If McCain loses, what next for conservatives?

By Ed Stoddard - Analysis

DALLAS (Reuters) - If Republican John McCain loses the November 4 election as most polls predict, his party may be in for a rough period of soul searching.

Analysts and some party activists say losing the White House will highlight the pitfalls of relying too heavily on a narrow foundation of conservative Christians whose support has nonetheless become crucial to Republican electoral success.

But some social conservatives say a victory for Democrat Barack Obama, whom they regard as an "ultra-liberal," will energize them for the 2010 congressional "mid-term" races and the 2012 White House battle.

The election is still over a week away and a lot can happen between now and then. McCain has staged huge comebacks before.

But almost every major poll has Obama with a commanding national lead as his campaign benefits from an unfolding financial crisis that has shaken America and knocked conservative red-meat issues like abortion and gay marriage off the political stage.

"An Obama victory will galvanize social conservatives for 2010 and 2012 and they will look for a standard bearer they can rally around," said Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, the public policy arm of America's largest evangelical group.

Land told Reuters the candidate most likely to "rally the troops" under an Obama administration looked to be McCain's running mate Sarah Palin.

The Alaska governor has excited the evangelical base but her strident opposition to abortion rights and other hard-core

conservative positions have alienated more moderate voters.

William Donohue, president of the conservative Catholic League which opposes abortion rights, said religious conservatives were bracing for a new phase in the "culture wars."

"I've been on the phone the last couple of days with some of my friends ... and we're getting ready for the biggest culture war battles ever," Donohue said.

"There is nobody in the history of the United States who has run for president who is a more enthusiastic supporter of abortion rights than Obama," he said.

President George W. Bush took almost 80 percent of the white evangelical vote and was the favorite of many socially conservative Catholics during the 2004 election.

In fact religious conservatives have played a key role in every Republican victory since Ronald Reagan's in 1980, which some analysts say shows the party cannot win without them.

Evangelicals account for one in four U.S. adults according to some estimates, giving them serious clout in a country where faith and politics often mix.