Amy Sullivan, newly-minted Time editor, had this to tell us about the break between the evangelical right and the Republican party on the occasion of the Values Voter Caucus
Don't ever let expediency or electability replace our principles," Huckabee urged the crowd. "Come on, Mike!" yelled a man in support. "That's right!" shouted out others.
After his speech, Huckabee was asked whether he was concerned about the disconnect between his showings in the straw polls and the unwillingness of Christian Right leaders to support his campaign. He shook his head. "I'll go with that great horde of people whose names nobody knows rather than the folks whose names everybody knows," Huckabee said. "Their votes are still just one."
Ms. Sullivan pointed out that Huckabee's surge was a shock to the established leadership of the evangelical right.
It was also, one would think, a bit of a shock to Ms. Sullivan.
It was, after all, Ms. Sullivan, a fervent evangelist* for Democrats seeking credibility on religion by pandering to evangelical voters, who introduced us to a gentleman named Randy Brinson
[Mr Brinson had just been countered on an issue by folks on his own team]
Not long after, while Brinson was still turning the taste of disillusionment around in his mouth, a Democrat called from Washington. The immediate post-election conventional wisdom was that Democrats lost because they couldn't appeal to so-called "moral values" voters. Democrats immediately embarked on a crash course in religious outreach and sought out people who could teach them about evangelicals. Brinson, who had caught the attention of the Democratic youth-vote industry, seemed like an obvious choice.
As for Brinson, when the Democratic chief of staff on the other end of the line asked whether the doctor would be willing to meet with some Democrats, he thought about his recent experiences with the other side and decided "maybe it wouldn't be so bad to talk to these Democratic people." In quick succession, the lifelong Republican found himself meeting with advisors to the incoming Democratic leaders--Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.)--field directors at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, and aides to Howard Dean at the Democratic National Committee. What they found is that their interests overlapped: The Democrats wanted to reach out to evangelicals, and Brinson wanted to connect with politicians who could deliver on a broader array of evangelical concerns, like protecting programs to help the poor, supporting public education, and expanding health care. It had seemed natural for him to start by pressing his own party to take up those concerns, but Democrats appeared to be more willing partners. They even found common ground on abortion when Brinson, who is very pro-life, explained that he was more interested in lowering abortion rates by preventing unwanted pregnancies than in using the issue to score political points.
Those Democrats who had initially been wary about working with a conservative evangelical Republican from Alabama found Brinson convincing. They also realized that conservatives had done them an enormous favor. "Listening to him talk," one of them told me, "I thought, these guys bitch-slapped him, and he's willing to play ball."
...
Many moderates were dismayed when the old guard refused to join protests against federal budget cuts that fall disproportionately on the poor in favor of what James Dobson called "pro-family tax cuts." These moderates had supported Bush despite often disagreeing with his specific positions. But in 2005, according to an Associated Press poll, the percentage of them who believed the country was headed in the right direction dropped by 30 points.
Big business v. believers
The newly converted are the most zealous, sharing the good news with gusto to any and all comers. Every few days, Randy Brinson calls me with another revelation. Republicans? "The power structure in the Republican Party is too entrenched with big business. It's not with evangelicals--they're a means to an end." The Christian Right? "They just want to keep the culture war going because it raises a lot of money for them." Abramoff? "Evangelicals were being used as pawns to promote a big money agenda." His fellow evangelicals? "Can't they see that Republicans are just pandering to them??" He once was blind, but now he sees.
This Randy Brinson
Brinson is the keeper of a massive e-mail list of much-coveted Christian voters that Huckabee is using to reach and organize people in early-voting states such as Iowa.
Brinson's list numbers about 71 million contacts, with 25 million identified as belonging to "25 and 45 years old, upwardly mobile, right-of-center, conservative households," he said. In other words, a target-rich environment for a candidate such as Huckabee, who is preaching a compassionate conservative message heavily infused with religious sentiment.
