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35 and counting

So you’ve been reading around on the liberal blogs, and you’re all excited that George Bush is down to a 35 percent approval rating.  I agree, it’s really something: he is approaching Nixonia, the land Tricky Dick charted when he plummeted from 51 percent in January 1973 to 27 percent in January 1974.  And as Josh Marshall points out, “once you get down below, say, 40% you’ve really, really gotta earn every new lost point on the way down.”

The comparison with past two-term presidents in their fifth year is pretty juicy, too:

Clinton 57
Reagan 65
Nixon 27
Eisenhower 58

And there’s more!  As CBS News points out,

Both Reagan and Clinton endured scandals during their second terms. In January 1998, when facing questions about his affair with Monica Lewinsky, President Clinton’s job approval ratings actually rose, reaching the low 70s, and remained at least in the 60s throughout the rest of that year. President Reagan’s job approval rating dropped by more than 20 points to 46 percent in November 1986, just after public disclosures about the Iran-Contra scandal.

So 35 percent may not quite be Nixonia, but it’s a border country.  Call it Dubyastan.

But dedicated readers of this humdrum blog know that here at michaelberube.com, we don’t just look at polls.  No, friends, we go inside the polls—so far inside, actually, that we come out the other end.  And this time, in our journey through the center of the poll, we found this intriguing item (some scrolling required):

EVANGELICALS’ INFLUENCE ON BUSH’S DECISIONS

Too much
Now 34%
11/2003 31%

Too little
Now 14%
11/2004 12%

About right
Now 25%
11/2004 35%

Yes, that’s right, folks—one in seven respondents believes that evangelicals have too little influence on George Bush’s decisions. And that number has risen in the past year. Honestly, when I saw that, I uttered those three little words—W. T. F.?

Well, because I’m aware that the left hemiblogosphere can be an echo chamber where natterers like me talk mostly to interlocutors of like mind, I’ve spent the day interviewing some of those people.  I call them “the gang of fourteen percent.” And what they have to say might surprise you.  It certainly surprised me.

“I just don’t trust Bush,” said Joseph Smith of Provo in a phone interview.  “Sure, he said that Intelligent Design should be taught in science classes.  But he didn’t deliver when it really counted.  He didn’t point out that according to the Book of Hosea, chapter seven, verse sixteen, ‘they turn to Biology, they are like a treacherous bow, their professors shall fall by the sword because of the insolence of their tongue.’ I was waiting for Bush to call down His righteous wrath on the idolators of Evolutionary Theory, and I came away with a handful of nada.  Frankly, I don’t believe his heart is really in this fight.”

Smith’s sentiments were seconded by Amy McPherson of Los Angeles, who told me she wasn’t sure about Bush’s Supreme Court nominees.  “Roberts, Miers, Alito, whoever they are,” Amy wrote via email, “they’re not what I was looking for.  The President just gets up and says he ‘knows’ their ‘heart.’ But he never comes out and says that their heart pumps the blood of the Lamb.  I don’t know what’s wrong with this country, when a President can’t stand up before the American people and testify that a Supreme Court nominee has been washed in the blood of the Lamb.  In the meantime, I’m praying for the death of John Paul Stevens and the nomination of James Dobson.  But I’m beginning to lose hope.”

Perhaps most compelling was Richard Elieu of Louisville, who abandoned Bush after the revelations of the torture scandals of Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib.  “That did it for me,” Rich said to me over CB radio.  “When I saw those photographs and read those reports, I just broke down and cried.  Everyone knows you’re supposed to convert the heathen as you flay them or boil them—it’s been standard practice for centuries.  But here we have a President who seems to have forgotten what torture is all about.  I don’t know where we went wrong, but I do know that the President needs to pay more attention to what we’re really trying to tell him.”

It sounds to me like Bush has some work left to do if he wants to convince his base that he’s listening to the right people.  Because otherwise, the next stop on this line is Nixonia.  All aboard!

Posted by on 11/03 at 10:38 PM

  1. Yup, even Junior has found out you can’t even please your base all the time.  You make religious references some of the time, they want you to make them all of the time.
    It is interesting that the Evangelicals prefer Catholics to Protestants on the supreme Court counting that they are white Men, women can use their brains and empathy and that is dangerous.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  12:23 AM

  2. Michael, love the blog, but I have to admit I find this sort of religious parody rather tasteless.  Yes, evangelicism leads to problematic black-and-white positions, but surely it’s possible to show the drawbacks of those positions without resorting to ridicule of people who are devout.  You’re just going to turn off those people who happen across your site and might learn something....

