This Saturday, 34 churches in Florida will host a viewing of “One Nation Under God,” which is being promoted as a “two-hour premiere DVD event featuring top American thinkers and political leaders who will bring the truth about God and America to people gathered in homes and churches across the nation.” The event is a thinly veiled national get-out-the-vote push for the religious right.

According to the event’s website, speakers include some big names in the Christian right: David Barton, James Dobson and Lila Rose of the anti-abortion group Live Action, to name a few. Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich is listed, as well.

The website calls for people to gather their friends and family in their homes or in churches on Nov. 12 to watch the video.

“Together, you’ll learn how to view history and current events in light of God’s Word, and how to take action that aligns with His truth,” the site says. “You can make a difference – one person, one household, one neighborhood at a time! Tools, tips, and timelines for a successful party will be provided.”

John Stemberger, president of the anti-abortion and anti-gay Florida Family Policy Council, is also listed as a participant in the event. Stemberger recently attended the Florida Renewal Project’s Pastors’ Policy Briefing. The “briefing” was aimed at getting churches and religious leaders involved in elections. Media outlets were barred from the event and a reporter was even escorted away from the meeting between presidential candidates Rick Perry and Gingrich and pastors.

Right Wing Watch reported that Stemberger recently appeared on a conference call for Champion the Vote, a California-based religious voter mobilization effort. During the call, Stemberger reportedly promoted “One Nation Under God” and warned that America is being “fundamentally transformed into a different type of culture, a different country” and said that “we will lose this beautiful thing we call America”:

According to Stemberger, only Christians are capable of creating a free society. “As only the Christian presuppositions of theology created this country,” Stemberger said, “only Christians can save it and unless the church rises up, we’re done.” He went on to say that without the resurgence of the church, “our country’s going to slip away into something we don’t even recognize.”

The Texas Independent’s Mary Tuma reported that this weekend’s event is the next step in a swell of religious voter mobilization efforts leading up to 2012:

Following “The Response,” American Family Association founder Don Wildmon sent a an e-mail message to those who’d registered for the event, encouraging them to become involved in the group’s effort to register 5 million new conservative Christian voters. To achieve the goal, CTV is asking 100,000 “champions” to register 50 people in their community, as the Texas Independent recently reported.

Bill Dallas, head of United in Purpose (UiP), the group leading the CTV initiative, has created a business and carefully crafted voter mobilization model around the event by fusing repackaged media and a detailed data mining project to reach those committed unregistered Christian voters.

Dallas’ crew plans to film the meetings and edit them down to a two-hour session called “One Nation Under God.” The repackaged event will be aired on Nov. 12 and can then be purchased by “host” churches and individuals.

Dallas expects about 1,000 “house parties” and 2-300 churches to take part in the November event. The hosts are not only instructed to air the reformatted briefing but have undergone an intensive eight week voter mobilization training session with CTV that include Webinars, conference calls, newsletters and a training kit. The hosts make up CTV’s base– the ‘champions’ assigned to reach out to the thousands of potential voters.

According to the event website, there are currently only about 100 sites — 34 of those are in Florida churches.

Watch a video promo for “One Nation Under God”:

The Colorado Springs, Colo.-based, group, which James Dobson founded in 1977, is projected to end the 2011 fiscal year, on Sept. 30, with a $105 million budget; however, Focus only brought in $90 million to $95 million in donations this year. The organization is responding to the funding reduction with a 7-percent staff reduction.

“God has never promised us a certain budget number,” said Gary Schneeberger, vice president of communications for Focus on the Family (FoF), in a statement.  “He’s only called us to spend the money He provides responsibly and to help as many families as possible. That’s what we’ll continue to do.”

In the last 10 years, FoF’s staff has been reduced by more than half. In 2002, FoF had about 1,400 employees; once the layoffs go through, it will have about 650 people on staff.

FoF has blamed reduced donations on the economy.

“Many nonprofit and for-profit organizations have had to close their doors due to the ravages of these tough economic times,” Schneeberger said. ”We’re encouraged by our donors’ trust in us and will continue to honor and earn it.

