Daniel Henninger is not the only columnist to note what the president has done to motivate evangelical Christians in this year’s election, but I like the way he writes about it. “Romney’s Secret Voting Bloc” is something of a miracle. “There and in other swing states—Wisconsin, Iowa, North Carolina, Florida—the evangelical vote is flying beneath the media’s radar. It’s a lot of voters not to notice. In the 2008 presidential vote, they were 30% of the vote in Ohio, 31% in Iowa and 26% in Wisconsin.”
Romney has the president to thank for bringing out the evangelical vote.
The president of Ohio Christian University, Mark A. Smith, says, “The intensity of voters in the faith community is as high as I’ve seen it in the last 12 years.” The driver of that intensity is religious liberty. “We took a direct hit with the Affordable Care Act,” he says. Evangelicals watched the Obama administration’s big public fight with Catholic hospitals and charities. What they concluded is that the health-care law was a direct threat to their own private outreach programs.
Mr. Smith says that if evangelicals in Ohio’s rural communities repeat their turnout levels from 2000 and 2004, they will offset the Obama advantage in Cuyahoga County. “Six different faith groups are out there” for Romney in Ohio, he says. “That didn’t happen the last time.”
Henninger’s focus is Ohio, my home state (and his) and what he is noting is also my experience. Christians around here were not enthused about Romney in the primary, partly because he is a Mormon. Now he is their candidate and they forgive his Mormonism, as they are resistant to the alternative; they are voting what they believe his values are. This is not just true in Ohio.
In his campaign and his presidency, Barack Obama has been explicit about a historic enlargement of the nation’s public economy. For anyone whose life consists of making a living in private work and donating off-hours to private charity and private worship, there is a sense of being squeezed by this president. And among these are evangelical Christians.
That Romney will have a hard time with the kind of bipartisan effort to revive the economy and do all the other things he says he wants to do it certainly true. That is American politics, maybe a flaw, but inherent in our politics.
October 31st, 2012 | 9:50 pm
Kate, you’re a very observant political scientist. Also, I might add, there’s those pesky Tea Party folks: white, retired, Christian, and still angry as hell at what the Democrat Party is doing to their America. They’ll be heard on Nov. 6 as well.
All kind of demographics at play, and few for our Muslim-Marxist president and his foreign ideology. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised that the Mittster’s coattails are responsible for the GOP capturing the Senate.
Romney in a landslide.
October 31st, 2012 | 11:13 pm
Once again, the next US presidential election will be fixed. Mitt Romney will be elected even though Barack Obama would have received more votes in the 2012 election. The political assassination will be perpetrated by Bush hiding behind Crossroads GPS, the most influential group of Neocons.
The Neocons will have Mitt Romney elected to first use him and then let him fall easy prey. All blames and responsibilities will fall on the new Mormon president for the events already planned
Mitt Romney will be the spokesman for George Bush and his job inauguration is on January 21 2013. The next Israeli election instead will be on January 22 2013. These two dates are overlapped in preparation for War.
The new World War of Religion is already a done deal behind the backs of all people to bring chaos and poverty and to favor in the end one New World Order.
It will be just from chaos that one voice will rise with the promise to fix all and everyone.
That will be the forked tongue of the New World Order.
One Solution once it happens.
http://www.wavevolution.org/en/humanwaves.html
November 1st, 2012 | 5:16 am
You are a funny guy, wavetorre. Do you know, as in have had actual conversation with, even one person expressing longing for chaos and poverty?
Bob, I’m glad you agree and hope we are right about this.
November 1st, 2012 | 6:31 am
Well, if they’re galvanized they shouldn’t rust. And it has been raining quite a lot out here in Columbus. But what strikes me most about these good people at the moment is that there hasn’t been a wave of killer tornados sweeping the Midwest lately, so they haven’t had a chance to see their government up close and personal.
But I’m sure all their good charitable works will soon be making a significant impact on the devastation in New Jersey and New York. And, without doubt, they will have taken time to pray for the safety and welfare of the people there, as well as giving thanks to God that the loss of life from Hurricane Sandy was nowhere near as great as that of Katrina.
November 1st, 2012 | 9:19 am
[...] How the President Galvanized the Evangelical Vote – Kate Pitrone, PoMoCon [...]
November 1st, 2012 | 10:21 am
“…those pesky Tea Party folks: white, retired, Christian, and still angry as hell at what the Democrat Party is doing to their America.”
Awww. What’s the problem? Tell me what was THEIR America like for minorities?
Also if we reversed social spending back to nostalgic 1950s levels, guess who would take the biggest hit? Retired folks. They make up a large portion of Mitt’s ’47%’.
As for this Muslim-Marxist business, first of all a Muslim-Marxist is an oxymoron. Marx was quite clear about religion being the “opium of the masses”. Muslims also dont generally support gay marriage.
If the president were indeed a Marxist or anywhere left of center on the economy, why are Goldman, JPMorgan, Citi and AIG all back on their feet and more profitable than ever, with almost no reprimands for the conduct that led to the crisis?
To sum up, the Tea Party is a case study in cognitive dissonance.
November 1st, 2012 | 1:53 pm
DM, wow, thanks for the corrections and I hope I didn’t upset you. You’re very smart!
Barry’s a Marxist who is rather nostalgic for Islam. When he introduces Sharia here, you people are done….lol!
Those evil banksters who lick his boots are what we refer to as ‘state capitalists’ or something like that. Like, you know, Rockefeller et al. These boys win even if you people run things. And, you’re right Barry’s not pursued the evil banksters like he said he would, almost like they had worked it out back when the gummint was strong arming them into making bad loans to dead beats and causing the economic collapse.
Anyway, we’ll see if the TPers, Evangelicals, and those anxious Catholics stand up to our commie president? I’ma thinkin’ they will and Mitt wins in a nine to tweleve pt landslide but we’ll see. The one good thing is, if Mitt wins you’ll have a chance to get a job and move outta your parent’s basement and pay off those college loans.
“To sum up”, to be a Democrat is to engage evil.
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