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Obama: "Sinning" Is Necessary To Compete in PoliticsSen. Barack Obama answers questions in our presidential mashup.


Updated Wednesday, Sept. 12, 2007, at 11:50 PM ET

The following is an unedited transcript and may contain typos or omissions. Click here for more on the presidential mashup.

(Continued from page 1)

Rose: But would it help if you made a pledge as he has not to accept free government health care until it was available to all Americans?

Obama: Well as I said, Charlie, I would probably able to get covered under Michelle's health-care plan. So, I think that for most of us in the Senate, you know, we are folks who can afford to get health care. What we need to do is just overcome the resistance of the lobbies and maybe sure that go ahead and get something passed.

Rose: Let me move to education. How would you assess the American education system, how well is it doing from K to high school?

Obama: Well, I think it's doing very well for some. But it's not doing very well for all. So, No Child Left Behind has been false advertising. And there doesn't seem to be a sense of urgency about improving the education system. It is a sense of urgency that we've got to restore if we're going to be able to remain competitive in this new global economy. So, a couple of steps that I think we have to take. Across the board we're going to have to recruit a generation of new teachers. We're going to lose a million teachers as the baby boom generation retires over the next decade. That's both a challenge, but it's also an opportunity. Because the single most important ingredient in K through 12 education is the quality of the teacher at the front of the classroom. That means we're going to have to pay our teachers more, we going to have to give them more professional development, and we're also going to have to work with them rather than against them to improve standards. And it also means, I think, that we've got to provide bonuses for certain areas like math and science instruction where we just don't have enough teachers out as well as bonuses for teachers who are willing to teach in tough settings. Inner-city schools, rural schools. We've got to improve early childhood education, because that's the area where we can probably most effectively achieve the achievement gap that exists right now. We know that half our work force fairly soon is going to be black and brown, and those are the kids that are being failed most drastically by the school system. We've to step up, and the biggest thing we can do in addition to improving their teachers is also to make sure they've got the kinds of resources they need before they get to school so they're actually prepared.

Rose: You make the valid point there, in fact, how well we educate, that people who are at the core of American productivity is crucial to our future. And Don Oral, a user question from Bayside, N.Y., says how would you change the system to make American students competitive on the world scene?

Obama: Well, as I said, I think it starts early. And so the more we invest in universal early childhood education, which by the way, for at-risk students means starting the moment they're born and working with at-risk parents to give them the kinds, the decent start that they need to be prepared. On K through 12 across the board we've got improved math and science instruction. And that means focusing on recruiting more math and science teachers, emphasizing math and science instruction, finding innovative ways to make it interesting for students. And I have to say this is an area where the president has the power to use the bully pulpit and to make math and science interesting and vibrant again. One of the things that I'm always struck by when I talk to engineers and scientists who are in their 50s and 60s is how many say they were inspired by JFK and the space program for going into science and math. And one area where I think we could actually do that is to really make a huge effort around energy independence. And if a president is talking about the importance of us engaging in research and development, doubling the amount of research dollars that are being put into basic science and basic research, all that can help lift up the importance of these areas of study for young people who basically take their cues from the larger culture. And right now what they're told is if you want to succeed, you've got to go into investment banking or run a hedge fund or heaven forbid, become a lawyer like me. Which we probably don't need more lawyers. We need more engineers.

Rose: As one who went to law school, I would agree with that. Let me finally conclude with our wild-card question. It comes to us from Bill Maher, who's in Los Angeles. You can hear it on videotape now. And roll tape.

Bill Maher: Sen. Obama, we've heard a lot of talk about Democrats courting the Christian evangelical vote. You yourself are running as a candidate of faith, and you've said many times that progressives must take the views of religious right seriously. If the Ten Commandments constitute our greatest source of morality, why is it there no commandments saying do not rape, do not torture, or do not commit incest, yet there are commandments against swearing, working on Sunday, and making statues to other gods?

Rose: Go ahead. Your answer.

