The Stars Have Aligned and Michael Steele Challenges Himself. (updated X4)
We have been discussing Newsweek‘s “The End of Christian America” for a while now, and Dan Gilgoff is adding some new fuel to the discussion:
But all that may be misleading. A survey out this week from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life challenges the conventional portrait of America’s unchurched as a burgeoning society of proud secularists, atheists, and agnostics. Yes, the religiously unaffiliated are the fastest-growing religious group, the survey reports, accounting for nearly 1 in 6 Americans. But it turns out that the unaffiliated are much less antagonistic toward religion than previously thought.
The new Pew survey finds that most Americans who were raised in religiously unaffiliated homes now belong to one religious tradition or another. And only a distinct minority of those who’ve left organized religion say that modern science has disproved religion, as many atheists believe. “There’s this naive secularization theory that says when somebody becomes unaffiliated, they stay there because they’ve become adults and found that religion is silly,” says Stephen Prothero, a Boston University religion professor who analyzed the Pew survey. “But it turns out that you call them back the next year and they’ve joined a Lutheran church. They were just looking for the right fit.”
I think we can all agree that it is way too early to proclaim religion, and particularly the Christian religion, as a non-factor on the American political landscape. Which only makes the challenge ahead for a GOP currently in the political wilderness that much harder. As they seek to regain strength, they cannot simply set religion aside – they have to find a way to work with it. That means facing facts. Something which this liberal blog, quoting Michael Steele, guest-hosting for Bill Bennett, indicates may be happening. There is a whole lot of context to this, but in a conversation with a caller, Steele says:
But remember, it was the base that rejected Mitt because of his switch on pro-life, from pro-choice to pro-life. It was the base that rejected Mitt because it had issues with Mormonism. It was the base that rejected Mitch, Mitt, because they thought he was back and forth and waffling on those very economic issues you’re talking about. [Emphasis added.]
This liberal blog, in reporting on Steele’s comments, is playing a bit of “gotcha.” And in this case, I think they do have us.
One thing should be clear to all, a revitalized GOP can have no tolerance for rejecting candidates on the basis of religious affiliation. Set aside for a minute the constitutional and philosophical reasons for that and look at the purely, practically political. The divisiveness created by such criteria in a primary will permanently keep the party out of power. Here we see the chairman of the party admitting almost as much.
So, Michael Steele has presented himself with a challenge here. If he is the guy that is going to rebuild this party, then he has to address this issue. The “how” is the hard part. We cannot just tell the discriminatory branch of the party to “go home” – that is cementing the division, not healing the rift.
So, what’s it gonna be, Mr. Steele? You wanted the job, now you have it – and you have, as of last Thursday, named your greatest challenge. I have a few suggestions for you, but I think you need to figure this one out for yourself, or you need to get out of the way in a big hurry. So let’s go – we’re ready!
Lowell adds:
Please excuse me for being blunt: Michael Steele’s comments on the Bennett show were idiotic. So idiotic, in fact, that I really wonder about his ability to lead the GOP.
No, I am not saying so as a Romney partisan, which I am. I do have problems with Steele’s analysis of why Mitt lost, but that’s a separate issue. What astonishes and dismays me is that the chair of the Republican National Committee guest-hosts a national radio program and concedes that “the base” of his party is dominated by religious bigots.
But Steele’s analysis also shows a startling lack of sophistication. Here’s Steele’s statement from the program transcript, in more detail:
STEELE: Yeah, but let me ask you. Ok, Jay, I’m there with you. But remember, it was the base that rejected Mitt because of his switch on pro-life, from pro-choice to pro-life. It was the base that rejected Mitt because it had issues with Mormonism. It was the base that rejected Mitch, Mitt, because they thought he was back and forth and waffling on those very economic issues you’re talking about. So, I mean, I hear what you’re saying, but before we even got to a primary vote, the base had made very clear they had issues with Mitt because if they didn’t, he would have defeated John McCain in those primaries in which he lost.
What?
Yes, Romney lost Iowa because Huckabee ran a religion-based campaign and got voters to the caucuses who had not voted before. Remember, Romney got all his voters out in Iowa. Without the Evangelical first-time voters who came out for Huck, Mitt would have won going away. Does Steele really think those new Evangelical Iowa voters are “the base?”
