...with James Dobson of the Focus on the Family which I only caught the very end of. During the interview, Bill Hemmer pressed Dobson to discuss ties with the Bush campaign and in particular his approaching KKKarl Rove to influence the republican platform and the direction that the administration should take. Dobson refused to discuss his associations with Karl Rove and also dodged Hemmer's questions refusing to answer in any direct way. I was just waiting for Bill Hemmer to nail James Dobson with, "So, were you and your religious right wing conservative Dominionists part of the neo-conservative conspiracy that stole this latest election?"
Here is the transcript of that interview which I just found at the CNN web site:
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0412/23/ltm.02.htmlHEMMER: In our week-long series, "They've Got the Goods," we're profiling people who have made 2004 a year to remember. This morning, James Dobson is founder of Focus on the Family. Some say President Bush has conservative Christians to thank for his second term in office. In part one of my interview I asked Dobson why 2004 was such a good year for the religious right.
JAMES DOBSON, CHAIRMAN, "FOCUS ON THE FAMILY": Well, I think it's a whole lot broader than religious right. That has become kind of a pejority term. But actually, I think the president owes a good part of his election not only to evangelicals, which is a better term, from my perspective, but from conservative Catholics, and from mainline Christians who happen to have had some of the same values. So I think it was broader than what you call religious right.
HEMMER: So you would accept some of the credit, then, for the re-election in 2004, then?
DOBSON: Well, we worked pretty hard at it. But I'm not, you know -- an awful lot of people that get the credit for this. There are people involved all over the country, there are people volunteering, people praying, people involved in various ways, and so, I think it would be very arrogant for anybody to start taking large chunks of credit here.
HEMMER: Let me try and go back to my first question here. Anti- gay marriage ballot measures passed in eleven states, all eleven that had them. 22 percent of voters in exit polling said moral values were their biggest concern in 2004. If you put that together, you consider it a pretty good year?
DOBSON: I do. And again, I would quibble with your terminology. Those elections were not anti-gay. They were pro-marriage. They were efforts to strengthen the institution of marriage. And I think maybe more than any other issue, other than the Supreme Court, that that determined the outcome. And it was a good year.
HEMMER: In 2000, you did not actively support the president's campaign. Why did you consider it so critical in 2004 to be out there in front?
DOBSON: You know, I have never endorsed a presidential candidate until now. Because I was president of Focus on the Family, Focus on the Family's a nonprofit organization, and I didn't want to drag it into the political arena. I have now stepped down as president. I'm chairman of the board, but there's some distance there. And that allowed me personally to endorse the president. Focus on the Family is still a nonprofit organization, and it could not be actively involved in the elections, although those moral issues that you talk about were very, very important to us.
HEMMER: What kind of contact did you have with Karl Rove during the campaign?
DOBSON: Well, I wouldn't say that I was on the phone with him every day. And I have talked to him and to other people within the White House. But, we are not an operative for the Republican party or for the White House. We supported the things we supported because we believe in the moral values that were at stake. And also, because we're very concerned about John Kerry. So this was not an orchestrated thing. Our part in it was not orchestrated by the White House at all.
HEMMER: Give me a better sense of that. Did you approach Karl Rove, or did he approach you?
DOBSON: My conversations with Karl Rove were off the record, and I really wouldn't be willing to talk about that.
HEMMER: Would you tell me if you went to him or he went to you first?
DOBSON: No, I wouldn't -- I wouldn't be prepared to talk about that at all. I can just simply tell you that what we did was motivated by our own value system, our own concern, and you know, we have 250,000 letters and phone calls a month. I knew where the people are out there who draw strength and information from Focus on the Family. And so that's where our motivation came from.
HEMMER: You said this recently and I'll quote you on this, you said now, "This year I had to do everything I could to keep the loony left from capturing the United States Supreme Court and shaping its liberal decisions for the next 25 years." I don't know if you've answered that just yet, but if you haven't, why did you make that change for 2004?
DOBSON: I'm not sure what change you're talking about. I have been concerned about the Supreme Court for a long time. So that's not a new perspective.
