Today’s Reading List – October 12, 2007
I Really Think We Are Smarter Than This…
It was just a few weeks ago, that we were declaring The Question as more or less over, but, as the SLTrib points out, it is anything but. One is forced to wonder why. All the religious heat lately, save Newsweek and Bartlett, has been on Giuliani and Thompson, particularly from Evangelicals. And yet Mark DeMoss has felt it necessary to rise to Romney's evangelical defense. A fact which has been reported by the NYTimes and The Boston Globe. The Washington Times is reporting increasing Romney support amongst Evangelicals as is CBS News.
There is some contrary notes like this from the Deseret News and this from The Baltimore Sun, but I think Roger Simon at Politico starts to hit the correct note when he says:
GOP rift sends Christian right adrift
The press/punditry is finally waking up to the fact that their, and I emphasize, their, conventional wisdom is not holding. They thought Evangelicals would never vote for a Mormon (I think because they thought we were all lockstep dogmatic fools?!). They thought Thompson was going to ride in like Jesus on Palm Sunday because we were so dissatisfied with the field. Giuliani's weaknesses were always known, but assumed unimportant with his national security credentials. But starting with the third party threat they began to notice that things just are not what they assumed.
First of all, Evangelicals actually think for themselves. They are no solid bloc unless a leader comes along that can forge them into one. — Oops. Secondly, Bush and his team are succeeding in Iraq, something they never anticipated, and suddenly the national security thing is not quite as overridingly important as they assumed (although it remains THE issue of the election) – Oops. Thompson has proven to be more style than substance – Oops.
And suddenly all these Evangelicals are appearing that like Romney. Funny, Mark DeMoss has been on the Romney train for a year. Last year I attended a Tony Perkins hosted event at which Romney spoke. Evangelicals have been backing Romney all along. But they did not seem to matter to the press until the press decided they matter. And so the press breathlessly reports on things that do not even qualify as "developments" – They are just more of what has been happening all along.
Unless, of course, you are Time Magazine. Who titles this same story this way
Why Evangelicals May Turn to Romney
See – they try to preserve their narrative. Which illustrates the greatest problem with the press – ego. They think they define these things. They think they understand Evangelicals and Mormons. Clearly they do not.
All this looks like to me is a bunch of people that tried to craft the story one way, a way that was wrong, but they don't want to admit it so they have to make the fact that they are discovering they were wrong look like news.
Remember when they reported news instead of tried to define it?
Lowell: I see the DeMoss memo a little differently than John does. After hearing the October 11 podcast of Hugh Hewitt's Mark DeMoss interview, the memo doesn't strike me as a negative thing at all. I think the memo was a carefully-timed strategic move (DeMoss is a Romney adviser, after all) designed to urge Evangelicals to rally around Romney because of the Governor's positions on issues important to religious conservatives.
From the darkside…
Harry Reid confuses religion and politics.
More of those folks at HuffPo prove the left is the enemy of religion – generally.
But we still have our bigots on the right. A post at WatchBlog lists ten reasons to vote for Thompson and lists as reason number 10:
He’s not a Mormon…
Sounds like a reason to read another blog to me.
Craig Romney says a mouthful…
Romney also spoke about his family's Mormon faith, which has been a recent topic in the media. A recent Newsweek cover featured Mitt Romney and read "A Mormon's Journey: The Making of Mitt Romney."
"I think he's been on the cover of a major magazine twice, and I think it's unfortunate that both times it's been that he's Mormon."
Don't you love the understatement?
Finally…
Is Mike Huckabee really running for Pastor-in-Chief?
Late addition by Lowell: Why does Huckabee's 12 years as a Baptist pastor get such mention, but little is said of Romney's service for 11 years as a Mormon bishop and stake president– also pastoral positions, involving all the same compassionate service responsibilities that a Baptist pastor would have? Romney's service, which is totally voluntary, seems to be described as a mark of trouble for him– "Not only is this guy a Mormon, he's — horrors!– a Mormon leader!"
Just wondering.
Posted in Reading List | Comment on this post » | 
Print this post
| 
Email This Post