Douglas W. Kmiec -- at one time head of the Office of Legal Counsel to President Reagan -- is credited with helping win a sizeable Catholic majority in key electoral states for Barack Obama in 2008. Until recently, he served as U.S. Ambassador winning the confidence of his embassy and the profound admiration and high praise of his host country, the Republic of Malta. Nevertheless, Ambassador Kmiec offered to resign rather than allow his efforts to be undermined by the State Department bureaucracy contrary to his publicly announced White House portfolio to advance inter-faith diplomacy and understanding. The Department rushed to accept as the White House stayed bafflingly silent. Was the Department miffed at Kmiec's UN presentation describing Obama as a genuine honest broker in Arab-Israeli relations? Why did the White House not "have the back" of its scholarly ally? Today, when the culture war is defining the Republican ticket and the President is accused of starting a "war on religion" at home while abroad he is confronted by an understandably anxious Israel fearful that the President's reliance on diplomacy and sanctions will not corral Iran, a book written with grace, objectivity and charity toward one's opponents is a surprisingly welcome tonic from all the noise and deserves notice. In a genre that is at once biography, political commentary, and religious reflection, the book ties these seemingly disparate features of our lives together with success. The Romney and Santorum teams would like nothing better if they could win back the conservative, pro-life Catholic who served in the top ranks of the Reagan administration, but today Doug Kmiec remains Obama's Faith-filled Ambassador and fully expects the President to win a second term. Find out why. Here is the Ambassador's poignant recounting of the cost paid for his Obama support as well as the tragic deaths that now shape the rest of his time on earth. Together with actor Martin Sheen's spot-on foreword, the account will bring tears, laughter, even outrage, but by virtue of Kmiec's recounting of a Theology of Kindness, the book by sheer force of friendships won and lost has the potential to change your life for the better and elevate all of our political discourse. Read the book that Sojourner's Jim Wallis, NCR's Michael Sean Winters, and other open-minded faith and political leaders have described as "honest," "powerful." and "deeply compelling," from the author LATimes Tim Rutten found to be a "muzzled diplomat" seeking only to bring our politics into touch with civility, common ground, and "our better angels."
About the Author: Ambassador (ret.) Douglas W. Kmiec is Caruso Family Chair and Professor of Constitutional Law & Human Rights, Pepperdine University. In addition to being an author and syndicated columnist, he has been privileged to serve Democratic and Republican presidents alike. Until recently, upon nomination by President Obama and confirmation by the Senate, he was U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Malta, where he completed the construction of a $125.5 million embassy compound and upgraded the security and economic ties between the Mediterranean and the U.S. When Qaddafi met the call for political reform with violence threatening civilian populations, the Ambassador successfully organized a rescue of the staff of Embassy-Tripoli and hundreds of other foreign nationals from Libya with a catamaran. Ambassador Kmiec had previously served as head of the Office of Legal Counsel (U.S. Assistant Attorney General) for Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, where his opinion writing led to the non-discriminatory application of federal law to those handicapped by AIDS. The Ambassador's academic career includes serving as Dean & St. Thomas More Professor of The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. and Professor and Director of the Center on Law & Government at the University of Notre Dame, where the Ambassador taught for close to two decades. A Fulbright Scholar (Asia), White House Fellow, and honorary degree recipient, the Ambassador is a graduate of Northwestern and USC.