Democrats win bigger share of religious vote

[Neil D]

Parties disagree on why the gap has narrowed

By Alan Cooperman

Updated: 2:40 a.m. AKT Nov 11, 2006

WASHINGTON - As the results of the midterm elections sank in this week, religious leaders across the ideological spectrum found something they could agree on: The "God gap" in American politics has narrowed substantially.

Religious liberals contended that a concerted effort by Democrats since 2004 to appeal to people of faith had worked minor wonders, if not electoral miracles, in races across the country.

Religious conservatives disagreed, arguing that the Republican Party lost religious voters rather than the Democrats winning them.

Either way, the national exit polls told a dramatic story of changing views in the pews: Democrats recaptured the Catholic vote they had lost two years ago. They sliced the GOP's advantage among weekly churchgoers to 12 percentage points, down from 18 points in 2004 congressional races and 22 points in the 2004 presidential contest. Democrats even siphoned off a portion of the Republican Party's most loyal base, white evangelical Protestants.

"The God gap definitely didn't disappear, but it did narrow. And it narrowed in part because evangelical voters had major questions about the direction of the country," argued Democratic pollster Celinda Lake.

Shift in evangelical vote

In House races in 2004, 74 percent of white evangelicals voted for Republicans and 25 percent for Democrats, a 49-point spread, according to exit polls. This year, Republicans received 70 percent of the white evangelical vote and Democrats got 28 percent, a 42-point spread.

Democratic activists joyfully compared the overall seven-point shift in the evangelical vote to the inroads that President Bush made in a core Democratic constituency -- African Americans -- in battleground states in 2004. "Boy, have we come a long way since 2004," said Mara Vanderslice, who was director of religious outreach for Sen. John F. Kerry's presidential campaign.

"We still have a long way to go, but what this election showed is that Democrats can begin to compete for the evangelical vote. Moving seven points within a community that large can absolutely swing tight races," she said.

Evangelical leaders blamed corruption and big spending by Congress -- rather than the party's positions on social issues such as same-sex marriage -- for the GOP's defeat.

Evangelical Christians are "fed up with the Republican leadership, particularly in the House," said the Rev. Richard Land, head of the public policy arm of the 16 million-member Southern Baptist Convention. "They're disgusted that Republicans came to Washington and failed to behave any better than Democrats once they got their snouts in the trough."

Roberta Combs, chairman of the Christian Coalition, said responsibility for the GOP's loss of the House and Senate "goes right back to the leadership, the corruption among Republicans."

And James Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family, issued a statement saying that "many of the Values Voters of '04 simply stayed at home this year" because the Republican Party has "consistently ignored the constituency that put them in power."

In fact, white evangelical Protestants turned out this week as heavily as they did in 2004, making up roughly 24 percent of the electorate both times. "This is a solidly Republican voting bloc that there was reason to believe might stay home. Given the polling before the election, the amazing thing was that the Democratic swing wasn't bigger," said John C. Green, a senior fellow at the nonpartisan Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.

Grave losses for conservative Christians

The finger-pointing came as conservative Christians absorbed the gravity of their losses, including the defeat of congressional standard-bearers such as Rep. John N. Hostettler (R-Ind.), Rep. Jim Ryun (R-Kan.) and Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.).

In addition, voters in South Dakota overturned the nation's tightest abortion ban. In Missouri, they passed a measure supporting stem cell research. In Kansas, they defeated Phill Kline, an attorney general who had aggressively investigated abortion clinics.

Seven states passed constitutional amendments barring same-sex marriage, but by much tighter margins than in the 11 states that adopted similar measures two years ago. In Arizona this week, voters rejected a marriage amendment, the first time gay rights advocates have beaten such an initiative anywhere in the country.

In the view of religious liberals, the results showed that wedge issues have lost some power.

"People really care about right and wrong more than right and left, and their antennae were up about corruption and the war in Iraq and kitchen-table moral issues -- health care and poverty," said Alexia Kelley, executive director of Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good, a group that set out this year to challenge the religious right's hold on moral issues.

Kelley noted that Democrats received the support of 55 percent of Catholic voters and Republicans got 44 percent, a sharp reversal from 2004, when the GOP won a narrow majority of the Catholic vote in congressional races.

