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POPSWhere Were Vocal Conservatives When It Mattered? Rod Dreher is a conservative writer for Beliefnet. Few of us stood up to Bush when he took us to this disastrous war in Iraq. Few, if any, stood up to him over his foolish support for Rumsfeld, long after it became obvious what a disaster Rumsfeld was. Few, if any, stood up to him over his amassing of power in the executive branch. Few, if any, stood up to him on the spending....
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POPS Bush 'happy' for pregnant Mary Cheney White House spokesman Tony Snow said Bush stood by his belief about a mother and father but also believes that "every human life is sacred and that every child that comes into this world deserves love and he believes that Mary Cheney's child will in fact have loving parents."
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POPS How modern evangelicals are ignoring their own history Today's Christian conservatives often note that Jefferson's famous line declaring that the first amendment had created “a wall separating church and state” was not in the Constitution but in a private letter. But in that letter, Jefferson was responding to one sent to him by a group of Baptists in Danbury, Conn. We usually read Jefferson's side of that exchange. It's worth re-reading what the Danbury Baptists had to say because it reminds us that for the 18th-century evangelicals, the separation of church and state was not only required by the practicalities of their minority status, but was also demanded by God. “Religions is at all times and places a matter between God and individuals,” the Baptists wrote, warning that government “dare not assume the prerogatives of Jehova and make Laws to govern the Kingdom of Christ.” Government had no business meddling in the affairs of the soul, where there is only one Ruler.
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POPSProminent conservative surveys the wreckage of contemporary conservatism The entire article is highly reccommended for those that want to trace the GOP's post-9/11 "stumble into neoconservatism" from an insider's perspective. Bramwell's honesty and way with words are refreshing. Until recently, it has been almost impossible for me to speak candidly about the conservative movement, for it was my strange fate to serve as director and later trustee of the movement’s flagship journal, National Review. Earlier this year, at William F. Buckley’s request, I resigned both positions. I can therefore now declare what perhaps has oft been thought but never, at least not often enough, expressed. Notwithstanding conservatives’ belief that they, in contrast to their partisan opponents, have thought deeply about the challenges facing the United States, it is they who have become unserious.
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POPSAmerican Conservative Magazine: GOP Must Go There may be little Americans can do to atone for this presidency, which will stain our country’s reputation for a long time. But the process of recovering our good name must begin somewhere, and the logical place is in the voting booth this Nov. 7. If we are fortunate, we can produce a result that is seen—in Washington, in Peoria, and in world capitals from Prague to Kuala Lumpur—as a repudiation of George W. Bush and the war of aggression he launched against Iraq.
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POPSSoldiers of Christ: Inside America's most powerful megachurch with Pastor Ted Haggard No pastor in America holds more sway over the political direction of evangelicalism than does Pastor Ted, and no church more than New Life. Having lived in Colorado Springs for 6 years, some people ask me what it's like living in what some consider the Christian Capital of America. Colorado Springs has a lot going for it besides Dr. Dobson and Ted Haggard, but politically and spiritually speaking, this article explains how the city became the center for the Religious Right movement.
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POPSConservatives Angry with Rupert Murdoch But the little people would have none of it. It was the contamination of traditional media by politically hostile elements that bothered them. Why was Al Jazeera shown on BSkyB? And why did BSkyB broadcast Channel 4's Death of a President, which mocks-up the assassination of George W Bush?
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POPSEvangelicals betrayed by Bush administration: Farah Farah is the founder and editorial voice of the very influential conservative Christian website, WorldNetDaily. This is the face of the Republican Party establishment. It's the reason Democrats are likely to sweep into power in a few short weeks. It's an illustration of the double talk we get from the Bush administration. It's confirmation that we who actually believe in that Bible have nowhere to turn politically in this country – at least in terms of voting options. Remember what I told you on the evening of Nov. 7. Don't blame me for the Republican debacle to come. Blame the people who brought it to you – the people in power.
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POPSVoters' Approval of Congress Falls To 16%, Lowest Point in 12 Years More bad news for conservatives. Three new records were set with today's Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll. 16 percent! The latest results set other records, also to Republicans' disadvantage: Fully two-thirds of the electorate rates this year's Congress "below average" or "one of the worst" -- the poorest showing on that question since it was first asked in 1990. As for the Republican Party, 32% of voters rate it positively and 49% negatively -- the highest negative ever for either party in the surveys. The Democratic Party, after months in which it also had a net negative rating only slightly better than the Republican Party's, now is viewed positively by 37% and negatively by 35%.
