In the spirit of full disclosure let me lay my biases on the table. Stephen Mansfield is a dear friend, colleague and kindred spirit. What’s more, as my self-aggrandizing little banner ads to the right make clear, it’s been my privilege to be his sidekick on a couple of books in the past.

Yet if none of the above were the case, I’d still tell you that anything Stephen writes is worth reading–irrespective of topic.  For me, he’s among a very small group of favorite writers who are simply a pleasure to read.

Another is the blogger/columnist James Lileks. I’ve been following Lileks’ personal blog daily since right after 9/11. And most days it’s more gratifying to read James’ dashed-off account of his trip to Target earlier in the day than the work of most mainstream “journalists.”

Similarly, Stephen crafts such wonderful prose . . . delivers insights with such grace and musicality . . . that I’m always happy to pull up a chair when he’s telling a story–whether it’s a story about Churchill, the Guinness beer family, Oprah or the American fighting man in uniform.

In this case, the protagonist of the story he’s telling is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Colloquially, the Mormons.

Ironically, one of the key virtues of Stephen’s writing is also a reason he doesn’t sell even more books than he does (although he sells plenty.)

As you may have noticed, most of the mega-top-seller books in the realms of politics and culture are designed to inflame, not enlighten. Their success feeds on the reality that in our increasingly balkanized cultural landscape, what most people crave is the gratification that comes from having one’s existing beliefs and biases validated.

That appetite is especially understandable for conservatives and Christians who, unlike liberals, aren’t constantly being told how enlightened and virtuous and cool they are by movie plots, TV drama plots, stand up comics, sketch comics, popular songs, actors and pop tartlets. (I wrote about this at length here.)

Stephen has never shown much interest in writing that kind of book–even though he is a passionate Christian and thoroughly conservative by ideology. It’s not that he doesn’t have a viewpoint or is free from agendas. It’s just that he clearly trusts us as readers to consider the facts he has unearthed and come to our own conclusions. His prose doesn’t pry our jaws open to jam doctrines down our throats . . . he gently offers ideas for our consideration and invites us to embrace them.

In other words, Stephen doesn’t write to massage the converted. He writes to feed the intellectually hungry, to enlighten the confused, to persuade the skeptic, and to say to the antagonist, “Come let us reason together.”

Indeed one of my favorite and revealing stories about Stephen springs from a time he was a guest on Dan Rather’s HDNET TV news magazine “Dan Rather Reports.”

Naturally, Dan Rather being, you know, Dan Rather, the program’s editorial viewpoint is well left of center. And since being relegated to the icy Siberian backwaters of cable television after the “fake but true” scandal swirling around the falsified George W. Bush military service memo at 60 Minutes, Rather is fully free from the need to even pretend to be non-partisan or objective.

After taping the interview, many fellow conservatives I know might have been tempted to take the opportunity to give Rather a piece of their minds. Or at minimum, they would have been cooly polite and gotten out of there as quickly as possible. Stephen, being Stephen, instead invited Rather to join him and his bride for a steak dinner. On Stephen.

This is how he rolls.  Like another person I admire, he displays an annoying pattern of being seen breaking break with tax gatherers and sinners. A historian by hard-wiring and an evangelist by heavenly calling, Mansfield saw Rather not as an enemy to be confronted but as a potential friend to be won. His instinctive goal wasn’t a cathartic “telling off” of the man, but rather future influence in his life.

It is no accident that it was through Stephen’s keyboard that I first encountered Plato’s quote, “Be kind, for every man you meet is fighting a hard battle.”

Indeed, our joint effort on the life and faith of Sarah Palin reflects this ethic. It sold quite well. But there is little doubt that we could have sold even more books if we’d written the fawning paean that Sarah’s passionate fans clearly wanted. Or perhaps a thunderous, screedy condemnation of her petty and vicious critics–and they are legion.