In New Hampshire, McCain won with independents because that was open primary. Everyone knows this, apparently, but Michael Steele, who thinks “the base” rejected Romney. Well, OK, if you think Northeastern independents form the GOP base. That’s, well, a novel view of the base.
In Florida, Governor Charlie Crist endorsed McCain at the last minute and that is generally thought to be the reason McCain won. Can it be that Steele sees Florida’s conservative “base” rejecting Romney in favor of the more liberal candidate, McCain — because the voters were unhappy that Romney had become more conservative?
Hello?
Here’s hoping Steele gets a better grip on what is happening within the GOP. If, as he suggests, “the base” of the party rejected Romney because of his Mormonism, then Steele has some work to do. Strident, exclusionary voices within the party will be our downfall if they are allowed to rule, and the only people who will be happy about that are liberals and the mainstream news media, who love the anti-conservative narrative such voices give them.
Postscript: EFM is writing on this very same topic – it’s worth the read.
Postscript 2: Jim Geraghty comments. So do Jay Cost, Phil Klein, and Rich Lowry. The consensus: Steele blew this one badly.
Postscript 3: The MSM is eating this up. CNN and the Romney-hating Boston Globe are now portraying this in civil war like terms. The Romney camp HAD to respond and they offered about as tame a response as possible:
Romney’s camp responded today by noting that he won the Conservative Political Action Conference straw poll three years in a row. Romney also became one of McCain’s most loyal and vocal surrogates.
“Sometimes when you shoot from the hip, you miss the target,” Romney spokesman Eric Ferhnstrom told CNN. “This is one of those times.”
Steele is giving the MSM what they want and seemingly carving up the party in response. Not good, not good at all.
Postscript 4: Dan Gilgoff has been distinguishing himself lately with some good insight into religiously motivated political movers. But this Tuesday morning, he seems to be showing his ignorance.
…then Steele’s gaffe contained a fair bit of truth.
But “truth” isn’t the issue “gaffe” is. Steele’s job is to unite the party, not give voice to its divisions. Besides, as Lowell’s initial comments pointed out there were far more factors at play than just the religion issue. Oh and one other place Gilgoff shame’s himself:
Romney was defeated last year by Mike Huckabee, who rode the GOP’s evangelical base—which Romney so assiduously courted—to victory in Iowa and in a slew of Southern states that Romney needed to challenge McCain from the right.
That sentence is rather grammatically spun. Huckbee did, in fact win some primaries, but he did not defeat Romney in the primary season, despite Huckabee’s claims to coming in “second.” Delegate counts do not lie – Romney was second in delegate count, even though he left the race weeks ahead of Huckabee. That sentence, organized as it is, makes it look like Huckabee just flat out beat Romney.
But then, Gilgoff doesn’t have to be politically astute; however, Michael Steele sure needs to be.
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Jerald on 11 May 2009 at 10:31 am #
Good post guys…I have nothing to add except my agreement that Steele should probably get out of the way and give the job to someone who can do it.
Steel’s first 100 days were way to lackluster to possibly rebuild the GOP in time for 2010.
coltakashi on 11 May 2009 at 4:56 pm #
I had hoped for a more perceptive view from Mr. Steele on the issue of Mormon candidates, since his proposed successor as Deputy Governor in Maryland was a blind Mormon woman who was head of state services for the disabled. In his oversimplification of the primary campaign, he was reinforcing the self-contradictory “conventional wisdom” of the opponents of Romney, who insisted that he was willing to say anthing to please voters–except change his religion from the very unpopular one of Mormonism!
The fact that the ONLY reason for Romney to stay true to Mormonism in the face of religious opposition was personal integrity, is not pointed out as a rebuttal to claims that his integrity was somehow suspect because he changed his position, years before, on whether government should regulate abortion.
