Sacred Ground

“Whatever you may think of the proposed mosque and community center, lost in the heat of the debate has been a basic question: Should government attempt to deny private citizens the right to build a house of worship on private property based on their particular religion? That may happen in other countries, but we should never allow it to happen here."
-Michael Bloomberg, Mayor of New York

Christian tradition tells us that one day, Jesus went into the region of Samaria with his disciples and stopped at a well. His disciples went into a nearby town to get something to eat, but Jesus stayed at the well. Now, Samaria was a region that most Jews liked to avoid. They didn't much care for Samaritans because of their mixed heritage and because they worshipped God a bit differently. But Jesus didn't seem to mind, and so here he was at this well.

After a while around noontime, a woman comes up to the well to draw some water. It was a bit odd for this woman to come to get water in the heat of the day, but here she was. Then, Jesus did something strange: he asked the woman a question. He asked her if she had any water.

The woman was shocked because this man was talking to her. And Jesus kept talking to her and because of this her life was forever changed.

This story, sometimes called the Woman at the Well is one of my favorites stories in all of Scripture. It's a wonderful example of Jesus reaching across the many boundaries of that time to treat this woman with respect. It was nothing short of a miracle for a Jewish man to be talking to a Samaritan woman. Two people, from two different faiths were able to cross what had become a great divide.

The recent controversy surrounding the so-called "Ground Zero mosque" has me wondering if my fellow conservatives are able to reach across a modern religious divide. So far, the results are not encouraging. Leading conservatives such as Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich and Rudy Giuliani have come out against building this place of worship because it is two blocks from Ground Zero, where thousands died on September 11, 2001.

Yes, we know that it was Muslim extremists who somehow thought God would be pleased if they rammed planes into buildings. That said 19 people who had a warped sense of their faith should not be considered the standard bearers for a faith of a billion adherents.

This issue has confirmed something that I have suspected for a long time: that there is a growing problem with religious bigotry within conservatism. I hear many conservatives talk about dealing with "radical Islam" and I tend to think that when those words are uttered it means that all of Islam is radical, not just a small portion.

As conservatives, we love to talk about how we tend to adhere to the Constitution and yet this issue has shown our love for that document to be a lie. If we can't respect the very first amendment which guarantees freedom of religion, then I doubt we will respect the rest.

There has been a lot of talk about sacred ground recently. Ground Zero is definitely such a place. The mosque inside of the Cordoba Initiative is also a sacred space for people to commune with their God. As Christians, we see our churches as sacred spaces as well. But sacred ground can occur whenever we learn to see our sisters and brothers of differing faiths as...well, sisters and brothers. It happens when we learn to live with each other and try to respect our differences.

September 11 happened because there were some that didn't want to live with others different from themselves. I think to not allow this mosque to be built would have basically supported their beliefs to divide people, to disrespect others and treat them as less than humans.

It's time for conservatives to not take the bait. We must be willing to say no to those who want to spread death and division. We must be willing to say yes to creating sacred ground in our communities, to welcome those who might not even worship the same god or worship no god at all.

It's time for us to go into our own Samarias, come to the well and meet whoever is there. We might realize we are standing on sacred ground.

The Palin Effect

I've been saying while Sarah Palin might play well in Republican circles, when it comes to the general public, there isn't much love for her and that will show up come November.

Well, it seems we have one example of how toxic Palin is to GOP candidates. The leading GOP candidate for a Senate seat in New Hampshire is Kelly Ayotte, who had a good following with moderates. She recieved and endorsement from Palin and saw her standing among moderates evaporate:

Kelly Ayotte's seen her appeal to moderate voters crumble in the wake of her endorsement by Sarah Palin and her lead over Paul Hodes has shrunk to its lowest level of any public polling in 2010- she has a 45-42 advantage over him, down from 47-40 in an April PPP poll.


