Frank Rich: On 'Moral Values,' It's Blue in a Landslide
Frank Rich's post-mortem of the election nails the real meaning of the electorate's choice, ranging from discussion of the 22-percent bloc of moral values voters to the 59 percent of Californians who supported stem-cell research and pointing out, for the first time since the election, that the Republican Party ALWAYS uses "moral values" to win the votes of poor, rural folk and then promptly ignores those folks' wishes once the election is over. Look at Bush's first few days since winning: He's sent Rove out to claim he's going to push the anti-gay amendment again, but everyone knows he doesn't have the votes, even after winning more seats. Meanwhile, he's pushed Congress to work on privatizing (eliminating) Social Security and talked about major tax reform. Which do you think the Republicans are more likely to actually deal with? Tax reform is a political cash cow; corporations will pony up any amount of money to be able to influence the legislators who will potentially rewrite the tax code. Brokerage firms will shell out big bucks to get their hands on more money from every employee in America. And the rural values voters who expect Bush to somehow conjure up a Constitutional amendment banning gay marriage? The Republicans, for all their flaws, know better than to go looking for blood from a turnip. Follow the money and it's obvious what sort of legislative calendar we can expect for 2005.
The question is this: When will these "values voters" catch on to the game and start voting their financial interests rather than casting symbolic votes based on their moral beliefs that have no chance of actually changing anything? When will they realize that a tax code that treats their family and other families fairly is more important than whether someone else can get married, or have an abortion, or burn a flag? When will they stop trying to use the ballot box to turn back time? Until Democrats find a way to speak the truth about these issues--that however much these folks disagree with the Democratic social platform, the Republican one is just a sucker game to con people into voting for their own continued poverty--in a way that doesn't condescend, the Republican strategy will continue to work.
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More important than convincing folks to vote for their financial interests, we need to convince folks its immoral to deprive working folks of health care, pollute the environment, and give tax breaks to the wealthy. As a Catholic, each one of these positions is reflected in official church documents. Documents which are the moral fabric of the church. Morality and values are broader than flag burning, abortion and gay marriage.
As a former Catholic, I agree with you completely regarding the teachings on health care, poverty, and stewardship of the planet. The church teachings also suggest that the death penalty is almost never warranted, yet bishops across the country essentially endorsed George W. Bush in this election. John Kerry may have voted against restrictions on abortions, but he never performed one. He may have refused to suppport an amendment banning gay marriage, but he wasn't party to a gay marriage, was he? Bush presided over--and had the direct opportunity to prevent--more executions as governor of Texas for six years than could possibly have been warranted, according to Catholic doctrine, in the past six decades. How this didn't make voting for him a "sin" is beyond me.
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