HEMMER: I guess the change I'm referring to is the low profile you took in 2000, and then the change you took for 2004.
DOBSON: Well, I -- no, I took a high profile on the Supreme Court a long time ago, but that's different than endorsing political candidates and especially presidential candidates. We were very, very concerned about the Supreme Court, and still are, because of the attack on religious liberty. I mean, this has been going on for 43 years now, going back to 1962, when the Supreme Court struck down the right to pray in schools, or have Bible reading in schools, or the Pledge of Allegiance in 2002, I think it was. You know, there's been this continuing attack on religious liberty.
And if John Kerry had had the opportunity over perhaps eight years to make as many as four or five Supreme Court appointees, that could have set in place a system of beliefs and values that would have stayed with us for maybe the rest of this century.
HEMMER: Listening to you, I get the sense of accomplishment from you. Is that a fair reading?
DOBSON: You know, that would be an arrogant reading. I really didn't go into this by trying to accomplish something personally. That's not what I'm all about at this stage of my life. You're looking at man who cares very, very deeply about the family, about children, about marriage, about unborn children, about taxes on the family, the marriage penalty tax, many of those kind of issues. And that's where I'm coming from; that's what motivated me. This was not an effort to try to, you know, aggrandize myself in any way.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HEMMER: In a moment, my conversation with James Dobson does not end there. If the president does not deliver for evangelicals, what are the consequences for the White House? Back with more after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HEMMER: Back to my conversation now with James Dobson, talking about the political influence his and other conservative Christian groups will have in the next four years.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HEMMER: If the president does not follow the evangelical agenda is there a danger for him?
DOBSON: Well, I think there's a danger for any president who does not do what he promised to do during the election. And so I don't think evangelicals are asking much of President Bush that he hasn't already said that he wanted to do. So he will be accountable, not just to evangelicals, but to the people who voted for him across the country. In terms of his own...
HEMMER: I apologize.
Do you find a risk in there if he's going to alienate moderates, independents in order to keep, in the larger picture, the Republican Party strong across the board?
DOBSON: Well, I think as the president you have to decide what you stand for and then tell the people what you stand for, and then stay true to it after you are in office. And I believe President Bush will do that. If he alienates some, again, what you call moderates or liberals, then you're going to alienate somewhere, somebody all along the line.
HEMMER: Focus on the Family fought hard against the appointment of Arlen Specter to head the Senate Judiciary Committee. You lost that battle. But at one point, you said, and quoting now, "he will assume his new position on a short leash." Who's holding the leash? Is it you?
DOBSON: No, I think his own colleagues are holding the leash. It was pretty clear that they were not happy with what he did. And why would they be? I mean, the day after this enormous victory occurred, after President Bush had come to Pennsylvania more than 30 times to campaign for Senator Specter, he comes out there and tells the world that he is going to oppose the president on the issues, especially life, and judiciary, the issues that he ran on. I mean, that's breathtaking, and I've never seen a politician do anything quite like that in terms of timing. And so he alienated his Republican colleagues, and they're the ones that have put him on a short leash.
He has now written a statement that he is accountable to, and I think if he violates his own statement, which has been released to the public, I think he will be removed as the chairman of the Judiciary Committee.
HEMMER: You are going to have midterm elections in this country in 2006, another race for the White House in 2008. Do you believe politicians running for the White House from this point forward have to change their own focus in how they address evangelicals in America as a result of this past race?
DOBSON: Well, it depends on whether or not they want the support of evangelicals. I think this constituency is more sophisticated now than it was 10 years ago. They're more involved. Churches are more involved. More pastors were involved in getting their people registered to vote. And I think it behooves politicians to think about that. But what else is new? There are all kinds of constituencies out there, and politicians have to decide how to deal with them. This is just another one. It happens to be, I think, a very influential one at this stage in history.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
<Note to DU Admin: To snip this piece seems to detract from reading it in it's entirety. But if it needs to be trimmed, then I'll do it, but under protest>
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