Focus on the Family kingpin James Dobson was outed, so to speak, as harboring some some strong anti-Fred sentiments yesterday. From the AP:

DENVER (AP) — James Dobson, one of the nation’s most politically influential evangelical Christians, made it clear in a message to friends this week he will not support Republican presidential hopeful Fred Thompson.

In a private e-mail obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press, Dobson accuses the former Tennessee senator and actor of being weak on the campaign trail and wrong on issues dear to social conservatives.

“Isn’t Thompson the candidate who is opposed to a Constitutional amendment to protect marriage, believes there should be 50 different definitions of marriage in the U.S., favors McCain-Feingold, won’t talk at all about what he believes, and can’t speak his way out of a paper bag on the campaign trail?” Dobson wrote.

“He has no passion, no zeal, and no apparent ‘want to.’ And yet he is apparently the Great Hope that burns in the breasts of many conservative Christians? Well, not for me, my brothers. Not for me!”

The founder and chairman of Colorado Springs-based Focus on the Family, Dobson draws a radio audience in the millions, many of whom who first came to trust the child psychologist for his conservative Christian advice on child-rearing.

Strong words indeed, from this self appointed kingmaker whose Christianized Communism is held forth as some sort of example of middle American, Christian conservative values. As if there’s anything conservative about an organization claiming pornography is a public health hazard, or that legalized gambling “exploits the poor” among the host of other crimes it supposedly causes.

In fact if you listen closely just underneath the Thumping of Dobson’s Bible you’ll hear a constant stream of Stalinist propaganda vomited forth from him and his cell of so-called conservatives, and find that Focus on the Family has less in common with the G.O.P. and are more with C.P.U.S.A.

Especially when it comes to the “issue” of homosexuals in America. Dobson’s desire to give the gay community the shaft, so to speak, on everything from marriage rights to gay churches, is suspiciously similar to communist states dealings with gays.

And that’s what this is about isn’t it? Dobson doesn’t like that Thompson’s not goose stepping along to Focus on the Family’s gay bashing drum:

Dobson and other Christian conservatives support an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would bar gay marriage nationally. Thompson has said he would support a constitutional amendment that would prohibit states from imposing their gay marriage laws on other states, which falls well short of that.

Karen Hanretty, a spokeswoman for the Thompson campaign, said Wednesday in response to the Dobson e-mail: “Fred Thompson has a 100 percent pro-life voting record. He believes strongly in returning authority to the levels of government closest to families and communities, protecting states from intrusion by the federal government and activist judges.

So Fred takes the actual conservative stance, allowing communities to decide for themselves how to address the issue of Marriage rights for gays without being pressured one way or another by the Federal government. That’s not good enough for Dobson though, because people like Dobson (or more precisely the suckers he milks for money) won’t be satisfied until the American government really oversteps their bounds and starts making theological decisions regardless of what the public wants.

Sorry jimmy, but that’s not conservatism, that’s communism. It’s almost like Dobson doesn’t care about conservatism at all.
Let’s be honest, Dobson’s group is no different than N.O.W., G.L.A.A.D. or Code Pink. They’re all in the business of collecting money from marks to fight a never ending battle over some issue that would, sans activists like themselves, work themselves out.

Groups like Dobson’s work to prolong the issue by demanding unreasonable measures (like denying 5-10% of Americans the right to marry the person they want) aimed not at getting accepted by the country at large, but at agitating the opposing side into action thus creating a fund raising opportunity.

Fred’s commonsense approach to this issue would cut into Dobson’s bottom line, thus the attack. Dobson doesn’t care if any G.O.P. hopeful becomes president, in fact he probably hopes a democrat wins, because it’d ensure his organizations would have plenty to “work on” with all the money the people who think Focus on the Family looking out for them will send in.

As a Republican who is neither Christian, nor by Focus on the Family’s standards conservative, I say screw James Dobson, I’m with Fred!

