Mary wrote:
> If you mean Roman Catholics, they are explicitly contravening certain > official teachings of their church in voting Democratic, at least in many > instances. I imagine that the same could be said, to a lesser extent, of > Orthodox Jews. They're going against the grain. That's not my definition > of a "fundamentalist." There are huge numbers of people of these religions who vote Democratic. I think they do hold to their fundamentalist beliefs privately even though they may vote for some whose platform does not always coincide precisely with those beliefs. > I believe that when most people speak of "fundamentalist Christians," they > do indeed mean evangelical Protestants. If you'd like to broaden the > definition of "fundamentalist" to include members of any religion who hew to > either a literal interpretation of a text or certain very basic (or > "fundamental") teachings, fine. My guess, however, is that that's not what > most people think of when they use that term in the United States. That's interesting to me, because I know a number of people who indeed have fundamentalist beliefs, i.e. funadamentalist protestants who believe in strict biblical interpretation and are very devoted to the particular teachings of their faith which are not at all "liberal", who continue to vote Democratic. Just as the Republican party is made up of a myriad of people, so is the Democratic. I guess my point is that people are complex and often vote the way they do for any number of reasons outside any procribed party line of the moment. It seems like the perception is that the "hawk right wing Christian fundamentalists" have some major power. I just don't perceive it that way. Again, I think that it depends on what part of the country one if from. I always looked at the Robertson/Falwell types as a small group out of small section of the South, who did gain some vocality because they raised money for their TV empires and therefore had a microphone, but who, in reality, are still a regional anomaly in the overall demographic of the US. Kakki
