Article VI Blog

Well, that’s what the pundits are calling it. “Home state,” of course, is a veiled way of saying “a state with a sizeable Mormon population.” (Fact: Nevada’s Mormons comprise 7% of its citizenry.) I’ve been following the Twitter commentary all day, and that theme has been relentless. There were comments on how Mormons organize informally, tweets from the Hard-right punditry wondering why Mormons even support Romney, and so on.

Finally, as the polls were closing, frequent Romney critic David Freddoso of NRO let loose an inconvenient bit of information:

“Non-Mormons seem to have preferred Romney over Gingrich by 42%-26%, a margin similar to that in Florida” http://bit.ly/wffowM

Oops.

Fox is also reporting that Romney won Catholics by a 2 to 1 margin, against two Catholic opponents.

Oops again.

Finally, Justin Hart, a Romney supporter, tweeted that if not a single Mormon had voted in Nevada, Romney would still have won by 20 points. You can do the arithmetic.

We do not – not – expect the news media to drop its obsession with Romney’s Mormonism as a theme for much of their analysis of his success. But we do like to point out, as often as we can, how specious their analysis is.

We also got this, in Romney’s victory speech:

“I will protect religious freedom and will overturn any regulation that tramples on our first freedom: our right to worship as we choose.”

That is clearly a reference to this week’s Obama administration rule requiring faith-based employers to include contraception services (including elective abortions) in the health insurance plans they offer their employees. We blogged about that in our post this morning. I am sure that John’s heart is gladdened by Romney’s statement, as is mine. No doubt Romney will develop that theme in the coming weeks and months. Jennifer Rubin tweeted that it will probably be a major attack point for him.

We’ll have more to say after all the numbers are in and the dust settles.

UPDATE: Even Gingrich just excused his crushing defeat by noting that “Nevada is a heavily Mormon state.” Will the press let him get away with that? Probably.

John, The Next Morning Says

In all my morning reading, only one source notes Newt’s clear Mormon swipe.  We did the math yesterday morning on this thing.  Not to mention that I fail to understand how 7% of anything is “heavily.”

I spent several years of my life in the early ’90′s working the gold mines in Nevada.  Mining is the second biggest industry in the state, behind gaming.  (I am an environmental consultant after all.)  There are very few roads in the state I have not driven on in part because there are very few roads in the state outside of Las Vegas and Reno.  In all that travel I don’t think I can remember seeing a stake house.  I can not leave my house here in SoCal without tripping over a Mormon structure of some sort, but in Nevada? – give me a break.

Gingrich’s comment is simply despicable.  Gingrich is done as a candidate.  Santorum has a case yet to make, but Gingrich is done.  Sadly, he will garner enormous press because he is a good show – but like most of what passes for “good TV” these days, its side show material – a little off color, trashy, with just a hint of forbidden.

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Indications out of Florida are that Evangelicals may be beginning to figure things out.   However, in certain bastions, in this case Texas, it is a difficult struggle:

Christian conservatives are gradually coming to terms with the idea that Mitt Romney might be the GOP nominee. And they’ve got some advice if he wants evangelicals to turn out and vote for him in November. Leading social conservatives want Romney to be very public about opposing abortion and gay marriage. The fact that he’s been all over the board on these issues is a problem, along with his Mormonism, but leaders say if Romney has any hopes of rallying the Christian faithful in the fall, he’ll have to be demonstrative in support of the social issues they care about. That, of course, is exactly what the opposite of what his political advisers are likely to recommend for a general election – where Romney will be trolling for votes among independents and moderates

Who knows if this is the true source of the objections or it is cover for simple theological bigotry, but there is one important fact that Evangelicals that are in the camp described have to bear in the mind.  We live in a highly divided nation on the matter of abortion and on the matter of same-sex marriage we are losing ground.  From that essential fact flows one important related fact – it’s not about the presidency.  Abortion is legal due to the courts and same-sex marriage is at the moment a states issue, which is where it should remain.

So, two conclusions flow from these facts.  One, if you want to affect these issues, focusing on the presidential election is pouring your resources down the wrong hole.  Yes the president appoints court members, but even then – a “litmus test” qualification for the court is in violation of the spirit of the constitution.  Which leads me to the second conclusion.

Long before we lost the political and legal battles, we lost in the court of public opinion on abortion.  (If you are among those that believe the court “rammed Roe v Wade down our throat,” check the records – states were legalizing abortion at a rapid pace legislatively.)  We have not yet lost the political battle on same sex marriage, but we re losing the battle in the court of public opinion.  Why?  Somewhere, we have lost our ability to change people’s minds and characters.  That is what the church is supposed to do.  The salvation narrative common to all Christian faiths is about changing people from “sinners” to “saints.”  Among the changes that such a conversion would seemingly create in an individual is an understanding of the social ills of things like abortion and same sex marriage.

