The Media's Mormon Fixation

The Daily Beast ^ | Oct. 10, 2011 | Howard Kurtz

[Colofornian]

After the Trump tease, the Daniels Dalliance, the Huckabee hesitation, the Palin pretense, and the Christie charade, the press corps has reluctantly turned its lonely eyes back to the once and future frontrunner, Mitt Romney.

But having already exhausted the usual storylines—he’s stiff, he’s changed positions, he’s inauthentic—journalists have returned to the one that generated so many sparks in the last campaign: he’s a Mormon!

This is not quite breaking news, of course, but it does inject a note of dramatic divisiveness into an otherwise tepid candidacy.

Admittedly, news organizations had a legitimate reason to pounce on the question of Romney’s faith over the weekend. At the Values Voter forum, Robert Jeffress, a Baptist leader from Dallas who introduced Rick Perry as a “committed follower of Christ” ripped into Romney’s religion. It is a “cult,” he told reporters, and “Mormonism is not Christianity.” (Perry has largely avoided making any comment.)

Romney sidestepped the attack the following day, calling for tolerance and saying there is no place for “poisonous language” in politics. He did not use the M word.

Stuart Stevens, Romney’s chief strategist, brushed off the incident. “It doesn’t really change anything,” he told me Monday. “He’s going to talk about jobs, the economy, foreign policy. There’s not a grand strategy here except to talk about stuff we want to talk about.”

Romney is said by those close to him to have laughed off the Jeffress slam as nothing new, and Stevens insists he isn’t worried about the coverage. “It’s only a distraction if you get distracted,” he says.

Still, the floodgates have opened. Politico’s lead story on Sunday was headlined “Mitt Romney’s Mormon Issue Returns.” Other candidates were asked about the Jeffress rhetoric on the talk shows, and as the new week began it was the hot topic on television and online.

Will the press keep pounding away at this anti-Mormon outburst? Why, 50 years after JFK broke the Catholic barrier, is a candidate’s religion again emerging as a major issue?

Journalists have a fig leaf in tackling the topic. Evangelical Christians made up 44 percent of the Republican primary electorate in 2008, according to an ABC News analysis, and many have an antipathy toward Mormons, which is why Romney fared poorly among these voters last time. Thus news outlets can say, with some validity, that they’re merely engaging in horse-race analyses rather than singling out a Mormon candidate for special scrutiny.

We have been down this road before. The clamor over Romney’s religion was such that the candidate felt compelled to deliver a major address in December 2007. “He gave his speech on this four years ago,” Stevens says in a that’s-old-news tone.

Why, 50 years after JFK broke the Catholic barrier, is a candidate’s religion again emerging as a major issue?

At George H.W. Bush’s presidential library, Romney said: “Let me assure you that no authorities of my church, or of any other church for that matter, will ever exert influence on presidential decisions. Their authority is theirs, within the province of church affairs, and it ends where the affairs of the nation begin…No candidate should become the spokesman for his faith.”

That speech prompted a wave of reporting on everything from Romney’s days as a Mormon missionary to examinations of what Mormons, who comprise about 2 percent of the U.S. population, believe (the church gave up polygamy more than 100 years ago).

We had the spectacle of reporters asking Romney whether he wears The Garment, a special knee-length underwear. The candidate told The Atlantic he would keep such matters private.

A New York Times editorial said Romney was "trying to persuade Christian fundamentalists … that he is sufficiently Christian for them to support his bid for the Republican nomination. No matter how dignified he looked, and how many times he quoted the founding fathers, he could not disguise that sad fact.”

Mike Huckabee, the former Baptist minister, caused a stir by asking: “Don’t Mormons believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?” He later apologized for a mistake he said was rooted in ignorance. Huckabee won the Iowa caucuses, where evangelicals play a particularly strong role, and Romney has since developed an allergy to Iowa, blowing off the summer’s straw poll.

This time around, Romney’s rivals haven’t exactly rushed to the defense of Mormonism. Asked on Fox News Sunday whether Romney could be deemed a “true Christian,” Rick Santorum said: “He says he’s a Christian.” Michele Bachmann, asked on CNN’s State of the Union whether Romney is a Christian, ducked twice by talking about her own “sincerely held faith” and the need for “religious tolerance.” Herman Cain, asked the same question on the same program, said: “I’m not running for theologian in chief. I’m a lifelong Christian.”

