Jimmy "Birdhouse" Carter

It distresses me that Carter even said this, of course. It is doubly distressing that this was not in the context of any campaign or issue battle, where we might blame it on overheated passions and rhetoric. That would still be contemptible to be this bigoted, but it would at least be understandable. This comment comes after calm consideration, and we may safely conclude that this is how Jimmy Carter really perceives the political divide. Knowing that he will be quoted, knowing that Christians who disagree with him will read this, he nonetheless gives voice to a worldview that is so unable to consider alternative views that it would be embarrassing even if it were true.

"I was teaching a Sunday school class two weeks ago," he recalls. "A girl, she was about 16 years old from Panama City [Fla.], asked me about the differences between Democrats and Republicans.

"I asked her, 'Are you for peace, or do you want more war?' Then I asked her, 'Do you favor government helping the rich, or should it seek to help the poorest members of society? Do you want to preserve the environment, or do you want to destroy it? Do you believe this nation should engage in torture, or should we condemn it? Do you think each child today should start life responsible for $28,000 in [federal government] debt, or do you think we should be fiscally responsible?'

"I told her that if she answered all of those questions, that she believed in peace, aiding the poor and weak, saving the environment, opposing torture ... then I told her, 'You should be a Democrat.'"

Source: Creative Loafing, which published this comment like it was a good thing. I'll be linking back to this often, I suspect, as a roaring example of how dangerous the mentality of the Religious Left can be.