Posted on 02/02/2012 5:31:46 PM PST by writer33
Former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum commands a lot of respect in the Pikes Peak region.
And that support was hammered home Wednesday evening when Focus on the Family’s founder, Dr. James Dobson, made a surprise appearance at a Santorum rally to announce his endorsement.
“I’ve been watching you,” Dobson said to Santorum, with a quiet smile on his face. “We need you in the Oval Office.”
Santorum grinned broadly, and the thousand people at the rally stood and cheered.
And the senator told them solemnly, “God called me to do this.”
The event was Santorum’s second in the Pikes Peak region on Wednesday, during a campaign swing through Colorado. He stopped first in Woodland Park, where supporters filled the Ute Pass Cultural Center to capacity. So many people showed up that organizers worried about violating the fire code, and the campaign moved its evening rally to Mr. Biggs Family Fun Center, which had a much more room than the original location.
(Excerpt) Read more at gazette.com ...
Sorry bud but you aren’t the thread police and I don’t CARE what you discussed. Not everyone has seen it.
I too listen to Focus on the Family and applaud their Christian mission, but what The_Media_never_lies posted is not wrong. Dobson does have a tin ear for politics, and if his endorsement isn’t a liability, his condemnation of a candidate seems to be pretty effective. Dobson was behind sure loser Huckabee way before he formally endorsed him, and Dobson torpedoed Fred Thompson among evangelicals way early when their support could have helped. Why? Same issue; divorce, then taking up with a younger woman.
Dobson’s playing secular politics based on his moral judgements of candidates is not a positive thing.
Wonder if God called on him to vote for Title X? Heck, even McCain voted against PP.
Also, does God call on him to vote on spending tax payer’s money with reckless abandon? Does God call on him to be one of the biggest whores for the lobbyist “Johns” in DC? Does God call on him to create a huge secular bureaucracy?
Santorum, do not bring God into your power plays, the desperation shows too much.
He must not have been watching when Santorum backed Specter.
I've been trying over on the World Magazine website, and other conservative Christian forums where I am personally known to the leaders, to make a similar case for the legitimacy of voting for Newt Gingrich. I think someone can vote for either Santorum or Gingrich in good conscience. I happen to think Santorum is the better candidate but I can live with Gingrich.
Some comments:
1. You are absolutely right that too many conservative evangelicals apply the same purist approach to secular politics that they do in their churches. I have major problems with that approach.
Considering that I spent a decade fighting against outright liberalism in the Christian Reformed Church (the “official” conflict over ordaining women and creation/evolution issues masked a more serious problem of denial of inerrancy that led to fights over homosexuality and similar issues), I have legitimate credentials to say that I understand the difference between fighting over secondary issues and fighting when the gospel is at stake.
2. I do not think I have ever attacked Callista Gingrich either in private or in public. I think it looks bad and wins no votes. However, we need to realize other people **ARE** doing that, not just Dobson.
Santorum has spent his entire political career having to answer questions about his own wife's repentance from some rather wicked decisions in her past. People have brought up the background of Mrs. Santorum several times on Free Republic. Callista Gingrich is going to have to deal with that sooner or later — the criticism won't come from me, but it will come.
My answer, if I were Callista Gingrich, would be to say some version of “I did something horrible, I deeply regret it, and my church spent many years evaluating me and Newt before allowing Newt to join the Catholic Church. It's not easy for a twice-divorced person to join the Catholic Church, and you can rest assured that my priest and my bishop investigated our situation. I've repented, Newt has repented, and if people refuse to believe that, all I can say is my church did hard work my critics have not done.”
3. You asked, “Why would a Christian support a candidate who cannot win?” In the current situation we don't have that problem. The race has been so volatile that I believe pretty much any of the four candidates except Ron Paul could still win the race.
