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Hudson & Fournier: Catholic Countdown to Election 2012 - Day 34: Playing the Mormon Card

This playing of the Mormon card by a caller representing Obama contradicts the promises made by Obama himself and the head of his campaign, David Axelrod - not to mention being insulting to Catholics with the accompanying presumption that such prejudice appeals to them.

WASHINGTON, DC (Catholic Online) - The anti-Mormon push calls to Catholic voters were first reported here at Catholic Online.

Since the first of the two reports, the story was picked up by Peter Roff at U.S. New & World Report  --'Obama Supporters' Dirty Tricks to Win the Catholic Vote"

Roff's story was then published on the Drudge Report with the headline -- 'Push Calls Ask: How can you support a Mormon?' and was subsequently posted on Laura Ingraham's web site  -- 'Obama supporters' dirty tricks to win Catholic Vote.'

The latest iteration of the story can be found on the front page of www.redstate.com  -- 'Obama Campaign Uses Bigotry in a Push Poll.'

The U.S. News & World Report story by Peter Roff as of now has received over 180,000 views, and one can only imagine how many read it through the links on the Drudge Report, LauraIIngraham.com, and redstate.com.

These kinds of headlines are making the Obama Catholic supporters, and the Obama campaign, very unhappy. Calls and emails are being circulated that this story is not true, that it was misrepresented.

Obama's Catholic surrogates are denying it happened.

As far as we can tell none of these skeptics are even aware of the second story that provides the name, city, and parish of the woman who received both push phone calls.

Both callers read from the same script and both callers denied President Obama supported abortion, denied Planned Parenthood supported abortion, touted the valiant efforts of the 'nuns-on-the-bus,' and asked specifically about the faith of GOP president candidate, Mitt Romney:

"How can you support a "Mormon" who does not believe in Jesus Christ?"

This playing of the Mormon card by a caller representing Obama contradicts the promises made by Obama himself and the head of his campaign, David Axelrod - not to mention being insulting to Catholics with the accompanying presumption that such prejudice appeals to them.

Democrats consider themselves more naturally disposed towards tolerance than Republicans on the whole, therefore, this eruption of bigotry on the phone lines is hard for them to swallow.

Those Obama supporters scurrying around today trying to quash the story are driven at the most fundamental level by a firm conviction that "one of their own" could possibly be guilty of such a repellent remark.

We would advise those who are trying to discredit this story, or who are pushing emails around saying it's untrue, not to get very far out on that limb, lest it break fairly quickly.

The best course of action is to determine where the calls are coming from, stop them, and reprimand whoever is responsible for such a bigoted script.

If someone from the Obama campaign were to call Joy Allen and apologize, that would be an extremely civilized and appropriate gesture!

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