[lbo-talk] Re: Albright on Iraq/The Dems & the Divine

[andie nachgeborenen]

Certainly discouraging data. On the other hand the
change is relatively recent -- no longer than the late
1980s-mid 1990s things were different. The Pew
analysis says it's the Bush administration that has
solidified the GOP allegience of white evangelicals.
And it may be that perceived Dem contempt for their
religion and their class, plus elitist secularism,,
has played a role in this change. It might be worth
the Democrat's while to change those impressions --
that needn't involve comnpromise on core issues, just
finding a genuinely religious candidate whose piety is
unquestionable, if they can. 

Doug also remarks that to be an intellectual in US
politics today and also a successful politician, you
have to have killed people, or give impression of
being willing to kill or of having killed in living
memory -- the thought is that Kerry and Gore killed in
Vietnam but that was long ago and far away. Of course
Bush dodged the draft in Vietnam, but maybe his
massacre on Texas death row made up for it, and he
didn't have to overcome the handicap of being an
intellectual. Clinton, who wasn't particularly a 
killer, or at least not a very zealous one, was an
intellectual -- a former law professor! -- and
actually smart, but probably the deep fried accent and
the trailer park manner lowered his IQ 25 points in
the public mind, thu s compensating. So: It's OK to be
an intellectual if you don't seem like one, even if
you are not a killer, and it is OK to be a killer if
ytou are not an intellectual, but seeming like an
intellectual is a real obstacle even if you are a
killer -- in fact, even if you volunteered when you
could dodged (Gore, Kerry), or wewre a decorated war
hero (Kerry). 

A cheery thought.

--- Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:


> andie nachgeborenen wrote:
> 
> >Seems to me the Dems ought to be able to turn up a
> >semi-progressive evangelist
> 
> The Pew data I just posted look like white
> evangelicals are a lost 
> cause. They're now the base of the Republican Party,
> and it doesn't 
> make any sense to go after them if you risk
> alienating your own base 
> by doing so. Fuck 'em.
> 
> Doug
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>
http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
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