Blue John
by WonkoKevin
Whoa! John McCain lit up blue today, getting 50% buzz share from liberal bloggers in Wonkosphere. McCain’s Meet the Press video clip has been viral, with bloggers pointing to McCain’s statement that General James Jones did not say that political reconciliation was necessary for stability in Iraq.
The other big McCain story that liberal blogs took off on was the issue of McCain’s religion: Episcopalian or Baptist? From AP, “McCain, who has long identified himself as an Episcopalian, said this weekend that he is a Baptist and has been for years.” Say Anything notes, “I can’t imagine there’s a lot of Baptist voters out there saying to themselves, “Gee, I really hate the fact that John McCain is Episcopalian”. That got me wondering… would they care?
What is the difference between Episcopal and Baptist? First, I would note that most of the sites I found while researching this question were written by Baptists, so Baptists must care more about the differences than Episcopalians. According to an essay by Richard Laribee, Baptists are more Bible-centric and focused on individual salvation, while Episcopalians are less Bible-centric (relatively) and focused more on the spirituality of the community. The Episcol, or Anglican Church is run top-down, while Baptist churches are run very bottoms-up. Finally, many consider baptism into the Baptist Church a necessary prerequisite.
While liberal bloggers are using this as an opportunity to discuss pandering or flip-flopping, I think that the issue should be of import to both liberal and conservative bloggers because the two religions suggest different world views and thus assumptions about governance. Is John McCain of 2007 the conservatives that West wants or that the South wants? In today’s environment I am not sure the two are the same.