There's not much doubt that the shift in the race is all about Ayotte. Hodes' favorability numbers have seen little change over the last three months. Where 32% of voters saw him positively and 39% negatively in April, now 35% have a favorable opinion of him to 40% with an unfavorable one. But Ayotte's seen a dramatic decline. Her favorability spread of 34/24 in April was the best we've measured for any Republican Senate candidate so far this year but her negatives have risen 15 points since that time while her positives have increased only 2 and she now stands at 36/39...

The Palin endorsement may well be playing a role in this. 51% of voters in the state say they're less likely to back a Palin endorsed candidate to only 26% who say that support would make them more inclined to vote for someone. Among moderates that widens to 65% who say a Palin endorsement would turn them off to 14% who it would make more supportive.

It will be interesting to see what will happen in the coming weeks and months when Palin-endorsed candidates will have to face the wider public and not simply the adoring fans of the GOP base. Something tells me my hunches about how Palin will shrink the party instead of grow it will turn out to be correct.

Can Conservatism Be Reformed, Continued

A Reader responds:

I have faith in our political system that eventually the GOP or some other conservative party will be that reformed conservatism that you and I are looking for.

I always felt that 2008 wasn't enough to get rid of all the bad influences and extreme talking points on the right. I had hoped that it would reform but didn't think it would.

No(w) I feel that politics is cyclical, it will take a couple Mondale like thrashing(s) and wandering into the wilderness for sane conservatism to come back. Maybe like liberals will we come out with a new name, maybe ironically classical liberals (or just plain libertarians).

But whatever it is, I just can't see this country staying as it is, demographics and even ideologically the data says it won't. And no I don't believe in a permanent majority of any party. Eventually things change.

But that change might not be for decades and frankly that sucks for you and I.

All you can do is try to speak your views and vote for whoever you feel best represents them.

I think he has a point. At this point, the GOP losses in 2006 and 2008 were only seen as mere bumps in the road, instead of signs for reform. With the economy the way it is and with Obama presently in the doldrums, it seems like a chance for the Republicans and conservatism to strike back with no changes in their agenda.

In some way, I think the GOP is repeating the some of the same mistakes the Democrats made 30 years ago. After losing big time in 1980, the Democrats gained some seats in 1982- a year when the economy was still in the dumps and President Reagan was losing some of his popularity. These signs made them think that nothing had to be changed and former Vice President Mondale became the Democratic nominee in 1984. Mondale went on to be crushed by Reagan in November of that year, winning only 10 electoral votes.

In someways, it feels like history is repeating itself. I can see the Republicans gaining seats in November and feeling overconfident. Believe that nothing need be changed, I can see the GOP nominating someone like Sarah Palin and then going down to a devasting defeat.

Of course, history doesn't repeat as much as it rhymes. Things might change between now and 2012. But I do know that American Conservatism won't change until it enters the wilderness and ends the denial that it is currently in.

Can American Conservatism Be Reformed?

I've been reading the ongoing debate about where Libertarians belong with some interest. Folks like Brink Lindsey are aruging that the conservative-libertarian alliance must end, and that libertarians must make their own way. Bloggers like Tim Lee and Mark Thompson go even further, arguing for a left-libertarian alliance (the liberaltarian arugment that Lindsey was a part of until recently). The argument for leaving conservatives behind is the same in both camps: conservatism in America is made up of those who might talk a good game about freedom, but in reality are not interested in freedom when it comes to civil liberties or acceptance of various minorities. This is what Tim Lee says:

Conservatives care about “protecting individual liberty” for some people, but the conservative movement includes many people who are indifferent, if not hostile, to the liberty of foreigners, immigrants, drug users, gays and lesbians, women who want abortions, broadcasters, sex workers, criminal defendants, Muslims, publishers of pornography, atheists, and so forth. It’s true, of course, that you can compile a similar list (gun owners, business owners, etc) on the progressive side. But I see no reason to think the progressive list is longer, or that the people on that list are somehow more important, than the people on the conservative list.

This belief is shared not just by some libertarians, but conservatives and Republicans as well. More than once I've seen people come to the fore with the sunny hopes of presenting a more inclusive vision of conservatism and the GOP, only to give up months later when they encouter some of the darker sides of the American right.

