Outside Counsel

Department of Magical Thinking: Here's a breakdown of the last Presidential election by voter's religious beliefs. There are all kinds of things to be disturbed about here, but how about this for starters: 57% of Bush's vote came from three groups. As defined by the study, the Religious Right made up 26% of Bush's total. 88% of this block believe the Bible is literally true. Moving leftward a smidge, "Heartland Culture Warriors" were 20% of Bush's total vote. Among the Catholics in this group, 60% agree with papal infallibility. (Only 54% of the Protestants were Biblical literalists.) The next group, which Beliefnet calls "Moderate Evangelicals" made up 11% of Bush's total. The examples of "Moderate Evangelicals" include Jimmy Carter and Bill Frist, and I'm sure they are both insulted and astonished to find themselves in the same part of a Venn Diagram. I'd like to see where these people fit on the question of whether cavemen hunted dinosaurs.

As you might expect, at this point the numbers move into the single digits for Bush, and into the double figures for Kerry. The junior senator from Massachusetts' biggest bloc was the Religious Left-- he did better with "Spiritual But Not Religious" and "Seculars" but fewer people admitted to having no formal religious affiliation, or being atheists.

I mention it because right now things look pretty rosy for the Democratic Party, but that's not necessarily the reality. Look at who is out there voting before you get too confident: people who believe that Jonah was swallowed by a fish. People who think evolution is blasphemy. People who believe in blasphemy! I'm not so sure that I can ever be completely comfortable in this America- the America that thinks that voting on science makes science not real.