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Is a Mormon mainstream enough to earn the votes for president?

By: honoraryintern (Diary)  |  February 17th, 2012 at 03:24 PM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

Huge issue that The Romney campaign tries to snowplow through with the, ‘He’s just a normal guy!’ So offer myself up as a messenger to take shots at…

Are there enough people in the Republican voting coalition to select and then elect a Mormon in 2012? Even bigger, with the perceptions about the LDS church to the public at large will enough independents vote for Mr Romney to gain a majority in the electoral college?

The only article I’ve found that addresses some of the issues at play is by Amy Stevens from back in 2005:

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2005/0509.sullivan1.html

Here is the most important quote:

“Compare that (4% that wouldn’t vote for a Catholic) to the 17 percent of Americans who currently say they would have qualms electing a Mormon to the White House. That number hasn’t changed one whit since 1967, the year that Romney’s father considered a presidential run..”

Looks like those numbers came from Pew research (reports below) but I would suggest the reality is worse as people will admit to being more inclusive in an interview than in a voting booth. Some of those people would go ahead and vote for Mr Romney, but I would suggest he will still lose at least half of these people. That’s as much as 15% of voting Republicans.

This is not a political issue to these folks. It’s an issue of faith and violation of core beliefs. Not to excoriate Mormonism here, but no Christian denomination accepts Mormons as Christians and most consider it a ‘cult’ offshoot of Christianity. Do Mormons accept Evangelicals as their brothers in Christ? There are all kinds of nuanced answers from a Mormon, if they will talk to you, but they don’t see me, with my faith in Christ, as one of them. Just a cursory glance stuff like the 1607 King James Bible, word for word, quotes that were the majority of verbiage in the 2000 years before establishing gold tablets causes my mental processes to hit the tilt meter.

I understand someone searching for a community for their family, or even if their family has been raised in Mormonism for generations, both would gravitate towards Mormonism, but when you are talking about the potential leader of the free world, I would like to have some understanding about their thought process. If Mitt can so easily be mislead by the ‘cult’ he has invested his faith and family in, how easily can he be mislead (sure he wouldn’t consider himself mislead) about other important things?

The Pew Studies are instructive:

Mormon-  http://www.people-press.org/2011/06/02/section-2-candidate-traits-and-experience/#mormon

Catholic-http://www.people-press.org/question-search/?qid=1689135&pid=51&ccid=51#top

-Mormon topic- 23% (Group-Repubs only) less likely to vote, you can’t subtract the more likely because they would vote Republican any way. But it gets worse: Dems are 20% less likely and Independents are 30% less.

-Catholic topic-7% (Group-Voters as a whole) less likely to vote. These are the rabid ’anti-religion’ people we hear of all the time. They will never vote Repub anyway. There is actually greater hope here than with an Evangelical because of Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi !?

-Evangelical topic-(Group-Repubs only) 16% less likely, 19% more likely (these are the same people that will NEVER vote for Mitt Romney)

So it seems that Mitt would lose more than 50% of the Evangelical voters and 30% of the Independents. That looks like a train wreck worse than the derailed McCain train from the last election…

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COMMENTS

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  • http://www.gmsplace.com/ civil truth

    Your first content at RedState is an attempt to set Mormons against Evangelicals – both of whom are “them” to you.

    We really don’t need this kind of analysis – we’ve got enough trouble finding a candidate who can articulate conservatism credibly and avoid the massed hostility of the entire MSM and Democratic Party.

    It you want to play “let’s you and him fight” – head over to DailyKos and expound your wisdom there.

    • youngthegiant

      I used to think that Republicans were making legitimate arguments when they said that it was Mitt’s “liberalism” or “moderate-ism” that made them oppose Mitt and support candidates like Rick Perry, who was labeled “a conservative” by the powers-that-be here, even though his record showed a history of compromise and nanny-state-ism.

      But then, after Rick’s implosion, I saw the same Republicans who were trashing Romney since 2007 suddenly embrace Newt Gingrich, who has a history of publicly cozying up to liberals like Nancy Pelosi and Bill Clinton. Newt has called himself a “Wilsonian Progressive”. Newt is not even an evangelical Christian. He’s a Catholic and he doesn’t have a history of following either the Christian code or the Catholic one. He follows the “Bill Clinton code”, if that term is not an oxymoron. That didn’t bother the evangelical Christians who literally cannot tolerate Romney.

