Posted on 09/19/2007 7:14:10 PM PDT by pissant
DENVER (AP) — James Dobson, one of the nation's most politically influential evangelical Christians, made it clear in a message to friends this week he will not support Republican presidential hopeful Fred Thompson.
In a private e-mail obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press, Dobson accuses the former Tennessee senator and actor of being weak on the campaign trail and wrong on issues dear to social conservatives.
"Isn't Thompson the candidate who is opposed to a Constitutional amendment to protect marriage, believes there should be 50 different definitions of marriage in the U.S., favors McCain-Feingold, won't talk at all about what he believes, and can't speak his way out of a paper bag on the campaign trail?" Dobson wrote.
"He has no passion, no zeal, and no apparent 'want to.' And yet he is apparently the Great Hope that burns in the breasts of many conservative Christians? Well, not for me, my brothers. Not for me!"
The founder and chairman of Colorado Springs-based Focus on the Family, Dobson draws a radio audience in the millions, many of whom who first came to trust the child psychologist for his conservative Christian advice on child-rearing.
Gary Schneeberger, a Focus on the Family spokesman, confirmed that Dobson wrote the e-mail. Schneeberger declined to comment further, saying it would be inappropriate because Dobson's comments about presidential candidates are made as an individual and not as a representative of Focus on the Family, a nonprofit organization restricted from partisan politics.
Dobson's strong words about Thompson underscore the frustration and lack of unity among Christian conservatives about the GOP field. Some Christian right leaders have pinned their hopes on Thompson, describing him as a Southern-fried Ronald Reagan. But others have voiced doubts in recent weeks about some of the same issues Dobson highlighted: his position on gay marriage and support for the 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform legislation.
Dobson and other Christian conservatives support an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would bar gay marriage nationally. Thompson has said he would support a constitutional amendment that would prohibit states from imposing their gay marriage laws on other states, which falls well short of that.
Karen Hanretty, a spokeswoman for the Thompson campaign, said Wednesday in response to the Dobson e-mail: "Fred Thompson has a 100 percent pro-life voting record. He believes strongly in returning authority to the levels of government closest to families and communities, protecting states from intrusion by the federal government and activist judges.
"We're confident as voters get to know Fred, they'll appreciate his conservative principles, and he is the one conservative in this race who can win the nomination and can go on to defeat the Democratic nominee."
In his e-mail addressed "Dear friends," Dobson includes the text of a recent news story highlighting Thompson's statement that while he was baptized in the Church of Christ, he does not attend church regularly and won't speak about his faith on the stump.
U.S. News and World Report quoted Dobson earlier this year as questioning Thompson's commitment to the Christian faith — comments Dobson contended were not put in proper context. Dobson in this week's e-mail writes that suppositions "about the former senator's never having professed to be a Christian are turning out to be accurate in substance."
Earlier this year, Dobson said he wouldn't back John McCain because of the Arizona senator's opposition to a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.
Later, Dobson wrote on a conservative news Web site that he wouldn't support former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani should he win the Republican nomination. Dobson called Giuliani an "unapologetic supporter of abortion on demand" and criticized him for signing a bill in 1997 creating domestic-partnership benefits in New York City.
Last week, Dobson announced on his radio show that the IRS had cleared him of accusations that he had endangered his organization's nonprofit status by endorsing Republican candidates in 2004. The IRS said Dobson, who endorsed President Bush's re-election bid, was acting as an individual and not on behalf of the nonprofit group.
From Post #27:
“Isn’t Thompson the candidate who is opposed to a Constitutional amendment to protect marriage, believes there should be 50 different definitions of marriage in the U.S....”
Because, Jim, it isn’t the business of the federal government to engage in social engineering even when the results are those that you think you’d like. If you want that kind of government then go to the former Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, Cuba, the People’s Republic of China, or Venezuela or get a bunch of folks to follow you to some place out in the middle of Guyana (or one of the Carolinas).
My response addressed the subject of this thread. Your response injected a red herring implication that FDT is pro-choice. If you have backup that FDT is pro-choice, let’s see it!
Right. And if Rooty is the GOP nominee Hillary will be our next president, count on it.
What this election comes down to is we either get Hillary or Fred as C in C of US armed forces in a time of war with Islamic fundamentalists for the survival of the free world, which one do we prefer?
Ah facts, they always screw up the truth...
~ BUMP! ~
I agree.
Also, it sometimes gets a little disheartening to read all the nasty, snide, cheap shots that many Freepers take towards Christians. But, alas the GOP is certainly a big tent. I guess it comes with the territory.
