Joe Vogel on Obama and Hinckley

Joe Vogel does it again, this time on Huffington Post:

There are reasons why Barack Obama has won such broad support from people of all different backgrounds, ages, regions, races, religions, and cultures.

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One of those reasons is that he is a decent human being.

That decency was on display today as Senator Obama respectfully acknowledged the passing of the president of the Mormon church, a faith he could have easily written off as another right-wing, fundamentalist religion with no bearing on his political objectives. It was an act that most likely won't make national headlines. But it mattered to me.

As a Mormon progressive supporting Barack Obama, I hear the criticism from both sides. Some Mormons think voting for a Democrat is akin to denying the faith. Meanwhile, many liberals write off all Mormons as strange and delusional. (I won't even get into what many Evangelicals think of Mormons).

Mitt Romney, unfortunately, hasn't done much to change the stereotypes. His run for president has been disappointing not only because of his pro-war, pro-guns, double Guantanamo, favor the rich policies, but because of his consistently un-principled, say-and-do-whatever-is-necessary-to-win strategy.

There are many Mormons like myself who reject both his policies and his politics.

We have looked elsewhere for a candidate who represents our values. And we have found that candidate in Senator Barack Obama.

The most recent demonstration of Barack Obama's class, grace, and integrity came in response to the recent passing of the Mormon Church's beloved president, Gordon B. Hinckley.

Barack Obama was scheduled to campaign in Utah this Saturday. While not containing hundreds of delegates, Utah is considered a toss-up state in this tight election where every delegate counts. Nevertheless, Barack Obama canceled his stop in Utah in deference to President Hinckley's funeral.

In a statement, Senator Obama said: "Last night I spoke with President Thomas Monson and expressed my deepest sympathies to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on the passing of President Gordon B. Hinckley."

Obama could have easily just held his rally or skipped it without a word. With his busy schedule he certainly didn't have to call President Monson and offer his condolences. But he did. And to me it says a great deal about his character.

I know the general reader doesn't know much about Gordon B. Hinckley, but he was loved by many, including myself, for reaching out to people of all races, religions, and countries. As many people know, the Mormon church (like America) has an unfortunate history in regards to racism, but Hinckley helped bring us out of that dark past and into an understanding that we are all God's children and that no one should be considered a second-class citizen because of race or ethnicity. Under his leadership, the church flourished in Africa, where it has also provided consistent humanitarian aid. Hinckley also helped establish the Perpetual Education Fund, which helped people around the world living in poverty (primarily in developing nations) receive an education.

One of Hinckley's greatest legacies was his inclusiveness. Mormons have a reputation sometimes for being self-righteous and exclusive, but Hinckley taught us to not be "clannish," to reach out to people, and respect and appreciate the beauty and goodness of those from different faiths and worldviews.

President Hinckley wasn't perfect, but he was a good man and will be missed by many.

On behalf of many other Mormons throughout the world, we thank Senator Obama for his thoughtfulness and sensitivity at this difficult time. It is a gesture that won't soon be forgotten.

Joe Vogel: Remember How We Felt

If I were to invite people to be regular writers on this blog, one of the first people I would invite is Joe Vogel.

From his blog on Barack Obama's Website:

Remember how we felt the night Barack Obama won the Iowa caucuses. For a brief moment, the division, the bitterness, the cynicism, the anger subsided. Even the most skeptical pundits recognized the beauty of the moment as Barack Obama and his young family made their way onto the stage where he delivered one of the most memorable speeches in a generation.

That night as I read through blogs and comments on news sites I witnessed something I have never seen before or since. Almost unanimously, people recognized something profound just happened. They were inspired. They felt hope. They were proud to be Americans.

As Ariana Huffington eloquently put it the morning after: "Obama's win [in Iowa] might not have legs. Hope could give way to fear once again. But, for tonight at least, it holds a mirror up to the face of America, and we can look at ourselves with pride.

"It's the kind of country we've always imagined ourselves being -- even if in the last seven years we fell horribly short: a young country, an optimistic country, a forward-looking country, a country not afraid to take risks or to dream big."

A few weeks later, we find ourselves once again muddled in vitriolic debates about race, gender, drugs, corruption, voter suppression, distortion, and division. A party that was once on the cusp of becoming a unified and powerful new coalition, supported by a substantial, energized youth vote and droves of independents is now fracturing and may not recover.

Is it a coincidence that this sad state of affairs comes on the heels of two Clinton victories?

Is this what we have to look forward to for the next four to eight years? Sure, things will be better than Bush, but for the most part, it will likely be the same fights, the same dull rhetoric, the same polarization, the same politics as usual, the same damn game that drove so many young people like myself into cynicism and indifference over the past 30 years.

Barack Obama gave us hope that we could move beyond this gridlock. It wasn't that we believed he could magically solve all our problems. It was that he empowered us, he created a movement for change, he showed us what a real democracy looked and felt like. His change wasn't a mere slogan, it was something real and tangible, bubbling up from the grassroots.

