A recurring theme of my posts is that Republicans play "values voters" for chumps. Every election cycle, Republican candidates call up leaders of the religious right, find out what they're freaking out over these days, then go out on the campaign trail and join in the freaking out. George W. Bush was a great example of this. In 2004, Bush used opposition to same sex marriage to bring the fanatics to the polls and, once elected, stopped caring about it. He went right to work on privatizing Social Security. The values voters fell for a bait and switch. This wasn't a huge surprise to most observers, because the values voters always fall for a bait and switch.As a result of championing campaign promises over actual policy, the religious right has managed to get very little done other than electing Republicans. Roe v. Wade is still the de facto law of the land, marriage equality is expanding -- as well as support for it -- and evolution still hasn't been declared a godless lie. Since Nixon got cozy with Jerry Falwell, the evangelical movement has been a high-profile player in Washington. And, since Nixon got cozy with Jerry Falwell, the evangelical movement has been ineffective. They get thrown a bone occasionally, but the big issues -- the most important ones -- really haven't gone anywhere. They get Republicans elected to make abortion illegal or to protect them from the Homosexual Menace and the Republicans go right to work on tax cuts, union busting, and privatizing everything under the sun. For the values voter, the Republican candidate is a fairweather friend.
Turns out that some on the right, after all these decades, have come to accept the fact that this isn't working at all.
Telegraph:
Leading evangelicals have admitted that their association with George W. Bush has not only hurt the cause of social conservatives but contributed to the failure of the key objectives of their 30-year struggle.
James Dobson, 72, who resigned recently as head of Focus on the Family -- one of the largest Christian groups in the country -- and once denounced the Harry Potter books as witchcraft, acknowledged the dramatic reverse for the religious Right in a farewell speech to staff.
“We tried to defend the unborn child, the dignity of the family, but it was a holding action,” he said.
“We are awash in evil and the battle is still to be waged. We are right now in the most discouraging period of that long conflict. Humanly speaking, we can say we have lost all those battles.”
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