Echoes and Propaganda
Echoes…
We’ve been saying it for a while, but aside from Hugh Hewitt, no one has been paying attention. There was this big discussion on The Corner yesterday featuring Maggie Gallagher, Mark Steyn and EFM’s David French. Steyn and French were “dittoing” Gallagher who was, and if you read this blog regularly you’d know this, dittoing us. Says Gallagher:
Social conservatives simply have not been in politics. We lack institutions that can defeat our enemies and directly assist our friends.
After a while, threatening to leave the coalition unless the coalition does what you want gets old. And tiring. And ineffective. It makes your allies not like you very much. Social conservatives talk like that because it’s our one lever of power.
Time to get some new levers.
I must, however, object to her choice of the term “social conservatives” here. She properly characterizes only a subset of social conservatives. Yeah, they are the ones leading the way, and they are the ones that the press just adore (more on that in a minute) but that are far from the entire movement. It is really only the Evangelical/Southern Baptist bunch that play the game the way everyone is pointing out is ineffective. Conservative Catholics (of which there are numerous at The Corner) and those few remaining conservative mainline protestants have been far more effective when they are not crowded out of the space.
Pointing out mistakes is a good thing, but let’s not not decry an entire movement when there are some smart people still in it.
Which brings me to megachurch pastor Mark Driscoll who points out on FOXNews, that contra Newsweek, interest in religious things remains high in America, but religiously motivated political action may be on the wane. He calls it Christian America v Christendom America. Catchy phrase, but once again, you heard the same idea here, and again echoed by Hugh Hewitt, the day the Newsweek piece broke.
Welcome aboard people!
Propaganda…
There is a new leading Mormon in politics this week as the president has appointed Jon Huntsman Ambassador to China. Huntsman’s name has been being tossed around for the Republican presidential nod in ’12. Most right leaning pundits have presumed that by accepting this post, Huntsman is taking himself out of the mix for ’12. Makes sense, it is hard to run for POTUS from Beijing, and in some sense, the campaign is already underway.
But the left-leaning New Republic chimes in (HT: ABD4 SLC):
If Huntsman was planning to run for president, why would he move so brazenly to the left at a time when the GOP seems to be heading rightward? The most obvious reason is that he may actually be a moderate. “I’m not very good at tags,” he tells me. “I just try to do my best, and maybe that makes me a pragmatist.” He joins a long tradition of moderate Republicans from Utah, despite–or perhaps because of–the fact that the state is the reddest in the country, with the GOP holding every statewide office and more than two-thirds of the state legislature. The GOP lock on Utah politics allows the party to welcome a broader swathe of politicians, and breed leaders who are less combative and ideological than their besieged colleagues in more competitive states. And if Huntsman has learned anything from the failed Mitt Romney campaign, it is that the only thing worse for a Republican than not being a conservative is being a phony conservative.
[...]
Huntsman seems to have learned another lesson from the Romney campaign: A Mormon, no matter how conservative, cannot win amongst the right wing of the party–particularly evangelicals. Romney thought he could win their favor by becoming a drum-beating social conservative, underestimating the deep-rooted antipathy many evangelicals have toward Mormons. A recent Pew poll found that 39 percent of evangelicals hold negative views of Mormons–a sentiment Mike Huckabee used against Romney. Though RNC Chair Michael Steele was lambasted last week for saying “the base … rejected Mitt because it had issues with Mormonism,” he wasn’t that far off: According to a study by John C. Green and Mark Silk, the size of the evangelical community was one of the best predictors of Romney’s success or failure in each state; without the evangelical vote, they argue, Romney probably would have won in four of the five southern states he lost. In light of Romney’s experience, the more likely base for Huntsman would have been the moderate wing of the party, which is less concerned with religion in general (and the LDS church specifically).
Folks, that is effective and dangerous propaganda. In one piece they manage to savage Romney, Evangelicals and Republicans in general – and they do so based on some facts that are very real – all the while tilting up a “candidate” that would not represent the desires of the party base much at all.
The good news is, a piece like this will backfire on Huntsman amongst his base consitutency in Utah. If, as the TV piece claims, he is “distancing himself” from the CJCLDS, then I would bet the church will respond likewise. That’s gonna hurt. And frankly, Evangelicals don’t have much taste for people that lack the commitment to their convictions, even if they think the convictions are heretical.
The bad news is, in many senses we deserve this. But it also lays out the path to getting better. The acknowledgement that Huck used anti-Mormon sentiment is the starting point. Orthodox Christians may be suspicious of Mormons (that can be overcome with time and relationship), but those that are openly opposed have to go. Later Huck!
The point is, propaganda works when based in reality. We need to sift through this and learn its lessons if we hope to prevail.
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VB on 22 May 2009 at 7:12 am #
As usual, your post is very thoughtful.
Perhaps I am being nitpicky but you said “If, as the TV piece claims, he is “distancing himself” from the CJCLDS, then I would bet the church will respond likewise.”
If by CJCLDS you mean its leadership or the Church itself, then I think you are wrong, but;
If by CJCLDS you mean its general membership, then I think you are right.
Just my thoughts.