    We all know that a great challenge in our world is to find ways to discuss issues with those with strong spiritual beliefs (and yes, I’m thinking of Islam, Judaism, etc. now too).  If we just going to sit and make fun of devout people, we’re not going to get very far.  How about finding a way to acknowledge their humanity and right to believe what they want while gently pointing out problems with their positions?  Isn’t there something called “civil discourse” that you, as a public intellectual, should be modelling?  I know O’Reilly et al don’t do any better, but honestly you’re much smarter than them.

    Maybe those who said “more evangelical” thought that Bush is dishonest.  If so, I agree with them.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  12:46 AM

  3. But if Michael gets so much pleasure out of mocking the whackos (and his readers get so much pleasure out of reading the mockery) why deny him this little guilty pleasure?

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  01:09 AM

  4. Chris, thanks for the criticism.  You’re right, I could offer other—and better—rhetorical modes of engaging the question of religion and the public sphere.  But you know, with regard to that public sphere, I’m really still waiting for someone, anyone, on the religious right to condemn Abu Ghraib.  And I’ve been waiting for a year and a half, as this post from May 2004 goes to show.

    More generally, I think there’s a profound difference between merely “devout” people, as you call them, and hard-core evangelicals.  Some religions insist on the conversion of nonbelievers, some do not.  Devout Buddhists, for whatever reason, seem not to believe that everyone else is consigned to eternal perdition and must be saved by any means necessary from the error of their ways.  But because one wing of Christianity—and a similar wing of Islam—is steeped in the belief that it is a sin not to convert the nonbelievers, we’ve been treated to the obscenity of mass murders committed in the name of God on every inhabited continent on the globe.  The link between evangelism and intolerance is not a strained one:  on the contrary, intolerance (and the willingness to act on that intolerance) is fundamental to evangelism, for it perceives itself as an intolerance that performs a positive service to the untolerated.

    So I did not, and do not, intend to make fun of people whose lives are guided by devout belief.  I intend only to register my amazement and disbelief (so to speak) at people who claim that George Bush has not been sufficiently influenced by evangelicals, and whose lives as evangelicals have not led them to condemn manifest atrocities and injustices in this fallen world. 

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  01:10 AM

  5. I’m a Christian, and I appreciate Michael’s genius
    at parody.  We’ve compared our (differing) perspectives on lots of issues--including religious faith and practice--since 1983, when,
    like Chris, we were at UVA.

    And these were always friendly and stimulating comparisons. So, yeah, I think we all agree that
    a skilled parodist should be able to
    “acknowledge their humanity and right to believe what they want while gently pointing out problems with their positions,” as Chris says.

    I’ve always found Michael was able to do just that, as a friend/fellow student/co-worker/conversational partner.

    I’m sure he’s good at it in the classroom too.

    I’m not trying to mis-cast Chris’s point, I hope, too! I just think that it’s more of a matter of audience. That is, Michael can assume a strong satirical tone with a mass audience, yet also has the skills, in addressing the same issues, to relate to individuals gently and humanely.

    Posted by david ross mcirvine  on  11/04  at  03:01 AM

  6. Michael, keep the parody!  Your stuff is priceless.  Satire is a powerful tool and maybe the only one sharp enough to puncture the bubble these nuts live in.  The last thing we need is more tip-toeing around the sensibilities of fundagelicals as if they weren’t, you know, clinically insane. And besides, you’re adding to the overall quotient of good writing in the world.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  05:55 AM

  7. I think there’s a wider issue with parody - which The Onion episode of recent memory highlights nicely - and that is that there’s a real tendency for the holier-than-thous to not understand the true moderating suggestion that’s inherent to the choice of this tool of humour. Of course they don’t understand the value of moderation or diversity anywhere else, so it’s hardly surprising.

    In my particular case my girlfriend is a believer - even if Episcopalian, rather than Catholic or Baptist or Muslim - and she’s very much capable of seeing the humour in such parody. Although I’d say - knowing her church - that that’s very much intertwined with the religious, humanitarian, and cultural purposes of the organisation. They are very much of the non-converting ilk, as Michael suggested was characteristic of the more understanding varieties.