      That’s when I realized something that has been said since the beginning of Romney’s campaign in 2007: If Romney had been a Catholic, or an evangelical Christian, or a Presbyterian, or a Methodist, or a Baptist, or a Jew, he would have locked up the nomination by now. The people who vociferously hate him do so because he is a Mormon and they have personal reasons for wanting to use Romney as a foil to vent their feelings toward his church.

      This realization surprised me because I have always found Mormons to be nice, honorable people. The origins of their church are sketchy but so are the origins of every church. Ultimately, I think that the bigots are allowing their bigotry to help the uber-liberal, Obama, get re-elected. If we could just stop all the fish-slapping for 10 months, we could take the White House and the Senate and stop the incredibly expensive Obamacare from dragging down what’s left of the U.S. economy.

      This is where leadership comes into play. We need a leader to stand up and say “anyone who has a problem with Romney’s religion can go now”. Once those people are cleared out, we can have a meaningful debate about the issues that we need to be talking about.

      • SoFiMil

        (Religious issues aside.)

        • SoFiMil

          This Mormon doesn’t support Romney for three reasons: 1) he’s not a conservative; 2) he has no core ideology; and 3) he’ll say just about anything to get elected.

          I disagreed with Dubya on several issues, but admire him because he had convictions even when I disagreed with the policies he sought to implement.

    • SoFiMil

      Interesting…

    • honoraryintern

      Sorry if this came off like an attack of the Mormon faith, it’s not. Not trying to condemn anyone beliefs, but we have all seen the MSM build a straw-horse to accomplish their goals.

      The attacks will be made at the Mormon Church. Will Mitt try to separate himself from Mormonism? Never. This is about if a plurality of Republicans can be brought to the point of believing Mormonism and therefor Mitt is acceptable. If I could phrase it again:

      About 4% of the US public are Mormon. Some percentage (seems about 20% from Pew) do not consider Mormonism a valid religious choice. That will have blow- back against any candidate that claims that lifetime faith. If that 20 % comes from the core of the conservative base, a Mormon candidate in 2012 can’t put together the voter support to win this general election.

      My family is in the the South and I was raised in Colorado. Our attitudes about “people of color” are night and day. Just one issue that is ground ripe for MSM fodder- Mitt was 31 when Blacks were provided a path to salvation. Was he a good Mormon when he was 30 and believed the church was right to exclude blacks? Who was working for you before? Who works for you now?

      No matter the answers what the LDS church did will be the issue. Its the ‘when did you stop beating your wife?, question. Its not fair, but it will destroy our candidate because here is no good answer.

      Mitt has shown over and over he has a tin ear to these kind of gotcha questions. Maybe another Mormon candidate could walk this tightrope and blunt these attacks. 1.2 Billion buys a lot of dirt, real or implied.

  • Kyle-MI

    Outside of religious doctrinal differences, Mormons are about as mainstream as you can get. What would a conservative Mormon president advocate that would be any different from a generic conservative Republican?

    • honoraryintern

      I don’t know. That’s the problem.. The biggest target that is presented because of Mormonism is that Mormons have only become mainstream in Mr Romney’s lifetime. Same thing that has gone on in southern politics, “does he believe what he was raised with or what he says now?” or Has he really flip-flopped on these issues?

      I’m no expert, and my biggest concern is for lives that are lived without the gift of grace, but I do know that until 1978 effective segregation was Mormon theology regarding blacks by refusing ordination (the path to heavens), polygamy, women only get to heaven if they are called by their husbands, And strangely in the news this week is, the ‘baptism of the dead’, a practice that has been observed for decades but somehow shows up in AP reports this week.

      Do you seriously believe that the Super Pac/ MSM won’t do a ‘Mormon Beliefs’ expose that heightens the hostilities of ethnics/women/other religions? Mr Romney’s inability to speak plainly will tar him with those general allegations. Even his tepid support by Mainstream Christians will have evaporated by the November election.

      Obama has the ability to point the federal government at Mormon families and it would surprise no one if a ‘Big Love’ kind of bust started the ball rolling of painting this faith as still out of the mainstream.

