“There is a culture of obedience in this country, but it’s probably no more evident than in most parts of Utah,” Anderson told NEWSWEEK in an interview. “That’s why we’ve seen the highest approval ratings here for this entirely corrupt, disastrous presidency.” As for Romney, his “opposition to abortion and stem-cell research is a very different Mitt Romney than the one who ran for governor of Massachusetts. I felt that Mitt Romney was a man who could really bring people together in a nonpartisan fashion, who would always stand up for the highest ideals and not worry about the polls … I can only think this is a man who’s caving to what his handlers want him to say.”
As a Democrat and former Mormon, Anderson does not represent LDS views. But political scientists at Brigham Young University do say there’s a surprising diversity among LDS voters. For starters, Mormons tend to vote regionally: more liberal in Blue States and more conservative in the Red States. And though they are almost universally socially conservative, they are much less predictable on the question of big government versus small government, for example, which means they’re up for grabs on issues like health care. Jeff Fox, a researcher at BYU, has studied Mormon voting patterns. Most Mormons, he says, have supported the War on Terror, but “I for one opposed it completely.” Rocky Anderson may not be an LDS poster boy, but in some small circles, Mitt Romney isn’t either.
