Evangelicals and Democrats

by Kieran Healy on March 6, 2006

“Amy Sullivan”:http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2006/0604.sullivan.html writes about the prospect of the Democratic party recruiting evangelical or conservative Christians. Kevin Drum “comments”:http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_03/008354.php

bq. I have to confess that I’ve always been skeptical of the notion that liberals should spend much time trying to get the Christian evangelical community on our side. When push comes to shove, they just care way more about sex and “moral degeneracy” than they do about helping the poor or taking care of the environment, and that means that outreach efforts are ultimately doomed to failure.

Two quick points about this (with pictures!) below the fold.

First, when political commentators talk about wooing the evangelical or conservative Christian base, they typically mean — but do not say — that they’re talking about _white_ conservatives. African-American Christians may look similar on theological issues like the veracity of the Bible, but they vote Democratic. Here, for example, is some data courtesy of Andrew Greeley and Mike Hout, from a forthcoming book on conservative Christians in America. (Andy presented some of this work in my department recently, and these figures are based on some crosstabulations of GSS data that he showed us.) The three panels in the figure below break respondents down by their answer to a question about the truth of the Bible — is it the literal word of god, the divinely inspired work of men and women, or a book of historical fables. Within each panel, we see what percentage of each of four kinds of Protestant groups voted Democratic in Presidential elections in the 1990s. These groups are Blacks affiliated with historically black churches, blacks affiliated with other Protestant churches, whites affiliated with Mainline Protestant denominations, and Whites affiliated with Conservative protestant denominations. (Note, of course, that these are percentages: in terms of sheer numbers there are more conservative white Christians than their black counterparts.)



The two things to notice are, first, blacks pretty much always vote Democratic. You knew that already, but it’s worth reiterating given that many African-Americans also believe in the literal truth of the Bible, attend church every week or read the Bible every day. In fact, African-Americans with conservative views on the Bible are _more_ likely to vote Democratic than those who think it’s just a bunch of stories.

Second, while it’s clear that white conservative Christians lean heavily towards Republicans, the swing in some cases isn’t as large as you would think. More than a third of white conservative christians who profess the literal truth of the Bible still vote Democratic. That’s probably more than you imagined. The picture is similar for church attendance, as shown below.



Now, the implications for Democratic Party strategy are of course not so clear. For one thing, the structure of U.S. Presidential elections means that recruiting more conservative Christians at random probably won’t do much good. And the question of which _policies_, exactly, would win over these voters is also unclear. On the other hand, it’s at least worth bearing in mind that there’s more than one sort of conservative Christian, and that they’re not actually required to vote Republican — even if they’re white.

{ 135 comments }

1

Frenchdoc 03.06.06 at 11:13 pm

Aaah, finally, some good ol’-fashioned sociological analysis… gotta love Microcase!
My favorite phrases when teaching intro to soc when students blather half-baked opinions: “let’s go to the data” and “it’s more complicated than that”
That’s why sociologists are never on cable TV and never become pundits… :-(

2

Kenny Easwaran 03.07.06 at 12:03 am

Is there a particular reason that “Black: Other” are grouped together? Are most of these people members of Evangelical or Mainline denominations? I’m mainly wondering because I can’t tell if one would expect “Black: Other” to be more or less theologically conservative than “Black: Afro Am”. (Based on the voting trends they look slightly more conservative, though that could easily be because of a lessened racial affiliation, even if they were mostly Unitarians and Quakers.) I’m guessing the three empty spots in the diagrams are places where there wasn’t enough data available? Are these data gathered from exit polls, or some other survey method? It seems a bit surprising to me that there wasn’t enough data to talk about black protestants that never attend church, though there was enough to talk about white conservative protestants that never attend church. But I guess there are just a lot more white conservative protestants than black people in general.

Anyway, quite interesting!

3

Kieran Healy 03.07.06 at 12:09 am

The data are from the General Social Survey through the 1990s. I constructed the figures from my note of a table presented in the talk. As far as I recall dividing up the African-American congregants this way is not unusual: I’ll check into it.

4

bad Jim 03.07.06 at 4:45 am

“Black – other” appears to be contrasted with “Black – Afro-American”. The distinction is obscure, and both groups poll about the same, so it appears not to matter that they might instead be mixed, South Asian, Australian or whatever.

Claims of the literal truth of the Bible can’t and shouldn’t be taken seriously. Who can claim the literal truth of poems or proverbs? It shouldn’t be news that pollsters harvest earnestly expressed pieties, or that there’s a whole lotta metaphorical exegesis going on.

Even the most devout believer will generally yield to common sense and shrug off the consequent cognitive dissonance.

5

Brett Bellmore 03.07.06 at 7:16 am

The implication of this ought to scare Democrats spitless: If blacks ever shake off the “racist Republican” meme, and start voting accoring the their beliefs, especially on social issues, the Democratic party is toast. You’re just too reliant on getting a percentage of the black vote approaching 100%.

Condi Rice vs the usual socially liberal white Democrat could probably start that happening.

6

brenton k 03.07.06 at 7:30 am

Brett, maybe instead of Black people shaking off the notion that Republicans are racist, the Republicans should stop being racist. Or do you really think the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina — not just the immediate incompetence, but also the complete dropping of it from the federal legislative agenda and the focus on giveaways to developers and mega-corporations instead of the actual people affected in the months since — doesn’t tell us anything about how Republicans feel toward Blacks?

7

Russell Arben Fox 03.07.06 at 7:55 am

“If blacks ever shake off the ‘racist Republican’ meme, and start voting accoring the their beliefs, especially on social issues, the Democratic party is toast.”

All the more reason for the Democratic party to continue its tentative work at recruiting candidates–not always, and not everywhere, but where it would matter–who are capable of joining a religiously conservative take on certain social issues with progressive political causes. Not because it’ll make all the difference in the world; it’s foolish to pretend (as, admittedly, some of us on the Christian left sometimes do) that there is some huge “left traditionalist” subset of the electorate out there, just waiting for a candidate. Rather, they should do it because, in some places at least, it could mean the difference between a competent politician and a Neaderthal in office, and moreover because it’ll show those on the bubble–both African-American and otherwise–that they don’t have to set their religious and social hopes aside when voting Democratic.

8

Uncle Kvetch 03.07.06 at 9:07 am

PZ Myers slapped this nonsense down quite nicely the other day. Amy Sullivan is basically a Mickey Kaus who knows how to write.

All the more reason for the Democratic party to continue its tentative work at recruiting candidates—not always, and not everywhere, but where it would matter—who are capable of joining a religiously conservative take on certain social issues with progressive political causes.

Yeah, that’s the ticket. Hasn’t “Just like the Republicans, only not quite so, y’know, Republican about it” been a consistently winning formula for the Democrats?

it’ll show those on the bubble—both African-American and otherwise—that they don’t have to set their religious and social hopes aside when voting Democratic.

“Don’t fret, People of the Bubble–you can vote Democratic and still hate homos!” Beautiful.

9

Rob 03.07.06 at 9:10 am

Only if those stupid blacks would listen to smart people like, Brett who are better than them they could see they should vote Republican. But they are just too stupid.

Yep, no racism there.

10

Baal_Shem_Ra 03.07.06 at 9:28 am

How big is the moderate white evangelical population in Florida, Ohio, Missouri, Pennsylvania and the other big swing states? Isn’t that what matters most (solely?) when considering election statergies?

“A targeted effort by the Democratic Party to appeal to them could produce victories in the short term”
Like what? Is Godtalk and some Bible classes enough to attract those she calls moderate evangelicals? Lieberman cannot possibly be accused of being hostile to religion, ran as vice and that hasn’t shaken off the reputation. What would be sufficient? She mentions abstinence (alongside birth control) but I gather evangelicals only want abstinence, birth control encourages teens to have sex and all that. Any data on how much abstinence classes reduce unwanted pregnancies? She asserts that it does when she says :”plan that would truly reduce abortions”.

11

arthur 03.07.06 at 9:52 am

The implication of this ought to scare Republicans spitless: If racist whites ever shake off the “racist Republican” meme, and start voting accoring the their beliefs, especially on social issues, the Republican party is toast. You’re just too reliant on getting a percentage of the white racist vote approaching 100%.

Condi Rice vs the usual white Democrat could probably start that happening.

12

harry b 03.07.06 at 10:32 am

uncle kvetch,

I’m not so sure. If you divide issues into social issue and economic issues, what the Democrats consistently do is talk liberal on both, but act conservative on economic, and not-too-liberal on social issues. Maybe talking less liberal (ie more in synch with how they act — and all I care about is how they act) on social issues would make it easier for them to win conservative support on economic issues. This assumes, of course, that they ahve some will to act more liberal on economic issues, which is a big assumption.

Think about the fuss the Kerry campaign made over stem-cell research. They, well, to put it kindly, they misled people about how soon it might actually do some good. In doing so they pissed away who knows how many RC voters by making a start-of-life issue a major part of their campaign. Does ANYONE think that stem cell research holds out greater promise for the health prospects of the 50% least advantaged Americans than better public health measures, less inequality, and universal primary care? Does anyone think that making a fuss about stem cell research before the election enhanced Kerry’s ability to do whatever he wanted about it if he had subsequently won? (sorry, that’s me on my hobby horse).

Gay marriage would, in my view, by a real and substantial gain, one worth making a fight about if you are really serious about it. But again, you can choose how you talk about it. I’d like to see some heterosexual and un-divorced Democrats defending gay marriage and pointing out very forcibly to religious conservative constituencies the hypocrisy of people who have themselves divorced opposing or voting against gay marriage, and pointing out, too, that the Republicans are in the party that even more than the Democrats opposes the preconditions for successful family life. I do realise that because the Dems are so deepply implicated in so much of what is wrong they cannot do this easily.

So I guess I’m moderately attached to a kind of Sullivan-lite alternative; be a bit more strategic about when and how you choose to piss these people off, and only do it when what is at stake is some real policy pay-off (like gay marriage).

I should add that I think its pretty irrelevant what someone like me (or you) think about what the Dems should do; its not our party, and it doesn’t want us around!

13

Barbar 03.07.06 at 10:35 am

The only reason Condi Rice is even mentioned as a Presidential candidate is that a lot of Republicans are dying for a shot to prove they aren’t racists.

14

nick s 03.07.06 at 10:36 am

If blacks ever shake off the “racist Republican” meme, and start voting accoring the their beliefs, especially on social issues, the Democratic party is toast.

Fortunately, arrogant white ‘libertarians’ like Brett ensure that it’s a big ‘if’.

15

nick s 03.07.06 at 10:38 am

The only reason Condi Rice is even mentioned as a Presidential candidate is that a lot of Republicans are dying for a shot to prove they aren’t racists.

I’d like to see that in practice: say, at the 2008 South Carolina primary.

