The most important event at either national convention was the "vote" taken by the Democratic delegates on a last-minute resolution to reinsert the words "God" and "Jerusalem" into the Democratic Party platform.
Regarding God, since Karl Marx, the aim of the left, everywhere on Earth, has been a godless society. And the Democratic Party has evolved over the last half century from a liberal party into a leftist one -- so much so that it is now indistinguishable from any of the leftist parties in Western Europe.
Yes, Franklin D. Roosevelt was a left-wing president -- as concerned the size of the state and its role in the economy. That is of great importance, of course. But an ever-expanding state is only half of the left's agenda. A thoroughly secular society is the other half. And in that regard, Franklin Roosevelt was no man of the Left. He regularly spoke of the need to defend and preserve "Christian civilization" and of the centrality of the Bible and religion to American life.
Here are three representative statements by FDR:
"On this day -- this American holiday -- we are celebrating the rights of free laboring men and women. The preservation of these rights is vitally important now, not only to us who enjoy them but to the whole future of Christian civilization" (Labor Day, September 1, 1941).
"We guard against the forces of anti-Christian aggression . . ." (Madison Square Garden, Oct. 28, 1940).
"The world is too small to provide adequate "living room" for both Hitler and God. In proof of that, the Nazis have now announced their plan for enforcing their new German, pagan religion all over the world -- a plan by which the Holy Bible and the Cross of Mercy would be displaced by Mein Kampf and the swastika and the naked sword" (State of the Union Address, January 6, 1942).
However, by the mid-1960s, to speak of militantly atheistic Communism's threat to Judeo-Christian civilization the way Roosevelt spoke of the Nazi threat to it was to invite left-wing mockery. "Godless communism" was dismissed as laughable.
So, it is not surprising that whereas previous Democratic Party platforms all contained references to God, the 2012 party platform committee voted to remove any such reference.
The 2008 Democratic Party platforms had included this sentence:
"We need a government that stands up for the hopes, values and interests of working people, and gives everyone willing to work hard the chance to make the most of their God-given potential."
Obviously the removable of only the words "God-given" was deliberate. The question is, why?
The answer is simple: America's left wants a godless society here in the United States, just as Europe's left has created such a society there -- and the Democratic Party is run by the left. To anyone who watched or just heard the "vote" among the ones on the floor of the convention, it was clear as day that at least half of the Democratic delegates wanted the words "God-given" and the reference to Jerusalem as Israel's capital to stay out of the party platform.
Democrats and liberals respond that the charge that the left aims to establish a godless America is a calumny because millions of Democrats believe in God. Indeed, the delegate who introduced the resolution, former Ohio governor Ted Strickland, introduced himself as an ordained minister of the United Methodist church.
But this response is a non-sequitur. The fact that tens of millions of Democrats and liberals (though relatively few leftists) believe in God is unrelated to the fact -- I repeat, fact - that the left wants a godless society.
Why, then, do many God-fearing Americans support a party and movement dedicated to removing God from as much of American life as possible? Because they are naive about the left.
The removal of the reference to Jerusalem as Israel's capital was equally revealing and significant. The left thinks that Israel is just as responsible as -- and often more responsible than -- the Palestinians and other Arabs and Muslims are for the Middle East conflict, and the United States must therefore be scrupulously neutral between Israel and its enemies as if there is a moral symmetry between them.
And finally, the convention vote itself was revealing. The blatant lie -- enacted in front of a national audience no less -- that two thirds of the delegates voted "aye" for the resolution was a classic example of how the left behaves when in power.
In his address to the Democratic convention, former President Bill Clinton noted that even a broken clock is right twice a day.
What is true for a broken clock, however, is not true for a broken moral compass.
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