Governor Bill Richardson, quite rightly, counsels Democrats that they must connect with voters' values if they are ever to regain political power.

The problem is: How, exactly, are the Democrats going to do it when they have leaders like Chuck Schumer, who sees no place for people of faith in American politics?

What the Democrats seem to have forgotten is that, for mainstream American voters, it is their religious convictions that shape their "values" -- and that it's pretty hard to appeal to the latter while deriding the former.