Article VI Blog

All week long we have been bombarded with Mormon stories and most of them are about the fact that Romney will win Nevada because it has a heavy Mormon population.  The story has featured prominently in Politico ad WaPo:

Despite comprising about 7 percent of the state’s population, they made up more than one-quarter of the GOP caucus electorate, and entrance polls showed Romney winning a stunning 95 percent of their vote.

In other words, half of Romney’s vote in Nevada came from fellow Mormons, and he could have won the state’s caucuses even if he hadn’t gotten a single vote from anyone else.

Because Mormons vote in unison and because they turn out in large numbers, a state like Nevada is virtually impossible for any of Romney’s opponents to win.

OK, forgive me, I only majored in chemistry and minored in mathematics so I might not be as good as this as a political reporter at the Washington Post but let’s assume 100 votes in the caucus.  25% of those votes are Mormon and 95% of those are going to vote for Romney.  That’s 22 votes.  But last polls in Nevada had Gingrich at 25% – or in our model 25 votes.  So how precisely does Romney win if only Mormons vote for him?  And then, all those non-Mormon votes that Romney just gave up are gong to land somewhere.

And what about that canard that “Mormons vote in unison?” The most quoted Mormon pundit this cycle is Joanna Brooks.  She has risen to the defense of Mormonism many times, but she also is not afraid to take it head-on, and I could be wrong, but a Romney vote is not likely from her.  Mormons in Nevada, all 140,000 of them may vote more or less in lockstep, but in California, or urban Utah – I’m not buying it.  Will the majority of Mormons vote for Romney?  Sure, but not in lockstep.

What is all this really?  Just an attempt to paint Mormons as a creepy cult.  Obviously any large group that would be that single-minded would be both creepy and cultic.  (Unless of course you are a knee jerk liberal, in which case spouting the “party line” is just reasonable.)  The latest raft of stories that attempt to be balanced by calling all the Mormon attention a “mixed blessing (LA Times) or wearing out the alliterative “Mormon Moment” meme (Politico) by their very nature make Mormons seem “odd” because they have to be explained.  I am sure Lowell could cite any number of misunderstandings and misrepresentations in these pieces, but I am concerned that the very existence of these articles, even if correct, has a subliminal effect.

There are also attacks that are far less that subtle.  Dana Milbank writes about a cousin Romney has never met that has some “issues” to say the least.  Here is the funny part:

This isn’t necessarily bad news for Mitt Romney. In most cases, family antics are more embarrassing than politically damaging. And the emergence of a “crazy cousin” might remind voters that Romney, a candidate who too often comes across as programmed, is just like the rest of us.

In other words, “This isn’t really news, but I just spent a whole column on it reminding you that Romney is a Mormon and some people don’t like that.”  I don’t know what’s worse, that people write such transparent drivel or that a significant number of people fail to see through it.

In the meantime, Romney has come out hard defending the Catholic Church against the latest assault by the Obama administration in an op-ed.  Coverage here, highlights here, full text here.  But there remains a messaging problem.  This is only making it through the conservative outlets.  (The left-leaning outlets have their own truly misleading spin.)  The MSM just is not covering the issue left, right or center.

Romney alone has a big enough profile currently to push this issue onto the front pages.  Should he do so?  I am sure many are thinking that since this is a part of the larger issue of Obamacare that handling that issue will handle this one.  True enough.  However, it is not all about the issue.  Romney, as the frontrunner and presumptive nominee, needs to begin his efforts to unite Republicans.   Getting loud and proud about this issue can go a long way to accomplishing that.  Not to mention it is the perfect opportunity for Romney to get indignant – something that a lot of voters seem to want to see.  To borrow some papal language – This ruling is anathema – it is worthy of strong emotion.  Romney has said “It’s not worth getting angry about.”  There is wisdom in that – anger often clouds judgement, but somethings are so heinous that they are repulsive and they deserve a visceral response.   This is one of them.

Vic Lundquist at Mitt Romney Central wrote yesterday about how many people of very serious, non-Mormon Christian faith are supporting Romney.  It’s an impressive list.  But it needs to expand.  The ruling by HHS is the perfect open door for Romney to move from being the Mormon candidate to the candidate of faith.  For some of us he has been that for a while, but a lot of people still need to get the message.  The op-ed is a great start, but unless Romney pushes hard on this – really, really hard – it will languish within the wide circle that is his supporters.  That circle needs to grow for the general.

Lowell adds . . .

Romney as the candidate of faith is an interesting idea. I agree that he should step forward as a faith-friendly, but at this point in the race he should not try to out-Santorum rick Santorum. I think the time will come when people of faith (well, most of them) will turn to Romney as their guy.

