April 10, 2005
THE NEW FACE OF THE PARTY:
Southfield reverend to run for Senate against Stabenow (SVEN GUSTAFSON, 4/09/05, The Daily Oakland Press
A local Republican is expected to announce his candidacy Tuesday for U.S. Senate against Debbie Stabenow in 2006.The Rev. Keith Butler, senior pastor of the Word of Faith International Christian Church Center in Southfield, will formally announce his candidacy Tuesday, a source who would not speak on the record confirmed. Butler will speak in Southfield and later at news conferences in Lansing and Grand Rapids. He will travel Wednesday to Flint, Traverse City and Marquette.
Butler is founding pastor of the evangelical, nondenominational Word of Faith church, which boasts 21,000 members in Southfield and has branches in nine states, two countries and in the Virgin Islands. He could not be reached Friday.
Butler's political experience includes serving on the Detroit City Council from 1989-1993 - a rare distinction for a Republican in the heavily Democratic city - and in March, he was appointed by Republican National Committee Chair Ken Mehlman to an advisory committee charged with helping the party make inroads among black voters.
In addition, Butler worked on the campaigns for Republican gubernatorial candidates Richard Headlee in 1982 and Bill Lucas in 1986.
He's what a contemporary Republican looks like. Posted by Orrin Judd at April 10, 2005 2:17 PM
Given the realities of Michigan race relations, she'll beat him 2-1 or more, unless a picture of her having sex with a sheep as part of a sorority prank makes the papers.
Posted by: bart at April 10, 2005 2:37 PMOnly if it's a dead sheep. Otherwise, it's a matter of personal preferences - don't you know.
Posted by: oswald booth czolgosz at April 10, 2005 4:20 PMDon't count on it Bartman. Blacks L O V E the Word/Faith message. Just imagine a politician that preaches material blessing in abundance from God as the right of a Christian with the purse of the State to back it up.
OJ..
If this is what a contemporary Republican looks like they're just as dead as the Democrats.
Posted by: NC3 at April 10, 2005 7:04 PMYet oddly aren't.
Posted by: oj at April 10, 2005 7:11 PMNC3,
It isn't the Black vote that kills him. It's the White vote. The metro area with the worst race relations in the US is Detroit. Its suburbs are probably the most segregated in the nation. Atlanta isn't far behind. Those White voters who fled Detroit, Pontiac, Flint, Inkster, Dearborn and, yes, Southfield aren't voting for a Black guy for the Senate.
Posted by: bart at April 11, 2005 9:28 AMBart:
Many of us just might.