I’m afraid we need a little Sunday morning theology. Hopefully someone at the White House will read this and realize just how ill advised the President was to do what he did this week and we should be praying hard for him to see the error of his ways on this.

In the Bible we read these things:

“And God blessed them. And God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.’” Gen 1:28 (ESV)

“Did not he who made me in the womb make him? And did not one fashion us in the womb?” Job 31:15 (ESV)

“Your hands have made and fashioned me; give me understanding that I may learn your commandments.” Psalm 119:73 (ESV)

“For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.” Psalm 139:13 (ESV)

These are clear references to God intending people to procreate and recognize that, even in the womb, God played a vital role in the formation of children and we should not casually destroy life God himself created. These passages of scripture are what inspire so many pro-life advocates to defend the unborn.

Had the President of the United States stood at the National Prayer Breakfast and uttered any of those passages and then announced his intent to protect the unborn, abortion rights advocates would have stormed the White House and the Courts all in the name of separation of church and state. The media would have had on Barry Lynn to proclaim his outrage that the President was mixing religion and politics.

Jim Wallis would have gone on the news to dance around life issues and try his best to neuter God out of them and the media would have treated him as an objective source.

But that’s not what happened.

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Promoted from the diaries

Most of my writing is on foreign policy. There are few other topic areas other than the law on which I’m comfortable writing. However, as streiff notes, I, like most other Catholics, got to hear a heartfelt letter from my Bishop — a living examplar of St. John Chrysostom’s famous (possibly apocryphal) maxim — explaining that clear out of nowhere, somehow, the Obama Administration decided to make Catholic institutions pay for abortifacents, birth control, and sterilization procedures, all of which are actually explicitly mortal sins in my faith, which is to say, one can be in danger of Hell merely for helping to provide them.

As Sts. Nicholas and Chrysostom would not, in their unenlightened days, have likely had warm feelings for His Excellency, it is perhaps incumbent upon me to note that my Bishop neglected a few details in the sermon he had our deacon read aloud. His Excellency was absolutely silent on the possible election of a man who actively defended the post-uterine execution of neonatal infants, which I ascribe to moral laziness and cowardice, though it may have been instead interest in funding a short lived billboard campaign in Atlanta extolling Catholics who believe him and the Pope evil to come on back for a quick round of communion. The Secretary of Health and Human Services is a self-professing Catholic who is one of the most ardent defenders of the abortion license in our country. Obamacare was passed through the good offices of numerous nominally-Catholic Senators and Representatives, despite warnings from Catholic groups (such as the Knights of Columbus, who fought tooth and nail) and without so much as a peep of the same from our esteemed Bishops, that maybe, just maybe, the Obama Administration might be vaguely interested in making free abortion on demand and contraceptives available to all, conscience exceptions be damned.

No pun.

Instead, in that pastoral letter, there was a general note that this was bad, and we should all be aware of it. In the background, I believe I heard someone dropping bread into a bowl of milk. I may have also heard someone washing his hands before a condemned man, but I’m not sure about that.

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Judd Legum at Think Progress did what appears to be a pre-emptive strike against former Bush White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer claiming that Fleisher was “secretly involved” in the Susan G. Komen Foundations’ strategy on planned parenthood.

In fact, according to people I’ve spoken to who are aware of the decision making processes at Komen, Fleischer had nothing to do with Komen’s strategy or decision on this matter. I use the word “pre-emptive” because it seems Think Progress and the left wanted to get this out there quickly, damn the facts, to distract from Brendan Daly.

Brandon Daly is Nancy Pelosi’s former press secretary. He now works at Ogilvy Public Relations.

According to people close to the Komen Foundation I’ve spoken to, it was not Fleischer who was involved in the strategy and PR related to the Planned Parenthood decision, but rather Nancy Pelosi’s former press secretary and Ogilvy Public Relations executive Brendan Daly.

Think Progress seemingly wanted to jump the gun and blame a Republican for a disastrous PR strategy when it was not just any Democrat, but one tied to Nancy Pelosi, who was quick out of the gate condemning the Komen Foundation.

Maybe Komen should have gone with Edelman instead.

The good folks at the RNC took a look  at what candidate Obama promised in Nevada during the 2008 presidential campaign … and the record of failure that followed. The result reveals President Obama’s failure to live up to candidate Obama’s promises.

In a new video the RNC reminds us of how Obama’s failed promises impact Nevada. Nevada has the highest unemployment rate in the country — 12.6%, the highest foreclosure filings in the country and more than 58% of properties with mortgages underwater:

Research proving Obama’s failed promises is provided below the fold courtesy of the RNC.