What does seem clear is that Romney himself is the one who decides on his message and the language he will use:

“There are a lot of people who make suggestions to the governor and provide drafts to him, but the governor uses a heavy red pencil” in his speeches, said spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom. “Everything that he says — whether it’s at a news conference, a debate, or a formal speech — flows from his own pen. He is ultimately his own speechwriter.”

For his own reasons (at which I can only guess) Gov. Romney has taken a very measured approach to discussions about faith.  I can’t say that I blame him, since he can’t say anything right about that subject in the eyes of so many people, including prominently the MSM that filters and repackages his statements.

Even on the conservative side there is constant niggling about what Romney says, as is evident in Stephen F. Hayes’ latest explanation of why Romney makes conservatives nervous.  Predictably, Hayes concludes his piece wishing Romney were more like someone else.  At least this time it’s a living person, Marco Rubio, and not Ronald Reagan, who never made mistakes or misstatements and was consistently and reliably conservative on every issue. (Insert eye-rolling smiley face here.)

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In the rush to say something, anything, after a big electoral event like Florida yesterday things can get said that are revealing.  On the smart side of things Robert Costa wondered if Gingrich is now a wounded animal, often more dangerous than a healthy one:

Speaking to supporters on Monday, Gingrich was defiant. Enraged by Romney’s “dishonest” television ads, he pledged to stay in the hunt until the convention, almost out of spite.

[...]

Indeed, as Romney said tonight, addressing his cheering supporters, “a competitive primary does not divide us, it prepares us.” If he’s right, Florida will have been a tumultuous stepping stone. If not, his negative ads, along with Gingrich’s barbs, may be only the start of an extended, bitter battle.

But a wounded animal tends to lash out and not exercise strategery.  Consider this tweet from an obvious Newt supporter:

This is why I can’t stand Mitt and a lot of his supporters…they are whine like a toddles and have the same level of self awareness of one.

COPY EDITOR!  Honestly, I thought I was bad at typing and spelling (Thank you Lowell!).  Anyway, we spent all last week looking at Gingrich’s total lack of self-awareness among his many other character flaws.  Fortunately, people are not bears.  When wounded they lash out, and they lash out with the increased vigor of an adrenaline rush.  But such adrenaline rushes also tend to block out the higher functions of the cerebral cortex.  Thus we get, “I know I am, but what are you.”  If this is what we have to worry about from a wounded Team Gingrich, I have better things to worry about.

Such as…

Mitt Romney may have taken his opposition to sound bit heaven to this morning.  He did an interview with CNN, from which a single sentence has been excerpted and is already being tweeted and facebooked and spread throughout the land:

“I’m not concerned about the very poor. We have a safety net there. If it needs a repair, I’ll fix it.”

Now, it’ll be interesting to watch this.  Romney is, of course, talking on a policy level, not a personal concern level.  But that doesn’t undo the damage such a quote can inflict.  I also think that is a much more potent weapon in the general than it is now.  So, will it be held in check or will its power be wasted by Team Gingrich?

Whatever, Team Romney needs to get on this fast and hard or else “I’m not concerned about the very poor,” is going to join “I was for the 47 billion before I was against it,” in the pantheon of killer sound bites.

Of Course, It’s Nonsense…

The benevolence of the Mormon Chruch should be more renown than it is, but nobody wants to pay attention to the good stuff about the LDS.  A South Carolina professor has now studied the vote out of that state and found that religion played a significant role.  Well shucks, we know that – and the results out of Florida confirmed it.  But people suspicious of Romney’s faith are running out of places to go.  Friend David French pointed out in a special piece for CNN that Evangelicals will soon be abandoning Gingrich in droves:

But they also understand that we don’t discard our core values for the sake of political victories. Fidelity, honesty, humility and charity matter.

No one doubts that God forgives, but only God knows Newt Gingrich’s heart.  We only know his actions, and we know that he has a history of deceiving even those who are closest to him.

Three other Republican candidates are anti-abortion. Three other Republican candidates have been faithful and honest in their personal and professional lives. With honest alternatives to choose from, evangelicals will soon abandon Gingrich.

Santorum is a good man that deserves a better shot than he has received, too late now.  Paul is a good man, but a political looney tune.  They have no place to go but to Romney.

