Poll of the day.

Via Yglesias, a Gallup survey that asks...

If your party nominated a generally well-qualified person for president who happened to be Mormon, would you vote for that person?

A mere 22% said no. That the number is so small reflects a failure of civics education in America. It's worse than it looks, actually, since no small part of that group doubtless would reject a Mormon candidate because of their own religious fundamentalism, rather than for the simple fact that any religious fundamentalism, (and to be a practicing Mormon is, by definition, to be a Mormon fundamentalist) is inconsistent with Constitutional governance in the United States.

If your religious faith requires you to ignore physical science, disregard recorded history and abandon human reason, well, regardless of your other attributes, you're not qualified to lead the secular liberal government that the framers purposely designed. Every educated American should know that.

With so many fundies of so many stripes vying for the Republican nomination, it needs to be said.

Poll of the day.

Via Matt Yglesias…



Since the "progressive" label has been adopted by folks ranging from the DLC to Dennis Kucinich to mean, well, anything they want it to mean, it's not surprising that folks would be confused about whether they are one.

Of course, as Yglesias points out, there's plenty of confusion about "liberal" and "conservative" as well, but I think that's based more on ignorance than the genuine puzzlement that attaches to "progressive."