16

Russell Arben Fox 03.07.06 at 10:45 am

Uncle Kvetch,

“Amy Sullivan is basically a Mickey Kaus who knows how to write.”

I don’t think she’s that bad, but I do agree she makes the whole thing seem a little too easy and obvious. It’s not as simple as just asking Democrats to up the religious rhetoric while speaking to particular audiences, what Michael Kazin called the “dishonest pandering of the last two Democratic nominees for president”; there has to be a rethinking of the ground upon which traditional Democratic arguments are advanced.

“Hasn’t ‘Just like the Republicans, only not quite so, y’know, Republican about it’ been a consistently winning formula for the Democrats?”

Considering the voting data on church-going, lower and middle-class Southern whites, Bill “abortion should be safe, legal, and rare” Clinton would appear to be Exhibit #1 in favor of this position (in contrast to the two examples cited above).

“‘Don’t fret, People of the Bubble—you can vote Democratic and still hate homos!’ Beautiful.”

I must admit, I wasn’t aware that homophobia is the be-all and end-all of anything that could possibly lead someone–white or black–to affirm certain socially conservative positions, or even cast votes for socially conservative candidates on occasion.

17

Steve LaBonne 03.07.06 at 11:02 am

Is it that you really weren’t aware or that you just didn’t want to know, Russell? If you don’t understand that misogyny and homophobia are the twin streams of sewage that fertilize the Christian Right movement in all its permutations, you don’t understand much of anything.

18

KCinDC 03.07.06 at 11:04 am

PZ Myers is great at tracking insane anti-evolution sentiment, but not exactly the adviser I’d choose for the Democrats on reaching out to (and keeping) religious voters. In some alternative universe in which a large majority of the US voting public were atheists, then perhaps I’d consider him.

Perhaps I’m biased by having once gone to church with her (a church that has plenty of gay members, by the way), but I think Amy Sullivan’s ideas are more about rhetoric and choices of focus rather than about “Republican-lite” policies. Where is she suggesting reaching out to homophobes?

19

Uncle Kvetch 03.07.06 at 11:20 am

I must admit, I wasn’t aware that homophobia is the be-all and end-all of anything that could possibly lead someone—white or black—to affirm certain socially conservative positions, or even cast votes for socially conservative candidates on occasion.

Really? Do you know the nature of the big electoral push being planned by the religious right for the midterm elections? It’s not abortion, it’s not school vouchers, it’s not abstinence-based sex “education”: it’s state ballot initiatives to ban adoption by gays and lesbians. How I look forward to the coming months: listening to theocratic bigots discussing why people like myself shouldn’t be trusted to be around children, while Amy Sullivan instructs me to be quiet and let her handle this. I’d only alienate them, after all.

Maybe you and I have simply have wildly different conceptions of what constitues a “social conservative,” Russell.

I should add that I think its pretty irrelevant what someone like me (or you) think about what the Dems should do; its not our party, and it doesn’t want us around!

Well, that’s pretty much the nub of it, Harry B. Kevin Drum recognizes this in his post on Sullivan–not being religious, he’s part of the problem, not the solution. The nonreligious among us are expected to sit quietly while people of faith like Sullivan fight the good fight. Of course, being Kevin Drum, he can’t muster anything stronger than a “Hmm, I’m not quite sure just how I feel about that,” but that’s not surprising.

20

Russell Arben Fox 03.07.06 at 11:26 am

“If you don’t understand that misogyny and homophobia are the twin streams of sewage that fertilize the Christian Right movement in all its permutations, you don’t understand much of anything.”

I also wasn’t aware that “someone [who affirms] certain socially conservative positions, or even cast[s] votes for socially conservative candidates on occasion”–which is, you will note, what I wrote–and “the Christian Right movement in all its permutations” are identical. They don’t appear to be such to me. The “Christian right movement” I take to be a group of mobilized quasi-theocrats who are about as likely to stop voting Republican as George Bush is to admit mistakes. The former group, by contrast, appears to include some of the latter, but isn’t–at least, not if the data Kieran has supplied is any indication–identical to it.

Though of course, I suppose as usual it all comes down to definitions. If you think the only possible reason on earth that anyone just might circumscribe the practice of abortion is because they hate all women everywhere (because, of course, that’s what the Bible teaches), well then, it’s all settled: you’ve nicely defined all those evangelicals which Kieran graphed for us as completely beyond the Democratic pale. What a great kick-off for Ohio in 2008.

21

paul 03.07.06 at 11:29 am

The “literal truth of the bible” bit is even more of a meaningless piety among the conservative white christians, unless of course their inerrant copies of the Good Book are somehow missing the passages about “replenish the earth” and “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.”

22

Daniel 03.07.06 at 11:38 am

I think Russell has a point here. “Will and Grace” could not be as big a TV series as it was without picking up at least material audience share in the demographic described.

On the other hand, “Arthur”, with post number 11 above has obviously won “comment of the week”, so I can’t be bothered saying any more.

23

Steve LaBonne 03.07.06 at 11:44 am

Russell, when they admit (given the high rate of spontaneous abortions) that they worship the all-time mass murderer of babies, then I’ll be willing to conclude that their stated principles are really thought-through and their implications digested. But in so many ways, of which that is only one of the the most glaring, the blathering about “life” is very clearly just rhetoric and sentimentality, not a principle that is ever followed consistently to any legitimate ethical conclusions, nor by any means the emotional nexus where the anti-abortion fervor truly originates. You really do understand very little…

24

Steve LaBonne 03.07.06 at 12:10 pm

And I want to add one more thing. I once held a “moderate” position that included a lot of discomfort with abortion and a Clintonian insistence that it be rare as well as safe and legal. Then I started asking myself- as someone with training in developmental biology- what justified that discomfort in the most uncomplicated case, that of an early embryo which only a lunatic could regard as anything even close to a fully-fledged person. When I really examined my conscience for unexamined assumptions I found a lot of stuff about women, sex and “responsibility” which I found quite unattractive when I really brought it out into the light of day and looked at it. Others might benefit from a similar self-examination.

25

Uncle Kvetch 03.07.06 at 12:14 pm

If you think the only possible reason on earth that anyone just might circumscribe the practice of abortion is because they hate all women everywhere (because, of course, that’s what the Bible teaches), well then, it’s all settled: you’ve nicely defined all those evangelicals which Kieran graphed for us as completely beyond the Democratic pale.

And if there were any Democratic candidates, officeholders, or party representatives who actually went around saying that, then you’d have a point, Russell. But they don’t, and you know it. So just what is it that you and Amy Sullivan are arguing?

26

Steve LaBonne 03.07.06 at 12:25 pm

Oh, they don’t hate women- as long as they’re sexless. Let them have- worse, enjoy- “unauthorized” sex, then you’ll see the hatred…

27

Tim 03.07.06 at 12:38 pm

A good portion of “the Christian right” won’t vote for Democrats because they don’t respect Democrats.

My dad didn’t vote in the last presidential election (voted in the rest of the elections on the ballot) because he couldn’t stomach any of the candidates, and my mom held her nose and voted for Bush; I held mine and voted for Kerry.

If Democrats, individual Democrats enough to make a critical mass, can say, listen, we think that we have a moral and theological obligation to do what it is we do, and can show that there’s consistency to their message, and, yes, that it is consistent with their religious worldview, then they can start earning the respect of religious swing voters.

The Cuomo abortion position is an example of pussyfooting inconsistency. The Clinton abortion position is more respectable.

Changes in policy positions aren’t needed; what’s needed are politicians willing to put their beliefs on the line. It’s not just about showing respect for religious voters; it’s about earning their respect.

28

Hektor Bim 03.07.06 at 12:50 pm

Kerry pushed stem cell research because it was a winning issue for the Democrats, and it still is.

I think there are a lot of things here that need to be disentangled. Whatever Democratic candidate appears is not going to agree with me or anyone else on this thread on every issue. So there will be some disagreement on issues and some disagreement on cultural markers and sensitivity.

I’m all for sensitivity to religious groups, since that’s where the votes are. But I see no evidence of insensitivity to religious groups by Democratic candidates. Kerry and Gore both were very respectful of religion, and it got them nowhere.

The cultural referent may be needed to save us, in which case the Democrats are doomed to nominating Southern Baptist governors as their candidates for President. Maybe that is what it takes.

As for issues, I don’t understand the “conservative cultural” argument. As far as I can tell from what I’ve read from RAF before, it comes down to abortion, abstinence, and prayer in schools.

I don’t understand why those issues are more important to RAF, as opposed to all the other issues out there, like capital punishment, poverty, unjust wars, divorce, etc. which are all also condemned by religions, but there you go.

I don’t believe religious conservatives when they say that if the Democrats became pro-life, they would vote for them. They would just demand more, and most of what I see coming from them is to dismantle separation of church and state. Abstinence education doesn’t work, as numerous studies have shown. So the only reason to waste government money on it is as a sop to people’s religious beliefs. Prayer in schools is pure establishment of religion, and is actually blasphemous in certain religions, so I don’t see how that could work either.

If that is the only thing keeping you from voting for the Democrats, then it seems the more rational thing to do is vote for a more economically liberal, church-establishment party and stop voting for the Republicans.

If one decides to keep voting for the Republicans solely because of chursh-state and abortion, that says that you consider those issues more important by far than everything else, and in that case, you have an essential disagreement with a lot of the Democratic base. There is no way the Democrats will come your way.

29

cw 03.07.06 at 12:59 pm

Black people will never vote republican in great numbers. Republicans ARE the man. They are the bankers, the cops. They are the ones lecturing about personal responsibility, law and order, and the world-wide superiority of “american” culture. They are the ones that all live out in the suburbs on the curvy streets. They are the ones that view the term “social justice” with contempt. Black people would have to be crazy to vote for republicans. All the republicans have to offer blacks is a private school voucher and a national ID card. The Republican/conservative attitude towards the other is literally is “assimilate or die.”

30

Russell Arben Fox 03.07.06 at 1:05 pm

Steve,

“[W]hen they admit (given the high rate of spontaneous abortions) that they worship the all-time mass murderer of babies….When I really examined my conscience for unexamined assumptions I found a lot of stuff about women, sex and ‘responsibility’ which I found quite unattractive when I really brought it out into the light of day and looked at it….Let them have–worse, enjoy–‘unauthorized’ sex, then you’ll see the hatred….”

Huh. Well, no one can say you don’t have strong feelings about all this. For my part, I guess I just mulishly continue to doubt that a couple of millenia of argument and struggle over all sorts of beliefs and aspirations and convictions regarding women (and men) and sex (and family) and ‘responsibility’ (which, surprisingly enough, sometimes exists outside of scare quotes) can be clearly reduced to “unexamined assumptions” when confronted by the “light of day.” Part of the reason for that, surely, is that fact that despite about four decades of what I would like to think at least fairly regular self-examination, I still don’t quite see the faith of, say, the black preacher running the local Campus Crusade for Christ as consisting of nothing more or less than unexamined misogyny, homophobia, prudery, and hate. But then, admittedly, I’m somewhat biased.

