A new poll, conducted September 1-5 by International Communications Research, has a 48-47 lead for Kerry among RVs, consistent with the recently-released Gallup poll and further calling into question the results of the Time and Newsweek polls.
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Editor’s Corner
By Ed Kilgore
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January 24: MAGA World Goes to War with Liberal Christianity
As someone ever-attentive to the intersection of political and religion, it wasn’t so much Trump’s explosion at the Bishop of Washington but the follow-on by his clerical allies that struck me, as I explained at New York:
Everything about the Washington National Cathedral, from its vast Gothic architecture to its clergy’s vestments, suggests to the politicians who sometimes grace its pews that they are small players in the grand drama of human events shaped by an omnipotent God. But the most important pol in attendance at this week’s National Prayer Service, right there in the front row, was a newly re-inaugurated president for whom humility and self-restraint are alien concepts, and who has boldly asserted that God prevented his assassination in order to return him to power. So understandably, the clerical leader of the Cathedral, Bishop Mariann Budde, felt constrained in her sermon to beg Donald Trump for some Christian forbearance in how he carried out his vengeful mandate. She begged rather than commanded, using the time-honored language of Jesus Christ by way of enjoining compassion for the poor, the stranger, and those living in fear of state power:
“’Let me make one final plea, Mr. President. Millions have put their trust in you and, as you told the nation yesterday, you have felt the providential hand of a loving God. In the name of our God, I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now.’
“‘There are gay, lesbian, and transgender children in Democratic, Republican, and independent families, some who fear for their lives. The people who pick our crops and clean our office buildings; who labor in poultry farms and meatpacking plants; who wash the dishes after we eat in restaurants and work the night shifts in hospitals. They … may not be citizens or have the proper documentation. But the vast majority of immigrants are not criminals. They pay taxes and are good neighbors. They are faithful members of our churches and mosques, synagogues, gurudwaras, and temples. I ask you to have mercy, Mr. President, on those in our communities whose children fear that their parents will be taken away. And that you help those who are fleeing war zones and persecution in their own lands to find compassion and welcome here.'”
It was also understandable that Trump was annoyed by Budde’s plea, along with the underlying suggestion that he does not personify God’s will for America in 2024. He was undoubtedly aware that the bishop had criticized him during his first term for using one of the churches of her diocese, the White House–adjacent St. John’s, for a photo op in which he held up a Bible in righteous justification for his hard line on Black Lives Matters protesters. And here she was almost literally raining on his inaugural parade.
But when he lashed out at her on Truth Social as a “so-called bishop,” a “radical left hard line Trump hater,” whose sermon was “nasty in tone and not compelling or smart,” he unleashed a lot of MAGA rage aimed not just at Budde but at those liberal Christians who similarly reject a reactionary, Trump-o-centric version of the faith. The New York Times’ Elizabeth Dias hit the nail on the head in depicting the outburst against Budde as representing a submerged iceberg rising to the surface:
“For nearly a decade, American Christianity has been torn apart in every possible way. Christians have fought over whether women should be allowed to preach. Over the place of gay people. The definition of marriage. The separation of church and state. Black Lives Matter. And at the heart of much of it has been Mr. Trump’s rise as the de facto head of the modern American church, and the rise of right-wing Christian power declaring itself the one true voice of God.”
The National Prayer Service incident gave license to a lot of Trump’s clerical allies to deny the legitimacy of any form of Christianity that does not comport with their culturally conservative views. Several uttered their condemnations in interviews with the conservative Washington Examiner:
“’For the past four years, the Left has vilified biblically sound pastors for teaching what Scripture says about marriage, gender, and sexuality — accusing them of preaching politics from the pulpit. Yet, on the very first day of Trump’s return to the White House, a woke clergy member hijacks a church service to promote partisan rhetoric, personally attacks the President of the United States, and distorts the truth about illegal immigration,’ said pastor Lucas Miles, senior director of TPUSA Faith.
“Pastor John Amanchukwu, who has been vocal in his support for Trump in the past, took a harsher tone.