UPDATE: Allahpundit thinks Dobson’s “private e-mail” reads a lot like a fund raising letter. Also, why is a spokesman for Focus on the Family confirming the contents of Dobson’s private correspondence?

JunkYardBlog thinks this will help Fred more than hurt him.

Over at Hot Air the best analysis of the situation comes from the comments section:

Actually it wouldn’t be be so bad if Dobson had done that. A preacher has just as much right as anyone else to express a political opinion.

But that’s NOT what Dobson is doing. He is (apparently as a tax dodge) explicitly REFUSING to directly and honestly endorse any individual politician.

Instead, Dobson has publically (albeit back-handedly) proclaimed that he reviles all the leading Republican candidates. And I’m going out on a limb and assuming he’s not all that crazy about any of the Democrat candidates either.

So basically Dobson is just screeching that one sinner after another has failed to meet his ever-so-very lofty standard of righteousness. What does that leave? I suppose we are now supposed to sit around and try to puzzle out who among us Dobson DOESN’T think is a witch….

Well, sorry, but I’m just not in the mood to play that particular game. And frankly it’s kinda hard to see how that’s a good way for a so-called “evangelical” to reach out and show all of us lost sinners the way, the truth and the light.

If the guy has something to say, then he should have the guts to come out and SAY it. Otherwise, he’s not really Testifying very well is he?

logis on September 20, 2007 at 2:02 PM

Well said indeed.

Good News, DailyKos celebrates Dobson’s snubbing of Fred.

Hot Air, Michelle Malkin’s very successful conservative website, has run several negative pieces about Fred Thompson, coinciding with Michelle’s own blog running a hit piece on Thompson. Much of the angst aimed at Thompson is based on a Debbie Schlussel post. You heard that right, a Debbie Schlussel post.

This piece as a matter of fact. Read it if you can, but the summary is this: Debbie didn’t like the politics of Fred’s new campaign manager when he was a Senator, so Fred Thompson cannot be a good President, because he doesn’t hate this Spencer Abraham with as much passion as Debbie. For those unfamiliar with Debbie, who I do read and enjoy by the way, Debbie Schlussel is the rightosphere’s version of Keith Olbermann, except without the lying and sexual ineptitude.

What she does have is an overwrought polarized view of the world where people who disagree on an issue are bitter enemies for life. Further, Debbie thinks a bad Senator (and it does indeed look like Abraham was “bad” at least on some base issues) can’t be a good temporary campaign manager. Or even a good person! Here’s a snippet of pure Schlusselian venom:

Don’t believe Thompson’s claim that he understands the Islamist jihadist threat to America. His announcement, yesterday, of his choice of Spencer Abraham as campaign manager, told us everything we need to know. Although Abraham, of Lebanese descent, is a Christian, he is a career water carrier for Islamists of the most extremist stripe and made that the cornerstone of his failed, one-term Senate career and equally lousy tenure as Energy Secretary.

As a conservative–but more important, as an American concerned about the future of this country in the face of a terrorist threat–Thompson’s choice of Spencer Abraham was the final nail in the coffin for me in opposing Fred Thompson’s quest for the White House.

I know Spencer Abraham. He wrote one of my recommendations for law school. And the Spencer Abraham that I and all of America have since experienced is bad news for everyone except CAIR, ADC, MPAC, ISNA, and all Islamists who want to endanger America.

In 2003, I wrote the definitive column on Spencer Abraham a/k/a Spence a/k/a Edward Spencer Abraham (which was quoted in The Washington Post), and I re-publish it below, with several additions I’ve made, updating it. At the time Spence was still Energy Secretary, but he left to become a lobbyist for Islamist countries.

As a Senator, he took marching orders from James Zogby of the pan-Islamist Arab American Institute, opposing profiling of Arabs, the use of secret evidence against Muslims (at the behest of Muslim groups), attempting to repeal the Clinton counterterrorism package, refusing to fund computer tracking of student and other foreign aliens, giving millions in our tax money right to Hezbollah, and putting CAIR on the map on Capitol Hill (taking the group’s officials around to meet other Senators and Members of Congress). He took campaign contributions from the relatives of Hezbollah-backed top Lebanese officials after he got the group millions in our tax money.

