I didn’t like Romney before. I’m close to despising him now.
In a bid to take the spotlight off of Huckabee, he has extended the full length of his shallow platitudes to fellow western monotheists–most especially to patriotic American monotheists who believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God and the savior of mankind. Atheists, agnostics, skeptics, pagans, Hindus and Buddhists have no place (except perhaps a place of suspicion) in Mitt’s America. More about this later. Here’s my point by point reaction to Mitt’s posturing:
I do not define my candidacy by my religion.
No, members of the Christian Right, he defines his candidacy by your religion.
[The LDS Church’s] authority is theirs, within the province of church affairs, and it ends where the affairs of the nation begin.*
* Invalid in the case of the Equal Rights Amendment, gay marriage, and local Utah politics.
I will put no doctrine of any church above the plain duties of the office and the sovereign authority of the law.
Contrast this ambiguous commitment with JFK’s ballsy “up yours” to the Catholic Church: “I ask you tonight…to judge me on the basis of my record of 14 years in Congress — on my declared stands against an ambassador to the Vatican, against unconstitutional aid to parochial schools, and against any boycott of the public schools.” Mitt doesn’t have the spine to make the same bold claims (unless the polls suggest that spines increase ratings).
Some believe that such a confession of my faith will sink my candidacy. If they are right, so be it.
What’s really odd is that he follows this up with a generic Christian confession: “I believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God and the savior of mankind.” This is just the beginning of a Mormon’s confession of faith, which would go on to declare that the Book of Mormon is the word of God, Joseph Smith was his chosen prophet, and that Gordon B. Hinckley is the prophet to the world today (there are some minor variations on this theme). Pretty sneaky, if you think about it–Mitt Romney followed the “confession will sink my candidacy” group while looking like he was standing up to them.
Skipping forward:
It’s important to recognize that while differences in theology exist between the churches in America, we share a common creed of moral convictions…Whether it was the cause of abolition, or civil rights, or the right to life itself, no movement of conscience can succeed in America that cannot speak to the convictions of religious people.
This is just hypocritical bullshit. In abolition and civil rights, it was the radical progressives who got the heavy ball of social change rolling. Religious institutions were as guilty of preserving and protecting slavery and racism as they were in defeating them. Did Mitt speak out against the institutionalized racism of his own Church, which belatedly admitted black men to the priesthood (and to salvation) in 1978?
Perhaps the most important question to ask a person of faith who seeks a political office, is this: Does he share these American values — the equality of human kind, the obligation to serve one another and a steadfast commitment to liberty?
They are not unique to any one denomination. They belong to the great moral inheritance we hold in common. They’re the firm ground on which Americans of different faiths meet and stand as a nation, united.
This part has me steaming mad. “To ask a person of faith who seeks political office?” What’s up with that “of faith?” Since when does belief in deity equal morality? Listen up, you bigoted, self-righteous bastard: I AM AN ATHEIST. And I believe in “the equality of human kind, the obligation to serve one another and a steadfast commitment to liberty.” I might even argue that I demonstrably believe in this equality more than you do.
Any believer in religious freedom, any person who has knelt in prayer to the Almighty, has a friend and ally in me. And so it is for hundreds of millions of our countrymen: We do not insist on a single strain of religion — rather, we welcome our nation’s symphony of faith.
There it is, folks. No outreach to the doubters and skeptics from Mitt’s camp. We’re shut out of the choir. What’s sadder is that this is Romney bending over and puckering up to kiss the prudish asses of a torture-loving, immigrant-hating “core constituency.” I half hope he wins their hearts. They’d be good for each other.
OK. Enough air-time for Romney. On to things of substance.
15 responses so far ↓
1 pilgrimgirl // Dec 6, 2007 at 10:02 pm
We were eating dinner as we watched this. I had to stop looking at it as I ate. It made me nauseous.
2 Jeff // Dec 6, 2007 at 11:09 pm
Romney reminds me of Nathan Petrelli in the first season of Heroes (I hope I’m not the only one who’s a Heroes addict
). He would lock his wife in the house and disown his brother if it would help him get elected. In this case, he’s selling out to the people who have ruined this nation, people he thinks he needs to please to get elected. The sad thing is that the people will probably buy it.
Just once, I’d love to hear a candidate stand up and say, “I don’t believe in God, and I firmly believe that religion has absolutely no place in the public sphere. If you elect me, I will see to it that America is a place for people to worship, but that it’s also a place that’s welcoming of skeptics and atheists who chose not to worship.” I know it probably won’t happen, but I can dream.
Furthermore, it pisses me off to no end to hear people complain about the persecution of Christians in this nation when the government is full of believers who seek to pass laws that buoy up the Christian cause. In fact, Romney’s speech almost proves that you have to be a Christian (dare I say a WASP?) in order to be president in our nation. We are years behind the developed world in freeing ourselves from religious governance.
3 Kevin // Dec 7, 2007 at 1:49 am
Before going to sleep last night I turned on CNN and they just happened to be discussing this speech (I get a different version of CNN with British anchors - but they concentrate on American news).
They were interviewing a Reverend … (didn’t catch his name!) and asking him if it were possible in America to do what Tony Blair and Alastair Campbell did back in 2003 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/05/04/nblair04.xml
i.e. say “that we don’t do God” in the realm of politics and move on.
