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)

Related posts:

  1. Late Night: Sarah Palin–GOP WunderBoner, Cash Cow? Or Both?
  2. Late Night: GOP Says They’re Sorry for Misuse of Artists’ Songs
  3. Late Night: Blue Dog Frog March
  4. Late Late Night FDL: Midnight In A Nation Ruled By Centrist Weasels
  5. Late Night: Billo is a Giant Suppurating Anal Cyst. Oh Yeah, and He Says Some Things about Netroots Nation