Religion role in campaign ‘exaggerated’
The political foolhardiness of the the theologizing that Joseph Biden and Nancy Pelosi did concerning abortion comes through loud and clear in a New York Times piece today, `Abortion Issue Again Dividing Catholic Votes.’ The writer, David Kirkpatrick, sets the scene nicely with interviews at Holy Rosary Roman Catholic Church in Scranton.
But for my money (well, it was free), a well attended forum held at Fordham University last night offered the best insights I’ve encountered so far on the role of religion in the 2008 election.
There was news: Pew pollster Andrew Kohut said Pew’s next poll results will show John McCain moving ahead of Barack Obama in the Catholic vote.
But the biggest point I took away was that, as Kohut said, “There’s a tendency … to exaggerate the role religion has on voter behavior.” That was so in analyses of the 2004 presidential campaign, he said. And, he said, poll data show that abortion was even less important an issue to voters this year than it was four years ago – especially among people who are religious. As panelist E.J. Dionne said, there are just other issues on voters’ minds.
But that changed somewhat with Sarah Palin’s entrance into the race, Kohut said. Her selection seems to have lit a fire under the culture wars – and abortion is about as important an issue to voters now as it was in 2004. Which is to say, according to Kohut, still far less important than we think.
How will it play out among Catholic voters? ” I don’t think we know which way the white Catholic vote is going,” said Kohut, who has watched the Catholic vote shift back and forth between Obama and McCain.
Two other panelists who are veteran journalists – Peggy Fletcher Stack, religion writer for the Salt Lake Tribune, and Don Wycliff – excoriated news coverage of religion in the campaign. Stack said she was appalled at the way Mitt Romney’s religious beliefs were examined and offered a list of legitimate religion/politics stories that should be sent out to assignment editors pronto. And Wycliff called the coverage “a trip to the zoo,” with its menagerie of crazed Mormons and wild pastors.
The event – `Sinners and Winners – Election ’08: Religion, Morality and Media – was run by the Fordham Center on Religion and Culture, which Peter and Peg Steinfels direct. Ray Suarez was the moderator, and very good at it.
“Stack said she was appalled at the way Mitt Romney’s religious beliefs were examined and offered a list of legitimate religion/politics stories that should be sent out to assignment editors pronto. ”
Paul, do you remember any of the items on her list?
I think it’s fair to say that likely McCain voters tend to be “pro-life” and likely Obama voters tend to be “pro-choice.” So I wonder how many people will see abortion as the deciding factor. I know there are some people who would like to vote for Obama but feel they can’t, because of his stand on abortion. I also know there are some people who won’t vote for either McCain or Obama because of life issues (abortion, stem-cell research, capital punishment, war). So I wonder how many people will vote for McCain because of the abortion issue who would otherwise have voted for Obama.
Someone said in a comment recently (it might have been on dotCommonweal) that if the Democrats would just become pro-life, they would never lose another election. I doubt it.
The narrowing of the term “pro-life” to JUST mean anti-abortion is a problem. I firmly believe that the Democratic party has in the past and will continue to be more of a supporter of the broadest and most inclusive of “life” issues … Seamless Garment, anyone? The Republicans have a long way to go to catch up, particularly this time. Abortion is not the foundational issues of this election. It is one of the issues that people are passionate about, but it is not THE foundational issue. Certainly the last few days have shown us that the failing US economy has become the trump issue of the next 48 days.
What does “Seamless Garment” have to do with major party politics?
I recall when Romney was interviewed on 60 Minutes, the interviewer, I forget who he was, asked Romney if he and his wife had engaged in premarital sex.
A call to arms
How to handle the fury brought on by this election? Register voters, hit the streets, pray. Stop talking about her. Talk about Obama.
By Anne Lamott
http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/2008/09/16/anne_lamott/index.html
This saga in politics started at Cardinal Oconnor’s funeral when that paragon of virtue, Law of Boston went on his unambiguously pro life tear. http://www.abortionessay.com/files/CardinalJohn.html He was ambiguos when it came to born children being set upon by his predators whom he sent out to abuse them again and again.
Of course in that audience was that other virtuoso in pro life who went after Clinton for oral sex while he had a twenty year affair with a woman whose condo he used and paid for. He called it a “youthful indiscretion.” Hyde’s wife called her husband a great man and his mistress a tramp. Beautiful. http://www.salon.com/news/1998/09/cov_16newsb2.html http://www.aclu.org/reproductiverights/lowincome/16393res20040721.html
Now we have the other paragon of virtue McCain who shamelessly left his disfigured wife to marry someone else. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1024927/The-wife-John-McCain-callously-left-behind.html
So the moral of the story is if your wife becomes disfigured go out and get someone better looking. Or have a 20 year affair as long as you are not in the white house. Be against abortion, above all and we will let all else slide. But you should really become an evangelical so you won’t have to listen to Chaput and company.
Tom: “Seamless Garment” has to do with the focus of the Times’ story. Catholics need to take into consideration a wide panoply of issues that deserve Christian consideration when they go to the polls, not just the false “foundational issue” of abortion that the Republican Bishops want them to focus on. Critical thinking is much more important than blind obedience to those who gave us such wonderful leadership in the pedophilia mess.
Taking into consideration a wide panoply of issues that deserve Christian consideration when they go to the polls isn’t what the term “Seamless Garmet” refers to, though. It refers to the protection of life from conception through natural death, which is not something either major political party advocates.
As for “Republican Bishops,” it amazes me how often that charge is made without apparent reflection on what that says about the Democratic Party.
Jim:
I can’t do justice at this point to the various story ideas Peggy Fletcher Stack suggested at the Fordham event or the way she explained them. Her basic point was to examine the candidates’ policy positions in light of their religious beliefs, and she opposed reporting that simply examined the beliefs as if they were exotic or odd. For example, she suggested that Sarah Palin’s views on Israel be explored, given the role Israel is assigned in end-times predictions. She cited Mormon beliefs that could be considered in examining Mitt Romney’s economic plans (and recommended work Boston Globe religion reporter Michael Paulson did as part of a lengthy Globe series on Romney last year).
What it says, Tom, is that the Republicans know exactly how to push the right buttons with narrowly focused, single-issue obsessed clerics. If they would take the same obsessive stance toward Catholic politicians who have supported, and continue to support, the immoral actions in Iraq, then they be worth wooing by Democrats. These hierarchs are so eager to become “politically important people” that they will pander to folks who are secretly laughing behind their backs at these pitiful men (I wonder how female hierarchs would act/react?). Ranting on abortion and communion is an exercise in teaching selective deafness in the flock. We need more horse whisperers and fewer cowboys. Our hierarchs tend to forget what the man who appointed a great many of them (JPII) said on September 10, 2000: “Always propose; never impose.”