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Next weekend, political conservatives from all over the nation will be descending on Washington, DC to attend the annual Conservative Political Action Conference—better known as CPAC. Across town, however, union bosses and their adopted #OccupyDC progeny are planning to disrupt and lay siege to the conservative conference.

According to the AFL-CIO’s Washington DC Metro Council website, “Actions are currently being planned for noontime andafter work on Friday, February 10.”

Apparently, the unions plans to attempt to disrupt the conference with rats, puppets, and more:

WE’VE HEARD ENOUGH FROM THE 1%! Join the rally featuring tents, an inflatable fat cat, puppets, “candidate Walmart,” and more to LET THE VOICES OF THE 99% BE HEARD!

There is also a Facebook page for Occupy CPAC, posted by Change to Win staffer, Trina Tocco. It is important to note that Change to Win is the SEIU-led federation that broke away from the AFL-CIO in 2005—which means both union federations are involved in planning the attacks on CPAC.

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Good news? I had a great Pastrami Burger tonight from a place called The Hat. Seriously: the pastrami itself is great, and I’ll probably go for the Pastrami Dip next time. Bad news? It was a busy evening and now I’m tired. The good news that wins out? Not much to cover tonight, so let’s go.

In France it’s illegal to give away free maps. Yes, Google is reportedly having to pay €500,000 because a French cartographer didn’t like the competition. Insane.

Reminds me of one of the times Rick Santorum made a point to stand up for big government: when he tried to get government out of the business of providing “free” taxpayer-funded competition to private weather services.

Of course, Google’s free services are under fire in the US, too, so we can’t get too smug yet.

The push for a sales tax compact marches on. I still say it needs more safeguards against ever-higher taxes, double taxes, a national sales tax, and other forms of expansion.

And yes, Republican FCC reform plans are pro-growth by checking the runaway FCC.

I’ve written about the Muslim Brotherhood before at RedState and while researching that post, one thing became abundantly clear: it is a scary organization with a complicated history.

Bill Whittle narrates this excellent video from Encounter Books to help us understand the threat the Brotherhood poses.  Watch and learn.

Follow @ben_howe

Over at the American Enterprise Institute, James Pethokoukis modeled the economy and the effect of the economy on the 2012 elections. He calculated what unemployment would look like under 28 different scenarios, varying both job and labor force growth rates to cover the range of possibilities, ad the results look bad if there’s any sort of return to the previous trend, should job growth rates not grow sharply.

Even worse for the President, Pethokoukis applied a model by Ray Fair to guess the resulting share of the vote Barack Obama will win based on likely GDP growth rates. Pethokoukis calls the resulting prediction a “close race,” but it actually isn’t. Using Swingometer and some simple math, I think the prediction is one of a nearly 100 EV win for the Republican nominee.

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The topline number in this Pew survey shows that the current breakdown among registered voters is 43/48 GOP/Dem, which is a seven point shift from their 39/51 results in 2008. Now that alone should worry the Democrats, seeing as Pew found that the breakdown in 2010 was 43/47, which was the year where Democrats got shellacked across the country; but the news is if anything worse when you look at the breakdown by religious affiliation. A lot of attention will be on how Jewish support for the GOP went from 20/72 to 29/65 between ’08 and today; but what may be even more important is that that GOP support among white Mainline Protestant and white Catholic voters flipped from 45/45 and 41/49 in 2008 to 51/39 & 49/42 in 2011. How this will translate into likely voters is, of course, anybody’s guess… but if you’ve been wondering why the President is suddenly talking about how neat God is, it’s probably because somebody on his staff is keeping track of Pew.

As to how this breaks down in the 2012 election… well, obviously the increase in Jewish support (as Pew notes, those new supporters are identifying as Republicans, not as Republican-leaning) is going to have an impact in Florida, which is a state looking increasingly like it’s going to be leaving the Democratic column. But possibly what may be even more important was what happened with Mormon support: it went from 68/19 in 2008 to 80/17 in 2011. If I had to guess as to why, I suspect that this represents fallout from the incredibly racist* Democratic response to California’s Proposition 8; and if you’re wondering what the point is then I suggest that you look at this map of LDS population percentages in 1990. Mormons make up somewhere around seven and a half percent of Nevada’s population, and while the numbers are much smaller in Colorado and New Mexico they are still significant. While Obama comfortably won all three states in 2008, they are all considered in play for 2012: couple that with Republican gains among white Catholics and we’re seeing a suddenly-rickety Democratic position in the Mountain West.

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The left and right can together admit that the Susan G. Komen Foundation has just had three days of horrible publicity. They did the right thing and should have mapped out a release strategy better. My suspicion is that they assumed the purity of their intentions would override the abortion lobby’s demands.