The POTUS has to, I repeat HAS TO, be the president for all of the American people – even those that support abortion and same sex marriage.  If my evangelical brethren want a POTUS that is more forceful on these important issues, then maybe they should be spending more time on the the character changing aspects of the church’s mission and less on politics.  I think if they did, the politics might take care of itself.

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In this continuation of our inquiry into which candidate is the one whom people of faith should support, I’ll ask our readers to leave aside any judgments about Newt Gingrich’s admitted past moral mistakes, including his serial infidelities and the related divorces.

No, I want you to think, not about those mistakes, but about how easily he lies about them, how glibly he obfuscates the moral clarity surrounding them.

Not Like Clinton, or Just Like Him?  You Decide

First, the former Speaker of the House was asked in detail about whether he was hypocrital to pursue Bill Clinton during the Lewinsky scandal when Gingrich himself was engaged in a long-term adulterous affair (with the woman who is now his wife).  Gingrich has an interesting way of distinguishing between his own sleazy infidelity and Bill Clinton’s lies about the same kind of behavior:

Gingrich, when pressed that it was hypocrisy, responded that “people listen to your question but don’t listen to the facts.”

When pressed about having an affair himself, he responded many people approached him at the time and explained lots of people had affairs. But he always responded that it was lying under oath that made it an issue.

“I’ve been through two divorces,” Gingrich said. “I’ve been deposed both times under oath. Both times I told the truth in the deposition because I know that it is, I’m not a lawyer and I know it’s a felony, Bill Clinton is a lawyer. He’s a Yale Law School graduate. He knew it was perjury. He knew it was a felony.”

In other words, “I may have been a sleazeball and a hypocrite, but I didn’t lie about it — at least not under oath!” There.  Do you feel better about this man now?

Like so much of what Gingrich says, this response is — how to put this delicately? — an insult to the public’s intelligence. As one of the commenters to the post says, “Gingrich wasn’t the same as Bubba because nobody knew publicly he was having ANOTHER affair, cheating on ANOTHER sick wife…if they had, none of [the Clinton impeachment drama] would’ve proceeded, perjury or no perjury.”

Yet another Politico commenter raises an ominous point: “Well, there’s an opening: Let’s see Newt’s depositions in the 2 divorces to check out whether he told the truth.” As long as he is a candidate, Newt’s past will be the gift that keeps on giving, as closet after closet is opened to reveal yet another skeleton.

And Another Example

Remember the great signature moment of the second South Carolina presidential debate, when Newt Gingrich rose up in righteous indignation and thundered at the elite news media, which had no interest in the truth but simply wanted to to get him, and any other Republican candidate they could?  Remember how he stated, with fiery certainty and crystalline clarity, that his campaign had offered several witnesses to ABC news who would counter his ex-wife Marianne’s story, but ABC was not interested in speaking to those people?

As Rick Perry might say, Oops.  No such thing happened.  Here’s the video:

Well, so much for fiery certainty and crystalline clarity. I must admit, I am impressed, in a morbid way, by the ease with which Newt Gingrich lies so convincingly.  Watching him do that is like observing the behavior of a rare and exotic species of animal. It is astonishing, frightening, and disturbing all at once.  Is this the kind of man we want as President of the United States?  R. Emmett Tyrell doesn’t think so, and reminds us that we have been down this road before.

Conservatives should not be surprised by the scandals that lie ahead, if they stick with him. Those of us, who raised the question of character in 1992, were confronted by an indignant Bill Clinton, treating the topic as a low blow. To listen to him, character was the “c” word of American politics. It was reprehensible to mention it. By now we know. Character matters. Paul, Santorum, and Romney have it. Newt has Clinton’s character.

It sure looks that way. Please, please, voters of Florida — and voters everywhere who care about electing decent men and women to positions of trust and authority — keep that in mind.
 

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Lots of  taxes paid, lots of charitable donations

The Wall Street Journal summarizes the Romney tax returns.

John Kerry, by the way, paid his federal income taxes at a lower rate than Romney – 13.1%, as opposed to Romney’s 13.9%.  This was disclosed in the 2004 election cycle.  No one made an issue of  that.  Why not?

Tithing – what’s that all about, anyway?

A pretty good explanation of tithing by Buzzfeed’s McKay Coppins.

