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| Thursday, May 23, 2013 |
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It is a dangerous thing for Mormons to become a block party. It is one of the things that led to our removal of states like Missouri and Illinois long ago. |
I think I said something about the number of Mormons in Vegas. When is the Democratic primary there? |
Well I can tell you that here in Las Vegas it was about 75% LDS in the Room I was in and the building for that matter. I got stuck being one of the Delegates (because no one else wanted it so my wife raised my hand….) (and FYI I am for Mitt). Any how it really was a sweep here and I have read he even got around 50% of the “evangelicals” vote too! :) |
Sorry annegb the Democrats held theirs right after ours, in fact they were coming in as we were leaving… |
Gar! You live in Vegas! I live in Cedar City! We’re practically neighbors! We must do lunch. gardnera@netutah.com |
CNN indicated that about 20% of caucus attendees were LDS, and of those, more than 9 out of 10 were voting for the Rombot. When you see numbers like that, you can’t BEGIN to credibly deny that LDS voters are bigotted against non-LDS candidates, when given the chance to vote for an LDS member. Yes, I just turned that exactly on its head from what all the bloggernacle is gnashing their teeth over regarding religious bigotry against LDS–and I did so reasonably. I promise to laugh openly at anyone who tries to claim that this many LDS voters were voting according to a careful study of the candidates, and finding the one who most nearly matched their ideas of proper government. The simple fact is that LDS caucusers were far more religiously-aligned in their votes than Iowan Huckabee supporters were. Anyone who wants to blame Iowa on religious prejudice has to be willing to step up and acknowledge the same thing–to a greater degree–in Nevada. |
Nick, |
Nick, there’s a big different between being being bigotted against a candidate because of his religion and supporting a candidate because of his. (It’s also a great simplification to say that anyone supports anyone for one single reason). I have no problem with evangelicals favoring Huckabee because he shares their religious beliefs, but I do have a problem with them exluding Romney from consideration because of his. I haven’t yet heard any Mormons say we shouldn’t vote for any baptist. With that said, religion isn’t very important to me in a candidate, but if someone disagrees and feels more comfortable with a candidate that shares their beliefs, that’s not bigotry. |
I can’t help but wonder if the rest of the America really looks at Las Vegas and say’s “Vegas = Mormons???” or is it more like “Vegas = sin!!! I know when I left Utah for Vegas I did not expect to find us so abundant here… I wonder if we will have more an influence on the rest of the Votes because others will not look at Nevada and think “Cult”. |
WOW! that should have been Mesquite…errr |
Nick, you can spin this however you want to but you can’t honestly blame people for voting for their (technically speaking) brother! It’s not about been bigoted or anti-other religions. If your son or brother was running for president I’m sure you’d vote for him out of loyalty, and mormons are generally speaking one big family since, everyone calls each other brother or sister. And also when one considers the general discrimination and ridicule handed out to mormons in the past, its natural to see them hoping for a social breakthrough, which a mormon president would be. I honestly thought that Rombot would be finished by now and that Huck would win SC and eliminate everyone else; but been wrong makes me continue to hope that the Mormon will actually do well overall, even if I don’t vote in USA. |
Carlos,
Well, if we get really technical, George Bush is my brother as reprehensible a human being as he is. And I certainly never voted for him, never supported him, and hope he is tried for war crimes. |
If your son or brother was running for president I’m sure you’d vote for him out of loyalty, Nope. If my daughter or brother was running for president, and was espousing Romney’s views (not to mention pandering like nobody’s business), I’d not only vote against them, I’d be ashamed of them. |
I saw these stats as published by Jim Geraghty at the National Review at 2:40 this afternoon. I’m disappointed I had such a busy day (not really; we had a birthday party for my 3rd oldest daughter, but you know what I mean). I’d hoped to make a post to offer an analysis to discuss this statistic and try to explore it from a few different points of view, but arj beat me to the punch. Anyway, here’s part of what Jim Geraghty had to say:
