Karl Rove and the politics of religion

Last spring, Karl Rove was outed by atheist superstar Christopher Hitchens as a fellow nonbeliever.

"He doesn't shout it from the rooftops, but when asked, he answers quite honestly. I think the way he puts it is, "I'm not fortunate enough to be a person of faith."

But last night Rove told me he is in fact a religious person, though he didn't specify how his Christian roots manifest themselves in his life.

Rove was in Los Angeles to speak at the Gibson Ampitheatre, one of a number of distinguished voices in this year's Public Lecture Series by American Jewish University. His invitation had caused a bit of consternation in the Jewish community, but he quickly won over many of his skeptics, which I wrote about in an article that will be online Thursday.

"I spent part of my childhood in Utah," Rove said at a VIP dinner before the lecture. "I went to a high school that is 95 percent Mormon, and only in Utah could a Presbyterian and a Jew both be gentiles."

Regardless of his own beliefs, Rove, who left his post as chief adviser to President Bush in August, was instrumental in helping Bush monopolize the support of evangelical voters and making religious rhetoric an essential part of presidential campaigns, something we are seeing plenty of this year.

"Roosevelt used to say to his speech writer, Rosenman, Don't forget the God stuff at the end. That's a bit colloquial," Rove said, "but the point is Americans have always valued leaders of faith."

In fact, as early as 1800, in the race between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, religious piety and divine reverence played an important role in politics.

As Jefferson and John Adams, a publicly devout Christian, slugged it out on the campaign trail, the Gazette of the United States ran this:

THE GRAND QUESTION STATED

At the present solemn and momentous epoch, the only question to be asked by every American, laying his hand on his heart, is: “Shall I continue in allegiance to

GOD—AND A RELIGIOUS
PRESIDENT;

Or impiously declare for

JEFFERSON—AND NO GOD!!!”

Jefferson was vehemently attacked for being a godless, slave-owning (-impregnating) sinner. But the underlying issue was what kind of liberties would this country afford its few voting members and everyone else who lived here. Jefferson favored greater freedoms while Adams sought to strengthen the office of the president. (A proto-Bush?)

Still, many people couldn't get over the fact that Jefferson didn't believe in God. And though he eventually won through a complicated process in the Electoral College, some members who didn't want to give their vote to an atheist said they would rather "go without a Constitution and take the risk of civil war."

Now, though, Godtalk dominates -- whether it is about what kind of Christian John McCain is, why evangelicals can't stand Hillary Clinton or whether Barack Obama is a "covert Muslim." The question, and it's one Rove didn't answer, is why did religious rhetoric has become so central to running for president. So-called "moral-values issues" were just as important to voters in elections that brought Bill Clinton to the White House as those that elected and re-elected George Bush. Something else is certainly at play.

Hey Karl Rove: What happened to two Jews, three opinions?

Yesterday, I added to my story list the fact that many Jewish Angelenos are upset with American Jewish University for inviting Karl Rove to speak at its vaunted Public Lecture Series. Then today I opened The Jewish Journal and saw that Rob Eshman had dedicated his column to that exact topic, and I realized how much better a story like this reads when it has the voice of someone who is allowed to inject their opinion.

Something has happened in the Jewish community, all across the political and religious spectrum, and it isn't good.

Somehow too many people in the Jewish community have become stuck in a very dangerous place: their comfort zone.

They are loathe to confront and really hear ideas that differ from their own, and they cleave to the company of voices that echo their preconceived ideas and long-formed opinions.

A few people have picked up on this.

"There was a time," Haaretz's Gideon Levy said in an interview with The Nation, "when you'd ask two Israelis a question, and you'd get three different opinions. Now you only get one."

In The Jerusalem Post, columnist Larry Derfner noted the problem in Israel, where public opinion fell into "lockstep" behind the war in Lebanon, the invasion of Iraq and the criticism of the National Intelligence Estimate report on Iran. How different, Derfner writes, from the Israel of old, where robust public debate was the norm.

"This is a society that's been brainwashed by consent," he wrote. "And when all hands are raised together, it not only enhances certainty, it offers the added comfort of unity."

J.J. Goldberg, The Forward's brilliant executive editor, wrote that the national Jewish debate is similarly afflicted. In fighting nouveau anti-Semitism, he wrote, "It doesn't help when Jews ignore or deny Israel's genuine shortcomings. It doesn't help when they overreact to criticism -- hostile, benign or just clumsy -- and intimidate their critics into resentful silence, reinforcing their enemies' worst stereotypes."

The response to Goldberg's essay? One organization head accused him of blaming the Jews for their own victimization.

And here at home things aren't any better.

Karl Rove's out -- what's next?

With chief Bush strategist Karl Rove throwing in the towel at the end of the month, can we expect a change in the Administration's strategy?

Rove himself claimed to not be religious, but his harnessing of the evangelical vote was central to Bush's rise and re-election. Maybe Rove is going to throw Rudy Giuliani a bone. Boy, does he need one.

Is Karl Rove an atheist?

At the least, Rove's not a person of faith. That's what godless superstar Christopher Hitchens says in an interview with New York magazine. Here's the excerpt from the Washington Monthly's Political Animal:

Has anyone in the Bush administration confided in you about being an atheist?

Well, I don't talk that much to them — maybe people think I do. I know something which is known to few but is not a secret. Karl Rove is not a believer, and he doesn't shout it from the rooftops, but when asked, he answers quite honestly. I think the way he puts it is, "I'm not fortunate enough to be a person of faith."

The Political Animal -- also known as Kevin Drum -- wasn't surprised.

In fact, I've never really thought Rove was all that committed a conservative, either. He strikes me more as a pure political operative, someone who could have signed up with either side if different opportunities had presented themselves when he was young. But he signed up with the conservative cause early, and once that happened he was the kind of person to jump in with both feet.

But Mark Kleiman, a UCLA public policy prof, was a bit more cynical:

If we've learned anything in the last six years, it's that when Karl Rove's lips are moving, he's lying, generally for partisan advantage. He knows full well that (1) he's unpopular (2) atheism is unpopular and (3) voters still tend to associate Republicans with religiosity and Democrats with godlessness. So he's decided to pretend to be an atheist, hoping that some of the bad reputation he's worked so hard to earn rubs off on us.

Un-uh. No way. I'm not having any. The godly put Rove and his puppet in power, and the godly are stuck with the pair of them.

By the way, a Google image search for Karl Rove will turn up some comical mock photos, like the one above.