Posted on 09/08/2005 12:44:58 PM PDT by SirLinksalot
Mitt Romney's Evangelical Problem
Everyone wants to believe the Massachusetts governor's Mormonism won't be a problem if he runs in 2008. Think again.
By Amy Sullivan --------------------------------------------------------
Washington pundits in the throes of post-election doldrums are notoriously eager to find a fresh face to crown the "early favorite" for the next presidential campaign. Even by those standards, however, the speed with which they flocked to Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has been remarkable. Last December, barely a month after Bush's reelection, George Will devoted a column to Romney's potential, and a quick succession of profiles in the Weekly Standard, National Review, and The Atlantic Monthly appeared in the spring. Who could blame them? Romney has had a successful business career (he is known to most Americans as the man who saved the Salt Lake City Olympics). He comes from noble moderate Republican lineage (his father was governor of Michigan). He is attractive (the National Review sighed over his "chiseled handsomeness"). And he grabbed national headlines—and the attention of social conservatives—by standing up to the Massachusetts Supreme Court's legalization of gay marriage. Just as Democrats are always looking for a liberal nominee from a red state, Republicans dream about a candidate like Romney: a social conservative from the most cerulean of blue states who can please the base while not scaring off moderates.
There's only one problem. Romney is a Mormon, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS). Mormonism was never an issue when Orrin Hatch ran for president, but Hatch was never talked up with even a smidgen of the seriousness that accompanies the Massachusetts governor. Yet each Romney profile plays down the Mormon issue. In a typical treatment, under the headline "Matinee Mitt," John Miller admits in the National Review that some of Romney's Republican opponents might highlight a few of "Mormonism's doctrinal oddities," but concludes that "there is no telling how this will play out," and "it's even possible to think that Romney's Mormonism could become a hidden asset."
It's understandable that political observers want to think Romney's religion wouldn't be a problem. He's an appealing candidate with compassionate conservative allure. Moreover, we would all like to believe that a politician's religious affiliation isn't an obstacle to higher office. There's a general sense, particularly among the chattering class, that we've gotten past that. Didn't Sen. Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) run on the Democratic ticket in 2000 with no problem? Aren't there a handful of Catholic candidates among the field of potential Republican nominees for 2008?
Americans have indeed become more religiously tolerant, but the first Mormon to run for president will clearly have to change some minds. In the late 1960s, the percentage of Americans who said they would not vote for a Jewish or Catholic presidential candidate was in the double digits; by 1999, those numbers had fallen to 6 and 4 percent, respectively (roughly the same as the percentage of voters who say they wouldn't vote for a Baptist). Compare that to the 17 percent of Americans who currently say they would have qualms electing a Mormon to the White House. That number hasn't changed one whit since 1967, the year that Romney's father considered a presidential run (he abandoned the effort after making a gaffe about how the military "brainwashed" him into supporting the Vietnam War).
Some of this anti-Mormonism is a fairly fuzzy sort of bias, based mostly on rumors and unfamiliarity and the vague feeling that Mormons are kind of weird. It's a wobbly opposition that can be overcome by good public relations that defuses concerns about the religion and shifts focus to the personality of the candidate. This is how someone like Romney gets elected in a blue state like Massachusetts, where even Republicans are generally tolerant.
But moderate Republicans aren't the ones who could derail a Romney candidacy. His obstacle is the evangelical base—a voting bloc that now makes up 30 percent of the Republican electorate and that wields particular influence in primary states like South Carolina and Virginia. Just as it is hard to overestimate the importance of evangelicalism in the modern Republican Party, it is nearly impossible to overemphasize the problem evangelicals have with Mormonism. Evangelicals don't have the same vague anti-LDS prejudice that some Americans do. For them it's a doctrinal thing, based on very specific theological disputes that can't be overcome by personality or charm or even shared positions on social issues. Romney's journalistic boosters either don't understand these doctrinal issues or try to sidestep them. But ignoring them won't make them go away. To evangelicals, Mormonism isn't just another religion. It's a cult.
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Oh yes... we're all dreaming of Mitt frickin' Romney. President Mitt. You betcha.
He's a guy who can't really get things done.
He's done a lot.
I'd spend an hour in a burlap sack with a dozen rabid lemurs before I'd vote for Hillary.
How about Tasmanian devils?
we tolerate religious beliefs other than those particular ones we believe for ourselves.
Some do, some don't.
Well, I've voted for a United Methodist, so..
I like Mitt.
He catches stuff.
Hopefully it would never become a hold my nose vote. I'd rather have a Rat then a Mormon RINO.
Especially since those Mormons have horns.
They believe in a trinity, in fact 3 separate ones I think. The regular one, of course, is the three in one.
I think a lot of people would hold Romney's religion against him.
It was an issue against Kennedy.
I don't give a hoot that he's a Mormon. Let him come clean on his 2nd Amendment position, and then I'll decide about him (if it comes to that).
Isnt he DUMB as well?
And for that reason he will not even get the Mormon vote, much less the Evanglical/fundamentalist vote.
I'm LDS and I respect Colson's (and other evangelical Christians') right to believe that the LDS religion is a non-Christian cult. This causes me to lose no sleep. After all, what matters is not their personal opinions on the matter but God's opinion on the matter. To the extent they purport to speak on behalf of God in judging individual members of the LDS Church to be unsaved and non-Christian, they are presuming to exercise authority that even the Apostle Paul declined to exercise.
Personally I think Romney's bigger obstacle is his reputation among many conservatives for being a RINO of opportunity. Even many LDS members I know would be unwilling to vote for him in light of his previously declared support for allowing openly gay men to serve as scoutmasters.
Mitt Romney has a problem: he is a white male. If he were a hispanic or black female running with an "R" next to his name, a bunch of freepers would walk over broken glass to vote for him even if he moved left of Hillary on abortion.
It has a bigger problem: The guy's a flaming RINO.
Mormonism is fun. Check out Napoleon Dynamite.
There's a song in the LDS hymnal entitled "If You Could Hie to Kolob." It is set to a hauntingly beautiful tune arranged by the incomparable Ralph (pronounced "Rafe" by the cognosceti) Vaughn Williams. But my when my oldest son got back from his mission to Manchester, England, the first thing he did was take my guitar and say, "Dad, did you know you can sing "Hie to Kolob' to the Beverly Hillbillies tune?"
And he did just that.
Not only do I agree with post 1, but I would also share something Martin Luther had to say on this subject:
"I would rather be ruled by a competent Turk than an incompetent Christian."
And in the case of '08, we're almost certainly going to have a first-class death worshipper at the top of the Dem ticket.
Since when is the president not allowed to wear "magic underpants"?
I like Mormons a whole lot. But I despise pro-abortion politicians of every stripe and will not vote for any of them.
How about Marx/Lenin worshipers like the beast?
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