There’s a strong anti-Huckabee vote out there among Mormons — and with good reason. Honestly, I thought the guy was a bit nutty, but didn’t have strong feelings about him until he asked Zev Chafetz, reporting for the New York Times Magazine, whether we believe that Jesus and the devil are brothers. This age-old, anti-Mormon canard is like asking, “Don’t Jews believe in usury?” Huckabee’s question told me everything that I need to know about how pathetic Huckabee is. I was ambivalent about supporting Romney before this point. But not after. Huckabee is a wicked little man, and we must lose no opportunity to say so. |
How on earth is “Don’t LDS believe that Jesus and satan are brothers” the same as “Don’t Jews believe in usury?” Judaism FORBIDS usury. While it’s true that the “Jesus and satan are brothers” thing is an anti-LDS phrasing, the doctrine is absolutely correct, as both are the spirit sons of deity. |
But I’m almost as disturbed by those who vote for a candidate because of his or her religion as I am by those who vote against a candidate because of his or her religion…. Amen to that! |
Nick Literski: Judaism FORBIDS usury. Judaism condemns usury when lending to Jews, but not when lending to non-Jews. Ask any well-studied Jew about this, and they’ll tell you, “It’s a long story.” Wikipedia’s article on Jews and Interest explains why. (Of course, until fairly recently, the term usury simply referred to the charging of interest, because religious scholars didn’t grasp the time-value of money. Aquinas, for example, inveighs against charging interest of any kind.) I conclude that asking, “Don’t Jews practice usury?” is exactly analogous to the question about Satan and Jesus being brothers, because it is a purposeful oversimplification of a complicated issue, and it is designed specifically to promote a misunderstanding of the group in question — misunderstandings that cut along the traditional lines of virulent bigotry by exploiting classical stereotypes. |
Nick, |
cj: |
I’m just pleased that the Mormon vote actually means something (albeit a little something) for the first time in a long time. For decades we’ve been dismissed as a predictable and insignificant voting demographic, but with Nevada becomming more influential, we may hear more talk of candidates going after the Mormon vote. |
Ummmm Mormon from Nevada here /raises hand, and yes we all dislike that Dingy Harry guy…(Reed that is) |
How big of a win is this really? No one except Romney and Paul gave Nevada much thought. It’s like the Patriots winning the AFC East – not much competition. I think McCain winning South Carolina is the bigger news. |
So after tonight (it is 11:01 Idaho Falls time) can bloggernacle and the LDS I-15 corridor move beyond all the tirade against Huckabee and evangelicals and the constant talk of bigotry? Mr. Huckabee never was your great enemy in seeking to squelch your conservative morals or family values. Thanks for a little acknowledgement on identity politics, arj. Personally, I find it fun to go to the fast-food restaurants in town and listen to (eavesdrop on) the groups of older men and women as they talk about Mitt. And good ol’ Huck . . . well, he has always been a brother to the devil. |
I for one was shocked at the 25% GOP votership (I made that word up) being LDS when they are only 7% of the state. Turnout was clearly a factor. Romney has consistently done a good job reaching evangelical voters in most states. Huckabee dropping out (which he hasn’t yet) will only result in many evangelicals swinging to either Romney or Rudy (based on my interpretation of SC polls). However, we won’t see the end of bigotry and its more-attractive-yet-still-discourteous cousin ignorance until Romney’s out of the limelight. |
#21: #22: |
I don’t know where I got the reference, but I heard someone say that Barack Obama is the expert at telling people which road to take, and Hillary Clinton is the expert at building that road. The great thing is that both campaigns can spin that as a positive and a negative. |
I promise to laugh openly at anyone who tries to claim that this many LDS voters were voting according to a careful study of the candidates, and finding the one who most nearly matched their ideas of proper government. That’s the great thing about this country – everyone can count on their own particular minority special interest identity group to help them out, whether they be black, Mormon, gay, Wiccan, Indian, Southern, Utahn, whatever. The problem that most had with Huckabee was that he attacked the special interest identify of another. Then again, there are a lot of Mormons who are turned off by Romney because he’s not coming off in public as much of a Mormon as they would like. The raw vote totals bore me a little bit. The election will come down to about 10-12 states around the country, and so it doesn’t matter *how* Mormons vote. It won’t be enough to swing the election anywhere. Utah and Nevada will have virtually zero impact on the election. |
