I was glad to see that at least some people around Joplin got riled over Rep. Akin's remarks. It's amazing that he thinks women have the power to squash those little sperm and not get pregnant if raped but not the power to decide what they can do with their own bodies.

I've seen photos of embryonic and fetal development and I'm not sure if I would have had an abortion myself. However, I firmly believe in a woman's right to choose. Solely she needs to deal with moral implications, if any, and not the government. Anyone interfering with this right should not be elected to office.

Women, were you just raped by him? In Akin's zeal for saving at all costs what might become fetuses, he overlooks the horrors associated with rape and carrying the rapist's potential offspring to term.

What also confuses me, besides the fact that most right-to-life Republicans embrace the death penalty for punishment of certain offenders, is that they are bashing Democrats and Obama for what they call an entitlement mentality. Well, actually, I envision lots of problems associated with unwanted offspring, not the least of which might be the need for some form of government assistance...unless Rep. Akin would personally like to provide the necessary financial support and care for any unwanted babies.

I also wonder from time to time whether lower income Republicans actually realize who or what they are supporting. How were they sold a bill of goods that only Republicans have the moral character to lead the nation? I ask this not as a person of Democratic persuasion but as a free thinking individual. And WHY don't Republicans want to end the Bush tax credits for the wealthy?

How could so many Republicans become convinced that President Obama wasn't born in the United States, disqualifying him from assuming the role as leader? Do some folks not believe anything unless it's spouted by a FOX-TV affiliate?

I always thought that public education fostered a nation of sheep...people needed to fill those menial jobs and not question what they are told. Frontal lobotomies apparently have been replaced by something more insidious.

Not too many people in Joplin, I assume, have read David Maraniss' latest biography, Barack Obama - The Story. Ha, not too many people read. That may be the clue to how so many are easily brainwashed. Some, of course, hear the word "Obama" and won't touch the book of the same title with a 10-foot pole.

The book is at the Joplin Public Library. I dare you. Sneak a peak (there are 16 pages of photos). Its basic premise is that Obama spent a lot of his adult life searching for who he was and what he wanted to contribute to society. Maraniss often questions what Obama has written in his own literary endeavors in an attempt to document the truth.

The author goes off on tangents thoroughly discussing Obama's Kenyan heritage based on the background of his grandfather Hussein Onyango and his son Barack Hussein Obama, who turns out to be an alcoholic of little or no influence on his son of the same name but who in marrying several times creates a bunch of half-siblings for him. The Obama family is labeled jadak (pronounced Juh-DAK) or foreigner by other Luo tribesmen, a designation not meant to be complimentary.

Maraniss also thoroughly has researched the maternal side of the family, who were originally from El Dorado, Kansas, and how Obama's mother Stanley "Ann" Durham and parents find themselves in Hawaii. It is there, a place where being hapa or "half-and-half" was almost the norm, that Barack "Barry" Obama is born and comes back to after being schooled in Indonesia. We learn how his mother has a penchant for marrying and divorcing non-white foreigners (she produces a half sister named Maya for Barack), and how she puts her education and career foremost, allowing her son to mostly be raised by his white grandparents. He receives an education at Punahou, Hawaii's top notch private school before being accepted at Occidental in California, Columbia University and Harvard University Law School. We meet Obama's white girlfriends and understand how Obama's temperament and intellect develop, including his zeal to find a clearer sense of moral purpose, although I understand how difficult this would be for Obama haters to accept.

Granted, reading the book from cover to cover requires a commitment. Maraniss admits to having quite a few researchers. One also doesn't get Pulitzer Prize recognition so many times as he did for shallow writing. Unfortunately, the book stops short of describing Obama's life in Chicago after his marriage to Michelle Robinson. Just how he meets influential people in his pathway to the presidency is material for another book. Hee hee, perhaps, it will be written after Obama's re-election.

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