant Protection"), that would mandate care for infants who were born alive in spite of attempts at abortion.  Not exactly a mainstream American position, much less for evangelical voters.

As for his views on the most fundamental institution in our society, the family, it gets no better.

He's for overturning the Defense of Marriage Act, overruling the military by repealing "don't ask, don't tell", opposes constitutional amendments that define marriage as "one man and one woman", (which have passed in 30 states with an average 70% of the vote), and wants anti-discrimination laws that not only cover "sexual preference" but "gender identity".

That's "change we can believe in" all right.

And keep in mind that overturning the Defense of Marriage Act means each state could then be forced to recognize a gay marriage performed in another state, in effect allowing one state to redefine marriage for the entire country. 

He made his position on state marriage amendments known a few weeks ago in a letter to the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Democratic Club of San Francisco, saying: "I oppose the divisive and discriminatory efforts to amend the California Constitution, and similar efforts to amend the U.S. Constitution or those of other states".

Well, that's pretty clear, right?  At least until his campaign went into spin mode, suggesting that he still opposes gay marriage, but supports gay civil unions and domestic partnerships.

In other words, he's suggesting that he's opposed to same-sex marriage, but opposes any attempts to keep it against the law.  Meaning he opposes the right of voters in any state to be able to keep the traditional definition of marriage from being redefined by unelected judges, (as happened in Massachusetts and California).

The truth is that he wants to play the political game of being for something without having to admit it.  Meaning he'll say he's for gay civil unions and domestic partnerships which have all the same rights and benefits of marriage and hope nobody points out that it's gay marriage in all but name - so as not to upset some of those "bitter" middle class voters he'll need in a few swing states this November. 

For all the rhetoric of a new kind of politics, it turns out he's really just a repackaged version of the same old cultural liberalism most Americans have rejected for decades.  He's hoping that they don't catch on before Election Day.

(This column also ran in The State)

Some more conservative reaction to Obama's big race speech the other day for you to check out...

Wes Pruden:

His depiction of a white grandmother as a mean-spirited racist, his tolerance of harsh denunciations of whites (like his mother) from the pulpit that he has supported for 20 years with his presence and his tithes, strikes the white voters he must persuade as mean, harsh and inexplicable. This is not the message Barack Obama set out with a year ago when he caught magic in a bottle. Now the magic, and maybe his shot at the White House, resembles only a dashed wish written on the wind.

Pat Buchanan:

How would Barack explain to his press groupies why he sat silent in a pew for 20 years as the Rev. Jeremiah Wright delivered racist rants against white America for our maligning of Fidel and Gadhafi, and inventing AIDS to infect and kill black people?

How would he justify not walking out as Wright spewed his venom about "the U.S. of K.K.K. America," and howled, "God d**n America!" ...

My hunch was right. Barack would turn the tables. ...

But we must understand the man in full and the black experience out of which the Rev. Wright came: 350 years of slavery and segregation.

Barack then listed black grievances and informed us what white America must do to close the racial divide and heal the country. ...

Sorry, Barack, some of us have heard it all before, about 40 years and 40 trillion tax dollars ago.

Charles Krauthammer:

The beauty of a speech is that you don’t just give the answers, you provide your own questions. “Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes.” So said Barack Obama, in his Philadelphia speech about his pastor, friend, mentor, and spiritual adviser of 20 years, Jeremiah Wright.

An interesting, if belated, admission. But the more important question is: which “controversial” remarks? ...

The question is why didn’t he leave that church? Why didn’t he leave — why doesn’t he leave even today — a pastor who thundered not once but three times from the pulpit (on a DVD the church proudly sells) “God d**n America”? Obama’s 5,000-word speech, fawned over as a great meditation on race, is little more than an elegantly crafted, brilliantly sophistic justification of that scandalous dereliction.

His defense rests on two central propositions: (a) moral equivalence, and (b) white guilt.

Ann Coulter:

Obama gave a nice speech, except for everything he said about race. He apparently believes we're not talking enough about race. This is like hearing Britney Spears say we're not talking enough about pop-tarts with substance-abuse problems....

Discrimination has become so openly accepted that -- in a speech meant to tamp down his association with a black racist -- Obama felt perfectly comfortable throwing his white grandmother under the bus. He used her as the white racist counterpart to his black racist "old uncle," Rev. Wright.

From the "sun came up in the east" department...

Conservatives remain scarce in the news media landscape.

Only 6 percent of the national press corps describe themselves as "conservative" in a population that includes reporters, editors and producers from major television and radio networks, daily newspapers, news wires and online sources.

Those who consider themselves "very conservative" amount to just 2 percent, according to a wide-ranging survey of 585 journalists and news executives released yesterday by the Project for Excellence in Journalism.

In contrast, 36 percent of the overall population generally consider themselves conservative. ...

The majority of nationally ranked journalists — 53 percent — described themselves as moderate, 24 percent were liberal and 8 percent "very liberal."

And still liberals scream about Fox News.  I guess they're ticked off about that 6 percent.