{"id":13195,"date":"2007-10-11T10:40:41","date_gmt":"2007-10-11T14:40:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/13195.html"},"modified":"2007-10-11T10:40:41","modified_gmt":"2007-10-11T14:40:41","slug":"has-the-religious-right-picked-a-candidate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/has-the-religious-right-picked-a-candidate\/","title":{"rendered":"Has the religious right picked a candidate?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In recent weeks, major religious-right heavyweights like James Dobson and Tony Perkins have made it clear that if Rudy Giuliani wins the GOP nomination, they’ll leave the party. For all the already-outlined<\/a> reasons, I’m pretty sure the movement isn’t bluffing.<\/p>\n

That said, Dobson & Co. aren’t executing a general-election strategy; they’re executing a primary-election strategy. They don’t want<\/i> to give up on the Republican Party — the risks for the movement are at least as great as the risks to the GOP — they simply want an ideological ally to be the party’s nominee.<\/p>\n

OK, but which one? The religious right wants someone the movement can trust (which excludes John “agents of intolerance” McCain), someone considered viable (which seems to exclude like-minded candidates such as Mike Huckabee and Sam Brownback), and someone who’ll endorse the cause’s agenda (which would exclude Ron Paul). That narrows things down a bit.<\/p>\n

Now, it’s possible the religious right powerhouses won’t rally behind anyone, but that poses yet another risk — if there is no religious right favorite, it’s more likely the theocon vote will be diluted and Giuliani will benefit.<\/p>\n

Who’s left? Fred Thompson and Mitt Romney. Dobson has already vetoed the prior, and as of yesterday, the movement seems to be shifting towards the latter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In a bid to derail Rudolph W. Giuliani’s surge in the polls and rally evangelical voters, an influential evangelical public relations executive wrote to some 150 top conservative Christian leaders warning of the prospect of a Giuliani or Hillary Rodham Clinton administration and prodding them to rally instead around Mitt Romney.<\/p>\n

Mark DeMoss, a publicist whose clients include the Rev. Franklin Graham, penned a five-page letter, urging evangelical leaders to “galvanize support around Mitt Romney, so Mr. Giuliani isn’t the unintended beneficiary of our divided support among several candidates.” Or, “worse yet,” he warned, “so we don’t abdicate the presidency (and the future of the Supreme Court) over to Hillary Clinton.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It seems to be part of a trend.
\n
\nObviously, the religious right has been reluctant to back a Mormon, but DeMoss said the movement needs to put that aside.<\/p>\n

“I fully recognize some evangelicals take issue with me for supporting a Mormon for the office of president, and I respect their concerns,” he said in the letter. “Indeed, I had to deal with the same concerns in my own heart before offering to help Gov. Romney. But I concluded that I am more concerned that a candidate share my values than he shares my theology.”<\/p>\n

He went on to say, “as a Southern Baptist evangelical and political conservatives, I am convinced I have more in common with most Mormons than I do with a liberal Southern Baptist, Methodist, Roman Catholic or a liberal from any other denomination or faith group.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Just as importantly, around the same time DeMoss’ letter was going out, two other major religious right players were signaling to the movement<\/a> that Romney is in, and Huckabee is out.<\/p>\n

Two social conservatives leaders — in surprise moves yesterday — criticized fellow evangelical and Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee, while praising another party hopeful, Mitt Romney, a Mormon.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Giuliani, meanwhile, is trying to impress local religious right leaders, but isn’t having much luck. Iowa Christian Alliance President Steve Scheffler, for example, sounds more annoyed <\/a>than anything.<\/p>\n

“Yes, I and others met with some of the senior staff — but only for them say…’We have some things in common,'” Scheffler says.<\/p>\n

“It was clearly a meeting to patronize and not to talk about real issues. Just telling us that Hillary Clinton has to be beaten and insinuating that anything is better than her — just doesn’t cut it like it might have 10 years ago. This constituency is much brighter and sharper and ‘not taken in.'”<\/p>\n

The point, Scheffler continues, is this: “Why won’t Rudy himself sit down with myself and a few key ‘movers and shakers’ in the movement without a bunch of staff in the room trying to control the sequence of events? Pro-family conservatives here in Iowa will not ‘buy’ what Rudy’s people are saying here.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Stay tuned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In recent weeks, major religious-right heavyweights like James Dobson and Tony Perkins have made it clear that if Rudy Giuliani wins the GOP nomination, they’ll leave the party. For all the already-outlined reasons, I’m pretty sure the movement isn’t bluffing. That said, Dobson & Co. aren’t executing a general-election strategy; they’re executing a primary-election strategy. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13195","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13195"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13195\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}