Is it all over now but the counting?
As you probably already know, Mitt Romney crushed it in New Hampshire yesterday, becoming the first non-incumbent to win Iowa and the Granite State since our modern primary process began in 1976. Ron Paul finished second with about 23 percent of the vote.
The NYT says South Carolina will provide a bigger test for Romney because of its many conservative evangelicals and Tea Partiers.
“For most Christians, Mormonism is an issue and he has a hurdle here that he’s going to have to jump over and navigate around if he can,” Franklin Graham told the Old Grey Lady.
Romney actually won a plurality of evangelicals (30 percent) in N.H. Santorum came in second with 23 percent of the evangelical vote, but won just 8 percent of Catholics, in one of the more interesting entrance/exit poll findings.
Some politicos are already debating how the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints would influence a Romney presidency.
The Obama White House continued its election-year makeover, hiring an immigration expert with deep Catholic ties as its chief domestic policy guru. Earlier this week, Obama hired Jack Lew, a well-connected Orthodox Jew, as his chief of staff.
Latino evangelicals kickstarted a campaign to register young Latinos before the presidential election.
Oklahoma’s Shariah ban discriminates against Islam and a Muslim leader has the right to challenge its constitutionality, a federal appeals court ruled.
The Episcopal Diocese of Virginia should keep the property of seven breakaway parishes, a state court has ruled.
Kentucky’s governor nixed a deal that would merge state and Catholic hospitals because it would force the former to follow church ethical guidelines.
Holy men in India are seeking to outlaw a century-old ritual in which low-caste Hindus roll in the remains of food eaten by members of a higher caste, the Beeb reports. The ritual is believed to cure skin conditions.
Also in India, Muslim leaders want to ban novelist Salman Rushdie from entering his native land to attend a literary festival, re-igniting the loooong fight over “The Satanic Verses,” which is banned in India.
New York’s Board of Regents will allow yeshivas and parochial schools an exemption from elementary school curricula that teaches tolerance for religious plurality and same-sex orientation.
A West Virginia county is using its gambling revenue to help fund a “Jesus Fest.”
An evangelical pastor plans to spend 24 hours in bed with his wife on the roof of his church. Ed Young wants to encourage Christian spouses to have more sexytime – but Friday will just be pillow talk, one hopes.
Yr hmbl aggregator,
Daniel Burke