Romney addressed the matter himself on Fox News Sunday:

“If people want to discriminate against someone based upon their commitment to tithe, I’d be very surprised. This is a country that believes in the Bible. The Bible speaks about providing tithes and offerings. I made a commitment to my church a long, long time ago that I would give 10 percent of my income to the church. And I followed through on that commitment,” he said.

“Hopefully, as people look at various individuals running for president, they’d be pleased with someone who made a promise to God and kept that promise. So, if I had given less than 10 percent, then I think people would have had to look at me and say, hey, what’s wrong with you, fella, don’t you follow through on the promises?”

Brief explanatory note:  Faithful Mormons pay tithing at 10% of their annual increase.  Exactly how one pays, and how one computes that 10%, is seen in our faith as a matter between the tithepayer and God.

Hugh Hewitt’s take on Romney’s taxes and charitable giving is a must-read.  Excerpts:

Ann and Mitt Romney are wealthy, and Ann and Mitt Romney are generous.  Very generous.  And this is to be admired.

Much of their giving goes to their church, and Mormon culture is very generous not just to those struggling in the congregation, but to the community, the nation and the world.  A minute or so of googling finds this story from the days after Katrina, representative of how the Mormons respond to disasters, which noted that “[a]s of Sept. 13, 140 truckloads of commodities and supplies, about 5.6 million pounds or 2,800 tons had been shipped into affected areas; with thousands of LDS volunteers giving 9,204 manpower days helping 1,606 Church members and 3,226 people not of the LDS faith, according to Garry Flake, director of Church Emergency Response. In addition, some 3,500 volunteers served Sept. 10-11.”

All denominations of any size have their charitable arms, like Catholic Relief Services and Presbyterian Relief and Development Agency, but the culture of giving is deeply embedded in the LDS community and reflected in the Romney tax returns.  In addition to direct giving to their church, the Romneys have supported cystic fibrosis research and the United Way, but the bulk of their giving is to their church….

They are very generous people, which in turn suggests they are good people, and while good people don’t necessarily make good leaders, it is far less likely they will be indifferent to suffering or intentionally malicious in their politics.

This is quaint stuff, certain to fall on deaf ears among the bare knuckled blogging community and the self-righteous among the media elite.  But it ought to matter to some voters, especially values voters, even those of different denominations.

(Emphasis added.) We couldn’t have said that better.

I’ll add this:  Romney’s tax payments and his level of charitable giving should never be mentioned by any member of the news media, in any publication or forum (yes, even those ridiculous MSM-run debates) without equal attention being paid to the other candidates’ tax payments and level of charitable giving.  Fair is fair.

So who is the best candidate for an American of faith? I’d say Romney or Santorum, depending on which one’s politics best aligns with the religious voter’s views. What say our readers?

Some Additional  Notes On Taxes

John Hood at NRO notes that the 14% number is entirely misleading.

Romney’s real federal tax rate on his investment income was more than 40 percent (being conservative, after deductions and such), since the revenue stream was subject to both a personal tax rate and the corporate tax rate….state taxes would bring the effective income tax rate on Romney’s investment income to 50 percent or higher. Every time a reporter or opposing candidate tried to say Romney’s tax rate was 15 percent, a competent campaign would call them out for misleading the American people.

And, by the way, one might reasonably wonder why the pro-Obama forces are attacking Romney, not Gingrich, in Florida. Big Labor (SEIU-COPE. SEIU.org) has invested $$800,000 in Florida anti-Romney ads.  One of the ads is directed at Hispanics, in Spanish, claiming “Mitt Romney Has No Shame.”

Why, oh why, would Big Labor be attacking Romney, and not Gingrich? Is there some reason they want Romney knocked out of the race?

Then there’s that notion of simply being a good man

Rich Lowry at National Review has some hard things to say about Newt Gingrich, whom he calls “the Republican Clinton, except less lovable and more roguish.” Ouch.  Referring to the now-famous John King incident in the final South Carolina debate:

Only one other politician in America could have played the victim card so expertly when confronted by the story of a wronged woman. Only one other politician would have thrown out so many obfuscating “facts,” or turned his lavish anger on and off so quickly. Only one other politician would have dared hope to turn such an embarrassing imbroglio to his advantage. If he was watching the debate somewhere, Bill Clinton must have chuckled in admiration and thought, “Well played, my friend. Well played.”

Newt is the Republican Clinton — shameless, needy, hopelessly egotistical. The two former adversaries and tentative partners have largely the same set of faults and talents. They are self-indulgent, prone to disregard rules inconvenient to them, and consumed by ambition. They are glib, knowledgeable, and imaginative. They are baby boomers who hadn’t fully grown up even when they occupied two of the most powerful offices in the land.