“And if there were any Democratic candidates, officeholders, or party representatives who actually went around saying that, then you’d have a point, Russell. But they don’t, and you know it. So just what is it that you and Amy Sullivan are arguing?”

Uncle Kvetch,

I wasn’t talking to or about any Democratic candidates, officeholders, or party representatives when I wrote the passage you quote; I was responding to Steve. As for what Amy Sullivan and I agree upon (despite, as I mentioned above, the ways in which I think her approach to these issues is somewhat superficial), I think it can be summed up in my first comment: that “the Democratic party [should] continue its tentative work at recruiting candidates—-not always, and not everywhere, but where it would matter—-who are capable of joining a religiously conservative take on certain social issues with progressive political causes.” Consider Tim Kaine in Virginia as Exhibit #2 (going along with Exhibit #1, mentioned above).

31

roger 03.07.06 at 1:14 pm

Actually, I have understood why Dems don’t push the obvious Bible issue — stewardship. Modern liberalism is about nothing if it isn’t about stewardship — from keeping workers from being injured by unjust bosses to stewardship over air (should be clean as God gave it to us), water (should be acid free as God gave it to us) and the community (should encourage mutual aid). Etc., etc. I mean, you look at a 700 billion dollar trade deficit and an 8 trillion dollar federal debt and if the phrase “unworthy steward” doesn’t occur to you, you haven’t been reading your parables.

Basically, the bible has no position on things like contraception and abortion, and there are scanty mentions of sex in the New Testament, and numerous disparaging mentions of wealth.

32

Russell Arben Fox 03.07.06 at 1:14 pm

“The Cuomo abortion position is an example of pussyfooting inconsistency. The Clinton abortion position is more respectable.”

Well put, Tim.

“As far as I can tell from what I’ve read from RAF before, it comes down to abortion, abstinence, and prayer in schools. I don’t understand why those issues are more important to RAF, as opposed to all the other issues out there, like capital punishment, poverty, unjust wars, divorce, etc. which are all also condemned by religions, but there you go.”

If it did come down to just those three things, Hektor, then I wouldn’t have voted for Nader (twice) and Kerry. As for “capital punishment, poverty, unjust wars, divorce, etc.,” try here, here, here, and here.

(End of ridiculous self-promoting linkfest.)

33

roger 03.07.06 at 1:15 pm

oops — “I have never understood…”

34

maurinsky 03.07.06 at 1:15 pm

I would suggest that an additional problem for the Democratic party when it comes to courting religious voters is that a lot of religious voters, including people like Amy Sullivan, consider it hostile to religion to not allow further blurring between the lines of church and state.

I’m a liberal, and I’m not religious. I think everyone in this great country should be free to worship as they see fit, provided it doesn’t hurt other people. I am absolutely opposed to increasing the role religion plays in governing our country. I don’t think that’s hostility, I think it’s good sense.

35

KCinDC 03.07.06 at 1:17 pm

This discussion is demonstrating exactly the problem Sullivan is talking about. Most of the commenters are coming from the viewpoint that religion is only about sex, and that caring for the poor, the sick, and the environment, for example, is not an issue for religious people — a viewpoint the Republicans have been very successful in promoting.

She’s not talking about winning over the religious right, or even winning a majority of religious voters — just regaining some of the people who voted for Carter or Clinton but have been listening too much lately to the words of Republican Jesus. Don’t let the Republicans control the topics of discourse. Remind people about the bits of the Bible that Paul points out in comment 21, for example (but don’t try to fake it if you don’t believe it). Why is this controversial?

36

Uncle Kvetch 03.07.06 at 1:33 pm

capable of joining a religiously conservative take on certain social issues with progressive political causes

Translation, Russell, please. I’d really appreciate it if you can offer some specifics here. Firstly, what does “a religiously conservative take on certain social issues” look like, from where you’re sitting?

And secondly, does it really surprise you that, as a gay man, when I hear phrases like “a religiously conservative take on certain social issues” coming from my ostensible allies in the political sphere, I tend to get just a tad antsy?

37

save_the_rustbelt 03.07.06 at 1:36 pm

If the Dems use the half-witted, crude stereotypes on display here no wonder they aren’t having much luck.

How important is this? Evangelicals and conservative Christians took Ohio for Bush in 2004. They voted pro-life instead of their pocket books.

Until the Dems can find a way to allow pro-lifers back into the party (Dems have a lot in common on economic issues with blue collar Christians who are pro-life) they will start many elections in a losing position.

By the way, my medium sized evangelical church is involved in over 3 dozen programs annually for the poor and the sick, ranging from hands-on at home to raising money for international aid. The “they don’t care about the poor” argument is just crap.

38

Steve LaBonne 03.07.06 at 1:41 pm

kcindc, focusing on “religious” issues IS allowing them to control the topics of discourse. Liberals do have strong values, particularly having to do with fairness (especially to people who “work hard and play by the rules”) and opportunity, that have very broad appeal. My analysis of Clinton’s success is that that is where his fundamental appeal lay. (He always had a reputaion as a slippery fellow who was unlikely to achieve much of a comfort level in the minds of hard-core “values” voters.) Taking time and energy away from stressing those things in order to make lame attempts to play on the Republicans’ court will never fly outside the fantasy world of people like Sullivan. And as a malign side product it contributes to the creeping theocratization of America.

Russell, I suspect that your preacher, opposed to abortion as he may be, is not nearly as fixated on abortion as most white evangelicals. In fact from my own observations I’m pretty sure of it. So by bending over backwards on abortion we sacrifice core principles to do relatively little to appeal to him, while hardcore white evanagelicals remain our sworn enemies regardless. Brilliant strategy…

39

Hektor Bim 03.07.06 at 1:45 pm

save_the_rustbelt,

If they care about the poor, why don’t they vote that way? Why does abortion trump everything else? You seem to think it does as well, so I would like an explanation. Why is pro-life the end-all and be-all of these voters? It obviously isn’t for religiously committed African-Americans (probably including the preacher RAF mentions), so why is it for the people in your church?

That’s a real discussion – if people agree with the Democrats on everything but abortion, why is abortion the single over-riding issue for them? That seems to be the case for RAF as well, as far as I can see.

Helping the poor, stopping unjust wars, running the country sanely – these all pale before the abortion issue. Why is that?

40

KCinDC 03.07.06 at 1:50 pm

Steve, I’m opposed to the creeping theocratization as well. I’d like to see “In God We Trust” removed from the money, but I recognize that there’s no way that’s going to happen in today’s environment. I disagree with Sullivan about “faith-based” government programs (though that doesn’t seem to be what people are reacting to here). But I am concerned about Democrats’ continuing to allow Republicans to paint them as the antireligious party when the vast majority of US voters think of themselves as religious.

41

Steve LaBonne 03.07.06 at 1:54 pm

kcindc, Democrats need to respond, “They’re lying because they want to distract your attention while they shaft you”. They mostly aren’t willing to say that too clearly because they take lots of campaign contributions from some of the biggest shafters (a pox on Dems who voted for the bankruptcy bill, for example), but that’s yet another problem, and one which won’t be alleviated one bit by trying to be Republicans, only less so, on “values”.

42

Barbar 03.07.06 at 1:56 pm

Harry B, you seem to be badly misinterpreting the “stem cell research” strategy of Kerry’s campaign. Stem cell research is popular with most people, but unpopular with the socially conservative Republican base. So the Dems should make a big deal about it; either Bush panders to his base and loses some middle voters, or Bush moderates and alienates his base. I can’t imagine that playing up this issue actually cost Kerry net votes. If anything, that was the sort of thing the Dems should be doing all the time, rather than waiting for September of a Presidential election year.

It’s like the equivalent of passing husband notification laws for abortion, but not as odious (from my perspective, which is of course the correct one).

43

BigMacAttack 03.07.06 at 1:58 pm

This thread is great! A real howler. I hope I have some time.

But for now, what do Paul and KCinDC think replenish the earth means?

And how are conservative Christians against replenishing the earth?

Russell Arben Fox,

Come, take my hand, join ‘us’, they hate you. Come, now!, take my hand, you cannot resist!, give in!

44

Uncle Kvetch 03.07.06 at 2:03 pm

They mostly aren’t willing to say that too clearly because they take lots of campaign contributions from some of the biggest shafters (a pox on Dems who voted for the bankruptcy bill, for example), but that’s yet another problem

Indeed, and not to pile on Russell, but that’s another problem I have with the underlying assumption here: with hot-button social issues out of the way, the Democrats could finally build a true progressive base around economic issues. The rub is that I see precious little evidence that the current leadership of the Democratic Party is even interested in a truly progressive economic agenda at this point.

Reading Amy Sullivan in this light, I fear the worst of all possible worlds: both parties dominated by moralizers, prudes, and finger-wagging scolds…the only difference being that one of them wants to raise the minimum wage by 30 cents an hour.

45

Steve LaBonne 03.07.06 at 2:07 pm

We’re 90% of the way there already, uncle kvetch.

By the way, I hope hektor’s question will generate some real discussion. I’ve given my answer, I’d like to hear the answers not only of rustbelt but of others who agree with him.

46

abb1 03.07.06 at 2:36 pm

It’s not because they are white or because they are evangelicals. It’s because they are freakin’ hillbillies, hicks, kulaks. “White evangelicals” is a correlation, not causation.

47

Anthony 03.07.06 at 3:10 pm

hecktor bim,

It is because they take seriously the belief that a fetus is a human being and that abortion isn’t about sexual morality. In their view, abortion is like genocide. I’d take Bush over someone who perfectly agreed with me on social and economic issues….except for wanting to round up all Arab-Americans and kill them, making Bush’s Gitmo and domestic spying seem quite light in comparison.

Why is pro-choice the end-all and be-all of liberals? Opposition to Alito was heavily botched because the left obsessed about Alito as the possible vote to overturn Roe v Wade, when there were a great many other issues that were better for swaying public opinion. Abortion is a litmus test that seems to have swayed a lot of people on the left against Bob Casey Jr. (although they don’t seem to notice or mind that John Murtha has the exact same stance on abortion).

I argue that the left is as equally obsessed with abortion as the right. It has become a symbol, the Berlin Wall of American politics. The right sees itself as tearing down that wall, while left sees itself as preventing its re-erection.

If other things pale before abortion, would you have supported in Alito’s place a Supreme Court nominee who vowed to overturn Roe v Wade, but who also clearly would have ruled against the Bush administration’s overreaches of power and other Republican sins? If you can answer yes to this question, then you have a point about pro-lifers not really caring about the poor, etc., otherwise, you’re just another damn hypocrite.

