BONUS POINTS FOR HONESTY (via Political Theory):

Getting religion: Democratic guru Jim Wallis' strategy to woo "values voters" compromises on abortion in unacceptable ways. (Frances Kissling, Aug. 12, 2005, Salon)

I was sitting in a Senate meeting room a few months ago when I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. A senator started talking about Jesus. She (and it was not Hillary Clinton, so keep guessing) said, "What I want to do is get on the floor of the Senate and ask, 'What would Jesus do about the budget? What would Jesus do about poor children? What would Jesus do about healthcare?'"

What I wanted to respond was that the floor of the U.S. Senate is not the place to invoke Jesus Christ. Most of us, whether we are people of faith or not, would vastly prefer that public policy be developed democratically, taking into account people's views (including religious views, but not exclusively) about what they need to lead healthy and productive lives in relative freedom and peace. But I said nothing as I sent a private prayer of thanks to Jesus that no rabbis, imams, lamas or other non-Christian clergy were in the room. I vowed to send some money to the ACLU and People for the American Way, which seem to have the right strategies to deal with the rising tide of religious conservatism that has gripped the United States since the 1980s.

It was in 1981 that an outraged Norman Lear and others founded PFAW as a vehicle to combat the flag-waving bigotry of Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority. To counter it, they went to the core of American democratic values: the values of the Enlightenment, the idea of an America founded on a true secularism...

They're rarely that explicit about their project being anti-Christian and counter-foundational.

Posted by Orrin Judd at August 13, 2005 12:00 AM