      • SoFiMil

        I suspect the left’s opposition to Mormon candidates is the assumption the average Mormon is pro-life. Meanwhile, for many conservatives the biggest reservation to supporting a Mormon candidate may center on their belief of whether Mormons are Christians. The only reason the left will push this meme is to cut into conservative support.

        Full disclosure: I’m a Mormon, supported Rick Perry this year and Fred Thompson four years ago.

        • honoraryintern

          What do you mean by crosstabs on R/D?

          To put it in first person respond for ‘civil truth’s’ benefit, my biggest concern (i’m no proxy for others), is my lack of understanding of your choice and how hard it is to engage an average Mormon in a conversation about faith.

          In my experience, hard questions get kicked up the food chain where my eyes cross and ears turn blue from the circular logic that is well practiced from an Elder.

          That process excludes the free exchange of ideas and will leave the Mormon faith open to the attacks sure to come. Those attacks will fester and grow on their own without a stopper. Old rejected ideas and ‘secret’ services/baptisms/garments are a scab that the MSM will pick at until it bleeds.

          Just as people filled in their own meaning for the road in the big ‘O’, a lack of info will be filled in by implied innuendo.

          Don’t mean to put you on the spot and thanks again for responding.

          • SoFiMil

            Maybe our resident statistical polling experts, Neil Stevens, et al (who I suspect is mentored by Michael Baron) can weigh-in on the guts of Republican vs Democrat support/non-support for a Mormon candidate. I’ve been wanting to research this for a while and write a diary on it. If I wait until after Super Tuesday, perhaps it won’t be as relevant this election cycle. : )

            Have some things going on today, but will respond to the rest of your thoughtful reply and questions soon.

          • SoFiMil

            I have several problems with the 2005 article, which I read in its entirety. (At that time) 4% would not vote for a Catholic is quite different that 17% “having qualms about” voting for a Mormon. Yet the article equates “will not” and “qualms about.”

            I’d love too see these cross-tabs as well. Who are the people who “would not” support a Catholic? Are they mostly lefties who interpret “Catholic” as someone who believes abortion is murder? (I.E., pro-life Catholics are not acceptable, not because of their religion per se, but because of their high moral standards. Lefty “Catholics” – or pick you religious faith, are fine because anything goes.

          • SoFiMil

            a long time ago. I’ll try to find it or recreate it.

          • SoFiMil

            In AZ the politically conservative Mormon and lefty Democrat were running neck-and-neck. Suddenly some disparaging innuendos are made about Mormons. The Mormon loses in a squeaker.

            The author doesn’t realizes it, but she pretty much proved the opposite of her point.

          • SoFiMil

            This link dropped out from my post.

            http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross_tabulation

  • honoraryintern

    Messenger shot #1.. You really see this as an attack? I’m a certifiably, born again, Evangelical, caucus voter who is truly torn over potentially supporting Mitt Romney. Have you never sat through a Wednesday night ‘bible study’ about ‘other’ religions? This is easily documented as posted. Reporting that others like me will have a issue of faith in voting for Mr. Romney causing you great concerns ignores that giant Red elephant. It is the only thing that explains why Mitt can’t break 40%

    • chadd65203

      For Evangelicals, no man has the inherent power to fix all of the problems facing this course. Only the power of Jesus Christ can turn this country around. That makes it essential that our candidate be as righteous as possible. Frankly, none of the current group fits. Cultural issues, especially religious ones, get people out to vote. If 10% of the republican party isn’t comfortable with Romney, and I suspect this does play some part, it will be devastating to turnout.

    • Justin Spagnolo (standardcandle)

      I will use your words to prove the point:

      This is not a political issue to these folks. It

      • SoFiMil

        Just read your post.

      • honoraryintern

        Justin, Robb here.

        Hope you saw my post about this not being personal. I have been praying about how to respond to your eloquent post. I really don’t think anyone is a dupe in their faith choices. Its all a personal soup with family, history and experience making a mix that is yours alone.

        The circular logic thing: you touched on when you pointed out how the Mormon revelation came before the Christian Bible. My counter point still stands that the King James 1607 translation, errors and all, is the majority of that revelation and won’t be written for 1600 years… You will point to your book, I will point to mine and no ground will be gained.

        I would suggest to you, personally, that the christian definition of grace is very different than what you live under, As I believe Christ on the cross, looked at the totality of life and sins and still said, ‘Father, forgive Him. he didn’t know…’ It is a gift of grace and light and life that I will spend the rest of my time on this rock shining back into the lives of others.