48

Steve LaBonne 03.07.06 at 3:18 pm

It is because they take seriously the belief that a fetus is a human being and that abortion isn’t about sexual morality. Bullshit, Anthony, they do no siuch thing. If they did, the SD law, for example, would simply equate abortion with first-degree murder. If they did, they would be making frantic calls for medical research into the causes of miscarriages. If they did, they would all openly defend abortion-clinic bombers- how could a decent person oppose the killing of gruesome mass murderers? There are all kinds of indications that that’s merely the rhetoric and not the motivation. Frankly I question your motivation too.

49

Steve LaBonne 03.07.06 at 3:28 pm

This meme currently making the rounds is also illuminating. Try it on your friendly local pro-lifer.

50

Nat Whilk 03.07.06 at 4:15 pm

Steve Labonne wrote: “Russell, I suspect that your preacher . . .

If Russell has acquired a preacher, I’m going to have to report that to his bishop.

51

Jaybird 03.07.06 at 4:30 pm

Would a demographic note help much?

Maybe the Democratic Party should spend a little more time targetting those who are likely to have children who will register and vote the way their parents did.

It seems to me that the Republicans are outbreeding the Democrats in this particular arena.

52

james 03.07.06 at 4:47 pm

Religious Conservative Christians tend to assist the poor through their churches. Until you grasp this fact, you are just pissing them off. There is an action called tithing. It starts at 10% of your gross income. Every time someone talks about raising taxes to help the poor, provide healthcare, housing, etc through the government, the religious conservative is thinking about the tithe. Put up or shut up. Democrats are not going to pick up votes advocating for increased government intervention unless the advocates are willing to spend a proportionate amount of their own money. It is the Cosby effect. He can talk about failures of blacks in education, not because he is black, but because he spends millions of his own money trying to improve it.

53

Steve LaBonne 03.07.06 at 4:51 pm

More bullshit. Most of the tithing money goes into huge fancy churches, semi-legal political activism, and “helping” people via missionary work. I’ve lived in Mississppi, I know exactly what the typical conservative, comfortable, white Southern Baptist in the Bible Belt is like. They are NEVER going to support Democratic goals and values. Give up this fantasy once and for all.

54

Russell Arben Fox 03.07.06 at 5:06 pm

Looks like one of my posts (#32) was blocked by moderation for a while, and the whole thread raced forward in the meantime. Let me try a few quick responses before the end of the day…

#35: “She’s not talking about winning over the religious right, or even winning a majority of religious voters–just regaining some of the people who voted for Carter or Clinton but have been listening too much lately to the words of Republican Jesus.”

Well put, kcindc. Granted that the whole “moral values” issue was moderately overplayed in the 2004 aftermath. But c’mon: if trying to figure out how to bring 10% or 20%–who knows, maybe even 30%!–of the poor and lower-middle class evangelical and Catholic white vote back over to the Democratic party isn’t important, why have Larry Bartels and Thomas Frank and a dozen other people been tearing themselves apart over it? This isn’t a pie-in-the-sky debate over the possibility of engineering the overnight resurrection of a Bryanesque, liberal, progressive Christianity (as much as someone like me might wish it); this is, as I said in my first comment, about continuing a tentative, important project, one pursued in hopes that church-going African-Americans won’t continue to occasionally feel taken for granted, and that the Republicans will not be able claim white evangelicals as their own until kingdom come.

55

Scroop Moth 03.07.06 at 5:12 pm

Just because many blacks declare the Bible to be the word of God doesn’t mean they have the “same” beliefs and values as white Republicans who declare similar belief in the Bible.

The Bible doesn’t control belief, rather, people of all colors use the Bible to justify beliefs. Therefore, we shouldn’t expect to align the behavior of a white Baptist who obseses over the King James text with a black Baptist who thinks that Jason and the Argonauts is a Bible story.

It would be more interesting to compare the voting behaviors of blacks and whites who actually attend the same church.

56

Russell Arben Fox 03.07.06 at 5:16 pm

#36: “Firstly, what does ‘a religiously conservative take on certain social issues’ look like, from where you’re sitting? And secondly, does it really surprise you that, as a gay man, when I hear phrases like [that] coming from my ostensible allies in the political sphere, I tend to get just a tad antsy?”

Some of the links I stuffed in #32 might give you something of an answer to your first question, Uncle Kvetch; basically, I want to do what I can to connect certain religious and populist views on marriage and family to matters like abortion, welfare, education, etc., because–besides the fact that I think they can contribute to building a more egalitarian and virtuous society–you’re less likely to have extremist reactions (like the SD law, for example) as a backlash. And regarding your second question, no, it doesn’t surprise me at all. As that long exchange following Belle Waring’s old SSM post proved, for quasi-traditional like myself, this is terribly divisive issue. Which is why I’d like to think I’ve always presented my point of view in regards to this matter both on a high level of generality and with some humility and respect, though I suppose that’s in the eye of the beholder.

57

Uncle Kvetch 03.07.06 at 5:16 pm

Yes, Russell, we’ve heard the hypothetical upsides of this project many times now. If there were nothing but upsides, of course, there would be no debate. But there is a debate, because what you and Amy Sullivan (even if you’re not entirely on the same page 100% of the time) are advocating involves tradeoffs, which some members of the core Democratic base may find unacceptable. I’m still waiting to hear some specifics. I’m especially interested in how you allay the concerns of those of us who see this whole “outreach” business as a push to sell us down the river.

And frankly, I’m still reeling from the fact that any observer of American politics in 2006 could write about “a religiously conservative take on certain social issues” and then turn around ask in all seriousness “Wait a minute…what could any of this possibly have to do with being antigay?”

For the time being, I’m afraid I’ll have to go with BusyBusyBusy’s summation of Sullivan’s argument: “Secular people should have no trouble compromising away their principles, since they don’t believe in anything that matters anyway.”

58

Uncle Kvetch 03.07.06 at 5:18 pm

Russell, we obviously overlapped…I’ll withdraw what I wrote above about “specifics” until I’ve had a chance to look at your links. Thanks.

59

Anthony 03.07.06 at 5:22 pm

Steve, I should say that a portion of them feel that way (Catholics are more likely to view the abortion issue primarily as protecting human life, evangelicals are more prone to include sexual morality as a component of opposition to abortion). But it would be out of touch with reality on a Bush-ian scale to cast abortion opponents as a bunch of theocrats who don’t care about women. There is a sincere belief on the part of some that a fetus is a human being and there is no way around that.

The SD law doesn’t equate abortion with first-degree murder in part because that is not politically feasible. They don’t defend abortion clinic bombers any more than a leftist who calls the Israeli government a “terrorist state” for its oppression of Palestinians would necessarily support Palestinian suicide bombers. (And of course, some on their respective sides of the aisle express understanding of either set of bombers.)

My motivation is that people on both the left and the right turn into loony fucktards when the abortion issue comes up. And it’s not reality-based to fail to admit that the left is just as guilty. I blame the left’s obsession over abortion with the failure to mount any reasonable opposition to Alito’s nomination, which could have been used to highlight the Republican culture of corruption. I see the left’s seeming obsession with abortion over all other issues in DailyKos’s seeming transformation into Freeper-left. I want Democrats to recognize that the left has its own analogue of the Religious Right and that a portion of that consists of single-issue abortion voters, and these people aren’t necessarily smarter than their counterparts.

If universal health care is a good issue for the Democrats to run on, I see people screwing it up by fighting unnecessarily battles to try and include abortion and contraception, a far cry from the pragmatic Howard Dean position of getting more people invested in an admittedly flawed system before trying to perfect it. That’s the sort of needless stupidity that I want to avoid. Am I wrong to have that motivation?

60

Russell Arben Fox 03.07.06 at 5:25 pm

#38: “Russell, I suspect that your preacher, opposed to abortion as he may be, is not nearly as fixated on abortion as most white evangelicals. In fact from my own observations I’m pretty sure of it. So by bending over backwards on abortion we sacrifice core principles to do relatively little to appeal to him, while hardcore white evanagelicals remain our sworn enemies regardless.”

That’s one possibility, Steve. Another possibility is that some–definitely not all, probably not most, but some–of the white evangelical preachers who know and perhaps even work with that black preacher at various revivals will be somewhat more open to the sort of priorities by which he approaches his congregation–priorities based in scriptures they share and even kind of agree upon–if they realized that at least a couple of the issues that truly rally their support–such as abortion–weren’t definitely associated with just one political party. Which possibility you prefer kind of depends, I suppose, on just how much credit you’re willing to grant white evangelicals, and how seriously you’re willing to take (some of) their religious views. If one’s reigning assumption is that they’re idiots, hung up on fetuses and other nonsense like that, well then of course you wouldn’t want the Democratic party to move in that direction. (And which is why we’re having arguments like this in the first place.)

61

Anthony 03.07.06 at 5:36 pm

Uncle Kvetch,

Maybe the core Democratic base needs changing. At one point, the core Democratic base included Catholics (see the work of Andrew Greeley, who happens to be mentioned in the original post). At some point in the ’70s, someone seemingly decided that Catholics weren’t a part of the Democratic base and the result has been a steady erosion of Catholics from Democrats to swing vote. And the Democratic Party has been poorer because of it.

I tend to come from the viewpoint that the Democrats should be primarily a coalition that comes together around liberal economic issues with tolerance of diversity on social issues. Others seem to prefer coalescing around liberal social issues with tolerance on economic issues, and some want rigid ideological discipline on both social and economic issues.

62

Russell Arben Fox 03.07.06 at 5:36 pm

#43: “Come, take my hand, join ‘us,’ they hate you. Come, now!, take my hand, you cannot resist!, give in!”

Admittedly, bigmacattack, whenever I pull my Christian socialist shtick, they look at me pretty funny. I haven’t felt the hate yet though. Perhaps they’re waiting to catch me alone.

#50: “If Russell has acquired a preacher, I’m going to have to report that to his bishop.”

Good one, Nat. Though my bishop has a Barak Obama bumper sticker on his car and regularly reads The American Prospect; theological quibbles aside, I don’t think he can afford to excommunicate one of his few allies in the ward here.

#53: “Most of the tithing money goes into huge fancy churches, semi-legal political activism, and ‘helping’ people via missionary work. I’ve lived in Mississppi, I know exactly what the typical conservative, comfortable, white Southern Baptist in the Bible Belt is like.”

All I can say, Steve, is that I’ve lived in Starkville, MS, and Jonesboro, AR, have gotten to know a lot of people involved in Protestant churches at both places, and the picture you’re painting simply doesn’t fit my experience at all. I’ll grant you the mega-church thing: truly, those are a money-sucking eyesores. They are also mostly restricted to upper-class suburbs. The rural and older urban congregations I knew ran soup kitchens, did Katrina-relief drives, collected books for bankrupt libraries, supported refugee camps follow the tsunami, and a lot more. (Does that give them a complete pass, politically speaking? Not at all. I’m just adding some data points.)

