The Newsroom

There’s a gigantic difference between John McCain and Barack Obama and between me and I suspect my vice presidential opponent. … She’s good looking.

Christ answered the Herodians according to their condition. “Show me the tribute-money,” said he; — and one took a penny out of his pocket; — If you use money which has the image of Caesar on it, and which he has made current and valuable, that is, if you are men of the State, and gladly enjoy the advantages of Caesar’s government, then pay him back some of his own when he demands it; “Render therefore to Caesar that which is Caesar’s and to God those things which are God’s” — leaving them no wiser than before as to which was which; for they did not wish to know.

The mass media has been single-mindedly focused on the White House and campaigns for the presidency for two generations now. Is it any wonder that most people have lost the feeling that the country and its politics are theirs and they are responsible for maintaining liberty and democracy? Ben Franklin told the people outside the Philadelphia Convention that the Founders had put together “a Republic, if you can keep it.” Now every four years and most of the time in between we’re mesmerized with the idea that if we can just find that one perfect person who can pull the presidential sword from the stone, all will be well. We have been waiting around for this Mr. Goodbar for thirty years of deadlock, drift, and disappointment in our politics since Watergate times. Nobody seems to get the message that our problems are bigger than the presidents; we are stuck in a storyline that lets the rest of us off the hook.

I think it was important, a little bit for the stability factor, that it wasn’t God who was going to perform a miracle, end the war and bring us home. It was men. It was Caesar. I think the majority of those guys felt the way I did but we just had some, just as people turn to faith healing and that kind of stuff, we had some of that. A lot of times I would pray for strength and I think sometimes I got it. Pray for patience to get through the next minute when things were bad. I just don’t think it’s fair to expect too much out of what is basically not the Lord’s business.

You know, basically it’s a Google. What you can find out now on the Internet — it’s remarkable.