Giving credit where it is due

I wanted to add something to what I said earlier this morning about Mitt's speech on religion (reposted in full at the bottom).

First, for the sake of comparison, a quick check -- who said the following:

[M]y answer to people is, I will be your president regardless of your faith, and I don't expect you to agree with me necessarily on religion. As a matter of fact, no president should ever try to impose religion on our society.

A great—the great tradition of America is one where people can worship the way they want to worship. And if they choose not to worship, they're just as patriotic as your neighbor [emphasis mine]. That is an essential part of why we are a great nation. And I am glad people of faith voted in this election. I'm glad—I appreciate all people who voted. I don't think you ought to read anything into the politics, the moment, about whether or not this nation will become a divided nation over religion. I think the great thing that unites is the fact you can worship freely if you choose, and if you—you don't have to worship [emphasis mine]. And if you're a Jew or a Christian or a Muslim, you're equally American. That is—that is such a wonderful aspect of our society; and it is strong today and it will be strong tomorrow.

And who also said:

Let me talk about freedom of religion, as well, which is an incredibly important part of our society. My job as the President is to make sure -- this may get to your question, by the way, besides speech -- an incredibly important part about what you're asking is, can people worship freely, as well. Yes. That's the part of the job of the President, is to make sure that people can worship any way they want, any way they want. And they can choose any religion they want. Or they can choose no religion. You see, you're just as big a patriot -- as good a patriot as the next fellow if you choose not to worship. It's your choice to make. [emphasis mine] And the freedom of this country is that you can choose to do any way you want. And it's important that we keep that -- that freedom real and intact.

And finally:

First of all, we strongly believe in the separation of church and state here in Washington, D.C., and that's the way it's going to be. Secondly, I love the fact that people are able to worship freely in our country, and if you chose not to worship, you're just as patriotic as your neighbor. Freedom of religion means freedom to practice any religion you choose, or the freedom not to practice. [emphasis mine]

The answer is one that you are almost certainly going to be surprised by:

George W. Bush said all of the above.

For all the horrible things Bush has done to our country, I have to give him credit for one thing: he respects the non-religious in his public speeches. Do I think he respects us in his heart? No. Does he have to? No. But the man understands that a national community has to include all faiths...as well as those without faith at all. This is something Mitt got completely and seriously wrong in his speech.

And, if you want to see that spelled out very articulately, read Friday's NYT editorial on the topic:

Mr. Romney tried to cloak himself in the memory of John F. Kennedy, who had to defend his Catholicism in the 1960 campaign. But Mr. Kennedy had the moral courage to do so in front of an audience of Southern Baptist leaders and to declare: “I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute.”

Mr. Romney did not even come close to that in his speech, at the George Bush Presidential Library in Texas, before a carefully selected crowd. And in his speech, he courted the most religiously intolerant sector of American political life by buying into the myths at the heart of the “cultural war,” so eagerly embraced by the extreme right.

Conservative David Brooks even gives a critical note:

And yet, I confess my own reaction is more muted [to Romney's speech].

When this country was founded, James Madison envisioned a noisy public square with different religious denominations arguing, competing and balancing each other’s passions. But now the landscape of religious life has changed. Now its most prominent feature is the supposed war between the faithful and the faithless. Mitt Romney didn’t start this war, but speeches like his both exploit and solidify this divide in people’s minds. The supposed war between the faithful and the faithless has exacted casualties.

The first casualty is the national community. [emphasis mine] Romney described a community yesterday. Observant Catholics, Baptists, Methodists, Jews and Muslims are inside that community. The nonobservant are not. There was not even a perfunctory sentence showing respect for the nonreligious. I’m assuming that Romney left that out in order to generate howls of outrage in the liberal press.

Romney's speech will wither into the mist of history forgotten and mundane. It's just another ploy from another politician, not a genuine work of masterful prose and logic.

From WSJ's Peggy Noonan:

There was one significant mistake in the speech. I do not know why Romney did not include nonbelievers in his moving portrait of the great American family. [emphasis mine] We were founded by believing Christians, but soon enough Jeremiah Johnson, and the old proud agnostic mountain men, and the village atheist, and the Brahmin doubter, were there, and they too are part of us, part of this wonderful thing we have. Why did Mr. Romney not do the obvious thing and include them? My guess: It would have been reported, and some idiots would have seen it and been offended that this Romney character likes to laud atheists. And he would have lost the idiot vote.

My feeling is we've bowed too far to the idiots. This is true in politics, journalism, and just about everything else. [emphasis mine]

Amen, sister.

(from earlier)

So the big news in politics for the past few days has been Mitt's long-awaited speech on religion. Basically he pandered to religious godidiots by talking about the "religion of secularism" and implied that atheists are not Americans.

Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom. Freedom opens the windows of the soul so that man can discover his most profound beliefs and commune with God. Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone.

The idiot says the above, then goes on to admit that Europe is becoming more secular (but is still a country with more freedoms than we enjoy, thanks to King W) without seeing any contradiction. Jesus' General offers serious analysis of the issues at play and why considering a candidate's religion matters (from a secular standpoint).