Children Of The Corn

Jonah Goldberg:

No Sale

No doubt due to some leftwing rapid response, I'm getting deluged with this clip from some documentary called "Jesus Camp" in which kids appear to be praying to Bush. A few quick points:

1. Yes, that stuff ain't my cup of tea either.

2. But, the kids are not in fact worshiping Bush. They're praying for him.

3. And most important, the clip and the activity it shows wasn't part of any campaign effort. The Bush campaign didn't use glassy-eyed kids in a messianic P.R. stunt to promote their candidate, nor did any affiliated outreach group. Meanwhile, that is precisely what the Obama camp is doing — with the active support of the head of NBC, the parent company of MSNBC by the way. The analogy doesn't work at all. And, for those lefty-readers who think the analogy does work, they should be ashamed of the fact that their candidate is in fact doing the same thing. Again: objectively, it's not the same thing, but if you're going to email me the Jesus camp video as some sort of gotchya, that is in no way, shape or form a defense of the Obama Youth video. It is, on your own terms, an indictment of it. If you want to defend the Obama Youth video, defend it. I'd like to see you folks try.

Oh and for giggles: imagine the shrieks and howls if Rupert Murdoch had anything to do with a Children of the Corn for McCain project like this.

Update: Correction!

It's a different Jeff Zucker.

I regret the error. I stand by the revulsion at the video.

Update II: From a reader:

The kids are praying for Bush because he's the President, not because he's Bush. They could/would just as earnestly pray that Bill Clinton, or Barack Obama would appoint judges who would overturn Roe v. Wade. (God CAN work miracles, after all.)

In our (Mo. Synod Lutheran — ask Mark Hemingway about it) church, we pray for the President just about every Sunday (we don't chant and lay on hands and stuff — heck we don't even clap for the choir); we've done it for every President I can remember, which would be about LBJ onward. As Lutherans, we also don't pray for particular policy decisions, more the generic "Thy Will Be Done" thing; but in any event, this prayer (in the clip) was a prayer that the President would DO the right thing, not a prayer to the Man who IS the Right Thing.