I've been meaning to blog for a while now about this painfully awkward question at last week's CNN/YouTube Republican debate, but Mitt Romney's long-debated "Mormon" speech yesterday, I guess, kinda superceeds that at this point.
I'll have a few thoughts later today. For now, here's the speech (and the video). Everyone seems to have something to say about it. So a quick straw poll of my devoted readers: what do you think? Any impressions -- style, political substance, theological substance -- welcome.
And here's Richard John Neuhaus, Rich Lowry, Charles Krauthammer, David Brooks, E.J. Dionne Jr., Richard Cohen, Jonah Goldberg, Peggy Noonan, the gang at NRO, and the NY Times to help.
Be back later.
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5 comments:
the speech overall was ok though i did not watch it (finals studying gets in the way! ahh!). but i skimmed the text of it in an online transcript and heard soundbites. I think Romney is on the right path and ok to evoke notions of JFK's Catholic speech. I agree with a lot of what he said though I know some of my law school classmates would be vehemently opposed to the level of religion and state comingling that Romney would be ok with, as would I. However, in regards to Mormonism which Romney scarcely mentioned, it must deal with its past race relations that arent so good as I have blogged about. The church's denial of ordination to blacks and general ill-will to "inferior" races from the mark on Cain who supposed fathered them as dogged Mormonism since its beginnings but few know about it. I think this wound must get exposed to heal, otherwise these questions will continue to hound the Mormon church and rightfully so.
just to clarify - I would be ok with the level of religion/state comingling that Romney proposed, and thus I am not well liked by classmates in 1st Amendment law.
John,
Wouldn't it be great if we could set aside our theological je ne sais quoi for the higher goal of... MULTIPLE FIRST LADIES?
On a serious note, Mitt truthfully seems more like a Unitarian than a Mormon (not surprising, as he's an East Coast Mormon). Unitarians seem to do pretty well as president--at least the first two (Adams and Adams), not so much the latter two (Fillmore and Taft). Not that Mitt has any shot of winning, of course. So really this post doesn't matter a whole lot. Nonetheless, I've written it. (:
I found this interesting bit of historical hair-splitting about the Sam Adams anecdote Romney referred to, which basically makes the point that such expressions of tolerance and common faith were probably staged rather than spontaneous, even back then. Also reminds us that there were in fact no Catholics present to join in that prayer, and that sharing in a Catholic prayer would have stirred a lot of objection.
More to say, have to run...
http://boston1775.blogspot.com/2007/12/samuel-adamss-masterly-stroke-of-policy.html
Who knows where to download XRumer 5.0 Palladium?
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