In the states where Democrats fielded candidates who were able to speak credibly about their faith, they made larger gains, according to Vanderslice, who served as a consultant to half a dozen Democratic candidates. Among her clients was Ted Strickland, a minister who won 58 percent of the Catholic vote and 51 percent of the white evangelical vote in the Ohio governor's race against Ken Blackwell, a Republican who has championed conservative Christian causes.

GOP core mission in question

As they contemplated the results, religious conservatives anticipated attacks by business interests and fiscal conservatives within the GOP who think the party should focus on budget deficits and Iraq -- and put less emphasis on culture-war issues such as opposing embryonic stem cell research and keeping Terri Schiavo on life support.

David Barton, head of WallBuilders, a Texas-based evangelical group, predicted that fiscal conservatives would cite California's Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, as a model.

"They will say, 'Schwarzenegger won and won big; the guys that lost are the social conservatives -- Hostettler, Ryun.' And so there's going to be a push within the Republican caucus to move further away from social conservatives," Barton said.

Even before the election, former House majority leader Richard K. Armey (R-Tex.) called Dobson a "bully" who diverted the GOP from its core mission as the party of small government. On Wednesday, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) said the GOP needs to become "a lot more progressive and a lot less ideological."

Despite the GOP's losses, conservative religious leaders gave no indication they plan to engage in the kind of introspection and repositioning that religious liberals did two years ago. And despite their anger at congressional Republicans, they did not suggest that they were about to abandon the GOP.

"Even though a lot of Democratic candidates talked about faith, and even though a lot of them are devout people who hold similar values, they are part of a party that is liberal," said Janice Shaw Crouse, director of Concerned Women for America's Beverly LaHaye Institute, a conservative Christian think tank. "So the only hope social conservatives really have is the Republican Party."

from MSNBC

[Dr. Shane]

Not much shifting actually going on. A lot of the Democrat wins and Republican losses were narrow loses and narrow victories.

Democrats' problems are their support for abortion-on-demand and gay rights. Moderate Democrats that support restrictions on abortions and civil unions but not gay marriage are going to have more luck attracting Christian voters. From what I understand, many such moderate Democrats won this past election although I haven't seen any break-down of that.

[gina i]

Not all democrats are for abortion or gay rights, Shane. There is a lot of conservative democrats. The cons are not just the republicans. You can't put any one group in a box, like I see you doing all the time.

[Dr. Shane]

I am not the topic here. Let's try to stay on topic. Thank you.

[CyberGuy]

It was only a matter of time before the polical pendalim swings to the left. It may go further. I expect a democrat to win the white house in 2008 and if he does not alienate the voters and stay there until 2016. After that who can tell.

It is time for a change. I can only tolerate so much of a swing to the right before I will vote the other way.

This year I did vote for Arnold for governor of Calforia but voted democrat for every one else except the congressman. Our republican congressman did win. Our area is strongly republican.

To much of a swing to the right and they start endangering our religious liberties and start legislating morality as the republicans started doing. Americans will tire of that very quickly and turn the tables on that party.

The same will happen in a decade or so to the democrats if they do not learn their lessons from the republican defeat this week.

My cheif beef with the republicans is their fight against stem cell research and their anti choice stand on abortion. I voted against all the republicans who stood against those issues. They all lost in california. California is a very progressive state. We will not be drug back to the dark ages by any party.

[Dr. Shane]

Well, Republicans passed legislation to fund stem-cell research and Bush vetoed it. So that is not a partisan issue.

I don't see the pendalum has been swinging much at all. The country has been very polarized with about 20% of independants or moderates being the swing voters that have decided close elections for a number of years now. Clinton did not get 50% of the vote in either of his elections. Bush got 50% in 2000 and just over that in 2004. Democrats recently won a lot of close elections which has given them power in Congress.

Now, we know from Bible prophecy that the secularists will take control and push the pendalum far to one side. Then it will get to a point when the pendalum will swing to the other extreame when the church will influence civil governement like the days of the Dark Ages.

[Jeannieb43]

Bible prophecy and Ellen White tell me that apostate Protestantism will join with Catholicism to bring on the Time of Trouble. I don't recall reading anywhere that "secularists" will take control.

I think this latest election has illustrated that God is again holding back the winds of strife a little longer; giving centrists [Republicans and Democrats] the opportunity to bring our country into balance. I may be wrong, but the pseudoreligiosity being demonstrated in the past six years of government caused me more worry than ever.