This all leads me to wonder: can American conservatism every be reformed?

There really isn't a strong movement in the United States that is committed to a more moderate version of conservatism. There are a few groups, but there is not strong reformist presence within what makes up the American Right in the same way that there is in the United Kingdom. Across the pond, the Tory Reform Group has been around for 35 years representing a more moderate brand of conservatism and they can be credited for helping get the Conservative Party back in power.

But the impulse here in the States among those on the Right who are disatisfied with the state of things, is to simply walk away. Whether its Brink Lindsey now touting a "libertarian centrism" or Tim Lee flirting with the Left, the usual result of frustrated folks on the right is not to change things, but to leave and look for greener pastures.

Why is that? Why is there no impulse to change the Right?

I think I have a few reasons.

The first is the word "conservative." When someone uses that word it is almost always about the more negative aspects of human nature. If a community or person has issues with same-sex marriage we tend to say that they are "conservative." Conversely, the word "liberal" tends to have more positive connotations. All the philosphical meanings of conservatism that came from people like Edmund Burke or Russel Kirk are never thought of in common parlance. If being a conservative means being anti-gay or suspicious of immigrants, well, who would want to be a part of that, let alone try to reform it?

Related to that, is how we see conservatism. If conservatism is made up of bigots, whom we believe can't change, then why bother trying to reform anything?

Finally, I think there has been so little impulse for a renewed conservatism, because there has not been a keen vision of what a renewed conservatism would look like. While there has been some attempt to start this project,
for the most part there really has not been any strong desire to frame a new conservatism for the 21st century. There's a lot of talk about what conservatism was like in the 1980s under Reagan, or about the moderate Republicanism of the 1950s through 70s, but very few have said this is what conservatism should look like today.

If you are someone under say, 40 years old who believes in limited goverment, but sees a conservatism that is filled with bigots and with no one really crafting a more positive vision, then you would probably want to ignore the conservatives and leave them to their fate.

For me, the question is not can American conservatism reform, but should it reform and I believe wholeheartedly that it should. The reason I believe it has to reform has to do with the fact that unless something radical happens, we live in a two-party system. While many folks have left the conservative movement, there are still a fair number that remain and they are more radical than ever. It is less thoughtful and deeply suspicious of anyone that doesn't think or see things in the way they do. It is a movement that is built more on resentment than on the sunny conservatism that Ronald Reagan once espoused. On paper, a party like this should be on the margins, but because of our two party system, they are the alternative to Obama and the liberals. As the alternative, it means they have a greater shot at winning. As Jeffrey Goldberg has noted in his blog posts on Sarah Palin and the New York mosque controversy, a simple-minded conservatism is dangerous to the health of our democracy.

Will Sarah Palin Play in Peoria?

If you listen to some in the media, Sarah Palin has become a kingmaker in the GOP. And she has become a kingmaker, in the GOP. Outside the GOP? Well, that's another story.

I tend to think that the true test of Palin's power will come in November. If I were a betting man, I would say that we will see that Palin is not all that and a bag of chips in the real world.

Greg Sargent sums it up in his post that says it all: Sarah Palin is Toxic.

Commentators keep telling us how influential Sarah Palin's endorsements are, and even if the whole "mama grizzly" meme is clearly overstated, there's no quibbling with the fact that Palin has pull among GOP primary voters.
But the more interesting point to be made about Palin is how toxic she's become among the broader electorate. In fact, buried in the internals of the new NBC/Wall Street Journal poll is an amusing number: A majority see a Palin endorsement as a clear negative.
The poll asked people how they'd respond if a Congressional candidate had various hypothetical attributes. Asked how they'd feel if a candidate were "endorsed by Sarah Palin," the response was....

Enthusiastic about this attribute 8
Comfortable with this attribute 17
Have some reservations about this attribute 15
Very uncomfortable with this attribute 37

So a majority, 52%, reacted negatively. And an astonishing 37 percent would be "very uncomfortable" about a Palin endorsement, more than four times the eight percent who would be "enthusiastic" about it.

