Wishing John And His Family Well

John's parents were in an auto accident in Mississippi and he dropped everything to go there and be with them. I know all our readers join me in wishing him and his family every good thing and keeping them in our thoughts and prayers.

The Mormon Missionary Advantage? 

Noam Schreiber in today's New Republic on-line edition (link requires subscription; also available here) has decided that Romney's Mormonism gives him "at least one truly unprecedented advantage:"

one that could be decisive in a closely contested primary. It derives from an aspect of the Mormon community that the press has largely underplayed: the vast grassroots organizing potential of thousands of highly-disciplined young missionaries.

I hardly know where to begin, so I will simply encourage you all to read the whole thing.  As you do so, and if you are not a Mormon, a couple of warnings.  

First, don't pay too much attention to his description of Mormon Missionary life.  Schrieber seems to have tried hard, but apparently he got his information about what it's like to be a Mormon missionary from two of his Mormon acquaintances who served in the 1990s.  That's always dangerous.  Just trust me, it ain't necessarily the way Schreiber describes it.  

Second, Schreiber makes a gigantic leap in assuming that Romney's volunteers are predominantly former Mormon missionaries.  What basis is there for that belief?  After their missions, Mormon young men and women get on with their lives, getting an education, marrying, working, and so forth.  Most of them are not all that interested in politics.  They are not going to drop everything and flock to Iowa to help Brother Romney.

Even so, Mormons generally have lots of organizational experience, especially those who have served full-time missions.  So to the extent Romney has a lot of Mormon volunteers on his campaign, they should be very effective workers.

So in the end, Schreiber's piece is another rather quaint effort by an outsider to find an interesting angle on the possible impact of Romney's Mormonism on his candidacy. 

The Bigotry Thing

Small-market and late-night talk radio host Mike Gallagher complains about charges of bigotry against those who won't vote for Romney because he's a Mormon: 

But if a presidential candidate has a set of religious beliefs that seem contrary to the vast majority of Bible-believing Christians and those beliefs might cause someone to decide not to vote for that person, how can that possibly be called bigotry? [snip]

 

There’s nothing wrong with believing that a candidate who wants to become the leader of our country should have the same kind of religious beliefs that most Americans have. We should be allowed to disagree with a political candidate for just about any doggone reason we want to, and even be able to stand up on a soapbox and proclaim our reasons in this free country of ours without being afraid of being labeled a racist or a bigot or a hatemonger. 

Let's see:   If I say I will not vote for Smith because he is a

Catholic/Jew/Asian-American/Evangelical/Hispanic.

Does that sound all right to you? 

Didn't think so. 

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