(The other Mormon candidate in the race, Jon Huntsman, told voters in New Hampshire: “I have no idea why people are wasting so much political-capital bandwidth on this issue. It’s nonsense.”)

Romney has significant weaknesses as a candidate, starting with his evolution from a Massachusetts moderate who once backed abortion rights through his awkwardness at chatting with regular folks at a diner. But he has focused like a laser beam on the economy, a sensible strategy for a former venture capitalist running against a president who is presiding over a 9.1 percent jobless rate.

Why, then, are the media again being diverted by his faith? It is true that Romney would be the first Mormon president, but that hardly seems a farfetched notion in a country that has elected its first African-American president.

The answer is that Romney’s disciplined style doesn’t lend itself to the Trump-style entertainment that many in the media seem to prefer in 2011. A religious controversy, by contrast, touches enough hot buttons to heat up the debate. The question is how long the media can stoke this issue if Romney, the stubbornly steady campaigner with every hair in place, refuses to engage.

[Colofornian]

From the article: ...a Baptist leader from Dallas who introduced Rick Perry as a “committed follower of Christ” ripped into Romney’s religion. It is a “cult,” he told reporters, and “Mormonism is not Christianity.”...the floodgates have opened. Politico’s lead story on Sunday was headlined “Mitt Romney’s Mormon Issue Returns.” Other candidates were asked about the Jeffress rhetoric on the talk shows, and as the new week began it was the hot topic on television and online.

No surprise. First of all, all this Baptist pastor did was repeat what is on the Southern Baptist Website: That Mormonism is a cult...hardly "headline news."

If Mormonism wants to be Mormonism, let it be Mormonism. If Mormonism wants to counterfeit itself as "Christianity," then it's going to be identified by what it is: A cult! Its camouflage isn't going to "take."

From the article: Evangelical Christians made up 44 percent of the Republican primary electorate in 2008, according to an ABC News analysis, and many have an antipathy toward Mormons, which is why Romney fared poorly among these voters last time. Will the press keep pounding away at this anti-Mormon outburst?

Yup. And even more so if Romney wins the nomination. The entirety of the 2012 MSM coverage will be...
(a) all about the ins and outs of Romney's culthood; and (b) the fact that Romney was a member of a church that banned blacks from its temple, from its priesthood, from temple marriages -- all while he was still age 30! If you think about how a mere rock in a hunting ground caused a stir, Mormonism has tens of thousands of such "rocks" highlighting its racism...and some of them are still in their sacred books...which can't just be erased away as an off-base leader opinion-from-the-past.

We will see MSM questions like, “Mr. Romney, why as a 30 year-old adult did you belong to a religion restricting blacks from priesthood?” "Do you believe you will be a god? Do you believe conservative voters from other churches are 'apostates?' Do believe that although polygamy is no longer practiced on earth, it's being practiced at now & for eternity in another dimension known as the celestial kingdom?"

From the article: We had the spectacle of reporters asking Romney whether he wears The Garment, a special knee-length underwear. The candidate told The Atlantic he would keep such matters private.

Yup. Expect the weird beliefs of Mormons to override the economy, the attack upon the preborn and marriage as an institution, etc. etc. etc. I'm sure the fledgling GOP would have loved to focus on other issues in 1856 besides polygamy and slavery...but the Mormons were negatively helping to set the social agenda then -- as were the institutional bondage-masters of the South.

[Colofornian]

From the article: Mike Huckabee, the former Baptist minister, caused a stir by asking: “Don’t Mormons believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers?” He later apologized for a mistake he said was rooted in ignorance.

This is where Kurtz is showing his utter ignorance as a writer. Indeed, Mormon theology does teach that Jesus and the devil are spirit-brothers. And the fact that the Mormon church and grassroots Mormons made much "to do" over this in December 2007 and thereafter shows a tremendous lack of candidness on their part.

It's late January 2010. Rexburg Idaho. Home of BYU-Idaho. An Lds apostle, M. Russell Ballard, gives an unscripted fireside "convo" with Mormon students. See: Ballard speaks on Mormons in the media from the Rexburg Standard Journal, which covers the talk.

