Story summary:
In this part of the country- halfway between Sioux City, Iowa, and Sioux Falls, S.D.,- separating religion from politics is folly. Religious conservatives here were energized by President Bush's public declaration of faith and handed him a landslide in 2004. With growing sway in the state GOP, they recently captured a prominent party leadership post. "It's just kind of a tepid response," he said. "McCain really hasn't convinced them he has the same fervor about the appointment of judges, about the right to life."
Stirring her morning coffee, lifelong Republican Grace Droog voiced her doubts — and those of many evangelical voters — about what she isn't hearing from John McCain in this year's presidential election.
"I look for something about his faith," she said. "It's very important, it's what our nation was founded on."
Her pal Joan Rens nodded; she, too, wants McCain to talk about his religious beliefs. "I wish he would so we would know how he stands on his religious views and where his faith lies," she said.
In this part of the country — halfway between Sioux City, Iowa, and Sioux Falls, S.D., — separating religion from politics is folly. Religious conservatives here were energized by President Bush's public declaration of faith and handed him a landslide in 2004. With growing sway in the state GOP, they recently captured a prominent party leadership post.
"When they get on fire, it's Katie bar the door," said Rock Rapids businessman George Schneiderman, who worries that McCain isn't generating that excitement.
"It's just kind of a tepid response," he said. "McCain really hasn't convinced them he has the same fervor about the appointment of judges, about the right to life."
In the ongoing AP-Yahoo News Poll, only 10 percent of white evangelical Christians say they are excited by this election, compared with 20 percent of Americans overall. A third of these evangelicals said they were interested in the election, but half said they were frustrated by it.
Nevertheless, they support McCain over Obama by 62 percent to 18 percent. Although the AP-Yahoo News Poll is of all adults, not the smaller, more energized group of likely voters, McCain's figures lag behind Bush's showing among white evangelical Christian voters in the 2004 election, when exit polls indicated 78 percent supported him.
In some parts of Iowa, overall turnout in 2004 was 20 percentage points higher than 2000, virtually all of it an energized Bush vote.
A prosperous hamlet of 6,300, Sioux Center is home to 17 churches, 13 of them with the word "Reformed" in their name, a sign of a strong evangelical presence. In 2004, 16,000 people in the county voted, 14,000 of them for Bush.