63

Walt 03.07.06 at 5:37 pm

Anthony: That somebody was the heirarchy of the Catholic church, not the Democratic party.

64

Tom Bach 03.07.06 at 5:42 pm

If this has not yet been pointed out: it is possible to be deeply religious and yet embrace a package of social policies that are more closely associated with the Democratic Party. Not every religious person, black or white, is committed to the notion that they ought properly vote their religious beliefs. Indeed, those that do are a minority.

65

Russell Arben Fox 03.07.06 at 5:45 pm

#56: “And frankly, I’m still reeling from the fact that any observer of American politics in 2006 could write about ‘a religiously conservative take on certain social issues’ and then turn around ask in all seriousness ‘Wait a minute…what could any of this possibly have to do with being antigay?'”

Fair enough; my pose of ignorance was about as accurate as the complete inverse, in which it’s all about being antigay, which I was mocking. Truly, there are plenty of homophobes in my church and most every Christian congregation in America. I don’t like that and neither do any of my fellow liberals in the pews, no matter what our views on same-sex marriage or other sundry issues. How it’ll all play out, I don’t know. Part of me strongly suspects that, in the end, much of what I and others like me agonize about regarding all this is going to get thrown out by history like so much dirty bathwater. In the meantime, I just want to make sure the baby doesn’t get thrown out along with it.

66

Hektor Bim 03.07.06 at 5:48 pm

Russell,

Wow, voting for Nader twice. I don’t understand you at all then, considering Nader is about as far from religion as it is possible to be. I was under the impression that abortion was the core issue for you – if it isn’t, then I apologize.

Anthony,

I think you slipped up there a bit. The hard-core pro-life position also obviously rules out contraception (which you threw in there on your last comment), but that is not a position most people in the US hold. Most people, even ostensibly pro-life, are fine with contraception and regularly tell pollsters that. (The figures for Catholics are particularly illuminating here.) What you are talking about is a fringe position, supported by maybe 10-20 percent of the population at most. If that is the only consistent pro-life position, then most of the people who hold pro-life positions are hypocritical, and don’t agree with the reasons you state for being pro-life.

I see no comparable craziness on the left, especially since Roe v. Wade isn’t even close to the maximalist pro-choice position. I don’t see this equivalence you state, and just asserting it isn’t going to convince me.

My own feeling on this is that giving up on abortion will naturally lead to giving up on a lot of other things. So if abortion is given up for religious reasons, then we will have to give up protection of gay rights and many aspects of separation of church and state. It isn’t just a question of addition, either. If the Democratic party gives up on abortion rights, it may lose a lot of votes from women (single women especially) who are single issue voters, either by voting Green or not voting at all. Similarly, messing with separation of church and state will lose you Jewish votes, and the votes of other minority religions as well. Many secular voters will be turned off as well. Uncle Kvetch and Steve Labonne are similar examples of people who will be strongly turned off by a more religious outlook by the Democratic party.

One may argue that you pick up more votes than you lose, but that takes serious demographic and voting data.

67

Hektor Bim 03.07.06 at 6:00 pm

Russell,

I’m a little disturbed by your comment in 59. What you are suggesting is that white evangelicals only care strongly about abortion and a couple of other issues, and that coming over to their side on those issues is the only way to educate them properly about their own religion. That suggests that indeed, for many evangelicals, abortion and church-state separation are the overriding factors.

What is stopping white evangelicals from coming to their senses on their own? Are they children to be shown the true path? It seems to me that most of these people made a decision to accentuate abortion above other issues, and I’m not sure that gentle prodding from Democrats (who are always going to be more pro-choice than Republicans in the forseeable future) will convert them.

If all white evangelicals care about is abortion, then that is all they care about. Since there is essentially no way the Democratic party will ever be as pro-life as the Republicans, what’s to stop them from just voting Republican as they have been doing?

Let’s be clear, this is a pragmatic argument. The idea is that by giving up on abortion, the Democrats can win elections again and move forward on other issues. But that analysis is dependent on the Democrats being able to peel away voters, and I don’t see any evidence that soft-pedalling abortion rights will gain more voters than it loses. Is there any data on this, and is there any data on this comparing it to more progressive economic stances that might do the same thing?

68

Steve LaBonne 03.07.06 at 6:05 pm

Hello? Our presidential candidate in 2000- a good man who waged a poorly run campaign- actually won the popular vote. Our godawful empty-suit candidate in 2004 came within an eyelash of ejecting Bush from office. And yet some people think we’re so far from viability that I should be deperate enough to say, “Sorry, Uncle Kvetch, I’m going to have to be much more tolerant of people who don’t want you to exist; sorry, poor woman, you had sex, now you have to bear a child you didn’t want and can’t support- and who will probably grow up to have a miserable life- because I want to try to get more votes for Democrats from crazy religious misogynists”? That is some serious insanity, dudes. Please step away from the crack pipe.

69

Dale 03.07.06 at 6:21 pm

I don’t think its about the Dems becoming more religious and using religious language. It’s more about being open to a visionary, values based vision of a more just and sustainable world.

Liberal religious traditions inculcate such values in their members.

I often argue that most of what we take for our left- progressive- utopian aspirations for a better world come from the Jewish-Christian traditions. As others have said here, the Bible doesn’t mention abortion. Literalists have no textual foundation for their abortion obsessions.
(though there is one passage in the Torah that places a higher value on the death of a pregnant woman than on her fetus that can be read as pro abortion)

But the Bible does offer many, many supports for economic justice, community, peace. But especially economic justice.

70

derrida derider 03.07.06 at 6:25 pm

As an ousider to the US, I reckon the best thing that could happen to the Democrats (and therefore the worst thing for Republicans) would be for Roe vs Wade to be overturned. And I reckon the Repubs realise this, which is why they haven’t been putting unequivocally anti-Roe people on the Supreme Court (they don’t let a little scruple like betrayal of their base stand between them and power).

Abortion would become a State, not Federal, issue. At the federal level people would vote more on their economic interest than their religious prejudice. And of course in many states the struggle for abortion would be a vote *winner* for the Dems.

But then, I’m not a woman with an unwanted pregnancy living in the Bible Belt. I’d no doubt fell differently about Roe vs Wade if I was.

71

Brett Bellmore 03.07.06 at 6:52 pm

“Our presidential candidate in 2000- a good man who waged a poorly run campaign- actually won the popular vote. Our godawful empty-suit candidate in 2004 came within an eyelash of ejecting Bush from office. And yet some people think we’re so far from viability”

Yeah, I think you are. You lost to a Bush. What are your chances if Republicans nominate a good candidate in 2008? Somebody who, for instance, is skilled at public speaking? Who doesn’t undercut the NRA’s efforts by publicly endorsing gun control? Or insult the conservative base by implicitly accepting liberal claims that they’re devoid of compassion?

You went up against a GOP hobbled by a bad nominee. I think you’d have done rather poorly against a better one.

On Republican racism. Yeah, it exists. So does Democratic racism, on a scale that’s at least comparable. It finds different expression, sure, but it’s pretty evident to anybody without reason to turn a blind eye to it.

72

james 03.07.06 at 7:19 pm

Steve LaBonne – Your tarring over 100 million people based on the actions of one church. Where you a member of this church or did they just refuse to give you money. Your antidotal evidence lacks specifics. Having spent time in churches in 7 states, I can say your experience does not match mine. You are ignoring the point that conservative religious people are already giving away at least 10% of their gross income. It is impossible to advocate an increase in taxes if the individual or group is not making the same sacrifice. It translates to, “let me spend your money to take care of a problem that bothers me.”

73

maurinsky 03.07.06 at 7:44 pm

God gave us free will. Why do the Republicans, supported by their anti-choice brethren, want to take away what God gave us freely? And why do some religious Democrats want to enable them?

74

KCinDC 03.07.06 at 7:46 pm

James, do you have any statistics on the actual percentage of Christians, or conservative Christians, or evangelical Christians, or Republican Christians, or any other subgroup, who give away 10% or more of their gross income?

75

Anthony 03.07.06 at 8:23 pm

Hektor, the left wingnuts are those who play the theocracy card as if all pro-lifers are rabid religious nuts and fool themselves into believing that the rhetoric is reality. The crazies aren’t confined to abortion. I lump anyone who cites drug legalization as one of their top ten issues as a crazy, for example. If you don’t think that potheads are morons, well, I’m probably not going to convince you about any of the other lunatics on the left. Democrats also lose any moral high ground that they think they may have in claiming that abortion opponents are extremists when some take the position of no conditions or restrictions at all on abortion such as parent notification, which the public generally seems to like.

The masses of the electorate are not ideologues. Perhaps one percent have anything approaching consistency. It’s fairly easy to point at people and say they are not completely pro-life for opposing abortion but supporting capitalism. But it’s also fairly easy to say that it is inconsistent for people to claim that a woman’s body is her property and she has the absolute right to do with it what she pleases, yet oppose the libertarian capitalist position that people have the absolute right to do with their money as they please.

You bring up gay rights. I will say bluntly that I would rather take the status quo on gay rights and expand economic justice for all rather than keep the status quo on the economy and expand gay right. I’ve been accused of not caring about gay people for taking that stance when it seems obvious to me that if you want gay marriage legalized, you should work to slip it in the back door. Unless, of course, you want to amend the constitution to allow for amendments by referendum and put it to a national vote so that the will of the people is heard.

Are secularists so hardened against religion that they don’t want any prominent religious people in the party unless they are trained monkeys who know their role like black Republicans who get trotted out for various GOP events? I support the separation of church and state. I don’t support the absolute separation of the church and the public sphere and I think those are two different concepts. The only way you should be able to guarantee freedom from religion is the same way you should be able to guarantee freedom from associating with black people: don’t leave your house.

The argument here isn’t that the Democrats should all of a sudden be the party of pro-life. The argument here is that Democrats should reach out to theologically-motivated people who aren’t black. If anyone accepts, they should be granted a seat at the table and influence on the party in proportion to their numbers. I don’t want the Religious Right to be like Iraqi Shiites while we are like Sunnis being steamrolled, but on the other hand, I don’t see U.S. history as escaping from the stranglehold of a Saddam-like Christian hegemony.

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Barbar 03.07.06 at 8:56 pm

Democrats also lose any moral high ground that they think they may have in claiming that abortion opponents are extremists when some take the position of no conditions or restrictions at all on abortion such as parent notification, which the public generally seems to like.

Uh, the mushy middle position on abortion, while popular, is incoherent. The median position in the country is probably something like “women should have a right to an abortion, but abortion is icky, so I’d feel better if women had to notify their husbands before getting one. This helps me support the right to choose without making some sort of irresponsible hippy freak. Oh yeah, and please ban certain kinds of abortion procedures, that really helps me sleep at night even though the number of abortions will remain unaffected and women who get abortions will face greater risks.”

