RON SIDER
Open Letter to President Obama Congratulations. A brilliant campaign. A mandate for change. And, oh, yes: a nearly impossible cluster of horrendous problems.We don’t ask for miracles. And you have our prayers. But we do expect you to keep your promises. Let’s start with poor Americans.About 36 million Americans already fall below the poverty line.The recession may push another 6 to 8 million Americans into poverty. During the campaign, you publicly embraced the goal of cutting domestic poverty in half in 10 years. You know from your work in South Chicago that poverty devastates tens of millions of Americans. You know as a Christian that God measures societies by what they do to the people at the bottom. Measure proposals for economic recovery by what they do to the poorest. Emphasize programs that empower the poorest 40 percent. And, early in the first year, spell out concretely how you plan to cut poverty in half in 10 years. Morally, it is simply unacceptable for the richest nation in history to have 47 million uninsured people with no guarantee of adequate health care.We cannot wait another four years for dramatic changes. It would be immoral to solve Wall Street’s problems by postponing health care coverage for poor working families. Within the first six months, unveil your proposals to get us to universal coverage. Nor dare we delay the major changes needed to fundamentally reduce and change American energy consumption. In international affairs, you have an historic opportunity, perhaps unparalleled since the end of World War II, to reshape international relations. All around the world, respect for and trust in the US is
at its lowest point in decades. An imperialistic, unilateral foreign policy simply will not work. Fortunately, your election has evoked almost everywhere astonishing levels of hope for change. Quickly strengthen that hope by moving immediately and unequivocally to end torture. Other powerful interests will demand that you continue policies that protect and preserve America’s military dominance and economic self-interest. Many Christians, I believe, join me in urging you to embrace a genuinely multilateral foreign policy. Global economic structures must be redesigned both to incorporate the reality of growing economic powerhouses like China, India, and Brazil and also to give the poorest nations a larger voice.The patterns of international trade should be slanted, not to benefit the richest nations, but the poorest. Please don’t wait until your last year in office to work seriously at resolving the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Early in your first year, signal unequivocally that you intend to use the full weight of American influence to lean on both sides to negotiate a permanent two-state solution that provides peace, security, and justice for both Israelis and Palestinians. Mr. President, seize this historic opportunity to lead the world in building a new global political/economic order that is more just, free, democratic, and cooperative. Finally, the messy issues of abortion and faith-based organizations.You have a fundamental choice to make. There is a large, secular, radical segment of the Democratic Party that is demanding that you end the hiring rights of faith-based organizations when they receive government funds and sign a “Freedom of Choice Act” which would end the freedom of doctors and hospitals that oppose abortion to act according to their conscience. You might even have enough votes in the House and Senate to pass such partisan measures. But the result would be disastrous. Large numbers of Catholics and evanPRISM 2009
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gelicals (many of whom voted for you) would feel betrayed. Millions of us would vigorously oppose such changes.You would undermine your declared hope to reach across partisan lines to build a strong center. And your hopes of building a bipartisan coalition that would enable you to make substantial, far-reaching changes in areas like healthcare and energy policy would be seriously undermined. There is a better option. In your evaluation of the whole faith-based initiative, listen to the grassroots faith-based organizations working among the poor.They will tell you that policies preventing them from hiring on the basis of their religious beliefs would fundamentally undermine their successful programs to empower broken people.Then improve the program, correct mistakes of the previous administration, increase the funding, and make sure that you protect the identity of faith-based organizations that are often succeeding in difficult circumstances where almost nothing else works. On abortion, why not be genuinely pro-choice? That would mean retaining, not abandoning, policies that allow doctors and hospitals to follow their conscience and choose whether they want to perform abortions. It would mean not building compulsory payment for abortion into your healthcare policies. Instead of trying to force millions of Americans to violate their conscience with allegedly “pro-choice” policies that actually deny choice to tens of millions, form a strong center of people (both “pro-choice” and “pro-life” folk) who can agree on a number of concrete programs that will actually reduce the number of abortions. Let’s work together to form a strong majority that figures out how to make abortion far less frequent. That’s my advice, Mr. President. I know that giving advice is easy for me since I am sort of … well, a kind of “community organizer with no responsibilities.” But I do promise to pray for you regularly. n