...
Huckabee got involved with Redeem the Vote on the ground floor, agreeing to serve as the chairman of the organization's national advisory committee in 2004. After the 2004 presidential election, Brinson went to each of the presidential campaigns, Republicans and Democrats, to pitch his list. Huckabee bit, hiring Webcasting TV -- a for-profit manager of the list -- as a consultant to his campaign. (Redeem the Vote is a not-for-profit group and, as such, does no political work.)
In Iowa alone, Brinson's list has produced 414,000 contacts for the Huckabee campaign, a stunning number given that less than one-quarter of that total is expected to vote in January's Republican caucuses.
Bipartisanship handed Mike Huckabee a mailing list of his (right wing, not-at-all-centrist) target voters, with the helpful assistance of the militantly centrist Ms. Sullivan.
In case you were wondering what it took to be centrist enough to be hired by Time.
*I'll link you to what Fred had to say about Ms. Sullivan's "god gap" (over at the invaluable Slacktivist, with the caveat that my interpretation is my own, because Fred has a more charitable view about Ms. Sullivan than I do)
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Huckadoodledoo!!!
hi Julia. now to read.
Hey, folks.
Shouldn’t Time be hiring editors on the basis of their, you know, editorial skills, not because of their particular brand of partisan hackfuckery?
Hi, Julia!
Yeah, but that might lead to, like, actual journalism. Can’t be having that.
There are actual reporters who work for Time - not a few, actually - but there are their spotlight dancers, and, well, Joe Klein.
Yeah, journamalism is much better, fer sure.
How many professions have the Rs trashed?
Eleventy bajillion point two.
I’m sure that back when Democrats were in charge, the majority of the people chasing the main chance were fervent Democrats, at least in public.
Many of those people have jumped the fence since then. Some of our more recent strivers have jumped back since thinkgs started to look bad for the right.
Me, I’d like to think it was for the right reason.
Aha, another age-old dilemma. Should we welcome opportunists into the big tent, or are only True Believers welcome at the revival?
What if you are an opportunistic True Believer?
O/t & FYI -
Paul Krugman supposed to be on Charlie Rose tonight.
What’s the True Belief?
when the rapt, sure crowd vaporizes, what will the rest of us do?
thank you!
Fix all the stuff they screwed up?
Here’s the classic on True Believers. If you haven’t read it, you MUST.
http://www.amazon.com/True-Bel.....038;sr=1-2
tsk tsk tsk. Oxymorons not allowed.
Well, my personal dividing line is that I welcome back people who never claimed that they had to jump the fence because Democrats were big stinky stupidheads, but that would leave us with very few pundits (and, of course, since most of them are pretending the first part of the decade never happened we could too)
OT
Guy on Charlie Rose talking about Haiti is REALLY good. Have heard him on C-SPAN. Think he’s on a book tour.
My church loves the Warmonger party. I guess they think its ok to eradicate Muslims. My church gives out Candidate Questionaires. The first question they asked the candidates was “Would you support legislation that would destroy a human embryo?”. All the R candidates had the no box checked. The grand leader of my church is Pope Benny. He met with Neil Bush before the 2004 election. Neil is the one who loved Silverado Bank and Thai hookers. He sells his Excite! software to schools for millions. Neil is a paid board member of many businesses that he knows nothing about. Neil gets meetings with the pope.
Good post, Julia. Whatever else I may think of Huckabee (like, he’s a dickwad, maybe?)this post shows that he really utilized resources and targeted his efforts. To hear the mainstream press, his message (whatever it may be)is, almost magically, spreading like wildfire. It’s a good political campaign. And frankly, I’m happy to see Giuliani and Romney, in particular, caught off gaurd and not knowing what to do.
Randall Robinson is his name.
http://www.amazon.com/Unbroken.....038;sr=1-1
Oxymorons? You must be talking about Rush Limbaugh…
Randall Robinson, the TransAfrica guy?
