Publius over at Legal Fiction asks whether the evangelicals act as a solid bloc, as is often assumed, or if they’re free agents doing their own thing. And he asks in regards to the Miers nomination, and why guys like Robertson and Dobson act as if their supporters are behind Miers, yet many evangelicals seem to totally oppose her. And my response over there was a good enough cop-out to count as my post for the day. I’ll be traveling on business tonight and through this weekend, so this might be my last post for a few days.
Robertson is obviously of the opinion that they're a solid bloc. Hence his threat that politicians will be voted out of office if they vote against Miers. But I think he's mistaken on this one.And while I really shouldn't say this publicly, I think that the stereotypical evangelical (which there certainly are many) should support Miers more than anyone. One reason they might not is because the rhetoric of the right is so divorced from reality. They've rallied so much against "activist" judges and for "originalism", that they haven't noticed that they really DO want activist judges and reject originalism. Those were just keywords used like magical incantations as a quickie attack on the type of activism that liberals might want. But it had nothing to do with overarching principles and everything to do with the agenda of those they opposed. Their argument sounded more legitimate because it had overarching principles, but it was always bullshit designed to win elections and rally their base.Guys like Dobson and Robertson know that; which is why they support Miers. Apparently, many of their followers haven't figured it out yet. They’re holding out for the “strict constitutionalist” that they’ve been told of for so long. And so it looks like the right might be undermined by their own rhetoric, once again. And the more guys like Dobson and Robertson push this issue and assume that the base is following, the more they’ll risk ripping apart the movement they’ve been building all these years. Nobody appreciates being taken for granted.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
2 comments:
Damn, my paragraphs didn't seem to hold up so well after I hit the Publish button. I really hate long paragraphs. Oh well.
Recently I was cruising through a small town in Texas on a Sunday and I saw a bunch of Pro-lifers out in the street with there signs chanting slogans. The problem was, we were almost the only damn car on the whole street. Odds are, most of the town was out in that street chanting like a bunch of loonies. I think the shits gonna hit the fan when these evangelicals realize that Bush can't, and doesn't want to do what he promised he would. He's a big fake and once again the super rich get the spoils of the God vote.
Post a Comment