Paul Greenberg has the best assessment of Obama's Notre Dame Screech I have read: The News That Didn't Happen:
The president did the politic thing at Notre Dame. Sidestepping the issue, he took refuge in Bill Clinton's smooth old formula about just wanting to make abortion safe, legal and rare. Even though that kind of passive acquiescence in abortion has resulted in its becoming anything but rare in this country...Read the whole thing.If the American presidency really is what Teddy Roosevelt called it -- a bully pulpit -- it might as well have been empty last weekend. The church stilled its voice and the president said nothing at length with all due ceremony. And everybody could be at ease in Zion.
The surest way to win acceptance for any morally or ethically dubious practice is to accustom people to think of it as no big deal, just politics. Which is why the most significant aspect of the president's appearance at Notre Dame is that it had no moral significance at all. Beyond all the handshakes and nice gestures, nothing was happening. The moral numbness of American society remained undisturbed. And that may have been the only real news.
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