http://www.buzzflash.com/farrell/04/03/far04007.html'On a Mission From God': The Religious Right and the Emerging American Theocracy by Maureen Farrell
"The religious right is winning. They've won." -- Howard Stern
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So how embedded is the religious right in our political institutions? In his aptly titled Jan. 28, 2004 Rolling Stone cover story, "Reverend Doomsday," Robert Dreyfuss explains: "It might seem unlikely that the commander in chief would take his marching orders directly from on high -- unless you understand the views of the Rev. Timothy LaHaye, one of the most influential leaders of the Christian right, and a man who played a quiet but pivotal role in putting George W. Bush in the White House."
LaHaye, you may recall, is co-author of the various Left Behind series, which, to date, has sold a reported whopping 60 million copies. A "strict biblical reconstructionist" who takes the Bible as "God's literal truth," LaHaye believes that Armageddon will be unleashed from "the Antichrist's headquarters in Babylon" (i.e. Iraq).
"Of course, there have always been preachers on the margins of the religious right thundering on about the end of the world," Dreyfuss writes. "But it's doubtful that such a fanatic believer has ever had such a direct pipeline to the White House. Five years ago, as Bush was gearing up his presidential campaign, he made a little-noticed pilgrimage to a gathering of right-wing Christian activists, under the auspices of a group called the Committee to Restore American Values. The committee, which assembled about two dozen of the nation's leading fundamentalist firebrands, was chaired by LaHaye."
In other words, Toto, we're not in Kansas anymore, and the religious right wants to be the great and powerful Oz. For your consideration, here are some of the means by which they're succeeding:
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