Here’s an interesting burst of candor by Governor Romney, giving new meaning to the old football term “triple threat.”  I’m not sure he meant it that way, however.

Some interesting insight into the recent Bloomberg-Los Angeles Times poll: 

While there are Evangelicals with a remarkable distaste, one might even call it hatred of Mormons, these are few and far between. No, the real generalized bigotry against Mormons and other religious traditions that place high demands on their adherents comes from “liberal” Democrats. 

Read the whole thing.

Mitt v. McCain, in the South:  These commentators think Romney wins this match-up, even among evangelicals.

A few random but interesting comments about Romney, the religion issue, and the Bloomberg-Times poll. Excerpt:

“Well I think with polls like that, I’m not sure if you asked those same people what they thought Mormonism is, they would necessarily be accurate,” Professor John Freemuth of Boise State University told KBCI CBS 2 News. “I mean they may be playing off some sense that it’s cultish, it’s an odd religion.”

Yep.

Democrat rising star Barack Obama leaps into the religion-politics fray, with a USA today op-ed that includes this remarkable statement:

[T]he separation of church and state in America has preserved not only our democracy but also the robustness of our religious practice. After all, during our founding, it was not the civil libertarians who were the most effective champions of this separation; it was the persecuted religious minorities concerned that any state-sponsored religion might hinder their ability to practice their faith.

Apparently, even when Obama is arguing for a place for religion in politics, he must make the obligatory nod toward that “separation,” mentioned nowhere in the Constitution and certainly not “championed” by the Founders.  To be fair, Obama’s statement is accurate as far as it goes.  The debate has always been over what the phrase “wall of separation between church and state” actually means.  The term originated as a rhetorical flourish by Thomas Jefferson, and when read in context it clearly refers to state-established religion, not the notion that religion must not infect public life in any manner.  Besides, whatever Jefferson was, he was no “persecuted religious minority.”

Finally, over the weekend Kathryn Jean Lopez wrote about the real (political) significance of Romney’s faith:

The media, naturally, will continue to miss the real story: the fact that Romney’s convictions, as they are translated into politics, might make him more, rather than less, appealing to evangelicals. This isn’t just conservative grousing, either: CNN political analyst Bill Schneider recently remarked, to the LA Times, that “the press is one of the most secular institutions in American society. It just doesn’t get religion or any idea that flows from religious conviction.”

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