My wife and I attended two out of three classes at a conservative Christian church regarding voting in the upcoming election.  The first class was OK, but there were issues with the voting guidelines on "why people vote" the way they do vote.  The reason people don't vote "Republican" is that they don't know any better.  Basically, anyone who votes for the "Democratic" party or candidates is an uneducated or uninformed individual.  If they really "knew" the issues (which are extremely limited), they would see the light and vote Republican.

The class began with an individual claiming they were being persecuted at work because they are Christian.  After questioning this individual on their persecution, it came out that someone allegedly said something that "bothered" them.  When it was discovered that they were bothered, the alleged offender apologized and nothing has happened since that time.  Yet, this person is "persecuted".  One thing I have noticed about conservative Christians is they have a "persecution complex". 

Then, the leader brought up issues regarding "liberal" book banning, which was refuted by a librarian in the class.  Lastly, the idea of an "activist" Supreme Court came up (activist only with Roe v.Wade, not Bush v. Gore).  At the end of the first class, their was good discussion but the goal is to make sure you vote Republican.  One caveat, these conservative christians do not like John McCain, but they love Sarah Palin.

My wife and I missed the second class.  But, during this class they came up with the "important issues" (Abortion, homosexuality, stem cell research, etc) which would be discussed during  the third and last class.  The economy, War in Iraq & Afghanistan, poverty, health care did not make the cut.

The third and last class was basically if you don't vote Republican, you are anti-Christian based on their "important issues".  There was a lot of blatantly racist and ignorant remarks about voting and voters.  They are against Voter Registration Drives and basically feel you need to be able to somehow show you are "educated" enough to vote (ie-vote Republican).  During the third class (remind you this is a "christian" church), I discovered that some conservative christians view the poor as the enemy.  The poor are greedy and want what the rich have.  The poor want "redistribution of wealth".  When I asked about the "redistribution of wealth", our tax dollars, to the already extremely wealthy, that was just fine by this group.  So, "redistribution of wealth" to the poor=bad, but to the rich=good.  And they didn't even get the hypocrisy of their position.

After the class, I was cornered by three of the members who wanted to know who I was going to vote for.  I told them Obama.  When asked why, I said there were many reasons, but since the Republicans have destroyed the economy and Democrats typically have good economic programs--it was time to put a Democrat in the Whitehouse to turn the economy around.  This response was just "socialism".  Yet, when I told them what we've had under Republicans was "socialism for the rich" and "destruction of the middle class", I just got a blank stare.