    At the end of the day it’s a laugh or cry choice. Although these days it seems as though you’re really justified in going for both.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  09:21 AM

  8. Michael,

    I’ll see your W.T.F., and raise you a W.T.F.  Why are you surprised that many evangelicals feel that they don’t have enough influence in this White House? This is a president who’s always selling his evangelical faith. Yet his first loyalty is clearly to his corporate cronies, not his wingnutty religious base. The now infamous Abramoff “wackos” e-mail is probably pretty typical of the attitude of many leading GOPers toward their evangelical supporters.  So I’m not a bit surprised that a good chunk of those rightwing evangelicals understand that they’re not quite getting the theocracy they signed on for.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  10:36 AM

  9. I’m surprised it is such a low number.  Ask any group if it has too little influence on the white house, and you will probably find that they believe they do.  Evangelicals are probably much more than 14% of the country.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  11:13 AM

  10. Add me to the list of “surprised the number is that low"--surely there are more “evangelicals” than that.  (Evangelicals in quotes because it has a different meaning politically than religiously--I’m including politically conservative Catholics and charismatics).

    Understand that politically conservative Christian traditionalists have one over-riding goal--to return to the 1950’s relationship between Christianity and the government (this includes several areas: public celebration of Christianity, morals legislation, family structure law.) Most of the changes that have taken place in that area have been imposed by the judiciary, so conservative judges--particularly conservative Supreme Court justices--are THE key concern for most “evangelicals.” President Bush has spent no political capital on any evangelical concerns; none.  He spent a tremendous amount on Medicare, on tax reform, on Social Security--but none on any hot-button evangelical issues.  His judicial picks have been conservative, but not likely to change the church-state consensus (if he wanted that, Pryor and McConnell would have been the names to look at).  In short, he talks like evangelicals are important, seems to like them, but doesn’t deliver on their key issues.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  12:07 PM

  11. Michael, thanks for your thoughtful response.  For the record, I do almost always enjoy your hilarious satire, it’s just this time it seemed a bit much to me.

    I find myself wishing that there was more reasoned public debate about your insight that

    “Because one wing of Christianity—and a similar wing of Islam—is steeped in the belief that it is a sin not to convert the nonbelievers, we’ve been treated to the obscenity of mass murders committed in the name of God on every inhabited continent on the globe.”

    I know that Christ, as represented in the Bible, never advocated violence against unbelievers.  Where did this form of Christianity start? (and I know it goes way back to ancient times, before the Crusades).  I’m not familiar with the Koran, but I suspect that the Islamic extremists have similarly perverted its teachings. 

    I find myself wishing that some billionaire would step forward and take on religious intolerance, much as Gates is doing with world health now.  It’s such a huge problem in our world that it deserves serious attention.  It’s astonishing to me that something so influential doesn’t get more respectful treatment.  I guess I’m just tired of people being defeatist about it, and demeaning those caught up in it, as if nothing can change.  I hope there are more options than Rob’s laughing or crying. 

    So much time is spent critiquing similarly entrenched attitudes like racism, sexism, ableism, etc.—why not this?

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  12:10 PM

  12. Furthermore, Michael should have been honest enough to attribute the “praying for the death of John Paul Stevens” line to me.  That’s not a parody—that’s my policy.  Though I prefer to speak of “praying for vacancies on the Court,” myself.

    Posted by Rev. Pat Robertson  on  11/04  at  12:12 PM

  13. Oh, whine, whine, whine. The Christers corrupt our political discourse, degrade our educational system, and poison our culture with their superstitious nonsense; are we not even allowed to mock them? Is there anything less attractive than a bully pouting that he’s being picked on? Phooey.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  12:19 PM

  14. It looks like we may finally get a measurement of the BTKWB limit.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  12:30 PM

  15. Thank God someone is doing the hard scientific polling work to determine what the numbers really mean. Time for you to form a Think Tank (what would we call it?) and raise an endowment. Your phone bill must be enormous.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  12:47 PM

  16. Hey, rootlesscosmo, Chris wasn’t whining.  And truth be told, my mockeries have missed their mark more than once.  This time around, I seem to have been not only unfunny (to Chris) but unsavvy as well (to Ben, Njorl, and Sam).  They’re right, after all—what group tells pollsters it has too much influence over the White House?  For the record, the poll’s breakdowns reveal that “45 percent of white evangelicals themselves think they have about the right amount of influence, while another 25 percent think they have too little.” Make of those numbers what you will, folks.  They induce a little shudder in me, but perhaps that’s just me.