Punaise is the only real punned it.
And why are you still a member of this church? My Q is not a snark, but a genuine inquiry into what you might still find fulfilling in light of things you don’t like.
Huck-Kaboom!
LOL
I’m sure the offer from TIME is in the mail… :~)
Never heard him before the last couple of days. Sounds sensible to me. Can you provide a link so I can find out more?
Hey, at least he didn’t shoot any of his hunting partners in the face!
ot………
Marjorie Cohn: When he was a federal judge, Michael Mukasey issued the material witness warrant for Jose Padilla. The warrant was based partly on information from Abu Zubaydah. It is not clear whether Mukasey knew Zubaydah’s statements were obtained by torture. But since he issued the warrant, Mukasey has a real or apparent conflict of interest.
Robinson said that Bill Clinton ruined the Caribbean banana industry as a favor to Chiquita. Robinson said that many Caribbean banana growers were so despondent that they committed suicide.
Whatever else I may think about pope benny (like, he’s a dickwad, maybe?), I honestly don’t think he or the Catholic Church support or condone the eradication of Muslims. But somebody should tell ‘em to just shove those questionaires so far up their asses they’ll be shittin’ ‘em for a year.
eCAHN, looking now — will be back in a few.
There is no question in my mind that they do indeed support the eradication or conversion of Muslims. My priest said that the ME will be converted to Christianity (the Catholic brand, of course). It might take a long time, he said, but that’s ok, he said.
Read his wiki. Sounds like reparations is his most controversial stance. Much else seems reasonable. I don’t know the details of the banana dispute that Hackworth mentions in 36.
I’m genuinely surprised, given what a fervent partisan of Bush our current Pope was in the ‘04 elections, at how willing he’s been to disagree with him (although that’s mostly been since he’s lost all that lovely power)
Well that crap goes back more than a hundred years. The Bushes were major stockholders in United Fruit (modern day Chiquita).
More on the Randall Robinson I’m thinking about here and here (Wiki)
OMFG! I didn’t know about the United Fruit connection. Their bastardness knows no bounds.
eCAHN, you beat me to it wrt to the Wiki. He is a very interesting guy.
Actually, I welcome everyone. Why not?
My Q about the professions was actually a snark. Just shows how unprofessional professions are that they can be so easily intimidated & subverted by bullies.
Well, there’s also the making the boss happy thing, which media consolidation has made kind of a no-brainer for our pundits.
Reason is, my wife is Catholic and I go with her once in a while. I’m just listening to the stuff. It is maniacal. I don’t think she pays as much attention as I do to the actual “sermons” (they call em masses, I prefer the word sermon - it fits better).
Yeah. Some are, and some aren’t.
pundits: Divide and Concur
I thought it was Divide and Concuss.
That just may be your all time best.
What I like about what he said is that Jeanne Bertrand Aristide was a legitimately elected prez and it’s not our business to interfere. This in response to the Q about whether Robinson is too favorably disposed to Aristide.
Now that ties into some issues I was wrestling with at the time of the U.S. abduction of Aristide. I was new to the foreign policy world, and I spent a lot of time trying to figure out whether Aristide was a solid citizen or a flake, to, in turn, figure out whether the U.S. was justified. But what Robinson sez is that it doesn’t matter about Aristide, it’s just not U.S. business to butt in. Seems so simple, but sometimes the right answer is.
I’m kinda with Twain. That was great.
thanks for the hype raise.
and Prescots daddy was Remington arms dealers selling to both sides inWW1….they have always been WAR PROFITEERS
OK. I get the Catholic thing. I was raised R.C., and was quite devoute in my preteen years, but gave it up half a century ago.
OT-has CTuttle checked in today? I was wondering how his son was doing.
Going all the way back to great…great grand uncle Franklin Pierce, there’s nothing to be proud of in that family.
He was here a couple of hours ago I think.
