I view it as a sign they’re moving away from the simplistic, single-issue politics toward a more thoughtful consideration of how complex and interrelated so many issues really are.

I view it as very encouraging.

I think Obama’s on solid ground with a substantial wing of the evangelicals.

Bob in HI

I think Katrina really rocked their worldview to the core, as did the images out of Abu Gharib (particularly among former military). But the irresponsible fiscal policies and the missing WMD really exposed the ’false prophets’ of the GOP.

Some will vote GOP this year, but others are really ’praying’ about what to do. The issues of social justice, ”Climate Care”, economic fairness, bailouts for unethical outfits like Bear Stearns, and corruption have been recurring themes in the conversations that I’ve heard.

And FWIW, the best analysis that I’ve read about Rev. Wright was Jim Wallis’s commentary over at beliefnet.com. For people of deep faith, racism just doesn’t cut it.

If Rick Warren can host a more civil, more reasonable, more solutions-focused conversation than the hysterical ranters like O’Reilly and Hannity have managed, then I tip my cap to Warren.

My gut sense is that people do see this election as very important and they want a more civil, better informed conversation about what’s at stake. Robertson and Falwell never could have pulled this off, and it wouldn’t have occurred to them to attempt it.

people like Dent Myers, a relic collector and self-caricaturing bigot in Kennesaw, Ga., north of Atlanta. (His shop, Wildman’s, is full of the crazy literature of the unreconstructed South, as well as guns, swords, Ku Klux Klan hoods and scurrilous bumper stickers.) Dent argues that when Southerners criticize Obama, “They say, ‘He’s a Muslim, he’s a mulatto Muslim, or quadroon Muslim … [only because] they don’t want to use the old N word.”