Daryl Hedding

This week, Obama gave another commencement speech, this time at Notre Dame University. Not afraid of a little controversy, he waded into the abortion debate right there in front of a community of Catholics. His "fair-minded" approach was to suggest that since the pro-choice and pro-life views are irreconcilable, we should all focus on reducing unwanted pregnancies and increasing adoption. Sounds good, right? Maybe in a world where we all accept abortion is not murder. However, less and less of us are buying that , despite our pay grade. Almost 90% of abortions occur in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy . Mid-way, at six weeks, the heart is already beating . You don't need special training to work out whether that little fella is alive yet or not. Even if we assume that only 25% of abortions occur after 6 weeks, that amounts to a quarter of a million lives being aborted annually in the US. None of this resonates with our President, despite his statement that it has "mor...

I decided to tune into last night's broadcast of the President's first commencement speech at Arizona State University. Having recently attended my wife's commencement at Vanderbilt University, I was interested to hear what Obama would have to say to graduates entering work life in the current economic climate. First off, there's no doubt that the President can deliver a mean speech. He could easily have the reverse career of Reagan and go into acting after politics. Not likely, but anyway, besides great delivery, there was actually some good content in the speech. I think his main take-home for the graduating class of 2009 can be summed up by the simple phrase, "substance over form". While attacking the culture of greed that has permeated American society, he successfully, I believe, inspired the next generation to take a path more righteous; to forgo the pursuit of wealth and status in favour of a life of meaning and accomplishment. Good stuff. Can't fau...