Posted on 02/16/2007 1:03:23 PM PST by SJackson
Heard the one about the Mormon President? The shaky prospects of Mitt RomneyGerard Baker There are so many minorities now in the crowded field for the 2008 US presidential election that daily news coverage of the race is starting to sound like one of those politically incorrect jokes from the 1970s. You’ll recall the kind: A woman, a black man, an Italian and a Mormon are in a plane over the ocean . . .
We have Hillary Clinton, credibly promising to be the first female to be President, Barack Obama, the first African-American in the White House, Rudolph Giuliani, the former New York Mayor, the first Italian-American (and occasional transvestite) to be President, and Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts Governor, who launched his bid this week to be the first Mormon to get to the top.
Most of these potential firsts are lauded by commentators as representing great social and political progress. The exception is Mr Romney, whose potential breach of the infamous glass ceiling for members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is regarded with considerable misgivings.
In fact, while the consensus seems to be that Mrs Clinton and Mr Obama can overcome sexism and racism, it is considered more or less axiomatic that Mr Romney is in for a very hard time on account of his religion. On the face of it, this seems odd. If you’ve been brought up on a diet of the usual liberal media stereotype of America as a nation of woman and black-hating religious maniacs, you have a right to be puzzled when you hear that a devout God-fearing white man faces bigger hurdles than either a feminist or a liberal African-American. But as with everything in the US, it’s more complicated than that.
Mr Romney should be a highly appealing candidate. He has just finished his term as Governor of Massachusetts, where in the most Democratic state in the nation, he was an effective and quite popular Republican chief executive. He is clever and good-looking, and has made a ton of money for himself. He is completely untainted by any attachment to the awful foreign policy mistakes of the Bush Administration for the past six years.
But his religious problem is that to win the presidency he must first win the Republican nomination, a contest in which evangelical Protestants, especially in southern states, have a disproportionate influence. Evangelicals are deeply suspicious of Mormonism, which they regard as a heretical sect, and not even Christian in any proper sense of the term. They find the whole story of how Joseph Smith is supposed to have received a new set of scriptures and refounded the Christian church in America, how his followers drove westward, with their many wives and their curious underwear, all a bit strange (this, by the way from some of the same people who want it taught as a scientific fact that God created the world in precisely six days, Adam’s rib and all).
Popular conceptions about the Mormons do not help Mr Romney or his fellow believers either. Though the church officially forbids polygamy, it will never be able to dissociate itself from past practice. Some of its rituals also invite a nervous scepticism.
Mr Romney is battling to shake off the religious doubts. He insists that Americans care less about which brand of faith you practise than that you are a good and decent person who lives according to religious principles.
He tackles some of the concerns with good, self-deprecating humour. He once said in a debate over gay marriage that he believes that “marriage should only ever be between a man and a woman . . . and a woman . . . and a woman . . .” Privately, he has enjoyed pointing out that he, the supposed polygamy-loving Mormon, has been married to the same woman for 37 years, while his principal rivals for the Republican nomination have — so far — been married an average of 2.7 times each — the Catholic Mr Giuliani (three times), the Episcopalian Senator John McCain (twice) and the Baptist Newt Gingrich (three times).
What is especially odd about the Romney problem is that it is only recently that Mormonism seems to have become a political burden.
There have been Mormon candidates for the presidency in the past and it hardly came up as an issue. Senator Orrin Hatch from Utah — a bishop of the Mormon Church — ran for president in 2000. Senator Harry Reid, a Democrat of Nevada, and the Majority Leader of the Senate, is a Mormon. Mr Romney’s father, George, a Governor of Michigan, was for a time the leading contender for the Republican nomination in the 1968 election. It was not his religion that felled him then, but an infamous remark in a radio interview that he thought he had been “brainwashed” during a trip to Vietnam in 1967: a comment that, given what some deemed to be his slightly vacuous intellectual qualities, caused one commentator to note that his experience could not have amounted to more than a light rinse.
Religious-political prejudices have been overcome before, of course. Many Americans were once much more suspicious of Catholics. But John F. Kennedy proved that it’s perfectly all right to have papists govern, less I think because of his declaration that he would not take orders from the Pope, and more because in his frenetic extramarital activity he was able to demonstrate that he was really, deep down, reliably indistinguishable from any other politician.
In the end, I suspect the Mormon issue will not be the largest impediment to a Romney presidency. He has suspiciously changed his position on critical social issues, for example — when he was running for governor of heavily Democratic Massachusetts, he was pro-abortion; now he is running for the Republican presidential nomination, he says he is anti-abortion.
Iraq, too, could hurt him. So far his approach seems to be the Basil Fawlty strategy — “Don’t mention the war!” He gives long campaign speeches without a reference to Iraq. But in what looks likely to be a foreign-policy dominated election, he will surely not be able to get away with that, and his inexperience in the national security field will not help either.
In the meantime, expect to hear a lot more about Mormonism in the next year or so than you will ever learn from those nice, smart young men who come and knock on your door.
He does.
Obviously evangelizing isn't my thing, but for those who practice it, I agree completely.
I admit this issue puzzles me. Other than the media, do people really care.
I agree till you got to proponent of the false prophets Joseph Smith and Brigham Young to boot. Nein!
Should he win, he's Commander in Chief, not Minister (apologies if the term is wrong for Mormons) in Chief.
Dear SJackson,
"Other than the media, do people really care."
