Religious Right will draw blood tomorrow

Sarah Palin, queen of oogedy-boogedy, recorded a Va. robocall, mostly about herself. She also endorsed the New York 23rd District Conservative Party candidate, turning that race on it's head.

In April conservative columnist Kathleen Parker was mulling the obituary of the Religious Right - the oogedy-boogedy branch of the Republican Party. And tomorrow, very much alive, they're likely to romp here and there.

Progressive Sara Posner writes:

From Virginia to New York to Maine, the religious right is playing a key in tomorrow's off-year elections. The reports of its death were greatly exaggerated.

. . .

Every other election cycle or so, the religious right makes noises that it might have to form a third party of its own. Although the likelihood of success for Christianist third party is nil, this "values voters" grandstanding is not an empty threat. It moves GOP candidates, particularly in the primaries, to the right. They can't win without the Christian right money or ground troops.

She then conducts a tour of races in which the Religious Right has imposed its will, most notably in NY-23 where, win or lose, Sarah Palin & Co. ejected a Republican moderate and put a Conservative Party candidate in the lead.

They're not the same, but the search for a redeeming new name isn't on the minds of the prevailing Religious Right leaders tonight. That doesn't mean they're really back in electoral charge, however. It means they aren't dead.

Did someone seriously think they would be dead? They have long made their political living by manipulating a target audience they know well and they are, of course, still good at it.