Sociopath for sure, but if he was a minority of the Utah Legislature, you can’t blame the Mormons for what his positions are.
The most disturbing thing about the link was that he got a Silver Beaver. My father got one of those, before the Boy Scouts became a division of Hitler Youth that is.
I would not vote for Mitt Romney if he sat next to me in the pews at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church each Sunday morning. However, I chose “I wouldn’t vote for a devout Mormon” for the office of President or any other. My opinion is that most Mormons are pretty nice, decent, honest people, and that the leadership of the LDS Church is a bunch of scumbags. By supporting the Church with his money, time, and effort, Romney helps keep those scumbags in business.
I must have missed that announcement.
Not in the least. Mormons are okay with me. It is his Republicanism that bothers me. If it turns out that he is less Republican than Obama, maybe I’ll vote for my first Republican.
I answered “Some, but not enough…” since there are a few old-timey LDS practices & positions that do make me wonder, like the vow to avenge the murder of Joseph Smith upon the US & blood atonement. I’m only slightly more moderate than most modern LDS social-political positions.
As a person who grew up in Utah, I’ve seen there’s no such thing as a “Mormon lite” with politicians. Virtually all politicians in Utah are Mormon and they all follow lockstep what the Prophet tells them to do. For this reason alone I would never vote for him for anything.
So I’m wondering if the liberals in this room don’t take Obama’s ‘Christianity’ seriously…?
I care about someone’s politics. Not their religious beliefs.
My feeling is that Obama is not particularly religious. But if he is, I respect that he keeps it to himself for the most part.
I look forward to the day when we can have an out and proud agnostic/atheist as president.
Yes it bothers me, due to magical underpants. I am jealous of them and want a pair.
I’m a liberal, and I have no doubts that Obama is pretty areligious. Politics requires politicians to pay religion lipservice.
In his book, it’s quite clear that Obama is not just a Christian, but a “born again” Christian. He’s given more than just lip service, although its true he keeps it mostly to himself, and doesn’t flaunt it in the way that, say, W. did.
It happened when they moved from New Jersey to New Mexico.
I agree with this. The difference is not between strong belief and weak belief, but between those who believe but think that other people should have the right to believe other things and act on them, and those with strong belief who are offended when people with other beliefs do things that go against the beliefs of the strong believer. (Hope that is slightly clear.)
Kerry was another good example - he personally was against abortion, but thought those with other views should be allowed to act on them.
I haven’t seen any evidence that Romney is a politician of the second class. He may wear the magic underpants, but he isn’t going to require that we do.
What little I know about Mormonism doesn’t incline me to dislike Mitt Romney but it’s that the man strikes me as a spineless noodle-kneed flip-flopping clown that would have a Cheneyesque overlord to do all his thinking, And LOOK how well that worked out with Cheney and W.
The hell of it is that he’s still a lot less scary than the rest of the GOP field.
Atheist here, not an issue, because I live in Utah and have seen real crazy mormon politicians (like the aforementioned Buttars). Mormon Lite was a great way of labeling him, he barely registers for me.
The mormon you are looking for is Jon Huntsman Jr…
Interesting. Which book? I haven’t read either of them.
Some people would find a conflict between these two parts of your post.
Dreams from My Father.
I have issues with Romney’s dishonesty, his flip-flopping, his namby-pamby approach to everything I hold important, his animal cruelty, his horrible hair and his smarmy smile.
His religion, however, is irrelevant.
Really? 60 people here (the largest # of votes so far) wouldn’t vote for Romney because of his religion?
I always thought it bizarre that JFK’s Catholicism was an issue, but I brushed it off thinking “different times, different culture”, but sadly it seems that things really aren’t that different. 
I wonder what the results would be to the question “Would you vote for a Muslim for President?” I wonder how many of the 60 would berate those who said “No” as being bigots, etc?
I am not a Mormon, though I have been accused of being a moron. 