Anyone who is familiar with Mormon teachings on abortion knows that the attitude of the CJCLDS church to abortion by a member of that church is highly opposed, except under very narrow circumstances (threat of serious physical harm to the mother, rape or incest), and that Romney, even when he was not trying to use government to restrict abortion, was counseling other Mormons under his leadership that they should avoid them in almost all circumstances. So when Romney decided that government should also take a stance to restrict abortion for ALL citizens (not just those who subscribe to Mormon beliefs), he was not changing his own personal and religious opposition to abortion, but only his position on how much of a role government should play in regulating it. Indeed, he specifically advocated that the issue be taken out of the courts and returned to the states, where democratic processes could give expression to the moral judgment of citizens, a return to the pre-Roe V. Wade status quo ante.
Ronald Reagan “flipped” from allowing abortion to opposing it. Was his integrity on the issue somehow suspect because he changed it to match what his supposed critics WANTED? If you beat up someone because they decide to AGREE with you, you are never going to make converts of additional politicians and voters to your cause!
In sum, anyone who criticizes Romney for his allegiance to Mormonism has to give him credit for basic integrity in the face of immense pressure to distance himself from his church (in the way that John F. Kennedy did in 1960), and they should also admit that Romney’s alleged “flip” (without a “flop”) from limiting government regulation of abortion to allowing is was ONLY about public policy, and NOT about his fundamental beliefs opposing abortion in most circumstances. But that would require critics to have both knowledge and integrity themselves, and not “think” through reciting contradictory mantras.
Frankly, the “flip flop” accusation was just a way of masking the “Mormons lie” view that many opponents of Romney held, both secular and religious. The “Mormons lie” or “Mormons are stupid” theme was constantly repeated by secular left wingers and bigoted right wingers, ironically with supporting “evidence” that demonstrated only the ignorance and lack of integrity of the accusers, like Lawrence O’Donnell. Regardless of how widespread direct bigotry toward Mormons is among conservative Republicans, and liberal Democrats, the fact that the rest of America allowed those speakers to make those claims without penalty and universal condemnation, in the way they would have reacted to “lying Jews” and “ignorant Catholics” epithets, means that America’s arguing classes–politicians, academia and the news media–are complicit in allowing Mormons to be used as a public scapegoat.
So the reason I am disappointed in Michael Steele is that he has failed to demonstrate leadership to Republicans, failed to demonstrate intelligence and failed to indict religious bigotry. Ironically for an African American, rather than tell the bigots to get out of the Republican Party, he is telling the rest of us that the bigots are “the base” of the Party, that they own it, and that we have to put up or shut up. That is a formula for continued factionalism and weakness that will never build a unified Party that can ever challenge Democratic hegemony even as Obama, Reid and Pelosi commit national suicide by degrees on the body politic.
One wonders whether Mr. Steele has somehow bought into the notion that Mormons harbor some kind of residual racism toward blacks, even though tens of thousands of white Mormons have labored to persuade over a quarter million blacks, many in Africa, to become Mormon in the last 30 years, and a black man from Kenya is called as one of the general leaders for the entire church. The Salt Lake Tribune (pointedly the non-Mormon newspaper in Utah) noted that Haitian Mormons in the Boston area loved to seek help from Mitt Romney when he was a local church leader, because he is fluent in the French language Haitians speak.
TVHall on 11 May 2009 at 10:28 pm #
I think it’s safe to say that Mr. Steele has been a profound disappointment since shortly after his installment as GOP Chairman. Thus far, it appears his actions could be attributed to mere incompetence. One other factor to keep in mind when evaluating things of a political nature, especially on the federal level, is the “high school clique” nature of Washington society. Even though they profess to be on opposite sides, there is enormous pressure to be accepted by the “in” crowd.
Having said all that, it is clear that there is a concerted effort to portray the Conservative base in the most extreme terms possible. It might be good to remember that this is just a continuation of the same tactic used by the Clintons duration their administration. That tells me just about all I need to know about anyone furthering this ploy.
K.G. on 12 May 2009 at 9:46 pm #
Loose lips sink ships. It seems Mr. Steele (whom I originally supported) is way too happy to be seen and heard–and in thoughtless ways that do not help the party. We should have listened to Newt, who was obviously lukewarm toward Steele’s election.
Article VI Blog » Blog Archive » The Invisible Primary Is Well Underway, Mormonism Still Has Image Problems, and more… on 19 Oct 2009 at 6:30 am #
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