Moreover, the Democrats do play to this middle ground — remember “abortions should be safe, legal, and rare”? Hillary Clinton made a similar comment maybe a year ago and the press corps got all excited that a visionary Democratic politician had this new take on this issue.

The 1990’s happened, right? I didn’t just make all that stuff up? Compare Bill Clinton talking about religion to Bush.

77

Brett Bellmore 03.07.06 at 9:24 pm

See, that’s what I mean by Democratic racism showing up in different ways. I can only imagine Democratic reactions if a Republican refered to blacks as “trained monkeys”. LOL And apparently blacks aren’t allowed to genuinely have different opinions.

78

Uncle Kvetch 03.07.06 at 9:44 pm

You bring up gay rights. I will say bluntly that I would rather take the status quo on gay rights and expand economic justice for all rather than keep the status quo on the economy and expand gay right.

Unfortunately, the religious right does not accept “the status quo on gay rights.” If you think for one second that if we just backed off on same-sex marriage they would back off on us, you’re mistaken.

We have a declared candidate for the state senate in Ohio, and one for governor in Texas, who are running on platforms of “biblical” principles that include making homosexual acts a capital crime. Now, it seems to me that there can only be one proper response to this, and it doesn’t involve “outreach.” But then again I don’t want to alienate good people of faith, so I guess I’d better keep my mouth shut. Not being religious, I really have nothing meaningful to contribute to the discussion anyway. And so we move one step closer to a country in which “political debate” consists of Amy Sullivan debating some theocratic whackjob about what Leviticus really says, while I cheer her on (silently, of course) from the back row.

it seems obvious to me that if you want gay marriage legalized, you should work to slip it in the back door.

I have no idea what that means.

79

Martin James 03.07.06 at 10:10 pm

Steve Labonne,

This thread started with a graph separated as to race.

You said you have experience with Mississippi and with examining your conscience and unexamined assumptions.

The root political question here seems to be “Why are people racist?”

Until one can answer that precisely one can’t answer how changing the message of a political party will or will not be effective.

I don’t think its an easy question to answer.

Do you?

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james 03.07.06 at 10:33 pm

Stats from 2001

http://64.233.179.104/search?q=cache:6jdcVM8mQ70J:www.independentsector.org/PDFs/GV01keyfind.pdf+united+states+giving+based+on+religious+&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=4

Some points:

Households with people who attend religious services on a regular basis, at least once a month (54% of the respondents)gave more than twice as much annually as those who were notregular attendees ($2,151 and $867, respectively).

Volunteers were more likely than their non-volunteering counterparts to belong to a religious organization (75.6% vs.58.0%).

Households in which the respondent also volunteered gave sub-stantially more than households in which the respondent did not volunteer. For giving households, the average contributions were $2,295 from volunteers and $1,009 from non-volunteers.

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cw 03.07.06 at 10:37 pm

brett bellmore:

There is no way you can imply (as I believe you are attmepting to do) that the republican party and the democratic party are equally racist. The republican party has as an election strategy consistently kow towed to racists and it’s core message to the “other” is as I mentioned before, assimilate or die. That is why black people of all persuasions overwhelmingly vote democratic.

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Kenny Easwaran 03.08.06 at 1:22 am

Someone said something asking about why Democrats should be all hopeful about someday being able to get 10, 20, or even 30% of white conservative Christians. But look at Kieran’s graphs! They’re already getting more than 30% of the white conservative protestants who believe the Bible is the word of God!

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Anthony 03.08.06 at 2:15 am

“it seems obvious to me that if you want gay marriage legalized, you should work to slip it in the back door.

I have no idea what that means.”

It means that it’s not something you try to do by legislating in the current climate. You don’t bother to fight state consitutitional amendments because those are meaningless in the long run. You let an activist Supreme Court overrule those amendments, but you make no noise as if you expect or want the SCOTUS to actually do it. Which just goes along with my belief that the left screwed up the opposition to Alito because it was fixated on abortion rather than on everything else that Bush may be able to foist on us through the Supreme Court back door. And any liberal-leaning judge who wants to legalize gay marriage should work on being a stealth candidate who decides things completely in line with precedent, however odious, until getting elevated to the Supreme Court.

Of course, that activist Supreme Court is unlikely to occur because idiots have botched the past two winnable presidential elections.

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Z 03.08.06 at 2:41 am

A long time ago, this was about the fact that Christians in the US tend to vote more democratic than commonly thought. Kieran, in the case you are still reading, have you ever heard of a multivariate analysis of electoral distribution in the US identifying the main cause of variation. When this is done in France (not too often of course), the results quite consistently show that the main axis is spatial configuration (where you live) and the second axis the ration between what you earn and your educative level. I have a hunch that one would find the main first axis in the US, but I would be extremely curious to see such study.

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Doug 03.08.06 at 6:31 am

In re 47: “Why is pro-choice the end-all and be-all of liberals?”

Because the anti-choice position is all about state control (or indeed state invasion) of the person. The anti-choice position, at its root, holds that the power of the state must be used to compel every woman to bring every pregnancy to term. It is an extremely anti-liberal (in either the classical or modern sense of the word) view.

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Doug 03.08.06 at 6:54 am

An interesting study that I read a while ago (and cannot for the life of me find the cite on — where is GoogleBrain — maybe someone else here saw it as well) showed that when political positions that African-Americans otherwise agreed with were identified as Republican positions, support dropped like a rock. The Republican brand is so poisonous among black Americans that associating views with that party causes people to question the view, rather than wonder about party affiliation.

I think there are valid historical reasons for this chain of reasoning, but that is another post entirely.

Also, the Democratic party as it already exists today is far more open to different views on the law and abortions than the Republican party. Or did I miss the Republican Senate majority leader who is pro-choice? Saying that we Democrats need to be more open to diverse views is a Republican talking point designed to hide the fact that we already are.

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Brett Bellmore 03.08.06 at 7:09 am

CW, I’m well aware that there’s no way I’ll ever convice you that, for instance, it’s racist to demand government mandated racial discrimination. Or to hold one race to a lower standard than another, because you think they’re only acted upon, not capable of acting on their own behalf.

That doesn’t mean that it isn’t, though.

The Democratic party is at least as racist as the Republican, it’s just that you think because your racism is dressed up in a gloss of benign motives, it doesn’t qualify as such.

Like the victims of racial quotas have any reason to care that it’s a quota to increase another group, not decrease their own.

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Steve LaBonne 03.08.06 at 8:29 am

It’s really nice to see the crypto-Republicans being smoked out here. All of you can go to hell, or the the Republican Party, if there’s still any distinction. The Democratic Party will never develop a coherent, winning message until it stops listening to those who want it to be the Republican-lite party. Brett especially cracks me up with the tired old white-victimology schtick.

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soru 03.08.06 at 8:41 am

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/45793

WASHINGTON, DC—In a press conference on the steps of the Capitol Monday, Congressional Democrats announced that, despite the scandals plaguing the Republican Party and widespread calls for change in Washington, their party will remain true to its hopeless direction.
“We are entirely capable of bungling this opportunity to regain control of the House and Senate and the trust of the American people,” Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) said to scattered applause. “It will take some doing, but we’re in this for the long and pointless haul.”

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abb1 03.08.06 at 8:55 am

I agree that the idea of quotas and preferences based on race (for disadvantaged racial minorities) is misguided, but I don’t see how it can be construed as racism.

It’s not racism, of course, it’s just a typical dopey feel-good policy.

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eweininger 03.08.06 at 9:29 am

Hout published an op-ed in the NYTimes a few months before the 04 presidential election which, if I recall correctly (and I apologize–I don’t have time to look it up), argued that even among whites Protestants who affiliate with “conservative” denominations, there is a fairly pronounced income gradiant in the propensity to vote Republican. In other words, while the entire line for white-religious conservatives may be shifted in the Republican direction (relative to other race/religion permutations), the folks in this group are responsive to appeals to economic interest. So, the message of the piece (again, if I remember right) was that Kerry might be able to pick off enough votes from this putatively Republican block in a couple of states if he intesified his appeal to low-income workers. More or less the opposite of the “dems-should-find-Jesus” idea that people are debating here.

How hard would it be to re-run the GSS data for the white-conservative group with some kind of simple income control (e.g. above/below median in a given year)?

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abb1 03.08.06 at 9:42 am

How hard would it be to re-run the GSS data for the white-conservative group with some kind of simple income control (e.g. above/below median in a given year)?

It’s not so much high vs. low income as rural vs. urban. Rural people on average are always more reactionary, even the rural poor. They live in a small town and they don’t see any need for things like traffic lights, sewage processing plants and most of the other stuff the government provides.

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eweininger 03.08.06 at 9:53 am

It’s not so much high vs. low income as rural vs. urban.

Well, could be. But I believe that the income argument has been put forward as such.

My recollection is that the GSS only collects (or makes available) income data in ordinal form, so no median break, unfortunately.

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james 03.08.06 at 10:11 am

Hektor Bim – Your associating the Catholic reasoning on abortion and birth control with all religious groups. To the best of my knowledge, Protestants are not apposed to birth control that prevents fertilization. Nor is this position contrary to the fundamental reasons most Protestants appose abortion. Many Catholics and Protestants appose abortion because they believe the soul enters the body at conception thus the cells are a person. Some groups believe it is a when the blood starts to flow. The fight over abortion is really about one group believing it is state sanctioned killing of an innocent person versus a second group believing it is about preventing state control of an innocent person’s body. The discussion is stuck on the extremes because neither side is budging from these fundamental positions.

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Steve LaBonne 03.08.06 at 10:22 am

There are not two legitimate positions for a genuine liberal, James, that’s what you don’t get. I completely respect and indeed will defend to the death everyone’s right to hold, practice and disseminate his/her religious beliefs, but there is NO such right to enlist the state’s monoply of violence in order to control the bodies of others in accordance with those beliefs. You’re damn right I won’t compromise on such an utterly fundamental principle, which in addition is a stalking-horse for much else that I abhor. If these people want to live in a theocracy let them go to Iran- I don’t think that after a short adjustment the change in scriptures will bother them much, it’s the state-enforced “morality” they’re keen on.

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Steve LaBonne 03.08.06 at 10:49 am

P.S. More fuel for my rejection of your naive beleif that they really take the “life” rhetoric seriously rather than wanting to control women’s uteri- an elaboration of the “petri dish” thought experiment that I found as a comment to one of PZ Myers’s posts.

On the Evangelical Outpost — the home of willfully ignorant morons of the lowest stripe — the fertility clinic conundrum question was raised and it was fascinating to watch the fundies dodge.