I can pretty much tell you that getting an endorsement from Sarah Palin doesn't necessarily want to make vote for said candidate.

I know that Sargent is a liberal blogger, but facts are facts. Palin is not admired outside of Republicanland. Come November, I think Republicans will find out that the former Alaskan governor has not been a help to us at all.

Fred Kaplan's Republican Party

Newsweek's David Graham has a piece up on Slate's Fred Kaplan's plea for "responsible Republicans" to speak out against Sarah Palin.

How to Do You Solve a Problem Like Sarah?

Over the holidays, an article appeared on the Daily Beast outlining how Republicans can effectively criticize former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. 

How does one do that?  Well, ask Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Sarah Palin: Exit Stage Right?

I was on vacation in my native Michigan when news broke Friday about Alaska Governor Sarah Palin stepping down from the governorship, so I've been slow in responding about this. I can say that it was somewhat surprising and a good way to make sure one isn't going to run for the Presidency in 2012. Palin herself noted that a lame duck governor with higher political aspirations (like Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty) would do start giving speeches and going on trips. Here is what she said:

So that Alaska will progress, I will not seek re-election as governor. And so as I thought about this announcement, that I wouldn’t run for re-election and what that means for Alaska, I thought about, well, how much fun some governors have as lame ducks. They maybe travel around their state, travel to other states, maybe take their overseas international trade missions. So many politicians do that. And then I thought, that’s what wrong. Many just accept that lame duck status and they hit the road, they draw a paycheck, they kind of milk it, and I’m not going to put Alaskans through that.

Of course, doing that would have allowed her a national spotlight and shown her governing. Had she simply stayed in office as a lame duck, she would have governed, gained experience and gone on those important trade missions that look presidential. But quitting before even finishing one term, puts her without the experience that she sorely needs if she wants to run for president. That's the general wisdom, but I think with Republicans in such an anti-government mood, it might not be surprising that some party activists would want a candidate with as little government experience as possible.

But the real thrust of this post is really about who is to blame for the governor's current situation? Was she taken down by the elites or did she bring this down on herself?

My answer mirrors that of blogger Radley Balko:

Here’s all I want to say: It is possible that Sarah Palin was both unfairly mistreated and personally attacked by the media and many on the left, and that her family was rather ruthlessly and mercilessly run through the ringer wringer . . . and that she’s a not particularly bright, not particularly curious, once libertarian-leaning governor who sadly devolved into a predictable, buzzword spouting culture warrior when she was prematurely picked for national office by John McCain.

I believe that Palin had been brutally attacked by the media and the Left. There were the odd conspiracy theories about Trig Palin, her son and those horrible jokes by David Letterman about her 14 year old daughter. Politics is a rough field, but it seems that it was incredibly rough on Palin.

But truth also is that she was not the brightest bulb in the bunch. The Vice Presidency isn't the most glamorous job in the land, but it is as they say, a heartbeat away from the presidency. One would hope that someone like Ms. Palin would have at the very least some "street smarts" when it comes to major issues, but in the end, she didn't even have that.

Even though she was rough handled by the press and liberals, the fact remains that politics is a rough business and you have to have a certain amount of fortitude to deal with it. The politics of personal destruction is not new to American politics and those who seek elected office have to develop a hard shell to repel the slings and arrows that come their way. Palin's resignation shows she didn't have what it takes to remain in the arena.

If she is planning to run for President in 2012, the only thing I can say about that is that it will be a rough ride. Leaving aside that she will still lack credible experience, her leaving office because people said bad things about her will come back to haunt her out on the hustings in New Hampshire and Michigan, two states that allow independents to vote in primaries. If she can't handle being governor of a small state, be sure that her opponents in '12 will tell voters she won't be able to handle the pressure that is the Oval Office.

Why A GOP Blowout Might Be A Good Thing

The blogosphere is chatting about former McCain and now former Huntsman advisor John Weaver's fears a 2012 GOP Blowout if the party's guiding lights are Rush Limbaugh, Sarah Palin and Dick Cheney.