“Tears have been spilled on both sides of these decisions, because these aren’t numbers on a spreadsheet,” he continued. “These are friends who share our passion to do the Lord’s work. Given economic realities, though, we had to ensure we continue to maximize the resources we have to help spouses in their marriages, help parents raise their kids and help Christians walk out their faith with boldness and joy.”

In the past three years, FoF — along with its Washington, D.C.-based affiliate the Family Research Council – has used its donations to fight initiatives to legalize same-sex marriage at the state level. In 2008 (PDF) and 2009 (PDF), the group contributed about $200,000 to anti-gay-marriage political campaigns in California, Maine and Washington, D.C., according to financial statements submitted to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). FoF donated about $50,000 Exodus International, the country’s larges “ex-gay” ministry. FoF also spends significant funds on donations to crisis pregnancy centers and on supporting anti-abortion-rights ad campaigns throughout the country. This year, FoF paid for a controversial anti-abortion-rights Super Bowl commercial that starred Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow.

Many of FoF’s state-based affiliates have benefited from a massive political funding campaign called “Ignite an Enduring Cultural Transformation,” where funds are funneled to states with majority-Republican control to oppose same-sex marriage, abortion rights and transgender rights. As The American Independent has reported, most of the Ignite plans were launched with an anonymous matching-grant donor, and FoF has claimed it has no involvement in the program despite being “fully associated” with its affiliates.

FoF experienced a slight budget surplus in 2008, ending the year with about $130 million in revenue. The following year however, FoF ended the year with $109 million in revenue and a $12 million deficit. Further budget reductions in 2010 led the organization to eliminate more than 100 jobs.

No serious GOP candidate can risk avoiding South Carolina and its influential players. As the Washington Post recently reported, South Carolina’s Republican primary has “accurately predicted the GOP presidential nominee for the past three decades, often in campaigns that revolved around guns, God and gays.” Thus far in the race, the state has been host to the first GOP debate and the debut of Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann’s campaign, in Myrtle Beach.

Recently, Palmetto Family Council (PFC), a Focus on the Family affiliate, sent candidates a challenge, accompanied by an indicators report (PDF), showing that South Carolina’s crime and welfare rates are exceeding the national average, which PFC President Oran Smith attributes to reduced rates of heterosexual marriage within the state.

“Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Jon Huntsman, Gary Johnson, Barack Obama, Ron Paul, Tim Pawlenty, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum, what will you do as president to help us rebuild our families? We need your help and leadership,” said Smith in the statement sent to candidates.

So why should the presidential hopefuls be concerned with appealing to the Palmetto Family Council? Because the state listens to the group.

Since it formed in 1994, PFC has pushed a political agenda relative to its conservative Christian attitudes, especially on issues related to marriage and abortion rights. A featured link on Palmetto’s homepage jumps to a reprint from the Columbia, S.C.-based Christian magazine Reach Out Columbia, which lists 24 state legislative issues that the group was “actively involved in” between 2005 and 2008. The top issue on the list is the constitutional amendment prohibiting marriage between gay men and lesbians that was passed in 2007. In 2006, Palmetto stated its “top priority” was South Carolina’s anti-marriage-equality amendment.

Increasing PFC’s influence, some of the organization’s board members are connected politically, Chad Connelly in particular. In May, Connelly was elected chairman of the South Carolina Republican Party. Connelly, like most of PFC’s board members, also serves on the board of PFC’s lobbying arm, Palmetto Family Alliance.

President Oran Smith has been a critic of groups with social agendas using public money, when it comes to agendas he disagrees with. Last year, Smith was particularlyoutraged when the city oftwColumbia installed rainbow flags leading up to the South Carolina pride parade. Following the debate earlier this year on the 2011 federal budget, Smith praised the U.S. House GOP for trying to strip Planned Parenthood of federal family-planning funding. He criticized the South Carolina legislature for not removing family-planning funding from the state budget. In a blog post dated May 11, Smith wrote: “Last week, Democrats fooled the GOP into believing that banning state taxpayer funded abortion in the state health plan would ‘endanger billions in federal Medicaid funds’ until Americans United for Life and the Department of Health & Human Services set the record straight.”

