(TRUTHDIG)
By Juan Cole
Could the enormous popularity of Pope Francis spill over into American politics? Pope Francis is worried about inequality, a Democratic Party issue, and his statements and actions on the subject are a stunning rebuke to “evangelical Catholics” such as Paul Ryan, who tend rather to celebrate economic inequality or to deny it or to blame the victims. On the other hand, Francis is worried about Obamacare forcing Catholic institutions to pay for birth control for their employees, against their will.
The real reason Joe Biden is vice president is that the Democratic Party has a White Catholic problem. Irish-Americans, Polish-Americans and Italian-Americans give the edge to Republican presidential candidates over Democratic ones by anywhere from 5 to 19 points. The two extremes both occurred in the case of Obama, who received 47% of the White Catholic vote versus John McCain’s 52 percent in 2008, and who received only 40% of their vote in 2012 versus 59% for Mitt Romney. Biden was able to turn things around in that constituency in 2008, but not so much in 2012.