But that is not the literary endeavor Stephen graciously invited me to join. Our premise was simply this:

Sarah Palin is a fascinating and unique person of deep faith who is rising in prominence and influence. Let’s examine her faith journey, explore her influences and discern her worldview. Let’s report the good, the bad, and even the ugly as honestly as we can in the service of any reader interested in learning more about her.

A reviewer for the Pajamas Media group called our book “remarkably detached.” He meant it as a compliment and that’s precisely how we took it.

Enter Stephen’s latest offering: The Mormonizing of America: How the Mormon Religion Became Became a Dominant Force in Politics, Entertainment, and Pop Culture. The quasi-alarmist title, not withstanding, this book perfectly reflects the tone and tenor I described above.

For spending a little time with Mansfield here you will be rewarded with a richer, deeper understanding of the LDS story in America–the movement’s history. And you’ll come away with a pretty comprehensive survey of the religion’s beliefs. And as he makes clear here, there are some mighty odd ones.

Nevertheless, Stephen’s handling of these is simultaneously frank, Christian and charitable.

In other words, if someone is a kook, it’s possible to point the kookiness out without being ugly or mean about it. It’s possible to examine a person’s flaws and failings without denying his or her value as a human being. And this is precisely Stephen’s way–on the street and on the page.

But accessible history and theology are just tasty bonuses here. The chewy, meaty center of the book is Stephen’s quest to discover the how and why of Mormon success in America. He asks why so many Mormons seem to do so well. And then he leads us on a journey for answers.

It’s a journey worth taking.

I have three hopes for Stephen’s new book.

1. I hope The Mormonizing of America finds a wide readership. It deserves it. It’s a lovely, illuminating and thought-provoking piece of writing.

2. If my first wish is granted, I hope it’s success does not translate into dampened enthusiasm for the Republican nominee. As I tried to explain in a previous blog post titled “About the Mormon Thing,” I don’t think Mitt Romney’s faith should deter any evangelical from the vital work of retiring Mr. Obama. Indeed, I’m not concerned that people who read the book will be less likely to vote for Romney. But I do wonder if some who just glance at the title might be.

3. Finally, I would love to see this book “provoke to jealousy” my fellow evangelicals. As I read it, I found myself realizing there is much that has contributed to the creation of what Mansfield calls “the engine of Mormon advance in American society” that used to be true of we evangelical Christians.

Put another way, many of the cultural tools Mormons are currently using to grow in influence and impact are those we left lying on the ground rusting. We should own the concepts of community, family, missional focus, discipline and achievement. But we don’t. Today the divorce rate among evangelicals is virtually indistinguishable from that of raw pagans. We’re insular. Self-absorbed. Comfort-seeking. Complacent. Defeatist.

For some Stephen’s new book can and should serve as a wake-up call. For others, it’s a sensitive, perceptive and fascinating window into a mystery-shrouded cultural phenomenon. I recommend it.

Twenty-five years ago last night, I proposed to Mrs. Blather. And as I layed out in horrifying detail in this blog post my beautifully planned, romantic proposal turned into an epic train wreck.

Inexplicably, she said, “yes.” Which immediately made me wonder about her. I, being like Groucho Marx, who once famously said, “I’m not sure I want to belong to a club that would have me as a member.”

Of course, she turned out to be a wonderful person to travel through life with–more than a wife–a best friend. Over the last two-and-a-half decades we’ve managed to live in three states; buy, fix up and sell a half dozen houses; and raise three daughters.

Those daughters are 23, 20 and 18 today. The eldest, previously known on these pages as Female Offspring Unit #1 (FOU#1), had a boyfriend. And a few months ago he called and asked if I was available for morning coffee in the next few days. They had been in a serious courtship for months. He had also been a regular and welcome fixture at our dinner table.

So although I can be a little slow, I’m not that slow. I knew what was up. This handsome, flat-bellied whippersnapper was about to muster the unmitigated gall to ask if he could have my firstborn daughter.

Nevertheless I set the coffee appointment and feigned cluelessness.