Instead of a petri dish, put the embryos in a thermos and simply specify that a freezer is waiting outside the clinic.

They simply refused to answer, coming up will sorts of “objections” to the hypothetical.

It’s a really great way to expose the loonies.

You can even sharper it up — make it ten five year olds and a thermos filled with a 1000 frozen embryos.

Or 500 frozen embryos and 50 black teenagers.

Or 1 frozen embryos and 2 babies with incurable spina bifida.

Or 3 frozen embryos that were set aside because they comprised horrible genetic diseases and 3 comatose Jews.

Loads of fun with the fundies!!!!!!!

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Jaybird 03.08.06 at 11:09 am

I was listening to NPR the other day (this was a handful of days before Madri Gras) as I’m sure everyone on Crooked Timber does and there was an interesting observation from one of the European Correspondents visiting New Orleans.

He was from Sweden or Denmark or one of those blond haired/blue eyed countries and he was talking about the help that NO was receiving.

He said that, back home, if something like this happened then people would have the attitude that “I pay my taxes, the government should do something.”

In NO, however, there were a huge amount of volunteers who were there because of the attitude that “this is our responsibility to our fellow man” (that was (co-incidentally?) preached from the pulpits nearby).

I thought that that little observation would fit here, for what it’s worth.

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Steve LaBonne 03.08.06 at 11:18 am

Right, jaybird, that’s what makes the quality of life for everyone in the US, especially below the Mason-Dixon line, so much better than in Scandinavia. Oh, wait…

What your anecdote is worth is that it’s another milestone in the Republicanization of NPR.

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Uncle Kvetch 03.08.06 at 11:29 am

Hektor Bim – Your associating the Catholic reasoning on abortion and birth control with all religious groups. To the best of my knowledge, Protestants are not apposed to birth control that prevents fertilization.

You obviously haven’t encountered the “‘Full-quiver’ Christians.”

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abb1 03.08.06 at 12:19 pm

One hundred!

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Brett Bellmore 03.08.06 at 12:50 pm

From Merriam Webster:
Main Entry: rac·ism
Pronunciation: ‘rA-“si-z&m also -“shi-
Function: noun
1 : a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race
2 : racial prejudice or discrimination

Quotas and preferences certainly meet the 2nd definition, and the double standard for judging cultural matters meets the 1st.

Frankly, you can’t justify racial preferences as they are currently practiced without a belief in group rights and guilt based on color rather than individual merit. And that IS racism, even if it’s intended to be beneficial to a particular minority, rather than harmful.

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Brett Bellmore 03.08.06 at 12:52 pm

BTW. why are blockquotes listed as acceptable tags, if they’re not going to appear in the posts?

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Steve LaBonne 03.08.06 at 1:05 pm

It did. Your whole post is indented- you forgot to close the tag. On a par with your political savvy. ;)

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Martin James 03.08.06 at 1:20 pm

Steve Labonne,

You passed on the offer of a cause of racism, so how about this earlier post.

I freely admit to not understanding anything but I am curious.

Why, precisely is the right fertilized by misogyny and homophobia, that is, why are some people fertilized by these appeals and why are others just offended by the stench?

Why do people not behave as they ought?

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Steve LaBonne 03.08.06 at 1:28 pm

If I knew any of those answers, Martin, I imagine I would be the most famous moral philosopher in the world, or else the most highly paid Demcratic consultant. ;) I do think racism is starting to fade a bit compared to misogyny and homophobia (most wingnuts will now vote for black wingnut candidates, like Ken Blackwell here in Ohio) but all three seem to be manifestations of some deeper ressentiment which I don’t understand.

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Martin James 03.08.06 at 1:37 pm

Steve,

Thanks.

I just think both moral philosophy and social science are very, very difficult and sometimes people act like they are not.

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abb1 03.08.06 at 1:55 pm

Brett,
it’s not racism, it’s an attempt to rectify consequences of racism, to compensate.

Suppose you got beat up by cops (no injuries) and the city offers you $100K as a compensation. One could ask: why do they give you all that money, someone else’s money? You are not special. Do they think you can’t earn your own money? Right? No, they are simply trying to compensate you for the injustice that you experienced for which they feel responsible.

It’s the same spirit with the racial quotes, etc., even though I agree it shouldn’t be based on race even if the initial offence was.

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james 03.08.06 at 2:33 pm

Uncle Kvetch – From the article you sourced:

“Bruce Prescott of Mainstream Oklahoma Baptists said in a Weblog that Mohler’s article shows how far Southern Baptists have come toward adopting the Roman Catholic view that sex is only for procreation.”

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Brett Bellmore 03.08.06 at 6:22 pm

No, it IS racism, because it does not distinguish between people who actually HAVE been subject to those consequences, and people who have not, but instead assigns people to victim and victimizer status purely on the basis of race.

If I get beat up by the cops, and get compensation, it’s because *I*, personally, got beat up. Not because I bear a vague resemblance to somebody ELSE who got beat up some time ago.

In fact, that’s why they came up with this “diversity” business: So that they wouldn’t even have to pretend that the discriminatory policies were justified by some attempt to undo wrongs.

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LogicGuru 03.08.06 at 10:30 pm

I’m f*ing fed up with this whole damn debate. I don’t see why religion or “lifestyle issues” should have anything to do with left vs. right politics. The core issues are the welfare state and government intervention to stop discrimination against women and minorities. That is all that matters.

Suppose, for a worst case scenario, abortion were illegal. If good leftist policies were in place than women who had unwanted babies could either a) get government benefits and state supplied childcare to take care of their kids and get on with their lives or, IMHO better, ditch their brats, and get on with their lives. Suppose religious groups could put up creches in parks for Christmas or have prayer in the public schools. Who the hell would care? Who would take it seriously? Just a bunch of silly bullshit–enjoy the Christmas display and mumble the prayers. Who takes any of this garbage seriously? Let those that do have it–big deal.

Promote affirmative action and the welfare state and screw everything else. All that matters is seeing to it that people, regardless of race and sex have money, financial security and good jobs. That’s the old time religion.

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abb1 03.09.06 at 3:06 am

Brett,
the ‘diversity’ thing is, again, an attempt to correct and compensate for discrimination and segregation.

Again, I personally don’t like race-based policies perpetuating rather meaningless (IMO) identities. Also I agree that the analogy with an individual doesn’t work very well (and this is true about any kind of generic large scale reparation), but that’s the idea behind it. It may be (I suspect) perpetuating racism, but I don’t think it’s a manifestation of racism.

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Brett Bellmore 03.09.06 at 6:41 am

Doesn’t matter if it’s really an “attempt to correct and compensate for discrimination and segregation”, because it’s racist in both conception and execution.

Nothing says that racism has to be consciously malevolent. It just has to involve ignoring the particulars about people, because you think their race tells you all you need to know, and is sufficient excuse to treat them in a particular way.

You know, like compensating a recent immigrant from Jamaca for historical wrongs that happened to somebody else’s ancestors, because she’s the right skin color? AA and “diversity” policies are helping people who have nothing but skin color in common with the people who once suffered, at the expense of people who have nothing but skin color in common with the people who caused that suffering.

That IS racism, even if like most Democrats, your working definition of racism has a long list of riders and exceptions tacked onto it, to make sure that people you happen to be allied with are definitionally immune to being acknowleged as racist, no matter what the reality might be.

And you still haven’t explained that “trained monkey” remark away. ;)

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abb1 03.09.06 at 8:22 am

If you decide to compensate a large group of people for some very large-scale injustice like a couple of hundred years of slavery, a hundred years of institutionalized discrimination, genocide, etc. – there’s no way to be precise, especially if it happened a while ago. Superficially the big-picture view seems reasonable: blacks were discriminated – blacks get complensated, but if you look close you’ll see a bunch of stuff that doesn’t makes sense at all. That’s just how it is with these feel-good policies.

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Steve LaBonne 03.09.06 at 8:23 am

logicguru, I respectfully but very strongly disagree. You are failing to take into account the potentially serious effects of pregnancy and childbirth on a woman’s health. Banning abortion would still be a gross violation of a woman’s right to control her own body, even if there were no economic consequences to bearing a child. You bet your sweet ass that women would still care, a lot.

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Bobcat 03.09.06 at 10:45 am

Here’s a question, along the lines of saving the petri dish vs. saving the two-year old child:

What features of a person make it immoral to kill her? We all know that there’s nothing immoral about destroying a fetus, at any stage, so it can’t be any features that a fetus has. Maybe it’s rationality? But jeez, if THAT were the case, then since babies don’t have rationality (along with people in comas and people who are severely mentally retarded), it would be okay to kill babies, the comatose (even if we know there’s a 90% chance they’ll recover from the coma) and the mentally retarded, and we don’t want THAT. So maybe it’s their capacity to suffer? But geez, if THAT’s what makes killing wrong, then we should outlaw raising livestock for food, as well as farming, because those activities cause a lot of suffering (40 million cows a year and 2 billion chickens are killed for us to eat them; on the other hand, 600 million rodents are killed a year when we tract fields). I know! The morally relevant feature is whatever allows us to, without inconsistency, say it’s perfectly permissible to kill an eight-month old fetus, but not morally permissible to kill a one-month old baby; and that feature is: because we say so!

The abortion debate is so easy. People who aren’t pro-choice are retarded.

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Steve LaBonne 03.09.06 at 11:31 am

bobcat, your “argument” doesn’t even reach the level of a strawman. There’s no point at which there’s a bright line; I certainly make a major distinction between an embryo that doesn’t even have a functioning nervous system and a near-term fetus, and there is clearly a continuum in between that has to be treated carefully as such. Oddly enough, the much-maligned Roe decision took this into account in a clear and constructive way which has held up well even as more is learned about human development. And nobody, not even those most fervently in favor of keeping the state out of the medical decision about late-term abortions, is in favor of them except when there is a grave threat to the mother’s life and health. Who are you to play God and set yourself up as the judge of such an awful choice as the one between a mother’s life and that of a near-term fetus? Both you and the politicians should mind your own God-damned business.

Consider also that the more difficult it is made to get a first-trimester abortion the more common later ones will be, legal or not. The exquisite consciences of buffoons like you apparently are easily satisfied by legal fictions regardless of what will actually be happening in the real world. Mockery from someone with such an undeveloped moral sense merely redounds on the mocker.

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Bobcat 03.09.06 at 12:02 pm

First of all, I didn’t present an argument. I didn’t even present an “argument”. Rather, I lampooned an attitude of absolute certainty that pro-lifers are “wingnuts”.

As for your claim that “I certainly make a major distinction between an embryo that doesn’t even have a functioning nervous system and a near-term fetus, and there is clearly a continuum in between that has to be treated carefully as such”, well, the fetus starts development of the cerebral cortex by about week 20 after fertilization. So I take it that you’re comfortable with restricting access to abortion after five months, except for threats to the life or health of the mother?

