Aide says White House mocked evangelicals

The Guardian ^ | October 14, 2006 | Julian Borger

[rakovsky]

A former senior presidential aide has accused the Bush administration of using evangelical Christians to win votes but then privately ridiculing them once in office. The allegations by David Kuo, the former deputy director of the White House office of faith-based initiatives, come at a devastating time, when the administration is counting on born-again Christians to vote in sufficient numbers to save the Republicans' hold on Congress in the November elections.

In a book entitled Tempting Faith: an Inside Story of Political Seduction, to be published on Monday, Mr Kuo portrays the Bush White House's commitment to evangelical causes as little more than a cynical facade designed to win votes.

"National Christian leaders received hugs and smiles in person and then were dismissed behind their backs and described as ridiculous, out of control, and just plain goofy," Mr Kuo wrote, according to MSNBC television, which obtained an early copy of the book. In particular, he quotes Karl Rove, the president's long-serving political adviser and mentor, as describing evangelical Christians as "nuts".

[Suzy Quzy]

Studds died yesterday.

[Suzy Quzy]

What does anyone KNOW about David KUO???

[Arizona Carolyn]

don't forget cBS.

[durasell]

The guy apparently has brain cancer...

[Suzy Quzy]

He seemed a little light in the loafers, even though I think he's married.

WHY do people who have been GIVEN a JOB in the WHITE HOUSE go and DISS the person who gave you the job??? WEASELS...Lisping weasels.

[srmorton]

I saw it too and he was totally unbelievable. He is angry that his pet project did not get as much money as he thought it deserved. He obviously does not understand that CONGRESS holds the purse strings. As the former director of the program said, the POTUS is not a king and he does not get everything he wants - even when he does not have 9-11, the GWOT, Katrina, and other costly things to deal with. In point of fact, it is the Dems who are contemplating using religion to get more votes. Christians are attracted to the Republican party because of a variety of issues and many of them feel that the poor can best be helped by nongovernmental agencies.

BTW, the best part of the show tonight was the two-part story about the Duke rape case. I live in NC and knew most of the facts and can verify that Ed Bradley gave a very accurate picture of the case. Nifong prosecuted those boys to win the Democrat primary for District Attorney - which, unfortunately, he did. The case should have been dropped when the DNA evidence exonerated all of the lacrosse players. It is frightening to think that in the United States of America, a corrupt DA and a deceitful woman can completely destroy the lives of these three young men. Nifong should be disbarred for what he has allowed to happen.

[durasell]

No, I meant actual brain cancer, malignant tumors etc.

[John Lenin]

[Suzy Quzy]

You think he has cancer? For REAL??

[Suzy Quzy]

OMG!! They should HANG Nifong!!

[LikeLight]

Just trying to keep...Christians at home on voting day. Man, they are really getting desperate.

If this is a good strategy, then why is it making me more and more fired up to go vote? I think it's backfiring!

[lexington minuteman 1775]

If he had written nothing negative, he would not have gotten on the MSM book circuit tour, aka. CNN, Katie Couric, and all those others.
So this makes the "former aide" a media whore.
As an Evangelical I know what the Word says about such.
So I still plan to vote for the only party that is at least attempting to fight the islamofacists and that means Republican. Am I totally happy with them? Nope, but at this point the survival of America is more important than some alleged "mocking" in the White House.

[durasell]

That's what he claims...

[t2buckeye]

Let's see...what has been the democrat strategy? To repress the Christian conservative vote by highlighting Foley and now this.....Why is this guy no longer the head of faith based initiatives? Why would he, knowing the animosity of democrats to ANYTHING Christian, write this so that it comes out before the election?
Methinks there is something rotten here.

[durasell]

Why would he, knowing the animosity of democrats to ANYTHING Christian, write this so that it comes out before the election?
Methinks there is something rotten here.




Uh politics? Quick, somebody call 60 Minutes! Someone is applying political tricks to politics!

[skr]

I just checked some of the author's other articles concerning Pres. Bush. Julian Borger and The Guardian are hardly unbiased.

As to Mr. Rove, I don't know what he believes. Pres. Bush, however, is just as unlikely to ridicule Christians as Dean isn't.

From what I can tell, the "whistleblower" is unhappy with how Bush's faith-based policies are being put into action. He apparently doesn't understand that the government-involvement is what's holding optimum implementation back.

[cambodia]

Found this in an article talking about David Kuo...

"...But before that, he had been a campaign volunteer for former representative Joseph Kennedy (D-Mass.) and an intern for Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.)..."

[BurrOh]

"What is your opinion of Karl Rove? "

Unprincipled party apparatchnik.


That is hilarious.
And, I thought he was the eevel jeenyus.
Can no one keep up? :)

[LikeLight]

Nope, but at this point the survival of America is more important than some alleged "mocking" in the White House.

And, for the record, even if true that Rove mocks evangelicals, I'm still glad to have him on our side. Why do you think we call him a magnificent bastard, anyway? Not because he's our favorite guy in the world, but because he gets the job done politically.

[Rockingham]

There is likely both truth and exaggeration -- with enough of the latter for a marketable book. As for the truth part, those who are in the political food chain tend to have a large measure of cynicism, an appraising eye, and proven loyalty to their superiors. Most of us treat fools and nuts politely to their faces while deriding them in private, and especially so in our areas of expertise.

In private, political operatives tend to deride not just fools, but almost everyone -- including each other. They also tend to be brutally cynical about their supporters, in the same way that actors tend to have a love/hate relationship with their audience, and anyone whose performance depends on public approval finds the public at large and their own customers often frustrating, annoying, and even idiotic.

Now, ask yourself, suppose a pious and well-meaning religious leader meets with political staff at the White House -- almost any White House -- and argues for support of a naive pet political idea? They will get a polite reception, perhaps a grip and grin photo in the Oval Office -- and be called one form of idiot or another in private, often in brutal terms. And that is how anyone with political stature and foolish ideas gets treated by political operatives, even in a friendly White House.

This does not get to the heart of the matter: do Bush, Rove, and the current White House regard the Christian Right as all wingnuts, to be treated just well enough and scared enough to be kept loyal, while they and their ideas get short shrift on policy? One can argue either way, but the question itself is wrong-minded, like asking if Charlton Heston really was Moses when he played him on film.

The record shows that Bush and his administration are overall, at best weakly conservative on domestic policy. Yet, as a Republican administration, they are vulnerable to pressure from the Right, such as on the Harriet Meir's nomination and preferable because they keep the democrats from power. But no administration is to be trusted, and the best test of where they have been and are going politically is not rumors and backstage comments but their record.

For ardent conservatives, the record of the Bush Administration is disappointing, about the same as the gentleman C that Bush had in college, and only a notch better than his father. Barring an unexpected series of victories in the War on Terror, few people who are not named Bush are going to give George W. Bush and his administration high marks. He will almost certainly go down in history as a transitional figure, like his father, with the War on Terror his most significant legacy, for good or ill.

It will not matter on January 2009 if Rove said unpleasant things in private about Christian Right leaders. And even now, it does not matter. Not one bit. What matter most is keeping the Democrats out. It is better to give power to the disappointing than to let the dangerous have have it.