Joanna
Doug Henwood wrote:
> Bush Seeks to Mobilize Religious Conservatives
> Thu Jul 1, 8:04 PM ET
> By David Morgan
>
> WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Bush (news - web sites), seeking to
> mobilize religious conservatives for his reelection campaign, has
> asked church-going volunteers to turn over church membership
> directories, campaign officials said on Thursday.
>
> In a move sharply criticized both by religious leaders and civil
> libertarians, the Bush-Cheney campaign has issued a guide listing
> about two-dozen "duties" and a series of deadlines for organizing
> support among conservative church congregations.
>
> A copy of the guide obtained by Reuters directs religious volunteers
> to send church directories to state campaign committees, identify new
> churches that can be organized by the Bush campaign and talk to clergy
> about holding voter registration drives.
>
> The document, distributed to campaign coordinators across the country
> earlier this year, also recommends that volunteers distribute voter
> guides in church and use Sunday service programs for get-out-the-vote
> drives.
>
> "We expect this election to be potentially as close as 2000, so every
> vote counts and it's important to reach out to every single supporter
> of President Bush," campaign spokesman Scott Stanzel said.
>
> But the Rev. Richard Land, who deals with ethics and religious liberty
> issues for the Southern Baptist Convention, a key Bush constituency,
> said he was "appalled."
>
> "First of all, I would not want my church directories being used that
> way," he told Reuters in an interview, predicting failure for the Bush
> plan.
>
> The conservative Protestant denomination, whose 16 million members
> strongly backed Bush in 2000, held regular drives that encouraged
> church-goers to "vote their values," said Land.
>
> "But it's one thing for us to do that. It's a totally different thing
> for a partisan campaign to come in and try to organize a church. A lot
> of pastors are going to say: 'Wait a minute, bub'," he added.
>
> The guide surfaced as a spate of opinion polls showed Bush's
> reelection campaign facing a tough battle.
>
> A Wall Street Journal/NBC poll showed Bush running neck-and-neck with
> Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry (news - web sites) among
> registered voters, 47 percent of whom said they now believed the
> president had misled Americans about the threat posed by Saddam
> Hussein (news - web sites)'s Iraq (news - web sites).
>
> The Bush campaign has also been spending heavily on television ads,
> only to see the president's approval ratings slump to new lows.
>
> Stanzel said the campaign ended the month of June with $64 million on
> hand. He had no figures on how much Bush has raised in June. At the
> end of May, Bush had raised $213.4 million and spent all but $63 million.
>
> The latest effort to marshal religious support also drew fire from
> civil liberties activists concerned about the constitutional
> separation of church and state.
>
> "Any coordination between the Bush campaign and church leaders would
> clearly be illegal," said a statement from the activist group
> Americans United for Separation of Church and State.
>
>
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