Posted on 09/17/2007 6:02:03 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
FORT WORTH, Texas --One of the names coming up most frequently as the 2008 presidential campaign gears up isn't even a candidate.
It's Rick Scarborough, an East Texas Baptist minister and evangelist determined to bring conservative Christian Republicans back to the polls next year.
The presidential election is still more than a year away, but the primary campaigns are in full swing, and Scarborough and other religious leaders are stepping up in the battle being waged for control of the White House, Congress and the GOP itself. They want the full force of conservative Christian voters to be felt in the primaries and general election.
As Scarborough, president of Lufkin-based Vision America, put it in a recent e-mail to supporters: "We are in a battle for the soul of our nation."
Scarborough and his supporters want to stem losses suffered by the Republican Party in last year's national elections. Democrats regained control of Congress in the wake of public dissatisfaction with Iraq war policy and a series of ethics scandals involving GOP elected officials and lobbyists.
As party leaders mobilize for the primaries, which begin in January, many say they are without a clear presidential front-runner who can address the needs of both conservative Christians and traditional Republicans.
Latecomer Fred Thompson, a former senator, has drawn some interest from conservatives, many of whom note that Rudy Giuliani is divorced, John McCain hasn't proved his conservativeness and Mitt Romney is a Mormon. They also point out that while Sam Brownback and Mike Huckabee (who attended Fort Worth's Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in the 1970s) hit on religious themes, they lack significant funding to get their messages out.
"These are troubled times for Christian conservatives within the Republican Party," said Cal Jillson, a political science professor at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. "The Republican field in 2008 is simply not one that is attractive enough to energize the religious right.
"It's uphill for Scarborough and his Christian ministers," he said.
Religious and conservative "values voters" are among those in high demand right now.
Republicans want to keep them; Democrats want to sway them.
Political observers say every vote will count in 2008, a time when the balance of power in Congress could swing more heavily to Democrats or bounce back to Republicans.
"GOP presidential candidates underestimate values voters at their own peril," said Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Virginia-based non-profit Susan B. Anthony List, an anti-abortion group. "One only needs to look back at 2006 to recognize the disastrous consequences for Republican candidates who failed to motivate this influential bloc of voters."
Estimates show that 4 million evangelicals chose not to vote in 2000, when Republican George W. Bush lost the popular presidential vote to Democrat Al Gore.
But things were different in 2004, when 26.3 percent of voters identified with the evangelical perspective, said Mark G. Toulouse, a religion professor at Texas Christian University's Brite Divinity School. In 2006, he said, evangelicals made up more than 30 percent of those who voted. At least in 2006, a strong evangelical turnout did not translate to GOP success.
"I think those on the right showed up in 2004 and showed up in 2006," Toulouse said. "It is more likely that trends among evangelicals ... moved in Democratic directions and helped sway congressional elections toward the Democrats."
Scarborough said he doesn't want to take any chances in 2008.
"At this time in our nation's history, it is absolutely essential that value voters stand up, speak up and vote their consciences," Scarborough wrote in another e-mail to supporters.
So he's doing weekly radio updates for Christians nationwide and TV interviews, speaking out on political issues such as federal hate-crimes legislation. He's continuing his patriot pastors effort, encouraging religious leaders and their parishioners to be politically involved.
And he's weighing what to ask GOP presidential candidates in the Sept. 17 Florida debate, where he and other conservative leaders each will get to ask the contenders one question. Scarborough is also reaching out to values voters through Vision America's One Day Crusade to Save America, holding 70 gatherings in different cities to recruit voters and teach them to apply their faith to their votes in November 2008.
Not everyone is pleased with Scarborough's work.
The pro-gay Box Turtle Bulletin Web site recently awarded Scarborough its first-ever LaBarbera Award "for the most outrageous, offensive, malevolent, crazy, excessive statement or claim." It was bestowed for Scarborough's recent stance on hate-crimes legislation and his claim that people who didn't oppose it would have the "blood of martyrs" on their hands.
The People for the American Way, a liberal group that has fought President Bush's judicial nominations, has repeatedly listed Scarborough on its "Right Wing Watch" Web site alert. And he's been criticized on the Web pages of countless bloggers.
Sounds like my kind of guy. I only support figures who drive the Hydrophobic Left into apoplexy.
“Do the democrats really think they’ll sway conservative Christians”
They hope to sway the Christian conservative women by focusing on traditional “nesting type” issues such as health-care and education. Christian women tend toward “inclusive and fair” positions and tend to vote sentimentally. If you look at the language that Hillary has been using(as well as all Democrats) in her speeches, the language zero’s in on just where many other-wise morally righteous women from about 18 to 40 are living at this time.
Many other-wise conservative women I have talked to suggest that its time for a woman president simply because they feel that women have a knack for consenses building and that this should be tried in negotiations with our foreign adversaries. The Dem’s have made an end run around traditional GOP conservative patriarchy and have tempted our women with the evil fruit of Liberalism...Sadly, many have taken a bite.(But just don’t tell their husbands they voted for Hillary...they might get “upset”!)
Yes, a poll showed that 33 percent of Christian “conservatives” supported “their bill” in 1996, rather than the dour Dole. A lot of Christians just “want to get along”, and that means Democrats.
You are absolutely right. Many Christians will be “glad” to support HRC in 2008. The Republicans will lose because they have not delivered on the platform. Even Newt Gingrich says HRC is a 4-1 likely winner.
Reporting for duty, first new voter baby in tow.
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