    And Chris, thanks for the followup comment.  The larger question you raise—how to engage in reasoned dialogue with people for whom reason is secondary to unquestioning faith (unlike my former mentors, the Jesuits, whose faith is somehow sustained by intellectual passion and vice versa)—troubles me every single day.

    Posted by Michael  on  11/04  at  12:52 PM

  17. You’re a more generous guy than I am, Michael. The really offensive comparison with racism--when did the secularists enslave 13 million Christians and subject them to centuries of lynching and discrimination? (The only people who enslaved Christians as Christians were likewise religious bigots, just a slightly different flavor.) The woe-is-me wish for a billionaire rescuer, as though secularists ruled culture and economy while the Christians were were a handful of impoverished, persecuted hedge-preachers? On the railroad this pose used to be called--not flatteringly--"cryin’ with a loaf of bread in your hand.” If I thought there was any useful political or social purpose to be served by shielding their delicate sensibilities, I might be willing to temper my impatience, but I don’t. They need to stop kvetching and grow up.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  01:07 PM

  18. I’ve got the same response I have to Amy Sullivan:  where have the mainstream churches been for twenty-five years?  (I think she promised a great upswelling of opposition beginning last January.) The right-wing evangelicals have been mocking their religious values all this time. 

    Sure, opening a dialogue is an important and difficult question, but nobody has the standing to do so like other Christians who do believe in the separation of Church and State, whose Christian values are mocked by torture and religious bigotry.  That’s where the moderating influence has to come from.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  01:56 PM

  19. Count me as an evangelical believer who enjoys the satire --- --- but then --- I’m an intellectual liberal evangelical who thinks the right-wing political dominionist movement is, in the most technical and exact sense, the antichrist (small a, of course).

    Meanwhile, in a phone interview from a shelter in Baton Rouge, PaPa LaBas of New Orleans, LA said of Bush’s plummeting poll numbers, “The counterattack is working. They are calling it a plague when in fact it is an anti-plague. It has no definite route yet but the configuration it is forming indicates it will settle in Washington, DC. Then it will be a pandemic and you will really see something. Don’t forget to feed the loas!” When asked to clarify, he replied “Use your two heads.”

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  02:01 PM

  20. For me personally, the gloves came off after the last election.  Of course I’d known for years that the fundagelicals were wacko—I’m related to a few of them.  They home-schooled their children, taught them that the dinosaurs lived in the Garden of Eden with Adam and Eve, and did everything in their power to bring back Industrial Strength Patriarchy.  It was weird and creepy and pathetic, but hey, it was their religion.  I disagreed with them on just about everything, but I didn’t mock their religion to their faces. 

    And then—last year.  After Abu Ghraib, after Iraq, after everybody in the damn universe knew that BushCo had lied us into war and instituted a policy of TORTURE for God’s sake—crimes which I thought would surely turn the American public against these evil fucks—after all that, what did those sweet little evangelical home-schoolin’ Christians do?  They went out, EN MASSE, and voted the sons of bitches back into office.  They voted for torture!  It was a great big YES to Proposition Torture, YES to Proposition War Crimes, and YES to Proposition “keeping gays from getting married is way more important than any of that stuff anyway.”

    So I say:  mock ‘em with everything we got.  These folks need to be shocked into realizing what monsters they’ve become.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  02:47 PM

  21. Good work, Michael.  How’d you find these people?

    Posted by Bulworth  on  11/04  at  03:23 PM

  22. Speaking of polls, the number I find shocking comes from a recent NBC/WSJ query:  Bush’s approval ratings (as of mid-October) among black Americans is 2%.  According to Newseek, Jefferson Davis put up better numbers than that.  A 5 general approval rating must seem pretty cush next to that stat.  (It also makes me wonder what his approval rating among white Americans is, since I assume it is they who are bringing that 2% up to 35%.)

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  04:18 PM

  23. I think it’s important to distinguish between those believers who are evangelical and those believers who are fundamentalist…

    ...only I don’t know how to go about making that distinction, though I believe it exists.

    Posted by gzombie  on  11/04  at  04:24 PM

  24. Michael,

    >>But because one wing of Christianity—and a similar wing of Islam—is steeped in the belief that it is a sin not to convert the nonbelievers, we’ve been treated to the obscenity of mass murders committed in the name of God on every inhabited continent on the globe.