Robinson was on Book teevee. that’s where I heard him talk about Chiquita. He is very interesting and smart and an eloquent speaker. Maybe his eloquence is what makes him an Obama supporter. I don’t know if Obama will straighten out the banana imbalance - prolly not.
I think your priest is full of shit. I really don’t have a problem with any religion proselytyzing and seeking to converty people of other faiths. But I don’t think it should be such a big deal. They should all take an approach that’s good PR- teach, set up hospitals, work with the poor - and some people may come around. For all the criticism it receives, the Catholic Church does alot of that. No need to feel a necvessity to convert every last person, i don’t think.
The labor leaders screamed when they closed the missile plants,
United Fruit screramed at the Cuban shore
. . .
“I Ain’t Marchin’ Anymore,” Phil Ochs
I gave it up too. I am a subversive now. I faxed the “election guide” to the proper authorities.
I’m of 2 minds about conversion thru good works. It isn’t voluntary, but done out of desperation.
Remember that’s how Hamas & Hizballah got to be so popular.
he he
I grew up in New Orleans as a Southern Baptist. I wanted to be Catholic sooooo bad. I used to make the sign of the cross in stealth fashion during church.
There was a big controversy about that when Mel Gibson’s passion came out - he gave a bunch of interviews about how spiffy evangelicalism was, while one of the mystic nuns the movie was based on (whose visions the church had determined not to be valid half a century before) had also announced that evangelicalism was one of the signs of the antichrist.
An awful lot of political religious people have blurred an awful lot of distinctions in order to consolidate political power - the problem for them is that they thought that the power was going to last forever and so was the consolidation.
It seems to be breaking up.
I live in the Ohio megachurch area, so I’m drawn to Catholic mass
as a kind of reaction to all the strident Protestantism.
I was raised a Presbyterian, but that was in the 60s when social justice was about all we talked about at church.
Ah, those were the days….
‘night all.
707! I asked my mom once if I could go to confirmation class with my very best friend in the whole world. I had no idea what it was, but if she was doing it then I wanted to as well. The idea of a pretty, twirly dress and a party was also appealing. It did not happen, my granny would have dropped dead from the shock!
That’s a big problem with the whole conversion thing. people get so convinced of their righteousness, that they don’t see or don’t care that their efforts may have, at bottom line, negative consequences. I’m talkin’ about no strings good works. It’ll bring people around. And if you ain’t wanted, no need to be a martyr. Just shake their dirt off your shoes and let God take care of ‘em.
Also Margot @ 69
I’m a cultural R.C. I love sacred music. And any time I’m in a European city over the weekend, I make sure to go to High Mass in the biggest cathedral on Sunday. The Catholics sure know how to make a wonderful cultural event. Don’t need to believe the doctrine to enjoy the ceremony.
I remember that too, in our small-town Episcopal church around the same time.
That’s funny. Stealth sign of the cross. I went to catholic schools and the nuns made sure you did it so everyone could see it or they’d make you do it again. And again. And again….. You wouldn’t have liked that.
My mom is a whiskcopalian. I was allowed to go to church with her for mass on Christmas eve. It scared the hell (grin) out of me when the trumpets started to play from the back of the church in the choir.
Well, really there is. It is a part of most Christian faiths. It is usually referred to as the great commission. It is the duty of all Xtians to go out therefore and share the good news of Christ’s salvation. Only when all (whom have the ability to comprehend it) have had an opportunity to hear of it and either embrace it or reject it, will the second coming occur.
Strange, the Muslims have similar designs on the ME…
Funny Catholic school story. I attended public school but went to religious instructions every Monday at 4pm. In 7th or 8th grade, someone in the class asked what the Feast of the Circumcism (New Year’s Day) was. the nun went beet red & told us that if we wanted to stay after class, the priest would come in & explain it to the boys & the nun would explaiin it to the girls. Needless to say we did not stay after class.