The difference between Obama and Hillary has never been about policy, where they share many similarities (for the time being). The difference is in leadership. Bottom-up versus top-down, conviction versus calculation, vision versus viability, mobilization versus machination.

I don't know what will happen from here. It appears many voters have once again succumbed to fear and distortion. In these uncertain times, we want certainty; we want "experience" even if that experience leads one to vote for the worst foreign policy decision of our generation. Over time, that reality can be re-written and blurred. Meanwhile, the candidate being re-cast by the Clintons as a full-fledged Reaganite had the vision and moral courage to speak out against the war when it counted.

America, when will we wake up? We have the greatest opportunity for a truly transformational leader since Bobby Kennedy and we seem determined to squander it for a candidate we will regret in a few years, when Republicans are ready to take back the Senate and our moment for substantial, meaningful change has passed.

For one cold night in Iowa, Barack Obama brought America together: liberal and conservative, black and white, male and female, rich and poor, young and old. At that moment, anything seemed possible.

Fortunately, it's not too late to be on the right side of history.

A New Obama Book from Joe Vogel

From Mormons for Obama:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE- A new book will be published this month that addresses the popularity of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama among the youth and young adult crowd. Created and edited by Joseph Vogel, an author and writing instructor at Brigham Young University, The Obama Movement is a compilation of essays by 25 teens and twentysomethings articulating why they are supporting Barack Obama in his bid for President of the United States.

The book, which is not an official Obama campaign activity, was inspired by Vogel’s frustration that youth interest in Obama’s candidacy was being misinterpreted as shallow or ephemeral. “The media tends to overlook what's really going on, what the real story is here,” said Vogel. “Young people are making history. They're organizing, donating, networking and turning out in unprecedented numbers across the country. They recognize the enormous opportunity we have in front of us.”

Indeed, not since the Kennedys in the 1960s has a politician so energized the youth of America. The key distinction is that today’s generation is mobilizing through technology and online networking in ways unimaginable to previous campaigns. Hundreds of thousands of previously turned off young people have tuned into the vision of the former community organizer from South Chicago. Online groups have swelled into the hundreds of thousands, creative ads by supporters have dominated YouTube, and interest has translated into record-setting donations and massive turnouts in Iowa and New Hampshire, Nevada and Texas.

Organizations such as Barack the Youth Vote, founded in early 2007 by Vogel, have built a network of support with the intent of educating peers about Obama, canvassing, registering young voters and encouraging campaign contributions. The Obama for America campaign has embraced the energy and activism of students and young adults to their advantage, organizing Students for Barack Obama and Generation Obama , which now contain over 550 chapters nationwide.

The Obama Movement contains the personal stories of young people in the trenches of one of the most exciting and significant elections in American history—and reveals why they are determined to make their voices count in 2008.

Vogel, whose book Free Speech 101 was published in 2006, hopes that by giving young people a representative voice in print, he is encouraging all of America to take seriously what its younger generations have to say, beyond the outcome of next year’s elections. "This book is essentially a symbol of a movement,” he said. “Barack Obama has inspired it, but it's bigger than just him. It's not his celebrity or his ‘rock-star" status.’ It's his ground-up message, his challenge for real citizens participating in a real democracy. It’s about transforming America."

Joe Vogel: Are We Not All Beggars?

Joe Vogel Gave a talk a couple of weeks ago in his Sacrament Meeting. He posted the text of it on his blog. It's well worth a read:

In the Book of Mormon, a king-prophet named Benjamin gave a shocking sermon. It was the kind of sermon meant to provoke, to awaken. The people had come from all over the land and now were spread out en masse. They set up tents and sat as families. King Benjamin climbed up on a tower to deliver his message and looked out at en extraordinary gathering of people. The crowd was so large that copies were made of his speech so that those too far away to hear his voice might still read his words.

Of several themes he discussed that day, one is unavoidably prominent: poverty.

“Ye will succor those that stand in need of your succor,” he told the people. “Ye will administer of your substance unto him that standeth in need; and ye will not suffer that the beggar putteth up his petition to you in vain, and turn him out to perish.”

....

We discuss what King Benjamin discussed so many years ago: that we risk our own salvation, our own soul when we ignore the plight of our fellow human beings. When we watch mind-numbing reality TV at the exclusion of educating ourselves and serving those in need. When we fail to vote for and put pressure on politicians to ensure some measure of economic fairness and charity to those less fortunate.

King Benjamin writes: “Perhaps thou shalt say, the man has brought upon himself his misery; therefore I will stay my hand, and will not give unto him of my food, nor impart unto him of my substance that he may not suffer, for his punishments are just—”

We hear this argument frequently today. The homeless man will just spend it on booze, the illegal immigrants deserve what they get, the single mom shouldn’t have gotten pregnant in the first place, the Africans should solve their own problems.

But Benjamin warns, “I say unto you, O man, whosoever doeth this the same hath great cause to repent; and except he repenteth of that which he hath done. . .he hath no interest in the Kingdom of God.

“For behold, are we not all beggars? Do we not all depend upon the same Being, even God, for all the substance which we have?”

Click Here to Read the full talk (it's even better than the excerpt I posted here)