{"id":15561,"date":"2008-05-16T12:40:37","date_gmt":"2008-05-16T16:40:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/15561.html"},"modified":"2008-05-16T12:40:37","modified_gmt":"2008-05-16T16:40:37","slug":"obama-to-emphasize-faith-based-appeals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/obama-to-emphasize-faith-based-appeals\/","title":{"rendered":"Obama to emphasize faith-based appeals"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Wall Street Journal had an item today<\/a> on the Obama campaign rolling out a “new nationwide faith effort” that will, among other things, make it clear that the Democratic candidate is a Christian.<\/p>\n

The initiative represents a direct challenge to Republicans, who successfully wooed conservative evangelical votes that in turn fueled President Bush’s re-election in 2004. Liberal evangelicals — such as some members of mainline Protestant churches — have been vocal during this election season, reminding voters that some evangelicals favor abortion rights and gay marriage and oppose the Iraq war, and also vote Democratic.<\/p>\n

“The Obama campaign is preparing a robust effort to reach out to people of all faiths, all religious backgrounds and moral beliefs and to bring new faith supporters in,” said Joshua Dubois, the Obama campaign’s director of religious affairs. “We’re trying to connect Americans to one to another. …What we’re conveying is his Christian faith and his core values.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It’s apparently quite an aggressive initiative on the campaign’s part. The Journal noted that Obama’s team has distributed copies of a letter by the senator, “intended to be read during church services, highlighting the senator’s Christian beliefs.” A letter distributed in Ohio said, “[I]f there is one thing I’ve learned from my time as a community organizer…it’s that ordinary people, with the grace of an awesome God, can do extraordinary things.”<\/p>\n

The Rev. A. Russell Awkard, pastor of New Zion Baptist Church in Louisville, said, “No one ever sent a letter before. I don’t think I have ever encountered a campaign that is more intentional in reaching our community. They are not getting to the grass roots. They are boring down the rock. They leave nothing for chance.”<\/p>\n

This came up a bit in January, when the Obama campaign produced a direct mail piece<\/a>, featuring pictures of Obama praying and speaking from a pulpit. It featured a large graphic that reads, “Committed Christian,” touts the “power of prayer,” and includes an account of the moment that “Obama felt a beckoning of the spirit and accepted Jesus Christ into his life.” Similar pieces are hitting mailboxes in Kentucky this week.<\/p>\n

I’m inclined to find much of this excessive, but I can’t help but feel like it’s a political necessity.
\n
\nIn a general sense, Obama’s religious outreach is not new. DNC Chairman Howard Dean, for example, has made outreach to evangelicals<\/a> a key priority this year. For too long, the phrase “religious issue” has necessarily been used to describe conservative opposition to abortion rights and gay rights. If Dems can expand the definition to include issues like poverty and climate change, it’s to everyone’s benefit, and has the potential to change the political landscape.<\/p>\n

At the same time, however, Dems clearly seem to appreciate church-state separation far more than Republicans do, and have generally realized that when it comes to national elections, we’re electing a president, not a preacher. Hearing a Democratic candidate mention, in the midst of a debate, that he “believes deeply in the precepts of Jesus Christ” — as Obama did<\/a> earlier this year — was a little unusual.<\/p>\n

My first instinct was to think of the faith-based style employed by Mike Huckabee, and his ad touting him as a “Christian leader.” Of course, the comparison is hardly exact — Huckabee told voters on the campaign trail that he wants to change the U.S. Constitution to bring it in line with “God’s standards,” not to mention all the time he’s spent with Christian Reconstructionists — but the Obama’s overt religious appeals are at least vaguely similar on a rhetorical level.<\/p>\n

And since I was critical of Huckabee for this, I’m acutely aware of the danger of hypocrisy here. I don’t want to give a Dem a pass because he’s a Dem.<\/p>\n

But to reiterate a point I raised a few months ago, there’s a reason why I’m hesitating and inclined to give Obama a pass: Huckabee isn’t the target of a coordinated smear campaign, and Obama is. Literally millions of people have been falsely told that Obama is a secret Muslim who was educated in a radical madrassa. It comes up in his town-hall forums; it’s come up in nationally televised debates; it’s been distributed by Clinton precinct chairs (all of whom were fired); it’s been referenced by Clinton surrogates (such as Bob Kerrey); it’s been promoted by at least one<\/a> official Republican website; and plenty of West Virginia Dems cited this nonsense last week.<\/p>\n

Because the smear is a religiously-based lie, it seems the appropriate response is the religiously-based truth.<\/p>\n

Huckabee swung the Jesus bat, it was excessive, in large part because it’s unnecessary — he’s a former Baptist preacher, and everyone knew it. Obama’s religious background, on the other hand, is less well known — indeed, it’s become the subject of widespread confusion as a result of the coordinated smear.<\/p>\n

Under the circumstances, I don’t think Obama has a lot of choice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Wall Street Journal had an item today on the Obama campaign rolling out a “new nationwide faith effort” that will, among other things, make it clear that the Democratic candidate is a Christian. The initiative represents a direct challenge to Republicans, who successfully wooed conservative evangelical votes that in turn fueled President Bush’s re-election […]<\/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-15561","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15561","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=15561"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15561\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}