Now, now, Ms. Parker, I'm not personally attacking you; I know you're sensitive to that.
But your column today in the Washington Post on the future of the Republican Party just doesn't make any sense.
On the one hand, you say this:
"To be more specific, the evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy branch of the GOP is what ails the erstwhile conservative party and will continue to afflict and marginalize its constituents if reckoning doesn't soon cometh. Simply put: Armband religion is killing the Republican Party."
And you say this:
"Which is to say, the GOP has surrendered its high ground to its lowest brows. In the process, the party has alienated its non-base constituents, including other people of faith (those who prefer a more private approach to worship), as well as secularists and conservative-leaning Democrats who otherwise might be tempted to cross the aisle."
Are you suggesting that evangelical Christians are stupid? Careful--sounds like a personal attack. But then, you say this:
"It isn't that culture doesn't matter. It does. But preaching to the choir produces no converts. And shifting demographics suggest that the Republican Party -- and conservatism with it -- eventually will die out unless religion is returned to the privacy of one's heart where it belongs."
But the fact is that many of our political beliefs are informed by our religious beliefs. And opposition to abortion is a principle--it's not just something that can be shucked off like an old, sweaty baseball cap. And then finally, in any case, you go and say this:
"Meanwhile, it isn't necessary to evict the Creator from the public square, surrender Judeo-Christian values or diminish the value of faith in America. Belief in something greater than oneself has much to recommend it, including most of the world's architectural treasures, our universities and even our founding documents. But, like it or not, we are a diverse nation, no longer predominantly white and Christian."
The problems there is that your last sentence doesn't follow.
And on the whole, the problem is this: you're saying that Republicans need not abandon their principles--but you do seem to be saying that we should just shut up about some of them (many of them?). And isn't that pretty close to abandonment?
Certainly we should try to communicate our ideas better than we have. Of course we don't want to drive persuadable folks away. But we can't just change who we are, what we are, what we believe in...
And evangelical Christians are not stupid lowbrows.
And I'll just ignore your tendentious, cheap-shot attacks on Sarah Palin--which sounded a tad personal. I thought you didn't like that stuff.
