Here's an old election-year saw: Christian conservatives, angry with the GOP, are threatening to bolt the party or stay at home. I'm surprised anyone still falls for that one. Let's face it, as long as a GOP candidate gets up and says he's against abortion and gay marriage--whether he means it or not, and whether he actually does anything about it or not--he'll get every Christian conservative vote in his district. Period. Their own beliefs to the contrary, Christian conservatives are just as easily manipulated as any constituency out there.
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Not necessarily sure that is an "old saw" this year. The GOP's ability to rally their base with red meat appeals is somewhat diminished. In 2004, Rove made sure there were anti-gay marriage proposals on several state ballots; so far, there's nothing comparable this year. Do not make the mistake of assuming that all Christian Conservative voters are a faceless, mindless, monolith, deliverable upon demand. That block of voters is more complex than most secular liberals imagine.
Okay, but that raises the question: who are they gonna vote for? The godless, baby-killing, gay-loving Democrats? A third party? True, no voter is really a drone deliverable upon command, but if my friends among the Christian Conservative bloc are any indication, they'll bitch and moan--occasionally--about how the GOP has done something wrong, and then they'll vote GOP in the fall. Every time. "Yeah, but what're you gonna do?" is the answer I usually get when discussing the GOP's flaws. For them, there literally is no other alternative: it's the GOP or nothing. And these are people for whom, to their credit, staying at home on election day is not an option. It's possible they may not be as energized this fall as they were in recent elections, but I don't see their net votes for the GOP dropping significantly this fall. In fact, I'm apparently one of the few people out there who believes the House and Senate will remain in the hands of the GOP this fall. The Dems' electoral strategy of doing nothing proactive and waiting for the GOP to implode will work eventually, but I don't think this is the year.
Bush won in 2004 because "Christian conservatives" who don't normally vote did so in large numbers, spurred on by the gay marriage issue. If they don't vote GOP, they likely will not vote at all. It remains to be seen if this relatively new bloc is motivated enough to turn out in comparable numbers this year.
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