David Brooks doesn't want to let the liberals have their "essential truths" remain unchallenged. You know the one about how Bush only one because he turned out the bible-thumping homophobes.

As an aside, I heard about a half-hour of Al Franken's show yesterday. I enjoyed Al's commentary which seems pretty informed and middle-of-the-road, but all his callers and guests could talk about was how ignorant everyone else who disagreed with them were.

The Values-Vote Myth

Every election year, we in the commentariat come up with a story line to explain the result, and the story line has to have two features. First, it has to be completely wrong. Second, it has to reassure liberals that they are morally superior to the people who just defeated them.

In past years, the story line has involved Angry White Males, or Willie Horton-bashing racists. This year, the official story is that throngs of homophobic, Red America values-voters surged to the polls to put George Bush over the top.

This theory certainly flatters liberals, and it is certainly wrong.

Here are the facts. As Andrew Kohut of the Pew Research Center points out, there was no disproportionate surge in the evangelical vote this year. Evangelicals made up the same share of the electorate this year as they did in 2000. There was no increase in the percentage of voters who are pro-life. Sixteen percent of voters said abortions should be illegal in all circumstances. There was no increase in the percentage of voters who say they pray daily.

Read the whole thing.