Yet, in recent years, Palmetto Family has also received federal grants to develop abstinence-education programs. As The American Independent previously reported, PFC is among several organizations affiliated with James Dobson’s Focus on the Family (and, by extension, the Family Research Council) that have received taxpayer money while simultaneously campaigning –- through Palmetto Family Alliance -– in support of legislation that limits marriage to heterosexual couples.

In 2008, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services awarded the Palmetto Family Council a five-year development grant as part of the federal Community-Based Abstinence Education Program (CBAE), administered by the Administration of Children and Families (ACF). PFC was one of only four* South Carolina funding recipients for a program that was founded on the belief that “abstinence is the surest way to avoid out-of-wedlock pregnancy and STDs.”

At the time, Palmetto stated it would use the award to fund a two-part strategy to promote abstinence — in community-based “abstinence clubs” and in online social networking websites such as Facebook and MySpace. On its website, PFC asserts that “teenagers need to remain abstinent from sexual activity because of their inability to think rationally.” PFC’s views fit in with the requirements of the grant program, which aimed to, among other things, teach children that “sexual activity outside of the context of marriage is likely to have harmful psychological and physical effects.”

The award amounted to $600,000 annually between 2008 and 2013, for a total of $3 million. However, because the Obama administration eliminated funding for the CBAE program in its fiscal year 2010 federal budget, PFC only received approximately $1.2 million of this money, according to HHS’s Tracking Accountability in Government Grants System (TAGGS).

In 2004, ACF awarded PFC $50,000 for a “Targeted Capacity-Building” grant, part of the federal government’s Healthy Marriage Initiative, a program partly developed withinfluence from a report (PDF) produced by the Institute for American Values. National Organization for Marriage (NOM) President Maggie Gallagher is credited with the research and editorial assistance of the first edition of this report, published in 2002.

The Palmetto Family Council did not return repeated requests for comment regarding these federally-funded programs.

More recently, Smith introduced his challenge to the presidential candidates — theFamily ’12 campaign — during a recent press conference in Columbia outside the Lincoln Street building Palmetto shares with a Starbucks. According to The Post and Courier, Smith said the breakdown of family and marriage is inhibiting South Carolina from prospering economically.

“The failure of the family is not only a social crisis or moral crisis; it is a fiscal crisis,” Smith said during the conference, as reported by The Post and Courier. “When family life isn’t healthy, there are huge financial costs for government and even business.”

*Correction: TAI previously stated PFC was one of only two CBAE-funding recipients in South Carolina. In fact, it was four. We regret the error.

As The American Independent recently reported, the Palmetto Family Council is using its state’s influential primary status to communicate its top issues to the presidential hopefuls. These are issues — among them marriage, abortion and religion in public life – that Palmetto has lobbied over in the past while receiving federal money for faith-based programs. And Huntsman is the first to show his allegiance to Palmetto’s causes.

Anticipating its first-in-the-South GOP presidential primary, the Columbia-basedPalmetto Family Council (PFC) recently sent out a Family ’12 challenge to all the presidential contenders asking them “to make family a centerpiece of their campaigns.” The challenge was accompanied by an indicators report showing that South Carolina has higher crime and welfare rates than the nation has a whole.

In an email to supporters, PFC President Oran P. Smith said Huntsman’s letter (pdf) was delivered Friday. Smith also indicated other candidates have “expressed interest” in Palmetto’s Family ’12 campaign, which essentially asks candidates to present solutions they would enact as president to restore family life.

From Huntsman’s letter (PDF):

As I stated at the Faith and Freedom Conference last month, “I do not believe the Republican Party should focus only on our economic life to the neglect of our human life. That is a trade we should not make. If Republicans ignore life, the deficit we will face is one that is much more destructive. It will be a deficit of the heart and of the soul.”

