Letters to the Editor
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re: well duh
Obviously that's only true if the percentage of defections of social conservatives among Democrats is equal to or greater than the percentage of such defections among Republicans.
I don't think that anyone will argue that there aren't social conservatives in the Democratic party, but it's reasonable to expect that if the religous right made good on its threats to run a third party candidate, the net loss would go to the Republicans. Whether the loss would be great enough to tip the election is another matter, but if such a third party candidate were expected to have a neutral or even beneficial effect for the Republicans, there wouldn't be much purpose behind Dobson's threat, would there?
However, maybe Dobson really is just a deluded old man who doesn't have as much clout as he thinks he has, but in that case Bush has certainly wasted a lot of time and effort (and dare I say, political capital) courting him.