e-mail me at billdeg@umich.edu

3/03/2008

McCain

I'm sorry that we live in a country where any presidential candidate would be "honored" to receive an endorsement from John Hagee. In fact, I'm sorry we live in a country where a Hagee endorsement matters at all. Hagee, recall, makes headlines periodically for claiming Hurricane Katrina, for example, was God's punishment for a city that hosts "gay parades."

Hagee's also called the Catholic Church "the great whore," which is why John McCain's enthusiastic acceptance of Hagee's endorsement is getting some attention. McCain has backpedaled (his spokesperson said that accepting an endorsement doesn't equate to accepting that person's ideology wholesale) but that doesn't change much. Does Hagee contribute anything to civic discourse beyond hate speech? Does McCain even care what the answer to that question is?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh good Lord (and no pun intended on this end). I hope this doesn't mean the frillion people who listen to J. will actually go out and do so because their pastor told them to "Vote the Bible".

Interesting that McCain has tried distancing himself from this endorsement, though. Could this be another sign that NeoConservatism is on the decline?

bdegenaro said...

Hi Chelsie. I think McCain wants to have it both ways: 'I'm an independent.' 'I'm the right choice for values voters.' He ought to know that Catholics are the definitive swing voters in Ohio.