        God bless. I look forward to reading posts on other topics.

        • Justin Spagnolo (standardcandle)

          I don’t see how you can opine about the correctness of someone’s religion and excuse yourself of any “personal” offenses.

          I believe that you’re being honest with your feelings and thoughts… but you don’t seem to see the contradictions.

          1. You state “I really don’t think anyone is a dupe in their faith choices. It’s all a personal soup with family, history, and experience making a mix that is yours alone”… but yet you excoriate Mitt Romney for being a Mormon suggesting that not distancing himself from his faith will cause an electoral loss. So should he or shouldn’t he distance himself from his faith? You never answered my straightforward question.

          2. You jump to assumptions too quickly. “The circular logic thing” that I touched on… wasn’t circular logic at all. I should wonder what it is you study on “Wednesday Night” bible studies, where you explore “other” religions. Good heavens, when Mormons study scriptures they study scriptures, they don’t study non-scriptural doctoral theses about the errors of the rest of the world… When you have the truth, you study the truth, so why should you concern yourself with what others believe? So let me clear up some faulty notions of yours… a) We believe the King James Version of the Bible to be the most correct translation of the Bible, We wholeheartedly believe the Bible is the word of God (so just stop with the “yours and mine” business), though it is true that it is said of the Book of Mormon to be “the most correct book of any on earth, and that a man can get closer to salvation by it, than any other book” we do believe that as well. Why? Because the Bible had 1000s of scribes and translators, the Book of Mormon had 3 scribes, and 1 translator. You need not worry yourself to discovering the degree in which we will “believe” the Bible… we believe it as much, and in some cases more than most. We study the Bible along side the Book of Mormon, and other cannon. We believe the words of God are for the good of all mankind, and studying all of that which was preserved in written format is as good for us as it is to have Prophets and Apostles, which we also have. From the Bible… we read in Amos 3:7 “Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets” So either you believe the Bible to be the word or God or you don’t, and if you do believe the Bible, and this verse… Then you must now ask yourself, Where are the prophets he revealeth his secrets to today?, or do you assume that the God that is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow, has done “NOTHING” since the Apostles were taken from the earth? Circular logic indeed. And thus you see what I meant when I said “Salvation isn’t a cheap experience, you want to oversimplify it, that is your choice.” I do believe that you are missing a lot of what God has to share with you, but your Wednesday Night gatherings are a stumbling block… and you have the audacity to come to this website, and spout off your Wednesday Night expertise?

          What a shameful waste of talent, Robb. I mean that literally.

          Now from one Christian to another… This is meant to be a gentle rebuke on doctrine:

          Christ on the Cross didn’t say “Father forgive him, he didn’t know…”

          Christ stated “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do…” this was in context of the Roman Soldiers, for they were entirely ignorant of the fact that they had taken pleasure in beating, kicking, whipping, fashioning of the crown of thorns, causing him to carry the cross and the crucifying of the Lord as they drove nails through the wrists, hands, and feet of the Savior of Mankind… his grace is sufficient to do many things, and in this instance, he chose to forgive the Roman soldiers of their actions against him due to their ignorance, unlike the Sanhedrin that ordered his crucifying and delivered him into the hands of Pontias Pilate and finding no fault in him, washed his hands, which were never dirtier, as he clearly knew he was condemning Christ to vicious crowd that would choose a murderer over an innocent man to be released due to politics and erred religious purposes…

          Now if you’re speaking of the grace he offered the thief on the cross, mind you he didn’t say the thief was forgiven… he said something far greater… he said “Today thou shalt be with me in paradise”…

          Which brings up another doctrinal issue that is perplexing to those that do not have modern day revelation in their life…

          If the Lord said to the thief, “Today thou shalt be with me in paradise”, yet three days later when he came to Mary at the sepulchre he said to here “Touch me not, for I have not yet ascended to the Father”… wouldn’t that imply that paradise, where he and the Thief went, were not the same ascensions to heaven? Where is this “paradise” and how can it not be in the same place as where the Father dwells? Modern revelation my friend… it sure clears up much more than this alone.

