cmotherofpirl Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 Campaign Crawlers Kerry Loses His Faith By Paul Kengor Published 11/5/2004 12:06:14 AM It is said that George W. Bush won the 2004 presidential election because of religious voters, especially evangelical Protestants. What is not said is that John F. Kerry lost the election because he failed not only to win religious voters generally but Catholics specifically. Because he lost Catholics -- an amazing fact when one considers that Kerry himself is Catholic -- he lost the race. Put differently, Catholics voted for the Protestant, George W. Bush, and did so in large part because they agree more with him than Kerry on moral issues, such as abortion, closest to Catholic hearts. Just as Al Gore did not win the Electoral College in 2000 because he couldn't carry his home state of Tennessee, John Kerry failed because he couldn't bring a natural constituency from his own church. According to CNN's exit poll data, 27% of those who voted on Tuesday were Catholic, which equated to roughly 31 million of 115 million voters. How these Catholics voted is striking: They voted for Bush over Kerry by 51 to 48%. In other words, they mirrored the popular vote to the exact number. Kerry lost the Catholic vote to Bush by at least a million. A Catholic with a major party nomination should have won the Catholic vote by several million. Another Democratic senator from Massachusetts, John F. Kennedy, once won an extremely close election because he overwhelmingly took the Catholic vote. The numbers diverge more sharply when one considers devout Catholics compared to those who find their way to church only for weddings and Christmas. Catholics who attend Mass weekly voted for Bush by 55% to 44%. The breakdown among states is most interesting. Bush remained close to Kerry in Pennsylvania, a state with millions of pro-life Catholic Democrats, which went for Kerry 52 to 48%, because he carried Catholics who go to Mass weekly by 52 to 48%. In New Hampshire, which barely went for Kerry, Bush took Catholics who attend Mass weekly by 63 to 35%. Most impressive, Catholics played a key role in Florida and Ohio. In Florida, they comprised 28% of voters, and went for Bush 57 to 42%. In Ohio, they made up 26% and went to Bush 55 to 44%. The margin was even wider for Catholics who attend Mass weekly: In Florida, they went to Bush by almost two to one, 66 to 34%, and in Ohio they supported Bush by 65 to 35%. In fact, Catholics for Bush made it unnecessary to begin counting provisional ballots in Ohio. Ohio Catholics cast 780,000 votes for Bush and 624,000 for Kerry, a difference of 156,000 votes. Compare that to the overall vote difference for all Ohio ballots: which was 136,000. Thus it can be asserted that Kerry lost Ohio, and therefore the election, because he couldn't get the support of people of his own faith in Ohio. The Catholic vote kept Bush competitive in the liberal East, where the 41% of voters who are Catholic went for the Protestant president by 52 to 47%, and those who attend Mass weekly supported him by 56 to 42%. Bush actually won the Catholic vote in New York by 51 to 48%. Those Catholics were offset by the 12% of New Yorkers who claimed no religion at all; these atheists eagerly voted for Kerry by 78 to 19%. Kerry actually almost lost the Catholic vote in his own liberal home state of Massachusetts, where Catholics gave him the nod by a paltry 50 to 49%. THE ISSUE BEHIND THIS Catholic snub was abortion. Pro-life Catholics were aghast at the prospect of a Catholic president becoming the greatest champion of legalized abortion ever to step foot in the Oval Office, as Kerry would have been. Kerry could speak all day about how his piety would prompt him to boost the minimum wage. Catholics could care less; they wanted him to defend babies in the womb. The Democratic Party has ditched pro-life Catholic Democrats (like my grandmother in the mountains of Pennsylvania), pursuing instead the pro-choice feminist driving an SUV through the suburbs of Maryland. In so doing, it has lost the votes of millions of people who long voted Democrat. By bowing before the altar of the feminist church, liberals like John Kerry have ceded a huge constituency. It cost the Democrats the 2004 election, and may do so again in 2008. Liberals will bellyache about how Karl Rove took the vote by mass-mobilizing evangelical Protestants. What they will not talk about is how they, and a presidential nominee named John F. Kerry, drove both evangelicals and Catholics toward Bush. Kerry did more for Protestant-Catholic unity in America than the churches themselves could accomplish. The fact is that moderate to conservative Catholics had nowhere to go but to George W. Bush. Liberal Christians like Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi say that Democratic politicians are "faith-filled" people as well; they read the Bible and Matthew's gospel. However, if church-going Democrats want to win the church-going population, the solution is obvious: it's about abortion, stupid -- an answer they do not want to hear. Call us club-carrying troglodytes, but us simple-minded Christians in the hinterland just can't countenance that Jesus would be a champion of legalized abortion. And until Democrats recognize that, they will never win the churchgoers they need to drive them to the White House. Paul Kengor is author of God and George W. Bush (Regan Books). He is also a professor of political science at Grove City College and a visiting fellow with the Hoover Institution. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lounge Daddy Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 [font="Courier"]what an awesome article! thanx for posting it[/font] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ilovechrist Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 i LOVE that article! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.R.D Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 It's ok Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