    Michael, to conflate the current pactices of murderous Islamic terrorists with finger-wagging moralists of the American Christian right is a mockery to those who live under Islamic terror (Indonesia, Sudan, Pakistan, Egypt...). I guess you are in solidarity with them, eh, you feel their pain? Hounded by the Christian right, quaking in fear at the spector of Rick Santorum? It is also mendacious comparison to contextualize current Islamic oppression and terrorism by putting it against a backdrop of some Christian crusade, conquest, or witchburning that occured 500, to 1500 years ago. What matters is now, or the recent past, which is now too.

    And really, Evangelical Christians hold it as sinful not to convert heathens? Where did you get that from? Of course many think it a good thing to convert non-belivers to Christ (I do.), but sinful.

    Is anybody hear concerned about whether it is proper, civil, appropriate for CBS News to run a poll on the public’s perception of Evangelical Christian Influence in the Republican party (well, they can do whatever they want, we are free, but..)? Hey, let’s just substitute a few of the words in CBS’s questionnaire, how many here think that Jewish influence in the Democratic party is excessive? Is it too much, moderate, not enough? Email me your response, I will post them next Friday.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  04:38 PM

  25. two comments:  A couple of days ago in the press gaggle Scotty boy suggested that millions of US citizens felt that the torture of Taliban and Al Qaeda “combatants” was just fine--he may be right on that point.

    I salute your choices of voices for religious zealotry.  Aimee Semple McPherson was quite a character and notorious hypocrit, drank while advocating prohibition, used other pharmacology while preaching for days at a time, and like similar CA christian sect founders, her legacy is the millions of believers who adhere to the most radical and extreme views. 
    Joseph Smith?? Fawn Brodie’s book: No Man Knows My History pretty much lays him out on the coroner’s table.  Were those golden tablets still inside him?? 
    And i still can’t stop giggling and laughing about the Louisville Cardinal himself.  Or was that a St. Louis Cardinal?? One and the same??

    Very fine humor here, and muchly well deserved on the part of the minions who have adhered to these sets of beliefs for so long.  Interestingly Richard got his Louis, Joseph has his Utah and Oren Hatch to boot, but poor ol’ Sister McPherson is awaiting by the side of the river--or is that the dock on San Francisco Bay.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  04:48 PM

  26. Michael, to conflate the current pactices of murderous Islamic terrorists with finger-wagging moralists of the American Christian right is a mockery to those who live under Islamic terror (Indonesia, Sudan, Pakistan, Egypt...). I guess you are in solidarity with them, eh, you feel their pain? Hounded by the Christian right, quaking in fear at the spector of Rick Santorum?

    Actually, Daniel, I was referring to the manner in which Christians dealt with the heathens they encountered in the New World, and the start of a couple of centuries of religious wars in Europe.  I suppose the statute of limitations has expired on that one.  Still, I think it shouldn’t be sent down the memory hole just yet.  If we’re talking about religious intolerance, “now” is not the only time that matters.  And there isn’t anything “mendacious” about saying so. 

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  05:08 PM

  27. Daniel’s comment conflating fundamentalist Muslims with murderous terrorists says more about Daniel’s thought processes than it does about Michael’s.

    Posted by gzombie  on  11/04  at  05:40 PM

  28. But you know, with regard to that public sphere, I’m really still waiting for someone, anyone, on the religious right to condemn Abu Ghraib.

    Ouch, yeah.

    They went out, EN MASSE, and voted the sons of bitches back into office.  They voted for torture!  It was a great big YES to Proposition Torture, YES to Proposition War Crimes, and YES to Proposition “keeping gays from getting married is way more important than any of that stuff anyway.”

    And ouch, yeah to that too.  :-(

    And we have to hear about the upright Christian values being practiced in the New and Improved Gulags.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  05:46 PM

  29. Daniel is right about the comparison between Islamic extremists and the current crop of evangelical wackos. But, once they get their heart’s desire and truly turn this into a Christian (their version) America, I think we’ll see any differences in the two group’s actions fade away to nothing!

    That’s why the Founders so strongly favored separation between Church and State. Of course, the Dobsons and Robertsons don’t believe in that, either.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  05:58 PM

  30. Hey, let’s just substitute a few of the words in CBS’s questionnaire, how many here think that Jewish influence in the Democratic party is excessive?

