God-o-Meter can’t believe it missed this Slate story several days back. Douglas W. Kmiec, the Catholic legal scholar who chaired Mitt Romney’s Committee on the Constitution, makes the Catholic case for Barack Obama. Given that Kmiec is a big deal in GOP circles–he was Ronald Reagan’s constitutional lawyer–and how politically scandalous his warm feelings for Obama are, God-o-Meter is surprised that this piece hasn’t made more waves:

Now, don’t think me daft, but when Obama gave his victory remarks in Iowa calling upon America to “choose hope over fear and to choose unity over division,” he was standing squarely in the shoes of the “Great Communicator.” Notwithstanding all of Bill Clinton’s self-possessed heckling to the contrary, Obama was right—Reagan was a “transformative” president. Reagan liked to tell us he was proudest of his ability to make America feel good about itself. He did. Catholic sensibility tells me Obama wants it to deserve that feeling….
However hard-working, intelligent, and policy savvy she may be (and she is), Clinton seldom inspires even the so-called “social justice” Catholics or reveals that rare gift of empathy that defined Reagan and that one glimpses in Obama. Say what you will about not preferring style over substance, modern leadership requires both, especially now when the international community—whose help we need to arrest terrorism—seldom gives us the benefit of the doubt….
Beyond life issues, an audaciously hope-filled Democrat like Obama is a Catholic natural. Anyone seeking “liberty and justice for all” really can’t be satisfied with racially segregated public schools that don’t teach. And there’s something deeply hypocritical about being a nation of immigrants that won’t welcome any more of them. And that creation that God saw as good in Genesis? Well, even without seeing Al Gore melt those glaciers over and over again, Catholics chose Al to better steward a world beset with unnatural disasters. Climate change is driven by mindless consumption that devotes more ingenuity to securing golden parachutes than energy independence….
Sorry to tell you this, Sen. McCain, but a good number of the Catholics I know are not certain to light candles at the Republican political altar. Some of us who rode McCain’s Straight Talk Express before the Republican commitment to a balanced budget put us on track toward a $400 billion deficit appreciate his confessed desire to redeem himself as a faithful conservative. But there are suspicions….
So, here’s the thing: John McCain will have many Catholics in the pews a little while longer, but more than a few of us are thinking of giving him up for Lent. Reagan used to say that he didn’t leave the Democratic Party, it left him. The launch of “Reaganites for Obama” might not be far behind. We might not be there yet, but we’re getting close.

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