Todd Wood: So after tonight (it is 11:01 Idaho Falls time) can bloggernacle and the LDS I-15 corridor move beyond all the tirade against Huckabee? Why on earth would we do that? Huckabee made his own bed when he waited weeks to admit that Mormonism is a religion and tried to feign innocence in order to advance anti-Mormon cliche’s in the mainstream media. That makes him our official punching bag for the indefinite future. Evangelicals show The God Makers and complain about Joseph Smith, and we Mormons complain about Huckabee. At least what we say about him is true. |
Meh. So is much of what they say in The God Makers, DKL. It’s just taken horribly, almost criminally, out of context, to make it look shocking. |
For those claiming bigotry, that’s a bit of a complicated issue. In my opinion (as a disclaimer I’ve given money to one candidate: John Edwards, laugh if you must) Romney is a much better candidate than Huckabee. In fact I think Huckabee is horrible candidate without even taking into consideration how he has actively injected religion into the campaign. So I can see how the block voting for Romney and Huckabee can and should be interpreted differently on the question of bigotry. I think some of it is a reaction to the anti-Mormonism in the campaign. Also, who else are you going to vote for? All the candidates on the Republican side have serious flaws, Romney might have the most/best experience and the fewest flaws. That said, 94% is an amazing number, and it would be hard pressed to claim that religion wasn’t a factor. |
Mormons in Nevada weren’t bigoted against opponents of The Mormotron 5000. When the choice is between 1. Romney, I don’t call it bigotry to vote against the candidates who are not Mitt Romney. Even if I were not LDS, I would probably overlook his pandering in favor of his competence. |
Dan, |
I honestly don’t know any Mormons who like Harry Reid. But somebody must, because he keeps getting re-elected. |
Queno, Romney didn’t bother me that way, he just bothered me. Then Huckabee bothered me, then Obama started to look too Hollywood, and McCain has bothered me for about eight years. So I’m back to Romney. If one of you guys ran for something, I’d vote for you. Because I’m a blogger and you’re bloggers and what’s not to like? Locally, I vote for my friends and people I like. On Mormons in Vegas, my impression is that they do more for their community than Mormons anywhere. I don’t hear a lot of criticisms of Mormons from Nevadans. So maybe some non-Mormons voted for Mitt for that reason. |
annegb, Nick, |
I like Harry Reid. I spent some Saturdays canvassing to send him to Congress back in 1982. Just because he’s a Mormon and I am too. That and I thought the Mr. Clean Face thing was cool. And because a semi-active roofer who worked with my Dad was home taught by Reid regularly a couple years before. I still like him for the most part, but a couple decades in the Senate doesn’t improve anyone. |
All this talk about how it’s a no-brainer that Romney took Mormon-rich Nevada, Mormons vote for their own, yadda yadda yadda. All those delegates he’s scooping up, especially in Iowa, Michigan, Wyoming and New Hampshire. A few maybe, but not most I’d wager. |
I meant to say, all the delegates aren’t Mormon. Sorry for the half-thought. |
Nick, I think you’ve set up a straw man in your # 6, and not just because of the hyperbole. I think that Mike L.’s answer in comment # 8 is a great response that you might consider. |
re # 25, Nick, Latter-day Saints are less than 10% of Nevada’s total population. |
john f., comment #8 suggests that no LDS have said not to vote for a baptist candidate. This is patently false, as there have been many LDS commentators in the bloggernacle calling upon readers not to vote for Huckabee (a Baptist) because of his religion. Some of them say it’s because he’s an “anti-Mormon,” but that is, in fact, part of the Baptist faith these days. It amounts to voting against Huckabee for his religion, period. Also, please note that I didn’t say that 20% of Nevada was LDS. Rather, I said that 20% of those who attended the caucuses were LDS. In other words, they were disproportionately represented, if your stat is correct. |
I think if people analyzed all of the candidates in a sober, clear-headed manner, they would conclude that Romney is far and away the best candidate. He launched a massive venture capital firm. He ran the Winter Olympics. Hillary Clinton’s accomplishments pale in comparison. Romney is the most talented person running for President. He is the most qualified. Some people are prejudiced against Mormons, and this keeps them from voting for him. For Mormons, this prejudice does not exist, they see Romney’s obvious superiority to other candidates, and the vote is a slam-dunk. |
Nick Literski: Some of them say it’s because he’s an “anti-Mormon,†but that is, in fact, part of the Baptist faith these days. If that’s the way that you’re going to define religion, then there’s no bigotry problem voting against someone because of their religion. Personally, I think it’s a mistake to define religion that way. Otherwise, (for example) you end up being against Islam just because you oppose jihadism, which is arguably part of the Muslim faith these days. Surely the Baptist faith is big enough to allow for members to be both Baptist and not anti-Mormon. |
