I like to poke fun at California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger as much as the next guy, but with this in mind, it’s only fair that I praise the guy when he gets one right. And over the weekend, Schwarzenegger was as right as he’s ever been.
As my friends at AU noted, Schwarzenegger was on ABC’s This Week with George Stephanopoulos over the weekend, for a pretty wide-ranging interview. When the issue of religion and government came up, Schwarzenegger sounded every bit as strong as a true civil libertarian on the issue.
Stephanopoulos: Let’s talk a little more about your personal philosophy. You’re a Catholic. How do you reconcile your political positions on abortion, on gay rights, on the death penalty? They’re opposed to the positions of the Catholic Church, the pronouncements of the Pope. How do you reconcile that?
Schwarzenegger: It’s easy.
Stephanopoulos: Easy?
Schwarzenegger: I never have one sleepless night over it. Trust me.
Stephanopoulos: Tell me why.
Schwarzenegger: Well, because it makes no difference to me. I’m representing the people of California. The people of California all of them are not Catholics so, therefore, I do not bring in my religion into this whole thing. As a matter of fact, religion should have no effect on politics.
Stephanopoulos: At all?
Schwarzenegger: I think it should not. I mean, if you make a decision, it should not be based on your religious beliefs. It should be based on what is it how can you represent the people of California the best possible way? And we have a combination. We have Jews, we have Christians and we have Hindus. We have Buddhists. We have all kinds of different religions here and there’s 140 some religions in this state. I have to represent all of them so we have to abide by the law. We have to stay with the law and then go and make the decision that’s based on what’s best for the state.
Sign this guy up for a membership with Americans United for Separation of Church and State. I honestly can’t remember the last time a high-profile Dem was this vocal in supporting the First Amendment’s principles of religious liberty, but here’s a Republican governor making his thoughts on the matter clear. Kudos.
Indeed, the more Schwarzenegger explained his political philosophy on this issue, the better he sounded.
Stephanopoulos: So your faith plays no role in the forming of your political philosophy?
Schwarzenegger: Not for me. But there are people that do it but I mean for me I do not make decisions based on what have I learned through my Bible studies, what have I learned in my religious classes in school so when I went to Sunday school in Austria, what, you know, what did my priest teach me about life and about the world? That does not come in in my decision-making.
Stephanopoulos: So you believe in very strict separation between church and state?
Schwarzenegger: Absolutely. I’m a big believer in separation of church and state, and I think that’s what also, you know, the law is. It’s what we all ought to do.
No word yet from the religious right, but I have a hunch the movement is not going to be happy.