Los Evangelicos

-- by Sara

A new Pew Foundation report just out this morning tells us that 37% of American Hispanics now identify as Evangelical Protestants, making it the second-largest religion after Catholicism in that group.

It's a short article, but full of worthwhile stuff -- including the fact that Hispanic Evangelicals are anti-gay and anti-choice in even higher numbers than their white co-worshippers (61% to 77% and 67% to 86%, respectively).

Which would appear to leave a great big opening for the GOP, as the article also notes. "Bush-Cheney '04 campaign manager Ken Mehlman called the Latino vote "the single most important number" that came out of the 2004 election. More recently, in a piece posted on The Politico, Mehlman stated: "The majority party in the 21st century will be the party that reaches out to Hispanics."

It's almost like that whole Republican anti-immigration thing never happened. Like the GOP is going to capture these "family values voters" handily, even as its immigration policies keep their families separated for decades, allow employers to treat them like slaves, and leave their brothers, sisters, and cousins dying in the desert. Gay marriage and abortion only distract people for so long when they can't get workman's comp for the fingers they lost after a 10-hour day in the meatpacking plant; or the hotel refused to pay them (again); or other Republicans decide they're fair game for assault simply because they're brown.

Coyotes and Minutemen and thousand-mile fences -- that's some real nice "reaching out to Hispanics," there, Ken. (Can't wait to see what else you cook up before the 2008 elections that will further endear you to these people.) The thing of it is, though, that the GOP is so inherently racist, all the way down in its DNA, that they don't even really notice the ways in which they contradict themselves -- let alone recognize the ways in which they're abusing the very people they readily admit they depend on most to ensure their own future.