Expose Book: James Dobson's War on America (by former Dobson Aide)

[NAO]

A former Dobson aide has written a badly needed expose of Radical Cleric James Dobson. (For those who do not remember, Dobson is the fundamentalist extremist who issued a Fatwa on SpongeBob Square Pants.)

Description from publisher (Prometheus Books) website:

Former Dobson aide and Focus on the Family co-founder Gil Alexander-Moegerle offers an insightful and detailed expose of this religious power-broker and his strong-arm corporation. Religious author and White House Family Conference task force member James Dobson formed the Focus on the Family corporation in 1977, a group that currently boasts plenty of political clout on the religious right, a $100 million budget, and a membership three times the size of Pat Robertson's Christian Coalition. This psychologist-turned-family-values-guru has a personal agenda so ambitious that Forest Sawyer of ABC News called him, "one of the most powerful men in America," while John Hockenberry of ABC noted, "On Capitol Hill, he's treated like some kind of powerful lobbyist." Although he may not be as well known as Jerry Falwell, Jim and Tammy Bakker, or Jimmy Swaggart, Dobson commands loyal legions who will do his bidding without question. And, like many moralists who call themselves "God's chosen," James Dobson has plenty to hide.

At Amazon.com
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/157392122X/qid=1117417713/sr=8-1/ref=pd_csp_1/104-6424535-4495136?v=glance&s=books&n=507846

[tsuki]

1. Just the beginning. Don't threaten the Grand Old Perverts.

[NAO]

2. I think of them as the "Greedy Old Pharisees"

The combination of extreme greed for material wealth and a rigid, hypocritical allegiance to legalistic strictures and dogmas while neglecting the well being of their fellow human beings.

To paraphrase a popular quote, "unless your righteousness exceed that of the GOP, ye shall not enter the Kingdom of Heaven."

The "Culture Wars" were going on in 1st Century Palestine. The Religious Reich was going around condemning people for their sins and stoning them to death whenever they could an excuse in the Law to do so. Interestingly, when the one who claimed to be the Son of God came into this situation, he consistently sided with the progressive/liberal position on both the "cultural issues" AND the "economic issues". (see John 8:3-11; Matthew 7:1-3; Matthew 25:31-46.

[Tux]

3. Yeah

[tsuki]

4. Good thought. I bookmarked. May try it out on some of the RW'ers

I know.

[hfojvt]

5. sheepers, the book was written in 1997

and it is still not out in paperback? That implies that nobody is reading it. Too bad about that.

[Ian David]

6. Don't link to Amazon. Use Powells instead. But thanks for the info

Powells is "blue."

Amazon is "red" and contributes to whacked-out fundie causes.

James Dobson's War on America
http://www.powells.com/biblio/62-157392122x-0


Powell's Books, Inc.
Rating: Dark Blue - 100 %
BuyBlue.org's Position:

Powell's Books currently has a 100% BuyBlue rating due to political contributions for the 2003-2004 election cycle. Powell's President and Founder Michael Powell contributed a sizeable amount of money to John Kerry and local Oregon politicians during the last election cycle. Furthermore, Powell is a long time community activist and progressive. Powell's biography is worth a read.

Powell's Books has an online presence in addition to their brick and mortar stores, so they would make a good alternative if you prefer to buy independent and local from a very strong blue company.

More:
http://www.buyblue.org/detail.php?corpId=42



Amazon.com, Inc.
Rating: Light Red - 41 %
BuyBlue.org's Position:

Amazon.com currently has a 41% BuyBlue rating due to political contributions for the 2003-2004 election cycle. The Amazon.com executives made few contributions to politicians during the 2003-2004 election cycle, but they donated significant money to Amazon's PAC. All political contributions to individual politicians were made to local Washington state politicians. Amazon's PAC sponsored politicians that act counter to the interests of their customers.

This PAC supported politicians that amongst other things supported "safeguards" regulating TV news content, opposed the "freedom to read" amendment allowing federal funds to be used to demand patron records from bookstores and libraries, and sponsored a bill to legalize "censorship software" for stripping "offensive content" out of films.

More:
http://www.buyblue.org/detail.php?corpId=34



December 13, 2004
Say it ain't so Jeff

I’m sure many of you will be surprised to see Amazon hit our naughty list for donating 61% of their PAC money to Republicans in this past election cycle. It seems counterintuitive for a company patronized by so many progressives to turn around and donate their money to causes antithetical to their constituents’ values. There are people out there who say that Amazon has every right to donate their hard earned money as they please after all isn’t this kind of patronage just the grease that keeps the wheels of capitalism in motion? I actually tend to agree with Fritz Hollings when he says: The cancer on the body politic is money. Money, Money Money. He said on 60 minutes last night that he had to raise $30k per week just to fund his next campaign! This is how our elected representatives spend the majority of their time. We wonder why our politicians are so devoid of ethics when we have a system that actually rewards them for selling favors to the highest bidder. We will never see meaningful reform, they will just invent ways to circumvent them. The only way to truly reform the process is for us to train millions of eyes on each corporation to make sure that no big favor goes unpunished. We intend to use the free market muscle of millions of progressives to make corporate and PAC donations as transparent as possible so we the consumers can make informed decisions on where our money ultimately ends up. To put it another way: We have financial capital and we intend to use it!

More:
http://www.buyblue.org/archives/2004/12/say_it_aint_so.html