“’Many fear a wolf in sheep’s clothing, but there is nothing worse than a wolf in Bishop garments. She’s heretical, diabolical, and should have NEVER had the opportunity to minister in the presence of President Donald J. Trump,” Amanchukwu said.”
Franklin Graham, who delivered one of the two official invocations at Trump’s inauguration, was equally harsh:
“‘She is a socialist, activist, LGBTQ+ agenda, and that’s, you know, so she’s just wrong,’ he continued. ‘So these are activists, and no question, they hate Trump. I don’t know why they hate Trump. Trump stands for truth.”
So denying that “Trump stands for truth” is apparently grounds for excommunication from the broader community of Jesus Christ. That’s certainly what the extremely influential Pentecostal preacher and musician Sean Feucht suggested from right there in the Cathedral: “This is not a church and she is not a pastor. Time to ditch this tradition of attending this place during the inauguration.”
Maybe these holy warriors will calm down. But for the moment, it’s clear that their relationship with Donald Trump, the most powerful person on the planet, is fully transactional. He’s using them to herd their flocks into the voting booth to back him despite occasional suspicions that he’s more interested in self-promotion and worldly wealth than in doing God’s will. And they are using his authority to monopolize their own power within Christianity, by insisting that the only real Christians are MAGA Christians. These politicized right-wing believers bared their teeth in the reaction to Budde’s decidedly Jesus-oriented plea to Trump for mercy. But their ultimate objective could well be to reduce the influence of liberal Christianity until it’s small enough to be drowned in a baptismal font, leaving loud-and-proud Christian nationalists as the monopoly proprietors of America’s largest religious tradition.
send some meat… give us some evidence… please.
Thanks
Would it be enough if he just threatened you with a horrible death?
It seems to be the extent of the GOP platform these days.
That and pleas for a Mulligan.
‘We’ll actually, like, do stuff and things if we get another term.’
former Democrat… dont just lay on rhetoric… add some concrete evidence to your chat. You are sounding so much like bush… give us something to chew on… send some meat… give us some evidence… please.
Thanks
former demorcrat said
” We need a united country that has strong leadership”
I agree! Ask King George why he is such a devider? Why does almost every country in the world want John Kerry to win? We will never have a united country that has strong leadership until we get rid of the cowboy.
“former democrat”:
“…supplied by the very people Kerry would turn to…” etc, etc, etc…
You seem to have missed the part where the Reagan and Bush I administrations very publicly supported and armed BOTH Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden. Remember the picture of Donald Rumsfeld shaking Saddam’s hand? Remember when Osama was a “freedom fighter” because he was fighting the soviet occupation of Afganistan?
Nice friends you “republicans” have…
P.S. Cheney voted against more weapons systems than Kerry did, but somehow THAT fact is never posted on Faux News.
Don’t you realize that you are dealing here with people who read ALL news sources (not just the ones they agree with) and are capable of doing research for themselves?
Come better prepared next time.
BTW, I’m a real live, card-carrying yellow dog Democrat who can trace his dues back to McGovern. If you’re really a Democrat, you could never become a Republican.
Being a Democrat is a state of mind best captured by Will Rogers.
If you’re not a white person in the upper half of society financially, or not a fundamentalist Christian, you have no place with Republicans. I am, but I’m a race/class/religion traitor.
Democrats – give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
God almighty, those words still give me a chill, and may they until the day I die.
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To lying Puke who claims to be a former Democrat:
————
You like me!
You REALLY like me!
BTW, Sally Fields is one of us, loser.
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You’re scared, that’s why you’re here. If you really had balls bigger than acorns, you wouldn’t be here fronting. You’d be fighting in Iraq, or at least serving meals to soldiers for $90K a year through Halliburton.
Chickenhawk.
Go Cheney yourself.
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you guys would be funny if it were not so serious.You run around screaming into the night to boost your courage while you put your hopes and trust into a man that is no better than Jane Fonda at her worst. The weapons our enemies use against us were supplied by the very people Kerry would turn to for his “coalition”. The intellegence agencies that were supposed to protect our country were stripped of their resources by Kerry and his former democratic president while they voted to stop the very weapons that we depend on for our protection now. It is easy to set back and
be critical of a man who would sacrifice his personal desires to protect our country. If you think the president wanted this war any more than you or I , you have never tried to know the man.
