6 minute read
News
from Oct. 25, 2012
If prayer counts, some religious groups are ready for the November election.
Paycheck message
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The Reno-Sparks Chamber of Commerce has provided employers with a “paycheck stuffer”—a list of candidates that will fit inside a paycheck envelope—and is encouraging them to “print out, copy ... and insert [it] into your paycheck envelopes.”
The candidates are about who would be expected— conservatives, plus inevitable winners in non-competitive races who under other circumstances would not get the time of day from the Chamber.
“Studies have shown that employees trust the recommendation of their employers when it comes to political matters and candidates,” reads an accompanying letter from Chamber lobbyist Tray Abney. “In order for the business community to have an impact on this election, we need to get the word out about our pro-economic freedom candidates. That means ensuring that this endorsement list is distributed beyond the people in your company who receive this email. It means making sure that every person in your company has this list in their hands when they go into the voting booth.”
The list does not include a choice for the presidential race.
Warning film
There’s a movie that is getting praise from both right and left.
The Forbes magazine film critic called it a “chilling documentary about the portrayal of women and its impact on young girls and boys.”
The Mother Jones film critic wrote that it describes the “dangerous potential side effects for girls sitting on the other side of the screen.”
It is Miss Representation, a movie that takes on the portrayal of females by the media—advertising, television, movies, etc.—and the way that portrayal shapes the self image of young women, drives rates of ill-health and depression, reduces school performance and ambition.
A preview can be seen at www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gkIiV6konY.
There will be a local showing of Nov. 8 at the McKinley Center, 925 Riverside Drive, Reno, 5 p.m.. Donation, $20, students $10. The Reno showing is sponsored by the Nevada Women’s Lobby.
School’s out
In a postcard mailed to voters about Democrat Debbie Smith, the State Senate campaign of Republican Kathy Martin reported, “Smith has been in the Legislature for 11 years with Nevada’s low ranking education, it is no surprise that the Nevada State Education Association gave her a ‘D’.”
Education coulduse help, if only to do something about run-on sentences and comma splices.
School’s in
The state jobless rate in September dropped to 11.8 percent from 12.1 percent in August. Washoe County unemployment fell from 11.5 to 10.8 percent.
The number of new jobs statewide—about 14,600—is nearly twice the number expected. State officials attributed it mostly to new private sector hiring.
September is usually a month in which jobs jump as a result of back-to-school hiring, but it was uncertain what would happen this year because the state’s population growth has leveled off.
—Dennis Myers
Political prayers
There are religious vibes headed Nevada’s way
If the ears of Nevadans are burning, it may be because they are the targets of by remote prayer in the weeks before Dennis Myers Election Day. Across the nation election prayer guides are being distributed, some of them tailored to Nevada and the other swing states. They mostly— but not entirely—reflect evangelical Christian concerns. Remote prayer—also called intercessory prayer—has mostly come to public attention when used to try to affect the health condition of sickly people. The election purpose, however, is to “return to the foundations of our nation—foundations that are based solely on the Word of God … to become engaged ‘in the spirit’in this battle for the future of America,” according to one of the guides.
40 Prayers in 40 Days Booklet
There are at least three or four of the guides and they are not just used by the groups that originated them. They have been recycled by other religious groups, a practice encouraged with verbiage like, “This article may be freely downloaded, provided copyright statement and links are included.”
Most of the Christian guides are imprecisely worded. They do not usually reference specific issues, presumably because they expect that the users of the guide know their own minds. Where they are vague, they still contain language that manages to communicate messages.
Intercessors for America, a group based in Purcellville, Virginia, has produced a guide, “Spiritually Swinging the Swing States,” that is the most specific and detailed of those available. IFA’s guide has an entry on each swing state, provides background for those states, and recommends particular approaches in prayers for the different states. For Colorado, for example, it discusses the importance of women and Latinos as voting blocs and then suggest prayers that the votes of the state’s women “be motivated by a desire to seek goodness, opportunity, and to follow a path of wisdom, that their decisions would be neither selfseeking nor self-defeating. Pray for responsible choices, the protection of unborn life, commitment to family, and personal fulfillment in marriage and in singleness.” For Colorado Latinos, other types of prayers are recommended: “Ask the Lord to shield them from busyness, apathy, cynicism and misinformation on election day.”
Sources listed for each of these state entries are news coverage. In the case of Nevada, the authors relied on reports in the Salt Lake Tribune, Washington Post, and United Press International. UPI has been a favored media source in evangelical circles since it was purchased by the Unification Church in 2000. Though it is not specifically cited, the Nevada entry in the guide appears to draw especially on an Aug. 11 piece by David Montero in the Salt Lake Tribune (“Latino vote key in Nevada, a swing state ravaged by housing crisis”).
The Nevada entry first discusses voting laws in the state, particularly voter identification and the “displacement of voters” as a result of the high mortgage foreclosure rate. It claims that union members will be active in “pushing back against voter ID laws.” However, Nevada does not have a voter identification law, at least at the polls. Only in registering are voters required to produce identification.
The guide then describes the job situation in the state. In its next section it highlights Latinos as the key voting bloc in the state. Finally, it recommends prayers, advice that is less specific than in the case of some other states:
“Intercede for voters to register and engage. Pray for those undergoing economic difficulties in Nevada and specifically Washoe County. In the midst of their struggles, pray that the Lord would guard them from cynical or naïve thinking, that He would grant them a balanced perspective and remarkable foresight.” It then recommends Proverbs 23:1-7 as particularly applicable to Nevada.
The IFAguide takes a particular interest in U.S. Senate races and provides descriptions of the candidates that are fair and respectful. In the case of Nevada, Democrat Shelley Berkley is portrayed in part as working hard to create jobs in the state and obtaining funding for renewable energy projects. Her opponent, Republican Dean Heller, is described as having worked for transparency in elections and for consumer protection when he was secretary of state. It has little on his record in the House, where he began serving in 2007, or the Senate. He was appointed to the Senate last year.
Riots?
Another guide, written by David Butts, was produced by Harvest Prayer Ministries, which publishes Prayer Connect magazine. Its recommendations for prayer are more general than in the IFAguide. It suggests prayer for candidates so that each “come to know the fear of the lord so that they will walk in wisdom throughout this long campaign