There was no question as to what my answer would be. Mrs. Blather and I had agreed on numerous occasions that we really, really liked this guy. He clearly loved God. He clearly loved her. And we agreed that should their relationship progress to the point at which marriage was considered, they would have our whole-hearted blessing.

And now it seemed that day was upon me. That blessing was about to be called for.

He asked. But I didn’t put him out of his misery immediately.

I began by describing what it’s like to be the father of a daughter. To hold that baby in your arms and feel for the first time the full weight of the stewardship responsibility.

I described how on numerous occasions when she’s small and vulnerable and dependent . . . you suddenly realize a day will come in which you hand her off to another man. And how unthinkable and strange a concept that seems . . .

How as the baby becomes the little girl, you love being her hero. Her Solomon whose vast brain holds all the answers to her questions . . . questions about where birds go when it rains  . . . or how something cold can burn your skin . . . and other mysteries of the universe. To be her Samson with the strength to lift any burden and fix all things broken . . .

To be the one she flys to when you walk in the door at the end of the day. To look into little brown eyes set in a face shaped just like yours and see nothing but trust and admiration.

To be her first dance partner . . .

I described what it’s like to think about the young man she would one day choose. To know that he was out there, somewhere, right now. To wonder how on earth there could possibly be a worthy boy who could make it to adulthood unscathed and undefiled in this nihilistic, porn-soaked, divorce-ravaged culture.

Will the one she chooses treat her as I’ve endeavored, imperfectly, to treat her mother? With gentleness and faithfulness and selflessness and honor?

“You wonder about these things,” I told him. So you pray. You pray into your daughter’s future. And you lift up that nameless boy to heaven and pray with all your strength that God will place His hand of kindness upon him. That He will draw that boy to Him with relentless, tenacious cords of mercy. And hold him by the scruff of the neck when necessary.

“In other words,” I told him, “Your hope is that when it comes time to choose, that she will choose well.”

The young man nodded, swallowed hard and waited for the verdict.

“Her mother and I believe she has chosen well,” I said. “We love you. We believe in you. Of course, you have our blessing.”

Indeed on numerous occasions Mrs. Blather and I have remarked that this young man has become in many ways the son we never had and the brother our other girls never knew they wanted. A faithful God has answered our prayers.

And as the wedding approaches, we take some solace in knowing that Jesus’ “leave and cleave” mandate falls to the husband, not the wife. (For a man shall leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife . . .”) And that this phenomenon is at the root of the old Jewish saying, “A son is a son ’til he’s married, but a daughter’s a daughter for life.”

So yes, my blessing was extended. And then a few months later on a cold late winter night, this happened . . .

This was offered and accepted.

Today preparations are well underway. Both budget and preference are making this a very small, intimate ceremony.

And so it goes. She’s still officially mine for a short while longer. But a handoff of this magnitude doesn’t happen in a day. A heart doesn’t change stewards in an evening. It moves in increments and by degrees. And whether I’m ready or not, this once-and-for-all transfer of residence of one wonderful girl’s heart has already begun. So . . .

Love her well and true, young man.  I have.  I do.

There is no shortage of water on Planet Earth. We’re literally two-thirds covered in the stuff.

There is, however, an acute shortage of fresh, drinkable water in many places. Up til now, desalinization of sea water has been a prohibitively expensive and complex technological exercise. But that may be about to change . . .

. . . thanks to Man’s new best friend “Graphene.”

Graphene is basically a chicken wire-like lattice of plain old Carbon atoms. It’s a substance that is proving to have amazing properties and a myriad of applications.

According to this report, one of them might be filtering sea water. A Graphene water filter promises to be anywhere from 100 to 1000 times more efficient than the current state-of-the-art reverse osmosis plants currently in wide use by the Saudis. (The desert oil emiriates of the Middle East demonstrate that desalinization isn’t a problem if you have unlimited funds.)