I shudder to think what Al Gore or John Kerry would have done. Bush inherited a recession brought on by a false economy spurred by the phoney companies of the dot com. This was not Clinton’s or Bush’s doing but he inherited it. We have fought through the recession and are fighting through the terroist threat that has been building for over twenty years. We need a united country that has strong leadership but I fear the democrats don’t want a unified country, they want a Victory so they can advance their liberal agendas regardless of the future. Who is living in a”bubble”?
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In the past four presidential elections, Gallup has missed the number between the Dem and the Repub an average of almost 4 million voters. They might as well be throwing darts.
They haven’t gotten closer than 2 million in 20 years.
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They’re getting paid, but not for being good.
I am watching CNN , Lou Dobbs and MSNBC Chris Mathews. They are saying they don’t care about what happened 35 years ago. Why didn’t they say this 3 weeks ago when they were spending days and days pounding up on Kerry? They didn’t get tired of it then……….
Notice former Demorcrat’s e-mail, one of those right wing fanatic evangels who don’t give a shit about anything because Jesus is going to come and take them all away.
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Now is the time for Kerry to challenge Bush directly.
Bush is trying to squirm out of the town hall debate where undecideds would ask questions. In addition to finally putting Bush where he might have to answer real questions of real Americans, it puts Bush beside Kerry, who is 6 inches taller.
Time for Kery to issue THE CHALLENGE which I call:
MEET ME IN MISSOURI
——————————
“President Bush,
Are you afraid to face Americans who don’t sign loyalty oaths to you?
Instead running all over the country giving your same stump speech to people who signed loyalty oaths to you, why don’t you come debate me in Missouri, before those town hall people?
Are you afraid to let America see us STAND face to face?
Will you STAND up this time, or will you disappear again?
Stand up and MEET ME IN MISSOURI, Mister President, or I will be there by myself on that day, debating your empty chair to the same audience.”
The buck stops in Missouri, Mister President.
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Feel free to spread it throughout blog land and Dem circles. Yes, osmosis works. No attribution necessary. Steal it, call it your own, but use it.
“promote their agenda for abortions, gay marriages, pornography, drugs, or any other form of behavior that destroys the very fabric of our society”
The republicans can’t beat us on our actual issues (education, environment, health care, tax fairness), so they lie, lie, lie about who we are.
“Former Democrat”: we are not the people who you are describing. You are a victim of propaganda. Try not to swallow all the lies you are fed, and get out and check things out for yourself. Also, try reading american history.
(Beep! Beep! Beep! Propaganda Victim Alert!)
WHAT KERRY SHOULD DO…
pull a Bush.
Kerry should come out and have this huge press conference.
In this press conference he should (in a forceful way) explain the following facts:
1) The election campaign for President is now tied.’
2) President Bush and himself have about the same amount of money in the bank.
3) President Bush and himself are polar opposites on practically every issue. He should explain the differences.
Then he should explain that this is the most important election of our lifetime. It is important, because the decisions made will affect the country for the next generation.
Will we have war or peace?
Will our children inherit the strongest economy in the world or will our children inherit massive debt?
Will we put the interests of the few ahead the interests of the many?
He should bring up Cheney’s latest attack. He should define it for what it is: an act of total desperation by an administration who believed that they could ride the worst terrorist event in US history to another four years in power. They believed that the American people would not care about the fact that one million jobs have been lost; or that millions of families have lost their health benefits; or that this administration has turned a record $250 billion surplus into a record $500 billion deficit. This administration believes that fear motivates this election. They believe that the people are too stupid to know the difference.
These are the decisions the American people have to make in this election. This election will not be decided by money. This election will not be decided by smears. This election will not be decided by pundits and talking heads.
It will be decided by the people. And it is in the people I trust.
Kerry should then say, “this is too important an election to leave up to the “experts” in Washington who have developed a knack for looking out for themselves. This is an election about the people. And to the people of America…I will not lose your election.”