    This seems to imply that even asking the question is improper. Of course it isn’t, whether with regard to Jews, Fundamentalist Christians, or anyone else. I personally think Jewish influence (as such) is negligible in both parties, outside a few City Council districts of Greater New York; I think on the other hand that Zionist influence on US foreign policy, as carried out under Administrations of both parties, has been excessive.

    The point, though, is that reasonable people can discuss these questions and disagree. It’s the fanatics who seek to foreclose discussion by ruling certain questions out of bounds.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  06:17 PM

  31. Hey, let’s just substitute a few of the words in CBS’s questionnaire, how many here think that Jewish influence in the Democratic party is excessive? Is it too much, moderate, not enough?

    Daniel, these are good questions.  I presume that your country has a large, well-organized rabbinical lobby that speaks of returning America to its Jewish roots (because America is a “Jewish nation"), campaigns on the platform of putting devout Orthodox Jews in legislatures and on courts, the better to persecute gays and lesbians (remember, Leviticus is part of the Pentateuch too, and I should know), and challenges the teaching of the life sciences in public schools on the grounds that evolutionary theory is anti-Semitic.  If so, then yes, your pollsters should be asking questions like this.

    Posted by  on  11/04  at  07:15 PM

  32. YHWH,

    You are making an assumption that as a religious faith Judaism is of a kind with Christianity, that while their content may differ their methods of directing the group internally - socializing members, moral and theological instruction - as well as represeinting the group to ousiders are similar. They are not. As much as Judaisim is concerned with theological and moral matters it is concerned with advancing the welfare and interests of the Jewish people. In gaining influence in the larger society, Judiasm’s goals are not the came as those of Christian sects, but Jews have goals too, and push for them.

    It is estimated that 50% of the total sum of individual financial contributions to the Democratic party are made by Jews. Both parties recieve similar amounts from corporations. As far as individual contributions go, the Republican contributor gives a smaller amount, and is more representative of the population as a whole. So, the Democratic party does not exist as a viable political force without the financial support of Jews. You think such contributions are made out of a gesture of pure charity? There is no interest involved? Commentators in this forum operate under the assumption that money matters, it has force, weight; politicians react favorably to those who give them money. Anybody who is fair, who would wonder at the seeming over-influence of Christian groups involvement with the Republican party would have to be as concerned with Jewish involvment with the Democratic party, that is if they would be fair.

    Posted by  on  11/05  at  02:38 PM

  33. yeah. conjure your cliche. Surely a brilliant scholar of the literary, but not so bright a historian..

    A) It has been pointed out that the poll was grossly over sampled towards a particular bias...and

    2) Get your comparative straight…

    “Every president since 1963 has had approval ratings at one time or another that were lower than Bush’s current rating. Those ratings include Lyndon Johnson’s 35%, Richard Nixon’s 24%, Gerald Ford’s 37%, Jimmy Carter’s 28%, Ronald Reagan’s 35%, the elder George Bush’s 29% and Bill Clinton’s 37%.”
    http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-10-17-bushapproval_x.htm

    AH, civilian child, you give moonbats a bad name. Don’t cake it up. Focus on the real nature of governmental jackassedness. You don’t have to embellish. As a scholar you should know better. One would hope. In the immortal paraphrased words of the Hansons’ “you don’t have to make it look tough”...just be, liou coe shuai du biao-tze huh hoe-tze duh ur-tze.

    Congrats on the bash of Wisconsin. Joe Pa rules.

    Juan Oh Juan.

    Posted by  on  11/06  at  02:25 AM

  34. It has been pointed out that the poll was grossly over sampled towards a particular bias.

    Pointed out by whom, Juan?  Powerline?

    And about history:  please, for your own sake, read more carefully before hurling the insults.  Bush’s fifth-year numbers were being compared to the fifth-year numbers of other two-term presidents after their re-election.  There’s no embellishment there, just a comparison with Clinton, Reagan, Nixon, and Eisenhower.

    And Daniel:

    It is estimated that 50% of the total sum of individual financial contributions to the Democratic party are made by Jews. . . .  The Democratic party does not exist as a viable political force without the financial support of Jews. You think such contributions are made out of a gesture of pure charity? There is no interest involved?

    Do you have a source for this passive-voice estimation?  Or for the Democrats’ Jewish agenda?