However, if someone sincerely believes as a matter of conscience that they cannot support Newt Gingrich, I'm not going to tell them they have to vote for him. Sometimes we have to follow our consciences even knowing we will probably lose. I think the people here on Free Republic saying they'll back a third-party candidate if Romney wins the nomination understand that logic quite well. Frankly, I don't want to have to think through what choice I will need to make if the ballot is Romney versus Obama, and I hope the Republican Party doesn't put me in that position.
You care enough to argue over it. If I’m not the police (and I’m not) why do you care that I call your comment “spam”? It’s just an opinion.
I wouldn’t take it personally, multi-page comments often elicit negative responses. Especially from people (not me) who try to read FR on small devices.
You didn’t post it to discuss it — because if you wanted it to be discussed and well-known, you’d make it a thread. Or maybe not, but that’s what a person SHOULD do if they have something that they want everybody to see, and to discuss.
If you really want to make sure people have seen it, why stick it in some silly endorsement thread that only a few poeple will read?
Seems kinda late for that.
Stick it in your ear you pompous windbag.
I have said for weeks I will vote Santorum then newt maybe even Paul but never Romney. I have defended newt when he was attacked (I think by romney supporters) because if he has made things right with God, who are we to judge.
Please remember that Dobson ran “Focus on the Family.” The importance of the family is a core issue for him.
Also, with regard to Fred Thompson, church attendance is one problem he had that Gingrich does not have. Gingrich gives every impression of being a sincere and committed Roman Catholic convert. I'm impressed by what the pastor of Skyline Wesleyan Church wrote about Gingrich's personal faith and repentance, and while I am not Roman Catholic, I am very much aware that Gingrich would have had to go through a lot of "hoops" to have his marriage to Callista Gingrich recognized. I cannot simply accept the Roman Catholic Church's verdict on the matter without question, but it carries weight with me, knowing how seriously the Roman Catholic Church takes divorce and remarriage.
The biblical principle is that if a man cannot rule his own house he cannot rule the house of God. A man's success or failure in his family life is a good though certainly not perfect predictor of how he will handle greater responsibilities.
We can debate for a long time just how much the general equity of that biblical principle applies to secular rulership. For example, I campaigned for Ronald Reagan despite his divorce, and did so back when most Republicans I knew thought Reagan has no chance of winning, because I believed Jimmy Carter was naive and incompetent in addition to having bad policies. That's part of why I believe a Christian can support Newt Gingrich in good conscience -- President Obama really is a terrible president, and we need the best person possible to run against him.
However, Dobson is not saying something new or unusual. A few generations ago, what Dobson says now was standard wisdom not only in the church but also in many secular positions of leadership.
Our society isn't getting better when it comes to family life and Dobson’s views make a lot more sense than much of what gets said today about the role of the family in public service.
Dobson is WAY out of line.
CharlesWayneCT is a concern troll and thread nanny.
Mind your own business, and don’t even try to lecture DJ MacWoW, you arrogant gasbag.
Keeping it classy, I see.
You need to mind your own business and take caution about who you attack with your sanctimonious comments, “concern troll.”
Is this where I’m supposed to respond “I know you are, but what am I”?
Or are we really on a serious site trying to save our country? Sometimes it’s hard to tell.
Seriously, do you think it wouldn’t be more visible, and easier to discuss, if it was posted in it’s own thread?
It just seems like an odd way to accomplish the purpose you stated.
Goodnight.
Nobody is calling into question Dobson’s moral views on the importance of family. What is questionable is political judgement and record as a kingmaker. The results of Dobson knifing Thompson and supporting no-chance Huckabee was what? McCain! By the way, how did McCain’s divorce and church attendance rate with Dobson? And I’m pretty sure Thompson wouldn’t have endorsed Obama, or ostentatiosly suspend his campaign to fly back to Washington and vote for TARP like McCain did. What was the end result of all the Machiavellian manuevers? An Obama presidency.
Dobson is just plain out of his depth in trying to play the secular political game. Results don’t lie, and Dobson’s Santorum game will likely also have disatrous results.
