I am so enamored with Mr. Obama right now!

First, a random tidbit: on my way to school today I walked past a car with the bumper sticker "God bless the whole world, no exceptions." I love that.

Now, as I was saying. Obama called on a man at a talk in Iowa recently who asked him what is wrong with American society, that people are outraged about Michael Vick's dog fighting while overlooking the thousands of babies killed through abortion. You can check out the full article here.

What absolutely thrills me about the way he handled this question is he gave a lengthy, thoughtful, balanced response. Now, you all know how impassioned I am on the topic of abstinence-only education. One of the things I'm looking forward to come January 2009 (geez, that's still a long ways off) is for whoever our next president is to put an end to Bush's funding of these programs. I think it's so important on the issue of abortion to address the intense feelings people have about it, rather than relying on black-and-white definitions of the people found on either side ("baby killers" versus "anti-choicers"). In the past I would talk about abortion pretty irreverently, and I think a lot of young liberals do so. Over time I've come to a more moderate approach. Maybe it's due in part to more and more of my friends being parents, changing my reality from one where "I'm late" leads to a response of "oh shit, what are you going to do?" to one where the response is "oh that's great, I know you've been trying for a while now!" I still believe abortion should be legal, and I believe that in some circumstances it is the best choice. I have friends whose choice to get an abortion when they were young gave them time to mature and reach a level of stability that has allowed them to be fantastic mothers today. At the same time, I would like everything possible to be done to preclude the necessity of abortion: education, birth control, and emergency contraception.

But now, back to Obama's fabulous response:

“The issue of abortion, I don’t think, has gone away. People think about it a lot, obviously you do and you feel impassioned. I think that the American people struggle with two principles: There’s the principle that a fetus is not just an appendage, it’s potential life. I think people recognize that there’s a moral element to that. They also believe that women should have some control over their bodies and themselves and there is a privacy element to making those decisions.

“I don’t think people take the issue lightly. A lot of people have arrived in the view that I’ve arrived at, which is that there is a moral implication to these issues, but that the women involved are in the best position to make that determination. And I don’t think they make it lightly. I don’t think they make it callously, so I reject a comparison between a woman struggling with these issues and Michael Vick fighting dogs for sport. I don’t think that’s sort of how people perceive it.

“Now, this is one of those areas – again, I think it’s important to be honest – where I don’t think you’re ever going to get a complete agreement on this issue. If you believe that life begins at conception, then I can’t change your mind. I think there is a large agreement, for example, that late-term abortions are really problematic and there should be a regulation. And it should only happen in terms of the mother’s life or severe health consequences, so I think there is broad agreement on these issues.

“One area where I think we should have significant agreement is on the idea of reducing unwanted pregnancies because if we can reduce unwanted pregnancies, then it’s much less likely that people resort to abortion. The way to do that is to encourage young people and older people, people of child-bearing years, to act responsibly. Part of acting responsibly – I’ve got two daughters – part of my job as a parent is to communicate to them that sex isn’t casual and that it’s something that they should really think about and not think is just a game.

“I’m all for education for our young people, encouraging abstinence until marriage, but I also believe that young people do things regardless of what their parents tell them to do and I don’t want my daughters ending up in really difficult situations because I didn’t communicate to them, how to protect themselves if they make a mistake. I think we’ve got to have that kind of comprehensive view that says family planning and education for our young people and so forth – to prevent teen pregnancies, to prevent the kinds of situations that lead to women having to struggle with these difficult decisions and we should be supportive of those efforts. That’s an area where there should be some agreement.”

In other words, saying "don't do it" is not a suitable response if you truly want to avoid the unplanned pregnancies that lead to abortions. Go Barack!!