But drought happens. Always has. Always will. So for the rest of the world, this technological breakthrough holds out the promise of a radically improved quality of life for billions.

At NRO:

Obama Turns His Back on Israel at the U.N.

I am, by disposition, a glass-half-full kind of guy. I am predisposed by the Manufacturer to see silver linings, upsides and bright spots in dark situations. With that in mind, now that I’ve had a couple of days to process the recent Supreme Court decision on Obamacare, here are a few thoughts.

Certainly conservatives are almost universally dismayed (to put it mildly) that Chief Justice Roberts sided with the liberals on the court in the decision that upheld Obamacare. I am among them.

Nevertheless there is a conservative rational for Roberts’ vote, opinion and calculus. Dr. Charles Krauthammer does a pretty good job of summarizing it here. Powerline’s John Hindraker has a slightly different but still sympathetic view here. I would explain the outcome this way.

There were two conservative principles in play in this case. On one hand, there is the principle of reigning in the runaway growth/power of the national government at the expense of state prerogatives and individual liberty.

On the other hand, we conservatives had long decried activist courts striking down laws legitimately passed by duly elected representatives just because an ideologically hostile court discovered some previously-unknown “penumbra” in the Constitution.

Not long ago the citizens of the State of California voted overwhelmingly to codify the definition of marriage as being between one-man and one-woman–thereby premptively shutting the door to the redefinition of marriage in ways that would include not only gay marriage but bigamy, polyamory, incest and other creative arrangements “between consenting adults who love each other.”

And yet the U.S. Ninth Circuit recently struck down that law on contorted, absurdist, touchy-feely grounds. This is precisely the kind of “judicial activism” conservatives loathe and conservative judges like Roberts have vowed to eschew.

Thus the dilemma. The four right-leaning or libertarian-ish judges viewed the first principle–reigning in the reach of the national government– as being the more compelling of the two principles. Roberts, obviously, picked the other one.

We rightly despise liberal courts’ proclivity to “legislate from the bench.” This is precisely what Roberts’ opinion says he was trying to avoid:

“We do not consider whether the Act embodies sound policies. That judgment is entrusted to the Nation’s elected leaders. We ask only whether Congress has the power under the Constitution to enact the challenged provisions.”

If only the liberal justices with whom Roberts sided had the same philosophy. How much would you like to wager that the next time a big piece of conservative social legislation comes before the Court, those other four justices encompassed in Roberts’ “we” above will suddenly lose their commitment to judicial restrain and Constitutionality.

Liberals now mindlessly and reflexively tend to view the Supreme Court as a type of super-legislative body that should decide what policies “ought” to be (irrespective of what the Constitution says or doesn’t say) and then rule accordingly.

Hilariously Sadly, after the SCOTUS handed down the Obamacare decision, I saw numerous headlines at news site that actually said, “Court Passes Obamacare“–as if the judges were legislators voting on a bill. Of course, this is precisely how libs view the courts, but the rest of us generally know better.

Frankly, the far-better, healthier-for-the-republic, more-conservative approach for preventing the rolling economic and cultural catastrophe of Obamacare is to elect Romney to the White House and fill Congress with men and women pledged to repeal it. And then legislatively yank the thing out of the law books by the roots.

Indeed this is precisely what Chief Justice Roberts clearly hopes will happen. In his majority opinion he wrote:

It’s not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices.

True enough. In strictly Constitutional terms, if the American people are dull-witted or greedy-for-other-people’s-money enough to put Obama, Pelosi, Reid, Frank, Dodd, Rangel & Co. in charge of the nation–as they did via the elections of ’06 and ’08–it’s not technically the role of the courts to reverse them–provided the legislation passes some generous minimum level of Constitutionality.

Robert’s opinion explicitly states that he found the Affordable Health Care Act cleared that minimum level–but it is hard to read it without concluding that Roberts had to squint, look-crosseyed, and directly repudiate everything Obama and the bill’s backers claimed about it in order to do so.

