Obama's faith takes center stage in ads

[draft_mario_cuomo]

==August 15, 2007
WASHINGTON -- The Obama campaign has produced a second ad targeted to a minority audience stressing his Christianity, on Tuesday releasing a Spanish language radio spot to run in Nevada, one of the early presidential vote states.

Why the emphasis on Obama's Christianity? Is there a worry that in some precincts there is confusion about his faith because of the Islamic heritage of his father and stepfather?

The Nevada Spanish language spot: A narrator says, "Let us tell you Barack Obama is a Christian man committed to our community, his wife and his daughters," according to the English translation provided by the Obama campaign.

A July ad aimed at African Americans in South Carolina, another early primary state: A narrator says, "It's Barack Obama time. A Christian family man, community organizer, civil rights lawyer, courageous legislator, and U.S. senator who's told the truth as a soldier for justice."==

Read the rest at http://www.suntimes.com/news/sweet/510636,CST-NWS-sweet15a.article

[Colobo]

1. Many Hispanics are very religious, especially Mexican-Americans.

[snowbear]

2. I agree -- very good move on the part of his campaign.

...As people like Bill Press would say.

And you need to appeal to all spectrums in this race ...

David Axlerod is earning his pay...

[PurityOfEssence]

3. And remember: if you're not a believer, you really don't belong

It's not enough that we're the most religious of all the industrialized nations, we need yet more religion.

There's NOTHING that needs to be done politically or socially that can't be expressed in a secular and thus inclusive way. Using the "gosh, aren't I sweet and lovely because I believe just like you do" approach is to tacitly reinforce separatism and further drive the stake into the heart of pluralism. Many would love such a demonic image, since only a satanic killjoy would ever resist aggressive proselytizing.

If one has to resort to superstitious proclamations of belonging, then one either doesn't have an inherent sense of right and wrong or one is simply playing cynical or superficial games.

Enough already.

[Larry-O]

4. Is Obama Appealing to 86% of Americans?

One thing that has baffled me in the last couple of elections is that we Democrats have done everything in our power to belittle, redicule, and harass Christians in America. So what, you say? Well the overwhelming majority of Americans are Christians, DUH! Sure we can appeal to the tiny base of Democrats that represent the 2.9% of Athiests in America but what will that gain us? Athiesm is a belief system that is just not going to catch on in America--at least not in our lifetimes!

Obama, like Bill Clinton is tapping into the great faith that most Americans hold. In fact the only two Democrats that have been elected president in the last 40 years have been Born-Again Christians, Carter And Clinton! If we continue to ignore the vast majority of the population and just cater to the pseudo-elite intellectuals from the two coasts, we will just chalk up another loss--what would that be 8 out of the last 11?

[ripple]

5. Spot on

Not to mention that instead of using religion to push wedge issues, Obama frames it in terms of helping the poor and infirm, equality for all, working for peace, tolerance, fairness, etc.

He's reframing the conversation to bring out the better ideals of Christianity, rather than exploiting the worst. I think that's a wonderful thing.

[draft_mario_cuomo]

6. So do I. This is consistent with the thinking behind Dean's 50 state strategy

Just as we need to compete in each state we must also compete in every demographic.