A lot of people are worried about a divided Republican base, fortunately…

The Left Will Unite Us

The really no longer relevant NYTimes has been carrying a series of blog posts about Mormonism.  They have many ominous titles:

• A Male Dominated World
• Can a Candidate be Too Perfect?
• It May Look Good on Paper
• What Is It About Mormons?
• Mormon’s Double Legacy

My favorite is the horror movie title sounding, There is a Dark Side To Mormonism.  (Can you hear the organ sting?)  These are all far-left hits pieces about Mormon being “anti-gay” or believing that the sexes are actually, you know, different from one another.  This is all stuff we conventional Christians hold very much in common with Mormons.  I believe come the general election, given this kind of attack, we will see our similarities more than our differences.

Besides, according to the left we are all crazy:

Coming this spring: The Republican Brain: The Science of Why They Deny Science — and Reality by Chris Mooney.

Of course.

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…that the Mormon issue is alive and kicking in liberal circles, but more or less dead in conservative ones after South Carolina three articles popped up today.

John McCain made some comments about what role it make have played in South Carolina.

“We haven’t had time to do a real analysis of the Romney race in South Carolina, but once we break that down, there was some element of anti-Mormonism in that vote,” McCain asserted. “I’m not saying all of it, but there were elements there. There was nothing that Mitt Romney could have done.”

Well gee Senator, why not just read this blog – we had that figured out last Monday morning.  Of course, the Aussies agree with us.  But as a lengthy CNN blog post notes, Evangelicals are quite different in different regions:

Conservative Christian activist Ralph Reed has called the Bible Belt home for decades, but he grew up in Miami in the 1970s, when the city was emerging as a diverse megalopolis.

Among his middle school friends were Jews, Catholics and Methodists.

Then, at age 15, Reed’s family relocated to the sleepy mountain town of Toccoa, Georgia, so his dad, a doctor, could take a better-paying job.

“It was very conservative,” says Reed, who now lives outside Atlanta. “At first – as would be true of any 15-year-old – I didn’t like it. I think it was a culture shock.”

Ultimately, the mostly evangelical residents of Toccoa shaped Reed’s faith, helping lead him to Jesus in his 20s. But in terms of his faith-based organizing, the well-known activist drew more on his experiences in hyper-diverse Miami.

“Later on in life, when I became a leader in the Christian Coalition, I had a greater appreciation [for] ethnic and religious diversification,” Reed says.

I am reminded of Lowell’s comments on how Utah Mormons are often quite different than Mormons in other parts of the country and especially in urban areas.  Had I a degree in sociology and political science it would be an interesting study to try and figure out if the whole divide is a urban/rural thing more than a religious thing, or if those things could even be separated?  Maybe its a three-way thing – rural Evangelicals-rural Mormons-urban people united in faith?  I don’t know, but it would be an interesting study.  Besides, I thought liberals ruled the urban areas?  They most certainly know how to get nasty on this point.

Remember our old “friend” at Slate, Jacob Weisberg with “the founding whoppers of Mormonism“?   Well, Slate is back with an explanation of Mormon belief concerning the afterlife, under the headline:

What’s Hell Like for Mormons?
No man on Earth can understand it.

No, there’s no snark there, none at all.  The sheer lack of respect such a headline conveys requires a Christian of any stripe to stand up and object.  I mean, even if I don’t agree with the Mormon view, mere civility – a Christian virtue – demands that I point out their lack of civility and defend the victims of it.

The general is not going to be any fun at all.

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Can I be honest?  I did not enjoy the post I wrote yesterday.  It was truthful, and it needed to be written, but it was no fun.  To watch some of my fellow Evangelicals descend into THE BIG LIE (as Orwell coined it, “To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient…”) is not something that brings any pleasure whatsoever.  So, it is time to look at some of the positive.

A South Carolina paper and CNN look at Evangelicals in South Carolina that are going out of their way to support Mitt Romney.  Says the NYTimes:

Four years ago, Mitt Romney’s Mormon faith was a point of considerable concern, if not contention, for many Republican voters in South Carolina, a state where many voters are evangelical Christians and one that is known for its bare-knuckled politics.

With two days until this year’s South Carolina’s primary, the issue of Mr. Romney’s faith has not vanished, though it is not nearly as prevalent as it was in 2008.

That’s very true and it is very heartening to read stories out of South Carolina about people that are reasonable, because not all of them are:

A prominent South Carolina evangelical endorsed Rick Santorum on Wednesday, and slammed Mitt Romney for his Mormon faith.

The criticism from the Rev. Huey Mills, the head of the South Carolina Association of Christian Schools, is the must public attack on Romney’s religion in the state so far.

“My attitude is first ‘anybody but Romney,’ and second, ‘let’s get Santorum elected,’ said Mills, whose organization includes 85 schools in South Carolina. Mills told The Hill that Mormonism is a “cult” and said he could never vote for Romney partly because he is a Mormon.

