Reply #106: Two issues here. [View All]

First, on religion.

Lots of Clark supporters gleefully skewered Dean for talking about his religion, calling it "pandering." I didn't see you or other Clark supporters telling them that was wrong -- if I missed that detail, I apologize.

Second point is:

THIS issue, narrowly defined by the original post, is how Dean prefaced his statements by saying he knows a lot about the Bible. Then he gets a very basic, elemental fact about it wrong.

But the fact, despite being basic, is pretty irrelevant to the subject of his speech, and since virtually everyone makes mistakes from time-to-time, focusing on it is a virtual "gotcha." And as I've mentioned before, if other candidates had the same degree of scrutiny, with "gotchas" in there, they'd be raked over the coals just as hard -- including Clark.

For those of us who understand real faith (rather than fundamentalism), such a minor mistake is no big deal. For fundamentalists who are offended by such a mistake, neither Dean nor Clark are their candidates -- Bush is. For campaign groupies such as ourselves who choose to nitpick opposition candidates to death, it's a big deal only in that you get an "ah-ha!" at your competitor's expense.

In any event, it's not a productive exercise.