Obama
Prophetic
By Mark Silk — August 10, 2008
As the McCain spin machine continues to beat up on Obama for his alleged messianic or prophetic pretensions (I say prophetic, Waldman says undeserved), the worry in a number of black quarters is that Obama is not prophetic enough–or more precisely, that his candidacy threatens to undermine the ability of black America to lift up […]
Obama Effect?
By Mark Silk — August 8, 2008
Rep. Steve Cohen’s overwhelming 79-19 victory in Tennessee’s ninth congressional district Democratic primary has got to warm the cockles of even the most cynical journalistic heart. Nikki Tinker’s race- and Jew-baiting ads, designed to encourage voters in the majority-black district to choose one of their own, backfired with a vengeance, as Americans’ rosiest accounts of […]
Obama’s ex-Muslim
By Mark Silk — August 6, 2008
WSJ’s got the story on the resignation of Mazen Asbahi as Obama’s coordinator for Muslims and Arab-Americans. The problem? In 2000, Mr. Asbahi briefly served on the board of Allied Assets Advisors Fund, a Delaware-registered trust. Its other board members at the time included Jamal Said, the imam at a fundamentalist-controlled mosque in Illinois. “I […]
Obamoses
By Mark Silk — August 6, 2008
OK, it’s old news, but since Ted Olson over at Christianity Today‘s political blog wants to keep up the chatter about the McCain campaign’s “He is the One” videoswipe at Obama, here’s my two cents. Yes, the Matrix reference and the opening do suggest messiahship, and since the ad is anti-Obama, it can be interpreted […]
Real Christian
By Mark Silk — August 5, 2008
The Chicago Sun-Times‘ Cathleen Falsani, who’s covered the Obama religion beat more thoroughly than anyone, responds to Cal Thomas’ two-month-old argument (based on comments by Obama in an interview with Falsani) that Obama is not a true Christian. Yes he is, Falsani says. This is the kind of debate that will make most Americans squeamish, […]
Obama’s Muslim
By Mark Silk — August 5, 2008
The Obama campaign has appointed its national coordinator for Muslim affairs and it’s not (as originally reported) Hiam Nawas, but a Chicago lawyer named Mazen Asbahi. Asbahi graduated from Northwestern Law School a dozen years ago, and has acquired his legal chops at some of the toniest law firms in the Second City. He’s also […]
The Late Great
By Mark Silk — August 3, 2008
Hal Lindsey, whose The Late Great Planet Earth was the premillennialist tract for the Jesus Freak generation, is still selling his premil patent medicine, and not very surprisingly the latest Sign of the Times is Barack Obama. Obama’s not the Antichrist, according to Lindsey, but rather a sort of harbinger, maybe an antichristical John the […]
Childe Baracke
By Mark Silk — July 25, 2008
And from the belly of the Street of Fleet, lo there cometh the Scorn of the Times.
Nothing like a visit
By Mark Silk — July 24, 2008
Israelis now favor Obama over McCain. Will there be any blowback on American Jews?
Barack at the Wall
By Mark Silk — July 24, 2008
From a chat with reporters on the plane to Germany: Q. Do you want to tell us what your prayer was? BO. Uh, no. Update: The Israeli paper Maariv got hold of the prayer and published it. Bad journalistic form. Nice prayer.
A Lefty Answer?
By Mark Silk — July 23, 2008
GOM’s Dan Gilgoff advances the proposition that Mara Vanderslice’s Matthew 25 Network, the Christian pro-Obama PAC, represents the religious left’s getting up to speed a lot faster than the religious right took. Nothing like having someone else break the trail. The relevant comparison is between the Moral Majority’s press release approach and Christian Coalition’s grass […]
Youth For Chr…er, Obama
By Mark Silk — July 23, 2008
“YOUNG. EVANGELICAL. FOR OBAMA.” The best. The Obama campaign. Can Manage. Since. The Joshua Generation. Crashed and burned. See Brody. For details. I say. Keep trying.
yerushalayim shel zahav
By Mark Silk — July 22, 2008
The Daily Show has the last word on Obama’s Jewish problem.
Not Going There
By Mark Silk — July 22, 2008
In one sense, Barack Obama’s trip to the Middle East could give him a chance to strut his religious stuff. His life experience has afforded him a certain personal insight into religion and society abroad: He spent a couple of years of his childhood living in largely Muslim Indonesia, and is acquainted with Kenya, a […]
The Free Marketplace of Ideas
By Mark Silk — July 21, 2008
Early this afternoon, Politico’s Ben Smith posted a report that the Obama campaign had decided to hire a Muslim liaison and that the person likely to be tapped for the position was Hiam Nawas, a Jordanian-American who held that position in the Wesley Clark campaign four years ago. Smith proceeded to quote from (and link […]