That’s really unfortunate, particularly when Santorum is coming under fire for his Catholicism.  Any campaign has way too many adherents for the campaign to respond to stupid statement by any one of them; however, given the circumstances, and the fact that this made an outlet as prestigious as “The Hill” I think it would behoove the Santorum campaign to issue a statement along the lines of,  “We welcome the support of all people, as especially the support of those that agree with us on crucial social issues.  This includes the Reverend Huey Mills.  However, this candidate and his campaign do not agree with the statement made by Rev. Mills regarding the Mormon church, nor do we find such rhetoric is appropriate for this or any campaign.”

But back to the positive stuff.  There is much being written about Romney’s donations to the LDS church.  Much of the coverage is trying to make it look sinister, both by the nature of the transactions and by the fact that they went to that particular church.  I view these donations as nothing but good news.  To have a candidate this extraordinarily generous is something this nation sorely needs.  To have a candidate that understands that people can care for each other when they have the resources better than the government can may be the most vital element of this election cycle.

And as things turn out, I am not alone in my distaste for last weekends confab of “Evangelical leaders.”  Jeffrey Weiss asks an interesting question:

But beyond the politics, this is an unusual opportunity to see whether the people the media reports usually describe as “conservative Christian leaders” are actual leaders. No question that some of the attendees at the weekend event were well-known spokesmen. And that they get quoted plenty.

But how many people do they actually lead?

If the polling is any judge (and Weiss contends it is) not many.  David Neff points out:

I believe that Christians have an urgent duty to engage the social, economic, and moral threats to a healthy society. That requires a wide variety of political action. However, one thing it doesn’t call for is playing kingmaker and powerbroker.

By conspiring to throw their weight behind a single evangelical-friendly candidate, they fed the widespread perception that evangelicalism’s main identifying feature is right-wing political activism focused on abortion and homosexuality….

I am jealous for the reputation of evangelical Christians.

I don’t agree with everything Neff says, but he has a point in there.  Such actions do identify the church as a political instrument instead of a spiritual one , and it can, and in this case probably has, tarred the reputation of us all.  And conservative pollster Dr. David Hill kicks things up a notch:

My critique of the religious leaders in the GOP today, dare we call them the Pharisees, is that they are doing more to hurt the cause of the Kingdom of God than they seem to recognize. Personally, I think the greatest public affront to the Trinity is the many divisions we see in the Body of Christ — the church. And as I have reflected on the history of those divisions, going back to the earliest centuries of the church’s development, the splits most often occur at moments when political and religious people and policies become intertwined to foster disunity. Today’s Pharisees need to re-read John 17:21 and grasp the importance of oneness: “I pray that they will all be one, just as you and I are one — as you are in me, Father, and I am in you. And may they be in us so that the world will believe you sent me.” As long as Christ followers are divided by lesser issues, like who deserves the GOP nomination, why would unbelievers be turned around?

[...]

Make no mistake about the Pharisees’ strategies, though: This anti-Romney stuff is more theological jihad than ideological critique. But if mainline Christians cannot even agree on the nature of the last days and afterlife, how do they credibly progress to a political posture critiquing Mormon Christology? Matthew 7:3 says it well of hypocrisy: “And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own?” I doubt the extra-biblical notion of purgatory that Catholics such as Santorum and Gingrich presumably endorse. Should I therefore publicly and stridently oppose their nomination because they might encourage others to believe in purgatory? Heaven forbid.

That deserves a hearty “AMEN!”

There, I have cleansed my intellectual palate.  Have a great day.

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The most amazing thing about last night’s debate is how little has been written about it.  It was debate, what? Umpteen?  That fact making it somewhat less than newsworthy on its own accord.  There is also the Twitter phenomena.  It seems that tweeted snark has replaced the drinking game as the activity of choice during a debate, leaving very little to talk about once the thing is over.  I did not get to see it because my wife had the day off and time with her is time much better spent than watching ANOTHER debate.  So with little to go on, it looks like the guns finally all pointed at Romney, but most pundits seem to think with little effect.  At least that seems to be the consensus of the tweets Jim Geraghty rounded up and the point of Hugh Hewitt’s instant analysis.

See, here is the thing – Artillery is best to prepare the battlefield, but once the armies are engaged it can harm your troops as much as the opposition.  And speaking of artillery, that brings me to the subject of TV ads.  There is so much written about them – we lavish attention on them as if they are the sole means in which the average voter is influenced.  And yet, in this age most voters can get on the internet and see all that discussion about ads, and fact-checking, and spin and….  Not to mention TV ain’t what it used to be in terms of viewership.  With all the options on cable you can now target your base much more effectively, but I truly wonder if TV is the heavy artillery it used to be.  Come voting time it is not the base you need to reach.