My friends, this matters.  What kind of a man we elect matters.  Bill Clinton did incalculable damage to our culture.  I recall, for example, having to explain to my then 8 year-old son what oral sex is — because of the President of the United States’ actions.  Do we want another man with a history of flexible morality serving in that office?  Yes, Gingrich says he has changed — has repented, in effect.  Well, I love redemption and forgiveness as much as the next believer in Christ, but I don’t necessarily believe that the redeemed person should be placed in a position of trust – and no office on earth involves greater trust than the American presidency.

And finally….

Jennifer Rubin asks. “Why Gingrich?” Read the whole thing.

And Dennis Prager, in Evangelicals and Romney , argues that “America’s survival is more important than one’s views of Mormonism.”  His best line:

In other words, fight the Left now. You can fight theology later.

Amen to that, Brother Prager.

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…A Romney victory – of course, the only question is by how much?  It really does, at this early morning juncture, appear to be an inevitability.  And Romney winning Iowa and NH back-to-back is an amazing political achievement.  No prevaricating, no conditions, no “buts” – it’s rare and it is extraordinarily well done.  What’s more is that Romney has opened up a double digit lead in Florida polling, and is leading most SC polls.  That’s stunning.

But as Romney seemingly steamrolls to an early primary end, a couple of ugly trends are emerging.  One has to do with the anti-capitalistic theme his opposition is striking in an effort to claw back into the race.  Lots and lots and lots of people are pointing how how very ridiculous this line of attack is, as it has been advanced by Gingrich, Perry, and Huntsman.  There is little I can add to the discussion, save to point out that in taking this line of attack, these gentleman join one of Gov. Romney’s former political opponents in its use – Edward Kennedy.  Does any self-respecting Republican want to be grouped with Ted Kennedy?  Really?  Really?

The other trend is the incredible uptick in the Mormon mentions and discussion.  The sheer volume of material our little web spiders and search tools have turned up in the last week is now on par, or may exceed, last cycle – and this after we have struggled to find material this cycle to this point.  One pretty smart person pointed out something from Iowa:

Santorum’s appeal to evangelicals marks one of the great developments in modern American religion and politics: the closure of the once-yawning theological and cultural gap between Catholics and Protestants. Protestants long distrusted and denounced Catholicism almost as much as they did Mormonism. The King James Version of the Bible originally carried an introductory dedication describing the pope as “that man of sin.”

This author is right, but what closed the gap?  I truly wonder if distaste for Mormonism did not sort of “force” the gap closed?  That notwithstanding, I think what we are really seeing out of all the Mormon coverage is foreshadowing.  As Romney becomes more and more inevitable, the left is warming up one of the few arrows they think they have in the quiver.  The shots are coming from msnbc, an msnbc contributor, and some blogger that Salon syndicated, just to name a few.

But consider what is happening on the right generally and in the polls:

• The latest Gallup data shows:

A new Gallup poll finds Mitt Romney is the now the only candidate that a majority of conservative and moderate/liberal Republicans nationwide see as an “acceptable” GOP nominee for president.

• Romney is the only Republican that is beating Obama in the polls.
• There are some amazing pro-Romney pieces appearing from the likes of Ken Starr and our own JMR.

Yep, things are looking good for Mitt Romney.  The only question is will we allow the religious prejudices of the left to use our religious convictions to divide us or will we stand united and win the most vital political battle of our lives.  It does not help that some of our own seem determined to turn left in an effort to garner the moment for themselves, but such is mostly the twitching of an already dead corpse.  We seem, finally, to be figuring this thing out.  Good for us.

John Mark here:

First, I will predict today . . .

Romney will win with more than 35% of the vote. There is no way to spin anything above that number as anything other than a win. I will repeat: Romney will be the nominee and the next President of the United States barring some cataclysm. The election will be 1980 with the electorate finally turning on the incumbent. Most Americans (about sixty percent) are looking for someone new.

Romney will give them that someone.

Second, Ron Paul is over-polling. He will end up in a near tie with the third place finisher. All the action is for third place. Gingrich has ended his career by attacking Bain using William Jennings Bryan rhetoric. Huntsman and Santorum will benefit. If Santorum comes in third, he might become a plausible Huckabee running second all way to the Romney convention. He will not be the Veep choice, but look for Huckabee himself as an outside choice if Santorum muddies things. (My favorite pick: Rubio.)