Dude! How’s the family?
One persons scare is another persons rhapsody.
My son is home and on a new anti-seizure med… seems to be working! 8-)
Yes. This is true.
Shortly after that I became an agnostic. It has stuck.
Let’s just send all the heathens an e-mail and get this commissionin’ over with.
That’s good news!
I am an atheist. I’m not converting to anything else, and I’m not joining any atheist “group.” the idea of Atheism kinda precludes groupthink.
IMO, religion…ALL religion, is the bane of human existence.
CT-your guy Colt was on the front page of the Picayune this morning. They arrived at 5 am and were welcomed by a brass band. From reports I got from my niece, the specialty beads for the 4 bowl teams are for sale in the Quarter. LSU, UGA, and OSU are 10 bucks, Hawaii’s are 15. The guy in the shop wouldn’t say why.
atheists unite!
Hi CT, glad to hear that your son is doing well :-)
Naah, you do your atheism, I’ll have a beer. ;)
Man, I don’t wanna talk about religion. It’s Christmastime.
I’m with you there. My version is that religion has killed more people than it has saved.
CT glad to hear that your son is doing well. Good wishes to your family.
By the way, has Suzanne taken the night off? Missing her. Bet she tried a dive and caught a cold.
Yes, it presents quite a predicament. It is foolhardy that we cannot accept each other as we are. In group/Out group. Yin/yang Good/Evil Zoroastrism was the precurser of the three monotheistic religions - Judaism, Christianity (Catholicism), and Islam. There are a great deal of common story lines in each b/c they are related. Lots of old bullsh*t stories handed down over the ages.
I went the opposite direction, I became a Baha’i and embraced the many faiths, I find that one faith does not trump all the others, each has steadily moved mankind forward, it’s truly a shame that each rejects the others…
Mahalo, PhysioProf!
Yikes. Is it something you can manage?
W Admin strikes again, this time EEOC decides employers dont’ need to provide medical care to retirees over 65.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12.....ref=slogin
So many of the faiths believe that they are recipients of revelation and I don’t have a problem sharing what they view as gifts. Sharing is OK. Insisting is no good.
Paradise Tax? They were showing the brass band greeting them, over here, and your local ABC reporter was taught the shaka sign…! *g*
But seriously. I don’t wanna talk religion anymore.
By way of changing the subject, what’s a bobtail?
I like that.
Suzanne has liberty this evening. She pulled all the holiday shifts and deserved a night off.
A cat.
Ann Coulter has apparently gotten tired of being ignored and now has started trying to be the Party Pooper for Huckabee…while plugging the insane [anti-evolution] parts of her book “Doglegs” ( or maybe it’s GAWD-LASS).
http://www.anncoulter.com/
Ann blames the recent rise of the Huckster on support of Sodomists, or liberals…it seems. Apparently they have been posing as Republican evangelicals in Iowa and South Carolina. Critically points out that the Osmond Family support Mitt Romney! And she affirms her lunacy by saying that Huckabee is just like Jimmy Carter.
So apparently Annie Anxiety is taking her cues from the “Caveman Club” of Growth (those brilliant lights that brought the sub-prime crisis to us) and is willing to be ecumenical in accepting that Mormonism is just like Catholicism. But maybe she has a point…Mormonism is possibly less of a threat to Catholicism than the Protestant missionaries running around Latin America (and not that much weirder).
I am getting a revelation now. I have to type it in tongues, though. jedofojofosedofahidoyubaf! Perhaps someone has the gift of interpretation. I don’t have that spiritual gift - just the tongues.
Evidence?
My version is that human progress started with industrial revolution (material well being) & Enlightenment (democracy), neither of which had anything to do with religion.
She surely does. Can I get an “amen”?
CT-too bad the weather was rainy and miserable today, no sightseeing for the distant travelers. Glad to hear your son id feeling better :0)
Off to bed for me, good night all!