'The Enemy' Within: My Strange Trek To The Values Voter Summit

I had a pang of nostalgia as I walked into the hotel hosting the recent "Values Voter Summit" in Washington and picked up my official delegate credentials at the registration booth.

This conference was sponsored primarily by Tony Perkins' FRC Action, but it brought back memories of my many similar visits to Christian Coalition conclaves held during its heyday. Although slightly smaller (perhaps 1,700 people) than its predecessor, the summit had familiar features like a "radio row" of second-tier Christian broadcasters and an array of booths hawking anti-abortion DVDs, right-wing bumper stickers and even "battling booths" promoting two competing Bible courses for public schools (each claiming the other was dangerously off-base).

One thing the Christian Coalition and its speakers never did was give much attention to their opponents. Although the ACLU or Planned Parenthood might get a fleeting reference, Pat Robertson, Ralph Reed and other luminaries usually did not give their ideological adversaries the pleasure of being singled out by name.

Organizers of the Values Voter Summit felt differently. One of the first sessions was a dialogue featuring Perkins, James Dobson of Focus on the Family and Alan Sears, chief lawyer for the Alliance Defense Fund. They began with general statements about how pastors needed to get involved in the political system. Dobson said he had some hesitancy about jumping into politics this year because he didn't think the Republicans had done enough on "profamily" issues, but then quickly explained he changed his mind "because the alternative is terrible."

That sure sounded like a clarion call to pull the Republican lever, touch the Republican part of the electronic screen or check off the Republicans on your absentee ballot for all offices from city dogcatcher to U.S. senator.

Although the session was long on rhetoric and I may have been nodding off, I came to full consciousness when I heard an attack on Americans United and me personally. As Dobson, Perkins and Sears were telling it, AU is trying to intimidate pastors and scare them into silence.

This was a reference to about 117,000 letters AU sent to religious leaders in 11 states, warning them about Religious Right efforts to politicize churches by offering them biased voter guides. Summit speakers were not keen on these letters. One even recommended using them to line bird cages.

But then Dobson surprised me. He told the crowds that he knew I had registered for the event and said he'd like to meet with me. He even called me a "nice guy."

After such an invitation, I had no choice but to find a security officer and say, "I'm the guy Dr. Dobson said he wanted to see." As arrangements for me to go backstage were being made, a gaggle of conference attendees had spotted me and many were pulling out their camera-equipped cell phones and were clicking away. It was a kind of rock star moment: The fans (or in this case, the non-fans) wanted proof they were there at some possibly historic event.

I met with Dobson, his wife Shirley (head of the "National Day of Prayer Task Force") and Perkins around a circular table. We examined specific "voter guides" put out in the past by some of FOF's associated state groups. I had complained about misleading questions, inflammatory rhetoric and the obvious (to me and any literate person) fact that these were designed to get voters to go GOP.

Dobson disagreed. He insisted they were all fairly written questions and said the guides were good for church distribution. It was a largely amiable 40 minutes, but I left confident there would be no fall bonfires with the voter guides crackling on the fire.

As a parting gesture, I gave Dobson an autographed copy of my new book, Piety & Politics. I hope he reads it.

The next day, during a panel on religion and politics, the Rev. Herb Lusk (whom we once reported to the 1RS for his pulpit endorsement of George W. Bush during the 2000 GOP convention) had another take on me. Rising from his seat and pounding on the podium he said: "The enemy is out there. I know that name is Barry. But we won't mention his name today or ever again. We know who our enemy is. The more you call the enemy's name, the larger he becomes."

None of this unduly disrupted my sleep cycle or caused stress-induced overeating. I am pretty thick-skinned. However, other sessions featured an escalating tide of extreme rhetoric that was truly stomach-turning.

Bishop Wellington Boone called gay men "sissies" and "faggots." William Bennett, alleged "virtue czar" of the Right, endorsed the form of torture known as waterboarding (and received a standing ovation for it). Ann Coulter spewed invective and received crowd adoration.

Sometimes, though, it is in the humor that one sees the most damaging confessions. At one point in the conference, Dobson told what he intended as a warm and fuzzy story of how he took his son bear hunting, and they each killed one. Then he said sharply, "Those of you who don't like hunting, and if that story offends you - get over it!"