Obama: Well, you know, I love Bill Maher, and he—I think rightly he points out some of the inconsistencies and hypocrisy of people who mix religion and politics sometimes. I have said it's important for Democrats to reach out to the faith community, and the reason is because 90 percent of Americans believe in God. It's a source of values. It's a source of their moral compass. And I know it's a source of strength for me and my family. And the way to do it, though, is to understand that, No. 1, people who are religious don't have a monopoly on morality, so they've got to be careful about being sanctimonious. No. 2 is that whatever values may be religiously motivated, if you're in the public square, if you're involved in politics, I think you have to translate those moral precepts into something universal that people of different faiths or no faith at all can debate and argue and hopefully at some point come to a consensus. I think the mistake that's been made with respect to the religious right is a literalism that is so rigid that it does not allow for the possibility of somebody of a different faith or nonbeliever to engage in a dialogue. And on the other hand, I think it's important for us not to presume that faith has no part in the public square. Look, Martin Luther King, the abolitionists, the suffragettes. We have a long history of reform movements being grounded in that sense often religiously expressed that we have to extend beyond ourselves and our individual immediate self-interests to think about something larger.

Rose: And how is faith most influenced you as a human being?

Obama: Oh, you know, I think that I came to Christianity relatively late in life when I was already an adult. So, I wasn't steeped in organized religion when I was a child. What I found was that the values that had been taught to me by my mother and grandparents, the values I held most dear were expressed powerfully in the church and particularly the African-American church that I joined. But the faith that I have, that's, I think is most important is a basic optimism about people. That there's a core decency, what Lincoln called "better angels of our nature," that we can appeal to and that we can't perfect ourselves, and we can't perfect the world, but we can continually strive to improve the world and treat each other with kindness and empathy. Even in the absence of perfection, and that is what helped to guide me into politics and that's what sustains me when I make mistakes or when I see some of those tough things that are going on around the world.

Rose: Sen. Obama, thank you very much for joining us on this matter. I appreciate your time and hope we get you here at the table to talk more.

Obama: I had a great time, Charlie, as always. Thanks.

Rose: Back in a moment. Stay with us.

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Remarks from the Fray:

Bill Maher is being deceptive. "Thou shalt not commit adultery" is a commandment. It was later explained by Jesus as such "If you even LOOK at a woman who is not your wife, you have committed adultery in your heart". So, rape and incest are certainly covered, as marriage is consent and you cannot marry a close relative. It does not matter what the modern English definition of adultery is. The commandment itself means what Jesus said it means.

Luther insists that "Thou shalt not murder" covers even harming your fellow man in the slightest way. Even if it did not, Torture would be covered by "Thou shalt not steal". Torture steals a person's dignity. Ergo, it's covered.

You might argue that a commandment against theft does not deal with intangible assets, however, that would be putting an arbitrary limit on an infinite God.

Now, the astute Orwell reader might compare this to thoughtcrime. However, Jesus himself in word and deed advocated separation of church and state, to wit, saying "My Kingdom is not of this world" and "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's". Every sort of bad behavior you could think of is covered by the Ten Commandments, and the Ten Commandments are by design impossible for anyone but Jesus to keep.

Bill Maher does, in his deception, raises the point that many so-called Christians like Bush are ignorant of God's law. Indeed, some "defenders" of the Ten Commandments could not recite them.

Sadly, that point will probably go over many people's heads.

--Madai

(To reply, click here.)

Neither a Democrat or a Republican president can do anything about universal healthcare or how to provide it without the assistance of Congress.

However there are many small steps that could be taken with simply a few nudges and compromises and these steps could provide real healthcare cost relief as early as next April 14th. 2008.

No one can give an exact date as to when all of our forces move out of Iraq because there are too many variables involved. Only a complete fool would set a definite date. Sure questions need to be asked about Iraq but it seems that the wrong questions are being asked. Where is the question: What conditions need to exist before we can begin a serious redeployment of our armed forces from Iraq? Not when, but what do we need to see happen?

No questions about our 10 trillion debt or how we might get out from under it. Very disappointing.

I wonder, could we have a debate that accepts the fact that sometimes we need to do a lot of the small things first before we try for the moon. And some times its best to load the bases before we swing for a home run.

We need to hear talk about some of the little things, things that will give us a better window into how these folks will operate once in. Its easy to say we want our troops out, it is easy to say we are going to fix health care. No one is seriously suggesting anything about the first steps they want to take or what could be done in the interim to provide relief for working Americans with no healthcare.

--NickD

(To reply, click here.)

(9/14)

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