Via Politics Daily:

On the 38th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion, President Obama said Saturday he is committed to protecting what he considers a fundamental principle: “government should not intrude on private family matters.”

Obama, in a brief statement marking the 1973 Supreme Court opinion, said he also remains committed “to policies, initiatives and programs that help prevent unintended pregnancies, support pregnant women and mothers, encourage healthy relationships, and promote adoption.”

Quick, can anyone spot the contradiction in those two statements? The obvious contradiction seems to have evaded the Smartest President Ever.

Additionally, doesn’t Obama know that the Supreme Court is part of the government?

And finally, the assertion that the “government should not intrude on private family matters” is awfully rich coming from the guy whose signature achievement includes forcing every family in America to buy a government mandated health insurance policy, whether they want one or not.

No, the idea that Obama and the majority of his party don’t want the government to “intrude on private family matters” is obviously complete bunk. They don’t want any legislation that restricts in any way a woman’s ability to have an abortion at any point during her pregnancy, that’s what they want. They’re all for intrusion if it means government helping to fund abortions. They’re all for government intrusion into any other area of human existence. This is just one more example of President Obama saying whatever he thinks will sound good in a speech.

Occasionally, some public figure will say something perfectly in line with traditional Christianity, and the forces of “tolerance” in America, in the media, professional grievance groups, bloggers, etc, will react in horror and outrage. By so doing, they merely display their own ignorance and prejudice.

The latest example, from the AP, via Yahoo News:

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley told a church crowd just moments into his new administration that those who have not accepted Jesus as their savior are not his brothers and sisters, shocking some critics who questioned Tuesday whether he can be fair to non-Christians.

“Anybody here today who has not accepted Jesus Christ as their savior, I’m telling you, you’re not my brother and you’re not my sister, and I want to be your brother,” Bentley said Monday, his inauguration day, according to The Birmingham News.

Christians routinely refer to each other as brothers and sisters. That’s essentially all Governor Bentley said, it’s basically a tautology. Any journalist really should have some basic understanding of the subject he’s covering before writing an article on that subject. What’s offensive is for these crackpots to attack the governor simply for expressing his faith. There’s nothing at all offensive about any American expressing his faith, or wishing for others to join his faith.

But the reaction from advocates of “diversity” and “tolerance” was swift. From ABC News:

“We live in a country that is hugely diverse,” said David Silverman, president of American Atheists, the country’s oldest atheist civil rights group. “The governor basically said: ‘If you’re not like me, you’re second class.’ This is a man puts the Bible above the Constitution and his preacher above the president. His words are disgusting and bigoted and reinforce Alabama’s reputation for being backward and bigoted.”

The governor said no such thing. Mr. Silverman is merely projecting his own bigotry. If you object to Christians stating the basic tenets of their faith in public, then you do not in fact favor diversity or tolerance. And calling the group a “civil rights group” while they’re objecting to an American exercising his First Amendment free exercise rights was an especially nice touch.

Similarly, an activist with the Anti-Defamation League weighed in with some defamation:

A spokesman for the Anti Defamation League said the governor’s comments were “stunning” and “distressing” and were tantamount to proselytizing.

“It is stunning to me that he’d make those remarks. It’s distressing because of the suggestion that he feels that people who aren’t Christian are not entitled to love and respect,” said Bill Nigut, the ADL’s regional director.

“On the day that he is sworn in as governor, he’s sending a statement to the public saying if you’re not Christian you can’t be with me. From our point of view that is proselytizing for Christianity and coming very close to a violation of the First Amendment.”

But Governor Bentley didn’t say anything to suggest that non-Christians aren’t entitled to love or respect. Again, Mr. Nigut is projecting his own prejudice onto the governor. Being pro- your own group in no sense suggests hostility to other groups. Would Mr. Nigut accept the premise that if he said he was a proud Jew or expressed a special affinity for fellow Jews, that was anti-Christian, or anti-Muslim, or anti-anything? The idea is absurd, as is the ridiculous and somewhat Orwellian notion that an exercise of free expression violates the First Amendment.

More at RedState, well said.

There’s not much to say about the shooting in Arizona on Saturday that hasn’t already been said in other places. It’s just a horrific, senseless act of evil by a deranged loner. We don’t see that there’s any great lesson to be derived, or any great national discussion to be had. This terrible event doesn’t, as far as the evidence at present shows, tell us anything about the current political environment, or American society, or anything; it just appears to be a senseless crime by one twisted individual in Arizona.

But the concerted effort of the left, and their allies in the mainstream media, to try to pin any of the blame on conservatives, or the tea parties, or Sarah Palin, is just despicable. There is no evidence of any connection. None. As human beings, and allegedly professional journalists, they should be ashamed, but they seem incapable of shame. These are some of the same people who have hounded Mrs. Palin since a few minutes after she was named as the vice presidential nominee in 2008, and now they’re going to turn around and blame her for incivility? Incredible, but completely unsurprising.

There certainly is an argument to be made that political discourse in America could be more civil, but that is an entirely different topic from what happened to Representative Giffords and the other innocent victims on Saturday. We certainly aren’t interested in hearing any lectures from the left on civility, or from people like Paul Krugman, or Keith Olbermann or Senator Dick “Pol Pot” Durbin.

Glenn Reynolds summed up the issue nicely in his piece today at The Wall Street Journal:

To be clear, if you’re using this event to criticize the “rhetoric” of Mrs. Palin or others with whom you disagree, then you’re either: (a) asserting a connection between the “rhetoric” and the shooting, which based on evidence to date would be what we call a vicious lie; or (b) you’re not, in which case you’re just seizing on a tragedy to try to score unrelated political points, which is contemptible. Which is it?

It is both a vicious lie and contemptible.