    Posted by Michael  on  11/06  at  10:49 AM

  35. Devout Buddhists, for whatever reason, seem not to believe that everyone else is consigned to eternal perdition and must be saved by any means necessary from the error of their ways

    Just to be technical, here (i was a religious studies major AND a devout buddhist), buddhists DO believe that everyone is consigned to an endless cycle of suffering unless they become enlightened and thereby escape, and they do believe that buddhism offers the best means of so escaping.  And, they generally would be happy to use any means necessary to help people escape, it’s just that they don’t believe that methods most people find abhorent, such as brow-beating and endless repetition of pugilistic dogmatic assertions, are useful. 

    Buddhists believe that this universe will continue essentially endlessly until everyone is Enlightened, and therefore take a much longer view of things than your typical western religionist, who thinks your eternal fate is totally decided based upon your performance in this one lifetime.  Buddhists believe in making gradual, steady progress over as many lifetimes as it takes.

    Posted by Zenji  on  11/06  at  11:18 AM

  36. Michael,

    Here is one source; it took 5 minutes of effort on Google. I have heard these figures tossed about enough over the past several years that I take them as correct. I havent’ seen anyone challenge or assail them. If you wish, I bet I could have 5 other sources by Tuesday morning for you.

    http://www.atljewishtimes.com/archives/2003/011703cs.htm

    “Sources within the Democratic Party estimate that contributions from Jews make up 50 percent of the donations the party receives from individuals each election cycle, though neither party will admit publicly that it tracks donations via religion or ethnicity.

    Research by University of Akron political scientist John Green, an expert on religion and politics, revealed that in the 2000 presidential primary, Democratic candidates Al Gore and Bill Bradley raised a staggering 21 percent of their contributions from Jews.”

    Agenda? We are not talking Protocols here; an agenda is simply what you want to achieve; something that furthers your interst: policy, legislation..... There is no grand plan, though, nothing clandestine. I am sure whoever is paying is quite blunt with what they want. I know I am when I pay any money to a politician.

    I assume correctly, I think, that most of the people visiting this blog operate under the assumption that money in politics buys access and power; anything virtuous is strictly beside the point. I pay; you do. Remember, we are talking money here; all is suspect. That’s how it is. Nothing wrong with it I guess, but if we are going to criticize Christians and Republicans for their tight relationship but allow Democrats and Jews to slide by then one would have to think of Chrstianity is especially malevolent or Judaism as especially benevolent or some cross of the two.

    Posted by  on  11/07  at  01:00 AM

  37. The original CBS survey that was found objectionable referred to “evangelical Christians,” not “Christians.” I believe members of both groups view this as a meaningful distinction.

    The Atlanta Jewish Times article cited notes that Jewish voters have varied in which party they support. No parallel between evangelical support for the GOP and Jewish support for Democrats is sustainable on the basis of this article’s findings.

    The CBS survey asked whether respondents believed evangelicals to have too much influence on Republican policy, not whether they actually have such influence. Evidence of actual Jewish or evangelical support for either party is irrelevant to the issue of public perception.

    Finally, the crude “quid pro quo” assumptions about political contributions really took my breath away. We assume that corporations, especially those with a direct financial interest in legislative or regulatory action, expect favorable treatment in exchange for their contributions; that’s one reason they generally give to both parties, though not as a rule in equal measure. But that’s the money influence progressives generally execrate. The rest of us know perfectly well our tiny contributions won’t buy favors, nor indeed do we wish them to; we support candidates or parties or civil society organizations whose views we share, in the hope that these views can be turned into policy. If Daniel’s pay-to-play attitude is characteristic of evangelicals, then we can add that to the list of pernicious effects they have on political life in the US.

    Posted by  on  11/07  at  01:25 AM

  38. Rootless,

    >>The original CBS survey that was found objectionable referred to “evangelical Christians,” not “Christians.” I believe members of both groups view this as a meaningful distinction.

    This is a meaningless distinction; ALL Christians should take offense at the presumptions built into the question. Once again, lets go back to the hypothetical; what if a poll were run asking “Do REFORM and CONSERVATIVE Jews have too much influence in the Democratic Party?” Do you see my point? No, because you do think conservative Christianity is a malevolent force. And it is not what these Christians do, it is what they are that bugs you. Glad we cleared that up.

