Posted on 10/19/2007 4:26:36 PM PDT by shrinkermd
As Friday's session opened, Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, told attendees they "can't rely on politicians alone" to advance the social conservative agenda. He then told a joke ribbing Capitol Hill lawmakers: one Democrat, one Republican, both of whom considered themselves grounded in conservative values, but neither of whom could recite the Lord's Prayer.
Taken together, these words suggested the depth of skepticism among values voters about the repeated appeals for support from politicians they view as less than authentic.
Perkins said social conservatives must end "judicial tyranny, which brought us Roe v. Wade," and press the future president to "move forward with public policy that promotes the protection of the unborn child."
Interestingly, Perkins drew a historical comparison between slavery and polygamy, calling them the twin evil of their time. At a conference where uneasiness over former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney's Mormon faith is a persistent topic of conversation and concern to some evangelical Christians...
As for marriage, Perkins said marriage between a man and a woman "must be enshrined in the U.S. Constitution."
Romney, alone among the top GOP presidential contenders, backs an amendment to the Constitution defining marriage as a union between a man a woman, a point he will drive home in his speech here today.
Arizona Sen. John McCain, trying to revive his once-flagging campaign, told a poignant and unscripted story about his captivity for 5 1/2 years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam, tracing the cruelty he endured to a personal discovery of the power of faith. He also called himself the only career-long pro-life candidate in the race and drew applause by saying he's pro-life "because I know what it's like to live without human rights."
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Hey! Did you see Alan Keyes?
No?
Oh, that's right. They didn't invite him. Didn't even put him in their straw poll. They had room for Hillary and Obama, Giuliani and Romney, but not Alan Keyes.
What a charade.
I think the invitations went out a few months ago. Are you sure that the Ambassador wasn’t invited at all?
Oh, I’m sure.
As to “the invitations going out a few months ago,” Fred Thompson got in the race the same week as Alan Keyes, and Rudy Giuliani only accepted their invitation a few days ago. So, those arguments, held up in the light of reality, don’t wash.
Maybe those who argue that we are in the last days are on to something.
"Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first..." - 2 Thessalonians 2:3
I know that I wasn’t surprised when Thompson officially entered the race, but I was when Dr. Keyes entered.
I talked to Dr. Keyes at the Texas Alliance for Life banquet on the 9th, assuming that he would be at this meeting.
Seriously the results were so skewed by the off site voting that they don’t mean anything other than that some of Romney’s and Paul’s people voted on line.
http://frcaction.org/
Here’s the onsite voting results
Mike Huckabee 488 51.26%
Mitt Romney 99 10.40%
Fred Thompson 77 8.09%
Tom Tancredo 65 6.83%%
Rudy Giuliani 60 6.30%
Duncan Hunter 54 5.67%
John McCain 30 3.15%
Sam Brownback 26 2.73%
Ron Paul 25 2.63%
The Texas event was a great one. I think it was one of the most successful that Texas Alliance for Life has ever had.
The only meaning the straw poll has is that they didn’t even have the decency to include Dr. Keyes. It’s shameful.
I don’t know whether it’s “shameful” or a shame. Could have been forgetfulness or someone dropped the ball. Event though I’m unhappy with the way the poll was run and don’t have the least bit of confidence in the results, I see clutziness, not maliciousness in the whole event.
I wish you were right.
But I know for a fact that you’re not.
I can be optimistic about your believability, too. It’s just that I’m dealing with an unknown person or persons posting under a pseudonym vs an organization made up of people with whom I’ve met and worked.
Personally, I wish all but the top 3 or 4 would drop out, allowing us to focus our energies on those. Dr. Keyes should have shown up as a regular attendee, like the rest of us (only with his own security). He could have/would have had a welcoming audience. And he could have joined Phyllis Schlaffly and Laura Ingraham. I was impressed with their absolutely unapologetic speeches - as well as the fact that they were given a forum to say that they are not in the mood to put up with pro-abortion, pro-gay, anti-family, antigun “Republican” candidates. They gave us an opportunity to applaud the “right” lines.
I can’t fathom the motive for purposefully skewing this poll one way or another, except to bury the Guiliani votes. (that’s why I clapped every time someone could have been suggesting that we wouldn’t vote for a prochoice candidate - it’s time to scare them, now.)
He’s a presidential candidate, one with decades of hard-earned stripes laboring in the tough part of the fields.
To ask him to just come hang out, without a speaking role, is insulting in the extreme. Especially when you’ve already given your platform and your political capital to leftwingers like Giuliani and Romney.
You’ve got FReepmail.
That idea constitutes a terrible disservice to the American people.
Not a single sovereign citizen has cast a vote, and will not for months.
We're not the Soviet Union, where a small clique of Politburo members decide who can be considered candidates, thereby pre-determining the outcome.
Or, maybe we now are...
It has nothing to do with “Politboro members,” for pity’s sake.
It’s about saving the Party to prevent 8 years of the growth of totalitarianism like we’ve never known in this country. More than during Roosevelt’s tenure and even more than during the last Clinton regime.
(If you believe that I’m over reacting, look at the limits Pelosi has put on debate and amendments in the House. Add in the cameras that have been erected on street corners and highways. Look at the grip that gay-rights, atheism and scientism have on the media, science reporting and the blogosphere. Worse, look at the way the discussions on this forum about whether Mormonism is Christianity have ripped the foundations from under less thoughtful believers and provided fuel for those atheists and anti-religionists. I’ve just spent the weekend taxing back and forth between the “bioethicists” and the “value voters.” I’ll take the least thoughtful among the latter over the clique that runs the former.)
I would have the men choose to withdraw on their own, for the good of the Party. Then, they could work as guiding statesmen. Or gadflies if necessary.
Imagine the stand that these honorable men could take as self-sacrificing, as giving up their runs at the Presidency to stand for unity and the core values we hold in common. (Even Guiliani proved he understands what those values are - if he doesn’t understand *why* - on Saturday.)
The limits imposed by campaign finance laws would be lifted the second they withdrew (and that topic alone would provide a few sound bites). They could speak at venues like the TAL banquet for the right and truth, rather than being restrained by their potential partisanship.
I dispute the assertion that speaking as Mrs. Schlaffly did - or to attend on his on dime as so many, including my husband, did (spending money for a hotel room and a full day each way in airports and on airplanes) - is insulting or demeaning. It would have been the ultimate act of resistance toward the would-be “Politboro.”
Flip, even I was interviewed - by a Japanese television reporter - in the lobby outside the auditorium.
He was NOT invited to do so.
Somebody really goofed in that, I’m sorry.
It was no “goof.” It was done quite deliberately, with full knowledge. Of that, I’m positive, because I made sure they knew exactly what they were doing every step of the way.
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