See if you can follow my thoughts: 1. Romney is indeed the best GOP candidate http://www.anncoulter.com explains why. 2. There is much religous bigotry in this country- which is why Romney isn’t the leading candidate in the race. The Vanderbilt study explains this 3. There are many people in Utah politics that aren’t mormon, because they were indeed the best candidate. So we can conclude that mormons don’t necessarily vote for other mormons. 4. Mormons aren’t going to be biased against a candidate of their own faith, since they understand his beliefs. So they will simply vote for the best GOP candidate, which is Mitt Romney- because his religon ISN’T an issue. 5. There isn’t a ‘mormon voting block’- the element of religon was removed from the equation, and the best candidate won. |
#43: #44: |
Nick, I hate to burst your bubble, but Romney is surging ahead of McCain in Florida. The latest poll has him up 5 points. |
Wasn’t it 20% of the Republican caucus voters were LDS, and 90% of them voted for Mitt? To see if LDS turn-out was really that huge, we’d need to know what percentage of registered-Republicans in Nevada are LDS (probably a harder number to track down). |
If Mormons voted in those numbers for a candidate with the wacky collection of ill considered quasi-theocratic policies that Huckabee has, I would be rightly embarrassed. Voting for a respectable moderate Republican, not so much. |
I’m sure at least some LDS voted for “a respectable moderate republican,” Mark D. The other 94% voted for Romney. |
Whatever happened to “In God We Trust” and “One Nation Under God?” I have no problem with religion in our country. Ann Coulter, you know, I can only take in small increments. But DKL, I do believe many Baptists not only are anti-Mormon, they vehemently despise Mormons. There’s a difference. Is Huckabee a Baptist? |
Nick L., McCain and Huckabee are both sufficiently left wing that they would make natural Democrats. Many conservatives would much rather see Hillary or Obama in office than see McCain or Huckabee run the GOP further into the ground. Romney, on the other hand, tends to be just about every Republican’s second choice. |
Nick, I’m sorry, I usually bite my tongue at times like these, but that’s ridiculous. My only question now is whether you are trying to be ridiculous for the sake or being argumentative (this is my suspicion, which made me hesitate to even respond) or if you’ve convinced yourself that you are so right that any argument that goes against what you think must be wrong, no matter how reasonable. I don’t even know where to start: #1) I’m sure there are many Baptists that would object that anti-Mormonism is a necessary principle of their religion. #2) Mormons have voted for an evangelical in large numbers (Bush). I’m not sure what flavor of evangelical Bush is. But I don’t see that Baptists are any more anti-Mormon than any other evangelical religion. Where were these Mormon commentators that apparently are saying that we shouldn’t vote for a baptist because they are anti-Mormon when Bush was running? #3) Even if anti-Mormonism really was a necessary principle of the Baptist religion, wouldn’t that justify Mormons not voting for them? Would you expect an African American to vote for someone who is racist against them? So how is that bigotry to vote against Huckabee for that reason? #4) I repeat again: No Mormon that I know of is saying that we should not vote for any baptist. That fact that you believe we should be saying that because you believe all Baptists are anti-Mormon is irrelevant. Therefore, there is a difference between some evangelicals saying we shouldn’t vote for any Mormon, and some Mormons voting for Mitt partially because he’s Mormon. I’m sure you’ll have some witty and over-simplifying response to those points though. Knock yourself out. To be fair: I do think that those that say that religion played no role are wrong. The main argument I’m hearing is, “Romney is the best candidate, so it’s no wonder that Mormons voted for him.” Well, then how do you explain why other voting blocks aren’t supporting him in such numbers? Are Mormons just so intellectually superior that we can see something in Romney that everyone else doesn’t? Is there some sort of subconscious anti-Mormonism in the rest of the population? Neither of those sounds defensible to me. I’m not saying that religion didn’t play a role, I’m just saying that doesn’t equate to bigotry as Nick suggests. (I think I just managed to make enemies on both sides of this debate, so I’m ducking for cover). |
Nick, I’m sorry I called your argument ridiculous. I don’t want to get personal. But I do honestly wonder if you are just trying to be argumentative. |