Ballard lets the "cat out of the bag": From the Rexburg article: "You remember Mr. (Mike) Huckabee (who was also vying to be the Republican candidate for president), who among other things said that Mormons believe that Jesus and the devil were brothers?" Ballard asked students. "Remember that? It went all over the media. "Well they are!" Ballard exclaimed to a laughing student body.

Ah, yes. When Mormons accused Huckabee of lying about this -- or worse. They were all offended. Get them behind closed doors, and they laugh about the reality of having Mormon worldviews pegged in the public square.

So, here, we have an Lds general authority conceding that -- to quote him "Well they are!" in reference to the issue of whether they cite "Jesus and the devil are brothers."

Now in case someone views that this information needs to be suppressed...not let it become aired out...or they think that we are overriding realities in our assessments of Mormonism, Elder Ballard concedes at this fireside chatm adding: "But they (the media and nonmembers) don't understand that, because they don't have the (LDS gospel) restoration. They don't understand the spiritual relationship that ... we are all sons and daughters of God, and that Lucifer was one of those and (that) he chose to use his agency in an unrighteous way."

[cuban leaf]

Pretty much everything you need to know about Mormonism (if you are thinking of joining) can be found in this episode:

And if you are serious about it, there is TONS of info about it. The baptist pastor was absolutely correct. Anyone who has actually STUDIED this religion would agree with him. Heck, I studied it in the late 1970's, thinking about becoming a member. But It's pretty clear to an "unaffiliated" person just how goofy the whole thing is. As with islam, it is completely made up by man, and losely based on the Bible.

It's a cult. And I have a serious problem with voting for a member of that cult for president.

[G Larry]

Expect a barrage of proctological exams of Mormonism over the next year.
Each objective of course.....
Endless MSM “specials”......

[StonyBurk]

But the issues here are —or ought be -What does the media gain by stirring up this divisive -non issue? Add to that the facts ignored by the Media (with few exceptionsi.e a newspaper in Seatle) #1 the Romney camp approached Bill Bennett for his support before the so called Values Voter Summit.#2 Pastor Jeffress mentioned ,Only from the podium
that his favored candidate Gov. Rick Perry is a Christian.
#3 when approached by reporters after Pastor Jeffress gave his personal opine. #4 Pastor Jeffress also made clear in that
meeting with reporters that he was not “close” to Gov. Perry; that he was expressing his opinion ,only;that gov. Perry might well disagree with him.#4 Clearly form the Seatle Paper—and from the Houston chronicle Romney intended to attack a Mr.Fischer from the podium— who is not a candidate-but a radio guy for American Family Association.Romney did attack Mr. Fischer following Bill
Bennetts speech attacking Pastor Jeffress ,(without mention of essential fact) And Romney also took a swipe at rick Perry in his same speech. Pastor Jeffress did Not violate Article VI of the Constitution in spirit or in law.(If one agrees with Joseph Story -A Familiar Exposition of the Constitution ,Regnery 1997 from the 1859 original -see also the 1833 Commentaries from which the school text was culled. I am aware of the Letter written to the Hebrew Congregation ( and others like it) I am also aware that George Washington issued General Orders to his Army , including one used by President Lincoln in Nov.1862 (that of 9 July 1776) that expressed the Generals hope and expectation that every Officer and man would so live as becomes a Christian soldier. ...” Other Orders issued reminded the distinguished Patriots to laud the more distinguished Character of Christian. Need I continue?
the great experiment of the so called church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints had not been invented by Joseph Smith
yet in Washingtons Day. But in Doctrines and in practices it manifests all the elements of a cult. It is unfortunate that the Media is now EXPLOITING the credible opinion of a Baptist Pastor... to advance the cause of the Democratic Party and their Beguiler in Chief?

[cuban leaf]

Well, I don’t think the press is fixated on Romney’s Mormonism any more than I am. He’s like a car I’m choosing not to buy because it gets bad gas mileage, has not enough cargo space, has bad styling and handles like a pig.

If I mention to a friend who is into sports cars that I’m not buying that car because it handles like a pig, I’m not fixated on it. Rather, It is the particular attribute I am discussing at that time because it is a topic to which the person I am describing the car can relate.

