Excerpt from last week's "Lexington" column in the Economist:
The president claims that Jesus Christ is his favourite political philosopher. John Ashcroft, his attorney-general, has daily bible-study classes in his office. "Faith-based organisations" are Mr Bush's weapons in the war on poverty; conservative lawyers (usually faith-based ones) are his sergeants in the war against "politicised" courts. The president's recent list of nominees to the federal judiciary includes several heroes of the religious right, most notably Michael McConnell.
So is the religious right seizing the reins of government? There is no shortage of leftist groups that will tell you so, and in the direst possible terms. In fact, Mr Bush's religious politicking is both more subtle and more ambitious than his critics think.
Begin with the fact, little noticed by the left, that much of the old religious right is in a state of collapse. Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority, which helped Mr Reagan to win the 1980 election, is defunct. Membership of the Christian Coalition, which provided the foot-soldiers for the Gingrich revolution in 1994, is plummeting, its finances are chaotic, and its leader, Pat Robertson, is under fire for appearing to condone China's policy of enforced abortions. Evangelicals are splintering into myriad interest groups, from home-schoolers to abortion opponents.
Moreover, many of the old-style religious rightists have been less than enthusiastic about Mr Bush's faith-based programmes. Mr Falwell harbours "deep concerns" that government strings will come with government subsidies. Richard Land, a leading figure in the Southern Baptist Convention, has "grave reservations" about the idea. Marvin Olasky, one of the architects of compassionate conservatism, fears that organisations which focus on "conversion" will be short-changed.
None of this seems to worry Mr Bush very much. This is partly because the old Christian right has nowhere else to go. Southern evangelical Protestants are not going to vote for a Democrat, whether Mr Falwell huffs and puffs or not. More interestingly, Mr Bush is also trying to broaden the definition of the religious right from that southern white Protestant base into something rather more ecumenical.
The people he is chiefly aiming at are Roman Catholics, the biggest single religious group in the country and the most ripe for picking. Mr Bush easily won a majority of religiously active Catholics in last year's election, the best showing by a Republican presidential candidate since 1984. Now he wants more. On Sunday, continuing a string of visits to prominent Catholic institutions, Mr Bush is speaking at Notre Dame University in Indiana. The White House has a weekly conference call with an informal group of Catholic advisers, and the Republican National Committee has revived a Catholic task-force. The head of the office of faith-based initiatives is a Roman Catholic, John DiIulio. Mr Bush tries to include fashionable Catholic phrases, such as "the culture of life", in his speeches. And, in Catholic circles at least, he plays down his party's anti-government stance: Catholic voters are much more enthusiastic about government activism than are southern evangelicals.
>From Today's New York Times:
May 24, 2001
White House Rejects Powell's Choice to Run Refugee Bureau
By JANE PERLEZ
W ASHINGTON, May 23 The White House has overruled Secretary of State
Colin L. Powell on his choice to run an important refugee bureau at
the State Department and has insisted on a nominee who represents the
Vatican's diplomatic mission at the United Nations.
The White House decided last week that the nominee would be John M.
Klink, who holds dual Irish and American citizenship and represents
the Vatican at United Nations conferences on social issues, senior
administration officials said. If confirmed by Congress, Mr. Klink
would head the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration Bureau.
Mr. Klink, 51, represented the Vatican on the executive board of
Unicef from 1988 to 1999 and worked for Catholic Relief Services from
1976 to 1986. His résumé lists his current job as adviser to the
Permanent Observer Mission of the Holy See to the United Nations. It
also says he is a member of the Republican National Committee's
Catholic Task Force.
His selection is seen as a setback for General Powell who, unlike Mr.
Klink, supports abortion rights. More broadly, the nomination of Mr.
Klink comes at a time when the White House is assiduously courting
Roman Catholic voters, a group President Bush's political advisers
believe may be pivotal in the next election.
Ever since Mr. Bush angered many Catholics during last year's primary
campaign by appearing at Bob Jones University, a conservative
university with a history of anti- Catholic bias, his political
advisers have placed a special emphasis on wooing Catholic voters.
