Yankee, Go Home! Part One

Today, I went to McCain-Palin Rally in Richmond, VA. This has been a hard election cycle on all of us, given its length, but it will be over in three weeks and one day. Phew. We'll have a new president and vice president. Anyway, today I headed to Richmond for a rally with Sarah Palin. (Sorry for the poor quality picture--my camera died and I had to use my blackberry for this one!)

She is a pretty neat lady--was very gracious (only one awkward moment when she thought people were protesting, but they were just shouting "louder!") and had a great pro-life message. She talked about how God made every child unique, including kids with special needs. It wasn't quite as good a pro-life speech as this one from in Johnstown, PA, this weekend, but it was still really good.

I know she's getting raked over the coals on SNL (Tina Fey is funny), but I like that she's out there, doing her best, in not a great political climate. That means something, especially when she gets up and says that every life is important. After all, life is first of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." For me the tipping point is that we can never have that third if we don't protect the first. You know, as a Catholic, I try to stay independent, but as a citizen, it's important to remember to speak the Truth in love. Even Mother Teresa did, in a brief to the Supreme Court. She wrote, in part:

As your Declaration of Independence put it, in words that have never lost their power to stir the heart: “We hold these truths to be self evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness…” A nation founded on these principles holds a sacred trust: to stand as an example to the rest of the world, to climb ever higher in its practical realization of the ideals of human dignity, brotherhood, and mutual respect. Your constant efforts in fulfillment of that mission, far more that your size or your wealth or your military might, have made America an inspiration to all mankind....It was a sad infidelity to America's highest
ideals when this Court said that it did not matter, or could not be determined, when the inalienable right to life began for a child in its mother's womb.

I'm just glad someone is finally talking about life in this election. More later in the week on the rally. Richmond is the SOUTH. The rally was part Nascar, part revival, and part policy. Oh, and Hank Williams was there. How's that for a teaser?