Religious voters could doom the Democrats

FT.com / Comment & analysis / Comment - Religious voters could doom the Democrats: "Howard Dean, Democratic National Committee chairman, is famous for his loose lips and exuberant vocal chords, which may help explain the muted reaction to his recent warning about religious participation in public life. A few months ago, Mr Dean told the Christian Science Monitor that the “religious community” would have to decide “whether they want to be tax exempt or involved in politics”.

It was not the most intelligent thing he could have said, given the current state of church-state relations in the US. Mr Dean tried to contain the damage by explaining that he was not pushing for challenges to the tax exemption of conservative churches. He was simply warning against giving congregation lists to political parties and other forms of prohibited political action by bodies of worship."