Be that as it may, we need not be afraid of the last days. In fact, as one preacher has preached, we should rejoice when we see the end times closing. That only means Christ is returning sooner than we realized.

[CyberGuy]

Bible prophecy and Ellen White tell me that apostate Protestantism will join with Catholicism to bring on the Time of Trouble. I don't recall reading anywhere that "secularists" will take control.

That is exactly my point. It is not the secular people we have to worry about according to SOP but the people with a moralist agenda who are the greatest threat to religious freedom.

[CyberGuy]

Shane

The ONLY reason Clinton did not get more than 50 percent is that that a popular independant was running that split the vote. Porot split the vote in 1992 and 1996. Perot got more republican votes than democrat gained but Clinton ran on a more cetralist platform. Go to far to the left or right and you will lose the election.

http://econpapers.repec.org/paper/cvsstarer/93-30.htm

http://www.presidentelect.org/e1996.html

[Dr. Shane]

Quote:

I don't recall reading anywhere that "secularists" will take control.

Check out this thread in the Religious Liberty section where we discussed that.

King of The North & King of The South

[Dr. Shane]

Quote:

It is not the secular people we have to worry about according to SOP but the people with a moralist agenda who are the greatest threat to religious freedom.

Secularists are causing the moral ruin of thousands. These are the very souls we hope to reach with the Three Angels' Message. Many of our own sons and daughters are being led astray by the secularists in the entertainment, fashion and advertising industries.

Prophecy teaches that secularists, symbolized by the King of the South, will take over and be beat back by a union of apostate Protestantism, Catholism and eastern religion.

We now see secularists advancing their agenda by advancing abortion, evolution, sexual perversion and banning religious expresion in the public light. As God's remnant people, we have nothing to gain by supporting their agenda. Once they have pushed the pendilum so far in one direction it will swing back the other way. Entertainers, porno pimps and the secular lawyers will be rounded up and imprisoned. The fact that Sabbath-keepers will also be rounded up with them doesn't make us allies.

Only Adventists that believe "the enemy of our enemy is our friend" will embrace secular liberalism of today. Religious fundamentalists that seek to legislate God's law are those we fear. But that does not make secularists our allies. The secularists oppose God and lead thousands to eternal destruction. As God's remnant people, we stand in the middle. When voting, we must look at the canidate, his or her positions and their charachter. We ought never allow a canidate's political party influence whether or not we vote for them.

[Neil D]

Quote:

Secularists are causing the moral ruin of thousands. These are the very souls we hope to reach with the Three Angels' Message. Many of our own sons and daughters are being led astray by the secularists in the entertainment, fashion and advertising industries.

This is just poppycock.

"Moral ruin" as you are so concerned about is based upon choice. And secularist are not causing, that is, choosing for you, your 'moral ruin'... If our own sons and daughters are being led astray, it is because WE are not doing our job as parents in giving them information as to HOW TO CHOOSE, if we even need to choose. And those who preach the above sentiment, appeal to the base emotion of fear. That is, life is full of dangerous things and EVERYTHING is something to be afraid of.

No, a better view is that there are choices that we make every day, AND that life is a gift from God. And, true, while there are dangerous things out there, and we have to becareful and choose carefully what is for our best good, life is full of good choices, and we need to live our lives as God would desire for us, that is, in relationship with Him. And that all life should live a life of love, in thought and indeed.

[Dr. Shane]

It is recorded that after Charles Finney would finish preaching in a town not a circus or a bowling saloon could turn a profit there for three years. When someone is led astray, someone else is doing the leading.

When a man decides to go get drunk he certainly bares a portion of the blame for his actions... but so does the one that sells him the liquor. In fact, if he kills someone while driving drunk, the one that sold him the liquor can be held legally accountable.

Unmarried men and women that have affairs with those that are married have long been called "home wreckers." While the married person that is stepping out bares a portion of the blame for his or her actions... society also places part of the blame on the home wrecker.

And so it is in Bible prophecy as taught in the sanctuary service. While each sinner bares a portion of the blame for his and her actions... so does the temptor, as symbolized as the goat in the sanctuary service.

Today we see secular society leading many individuals to hell and damnation. While it is true that the indivuals bare a portion of the blame... so do the secularist that are leading them astray. As Christians, we have no place becoming allies with these secularists because they appear, at this time, to be the enemy of our future enemy. Just because they are the present-day enemy of those that could be our future enemy doesn't make them our friend.