Say it loud and say it proud: Roy Moore for president.
He may not be tanned (too much time in TV studios), and he may not be rested, what with the speeches God has called him to give, but he's ready. And while he might seem like just another Bible-brandishing freak from the state that gave us George Wallace and Johnnie Byrd, he may also be the answer to Democrats' prayers.
Roy Moore, you will recall, is the ex-chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court. He was kicked out of his job for refusing to remove a 21/2-ton boulder with the Ten Commandments carved on it from the middle of the Alabama Judicial Building. Ever since then, Moore's supporters have been descending on Montgomery, prostrating themselves on the Capitol steps, praying that the nation will turn from godlessness to, well, Judge Moore, and following him to Ten Commandments pep rallies all over the country to holler their support and ask for his autograph. They're like Dead Heads crossed with Taliban.
There aren't that many of them, but they are committed. The current regime has alienated them. "Why Christians Should Not Vote for George W. Bush," a recent essay on IntellectualConservative.com, praises Moore and tears a strip off Bush for tolerating baby killers, sodomites, feminazis, and the socialist Jews controlling Hollywood. Mooreites don't see a dime's worth of difference between the Republicans and the Democrats. They want to vote for somebody who thinks like them. Even if he can't win. Even if he were to play the spoiler.
Sound familiar? Ralph Nader and his small but significant band of unthinking acolytes used the logic of the righteous cause, as opposed to political pragmatism, when they helped elect George W. Bush last time. They're using it again this time. Roy Moore is every bit as likely as Ralph Nader to actually become president of the United States. So Democrats should hope that Moore gets in to balance Nader. Let's have a double-spoil, a spoil-off. That seems fair and balanced, doesn't it?
Some speculate he'll go with the Constitution Party, with its 320,000 registered members and ballot access in at least 40 states. Others want to keep him in the Republican Party a while longer. Nader took 97,000 votes in Florida in 2000. He currently polls between 3 and 6 percent here. But Florida voters are a diverse lot. Surely a Leviticus-quoting, government-dissing white man who posts antiabortion and antigay poetry on his Web site can pull an equivalent or even greater number in a state where some see Senate President Jim King as a dangerous liberal. Moore could make the difference.
Indeed, Moore has a built-in Florida base at Coral Ridge Ministries, one of those Wal-Mart superstore evangelical outfits, located in the Gomorrah that is Fort Lauderdale. Coral Ridge is an opinionmaking behemoth, with television and radio shows, and even a lobbying outfit in Washington called the Center for Christian Statesmanship. Coral Ridge's pastor, Dr. D. James Kennedy, has been hot on Moore ever since the first suit was filed against him by the ACLU and the Southern Poverty Law Center. Coral Ridge raises money for Moore's "legal defense fund," even as Moore tries to stick the taxpayers of Alabama with the bill for his battalion of lawyers. For $19.95, they'll sell you a videotape of Moore sneaking the Ten Commandments rock into the Alabama judicial building in the dead of the night in 2001.
Moore acts like he's running for something. He gave a pulpit-thumping speech in January at a Christian Coalition jamboree in Atlanta. The Journal-Constitution said he was treated "like a rock star." He's a favorite with the Fox Network and recently appeared on a TV show in Alabama, hosted by indicted HealthSouth financier Richard Scrushy to bond over being persecuted by The Man. And Moore-watchers point out that George Bush himself has given the disgraced judge a reason to challenge him: in a recess appointment, the president put Moore's nemesis, former Alabama Attorney General Bill Pryor, on the 11th Circuit. Pryor, maybe desperate to look less reactionary than he is, refused to support Moore's Ten Commandments crusade.
John Kerry's campaign black ops ought to seize the day, start chunking discreet money at Moore, get a "Run, Roy, Run!" Web swell going. Ralph Nader is already getting lots of nice, fat contributions - from Republicans.
- Diane Roberts, a former Times editorial writer, is a professor of English at the University of Alabama.
