Hot Off The Press

John Amato, the author of Wingnuts, and David Neiwert, author of the Eliminationists, team up for Over the Cliff; How Obama's Election Drove the American Right Insane(Polipoint, 2010,$16.95). Amato is the founder of Crooks and Liars website and David Neiwert is a long-time investigative reporter of the radical right and editor of the blog Orcinus. The book documents many of the outrages I have posted with more goodies of how unhinged the right has become. It does an excellent job of weaving the paramilitary threats and groups into the narrative of the conservative entertainment industry, with special emphasis on Fox's war against Obama. My biggest gripe is with the sourcing. You have to go to:
http://overthecliff.crooksandliars.com for all the notes. From the assassination of Dr.Tiller to the Koch Industries' funding of the teaparty movement and the roots of the politics of resentment, it's all here. Even our friend, the Queen of the Birthers, Orly Taitz appears. A good read.

Next out of the box is Alexander Zaitchik's Common Nonsense: Glenn Beck and the Triumph of Ignorance (Wiley, 2010). Zaitchik chronicles the rodeo clown's rather tumultuousrise in the political entertainment industry. The operative chapter of this book is "The Ghost of Cleon Skousen", which details where Beck gets the insane ideas abouteverything from the architecture of Rockefeller Centeer to his Christian Constitutionalism. The late Cleon Skousen, a notorious member of the John Birch Society and a man tossed out of the FBI by J.Edgar Hooever himself for being too anti-Communist, ended his days as a crackpot pseudo-historian spinning extreme right wing tales about the new world order and the mysterious lack of the separation of church and state. ByBeck's adoption, Skousen's books have come back from the dead and now informs his right-wing audience. The notes in this book add to the argument that Over the Cliff should have included theirs in the print edition. For instance, in the notes, we find that Mr. Sklousen's last incarnation in Washington during the 1980s was funded by Rev. Moon and that Moonie money kept his work going until the end.

And a sort of oldie but goodie appears with Gregory A. Boyd The Myth of a Christian Nation: How The Quest For Political Power Is Destroying the Church (2005,Zondervan). This book was written in response to the 2004 Values Voter campaign by President George W. Bush spearheaded by the evangelicals. Students of that election know that it was the mobilization of the evangelical vote in Ohio that put him over the top. This book is aimed at Christians urging them to seek a "power-under" kingdom , where greatness is measured by sacrifice and service rather than the "power-over" politics of worldly government. The author is a minister, who is concerned that evangelical Christians are confusing patriotic zeal with Christianity and that Christianity is being used to legitimize a socio-political system that ought to be biblically critiqued.

What I find interesting about the evangelical critiques of the Religious Right are they mirror statements made by Alexis De Tocqueville in the the 19th century about American democracy. In the days around the American Revolution, only about 15% of Americans were members of a church and French observers noted how "curiously indifferent" Americans were to religion. By the time De Tocqueville travelled America a revival of religion was occurring. He commended religion on its role in solidifying democratic institutions but warned that direct involvement of religion in policy and political issues would eventually lead to its marginalization.

Apparently, Gregory A. Boyd felt the same way. In 2009, he wrote The Myth of a Christian Religion: Losing Your Religion for the Beauty of a Revolution. Here he revolts against the McChurch and declares war against violence, racism. the enviromental abuse of creation, social oppression, secularism, the whole shooting match. He embraces the Giant Jesus. In my readings of the self-criticism of evangelicals, they have more substantial gripes against their co-religionists than even the secular critiques. They feel that Christianity by definition is counter-cultural and only retains its power by its ability to critique the failings of the society at large and that any marriage with political forces not only despoils the religion but corrupts their co-religionists. Take that James Dobson, Satanist!

And if you want to get all scholarly about this, I refer you to the University of Chicago's The Fundamentalism Project. Spearheaded by Martin Marty and R. Scott Appleby, this project surveys religious fundamentalism throughout the world. The appropriate volume for the discussions both American and the Middle East is Vol.3 Fundamentalism and the State: Remaking Polities, Economies, and Militance ( University of Chicago, 1993.) The reason I originally consulted this project was because an old professor of mine was being threatened by Hindu Fundamentalists because of his scholarly, (and loving) work on Ganesh. Even though he had written his work decades before, its appearance in India years later provoked death threats here in the United States. I wanted to know more about this odd form of fundamentalism.

To follow-up yesterday's post Paradigm Lost, I came across websites that speak about "relocalization", the creation of communities that adopt "green values" and want to become self-sustaining. Apparently, there is an international movement in this area. Consult www.postcaribon.org and www.transitionnetwork.org for more information.

Speaking of University of Chicago professors, let's hear it for Cass Sunstein. Glenn beck has now targeted Cass,a member of the Obama Administration, as the "most powerful person in America". "He's more powerful than the Federal Reserve." That's great! See above-mentioned book for highlights of Beck's mental illness.