The press is covering many aspects of Romney, his religion being but one. At least, that is what I am seeing so far.

[cuban leaf]

—What does the media gain by stirring up this divisive -non issue?—

I’ve studied Mormonism. I come to this position with knowledge. It is not a “non-issue”. It is one of the reasons I will not vote for the man.

[Grut]

The best Aircraft Commander I ever had in the Air Force was a Mormon, and I don’t believe I ever met a better man. So while Romney is about my last choice, it’s not because of that.

Besides, judging from Romney’s history, his politics don’t seem to be very constrained by his religion.

[Texas Fossil]

MSM fixated on Romney’s religion?

Should surprise no one. Mormon’s historically vote Republican...

Anything that divides Republicans will be nursed as a campaign issue.

I am not Mormon, have no Mormon family members, but lived among many of them in NM & AZ. I was Republican County Chairman in a NM county that had 5 Dems to 1 Pubbie. The three groups that you could always count on at the poles were the Rock Rib Republican Ranchers, the Mormons and the John Birchers. Like it or not, that was the situation. The Dems played the race card and the evil corporation card (it was a mine union town) even then. (early to mid 1980’s)

There are some things better left unsaid in public discourse. One of those is religion. It is also true here on FR. Caution should be in order when this approach is taken.

I know a great deal about Mormon history. (from written history and from discussion with X-Mormons)

The issue with NittWitt Mitt is not his religion. He simply does not represent what has been Historically Republican. He is pro abortion, a very strange position for a Mormon. He is a big gov. statist.

There is plenty to discuss about Romney. But it is fruitless to discuss his religion. Even though there are some real problems with that.

[Elsie]

But it is fruitless to discuss his religion.

Maybe politically; but eternally it MUST be discussed because it will lead souls AWAY from the TRUE Christ of the bible.

[laotzu]

Its these McMormons, living in their McMansions, that are ruining this economy.

[laotzu]

How kool is it that Rachel Maddow & Chris Matthews are
now bringing attention to this subject that is so dear to us?

[magritte]

Birds of a feather.

[laotzu]

Another prominent Christian agrees:

"As for the one Mormon running for office. Those who really believe in God will defeat him anyways. So don't worry about that, that's a temporary situation."
--The Reverend Al Sharpton

[laotzu]

Good morning Elsie.

No more bailouts for these fatcat Mormons!!

[P-Marlowe]

The press is covering many aspects of Romney, his religion being but one.

Would that one be the fact that Mormons believe that black skin is a curse from God?

[Ransomed]

“That is a mainstream view, that Mormonism is a cult,” Jeffress told reporters here. “Every true, born again follower of Christ ought to embrace a Christian over a non-Christian.”

I don’t think that is bigotry, I wouldn’t have used “cult”, but whatever.

The last part is pretty dumb, in my opinion. How Christian would it be to vote for a pro-choice Christian over a pro-life Jew or Hindu? He probably didn’t mean it like that but then again I don’t know why he didn’t clarify what he meant.

Freegards

[P-Marlowe]

What does the media gain by stirring up this divisive -non issue?

If Romney gets the nomination, he will be running against a black man. The Mormons teach that dark skin is a curse from God and that white skin is a blessing from God.

How is that belief going to play in the general election?

And he had caused the cursing to come upon them, yea, even a sore cursing . . . wherefore, as they were white, and exceedingly fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon them (Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi 5:21).

The MSM is sitting on this one aspect of the Mormon Church. The long knives will come out as soon as he gets the nomination. Right now they are playing up the "Mormonism is/isn't Christian" angle to try to destroy Perry and Cain. But when Romney gets the nomination, the MSM will play the race card against the LDS Church and Romney. They will demand that the book of Mormon be changed or removed from their Standard works. Romney will be toast.

[Graybeard58]

It's a cult. And I have a serious problem with voting for a member of that cult for president.

To do so would help validate the cult in the eyes of the world and give a new talking point to the 50,000 Mormon "missionaries" all over the world. "Well, gee whiz, the President of the United States is a Mormon, it must be good".

[Graybeard58]

"As for the one Mormon running for office. Those who really believe in God will defeat him anyways. So don't worry about that, that's a temporary situation." --The Reverend Al Sharpton

Ignorant Al can't even get that right. There are two Mormons running.