The Obama Paradox

I believe that we watched the unraveling of more that twenty years of the so-called conservative ascendancy, or as Fred Barnes quoted W.D. Burnham, Professor Emeritus at The University of of Texas at Austin in the Weekly Standard, November 2004..."If Republicans keep playing the religious card along with the terrorism card, this could last a long time. Referring of course to the 'permanent majority' being bandied about by the leading lights of the right wing, DeLay, Limbaugh, ad nauseum. They were partially correct.

The terrorism card did not have the desired effect, in spite of the 'dog whistles' within the McCain\Palin and the outright lies of the 527's acting on behalf of the Republican right wing. However it is my opinion that the religion card is still in play.

The Obama Paradox is that while the campaign was able to GOTV in communities largely ignored by the Republican Party, it also brought to the voting booth many of the socially conservative elements of both the Latino and African-American population.

The sad truth is that while many people who voted for Obama\Biden voted proactively to bring the past twenty some odd years of political disgrace to an end; there are a good number of people who are still uncomfortable with the idea the of "gay" rights, as if those rights rights are somehow greater than those afforded to us by our Constitution.

It is not fantasy to believe that a member in good standing at your local Black Church in Oakland can vote for Obama\Biden on the one hand and then pull the lever approving Prop 8 with the other, or that while a Latino or Latina in Orlando may be chanting Si Se Puede, that they too would be approving Amendment 2.

We are doing a decent job at exposing the 'Terror" card for the cynical tool it is in the hands of right wing demagogues.

Now we should work just as hard in exposing the cynicism that 'religion' is playing in our national discourse of human rights.

There ya go.

update: the money poured into the pro Prop 8 movement in California was largely funded by the Catholic Church, the Mormon Church, and that good ol' standby, Focus on the Family.

later update: The Florida Amendment 2 moneybags seems to be limited to the Southern Baptists Convention

Originally posted at Talkingpointsmemo.com, TPMCafe on November 6th, 2008