If you aren’t reading Emma Green’s pieces at The Atlantic, let me recommend that you consider doing so.
In today’s article, she covered the religion/politics/morality/abortion angle from the VP-debate last night, and notes (with only thinly-veiled frustration) that these types of questions are important to many voters and therefore: “they should be important to moderators too.”
She also noted how revealing such questions almost always are–not least because of their capacity to tap into the deepest part of a candidate. Interestingly, Green noticed that in debate filled with loud and sometimes bullying cross-talk, the one time the two candidates got quiet and careful (and even introspective) was when they were asked about how their faith informs their politics.
Like Green, I hope moderators of future debates press tops of the tickets on these kinds of questions.
Thanks for the link, Charlie. I am kind of bemused at myself and at us as a country – for despite the fact that so many of us profess either a religious faith, or belief in even a vague spirituality – we are very hands-off about being open to that discussion. We like to believe faith and politics don’t mix, even as we know – from across the political spectrum – such is not the case.