October 2008 Archives

U.S. Senator Elizabeth Dole's challenger Kay Hagan has create a new ad called "Belief" in response to Dole's "Godless" spot, which attacked Hagan for attending a fundraiser connected to someone who is connected to an atheist group.

This is a very post-2004 way for a Democrat to respond to a faith-based attack: quickly responding to the attack head-on and testifying unabashedly about one's faith commitment. Which is to say, it's a very "Obama" way to respond to a faith-based attack, as opposed to the "Kerry" way of responding: wringing one's hands and marrying each public pronouncement about one's faith to a reaffirmation of support for the complete separation of church and state.

The "Godless" ad that U.S. Senator Elizabeth Dole is running against her Democratic challenger in North Carolina is a stark reminder that faith-based attacks have been kept to a relative minimum in the presidential race.

It's also a reminder, to GOM at least, that the McCain campaign has thus far refrained from running ads against Obama based on Jeremiah Wright, his longtime pastor. That kind of attack would be the opposite of Dole's in North Carolina; rather than paint Obama as "Godless," it would skewer him for cozying up to a man of the cloth.

To God-o-Meter, there's a pattern here: faith-based attacks tend to come from Republicans who are religious and who've incorporated their faith into their political personas, e.g. Dole and Palin. And McCain, a Republican who's famously uncomfortable incorporating faith into his political persona is refraining from such attacks.

So if Palin, Mike Huckabee, or another social conservative gets the nod in 2012, due to a post-McCain religious right uprising, we could be looking at more faith-based attacks at the presidential level. By then, though, Rev. Wright would be old news

David Brody has the scoop on Christian lit the McCain camp is distributing to churches across the country. The document is framed as a voting guide to the hot button social issues: abortion, gay marriage, judges, sex education, school choice. That's all well and good. This is the kind of thing McCain needed to start doing a year ago to mobilize the GOP's faith-based base.

But what surprises GOM is that the McCain campaign, in background interviews, argues that the evangelical movement is much more broad-minded than it used to be, pointing out that McCain's leadership on issues like global warming is likely to resonate with this crowd. In its limited evangelical outreach, however, McCain has ignored those centrist positions to bang the drum on the kind of culture war issues that McCain has long been uncomfortable discussing--which made him so unpopular with the Christian Right for so long.

Notice how so much political reporting these days about the future of the Republican Party is about the God Gap between religious conservatives and the rest of the party? Much of it hinges on the fact that Sarah Palin has become the movement's new political face. The New York Times reports today that conservatives are already discussing her future political prospects should the McCain-Palin ticket be defeated next Tuesday (The Times says it's "conservatives" who are excited about Palin, but the paper is basically writing about social conservatives):

Whether the Republican presidential ticket wins or loses on Tuesday, a group of prominent conservatives are planning to meet the next day to discuss the way forward, and whatever the outcome, Gov. Sarah Palin will be high on the agenda.

Ms. Palin, of Alaska, has had a rocky time since being named as Senator John McCain's running mate, but to many conservatives her future remains bright. If Mr. McCain wins, she will give the social conservative movement a seat inside the White House. If he loses, she could emerge as a standard bearer for the movement and a potential presidential candidate in 2012, albeit one who will need to address her considerable political damage.

Her prospects, in or out of government, are the subject of intensive conversations among conservative leaders, including the group that will meet next Wednesday in rural Virginia to weigh social, foreign policy and economic issues, as well as the political landscape and the next presidential election.

Ms. Palin's aides insist that winning this time around is her sole objective. But there are signs that she, too, is making sure that she is well positioned for the future if she and Mr. McCain lose.

The 2012 Republican primary could be waged on winning religious conservatives than the '08 GOP primary was, with Mitt Romney, Sarah Palin, and Mike Huckabee vying to become the movement's political standard bearer.

Like God-o-Meter said yesterday, the GOP's God Gap problem is not necessarily that the party's religious conservatives and more secular moderates are drifting further apart. It's that there's a shortage of figures who can unify those two wings going forward.

From today's LA Times:

The social conservatives and moderates who together boosted the Republican Party to dominance have begun a tense battle over the future of the GOP, with social conservatives already moving to seize control of the party's machinery and some vowing to limit John McCain's influence, even if he wins the presidency.

In skirmishes around the country in recent months, evangelicals and others who believe Republicans have been too timid in fighting abortion, gay marriage and illegal immigration have won election to the party's national committee, in preparation for a fight over the direction and leadership of the party.

The growing power of religious conservatives is alarming some moderate Republicans who believe that the party's main problem is that it has narrowed its appeal and alienated too many voters. They cite the aggressive tone of the McCain campaign in challenging Barack Obama, who has close to universal support from African American voters; as well as the push by many Republican leaders to clamp down on illegal immigration using rhetoric that has driven away Latinos.

A focal point of the GOP fight is the selection of the next chairman of the Republican National Committee -- the party's power center for fundraising and strategic thinking. With various factions already trying to build support for their favored candidates, some conservatives are warning that McCain cannot serve as the party's spiritual guide even if he becomes president. The Arizona senator, after all, has a history of breaking with the party's mainstream on such issues as immigration and campaign financing

Hat tip to Mark Silk.