I heard today that while small donations are up more than 100% to the Komen Foundation, major funders have threatened to pull money allocated to Komen because of Komen’s Planned Parenthood decision. Killing children in utero is the sacrament of the Church of the Secular Left and any person or organization that becomes the slightest threat to abortion rights must be destroyed. Because the Susan G. Komen Foundation dared to stop giving money to an organization that kills kids despite its spin, major liberal donors of Komen decided abortion outranks curing breast cancer and Komen had to be stopped.

The media headlines today are that the Komen Foundation has reversed itself. If you gave a donation in the past few days and want it back, you should call (800) 996-3329. But I hope I can provide for you some rational explanation for a mishandled PR exercise.

As a Komen Board member told Life News, the reversal is not really so much a reversal as a clarification of Komen’s grants procedures, which will still impact Planned Parenthood’s future funding from the Susan G. Komen Foundation.

The major outrage against Komen funding Planned Parenthood came after an undercover sting of Planned Parenthood proving conclusively that Planned Parenthood does not offer mammogram services. Komen claimed it funded Planned Parenthood because of its mammogram services. Planned Parenthood’s dodge is that they referred women to places to get discounted or free mammograms, which itself is not true.

In walking back its denial of funds to Planned Parenthood, my understanding is that Komen will not cancel already approved grants to Planned Parenthood, but in the future will only fund organizations that provide mammograms themselves. That, in effect, still shuts out Planned Parenthood unless they actually invest in in-house infrastructures to give mammograms instead of just killing kids in-house.

Today is February 3rd. On this date in 2009, Eric Holder was sworn in as Attorney General. Sorry about that. Also on this date in 1815, the world’s first commercial cheese factory was established in Switzerland, laying the groundwork for annoying Packers fans the world over. On February 3rd in 1870, the 15th Amendment was ratified, establishing that the “right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” Good on ya, amenders. And on February 3rd in 1913, the 16th Amendment was ratified, establishing that “Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration.” Way to follow a win with a loss, guys. Lastly, we’ll note that today is the anniversary of The Day The Music Died. So go listen.

Why the official 8.3 percent unemployment rate is a phony number | American Enterprise
“Even though the unemployment rate fell, so did the labor force participation rate (as more Americans became discouraged and gave up looking for work).”

McConnell: Obama is the most divisive president I’ve served with | Human Events
“‘Once they get the payroll tax holiday for another ten months, they basically don’t want to do anything else with us,’ said McConnell, referring to negotiations between Republican and Democrat lawmakers to extend tax cuts for the middle class.”

Obama’s the man leading the Occupy the Oval Office movement. | American Spectator
“By ineptness and, worse, by deliberate design, Barack Obama daily makes this nation weaker abroad, less free (and more authoritarian) at home, economically more feeble, and in the civic realm more bitterly divided than ever.”

Holder should walk the plank on ‘Fast and Furious’ | Washington Examiner
“A petulant, angry, and defiant Attorney General Eric Holder refused yesterday to take any responsibility for the growing scandal surrounding Operation Fast and Furious, the ill-conceived and incompetently managed program in which federal agents allowed thousands of guns to be purchased in the United States by known suppliers to Mexican drug cartels.”

Today’s Word of the Day comes from Wordsmith.org.
gradgrind (GRAD-grynd): noun Someone who is solely interested in cold, hard facts. Etymology: After Thomas Gradgrind, the utilitarian mill-owner in Charles Dickens’s novel Hard Times. Gradgrind runs a school with the idea that hard facts and rules are more important than love, emotions, and feelings. Earliest documented use: 1855.

Mitt Romney’s 1992 Democratic Primary vote for Paul Tsongas — a technocratic modernizer and reformer, but very much a Democrat — raised some Republican eyebrows last week.

What hasn’t been mentioned: Romney’s vote formally enrolled him in the Democratic Party. more…

For anyone who either believes in leprechauns or that Mitt Romney is a conservative this should be of significance, especially since his minions haunted this site making much of the fact that Rick Perry was a Democrat before 1989.

The speculation is that Romney had originally intended to challenge Ted Kennedy in the Democrat primary then decided to run as a Republican. This makes his 1994 campaign strategy much more understandable.

According to a Romney campaign spokesperson, Romney “switched back.” One doesn’t know how Romney managed to “switch back.” According to the town clerk, Romney became an Republican only on October 19, 1993. The implication is that Romney had either never voted between his registration as a independent in 1979 and 1992 (so his vote in 1992 automatically enrolled him as a Democrat) or that he was a regular Democrat voters in those earlier elections and changed to Republican to run for Senate.

Now I’m off to National Review and Jennifer Rubin’s precious little blog to read some more on how conservative Willard Romney is.