Falwell says evangelicals control GOP, Bush's fate...September 2004

[madfloridian]

In our area churches stood up in the pulpit calling the Iraq war a holy war. Some churches even gave out yard signs that were pro-war. Churches in Florida have banded together against gays...Baptists and Catholics joining hands. My state legislator has aides who spout religious rhetoric when we call...like abortion is murder, and gays need not to choose that life-style.

So I believe Jerry Falwell was sincere in when he said this, and I think he was right. Bush used that community and they got him elected.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20040925/news_1n25christ.html

WASHINGTON – The Rev. Jerry Falwell said yesterday that evangelical Christians, after nearly 25 years of increasing political activism, now control the Republican Party and the fate of President Bush in the November election.

"The Republican Party does not have the head count to elect a president without the support of religious conservatives," Falwell said at an election training conference of the Christian Coalition.

Falwell said evangelical Christians are now "by far the largest constituency" within the Republican Party, their route to dominance beginning in 1979 with his founding of the Moral Majority, a precursor to the Christian Coalition.

"I tell my Republican friends who are always talking about the 'big tent,' I say make it as big as you want to, but if the candidate running for president is not pro-life, pro-family . . . you're not going to win," he said.

This is why our Democrats who should be standing up for women's rights in the party are helping to pass anti-abortion laws. In SD that bill would not have passed with Democratic help. In Louisiana, two Democrats are supporting a bill which will allow no abortions at all...even in cases of rape.

There must be something done when a right wing evangelist says they own the president. There must a dialogue about whether Christians and churches run our country. And I say that as a recovering Southern Baptist, raised in the church, driven out by pro-war fervor.

[GreenPartyVoter]

1. I agree. I don't want the Talibornagains running everything

[gaialove]

2. You ask what should be done?

Get people to vote against those who are turning this country into a theocracy.

[MikeNearMcChord]

3. And you will notice that some in the GOP

are trying to pull the party away from the Falwells. The religious right IMHO jumped the shark with many people over the Terri Shaivo case, and continue to spiral downward, especially when Pat Robertson opens his mouth. One thing to remember the religious right is their own worse enemy, sooner or later they do stupid things that turn people, even those who might be sympathetic to some of their positions, and people hate nannies looking over their shoulder, or in their bedroom. Considering Shrub sinking like the Titanic if the fundies want to go with him, bon voyage.

[madfloridian]

6. But women's rights and gay rights are being taken away right now..

and the 06 elections are heating up. Our Democrats in many places are giving in to this pressure and sounding like Republicans, I fear.

[MikeNearMcChord]

7. And in some ways it is causing a backlash

especially women's rights, the moderate wing of the GOP will walk on the next presidential nominee if he proposes the fundie agenda.(the GOP here in Washington doesn't dare to pull stunts of the nature, or at least as nakedly as some in other states) I agree in some places that it is happening, but I think in the long run the fundies will overstep the mark and the GOP will have to drop them if they want to survive. I would suggest as a strategy adopt a libertarian "get govt off my back" to the fundies, at least let them stew in their hypocrisy

[Downtown Hound]

4. As strange as it may sound,

I actually, in some weird twisted way, find this kind of inspiring. Not because I support this religious cabal of killers and sexually repressed bible thumpers, but because look at what they were able to accomplish with 25 years of hard activism. They turned the Republican Party from a party focused on fiscal prudence and strong defense to a party of religious zealots who listen with rapture when Bush tells them that God told him to start a war. Regardless of how I or anyone else feels about their ideology or their sanity, that is an impressive accomplishment. If only they could use it for good instead of evil.

But it gives me hope that we may be able to one day do the same thing to the Democratic Party, and actually use it for good instead of evil. Remember it took them 25 years to get to this point, and with the way things are going, only 6 to completely destroy themselves. We've only been at this for a few years.

[xxqqqzme]

5. Xcept if raisin brain would have 2 chose

he'd take the 'have mores' every time. The have mores don't have parties for the falwells.