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POPSHomosexuality and Child Sexual Abuse: Science, Religion, and the Slippery Slope
In the wake of the scandal of former Congressman Mark Foley’s inappropriate behavior involving teenage male pages, a number of conservative commentators and organizations are reviving an old charge that homosexuals are more likely to sexually abuse children. But, as the author points out, this research has been debunked for decades now and is only being resurrected again for campaigning purposes. The numerous citations of the scientific literature by social conservatives initially look impressive. However, when one examines the original studies that have been cited, one finds that the conclusions of the original studies are contrary to the claims made by those citing the studies. Most significantly, while social conservatives claim that all the cases of sexual molestation of young boys by adult males are committed by homosexuals, the scientists whom they cite explicitly reject this assertion. Let us examine the actual claims of the scientists, one by one.
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POPSNew Poll: Democrats Open Up Giant Gap Before Midterm Elections Government corruption, Iraq and terrorism were the three most important issues to poll respondents. They said Democrats would do a better job on all three. The party had a 21-point advantage on handling corruption and a 17-point advantage on Iraq. A longstanding GOP advantage on terrorism vanished; Democrats had a 5-point edge. Yet another set of record-breaking poll results in.
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POPSWe're all watching Fox News now It's still possible to divide the news calendar into BF and AF—Before Fox and After Fox. Much of what you see on TV news exists because of Fox, and not just the opinion shows. The graphics, the sound effects, the general tone of news is set by Fox. The zipper—the visual signature of the anxious too-much-information era—was first introduced by Fox on the morning of 9/11. First by moments, but in TV news, moments are everything. As with so many things, Fox was slightly quicker than its rivals to detect, and direct, the next crank of the dial in our cultural volume level.
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POPSPoll: Foley Sex Scandal Has Hurt GOP Election Prospects Iraq, meanwhile, is continuing to be a problem for the Republicans. Only 38% of respondents in the TIME poll now support President Bush's decision to invade Iraq, down from 42% three months ago. A similar number believe that the new Iraqi government will succeed in forming a stable democracy, while 59% believe this is unlikely. Almost two-thirds (65%) of respondents disapprove of President Bush's handling of the war, while 54% believe he "deliberately misled" Americans in making his case for war — a figure that has increased by 6 points over the past year. President Bush's overall approval rating, according to TIME's poll, now stands at just 36%, down from 38% in August.
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POPSBorderline Catastrophe: How the fight over immigration blew up Rove’s big tent When policy and election politics collide. Did the Conservative base's nativist zeal for anti-immigrant rhetoric cost them the crucial Latino vote and majority power for generations to come? But perhaps the real casualty of the GOP’s immigration meltdown is the Rovian model of Republican politics. Part of the near-mythic aura of infallibility surrounding Rove stems from the sense that his tactics seem to defy all known political laws—that it shouldn’t be possible to reach out to minorities while fanning the flames of a base that is often hostile to them. And as it turns out, it probably isn’t.
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POPSConservatives come out against "The Path to 9/11" Add conservative TV/radio host Glenn Beck to this list: Last night on his TV show, Beck weighed in heavily against the validity of the "ficitonalized" ABC documdrama. From my own notes, Beck said he "agreed with Bill Clinton", "9/11 is sacred", we deserve to know "the cold hard truth of that day", and "we've taken too many liberties" already with reporting on 9/11. He also questioned "who ABC expects to take 'The Path to 9/11' seriously?" and proceeded to thoroughly mock his guest, conservative writer, Govindini Murty, for unquestioningly supporting the movie. Who says TV's no fun?
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POPSCato: Staying in Iraq 'Monumentally Bad Idea' Too bad it wasn't sooner, but Cato has been telling fellow conservatives what they don't want to hear for a while now. If you haven't read Cato's last quarterly letter, you should. Tucker Carlson managed to sit down long enough to write this straight-talking essay: The Decline and Fall of the Republican Party (PDF)
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POPSBill Kristol: Conservatives Believe The Bush Administration Is Incompetent Kristol ended the show with: "In all honesty, Democrats don't need a positive program. They should just keep quiet and let Republicans attack each other.” The increasingly bitter in-fighting within the GOP ranks continues unabated. Could Kristol possibly follow Fukuyama into anti-Bush territory? Looks like he's pointing his escape-pod in that direction...
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