Tom DeLay Wants An American Caliphate

Tom DeLay, at the "War On Christians" conference in DC:

"Sides are being chosen, and the future of man hangs in the balance!" he warned. "The enemies of virtue may be on the march, but they have not won, and if we put our trust in Christ, they never will. . . . It is for us then to do as our heroes have always done and put our faith in the perfect redeeming love of Jesus Christ."

Holy crap. This is poisonous stuff -- you'd think he's talking about the guy in Afghanistan on trial for converting to Christianity, but he's talking about the political environment in America. The audience gobbled up this unbelievably cynical ostentatious piety from a man who lost his GOP leadership position for some very sin-based reasons. "This is a man that I believe God has appointed," said conference organizer Rick Scarborough. Ridiculous BS like this can be found throughout the WaPo column about the conference.

How can they possibly not see that being played for politics cheapens their faith almost to the point of making it worthless? The people leading these fundamentalist victimization-claiming fests have an interest in nursing a sense of grievance, so their actions are understandable (though reprehensible). But these presumably well-meaning people being led around by the nose by these organizations are just so sad. And I mean that in both a sympathetic and a judgmental way.

The Economist has made a habit in the past of asking where the religious left is amid all the hard-right religious posturing in the U.S. I rather like the approach
of the United Church of Christ, which I was brought up in. They have a new ad airing on TV that's pretty funny, for this sort of thing.