God Conquers Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 Wow! I like it... thank you, I'm sending it to a friend of mine who lobbys in Ottawa against abortion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SirMyztiq Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 LOL. I like how the article said that we lost because of moral issues such as "abortion" Funny, abortion and gay rights is probably the only "moral" issue that had any effect. Talk about me generalizing. "Pro-choice women driving SUVs" I wonder how much those evangelicals were paid in order to subdue their crowd in to his own opinion. So in others words. Catholics prefer whining about something they shouldn't be minding instead of feeding their families, fixing the economy, fixing the war, fixing the job loss, fixing the deficit and fixing education. Kind of...short sighted? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.R.D Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 I agree what SirMYztiq said Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
littleflower+JMJ Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 good article cmom.....so true... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cmotherofpirl Posted November 7, 2004 Author Share Posted November 7, 2004 [quote name='SirMyztiq' date='Nov 7 2004, 01:48 AM'] LOL. I like how the article said that we lost because of moral issues such as "abortion" Funny, abortion and gay rights is probably the only "moral" issue that had any effect. Talk about me generalizing. "Pro-choice women driving SUVs" I wonder how much those evangelicals were paid in order to subdue their crowd in to his own opinion. So in others words. Catholics prefer whining about something they shouldn't be minding instead of feeding their families, fixing the economy, fixing the war, fixing the job loss, fixing the deficit and fixing education. Kind of...short sighted? [/quote] If we kill off enough children those problems go away... wait maybe that is the democratic plan... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SirMyztiq Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 Or if we have kids born forcefully and mothers then have to go into federal aid. Then we have a bunch of Republicans whining about it. That and that was a very stupid and naive statement pirl. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toledo_jesus Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 [quote name='SirMyztiq' date='Nov 7 2004, 12:48 AM'] So in others words. Catholics prefer whining about something they shouldn't be minding instead of feeding their families, fixing the economy, fixing the war, fixing the job loss, fixing the deficit and fixing education. Kind of...short sighted? [/quote] short sighted? no. Quite the opposite in fact. Social ills are interconnected. The moral decay that accompanies an atrocity like legalized abortion and contraception naturally puts a lower value on human life, making it easier to ignore those less fortunate, or ill, or the elderly, or the death of civilians in another country. It encourages the selfish "I want/don't want" attitude that tends to ensure that people don't look beyond their own physical comforts to help others. In short, abortion only exacerbates the socioeconomic difficulties facing America by instilling a hearty disrespect for life and attaching a temporal value to it. It's so much easier to just abort the little poor girl now than to see her on TV waiting for your 85 cents per day... Short sighted? Hardly. The only people who are short-sighted on this board are the ones who steadfastly revel in their ignorance, as if it is something to be admired. Cast your sight ahead to the moment of your death, and think about what you want to see when your eyes close for the last time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CatholicAndFanatical Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 (edited) Holy Toledo!! sorry couldnt resist. Well said. It is interconnected. SirMyztic, [quote] That and that was a very stupid and naive statement pirl. [/quote] What would be stupid and naive is people thinking killing babies is ok. Forcing women to have their babies?? get real! They made their own decision when they decided to have sex. Women want a freedom to choose? How about choosing between Sex or no Sex rather than between Life and Death. Stop being selfish and always thinking about 'me' but rather be selfless and think about 'we' Edited November 7, 2004 by CatholicAndFanatical Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paladin D Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 [quote name='SirMyztiq' date='Nov 7 2004, 01:12 AM'] Or if we have kids born forcefully and mothers then have to go into federal aid. Then we have a bunch of Republicans whining about it. That and that was a very stupid and naive statement pirl. [/quote] If you can't keep your pants on, then that's your problem. 1%-2% of abortions are a result of rape, the remaining 98%-99% of abortions are used as a form of birth control. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luthien Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 No babies, no spending. No spending, no economy. There is also a lot less being put into social security. The root? Less children being born. For people to replace themselves, a couple must have 2.5 children. This is not happening. Why? Birthcontrol and abortion. Shortsighted? Me? Purely an ignorant statement on your part. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
qfnol31 Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 [quote name='J.R.D' date='Nov 6 2004, 10:50 PM'] I agree what SirMYztiq said [/quote] The only reason you agree with him is if you're putting health aid on the same level of abortion. The government wasn't set up to aid health or regulate the econcomy, etc. This is something Leo XIII has actually said. But that's just my take on why you hate this article and agree with him. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now