I’ve never really understood the whole “concern troll” thing. I presume it’s meant to be a dismissive derogatory statement in lieu of an argument.
Aren’t we all concerned about all sorts of things?
Anyway, since this thread has been hopelessly hijacked from being a chance for the Santorum supporters to just enjoy their candidate getting a nice endorsement, it appears none of us have any concern at all about that.
I certainly didn’t expect anybody to get so wound up by an offhand comment about Santorum getting his own spammer. Or to have to drag you into the thread.
You do seem very quick to get personally nasty though, much more so than I remember from our more polite conversations of this summer, when there were still high hopes for a Palin candidacy.
I guess this election cycle has been hard on a lot of people.
Anyway, glad to see Dobson saying good things about Rick Santorum. He’s a good man who doesn’t deserve all the slime and personal attacks he’s getting just because he thinks he’s the best person for the Presidency, and is willing to fight for it.
Oh, that's RICH.
Dobson's actions are making it MORE likely that Romney -- who is ON RECORD sanctioning "Gay Youth Pride" for middle school children -- will get the nomination. A man who has led children to sin -- and so many people here are READY AND WILLING to vote FOR such a depraved person! As if having that on your Christian conscience is somehow justified for voting "against" Obama!
Santorum is considerably less experienced than Gingrich. Gingrich has a PROVEN RECORD of helping bring Reaganite conservatism and positive changes to this country; Santorum was at most a minor fringe player in that effort. And although his supporters vehemently deny the solid evidence and record, Santorum likes big government as much as anyone in this race.
In terms of proven ability, Gingrich is CLEARLY the better choice compared to Santorum.
But people like Dobson and many Santorum supporters are above such sinners as Gingrich! Oh, yes indeed! They can't bear to dirty their hands by supporting Gingrich! But I take heart because there ARE Christians on here who think a little more clearly about what would please God; a fellow FReeper Christian beautifully and truly describes Gingrich as "a humbled man who has been broken by his sin, who has repented and been forgiven, and as a sign of God’s grace in his life, has been given this opportunity in his declining years to lead the American people back to our own promised land, the land of liberty, morality, decency, goodness, godliness — and prosperity."
And Rick Santorum stands there and exhorts us to "vote your values," and anyone with an honest heart KNOWS that what he really means is "even though Gingrich has apparently done his penance with God regarding marital infidelity and strife, I'm better than he is because I'm still married to the same woman."
And because of such stupid, ugly, misplaced pride and vanity, Santorum AND DR DOBSON are risking, in a big way, a situation where they may end up voting FOR a politician, Romney, who has endorsed the open embrace of homosexuality among schoolchildren.
It seems to me that pride and vanity are behind Dobson's endorsement and Santorum's hopes. Gingrich is SEASONED. He's PROVEN. Santorum is a candidate to appeal to "better" Christian's egos and vanities.
I don't want to get into details of a campaign four years ago when the candidate isn't running now. I don't trust my memory on that sort of thing without doing research, and I don't see the point of researching it because Fred Thompson isn't running.
So, let's change the name. Were conservatives wrong four years ago to say that Barack Obama is “not Christian enough” because of the stuff going on in Rev. Jeremiah Wright's church?
Dobson is not “way out of line” here, any more than the people who criticized Obama’s church and pastor. Dobson has every right to criticize a candidate for not being Christian enough, especially if that candidate professes to be affiliated with a Christian church and has made his faith an issue but doesn't appear to be practicing what he professes.
Those who agree with Dobson will take that into account, and those who don't, won't.
I think Newt Gingrich compares quite favorably to Fred Thompson on the issue of practicing what he professes to believe, by the way. That's a point in Gingrich's favor. He gives every indication of being a sincere convert to the Roman Catholic Church who believes a spiritual foundation is critical to win the war on Islamofascism, and understands the Roman Catholic Church's long history of confronting Islam.
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