Why Do Some Catholics Assume Obama is Better Than McCain on Catholic Social Justice Issues?

Of course a couple of the biggies relating to Catholic Social Justice issues are abortion and issues relating to the family (that includes one's position on Gay marriage).

However once we get past what some call "wedge" issues the Catholic Obama supporters are rarely challenged about their assertions. Thank the Saints the very good Catholic Law Prof Rick Garnett is doing that here at Kmiec's question, and other things . . .

He says in part:
It seems to be a premise of many of these "for whom should Catholics vote?" discussions that "on every issue that matters, other than abortion, the election of Sen. Obama will actually yield meaningful policy actions that are edifyingly in concert with the Church's social teaching, while the election of Sen. McCain will actually yield meaningful policy actions that are distressingly in conflict with the Church's social teaching." But, this premise is false.

It is false because it ignores, or at least downplays, the political, social, cultural and economic realities that will almost certainly prevent dramatic changes with respect to most matters, and so it overestimates the "good" stuff about an Obama administration that, it is proposed, outweighs the "bad" stuff. It is also false because Sen. McCain's views (or, more precisely, the policies likely to be pursued by his administration) on a number of matters -- not just abortion -- are, in terms of consonance with the Church's social teaching, preferable to Sen. Obama's. Or, so a faithful, reasonable, informed, non-duped, non-Republican-hack, Commonweal-and-First Things-reading Catholic could conclude. It's a sad thought, but . . . I'm not sure that productive conversations -- even among friends -- are possible so long as this false premise is assumed...........

How true be sure to read the whole piece

I have commented on this before but it has been some source of amazement to me how McCain has been thrown under the bus by many "Social Justice Catholics" His taking of real political risk on immigration reform (something Obama helped kill by a poison pill by the way) is given just grudging respect. In fact on the issue of torture , where some conservatives went ballistic on McCain, his unpopular stance he has taken in the past is ignored. I could name other issues.

Obama is given a huge pass on other issues. The issue of State Execution used to be a huge issue as to Catholic Social justice issues and National elections. I have to admit I thought this odd since this plays out much more on a State level than the Federal level. Yet this once was a big talking point of the self proclaimed Catholic Social Justice politcal advocates and pundit as a counterweight to the abortion point. Of course Obama appears not to be in sync with that view at all. Perhaps we can thank Bill Clinton for that who during a Primary went back to Arkansas to execute a man that to say the least was a tad mentally off(he told his jailers to save his dinner when he got back from being executed).

Update- Perhaps it is a good time to revisit Civic Geek's post On the honesty of partisanship . Perhaps those that tower above us mere mortals ( mortals being party hacks with r's by our name that do not represent a true authentic Cathoic voice in politics and in whose view is too limited ) are seeing things through the same ole lens of healthy partisanship