"if somebody wants to find an excuse to vote against a candidate, he can always do it--regardless of the real reason."

Dead right, Ron! And that is what renders almost all the political discussions here about the American election into little more than an empty echo chamber of endless repetition of various people's established prejudices for or against whoever....

Bla. Bla. Bla. Rank prejudice all the livelong day.

Rig, I think your worry about the Faith-Based Init. Hooha is unfounded. Obama is simply doing the politically smart thing to do...he's ensuring that he won't lose a sizeable chunk of votes, which he would if he threatened to close the aforementioned Hooha.

He's acting like any American politician would who had serious intentions of being elected, because there are a few things you must NOT do:

show any disrespect to the great American Idol - the military
show any softness toward punishing crime severely
show lack of any patriotic enthusiasm in any way whatsoever
show any lack of interest in the flag or the national anthem
show any lack of support for religion, motherhood, the family, and God.
show any tendency to question the effects capitalism or tolerate the idea of socialism!

You have to bullshit constantly to win an American election, Rig, and you have to do it within certain very predictable guidelines...

God, the flag, country, the military, the police, families, just plain folks, working mothers, heterosexual marriage...focus on those kind of things and you're safe. Make bloody well sure they don't think you're too high class or too intellectual! That last part is tricky for Obama, because he's clearly a very smart man. He talks like a very smart man. I bet that worries the hell out of a lot of just plain folks who won't vote for him. They'll feel much safer with McCain, a man who reminds them of the rough-hewn, tough-talkin' heroes they saw in all those Hollywood movies all those years ago.

Americans like electing people who build log cabins and ride horses all day and git all dusty while they're doin' it. People like Reagan. It's frontier mythology. They are still ridin' off into the sunset after havin' gunned down a few more redskins and hard cases on behalf of God and country.

McCain is perfect for that dumbass mentality. Obama? He's from another world to those folks.