[...]

I agree with you that the decline of the family seriously threatens our future in America. Broken families not only lead to broken spirits — they lead to increased poverty, homelessness, crime, and government dependency.

[...]

As Governor of Utah, I signed some of the nation’s toughest laws to limit abortion and defend those who cannot defend themselves. We made second-trimester abortions illegal, required parental consent for minors, and allowed women to learn about the pain their aborted child would feel. My goal is to bring these pro-life, pro-family values to the White House.

[...]

I applaud the Palmetto Family for your FAMILY ’12 project. The research you have done clearly illustrates just how important it is to restore America’s Foundation.

On one hand, this is no surprise. The three banks’ presidents are, respectively, Thomas Hoenig, James Bullard and Richard Fisher — all known as inflation hawks, more concerned with low rates leading to inflation than with high rates leading to unemployment. It is not a sign of an imminent rate increase either. (The Federal Reserve banks don’t set their own rates. Additionally, to be clear without getting too deep in the weeds here, the primary credit rate is different from the federal funds rate, and it impacts how much banks pay to borrow from the government rather than how much consumers pay banks for loans.)

Indeed, last month, for the sixteenth month in a row, the Federal Reserve recommended keeping the federal funds rate low for an “extended period”: “With substantial resource slack continuing to restrain cost pressures and longer-term inflation expectations stable, inflation is likely to be subdued for some time. The Committee will maintain the target range for the federal funds rate at 0 to 0.25 percent and continues to anticipate that economic conditions, including low rates of resource utilization, subdued inflation trends, and stable inflation expectations, are likely to warrant exceptionally low levels of the federal funds rate for an extended period.”

Still, it demonstrates that more major figures within the Federal Reserve system are advocating a consideration of rate increases.

Senate candidate Trey Grayson, Kentucky’s Republican secretary of state, received the early backing of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and soon became regarded as the favored GOP candidate to succeed Sen. Jim Bunning (R). The NRSC created a joint fundraising committee with Grayson, Dick Cheney and other GOP figures offered their endorsements, and other lawmakers quickly signed on to support Grayson’s campaign.

But then Grayson began to sink in the polls and GOP anti-Washington candidate Rand Paul, eye doctor and son of Ron Paul, began gaining traction. Sarah Palin, Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) and Bunning all came out with endorsements for Paul, and Focus on the Family chairman James Dobson switched his support from Grayson to Paul.

As we head into tonight’s race, Public Policy Polling has Paul leading Grayson by 18 percentage points.

Back in Pennsylvania, Specter has seen his status go from “major coup” for the Democratic party to candidate for whom the party isn’t willing to trot out the top brass. Vice President Joe Biden was actually in Pennsylvania yesterday, but chose not to make a stop for Specter. Barack Obama last appeared with Specter at a rally in September.

Voters in Pennsylvania did see Obama’s image in a campaign commercial this cycle, but the ad used old footage and was financed by Specter’s campaign. When asked about the White House’s involvement in the race, Specter told The Associated Press: “They’ve done everything we’ve asked them to do.”

Specter tonight faces Democratic Rep. Joe Sestak; polls show the race is a toss-up.

In Arkansas, Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D) is being challenged from the left by Lt. Gov. Bill Halter, and the two appear likely to be forced into a runoff (a candidate must win a majority tonight to avoid a runoff, and there are more than two candidates present in this competitive race.) Though the president did not personally step in to help Lincoln, he did record a robo-call for the senator. Additionally, Lincoln’s party is attempting to protect her legislatively by delaying a vote on her derivatives language.

Polls show Lincoln’s chances of coming out ahead tonight are better than Specter’s and certainly better than Grayson’s, although an outright majority may be out of reach.

Either way, considering the anti-incumbent/anti-Washington mood in the country these days, behind-the-scenes help instead of visible support from Washington may be just what candidates are looking for this cycle.

