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This is my first post here, so let me begin by saying hello.
This topic presents one of my personal favorite issues, christianity and politics.
I'm surprised that the mere condemning of Bush by a christian group is in fact surprising to many Democrats. I'm not going to get into the validity of the groups criticism (simply because criticizing the bush regime for its environmental policies is just too easy). I'd like to talk about the "surprise" I think most of the left feels when reading that christians criticized the President.
During the 2000 election, Vice-President Gore received 50,996,116 popular votes to the bush's 50,456,169. If you believe that none of the 50,996,116 people who voted for Gore consider themselves christian, you are kidding yourselves. My mom is as Roman Catholic as they come and she voted for Gore (there is a very funny and tragic family story about my mom's vote that I'll tell you all someday).
There are christians in the Democratic party. There are christians who would proudly put a bumper sticker on their car that proclaims Jesus was a Liberal. If we are to take back the White House, we need those same christians, within and without the Party, to vote for Kerry.
In another thread someone opined that Bush is the "Beast" in Revelation and this was ironic since all the christians are voting for him. I got a chuckle out of this one. Bush certainly displays all the bible's characterizations of the devil in that he lies, cheats and is clandestine like a serpent. However the first statement is very far from reality, all the christians are not voting for bush. If they were, the election is over before the fun even begins.
There have been several studies on the religious population of the US. Some studies were commissioned, or performed on behalf of, religious groups, so the numbers must be taken with a grain of salt, but are still useful. The Pew Research Counsel (the name indicates its bias) conducted a survey of 2002 random Americans in March 2002 and concluded 82% of the US self-identified as christian. In my opinion, the most accurate survey on religious self-identification was performed by Professors Barry Kosmin and Seymore Lachman with the Graduate City University of New York in 1990. Although older than the Pew study, I put a little more "faith" in it for purely personal reasons (like their survey pool was 115,000 Americans rather than 2002). There study concluded 86.2% of the country self identified as christian. Kosmin and Lachman published a follow-up in 2001, based upon a reduced sample of 50,000 people, that
Concluded 76.5% of Americans self identified as christians.
These numbers are probably in the ballpark. I'm going to pick 80% as an estimate, but it many be lower or higher. If 80% of Americans are christian, and all christians are voting for bush. Its going to be a massacre in November.
Lets also be clear, christians, and lots of them, recognize that providing access to medical care for all Americans (including the homeless and illegal immigrants) is the responsibility of the government. They recognize that providing AIDS medication to African nations to halt the spread of this terrible plague is not only the government's ethical responsibility, but will benefit the people of this country.
We need to recognize that people like my mother, who are devote christians much like Kerry is, are indeed a significant part of our Party. They support the ideals of the party. They may disagree about abortion and the right to physician assisted suicide, but they support targeted tax relief for the middle and lower class, ensuring the future of social security by rolling back the bush tax cuts on the top wage earners, and most importantly believe that good christians must help those who need help.
It may have been meant as a joke, but I believe many members of our party would proudly support the proposition that Jesus was a Liberal.
O8)
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