What Romney's Religion Reveals About His Politics
Mormons hold a variety of political views
That won't discourage Baptist conservatives or atheist entertainers like Bill Maher from making fun of Mormons and their faith, whose history and tenets certainly sound strange to outsiders.
But is there any real reason to be troubled by Romney's religion? What does the career of the former Massachusetts governor tell us about the ideology of the LDS church—and what his personal beliefs may portend if he becomes the first Mormon in the Oval Office?
The complaint from the religious right—which has promiscuously allied itself with Mormon leaders to oppose reproductive and gay rights (and civil rights in an earlier era)—is that the LDS church does not conform to the tenets of Christianity as they see it. Pastor Robert Jeffress, the man whose anti-Mormon crusading has now taken him onto late-night television and the opinion pages of The Washington Post, says he prefers a "committed Christian," but doesn't say why or what that precisely means.
Mormons Include Glenn Beck, Harry Reid
Mormons may not share all of the tenets of Baptist or Methodist Christianity, but neither do Catholics nor Episcopalians, yet fundamentalist evangelicals like Jeffress don't seem to worry much about their role in public life. On issues that implicate morality, sexuality and family, the Mormons are equally "conservative" and consider themselves to be Christians, too. They officially abandoned polygamy many years ago—and they seem to succeed more consistently in adhering to what they preach than many of their more orthodox brethren, if surveys of divorce, addiction and teen pregnancy are accurate.
Those conservative principles, along with a history of extremist positions adopted by the Mormon hierarchy, have encouraged the perception of the LDS church as an ideological bulwark of the far right. Mormon leaders long encouraged associations with fringe elements in American politics, such as the John Birch Society, which still wields influence in the tea party movement today. And the ultra-craziness of Glenn Beck, himself a Mormon and a promoter of wacky LDS political theorists, has not improved the church's political profile.
In practice, however, the Mormons welcome or at least permit a much broader spectrum of political and ideological affiliations within their ranks, even among the elected officials who share their faith. The highest-ranking Mormon in public office today, for instance, is Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, a liberal Democrat demonized by the tea party and the Republicans, who spent millions trying to defeat him last year.
The best example of Mormonism's political flexibility, of course, is Romney's own career (and that of his father, the late Michigan governor who was hardly a hard-liner), which veered from the most liberal Republicanism to the harsh conservatism he currently espouses.
As an LDS bishop in Boston two decades ago, he staunchly opposed abortion; then a few years later, Romney became pro-choice when he ran for the Senate against Democrat Ted Kennedy; and then he shifted again when he began to aspire to his party's presidential nomination. Along the way, he designed and legislated a health care program that ensures coverage to almost every citizen of Massachusetts, and now repudiates that program (more or less) as an invention of Bay State Democrats.
The Romney family traces its lineage to the roots of the LDS movement, and today Mitt Romney stands at the pinnacle of wealth and influence in his church. His shape-shifting politics prove that however conservative most Mormons may be, they resemble every other American religious group in tolerating a wide assortment of political views within their ranks—especially among politicians who succeed in achieving power. There are many reasons for concern about Romney's character—including his hollow dissembling—but religion is not among them.
© 2011 Creators.com
Right now, we have a thing going on... It's obvious that there simply is too much money inequality going around, and it's a knock-down battle to figure out how to either keep the money we already got (legal and ethical or not), or how to force that money to be redistributed to those of us who lost out.
The people who currently have the money must decide where tomorrows profits will be made from, from our own people by giving them good-paying jobs, or from outsourcing their own workplaces before their competitor can outsource theirs (non-outsourced workers are the outsourced company's customers).
We have a disconnect... is an American Worker merely a "Labor Cost" to be reduced, or a "Valued Customer" to be nurtured and encouraged? is it possible to be both? Both the Middle Class and the Working Class are in this together.
The top 1% are those making more than $400K per year, are they the ones to be allowed to "cash-out" by lower personal income tax rates?
Since most of you are talking about which Republican candidate to support, this is my problem with changing over from an "Income Tax" to a "Consumption Tax". Look at all those jet-setters who simply adored buying at their "duty-free" stores. A Working class person has little choice but to pay the local "consumption tax", whereas the top 1% can easily "shop or invest" where there is no American "consumption tax" being collected. DO NOT CUT THE INCOME TAX on that top 1% (DO cut the corporate income tax on their companies, so they can bring the already outsourced profits back home to spend it here. That's what "trickle-down" was meant to do). Reward those who keep the money moving in the bottom 99% here, not just those who pull money into the top 1%.