Ralph Reed: Back From the Dead

Ralph Reed, the disgraced conservative political operative and evangelical leader who took secret money from former super-lobbyist and convicted felon Jack Abramoff, returned from political purgatory during the Republican National Convention last week.

Abramoff conned the directors of Indian casinos into giving him as much as $85 million to lobby on their behalf while secretly paying Reed to mobilize his Christian Coalition to lobby against the gambling operations. Abramoff pleaded guilty to three felony counts. While Reed was publicly shamed, he was found to have broken no law.

Now Reed has returned to try to convince evangelical Christians who may decide the upcoming election that Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, a Mormon, does not threaten their Christian values and thus deserves their vote. Reed claims to have been called by God to stop Barack Obama from winning another term as president. As he told a sympathetic audience at the time of his personal revival:

“This was probably three weeks after the ’08 election. My phone rang, and it was Sean Hannity, and he said, ‘Ralph, we can’t let this happen again; you’ve got to do something.’ And I said, ‘Well, Sean, I’ve been thinking about it and I’ve been praying about it,’ I said, ‘but I want to know that this is not me; I want to know that it’s not any ambition of mine; I want to know that I’m doing this for the Lord, and that’s the only reason why I’m doing it.’ And he said, ‘Ralph, God is speaking to you through this phone line right now and he’s using me to deliver the message.’ ”

Read a transcript of the segment by “Moyers & Company” here.

— Posted by Alexander Reed Kelly.

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