So here is my call:

Romney 38% (over 40% and it is a huge win, under 30 and he functionally lost)
Paul 20%
Santorum 16%
Huntsman 16%.
Gingrich 11%

(I should add that I write my ‘best reasonable case’ number for candidate and pick their rank in the finish. I do not try to predict percentages out of 100%).

Huntsman is now finished (as if he started). Anything under 20% keeps Daddy from paying to keep his son alive in a race that is a waste of family resources. Gingrich will be under great pressure to drop out with a dismal fifth place showing. He needs third to prevent being a spoiler.

I will be live blogging at johnmarkreynolds.com starting at 4:30 PST.

Feel good, by the way about my call. I was clearly wrong about Santorum’s best case and underestimated Paul, but I think I got the order just right.

(Except by later in the night it looks like I did not. The key thing I missed: Santorum failed to clearly outperform Gingrich or come close to Huntsman. This was, therefore, a bad night for Santorum given best cases. I also over-estimated the percentage of the Pitchfork Buchanan vote Santorum would get compared to Paul.)

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At this writing, the Iowa Caucus race is too close to call:  Romney 29,657 votes,  Santorum 29,662 — a 5-vote difference.  Statistically, this looks like a tie.

Rick Santorum is speaking to his supporters as if he has won.  As John Mark predicted, Santorum will be “the story,” even if he doesn’t win.  It’s too delicious for the news media:  An internal fight among Republicans!  Social conservative Santorum against moderate Romney; the Catholic adopted by the Evangelicals against the Mormon whom those voters abhor — or at least mistrust on theological grounds.  That Romney, who was not expected even to be competitive in Iowa, is neck and neck late in the evening, will be a side note to those themes.

As we contemplate this scene, a couple of tweets seem significant:

Jim Geraghty:  “Turnout looks like it will be about 20 percent of the state’s active registered Republicans.”

Mike Murphy:  “On to NH! A lot fewer social conservatives there….”

We’ve said it before:  Iowa means nothing.  It’s a lightly-populated state whose Republican voters are among the most conservative in the country– and only the most extreme 20% of those even vote.  Remember:  In 2008, Mike Huckabee won Iowa.  The same slice of Western Iowa voters who came out for Huck also came out for Santorum.  The same slice of Eastern Iowa and urban Republicans who voted for Romney in 2008 are voting for him now.

One aspect of this year’s caucus is encouraging, however:  It was not an Evangelical versus Mormon battle, at least not on the surface.  Still, as John has noted here before, the battle did seem to be Evangelicals against everyone else, as it was in 2008.   It’s just that this time the Evangelicals were scattered among several candidates (Santorum, Perry, and Bachmann).  All of those candidates have one characteristic in common: they have no reasonable chance of becoming President of the United States.  Electability is not a concern for those voters, evidently.  Maybe it shouldn’t be, in a caucus.  But it sure does matter in a general election.

Romney is now speaking, briefly and brightly congratulating Santorum on a great race, then turning to Barack Obama’s failings.
Then he turns to his Iowa theme:

“This election is bigger, even, than jobs and a strong economy….It’s really an election about the soul of America.”  He goes on to talk about the  principles in the Declaration of Independence, based on our inalienable rights to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

A few lines from “America the Beautiful” and he’s done. So on to New Hampshire.

John Mark here:

I live blogged this at www.johnmarkreynolds.com. Things came out as we expected, though Santorum slightly over performed. Great for him. Great for his Google profile and I like him.

Now let’s be clear:

Perry is done. Bachmann is done. Gingrich is down, because he cannot take a punch. Consider this question. If you had told anyone that: Romney would tie in Iowa and have a double digit lead in New Hampshire and that his major foes would be Rick Santorum and Ron Paul would they have thought Romney in good shape or bad?

Romney will be the GOP nominee.

God created the world in six days. Santorum has eight to create a campaign. Good luck.

John Rises From His Sick Bed…

Almost too ill to be coherent, no clear winner between Romney and Santorum – Bachmann and Perry big losers.  (Newt too, but he is too thick-headed to realize it – more in a moment.)  Romney very well positioned moving forward.  In other words, I agree with my co-bloggers.

Two brief comments.  First, while there was no overt play of the Mormon angle, it played – as Lowell notes in who came out for Santorum.  We noted on last Thursday that Hugh Hewitt interviewed Santorum last week about drawing the backing of Huck’s Army.  That group may have been smart enough to keep their mouth shut this cycle, but history is history.

Secondly, it was clear in his speech that it is personal with Gingrich vis-a-vis Romney.  See Jim Geraghty this morning.  Look for some real ugliness before Newt leaves the scene.

Oh, and by the way – Romney won.

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