CarlH on 22 May 2009 at 8:27 am #
Among many interesting angles to the cluster of news surrounding the ground-swell of support (mostly from Democrats and other “progressives”–assuming there is a distinction; Frank Rich picking Republican “good guys”? Please!) for Utah Gov. Jon Huntman, Jr. as the man to save the Republican Party from conservatives, and his appointment by Pres. Obama as ambassador to China, is proof positive that the impulse to try using politics for evangelization is as much present for Mormons as it is for Evangelical Christians.
The Huntsman family entourage could not have been pleased when, immediately upon the news of the governor’s nomination as China ambassador, a sitting Utah state legislator jumped up on his blog to declare: Ambassador Huntsman — The LDS Implications Are Huge. The predictable reaction, both locally and nationally, must have taken a bit of the shine off the moment. I am certain no one in the inner circle saw this as the appropriate counterpoint to to The New Republic‘s suggestion that Huntsman had been deliberately distancing himself from the CJCLDS to enhance his political ambitions. Making big “bipartisan” campaign contributions, yes; but putting distance between Jon and the CJCLDS, not likely.
Jerald on 22 May 2009 at 8:46 am #
In regards to… “The point is, propganda works when based in reality. We need to sift through this and learn its lessons if we hop to prevail.”….I am seeing a minute amount of discussion about this, but I am wondering.
Most of the commenters here and probably readers as well seem to be LDS. So in that sense the choir is listening.
So how do we get a serious discussion of this going in the Evangelical community?
Does that community in general even realize the need for the discussion?
From what I can tell from people I’ve talked to and blogosphere commentary I have read, the Evangelical community in large that needs to be having this discussion has waxed it over with “It was Romney’s fault. He’s the one who did the flip-flopping. He’s the one who faked he was a conservative. He’s the phony life-long hunter, pro-choice in pro-life clothing. He’s the one who won’t admit the truth that Mormons are not Christain. We can’t trust him. ”
Then they completely absolved themselves of any need for the discussion by concluding “I would vote for a Mormon who acted in office like a real Mormon and was not some phony social conservative like Willard Mitt Romney.”
Any thoughts on this?
John Schroeder on 22 May 2009 at 8:56 am #
Jerald – your analysis is pretty good, but there is little any LDS can do to kick off the conversation. Like most things political it needs to start among the elite and trickle out from there.
Things like the conversation at The Corner are the elite talking about it. At the moment there is no real elite amongst the Evangelicals – that has to sort out first
Phil on 22 May 2009 at 9:41 am #
I don’t know as much about Huntsman’s political views as I do Romney, but from what I’ve seen, they are not very different. What I’ve seen of Huntsman’s views I have liked very much, and am very happy about his appointment as ambassador to China. I think he’ll do a great job. I also think that in 2016, he actually might have as good a chance than Romney to be able to win the republican nomination. If it does come to that, it will be interesting to see the reaction of the people, like the Huckster, who claim that their dislike of Romney wasn’t due to Mormonism, but do to his flip-flopping. If these same people dislike Huntsman with the same intensity, then we’ll know that it’s religion-based, and that the “flip-flopping” charge was just a convenient excuse, which is what I suspect. If so, then they would also try to find some convenient excuse to dismiss Huntsman, probably on the charge that he is too moderate. But, I think to win in either 2012 or 2016, the GOP will have to moderate somewhat on some things (not abandon their principles, just be more willing to move to the center more on the environment and on other issues. I do think that they can and should maintain a strong stance against important social issues as unlimited abortion and “gay marriage”, and fiscal responsibility (one of Romney’s big strengths).
I also would doubt very much that Huntsman is distancing himself from the CJCLDS. That would be extremely unlikely. I think he is doing the right thing to go more to the center on things like the environment, and at least to an extent, so-called “gay rights”. I like that he is open to “civil unions” but not to “gay marriage”. That is also the stance of the CJCLDS (open to “civil unions” – to an extent). As far as the environment, I think that is important to the extent that it is handled in moderation, by balancing environmental concerns with effects on the economy. The one big unknown I have with Huntsman though are his fiscal policies. He is probably not as good as Romney on that front.
Jerald on 22 May 2009 at 5:29 pm #
Thank you John.
I agree with you that there is little LDS folks can do to kick start the conversation among Evangelicals other than to be careful not to think the entire Evangelical community is after them.
And as you have mentioned many times, the Evangelical community is more like a vast nebulus than a unified organization and that nebulus is currently consumed with its own major issue of looking for people to come to the fore and lead .
With their attention focused on their own internal struggle for the direction of the movement, they probably have little time and even less interest in worrying about whether or not they should be concerned with the “Mormon issue” as addressed by this blog.
Maybe if things continue to deteriorate in terms of the values dear to social conservatives, they will instinctively or through some survival reaction recognize the need to work with others with different theology for the common defense of their values.
Then again, this social conservative is hoping the political environment does not become that hostile to our values.
So, all though I desire for all of us in the social conservative “movement” to work together with mutual respect and friendship, I don’t want us to have to be refined by “hell fire” to get there.
I guess that is the Catch 22.