The Dallas Morning News had a front-page story yesterday about evangelical Christians’ growing frustration with Republican presidential candidates, which as the paper’s religion blog put it, includes “a Mormon (Mitt Romney), a Catholic who supports abortion rights (Rudy Giuliani), and a senator who has more than once told the religious right to stuff it (John McCain).”
Long the driving force behind Republican success, many Christian conservatives are disappointed over the GOP’s failure to deliver on issues they care about and divided over the candidates and moral agenda that will animate them.
For that and other reasons, the conservative Christian movement faces a moment of political decision. Its ultimate champion, George W. Bush, is in the final stage of his presidency. The candidates to replace him have received a lackluster reaction from voters such as Mr. Brookshire. Democrats are starting to claim the mantle of faith in a different way. And many conservative evangelicals are beginning to question the movement’s political priorities and focus instead on issues from the environment to terrorism.
I’ve written before that the evangelical vote is up for grabs, which is one reason Democrats seem to be pandering so much to people of faith.
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