Asked about his religious beliefs during an appearance before about 500 Republicans in South Carolina yesterday, Fred Thompson said he attends church when he visits his mother in Tennessee but does not belong to a church or attend regularly at his home in McLean, Va., just outside Washington. The actor and former senator, who was baptized in the Church of Christ, said he gained his values from "sitting around the kitchen table" and said he did not plan to speak about his religious beliefs on the stump. "I know that I'm right with God and the people I love," he said, according to Bloomberg News Service. It's "just the way I am not to talk about some of these things."
Regularly attending church doesn't make you a Christian anymore than regularly going into your garage makes you a Pontiac. Thompson's campaign is probably already over, but I don't think his admission about a lack of churchgoing would have had a marked impact on the campaign.
While many of Mitt Romney's supporters (and some detractors) think he scored big with his religion speech yesterday, I still think it was a sign of weakness on the part of his campaign. By getting up and having to explain himself what he's really saying to the voters is "I know my religion is weird and that would understandably make some of you wonder about my judgment, but I'll try to put a good face on it so you won't dismiss me out of hand". Ultimately, I don't think he'll succeed.According to a recent Fox News/Opinion Dynamics Poll, Romney has some work to do. When asked what type of president respondents would be comfortable with, Mormon scored just above Atheist and Muslim:
Protestant - 80%
Roman Catholic - 79%
Christian Coalition (whatever that is) - 59%
Jewish - 50%
Mormon - 36%
Atheist - 15%
Muslim - 10%
It may take an appearance by the Angel Maroni himself to turn around those numbers.
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