CA Condor – 5 point lead with 8 days to go is still anyone’s game in my book, but I am hopeful. I mentioned the theory that McCain and Huckabee have some sort of under-the-table deal to bring Romney out of the race (orchestrated by McCain) given the friendly way their campaigns have been run. Now that Huckabee has no ostensible reason to remain in the race, this theory is being brought forward elsewhere, too: http://www.article6blog.com/2008/01/21/is-huckabee-out-to-stop-the-mormon/ From the article: However, the article questions whether this is due to religious motivation or just good old-fashioned political deal-making. |
Of course religion made a difference. Is anyone arguing otherwise? The difference with Huckabee is that Romney is campaigning flat in the middle of the Republican mainstream (such as it is) – not a religiously based campaign. Huckabee acts like he wants to take back the party and the country for Christianity, with politics that are a first class aberration for the party he is running in. The specter of conservative evangelicals going for Huckabee is comparable to the embarassment we would have if large numbers of Mormons went for Bo Gritz. |
#44 ane #31 are arguing otherwise, unless I’m misunderstanding. There might be others but I don’t have time to look in detail. #31 is more ambiguous, but his argument is that he would not be biased in favor of Romney. I’m assuming that he is arguing that most Mormons also would not be biased to favor Romney, but I could be wrong. |
Nick (#41), Where’d you learn math? My understanding is that Nevada is pretty evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans. However looking at the CNN entrance polls it is clear that the independents broke heavily towards the democrats. So assuming even participation (which hasn’t been the case anywhere, but Nevada Dems don’t release the number of people that participated) Republicans make up about 40% of the electorate and 25% of them are LDS. So that puts them at about 10% of the total population. Thus LDS were not overrepresented, they just flocked (pun intended) to the Republican party. If Nevada turnout mirrored that of Iowa then twice as many people participated in the Democratic caucuses as did the Republican caucuses, leading to any even lower percentage of LDS participation. The link above is worthwhile, it breaks down both sides by a number of factors (party, age, religion, income, etc) and brings up a few more interesting LDS related numbers: 3% of Democratic caucus goers were LDS. On the Republican side the LDS that didn’t vote for Mitt were evenly divided between McCain and Ron Paul. Finally, Romney won the evangelical vote in Nevada with 39% of that block compared to Huckabee’s 22%. |
This age-old, anti-Mormon canard is like asking, “Don’t Jews believe in usury?†Huckabee’s question told me everything that I need to know about how pathetic Huckabee is. I was ambivalent about supporting Romney before this point. But not after. DKL, perhaps a better analogy would be to ask, “Don’t Catholics worship saints and the Virgin Mary?” Huckabee’s routine of “aw, shucks, I just wanted to know more about the LDS faith” was kind of sickening. It definitely turned me against him. |
There have been many LDS commentators in the bloggernacle calling upon readers not to vote for Huckabee (a Baptist) because of his religion. Some of them say it’s because he’s an “anti-Mormon,†but that is, in fact, part of the Baptist faith these days. It amounts to voting against Huckabee for his religion, period. There are plenty of Baptists and Evangelicals who are not anti-Mormon. They may think Mormonism is misguided or wrong (like Nick, perhaps), but they are not anti (like Nick). It’s the people who openly oppose Mormons because of their religion, that can’t separate the person from the faith, that deserve our scorn. I count Huckabee in that group. |
but they are not anti (like Nick). Lest someone twist my words, I was saying that Nick was not anti-Mormon. Maybe I should have said “like Nick is not”. |
Don’t know if anyone is still following this, but I thought I’d point out that the numbers in South Carolina are interesting to this discussion. Obama carried about the same percentage of the African American vote as Romney carried Mormons. Yet, last night watching TV, no one dared say that they voted for him “because he was black.” In fact, whenever the thought even remotely began to enter the conversation, someone always shot it down in favor of the theory that they just liked Obama’s positions better. This is exactly the argument that I said was indefensible in #52. So if we’re crowing a king of Identity Politics, shouldn’t Obama be in consideration? (I’m not saying Obama purposefully courted the black vote–from what I can tell he is trying to appeal to everyone. But then again, Romney wasn’t trying to appeal to Mormons either, so the comparison holds.) |