          :D

          As for the “grace” that I live by which is different than yours… you’re right… I consider myself more accountable to the things which God has revealed, and to much is given, much is required. But even then, I know like all others, I shall fall short of the grace of God, and will require the Savior and the gift of the atonement to bring me safely to the ones that I love. May God bless your life friend… and in the mean time… stop going to Wednesday Night studies… or find a different group. :D

          • honoraryintern

            “Remind them of these things, and charge them before God not to quarrel about words, which does no good, but only ruins the hearers.”

            Thanks for the kind words and if you have read my other posts, I’m pretty straight forward about stating that Mitt is the worst type of republican candidate. Especially this year, especially against Obama regardless of his religion. Will that change with a different Mormon candidate in the future? Possibly.

            Am I going to convince you (or Mitt) to change his faith? I will hope , but I don’t believe so. Will you ever convince me to change mine? It will never be. Will our, most ‘elegant’ discussion change the path of either our churches? I don’t believe so. If those statements are true, we are in the realm of words for words sake, which only damages the hearer, anyone that reads these posts.

            I’m not jumping to conclusions, I’m asking everyone to look at this issue from a crows nets above. Maybe an impossible request, but I’m asking.

            Years ago I spent many evenings with ‘Elders’, Greek, multi-translation open looking for common ground. Had 4 different elders come and we always got stuck on valid authority of resources. Until a fire 4 years ago, I had a copy of the book of Mormon on my shelf from those meetings, as a resource not an authority.

            I do believe God is alive today and works through the actions of the men he has blessed and supernaturally of his own volition. All men are sinners saved by grace. Grace is an unearned gift in its entirety that draws my heart to sacrifice to accomplish eternity for all who will accept that gift.

            My daughter graduated from a high school where 25% of her class were Mormons… I was the only ‘Christian’ that objected to ‘ A Midwives Tale’ for the reasons I’m sure you are aware. I suggested “Men and Marriage” as a required counter point. The liberal english teacher declined providing the pages I copied for her. My daughter spent weeks with the Mormon kids while the class worked through the book… One of my best friends 25 years ago was an ex-Mormon who wouldn’t go to services any more, but also wouldn’t come to mine. Late nights, deep conversations.. Been to 2 Mormon wedding in the last year. Obviously, Wednesday nights are not the only time I’ve studied this issue.

            If you would like to continue this on a personal basis, is there some way of exchanging contact info on RedState that is not a permanent record?

    • SoFiMil

      .

    • SoFiMil

      ..

      • Dave_A

        Is that all of them are too ‘flawed’ to one or more groups of the electorate…

        Romney can’t break 40%, because ‘I’m electable, and I know economics’ doesn’t sell him to conservative voters. The remaining 60% split between Newt and Santorum, and then there’s the ~10% non-Republican fringe voting for Paul.

        Newt can’t break 40% because a good chunk of the base either (A) is disgusted by his personal life, or (B) doesn’t want to run such an easy target against the Obama negative-campaign-machine…

        Santorum *might* be able to break 40% (we’ll see where his ‘peak’ is, as he keeps gaining momentum), but his ceiling comes from folks who think his social views are a handicap…

        Romney’s bloc isn’t going anywhere, but if Romney dropped they would probably go to Newt…

        Santorum’s bloc would go to Romney before they’d vote for Newt…

        Newt’s bloc will go to Sanatorium before they’d vote for Romney….

  • greyeagle

    It is not his faith that bothers me. He is not a conservative and his record as Governor makes it quite clear. His campaign said he would not repeal Obamacare, but would make small changes. I want Obamacare and all the regulations gone as quickly as possible. Romney uses a scorched earth policy in political ads. There has been some very ugly ads against Newt that would not true. I do not like them whatsoever.

  • cheetah2

    I am a Bible believing Christian and I do not consider Mormons to be of like faith with me at all, but it is of no consequence in the presidential race. I don’t care about Romney’s religion. I only care about what he will do for or to our country as president.

    Obama professes to be a Christian. I would vote for Romney over him in a heart beat. I plan to in fact!

    • honoraryintern

      What I was trying to document is that half the Evangelical voters see it as an issue that they walk away from. If Mitts the nominee how does get them back? I put on my foil cap and made some suggestions.

      http://www.redstate.com/honoraryintern/2012/02/22/mitts-not-stupid-or-hey-have-you-seen-my-new-aluminium-foil-cap/