So that moves the battle for economic freedom to November. Some, though not all, knowledgable political observers think the Court’s decision enhances Romney’s chances. I pray they’re correct.

As I said, I’m an optimistic guy. But if, come November, Republicans don’t take the White House and healthy majorities in both houses of Congress facilitating an immediate reversal of Obamacare and Obama’s toxic blend of nanny-state socialism and Crony Capitalism, it’s going to be tough to keep alive any rational hope for a renewal of freedom and opportunity.

American decline will be baked into the cake. Irreversible. And it’s hard to see a silver lining in that.

I’ve always been a geography nerd. And I’m obsessed with maps. So a few minutes ago I stumbled across a photograph that explains why . . .

If I was Charles Foster Kane, this would be my “Rosebud.” When I was four or five my Mom bought me the U.S. map puzzle depicted above. I couldn’t believe it when I saw the pic. What a flood of memories.

The pieces are made of wood. Man, I loved working that thing. To this day, I see that puzzle in my head when I need to visualize the relative positions of the states. It also explains why I’m always a little fuzzy about the the geography of New England. (All those tiny states were fused together into one piece.

When our girls were little, I looked in vain for anything like it.

{Update: Bad link fixed. Sorry.)

A kindergarten graduation program in the Gaza Strip:

More over at Powerline.

This is a blog post I drafted in my mind back during the heat of the Republican primaries. It was more timely then than now. And it’s almost certain to offend more people than it pleases. So naturally, here I go . . .

There has been much speculation about how Evangelicals voters will respond to the nomination of Mitt Romney–a Mormon. Will the enthusiasm and support Republican nominees usually enjoy from Evangelicals be dampened with a Mormon at the top of the ticket? Will a critical percentage of them simply stay home on election day?

Four years ago when Mitt Romney was battling John McCain for the nomination, much was made of a survey which indicated that a majority of evangelical Christians would not vote for a Mormon candidate for president. Of course, that was before they  experienced three years of “Christian” Obama–the most pro-abortion, pro-union, anti-capitalist, arguably anti-American president in our nation’s history.

Perhaps that’s why recent surveys reveal evangelicals are warming up to the idea of voting for a Mormon–a man with whom they share a lot of common values if not a common faith. Nevertheless, some still consider the prospect alarming, as this new book by my old friend and co-author Stephen Mansfield testifies.

Some Food for Thought for My Brethren with Mormon Qualms

I hear some of my fellow evangelicals declare that they can’t vote for a Mormon because Mormons believe weird stuff . . . stuff that’s not in the Bible . . . stuff we evangelicals view as heretical. I’ve heard more than one crack about “holy underwear” in the White House.

But hold on . . . Here’s the thought that frequently occurred to me during the heat of the Republican primary.

Romney’s two principle challengers were Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich–both Roman Catholics. From a strictly evangelical perspective, don’t Roman Catholics believe a lot of weird stuff? Stuff that’s not in the standard evangelical Bible? Stuff that we Protestants at one time viewed as so heretical that rivers of blood were shed for the freedom to dissent.

We could play a game. Name a bizarro Mormon doctrine and I’ll name an equally bizarre Catholic one. I’ll see your magic underwear and raise you a transubstantiation. I’ll see your Golden Tablets and raise you a papal infallibility or a perpetual virginity of Mary.

Please don’t misinterpret what I’m saying. I’m not calling for evangelical avoidance of Catholic candidates. On the contrary, I think the support many evangelicals gave Rick Santorum was appropriate and reasonable.

I’m saying I’m puzzled by evangelicals who can think nothing of voting for Rick Santorum but recoil at the thought of voting for Mitt Romney.

I personally am less interested in a candidate’s personal faith than I am his political philosophy and the policies he or she will pursue if elected.