    It is clear that the Democratic party is literally becoming the anti-Christ party. Hatred and contempt of Chrstianity motiviates so much of its base. Oh, yes, there is the mainline liberal Christian who is tolerated, as long as he doesn’t go off message, like Jimmy Carter did last week, decrying the Democrats’ obsession with abrotion.

    >>The Atlanta Jewish Times article cited notes that Jewish voters have varied in which party they support. No parallel between evangelical support for the GOP and Jewish support for Democrats is sustainable on the basis of this article’s findings.

    No, you are wrong. Oh, yes, Jewish voting support varies—CONSISTENTLY varies. The democrats will get 75-80% of the Jewish vote, pretty much always. But the voting pattern wasn’t my point, my point was the demographic composition of individual financial donors to the Democratic party, and how a news organization would never dream of probing, asking readers whether this was good or proper, but they will do so as a matter of course if Republicans and Christians are involved. My assertions stand.

    >>The CBS survey asked whether respondents believed evangelicals to have too much influence on Republican policy, not whether they actually have such influence.

    What’s your point here? I was questioning the propriety of conducting the poll in the first place. The pollster may simply have been trying to get a feeling of the public’s perception, or, just as likely (this is CBS News. Dan Rather, and Maples still insist those documents are genuine) they were seeking to provoke a preception, to further an agenda. I don’t know. (Once again, we can do whatever we like, but shouild we..)

    >>Finally, the crude “quid pro quo” assumptions about political contributions really took my breath away. We assume that corporations, especially those with a direct financial interest in legislative or regulatory action, expect favorable treatment in exchange for their contributions; that’s one reason they generally give to both parties, though not as a rule in equal measure. But that’s the money influence progressives generally execrate. The rest of us know perfectly well our tiny contributions won’t buy favors, nor indeed do we wish them to; we support candidates or parties or civil society organizations whose views we share, in the hope that these views can be turned into policy. If Daniel’s pay-to-play attitude is characteristic of evangelicals, then we can add that to the list of pernicious effects they have on political life in the US.

    How dare I presume that you don’t approach politics and policy with anything but the noblest intentions. Poor little virtous you. Look in the mirror, I’ll bet you are looking at the most moral, englightend, upstanding fella, the best little boy in the whole wide world. Give yourself a hug, kiss yourself in the a**. Your full of sh***.

    Please, give me a right-winger who doesn’t really give a damnn about others, who acts on what is good for himself and his kind but, nonetheless, is convinced that what is good for him is also good for his adversaries and enemies. Now that is bracing.

    Posted by  on  11/07  at  01:03 PM

  39. How dare I presume that you don’t approach politics and policy with anything but the noblest intentions. Poor little virtous you. Look in the mirror, I’ll bet you are looking at the most moral, englightend, upstanding fella, the best little boy in the whole wide world. Give yourself a hug, kiss yourself in the a**. Your full of sh***.

    Keep this up and I’ll delete the whole damn comment.  Saying that Democrats are the “anti-Christ” party merely makes you look ridiculous.  But replying to a serious point with personal abuse . . . take it to some other blog, pal.

    Posted by Michael  on  11/07  at  01:19 PM

  40. Well,

    How sensitive we are. Let me see, this thread is about number 4 down on the list; most everybody has moved on. Maybe an odd 1 or 2 of your regular readers will drop in and see what is still going on; to see me slug it out with whoever is still antagonistic, curious, bored or has nothing better to do at this point. Whatever.

    Now, I know I can’t match wits with you; your sense of satire and irony leave me far behind, but if you cannot perceive that alot of what I say is said with the spirit of good-faith jousting, razzing, provoking with the view of changing perception, not intending to be wicked or harmful, then you senses are dulled.

    Personal abuse? Get a grip. And yes, “Anti” - “Christ"ian.

    Well, before I get thrown out, I will find my own way to the door. You have been a rude host.

    Good bye.

    Posted by  on  11/07  at  01:45 PM

  41. Man, that’s what I get for my generosity.  You give some people a comment platform to make their remarks, you give ‘em a nice large 5000-character limit, and you get called out for your rudeness.  Well, now my feelings are hurt.

    Seriously, Daniel, anyone who’s ever read this blog knows that I like a bit of sparring—which is why I asked you for the source on your 50 percent figure.  And I don’t mind people directing a bit of verbal abuse at me; it’s my blog, I can take it.  But when one commenter spits on another, s/he gets a warning.  It’s pretty simple, really.

    Posted by  on  11/07  at  04:24 PM

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