I think you need some fresh air-preferably not near a natural gas line.
My comment was in response to your comment about Fred Thompson’s opinion of Roe v. Wade.
To: Hostage
Federalism refers to divided powers-ie making sure one group or branch of government does not wield too much power.
The states have specific duties and rights.
The federal government have certain duties and rights.
Some duties are shared-like defending innocent human life.
Every public official has a duty to defend innocent human life.
Defending human life is not a federalist issue. It is the business of all of humanity.
I do not owe you an explanation as to what I have contributed to THIS COUNTRY versus what Dobson or you have done for families. Oh, and keep up the judgmentalism you clone.
Done with you.
I remain very skeptical about that claim.
I read your misleading previous post. But it was you pissant that broached the subject in this thread, and it is you that needs to back it up!
It’s obvious you’re a liar. Pity Hunter having such advocates.
You were asked to back up your insinuation that FDT is prochoice. Why don’t you do so?
Do you think FDT is prochoice? Yes or No?
Think about this Nav Mom, if we didn't get nasty criticism and hate from the world we wouldn't b living our lives as true Christians, right? Jesus told us plainly that if we love and follow Him the world will hate and persecute us. I will gladly take the heat from the world if it means that I'm living and acting as Christ would have me live.
Yet Congress can choose to exempt pretty much anything from Federal courts' authority if they want to, certainly more easily than getting an amendment ratified. And if leftist judges cannot read the plain wording of the existing laws & Constitution, then why should we expect they'll respect the wording of a new amendment?
Women have been the deciding factor in most recent presidential elections. Women instinctively dislike and distrust men like Rudy who have ditched wives and had numerous extra-marital affairs, not to mention his close association and living arrangements with homosexual men. Rudy may attract some pro-abort but otherwise conservative women away from Hillary, but IMHO he will drive many more women into the Hillary camp than he will attract to his own. Just MHO and worth just what it costs.
You silence is telling.
Check and mate in three moves.
In order to win, and I do support your goal if not your strategy, you must understand your enemy and your battlefield. The abortion question is part of a tangled web of legal decisions over a 60-year period that have literally removed all logical basis from our Constitutional law, starting with the "wall of separation" decision in 1948 that elevated atheists to the same moral standing as those who believe in a nation "under God." Once that foundational understanding was weakened, all legal supports for traditional marriage, keeping sex within marriage, punishing adultery and viewing children as an immutable obligation of their parents were torn down in many, many Supreme Court cases, one case at a time, over many, many years. Now the institution of marriage has been so weakened under law that it is virtually gone except in the hopes and dreams of conservatives. Fully 37% of children in this country are now born out of wedlock.
If you want to hit a target effectively, you have to aim at the center of it, which is the underlying legal understanding that either God exists or God does not exist; and further, that the God in question is the culturally historic God of Abraham, on whose definitions of spiritual law our Constitution was based. This is a huge problem to solve, due to the First Amendment cult of what has become "freedom from religion" — as if God is contained within a religion instead of factually existing over and above and beyond the limits of a religion.
The abortion question is one of many that are symptoms, not causes, of this central problem: the impossibility of being a nation Under God while simultaneously ruling in favor of the godless entitlements of socialism. Conservatives have yet to understand the need to bring cases proactively to the SCOTUS in order to solve this dilemma fundamentally; on the other hand, we have had a liberal-slanted court since the days of FDR which has been highly unlikely to rule in favor of recognizing the ultimate supremacy of God. Only under Bush and his two appointments of Roberts and Alito have we had a ghost of a chance to make change. We need at least one other Federalist Originalist on the bench to have a shot at overturning the godless socialist revolution that encompasses a far wider range of issues than just abortion.
You are blowing smoke out your arse. Which of those quotes indicated a pro-life position? These are Fred’s words, not mine.
Yours is sound logic and is close to what I am confident FDT has as a strategy.
But this poster is I suspect a purveyor of disinformation destraction.
That is why the apporopriate question to him/her is whether he/she thinks FDT is prochoice. This leads them into the trap I set for them. Please wait aside and see if they take the bait.
“I will gladly take the heat from the world if it means that I’m living and acting as Christ would have me live”
Excellent point and thanks for the reminder.
I’ll answer that question. Fred claims to be pro-life now. I have no reason not to believe him. Just like Romney, he flipped flopped at some point. Unlike Romney, he never has said when he did.
Post his alleged ‘words’ pissant. Post them as you have posted them on countless threads before.
Why won’t you do it? You claim he is prochoice? Back it up!
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