What this breathless attack is basically saying is that this guy, who she was glad to get a rec from to get into law school, was a lobbyist. Being Lebanese, he lobbied for Lebanese groups and enjoyed the support of the Lebanese community. She goes on with a laundry list of his crimes, citing her most reliable source: herself. It’s a convincing hit piece that would make me not want to vote for Spencer Abraham.

But I’m not voting for him. I think this guy’s been hired because of his ability to make things happen and organize, and if what she says about him is true I’ve no doubt he can put a campaign together pretty well. How does this disqualify Thompson or reflect on him in any way? He’s stated his positions on immigration and the middle east in speeches, radio reports and interviews, and it sounds like he’s hired a guy who he doesn’t agree with 100%. To people like Schlussel, and Malkin, that says something bad about Fred Thompson’s character. To me it speaks well of him and let me tell you why.

I have lived in the northeast all my life, and for a good chunk of it I worked in non-profits, mostly in childcare programs. Most of the people that hired me were liberals, I have always been on the right and we often disagreed on many things, but they all respected my skill at coordinating either after school programs or summer camps. They hired me and kept me around because kids like me, I run a safe, state compliant program and I’m damn good at what I do. Period. They aren’t less liberal because I administered this or that grant, the Y.M.C.A.’s I’ve worked for aren’t secret enclaves of Republicanism. They were places that needed me at that time and gave me a job.

But apparently Thompson’s campaign doesn’t have that option, and the Senator is being held to some pretty high standards, including only employing people who line up with his views, or I should say Debbie’s views, and Michelle’s views and AllahPundit’s views and Bryan’s views…

Well you get the point. No one could pass that test, including Michelle Malkin who I suspect disagrees with her chief blogger Allahpundit in several key categories. Do I think Michelle Malkin is less of a Christian because she hired AllahPundit, who’s an atheist? Of course not. Is Fred Thompson less suitable for the Presidency because his new campaign manager wouldn’t make a good President? They seem to think so.

But they’ve got other axes to grind: he’s not raising enough money, he sponsored CFR (which I oppose, by the way) and worked as a lawyer for abortion groups though he himself is pro-life. That last thing is a stretch frankly, because saying a man who’s personally pro-life (but isn’t running on a platform of overturning Rowe vs Wade) can’t work for a pro-choice client is like saying a man who doesn’t believe in murdering people can’t represent murderers. It’s a childish and naive view of law practice indeed to think that lawyers don’t represent people they may not agree with.

In other words, this all amounts to nothing, so why beat this drum anyway? Is it because after the defeat of the Immigration Reform Bill, which sites like Hot Air rightly take credit for, the rightroots are feeling powerful enough to try to entrench themselves in the Republican party the way the netroots on the left have taken over the DNC? Is this just some muscle flexing? Are they testing out on Fred Thompson how far they can push? It seems that way.

If they can force Fred’s hand and make him cave in on this, they’ll prove that they’re the DailyKos of the right. They’ll sit in silent judgment ensuring that Republicans toe the new party line, a line drawn by the consensus of a tiny sub-section of American society. They’ll steer the GOP as far to the right as Kos and friends have driven the Democrats to the left. I don’t think that’s a good idea, and I hope Fred doesn’t either.

I don’t want a Kos on the right, because we’re better than that. Hot Air joyously cost Fred support, at least according to their comments pages, because they didn’t like who he hired more than a year away from the elections. This isn’t like when Ron Paul courts truthers and racists, this isn’t some scandal, this is just spitefulness that Fred Thompson hired a Republican, and not a “conservative” who marches in lockstep with the blogosphere. I thought the right was better than that, maybe I’m wrong.

I don’t care who he hires, I’m with Fred!