The Reverend admitted that it probably wouldn’t fly but that he personally was tired of all the talk about religion from the presidential candidates. I was quite pleased to listen to a Reverend talk about how religion doesn’t belong in politics (that he’s sick of it even) and support many of the points JFK made in his speech on religion back in 1960.
4 the narrator // Dec 7, 2007 at 2:02 am
Romney’s speech was political genius. No other candidate will ever get the free 30 minutes of advertising on every major cable news network, radio news, and subsequent pundit pandering that Romney secured. It was 30 minutes of Romney-only time and subsequent hours of pundit talk that other candidates could only achieve by having an affair with - and then killing - one of their interns.
This advertising/speech could very well give him the Republican nod.
With that said… Romney actually said very little. It was vacuous rhetoric aimed garnering the votes of believers at the expense of subtly snubbing non believers.
For a far far far better speech on faith and politics, read Obama’s chapter on the subject in his Audacity of Hope.
5 Elaine // Dec 7, 2007 at 8:16 am
John…you might want to look around to see if Keith Olbermann’s take on “the speech” is up on the ‘net yet (I looked for it, but my Google-fu isn’t working so well this early in the morning). He got what Romney was really saying, and how he was excluding anyone who believes in more than one god or in no god at all.
6 Romney Roundup | Main Street Plaza // Dec 7, 2007 at 11:57 am
[…] the exmos were none too pleased with Mitt’s rhetoric: see Mind on Fire, My Thoughts Exactly, and […]
7 xJane // Dec 7, 2007 at 6:31 pm
exmo! can I call myself an exca? excath? oooo, exch!
8 Astarte // Dec 7, 2007 at 7:08 pm
Hi, just popping in because of the plug over on Latter-Day Mainstreet. (I’m the author of My Thoughts Exactly).
While I looked at it from a different angle, I concluded the same as you. The man pisses me off. I can’t stand the double-talk, the misrepresentation of self, the pandering to the religious zealots of this country that would have us all choose a religion (and it better have Jesus in it) or get the hell out of the country.
Mitt was a stake president. He is a bishop of his local ward. He signs temple recommends. He is considered a “judge in Israel” by the Mormon people. He is one of the “Lord’s Anointed” that Mormons in his ward dare not speak negatively about, or they will lose his endorsement on that little slip of paper.
I want him to stop telling people that he isn’t a spokesperson for his faith. Try telling that to the members of his ward, or the members of the stake of two thousand people that he presided over.
Anyway, I liked the points that you brought up, about him totally ignoring anyone who doesn’t worship the Judeo-Islam-Christian God. That pretty much leaves atheists, Wiccans, Sikhs, Scientologists and Confucianists out in the cold, doesn’t it? Welp, better pack my backs and head for Canada…
9 Rich // Dec 7, 2007 at 9:19 pm
The right-wing-nuts over at Meridian Magazine are practically having orgasms over the speech. Sheesh.
10 John // Dec 7, 2007 at 10:17 pm
Jeff, I’m in the middle of Season One, if it’s any consolation.
Narrator, I’m picking up Audacity of Hope from the library tomorrow.
Here it is, Elaine.
Astarte, welcome! You’ve pointed out one of the biggest problems with Romney–he wants to have it both ways. I hope it gets him into trouble.
11 mel // Dec 7, 2007 at 11:54 pm
John, nice … thanks.
I’d just like to add that Mitt is the worst thing that’s happened to the Mormon Church since Joseph Smith. It took 50 years in the wilderness for the church to recover the last time. This time, there ain’t no wilderness.
12 Parker // Dec 8, 2007 at 9:16 am
John,
Nicely done. You put into words those feelings that I couldn’t quite articulate. But we really shouldn’t be too hard on Brother Romney. He is simply doing what we always do in the Church–tell one story and act out another.
13 xJane // Dec 8, 2007 at 10:46 am
heh. Parker said it better than I could have. Sounds like just about every organized religion I’ve ever encountered (with few exceptions):
14 Jonathan // Dec 11, 2007 at 9:45 am
Thank you for the overview! I didn’t see the speech myself, namely because I hate politics the 100% BS involved with it.
It appears that Romney, like many/most evangelical Christians, do not believe a person can be moral without a belief in God. This is probably what they think: Non-religous people are moral “free spirits” - they pick and choose what they want to be moral about, so they above all others, not encumbered by guilt from religious pressure, cannot be trusted to be moral people and should not be put in a position where a moral person is greatly needed.
I personally don’t believe this at all, as I believe in an innate basic absolute morality (i.e. human rights, no stealing, killing etc.) which becomes known through experience in human interactions independent of a person’s belief in God. I believe the atheist can be a very moral person, more moral than religious people, who are quite capable of ignoring their religious teachings.
This is probably something you have deal with a lot, I’m guessing. Have you done any writing on this subject or read any good discussions on this? It’s an area I’m really fascinated with (for the last year or so).
15 xJane // Dec 12, 2007 at 1:55 pm
finally got a chance to (a) read the whole thing and (b) watch Olberman’s response. I basically just want to chime in that I agree with everything that his guest speaker said. Not much more to add to the discussion except this link to a pagan’s response to it.
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