There is a lot of talk that if the party doesn't start appealing to moderates soon, 2012 is going to be bloody.

That prospect used to bother me, but I'm beginning to wonder if that's not a bad thing. Let me explain.

As Ross Douthat explained a few weeks ago in his case that Dick Cheney should have ran in 2008, I am beginning to think that maybe we should let the Limbaugh wing have its way for a few years.

That wing of the party has spent the last few years blaming others for the Republican Party's problems. In 2006 and 2008, it was that George Bush was not a true conservative because of his big spending. Or it was that the Republican-controlled Congress was seduced by the tempting ways of Washington. In 2008, they said McCain was a moderate. They look at the losses in the past elections and think the problem was that the party was "too liberal."

They refuse to listen to the data which says the GOP is losing support. They brand anyone that thinks it's okay to have civil unions or thinks the environment might be an issue, a Republican in Name Only or RINO. The brush off concerns that the party must be allowed to run more moderate candidates in blue states and pick off the moderates that are in office.

This far right wing has wanted to run the show in the party and I am sorely tempted to say, "It's all yours." Let them select candidates for Congress that will go down to defeat. Let them select a Mike Huckabee or Sarah Palin, candidates who have no chance in hell in winning in 2012.

The thing is, after such a devastating loss, ala Mondale and the Democrats in 1984, the far right will have no one else to blame. They could no longer live in denial that they only need to be "more conservative." Maybe, just maybe, they would finally know that they need help and that the party needs to change.

Maybe. We will see in 3 years. Hopefully, it won't be too late.

The Idea of Sarah

Danielle Crittenden, the wife of conservative writer, David Frum, is putting a lie to the belief among some conservatives that the only people against VP candidate Sarah Palin are elitist snobs who go to Ivy League Schools. But Ms. Crittenden is no such person. She never went to college, having gone straight into the family business of running a newspaper and becoming an "ink-stained wretch." She says that she like the idea of the Alaskan governor:

I love the idea of Sarah Palin. She conforms to an early American (and pre-feminist) ideal of womanhood: rifle on one hip, baby on the other. I love her modern incarnation of this ideal, complete with Sex-in-the-Tundra wardrobe and kick-ass Jimmy Choos (even if they are paid for by the RNC). I love the idea she represents "common sense" over fancy-pants theorizing. I love -- and certainly identify with -- her real world, "out there" experience over her opponents' closed-off years in Washington. Truly, there are few women I'd rather share a beer with.

On that note, I would agree. I like the idea of this folksy, gutsy woman who is tough as nails. The whole "hockey mom-field dress a moose-pistol packin' mama" thing is certainly appealing. That said, I agree with Crittenden when she says:

The problem is that the reality of Sarah Palin does not match the idea of Sarah Palin. It's as plain as day -- glaringly obvious! -- that she's unfit for the job she's running for. We wouldn't expect the best darn regional car saleswoman to be appointed the next vice president of General Motors. We wouldn't fly in a commercial plane piloted by someone with a Cessna license because we trusted her gut. We wouldn't follow a woman into battle because she's a crack shot at moose hunting. Why is it unreasonable -- or snobbish! -- to have expected a better choice from our party for the next potential leader of the free world?

And please don't reply with, "The other side doesn't have experience either!" That's an argument you can make without having graduated from elementary school.

I think part of the problem that I see is that many on the Right, especially the hard right are in love with idea of Palin and think that anyone be just one heartbeat away from the presidency. But conservatives are supposed to be realists, and the reality to me is that she is way out of her league and saying so, should not make you an elitist.

It's fine and dandy to pick someone from outside the Beltway, but they should at least have some idea who what they are doing, and so far, Ms. Palin hasn't gone beyond the act we first saw at the GOP convention.

Ideas are great and necessary. But our ideas also have to stand up to reality and the idea of Sarah just doesn't cut it.

(By the way, I went to Michigan State University, hardly an Ivy League school.)