Posted by
daddontsk8 on Monday, May 14, 2007 5:20:12 PM
There is no such thing as a socially conservative politician. We've got over a dozen years of recent history to demonstrate that fact. Politicians, are by their very nature, merely reflections of the majority of their constituents. When they are not, they lose the next election. Sometimes this can be mitigated by money and clever messaging, but they will eventually be replaced.
The governor of South Carolina, Mark Sanford, had an opinion piece posted on politico.com that discussed the REAL issue facing socially conservative Republicans, out of control spending. Right up there with abortion, heterosexual marraige and stem cell research, fiduciary management is one of the cornerstones of the social conservative agenda. Since the social conservatives tend to associate with conservative and evangelical Christianity, the idea of fiscal responsibility is in many ways even more important than the other social issues that face our nation.
Fiscal responsibility is the only one of the social conservative platforms directly mentioned and taught about by Jesus. The Gospels are silent on stem cell research, homosexuality and abortion. The parable of the talents, while conveying a spiritual truth, can also be applied to a political truth. Politicians who run on socially conservative principles must govern by those principles. Running on an agenda that restricts abortion, bans homosexual marraige, and denies federal funding of stem cell research, but fails on the one platform that Jesus explicilty taught about is doomed to failure.
In order to recapture the trust of the Christian right, the Republicans have finally started to preach a message of fiscal responsibility. Have they changed their tune in time for the 2008 election season? Only time and the willingness of the Republican base to forgive will tell.
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