Frankly, some of the worst and most disastrous presidents we’ve had over the last five decades were church-going Protestant Christians:

• LBJ (Disciples of Christ)
• Richard Nixon (Quaker)
• Jimmy Carter (Southern Baptist)
• Bill Clinton (Southern Baptist)
• Barack Obama (United Church of Christ)

Ronald Reagan, on the other hand, was initially viewed with a lot of wariness by evangelicals because he “never went to church.” I don’t think the country can survive many more church-going presidents like Carter or Obama.

Follow your own conscience. But as for me and my house, we’ll vote for the most conservative electable candidate irrespective of what he believes about God or underwear.

Not a Nickel’s Worth of Difference?

Of course there are those who contend it doesn’t matter which party’s candidate get’s elected in November. That there’s “not a nickel’s worth of difference between them.” I usually hear this assertion from my friends who have classified all candidates for president into two groups:

1. Candidates who are named Ron Paul
2. Candidates not named Ron Paul and who are therefore statist, globalist, insufficiently libertarian and evil.

From these friends I hear that the Candidate-Not-Named-Ron-Paul will still allow the country to drift in a statist direction–if admittedly less severely than Obama will shove it. (And trust me, if Obama is reelected, his second term will make his first look like his right-wing phase.)

I’m sorry, but the argument that if Car A will take you toward a cliff at 80 miles per hour and Car B will take you toward the same cliff at 35 miles per hour, it doesn’t really matter which car you climb into strikes me as a ridiculous one.

So, come November, I’ll be casting my vote for Romney. And I’ll feel great about it.

About a year ago I wrote a couple of ranty blog posts about the way husbands and fathers are portrayed in television commercials.  These:

Madison Avenue’s Go-To Guy – The Clueless Husband/Father

More on Doofus Dad/Hapless Husband

As Providence would have it, these posts came to the attention of Joshua Levs, a writer for CNN, working on a piece for CNN.com centered on that very topic. He shot me an email asking if he could interview me for the piece. I agreed. And a few days ago it published:

No more dumb old dad: Changing the bumbling father stereotype

I was a little nervous about the angle the piece would take (it being CNN and all) but I thought Levs produced a very good, very fair piece of journalism.

Sadly, the advertising industry’s lazy habit of defaulting to the Doofus Dad/Hapless Husband schtick shows no signs of diminishing. The most recent example that has my wife and I rolling our eyes is the Valspar paint spot in which the standard “all-knowing, all-wise, ever-patient” wife asks the standard “bewildered” husband to grab a magenta paint chip from rack at the home improvement store.

It didn’t make it into the CNN article but one question I was asked by the author was, “What’s the harm?” In other words, why should we be alarmed or dismayed about this trend?

My response was, “The issue isn’t whether this trend of pandering to women by disparaging men creates a specific harm. The interesting question is what the trend reveals about us as a culture.” I contend that a culture that happily holds fatherhood, husband-hood up for consistent ridicule and mockery is a culture in trouble.

Finishing the most recent book project meant I could finally take a weekend to run up to the hills of southeastern Oklahoma and check in on my mom.

It’s been more than a year-and-a-half since dad passed away so she usually has a healthy “honey do” list for me on those too-rare occasions I can visit. This was no exception. In fact, two nights before I arrived a thunderstorm knocked down a large tree behind the house.

A chainsaw was borrowed and the fallen tree was dispatched.

The demise of the tree above is good news for the tree it was crowding–a peach tree that was so laden with fruit this last weekend that several of the branches were bowing nearly to ground level.

Went to church with mom on Sunday morning. It’s the same small sanctuary I attended between the ages of 5 and 18. The aisle I walked at the age of eight looks the same. The same pews are in place. Only the upholstery color has changed.

My best friend from high school is now the Music Minister/Associate Pastor there. He has succeeded in introducing a few touches of modern worship to the place. They still sing the old hymns but now instead of turning to Hymn #245 in the Baptist Hymnal, the words are projected onto a screen. And a few classic praise choruses have been gingerly inserted into the song service. Nothing too radical or current. But progress is progress in this corner of Oklahoma.