President Bush has dined at least twice with groups of bishops and
cardinals. He has met Catholic prelates on trips to Missouri and
Pennsylvania. He also spoke last week at the University of Notre Dame
and is scheduled to address a group of Catholics in Cleveland on
Thursday.
The nomination of Mr. Klink also marks the second time the White House
has taken an anti-abortion stance in the area of foreign policy and
international population efforts. Shortly after his inauguration, Mr.
Bush issued an executive order banning American aid to international
organizations that use their own money to provide or promote abortions
in any way.
General Powell, after considering a number of candidates to head the
population, refugee and migration bureau including at least one
candidate with views similar to Mr. Klink's had decided on Alan
Kreczko, a career civil servant, who is the acting assistant secretary
at the bureau, administration officials said.
But the White House never formally approved Mr. Kreczko and decided
last week on what one administration official called the "Holy See's
choice." The general has not met Mr. Klink and did not find the time
to do so before leaving on a trip to Africa, officials said.
Mr. Klink would oversee an annual budget of more than $800 million
that is chiefly distributed to international agencies like the office
of the United Nations high commissioner for refugees and the
International Committee of the Red Cross. The United States is the
largest single donor to the U.N.H.C.R. and a top donor to the Red
Cross.
While the title of the bureau suggests an emphasis on population
issues, its work has been mostly dedicated to refugees and ensuring
that American financial assistance reaches refugees forced from their
homes by conflicts like the war in Kosovo and civil wars in Africa.
Mr. Klink's nomination is expected to please conservatives who have
been concerned about the distribution of what are known as emergency
contraceptive pills to some women in refugee camps. The availability
of such pills, which are included in some health kits provided by some
of U.N.H.C.R.'s health clinics, has been vehemently opposed by
right-to-life advocates on Capitol Hill. The pills, if taken 72 hours
after sex, prevent implantation and are considered by the Catholic
Church to be the equivalent of abortion.
Mr. Klink, who now oversees a family investment fund based in
California, did not return phone calls to his office. A spokesman for
Mr. Klink said he had no comment, but that Mr. Klink was "honored to
be considered to serve his country."
Before joining the Permanent Observer Mission of the Holy See to the
United Nations, Mr. Klink worked for Catholic Relief Services, an
agency financed in large part by the Catholic Church in the United
States and the United States government, and which specializes in
running refugee camps overseas. From 1978 to 1986, Mr. Klink served in
Morocco, Yemen, Thailand and Haiti.
Ken Hackett, executive director of Catholic Relief Services, described
Mr. Klink as dedicated to refugee work and as an official who had
chosen to serve in "hardship posts" and who had overseen important
projects in the agency's headquarters. Mr. Hackett added that Mr.
Klink worked in Thailand in camps along the Thai-Cambodia border,
during a period when the number of refugees was particularly high.
But of major concern to refugee specialists is Mr. Klink's background
as an advocate for the Vatican's positions against family planning and
against the use of condoms for protection against H.I.V. infection.
This could steer the bureau away from its primary responsibility, they
said.
Kenneth W. Bacon, a former Pentagon spokesman who is now the president
of Refugees International, expressed reservations about the choice.
"Clearly he has done some refugee work," Mr. Bacon said. "My concern
is putting someone in this because of his views on population issues.
This could distort the work of the bureau. If this represents a
redirection away from refugees towards population issues it could hurt
American leadership in refugee issues around the world."
Mr. Klink has attended 17 United Nations conferences on issues dealing
with women and social problems as a member of Vatican delegations.
At some of the conferences, notably in Cairo in 1994 where the use of
condoms against H.I.V. infection was a major issue, he played an
active role as the architect of the Vatican's strategies and served as
the delegation's floor manager.
Catholics for a Free Choice, a group that opposes the church's stand
on abortion, said last year that Mr. Klink was involved in the
Vatican's decision to stop supporting Unicef because it promoted a
manual for refugees that included information about emergency
contraception.
Groups supporting family planning services abroad were concerned about
Mr. Klink's joining the State Department. "Mr. Klink is well known at
the United Nations as a representative of the Holy See," said Amy
Coen, the president of Population Action International, a
nongovernmental agency. "But if confirmed he would be the
representative of the United States and we are worried about the
message that would send."