I was just watching Real Time with Bill Maher, and the subject of the election came up, of course. Interestingly, Pat Schroeder, Maher, and D.L. Hughley (hey, scoff if you want, but he’s pretty well-spoken and made Andrew Sullivan look like the blithering idiot he is) all agreed with the premise I put forth in the OP-- that the Dems need to appeal to their base, be hard-line left just as the right is hard-line right, and stop trying to appeal to the mythical “undecided voter.” Disagree with you want, but I was reassured by the fact that other people, one of whom has actually participated in national politics, agree with me, FWIW.
rjung, though the Presidency wasn’t won by a wide margin, the gap in the Congress has grown and the anti-gay measures sure did pass. I would like to see this trend reversed ASAP and I think something does need to change in the Democratic party if the balance is to return.
Times were different, and Kerry is more liberal than Clinton was (or Gore). Clinton himself apparently told Kerry to more actively oppose SSM on the state level, and he refused. I don’t think Clinton ever faced a divisive “moral” issue like this; perhaps Republicans didn’t realize they would need one until later.
This sounds to me like an enormous disaster. Talk about love all you want; I think the Bible is pretty clear about what that god thinks about the whole gay thing. Old Testament or New, it doesn’t matter. Saying “Jesus wouldn’t agree with you” won’t persuade anybody; I don’t think the people you’re talking about can be reasoned out of prejudice. Because this IS a matter of prejudice.
In any case it doesn’t matter. We’re not living in a theocracy, and making it a Jesus thing is fighting a battle Democrats can’t win on on foreign turf. The people who wish the Bible was the law of the land are never going to vote Democratic. The moral outrage on the pro-gay marriage side just can’t match its counterpart.
I read articles throughout the campaign that black churches were very torn over the issue, because they were opposed to gay marriage but wanted to support a Democrat. It seems to have hurt the Democrats in regard to the Latino vote as well, since they supported Bush more than was expected.
He faced one, but he’d already been re-elected by then. Wasn’t impeached, though. The Republicans had Whitewater, but maybe that was too abstract and involved too many numbers. Hating gays is pretty concrete and easy to grasp, even for those who are utterly misinformed.
I don’t think it’s clear at all. Jesus said in Matthew 22: 37-40, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” That’s it. You can really chuck all the rest of the laws out, because those two are the linchpins of Christianity, and if you abide by them, the rest become axiomatic. I don’t see anything in there about sexuality, or hating people and taking away their rights. I do see “love your neighbour as thyself,” which doesn’t have a proviso that it’s OK to break this law if your neighbor happens to be gay.
Jesus used to break bread with all of the outcasts of society (Samaritans, Levites, etc.) and only showed outright contempt for self-righteous hypocrites, like Pharisees, and the rich, like the moneychangers in the Temple. That’s not looking good for the Republicans on Judgement Day, eh? If we’re living by the Bible, that is. I’d love for the Republicans to get a nice dose of “look not to the beam in thy brother’s eye…” and I think it could be done to fabulous effect by the right candidate.
I don’t mean to be going on and on about Jesus, being a totally lapsed Christian, but the point I’m trying to make is, this Bible thing can cut both ways and should. No one has exclusive claim on God or what God thinks about anything, or Jesus for that matter. The Jesus I know was a loving, compassionate figure who showed kindness and mercy even to people who didn’t necessarily deserve it. He turned the other cheek. I’d like to see the entire Bible Belt practice what it preaches for a change, or have its own rhetoric held up to its face so it can see itself for what it is-- a demographic of frightened, bigoted hypocrites. I am not saying this of all people who live in red states, only people who vote how they do because they think it’s what Jesus wants. I’d like someone to remind them of what he said so they can make an informed decision about what he’d want.
First of all, I think it’s ridiculous to assume that the Bible and Jesus are “foreign turf” to all Democrats. It’s also kind of insulting to assume the Republicans have a lock on Jesus, or that being a good Christian automatically makes one the province of the Republican party. I don’t think it’s true that those who are outraged by the anti-gay bigotry are not as outraged the anti-gay voters. I just think that the Democrats have failed to show gays and their sympathizers any real support or fidelity, while the Republican HAVE shown that they value their constituents in the fundamentalist religions, no matter how hateful and unAmerican their rhetoric is. That’s why I implore the Dems to appeal to their base, because what they need to do is get out more voters, not try to persuade those who’ve already made up their minds.
