Tributes…

K-Lo on women, Romney and the “too perfect” meme.

And I’ll go one step further. I worry about a political culture that is a little too suspicious of a scandal-less, all-American-gee-whiz-this-is-the-American-dream-in-overdrive package. We should be glad that good people — who, while well-off, are not without their share of painful crosses — are willing to subject themselves to the ugliness that politics can inflict. We should be grateful that good families will make the sacrifices necessary to serve — and make those sacrifices with no guarantees they’ll succeed. (Now that even Hillary Clinton has proven to be vulnerable, we know there are really no guarantees!)

Mitt Romney has money, smarts, support, and a loyal staff. He’ll be fine. But the rest of us will have, someday, to face up to the consequences of a culture of political cynicism.

Matt Lewis on “Hero’s Journey:

If you’ve read Arthur or the Odyssey — or have seen Star Wars or Rocky — you are familiar with the idea. Before reaching the “promised land,” a hero must first endure his “wilderness years.” This is essentially a right of passage or initiation (I’ve written that Mitt Romney finally passed his “Initiation” into the conservative movement.)

Did somebody say “wilderness years?” And it is Reagan’s example? Uh . . . . Anybody ever hear of Richard Nixon? Lord I am feeling old . . . .

Analysis . . .

Dan Gilgoff in USAToday interviews Nancy French about why Evangelicals did not flock to Romney. The conclusion is because Evangelical leaders refused to lead. Interesting, but not politically wise. Leadership is flimsy stuff, one can only lead people as far as they are willing to go. If one pushes one’s constituency too much in a direction it does not want to go, one finds oneself alone and no longer a leader.

James Dobson, who receives particular ire in the piece, and has made any number of mistakes in this thing, cannot be blamed for this one. Bringing up the Mormon issue openly was for him a no-win situation. In the past when Dobson did reach out to Mormons he was pilloried by some in his camp. Now he is getting pilloried by others for failing to do so. In such circumstance one must either keep one’s mouth shut, or be willing to lose a lot. If Dobson has a problem, it is that he said too much at the wrong time.

Nope, the anti-Mormon problems in the republican party are at a deeper level than Evangelical leadership - much deeper. There is a lot of hard work that needs to be done at a “grass roots” level to sort this one out.

Lowell inserts: I agree and disagree with those last two paragraphs. This is a fundamental grass-roots issue, no doubt about it. I am, however, less willing to give Dr. Dobson a pass on this one. He is a leader and needs to be out in front of those he leads. If we are saying that he could not encourage Evangelicals to look past Romney’s Mormonism for fear of upsetting his members, then we are also saying he’s a captive of his membership. To me, that makes him seem more like a talk show host concerned about his ratings than a leader of a movement.

John responds: Ahem - Dobson is a radio show host… That’s where his base comes from.

Lowell:  Touché, sort of.  Dobson’s show is not on any AM station in L.A. (if it is, it’s well-hidden), so I do not hear it, and I am not alone.  He speaks to a certain narrow listenership, and when he is interviewed on Laura Ingraham’s show, for example, he is not interviewed as a talk show host, he’s interviewed as Mr. Focus on The Family, whose  web site appeals to readers to “support the ministry.”  If he’s a talk show host, then so is Jesse Jackson! 

To be fair to Dobson, he’s like a politician. He can only get away with so much (see the candidates’ positions on immigration, for example). That he can’t get away with saying positive things about Romney says more about the state of his constituency than anything. But he is not a man of courage. He will not risk alienating his supporters, without whom  he is nothing.

Mormons are thinking . . .

An interesting article out of, of all places, Fort Wayne, Indiana, interviews local, and not-so local Mormons for their thoughts and editorializes a bit.

This is the nub of it, really. Romney seemed so Mormon, so squeaky clean. Maybe we understand better those who’ve strayed or failed and recovered – or, for that matter, those who aren’t fabulously successful and can’t put tens of millions into their own campaigns. Maybe we relate to the family lives of other candidates, candidates who have been divorced, who have blended families.

I am not at all sure how to react to that. There was a bit of the “too perfect” stuff and that is associated with Mormonism, but let’s think rationally about this for a minute. The flip side of anti-Mormon bias is polygamy, which is, to the average American terribly unseemly. These comments also represent a lack of exposure to Mormons on a large scale, because, like with any group, I have known some really good ones, and some utter and complete jerks.

I guess, if people don’t like Mormons, they just don’t like them, rationality has left the room.

Sadly, Huck Still Needs To Be Hammered . . .

John Mark Reynolds lists five reason Huck should get out now! Reason #5:

You are harming Evangelicals by only getting their votes and forcing them into a ghetto.

HEY! That sounds familiar. Although “USnooze,” he said stealing from Rush Limbaugh, seems to think he is just rending Evangelicalism asunder. But then the MSM never could tell the difference between Evangelicalism, the Emerging Church, and mainstream denominationalism.

But, typically, Laura Ingraham, in conversation with Byron York, points out that Huckabee seems obsessed with Romney, insisting on taking shots long after Romney has left the race. Not to mention that the shot he takes is one designed to play into the “Mormons lie” meme. People very close to the campaign tell me that Huck is not motivated by anti-Mormon sentiment, but I am not seeing much in his public behavior that belies my suspicions.

This Catholic is suspicious of Huckabee and fears similar anti-Catholic stratagems to the anti-Mormons ones used in Iowa. Alas, that which I most feared is appearing. Serious damage, created by Huckabee’s strategy, has been done.

Getting It Wrong . . .

Yet another in the never ending series of atheistic rants when it comes to religion and politics. I wonder when atheists are going to figure out that what they have is NOT the absence of religion but religion of a different type? They are people of faith just like the rest of us, just not faith in God.

Stanley Fish tries to justify identity politics. What is interesting is he justifies it on the basis of the issues, reducing identity to a shortcut for “vote like me.” Except the shortcut cannot be relied upon and no identity group is sufficiently large to carry the day. In the end he has said nothing.

Background…

A very interesting Jewish perspective in a Muslim venue.

Andrew Ferguson on Lincoln and religion.

Polling Evangelicals.
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