The real knee slapper in this discussion is just how mathematically ignorant the anti-Catholics really are. The endless trot out the statistic of "54% of Catholics" elected Barak Obama in one breath and then tell us how Catholicism is no longer the largest denomination in the next breath.
Barak Obama got 69,456,897 votes. Of that number less than 12 million were Catholic. That means 57 million non-Catholics, the majority of whom were Protestant, put Obama into office.
True. And what would be interesting is if Alex posted the way his specific denomination voted -- I'm tired of some left leaning, Democrat voting groups (like the OPC etc.) hiding behind the "Protestant" label.
These small groups of 10,000 adults and pederasts may shout that x% of Protestants voted this way, but that hides the true numbers -- I mean, if 75% of 10,000 OPC vote democrat, they would hide behind the x%, right?
How are you defining "Protestant"? Does "Protestant" mean "Non Catholic" in the above sentence? If a majority of 57 million is Protestant, and their numbers are larger than the 12 million Catholics who voted for Obama, where are they found on the below chart?
2008 Presidential Election demographics, footnoted and annotated
Your "by the numbers" breakdown of vote, with emphasis on the religious voter (as of 11/10/08):xx% McCain, 23% Obama - White Evangelicals age 30-6411
75% McCain, 25% Obama - White7,10 Born Again5,10,12 Evangelicals1,8,10,12
xx% McCain, 32% Obama - White Evangelicals age 18-2911
65% McCain, xx% Obama - Weekly church-attending Protestants7
65% McCain, 34% Obama - White Protestants7,8
62% McCain, 35% Obama - State of Utah3
59% McCain, 40% Obama - Working-class whites13
57% McCain, 41% Obama - White men13
55% McCain, 43% Obama - Weekly mass-attending Catholics 6,9
54% McCain, 44% Obama - Weekly church-goers1,4,7,12
54% McCain, 45% Obama - Protestants6,8
53% McCain, 46% Obama - White women13
52% McCain, 47% Obama - White "regular-mass-attending" Catholics12
51% McCain, 47% Obama - White college graduates13
xx% McCain, 47% Obama - White independent voters13
51% McCain, 49% Obama - White Catholics1,7,11
46% McCain, 52% Obama - Non-Evangelical Protestants 12
xx% McCain, 53% Obama - Monthly church-goers 4**
45% McCain, 54% Obama - Whites13
45% McCain, 54% Obama - Catholics1,4,6,8,9,10,11,12
xx% McCain, 59% Obama - Semi-annual church-goers4**
38% McCain, 61% Obama - Occasional churchgoers1
37% McCain, 61% Obama - Non-weekly-mass-attending Catholics6,12
30% McCain, 67% Obama - Hispanics13****
xx% McCain, 67% Obama - Hispanic Catholics8,11**,***, ****
xx% McCain, 67% Obama - Hispanic Protestants and other Christians11**, ****
xx% McCain, 68% Obama - Don't attend church4 **
23% McCain, 75% Obama - Unaffliliated with any religion11
21% McCain, 78% Obama - American Jews2,8,12 and other faiths12
xx% McCain, 94% Obama - Black Protestants11,13**,****
xx% McCain, 96% Obama - Blacks13**,****** No source provided voting percentages for the other party.
*** Associated Press (citation #11) reports this number as 72%, instead of the 67% other media gave it.
**** Note that some media are reporting the same numbers for the Hispanic and Black vote in general, as well as for those same groups with Catholic or Protestant affiliation.
Citations:
1 The Awesome Blue God -- How Obama Forged A New Faith Coalition
2 Exit polls: 78% of Jews voted for Obama
3 Utah's red loses some of its luster
4 Obama's Religious Appeal: Still Missing Evangelicals - which TIME renamed as Obama: Bringing (Some) Evangelicals In
5 The Evangelical Electoral Map
6 What's wrong with Catholic voters? What's wrong with Catholics?
7 Evangelical Voters Favor McCain by Wide Margins
8 Catholic voters heavily favored Obama, analysis shows
9 What Happened to the Catholic Vote?
10 Loyal to the End: Evangelicals Stay the Course
11 Obama results show gains in key religious voters
12 How the faithful voted
13 Exit polls: How Obama won
All numbers cited above are the earliest ones reported in the press. In cases of multiple reports, some percentages cited were not exact. However, the numbers above are within 2% of all sources cited, lending credence to the general number & placement overall.
Other resources:
With the Help of Catholics…Obama’s Victory
Results! Evangelicals
Mainline Protestants and Latino evangelicals surge toward Obama [pre-election article]
Poll: Latino Protestants switching back to Democrats this election [pre-election article]
The Hispanic Protestant swing vote [pre-election article]
America spoke
Believers in the Pews--and the Polling Booth
McCain Beats Bush on Evangelical Vote
I wouldn't (and don't) "blame the Catholics" for Obama's win. If anything, I blame the Protestant and Evangelical churches for Obama's win, via the Hispanic and Black "Protestant" votes. Our congregations are (apparently) far more racially divided than 2004's vote let on. Hispanic and Black "Protestant" voters went for Obama in almost opposite ratios to White Protestants. That's not something the Protestant/Evangelical church should be proud of........In short, I believe that Christians in 2008 have lost ground, and are now too small a minority to sway elections in and of themselves. We have become strangers in a foreign land (Exodus 2:22, cf Jeremiah 5:19). That's the real story coming out of these election results, in my honest opinion.
-- Alex Murphy, November 10 2008