The Latino vote was expected to go Republican and has in other instances. The African American vote is still very firmly Democratic and I believe they will stay that way.
Yes he was. But that was a different issue. There, he’d done something wrong and was being attacked for it. I do see the similarity, but if Clinton hadn’t been a hound dog, that wouldn’t have happened. The Republicans actively worked to make SSM a big issue this time because they knew it would mobilize evangelical Christians.
You can make that argument, but I don’t think it’s going to persuade anybody. I think you need to find other voters because I just don’t think you’re going to reason with this voting bloc.
As far as I can tell, the GOP has been pretty careful to argue that marriage is a societal tradition and left the preachers on the ground to say it’s from the Bible. Bush’s rhetoric toward gays has been concilliatory in a “he doesn’t like them but knows what not to say” kind of a way. A Presidential candidate isn’t going to make this kind of rhetoric, it’s other candidates and supporters.
I was assuming none of those things. The foreign turf is not Christianity, although I think the Democrats do have more non-Christian voters. (As an atheist, the last thing I want is even more political pandering to religion.) Religious fanaticism, which the Republicans got plenty of this time out, IS foreign turf. This is supposed to be a country founded on a secular Constitution, not the Bible. The more we argue about the Bible, the further we get away from that. That’s why it’s foreign turf. Because even if you win the argument there, you’re arguing about how we govern according to religious precepts. And I still don’t think you’re going to reason away prejudices that religion is supporting, not creating.
I think that’s true. Clinton lost me with Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. (I was happy Kerry wanted to get rid of it.)
When did they focus on people who’ve already made up their minds? There were undecideds this election, and the Democrats did well with them, which I think is a good sign. When you talk about this “show the Republicans we can talk about Jesus too” stuff, that sounds to me like an attempt to get back at people who’ve already decided to vote against you. Talking about religion this much would appeal mostly to people who are very religious and undecided. But how many of those are there? I think there are other groups that would be better to focus on.
Pundits on both sides expected new Latino voters to go about 70/30 to the Democrats. Instead, they went 50/50.
To explain the “foreign turf” thing a little further: if the Democrats start talking more about faith more to match the Republicans, the Republicans say “great!” and do it even more. Not only do I feel that this is not so great in and of itself, when the argument is framed only in religious terms, the Dems have an uphill battle. I don’t think they can match the fervor - which isn’t to denigrate my or anybody else’s commitment to gay rights, but some people you can reason with and some you can’t - and I don’t think the text supports them. I can’t do it offhand, aside from the Leviticus prohibition of homosexuality, but I think there are a few choices quotes from Paul on the subject as well. I’ve seen this debate on this board.
Granted that self-interest is a factor, but I do think the party ends up marginalizing me and voters like me (non-Christians, not just atheists) if it chases the Republicans into Jesus territory, and that’s just a different form of abandoning their base.
It’s not what the Bible actually says about homosexuality, it’s what people think it says. This is like one of those pointless arguments about whether jihadists are “true Muslims” or not. Furthermore, I would wager that many people who haven’t cracked a Bible since Sunday School are against gay marriage simply on cultural grounds.
I used to live in a red state. Back then, I was liberal on every cultural issue, because what I saw all day were white, bourgeois, uptight people who considered spaghetti and meatballs “ethnic food”. The conventional wisdom was extremely conventional. Then I moved to a very blue part of a blue state. Here, you can skate down the sidewalk wearing a rhinestone g-string singing “I Enjoy Being a Girl” and draw applause and loose change. People talk incessantly about their minority status not out of pride, but because they know it scores them points both socially and economically. Every kid from 8 to 28 dresses like a gangster. In fact, if you’re not engaging in some kind of vaguely sociopathic activity, you’re a nonconformist. These are the same people who concoct public spectacles like Britney Spears kissing Madonna full on the lips and who require white people to engage in ritual self-humiliation (“Well, I may not know anything about the blues, being white and all, but anyway…”) before commenting publicly on anything cultural. Personally, I think there are a lot bigger threats to marriage than gays, if gay marriage is a threat at all. But I can see where people are coming from when they feel their culture is being mocked. There seems to be nobody in the Democratic Party who can see where people are coming from. I thought blacks could encourage the Dems to be economically liberal while being culturally middle-of-the-road, but apparently it’s not happening.