Religion and politics

By Tom Quiner

If Obama makes Romney's religion an issue, he makes Jeremiah Wright an issue

Reverend Jeremiah Wright

I don’t expect Barack Obama to talk about Mitt Romney’s Mormonism.

The question is, will his surrogates?

The Obama campaign will do so at their peril.

They have already demonstrated a profound hostility to the Catholic Church and practicing Catholics. That vote alone may swing the election.

If they begin beating up on Mormons, they are simply building on the narrative that Obama doesn’t like the religious. After he was caught on tape denigrating those who love their bibles and guns, we got a glimpse into that man’s opinion of those who hold religious views very much in keeping with America’s rural tradition.

If his team takes a cheap shot, suddenly Obama’s religion will be back on the table. And his faith, as he has made clear, was formed by the Reverend Jeremiah Wright.

Much has been written about President Obama’s mentor. This tasty morsel, delivered the week after 9/11 says it all:

“We bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon, and we never batted an eye. … We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and black South Africans, and now we are indignant because the stuff we have done overseas is now brought right back into our own front yards. America’s chickens are coming home to roost.”

If Mitt Romney’s religions is an issue, so is Barack Obama’s.

It’s just that simple.