Dudes, this would get such a reaction. Coming on top of the growing perception of a “limited Bush bounce.” Official Washington would talk about nothing else.
Kerry can then go on the offense regarding the economy, etc.
I don’t know about you guys, but i’m getting my second wind.
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I don’t understand why you would call the poll a tie.
Posted by reignman at September 8, 2004 07:23 PM
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Here’s why:
These polls are usually around 1000 people.
482 for Bush
473 for Kerry
41 for undecided
The poll is not and cannot be accurate. The only poll that is theoretically accurate is the election. Everything else is merely AN EDUCATED GUESS.
That is all polls are: EDUCATED GUESSES.
Problem is, as Ruy has shown, is that some of the guesses aren’t very educated these days. They have bad methodology, too short a time frame, too limited a means of data recovery, and/or inherent bias.
The next 1000 numbers called could easily have shown Kerry up by 9. It is not a statistically significant difference, hence, it’s a tie.
Um…a 3.5 margin of error w/ Bush a point ahead suggests that Bush has a small lead of Kerry, because the probability of that being so is larger than the probability of Kerry being in the lead. I guess it’s a virtual tie, but I don’t understand why you would call the poll a tie.
Can you smell it friends?
The smell of Democratic victory in November.
I mean, after a $50 million advertising blitz by Bush in August. To Kerry’s blackout.
After a smear by swift boat liars.
After an overtly negative party convention.
If they lead us at all, it’s by one or two percent.
In reality, I think they are behind or we are tied.
Now the Democrats have their gloves off.
Now Bush’s AWOL story is coming to light.
Now Kitty Kelly’s, Bob Graham’s book is coming out.
What does this all mean?
Bye-bye Bush!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I love the smell of smoldering right wing shills in the morning. Smells like….VICTORY!
I wonder if there is some way to translate Jeff’s 50-46 into a likely electoral number.
Former Democrat..
Based on your definition of repubs, how do they differ from the democrats? You seem to be implying that only repubs have these values but you need to know that this is absolutely untrue. You have spent too much time in the repub bubble and have gone thru a sad conversion.
I do not know any democrats who are not hard working, who do not pay taxes, who are not christian minded, who do not believe in the tenets on which the country was founded.. and if there are any dems who do not share in the values above, I am sure there are just as many repubs who do not share these values either.
It would do you plenty good to burst the GOP bubble and start to review the issues from all sides.
As much as you seem to imply the righteousness of the repubs, you must also know that truth and credibility are scarce commodities in the GOP camp also. Have a look.
Former Democrat?
Or current Bush shill?
Another one of the online goobers who thinks posting spam that someone else wrote. That story has been around the world a few times. All the Bushies who don’t watch Fox or listen to Rush all day, send emails with crap like that on it.
“former democrat”: I suggest that you take yourself and your Zell Miller-approved RNC talking points over to the Free Republic blog, where you and they clearly belong. We’re really not interested in that kind of garbage here.
Should clarify: An LV screen could presumably ask “Did you vote in the last election AND are you likely to vote this time. However, if the constraint is to reduce the sample size to match % voter turnout the first to be tossed out will be people who answered NO/NO or NO/YES.
I figured they were skidding when Cheney
came out with shrill scare tactics
And O’Reilly re-introduced Swiftboat Satan
O’Neill last night.
I just did my own analysis of the Gallup poll.
Using their own internals:
With each candidate receiving 90% support among their base (7% voting for the other candidate).
Also, with Kerry actually ahead of Bush among independants: 49% to 46%.
Here is how it ACTUALLY breaks down, if one assumes that the same number of people vote in 2004, which voted in 2000 (how about that for a LIKELY VOTER).
In 2000, of all those who voted – 39% were Dems; 35% were Republicans; 26% were independants.
Therefore using these numbers and the numbers supplied in the Gallup poll internals:
Kerry 50.3%
Bush 46. 2%
Is it me, or do you think someone is messing with these numbers?
