Tipsheet

Sowing Religious Division

Writing on the Obama campaign Dashboard, a supporter suggested that Obama proponents start a "whisper campaign" against Mormonism, designed to appeal to evangelical Christians in the south (http://www.buzzfeed.com/mckaycoppins/obama-volunteer-suggests-anti-mormon-whisper-campa).  The post remained for four days until Buzzfeed contacted the campaign about it, after which it was hastily removed.

As polls tighten, expect more focus on Mormonism -- both openly and crassly as by the above-referenced Obama supporter, and also with a veneer of disingenuous "coverage," as in the pending "reports" from ABC (http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/08/22/abc_world_news_does_four_minute_segment_on_mormon_church.html) and NBC (http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_TV_NBC_MORMONS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-08-23-10-03-54). The goal is transparent -- an effort to offer the Obama campaign an assist in its longstanding, cynical attempts to paint Romney as "weird," not incidentally at the expense of a religious group filled with good, law-abiding, patriotic Americans.