Doug Kmiec: "After Meeting with Barack" [UPDATED]

More credulity stretching from Prof. Kmiec regarding his meeting with the Obamessiah, this time at Catholic Online.

I've expended all the effort I care to spend in one day debunking this clown's nonsense. Besides, this essay appears to be a complete rehash of this bit of sophistry (again published at Catholic Online) from just over a week ago.

So, instead, I'll let this blogger at HotAir make the case against Kmiec:

I know, the Doug Kmiec posts are getting redundant, but he fascinates me as the clearest example among the Obamicans of someone who’s personally captivated by Obama (“Lightworker!”) but intellectually unable to justify voting for him on that basis. The solution: Self-persuasion through argumentation that the most liberal member of the senate is somehow the more responsible choice this year for a conscientious pro-life voter. Read his latest essay and tell me if you don’t have the distinct sense that he’s trying to convince himself of what he’s saying more so than the reader. Here’s my favorite part, which builds on a point he made last month about how Obama and McCain really aren’t all that different on abortion since neither one wants to amend the Constitution to ban it::

Senator Obama’s position accepts the existing legal regime which leaves the abortion decision with the mother — which is all right so long as the mother is persuaded to choose life. Senator McCain’s position would leave the decision with the individual states — which is all right so long as the individual states prohibit abortion.

Since we are assured of neither, neither position is fully pro-life.

In truth, both positions are pro-choice, with the former focused on the individual and the latter focused on the state. Senator McCain’s position is sometimes described as pro-life, but it is more pro-federalism (states being free under the McCain position to decide to permit or disallow abortion as they see fit).

From a standpoint of subsidiarity and prudence, one can make an argument that the Obama position is preferable since it does not arrogate to a higher level that which can be done more effectively below in direct relationship with the mother.

See what he’s doing here? The only way he can justify his vote for Obama on this point is to set up a false dichotomy: With Obama you get legal abortion but determined efforts to talk women out of it and with McCain you get abortion banned in some states … and no effort whatsoever to talk women out of it. It all nets out! Except of course it doesn’t: He has no reason to think McCain would be any less diligent than Obama would in setting up outreach programs to discourage pregnant women from aborting. On the contrary, given how passionate Obama’s base is about this subject, he has every reason to believe he’s blowing smoke. I’m mighty curious to hear the specifics of what Senator Hopenchange has in mind by way of getting women to carry to term, just like I’m curious to hear how McCain’s continuation of “an unjustified war” to try to keep the peace in Iraq would be worse for the culture of life than a pullout that might lead to ethnic cleansing. Which reminds me: Has Kmiec heard yet about the “tactical readjustments”?

Exit comparison. From [Kmiec's] essay:

Those who are pro-abortion, as I see it, are those who advocate the practice as a matter of fundamental right or as part of a radical, often feminist, agenda that takes no account of the moral weight or significance of unborn life.

And from the NARAL website:

Sen. Obama is fully pro-choice. In his own words:
“A woman’s ability to decide how many children to have and when, without interference from the government, is one of the most fundamental rights we possess. It is not just an issue of choice, but equality and opportunity for all women.

(emphasis added)


UPDATE
At least in the Catholic Online piece, Kmiec didn't have the audacity to include the bit about being denied Communion in his biographical information in the byline/attribution line. I suppose he knew that crap wouldn't fly at a Catholic site like it would at a mainstream media organ like The Chicago Tribune.


UPDATE #2 (17 June)
I left the following comment at Catholic Online. The comments are moderated over there, so we'll see if it shows up:

The best thing I can say for this piece is that at least you didn't mention (once again) that you had been wrongfully denied Communion. And I suppose it's to your credit that you didn't include that piece of trivia in the biographical information of your byline/attribution line like you did in The Chicago Tribune:

"Douglas W. Kmiec, who was denied communion by a priest for endorsing Barack Obama, is a professor of constitutional law at Pepperdine University and was an assistant U.S. attorney general during the Reagan administration."

As Ramesh Ponnuru has asked, will you be putting that on your business cards now? Or perhaps adding it to your resume?

You were definitely wronged by the priest in question, but your continually touting that one-time instance of Communion denial as some sort of "red badge of courage" proving your "standing up to the right-wing bona fides" is nothing but self-aggrandizement at the expense of holding the Church and her priests (and those Bishops like Archbishops Burke and Naumann who have taken a strong stand in this regard) up to the general public for ridicule and contempt. The whole situation could have been handled privately between you, this priest, and his Bishop (or, at the very least, mentioned ONLY ONCE by you and then dropped).

Instead, we're treated to a rehash of the whole affair as part of your biographical information in the attribution line of a major daily newspaper in the secular mainstream media.

Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
Cranky Conservative: "But At Least He Says It with a Smile"

Doug Kmiec Again Places Platitudes Above Policy [UPDATED]

Prof. Bainbridge on "Obama, Abortion, & Catholics"

Prof. Rick Garnett on Kmiec's Latest Nonsense

Deacon Keith Fournier: "Why I Disagree with Doug Kmiec, Once Again"

Give It a Rest Already, Prof. Kmiec!

Deacon Keith Fournier: "No More ‘Left’ or ‘Right’, Time for a New Catholic Action"

Doug Kmiec's Newfound Celebrity Status Among Those on the Left

Doug Kmiec Soon To Be Sorely Disappointed

E.J. Dionne on Kmiec Being Denied Communion [UPDATED]

Deal Hudson on Prof. Kmiec and Blurring the Lines Between "Pro-Choice" and Pro-Abortion

Did Doug Kmiec Just Now Catch On That Obama and NARAL Are Politically Conjoined? [UPDATED]

Deal Hudson on "How Obama's Catholics Will Dodge the Infanticide Question"Kmiec's Dishonesty [UPDATED]

Catholic Teaching and Political Risk Taking: When Credit Isn't Given Where Credit is Due [UPDATED]

Kmiec's Wishful Thinking on Obama and AbortionThe Curt Jester: "Shameless Garment" [UPDATED]

So-Called "Catholic Reaganite" Doug Kmiec Endorses Obama [UPDATED]

"No'bama for Me, Thanks"

Can a Catholic Vote for Obama?

Obama's Pledge to Planned Parenthood: “I Will Not Yield"

Deal Hudson: "Barack Obama's Catholic Problem"

"Why American Catholics are Supporting Barack ObamaCatholics at the Ballot Box"

How the Catholic Left Will Tackle McCain

Why Does Kmiec Criticize McCain for Positions on Which He Gave Romney a Pass?

Deal Hudson on "Douglas Kmiec and the Lure of Obama"

Douglas W. Kmiec on "The Moral Duty to Inquire"

Professor Bainbridge: "Will Catholic Reaganites Go for Obama?"

Deal Hudson: "Preacher Man: Barack Obama and the the Gospel of Liberalism"

"Sorry, Doug Kmiec, But This Catholic Isn't Buying Obama"

Ramesh Ponnuru on Douglas Kmiec and "Catholic Reaganites for Obama" [UPDATED]

Romney Advisor Says Obama "a Natural for the Catholic Vote"

Obama "Post-Partisan"? Ask John Roberts

Obama and the "Pragmatic Center"