LV screens will always bias in favor of republicans as they are usually more motivated than dems. Fortunately for dems they are outnumbered. If voter turnout is unusually high (and there’s no way the LV number can predict that since they are based on historic data) then the polls will be significantly off – which I agree is good, it keeps democrats more motivated. A landslide will be so sweet.
My choice for K/E slogan: THE ONLY THING WE HAVE TO FEAR IS BUSH/CHENEY!
New Kerry motto:
GIVE ‘EM HELL KERRY!
It is hard to measure motivation of the voters. I think the closeness of the last election, and the polarized electorate will work both sides into a frenzy to get out the vote. We will see a reversal of the trend of lower voter turnout this year.
Frankly, I am glad to see Bush pull ahead in the polls. This is not going to be easy, so we have to work harder if we want the best results. The previously unthinkable massive turnout could change the political landscape as dramatically as in years past when Presidential Candidates had coatails.
Does anyone doubt that Bush deserves to have the rug pulled out from under his feet more than any President in history? Not just a loss, but a BIG loss. Why not hope for that? After all, they have earned it.
Time for a good post explaining LV models. You’ve said in the past that they become much more accurate as the election approaches. It seems likely that news stories will increasingly favor LV results.
Yet it seems possible to me that they may be biased republican right up to the election. People’s statements about what they will do are always less reliable than measuring their actual actions. Thus, I would imagine that an important predictor of LV’s is whether they voted in the last presidential election. But the last election was a time of demoralization for dems, and this ought to be one for repubs (I know, we’ll see). But if prior voting figures strongly in LV screens, then I think their predictions could easily be off this time around… Right up to election day.
What’s your take on LV models? What do they typically incorporate? Why do you say they get better closer to the election? Are they based entirely on respondent predictions or on prior behavior?
Tx
Charlie
Do not despair…the Swift Boat has turned to the attack and not a minute too soon either
Every silver cloud has a dark intrnals lining…
ICR
The Race for Independents
The ICR press release of August 14th reported a substantive lead for John Kerry among registered Independents. This was in sharp contrast to August, 2000, when the last Democratic nominee for President, Al Gore, trailed in this important population by nearly 10 points.
However, since that time there has been a sharp erosion of preference for Kerry amongst this critical population. In fact, within this population Bush now holds a significant lead (47.7% to 36.9% with a 8% margin of error), in sharp contrast to one month ago:
Edwards Calls Cheney Remark Dishonorable and un-American
CLARKSBURG, W.Va. – Democrat John Edwards urged President Bush on Wednesday to renounce Vice President Dick Cheney’s statement that the United States risks another terrorist attack if voters make the wrong election choice, calling the warning dishonorable and un-American.
“This statement by the vice president of the United States was intended to divide us,” Edwards said. “It was calculated to divide us on an issue of safety and security for the American people. It’s wrong and it’s un-American.”
Edwards made his comments to supporters while campaigning in West Virginia, a day after Cheney said at a town hall meeting in Iowa, “It’s absolutely essential that eight weeks from today, on Nov. 2, we make the right choice, because if we make the wrong choice then the danger is that we’ll get hit again and we’ll be hit in a way that will be devastating from the standpoint of the United States.”
Bush declined to comment on Cheney’s statement when asked about it Wednesday at the White House.
Of course Bush would not comment because he is a coward.
Way to go Edwards ! make these slimeballs accountable for their sordid actions and behavior.
I cannot wait for the debates …
Kerry going to take Bushie boy to the woodshed and Edwards is going to verbally deconstruct Cheney.
This is weird phraseology “Based on registered voters who are certain they will vote, 48.2 percent say they will vote for George W. Bush, 47.3 percent for John Kerry, and 4.1 percent for others or undecided.”
So the screen is self identifying – There 90% of self-identified GOP said they were certain to vote. 80% of self ID’d Dems, and now over 70% of self ID’d Independents.
May I say that I am skeptical all around. All these people certain to vote – pshaw.
The other thing was the surge in Indies (self ID’d) certain to vote – well I think those are O’Reilly Indies, meaning Republicans.
Srry, Ruy, throw it out. Funny looking poll.
More of a bowling ball bounce than a basketball.