In other races around the country tonight:

• Pennsylvania 12: The special election to choose a successor to John Murtha will coincide tonight with the state’s regularly scheduled primary. Democrat Mark Critz, a former aide to Murtha, is competing against Republican businessman Tim Burns for the chance both to serve out the remainder of Murtha’s current term and to appear on the November general election ballot to serve out the next full term beginning in January.

• Kentucky Senate (D): State Attorney General Jack Conway and Lt. Gov. Dan Mongiardo are locked in their own competitive primary for the Democratic nomination. Additional Democrats are running. A competitive general election race is expected for this open seat in November.

• Oregon Governor: Voters are choosing candidates for the open gubernatorial race tonight. On the Democratic side, former Gov. John Kitzhaber is the likely leader over former Oregon secretary of state Bill Bradbury. Chris Dudley, a former professional basketball player, is regarded as the top Republican heading into tonight’s race.

• Arkansas Senate (R): Former Rep. John Boozman is expected to place first in tonight’s GOP primary, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he’ll be able to avoid a runoff. Former state Sen. Jim Holt appears likely to come in second in the GOP race.

During an interview today on Dobson’s radio program, Palin said she believes, from the bottom of her heart, that McCain supports these elements of the platform. Here’s the transcript:

[DOBSON]: …But I am telling you the Republican platform is the strongest pro-life, pro-family document to come out of a political party. Even more so than the platforms during the campaigns of Ronald Reagan. There are principles there that just, I’ve been fighting for, for 30-40 years and you are trying to articulate those same principles, aren’t you?

[PALIN] Absolutely. And Dr. Dobson thank you so much for recognizing that. This is a strong platform. [inaudible] around the planks in this platform that respect life and respect the entrepreneurial spirit of this great country. And those things, back to the social issues that are what Republicans at least in the past had articulated and tried to stand on. Now finally we have very solid planks in the platform that will allow us to build an even stronger foundation for our country. It is all good and it is encouraging, you would maybe have assumed people would have, that we would have gotten further away from those strong planks. But no, they are there, they are solid, we stand on them and again I believe that it is the right agenda for the country at this time. Very, very clear and contrasted tickets in this election, November 4th. People are going to see the clear contrast, just go to the planks in our platform and that is where you see them.

[DOBSON] In your private conversations with Sen. McCain, is it your impression that he also strongly supports those views? I know that he did not oppose that platform when it was written. Do you think he will implement it?

[PALIN] I do, from the bottom of my heart. I am such a strong believer that McCain believes in those strong planks and we do have good conversations about some of the details too, about the different planks and what they represent. And I’m very heartened that John McCain, he doesn’t want a vice president who will check the opinions of me at the door and we talk about some of these. And they are very important. It’s most important though, as you are suggesting that Americans know that John McCain is solidly there on those solid planks in our platform that build the right agenda for America.

Ambinder suggests that one of three things are possible:

Either Palin is trying to mislead Dobson, equivocate or perhaps he doesn’t know what her running mate believes. McCain opposes a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage…. He supports embryonic stem cell research…he opposes a constitutional amendment banning all abortion. Read the platform for yourself:   On abortion… on gay marriage… on stem cells.. .

Maybe McCain changed his mind?

I would offer a fourth possibility: Palin hasn’t read the Republican Party platform and therefore is just winging it with Dobson.

Palin’s rambling, superlative-laden responses sound eerily similar to her rambling, superlative-laden responses to questions posed during her interviews with ABC’s Charlie Gibson and CBS’ Katie Couric, in which she clearly was winging it.

Here is an example, from Palin’s answer to a question from Gibson about whether she believes the Iraq war was part of “God’s plan.”

I believe that there is a plan for this world and that plan for this world is for good. I believe that there is great hope and great potential for every country to be able to live and be protected with inalienable rights that I believe are God-given, Charlie, and I believe that those are the rights to life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

That, in my world view, is a grand — the grand plan.

I’m not knocking her for not having read the Republican Party platform. I haven’t read it either. However, it’s probably a good idea to err on the side of caution, rather than to wholeheartedly affirm someone else’s position on something she is unfamiliar with.