Regarding your question that “Who are you to play God and set yourself up as the judge of such an awful choice as the one between a mother’s life and that of a near-term fetus?”, well, moral philosophers speak to such dilemmas all the time, and even make judgments about them. I guess they should mind their business. What moral principle, by the way, are you relying on that justifies your claim that they should mind their business? And are we allowed to look at the principle and perhaps see if it’s up for refutation?

“Consider also that the more difficult it is made to get a first-trimester abortion the more common later ones will be, legal or not.” Well, yes. Any time you restrict people’s freedom to do what they want, there will be people who do it anyway, and often with shady characters. Of course, if the activity in question is bad enough, that really puts the onus on those who commit the now-illegal act in question rather than on the people who restrict the act.

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Steve LaBonne 03.09.06 at 12:07 pm

And those who knowingly set up the situation bear no responsibilty at all for it? That IS retarded.

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Steve LaBonne 03.09.06 at 12:17 pm

moral philosophers speak to such dilemmas all the time, and even make judgments about them. I guess they should mind their business.

Depends on whether they’re simply presenting their positions and attemtping to persuade, or whether they have the gall to expect the state to use its monopoly of violence to enforce their positions. If they should ever pretend to the latter role, hell yes they should mind their business. Funnily enough, I know of none who do; only religious fanatics are into that sort of thing.

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Bobcat 03.09.06 at 12:27 pm

“Depends on whether they’re simply presenting their positions and attemtping to persuade, or whether they have the gall to expect the state to use its monopoly of violence to enforce their positions. … Funnily enough, I know of none who do; only religious fanatics are into that sort of thing.”

Jeez. Donald Marquis, in his 1989 article, “Why Abortion is Immoral”, claims that it’s as seriously wrong as murder. I think it’s fairly obvious that he would move for criminalizing it. Then there’s also John Finnis, who thought it should be prohibited. And Peter Singer and Michael Tooley both think that infanticide should be legal, and would be in favor of using the state and “its monopoly of violence” to prevent people from preventing said infanticide.

Of course, Finnis is a Catholic, and so is a religious fanatic, and Marquis is an atheist, but I’m sure he knows Catholics, and so is probably a religious fanatic too.

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Bobcat 03.09.06 at 12:34 pm

I wrote that “Any time you restrict people’s freedom to do what they want, there will be people who do it anyway, and often with shady characters. Of course, if the activity in question is bad enough, that really puts the onus on those who commit the now-illegal act in question rather than on the people who restrict the act.”

You wrote that “And those who knowingly set up the situation bear no responsibilty at all for it? That IS retarded.” So lemme get this straight: I make murder illegal. This means that people who just want to kill their rich mother-in-law to inherit her money will have to cover their tracks to do so. But if any of them mess up, and someone sees what they’re doing, well, they might be tempted to kill these witnesses. If only murder weren’t illegal! Then they wouldn’t have to kill those witnesses! But it is, because of the gov’mint. And now more innocent people have died who didn’t have to. And so the onus should fall on the gov’mint.

Kind of a ridiculous argument, no? And not one that you would have the least inclination in accepting, no? That’s why I put in the clause, “if the activity in question is bad enough”; because it if is bad enough, then the onus is on the person who commits it, not on the one who criminalizes it. But if it’s not bad–like smoking marajuiana–then the onus for the bad results of the policies should fall on those who make the policies, rather than on the perpetrators.

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Steve LaBonne 03.09.06 at 12:40 pm

Again, they can “consider” whatever they like, but they can go to hell if they try to FORCE others to act on intuitions with which many disagree (nobody disagrees that killing fully-fledged human beings is wrong- except when they do disagree, of course, in the cases of capital punishment and war, so much for “life” being an absolute trump- the important distinction here being the ability to survive outside another human being’s body).

But it’s useless to even try to argue with someone who so easily slides from holding a quite controversial ethical opinion to holding that it’s fine and dandy to try to force those who disagree to comply. I’d suggest getting your own confusions sorted out before trying to persuade anyone else. Looks like that’ll be a tall order, too.

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Brett Bellmore 03.09.06 at 12:46 pm

“If you decide to compensate a large group of people for some very large-scale injustice like a couple of hundred years of slavery, a hundred years of institutionalized discrimination, genocide, etc. – there’s no way to be precise, especially if it happened a while ago.”

Which is why you DON’T compensate huge classes of people today for wrongs that occurred a long time ago to people who resembled them, at the cost of committing modern wrongs against innocent people who happen to resemble the long dead perpetrators. Because that’s the sort of activity that only seems to make sense if you ARE a racist, a believer in group rights and wrongs that over-ride individual guilt and innocence.

Of course, realistically, Democratic support for these activities today is probably more motivated by the need to keep blacks voting Democratic by huge margins, than any real belief that Jamacan immigrants need to be compensated for Jim Crow.

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Bobcat 03.09.06 at 1:14 pm

Likewise, Steve. Gay marriage and economic egalitarianism are pretty contentious, so let’s not try to force anyone to have to put up with them.

See, by your reasoning, not only is it useless to argue with me, it’s useless to argue.

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Steve LaBonne 03.09.06 at 2:27 pm

You really are a nimrod, my friend. Asking you to “put up with” something that’s none of your damn business in the first place is equivalent to forcing a woman at gunpoint to bear an unwanted child?? Please get help for your severe cognitive disorder before you wander onto a busy highway or something.

As the saying goes, if you believe abortion is wrong, don’t have one.

And some of you Republicans in Democrat clothing think the party should try to appeal to the likes of bobcat? What a joke.

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Steve LaBonne 03.09.06 at 2:31 pm

To the CT crew- I apologize for losing my temper. Please edit as you see fit.

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Uncle Kvetch 03.09.06 at 3:13 pm

Gay marriage and economic egalitarianism are pretty contentious, so let’s not try to force anyone to have to put up with them.

Gay marriage doesn’t have to be “put up with” by anyone except the two people involved. No one else is “forced” to do, or think, anything whatsoever as a result.

Steve, I don’t think your apology was warranted. “Nimrod” was too kind.

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Bobcat 03.09.06 at 4:11 pm

Thanks for the kind words, Uncle Kvetch, and you’re right; “Nimrod” was too kind. For disagreeing with you and Steve, I should probably be beaten to death with a hammer. That’s the enlightened thing to do.

But just for the record, Steve didn’t apologize to me, he apologized “To the CT crew”; I doubt I’m included.

As for “putting up” with gay marriage, let me remind you that, according to Steve, “it’s useless to even try to argue with someone who so easily slides from holding a quite controversial ethical opinion to holding that it’s fine and dandy to try to force those who disagree to comply”–it doesn’t even matter what the ethical opinion is! So if a state legislature doesn’t want to allow gay marriage, then the federal government should make them do so. AND the federal government should avoid intervening, because that’s controversial too. Similarly, redistribution of wealth is a contentious ethical opinion, so damn straight no law should be put in place to enforce it.

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Randy McDonald 03.09.06 at 4:54 pm

Bobcat:

So if a state legislature doesn’t want to allow gay marriage, then the federal government should make them do so. AND the federal government should avoid intervening, because that’s controversial too.

Ah, Jim Crow.

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Uncle Kvetch 03.09.06 at 4:57 pm

My point, Bobcat, was that gay marriage was a perfectly ridiculous analogy to bring up in the context of your argument with Steve over abortion. People who believe, rightly or wrongly, that life begins at conception oppose abortion because they perceive it as a wrong committed against an innocent victim. There is no analogous “victim” in the gay marriage debate, unless you believe that the marriages or heterosexuals are somehow devalued or cheapened thereby. Which is, granted, an argument that is trotted out repeatedly…unfortunately, it’s utter nonsense.

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Bobcat 03.09.06 at 5:11 pm

I agree with you that gay marriage harms no one, but as you admitted, it’s an argument repeatedly trotted out that it will “undermine the traditional institution of marriage”. I’ve taken my time to familiarize myself with such arguments, and while they’re sometimes valid (as in, not containing a logical fallacy), I have never seen one that is sound (as in, valid with all true premises). The two weak points of anti-gay marriage arguments, as far as I can see, is that (1) their empirical support is flawed; and (2) they are such that, even if (1) wasn’t true, they still rely on consequentialist normative principles that I find implausible.

Given the backdrop of the current political debate over gay marriage, it’s not a ridiculous analogy, because some people certainly feel as though their marriages are threatened by gay marriage, wrong though they may be. So if we’re going to use Steve’s principle–“it’s useless to even try to argue with someone who so easily slides from holding a quite controversial ethical opinion to holding that it’s fine and dandy to try to force those who disagree to comply”–then we’ll see that it’s useless to argue both with the advocate and with the opponent of gay marriage.

But whatever; if the analogy doesn’t cut the mustard with you, go back to the economic egalitarianism one. I haven’t yet seen anyone call that particular example, which I’ve used as a reductio against Steve’s point, evidence of my moral monstrosity and boneheadedness (but thanks for implying that I’m committed to a bigoted, government-sponsored regime of segregation, Randy! I was wondering how long someone would go from: “(A) Bobcat disagrees with Steve” to “(B) Therefore, Bobcat is racist”).

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Brett Bellmore 03.09.06 at 6:33 pm

I think the only problem with this “gay marriage effects nobody else” argument, is that the government is essentially certain to follow up legalizing gay marriage with a series of legal mandates requiring everybody else to treat the newly married as married. You know, for purposes such as insurance coverage?

Not an argument that’s likely to budge the advocates of gay marriage, but it does make clear that it’s not entirely devoid of effects on other people.

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a different chris 03.09.06 at 6:53 pm

>, there were a huge amount of volunteers who were there because of the attitude

I was at a specialist today for a worrying medical condition. I paid her good money.

I should have just looked for a bunch of compassionate “volunteers”, instead, eh?

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Uncle Kvetch 03.09.06 at 7:11 pm

That’s a valid point, Brett. You’re right that it doesn’t “budge” me a milimeter, but it’s true that I was overstating the case.

Interestingly, the point you raised isn’t brought up by the most vociferous opponents of gay marriage, who tend to favor a much more vague and nebulous argument about its supposed pernicious effects on straight marriages, or on the institution as a whole. Still, it’s true that the establishment of SSM would have ramifications for more people than the couples involved.

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Randy McDonald 03.10.06 at 9:54 pm

Bobcat:

but thanks for implying that I’m committed to a bigoted, government-sponsored regime of segregation, Randy! I was wondering how long someone would go from: “(A) Bobcat disagrees with Steve” to “(B) Therefore, Bobcat is racist

I wasn’t implying that you were racist. Rather, I was implying that you were using arguments which could be used, and were in fact used, in defense of “bigoted, government-sponsored regime[s] of segregation.”

There’s a notable difference between these two statements.

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