What’s more, it is looking increasingly like the Romney troops on the battlefield are an M1 Abrams on a WWI trench field – sort of rolling over everything and too tough for any of the fire it is taking to be effective.  Consider all the polling data, and discussion of polling data in places like here – here – here – here – here and here.  Nate Silver who spends a lot of time looking at polls says:

I don’t know that I’d go so far as to say that Mr. Romney has a 98 percent chance of winning the nomination. But the odds attributed to him by the betting market Intrade, which now gives him a 90 percent chance, may if anything be too conservative.

It is going to take a lot of “fire” to deal with something like that.

The fact that even with their much vaunted meeting to “settle” on a candidate, Evangelicals (at least as the press defines them) cannot seem to get their act together is also contributing to the apparent inevitability of a Romney nomination.  Many “Evangelicals” are spreading out like wildfire to say they are still for someone besides Santorum.  Despite appearances, there is even a Catholic/Protestant dust-up over the meeting itself.  You can read more coverage here – here – here – here and here.  Two key factors at play here.  One is the Evangelicals are not, nor have they ever been, the monolithic demographic that pundits and political consultants want them to be.  Secondly; however, is that much of this is driven by a need amongst some in the Evangelical community to attract attention to themselves.  I could step up in the pulpit over this second observation, but will resist the temptation

Most astonishing of the Evangelical spread out’s was the silly man himself – Robert Jeffress on Hugh Hewitt:

HH: Well said. Twilight’s Last Gleaming. Now let’s get to practical politics. There was a big meeting in Texas this weekend. I talked to Tony Perkins about it.

RJ: Right.

HH: You took a pass.

RJ: I did. We had a representative from our church there, and I respect what they’re doing. And I’ve said consistently that Christians ought to have a higher standard than William Buckley. You know, he had his doctrine we ought to elect the most conservative candidate who’s electable. I’ve been saying, Hugh, we ought to look for the most consistently conservative Christian with character. And you know, I think Mitt Romney’s nomination is inevitable. I said on MSNBC Saturday the fat lady hasn’t sung, but she’s in the green room warming up. You know, so, but I think, but still, we have an opportunity, maybe, to select somebody else. If it’s Mitt Romney? Look, in November, we may have to hold our noses and vote for the lesser of two evils. [Emphasis added]

Romney’s “inevitability” is becoming a theme in a lot of coverage.  So what to make of the “Mormon Question?”  Some are still working hard on it.  I think there is a lot of insight here:

It’s become reflexive for social-conservative voters to insist that Mormonism isn’t an issue, that it’s Romney’s record of flip-flops and Massachusetts’ individual insurance mandates, but polls tell us that evangelical Christians don’t trust Mormons. To ignore the religion issue is like ignoring President Obama’s race. No one who cares what other people think would admit to caring that Obama is (sort of) Black, but there are still a lot of bigots in the world. To declare that we live in a post-racial world because we’ve had black men and women serve in the most sensitive and important cabinet posts, as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on the United States Supreme Court and in the White House is just absurd. Race matters.

And religion matters.

It shouldn’t – but it does.  It’s all in how you play it.  Race was played in the last election – defensively – and it has a lot to do with how Obama won – it imparted a certain teflon quality to him.  Religion will not play that way.  Open opposition against religion is too plain.  As one insightful Mormon points out:

Liberals, not evangelicals, will have the bigger problem with Mormonism

When you see the likes of Robert Jeffress talking about Romney inevitability, even with the cracks about “lesser of evils” and “holding noses” you have to think that observation is very true.  It is interesting that as the President tries to look more religious, others are lining up to attack all religion.  There is some pretty ugly stuff out there (warning some of these links feature very offensive advertising).  It is going to take a lot of energy on the part of ALL religious people to overcome this onslaught.  We have to get over “holding our noses” and become enthusiastic if we are to prevail in the war.

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Now that media darling candidate Jon Huntsman – the other Mormon in the race – has left the building, the Mormon talk has gone from uptick to through the roof.  You would not do anything but read and I would not to anything but write if we tried to touch on all of it, but here are a few favs:

• WaPo has a photo album.
• Newsday says, “Be Vewy vewy quiet….”
• The NYTime goes theological.
• Saturday, we mentioned Bob Jones University – yesterday CNN could not get what they wanted out of Bob Jones III.

But Romney is not alone.  The long knives are also out against Santorum.

The facts on the ground; however, remain largely unchanged.  Nationally, Romney’s polling is looking better and better.  And even a paper as left wing as the LATimes has figured out that those in the stop-Romney camp are not really to force they think they are.

More as it develops.

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