Apparently, yes. I've seen a poll or two cited here at FR indicating that fair numbers of folks wouldn't vote for him precisely because he's a member of the LDS.
It's beyond me. And I'm speaking as a devout Catholic. The Church describes LDS baptism as invalid, the LDS conception of God to be ontologically different from the Christian conception of God, and the LDS church to be non-Christian.
Yet, even as a devout Catholic who believes what the Church teaches, I wouldn't hesitate to vote for a member of the LDS, if the candidate were actually a conservative Republican.
sitetest
LOL!!
One of my concerns about the '08 election is that the GOP retake Congress, and yet the three candidates considered to be the top contenders all have weaknesses that are likely to discourage the Republican base from casting the votes that will let us regain Congress.
In the case of Rudy Giuliani, his stances on abortion and homosexuality could offend religious conservatives to the point that many will stay home. Furthermore, his stance on the Second Amendment will so offend many sportsmen and self-defense advocates that they may stay home or vote Democrat to avoid giving him a mandate.
John McCain has flip-flopped a bit on abortion such as when he flirted with the pro-abortion side in 2000. He also attacked religious conservatives who were leaning towards Mr. Bush at that time. Finally, his campaign finance reform has been an attack on the First Amendment rights of both religious conservatives and Second Amendment supporters. He won't generate enthusiastic support from the base, and lacking that support, we may not get the votes to retake Congress.
Mitt Romney has similar abortion and homosexuality problems with religious conservatives. While he never supported either as strongly as Mr. Giuliani did, he hasn't stood strongly against either abortion or homosexuality. A pre-election switch to more conservative positions on these issues is going to leave many religious conservatives skeptical at best. In addition, his being Mormon will bother many traditional religious conservatives.
Of the three of these candidates, I like Mr. Romney the best. I won't take sides on the theological issues around his religion, but I don't have any problems supporting a Mormon. Mormons have shown themselves to be typically solid, patriotic people, and practice of Mormon beliefs shouldn't disqualify anyone from office.
I'm not supporting anyone for the nomination at this point, but I'll continue to look at Mr. Romney as a possibility.
Bill
I am a Lutheran, not LDS. I was merely stating the obvious: many mainline churches are shrinking, even disappearing, while the LDS and RLDS send missionaries to every corner of the Earth. I once visited the temple of the RLDS in Independence, Missouri while on a short vacation, and it is one of the most beautiful buildings I have ever seen. http://www.cofchrist.org/visit
If you are a Christian then I am not a Christian as a Baptist. Why? Because you believe that Lucifer and Jesus are brothers. I do not. I also do not believe that God has a human body, like you believe. LDS says that they are the TRUE Christian Church. Well Sorry, they are not. They teach the opposite of what the Bible teaches. And the Book of Mormon is provably wrong, ie, Native Americans are a lost tribe of Israel. DNA proves otherwise.
I don't really care to discuss theology with a Mormon. Mormonism is heresy pure and simple...but I would still vote for Romney if he was the alternative to Hillary.
Interesting that you should chose a German phrase to go with your activities, you sound like a jack booted thug to me, with your knee jerk, anti Mormon rhetoric.
Ok, how's this:
And a proponent of the false prophets Joseph Smith and Brigham Young to boot. Nyet!
Actually, my anti-mormonism is not what you think, on a personal level I like Mormons fine. Its the Mormon DOCTRINE, which is totally derived from Joseph Smith Mormonism's (false) prophet, I am 100% against. Jesus warned us about false prophets.
I can't trust someone in the oval office, who has to make judgment calls every day, who has no better judgment than to believe in such a charletan as Joseph Smith?
Correction:
How can I trust someone in the oval office, who has to make judgment calls every day, who has no better judgment than to believe in such a charletan as Joseph Smith?
>>In fact, while the consensus seems to be that Mrs Clinton and Mr Obama can overcome sexism and racism, it is considered more or less axiomatic that Mr Romney is in for a very hard time on account of his religion. On the face of it, this seems odd.<<
It is not odd at all, any more than if he was a Muslim. Black or female is what you are. Religion is what you believe.
We elect a president (or should) based on his beliefs. That is very much encompassed in his religeous beliefs or lack thereof.
They believe in "serial" monogamy.
Wouldn't that be H@$$|+o!e ??????
"I am a Mormon, I am a Christian, and you really have no business questioning what is in my heart.
Have a nice day and try talking to a Mormon instead of just about one next time."
Well said. I think those who doubt we are Christian would be better off to forget that foolishness and try to find out the ways in which we are like them... After all, it's the serious liberals (and the Devil who drives them) who profit from the attitude and the dissension.
"However, I really couldn't care less that he's a member of the LDS.
If I genuinely believed that he was a conservative, I'd vote for him, at least in the general election."
I agree completely. The LDS church is like any other; we've got fruits, nuts, and flakes, as well as good and decent people. It don't take all kinds, we just got all kinds.
I believe that we are all children of God. Christ is our eldest Brother, and only begotten of the father in the flesh. Satan was also a Child of God who fell from Heaven.
When Christ was resurected, what happened to his body if he did not keep it?
Yes, we believe that God has a body, glorified beyond what we know.
He also said "by their fruits ye shall know them". Show me a good practicing LDS member that does the things you must surely think they do?
Well the problem is that foundationally, you are not Christians. I would think foolishness is something like believing you will get your own planet when you die. Where does it say that in the Bible? Oh wait, it doesn't say that in the Bible.
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