The religious politics for '08

I couldn't make it to the Religion Newswriters Association's annual conference this week in San Antonio, but fortunately Jeffrey Weiss of the Dallas Morning News has been blogging the details. I found interesting the political insights he relayed from one of my favorite religion and politics sources: John C. Green of the Pew Forum.

Recent polls, he says, show that just about every segment of religious belief in the US is breaking toward the Democrats at this point. These are very early and pretty abstract polls -- asking if people would be more inclined to for Dem or GOP without any candidate involved. With the exception of evangelicals who say they regularly attend church, other segments of the US population are leaning Dem, including groups that helped elect President Bush twice.

Green thinks those Democratic attempts to be religious are working. Just as they bought the religious Republican line for the last 30 years, the public is now gobbling up the juicy pew details of Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, et al.

But despite Clinton's best efforts to put on a faithful face, her most unfavorable ratings are among people who don't think she's religions.

(Somebody better let Elisha Shapiro know that now is the wrong time to run for president.)