During the Iowa straw poll and political circus for Republican candidates there was a very strong outpouring of religious rhetoric. This was exceptional as we are a Nation that prided itself on our diversity and culture of not allowing theology to become a political tool. This wise decision was made by our founders as they had seen and experienced the damage that such a political structure generates.
One of the many things that puts persons such as myself in the cross-hairs of the religious right is a pledge signed by the majority of Republican candidates. As one that engages in the act of trying to gain civil rights this pledge is Mc Carthyesque in it's formation of a committee to investigate persons like myself who object to not having civil rights.
In signing NOM's marriage pledge, Mitt Romney, Michelle Bachman and Rick Santorum pledged to:
Support and send to the states a federal marriage amendment defining marriage as one man and one woman,
Defend DOMA in court,
Appoint judges and an attorney general who will respect the original meaning of the Constitution,
Appoint a presidential commission to investigate harassment of traditional marriage supporters,
Support legislation that would return to the people of D.C. their right to vote for marriage.
But the religious life writer for the WSJ thinks I'm just being alarmist:
The stories raise real concerns about the world views of two prospective Republican nominees. But their echo-chamber effect reignites old anxieties among liberals about evangelical Christians. Some on the left seem suspicious that a firm belief in Jesus equals a desire to take over the world. (Some extremist Christians leveled a similar charge against Barack Obama in 2008, that he was the antichrist aiming to take over world governments.)
She tries to minimize the influence that has crept into our political discourse as lone wolves:
Extremist dominionists do exist, as theocrats who hope to transform our democracy into something that looks like ancient Israel, complete with stoning as punishment. But “it’s a pretty small world,” says Worthen, who studies these groups.
There are many that object to this white washing of an important shift in our political debate:
The fact that Miller, responsible for religion coverage for a major national publication, doesn't seem to understand the big-picture significance of candidates exhibiting religion-based behavior and making religion-based statements that would have gotten them laughed off the political stage not very long ago, is a sign of just how far the Religious Right has dragged America from the realm of reason. We now routinely have candidates for the highest office who vocally deny evolution, resist efforts to address climate change, care about education only when the issues involve prayer or Intelligent Design, are hostile to the Environmental Protection Agency (which was created by Richard Nixon), and claim the moral high ground via a constant outward display of conservative religion.
These influences are not random nor are they transitory, they have been building for a long time in a concerted effort to essentially take over our political system that is more in tune with the authoritarian mindset:
What Miller doesn't acknowledge is that "the left" need not prove that the danger of fundamentalist religion in politics is a potential problem, because the danger has already manifested itself by draining virtually every drop of reason from American public policy discussions and moving the entire center of gravity far to the right. The American political landscape is not just in danger, but rather it has already been decimated, a landscape barren of rational dialogue at the hands of three decades of Religious Right firebombing. And Miller tells us to relax.
Dominionism is discussed in the link below. Some of the goals and methodology that got us to the point where we are at now are discussed:
There are two other dominionist sects within evangelicalism that have escaped in-depth scrutiny from the Left. These dominionists have been able to function virtually incognito for several reasons: 1) They have been deeply embedded within the evangelical subculture; 2) They cloaked their dominionism with new terminologies and doctrines over a period of thirty years; and 3) They figured out how to package dominionism using sophisticated mass marketing techniques. Also noteworthy: these two other dominionist camps have been operating in a dialectical fashion – while one group appealed to the TBN charismatics with all of its emotional excesses, the other group carefully managed its more intellectual public image to conform to traditional evangelical standards.
Violence and forced indoctrination is justified while the perpetrators assume a theoretically regal role:
The Gospel of Salvation is achieved by setting up the “Kingdom of God” as a literal and physical kingdom to be “advanced” on Earth in the present age. Some dominionists liken the New Testament Kingdom to the Old Testament Israel in ways that justify taking up the sword, or other methods of punitive judgment, to war against enemies of their kingdom. Dominionists teach that men can be coerced or compelled to enter the kingdom. They assign to the Church duties and rights that belong Scripturally only to Jesus Christ. This includes the esoteric belief that believers can “incarnate” Christ and function as His body on Earth to establish His kingdom rule. An inordinate emphasis is placed on man’s efforts; the doctrine of the sovereignty of God is diminished.
Rewriting history and infiltrating the political arena has been the game plan and they are nearly to the point of success in the fact that they have corralled virtually the entire Republican field in their matrix:
PATRIOTIC AMERICAN movement: Patriotic dominionists, most of whom are not Reconstructionists, teach that political action will advance the kingdom of God in America. Using the vehicle of Christian media, they have taught evangelicals for the past three decades that America is a Christian nation and needs to return to its roots. Almost every evangelical in the pew has been influenced in one way or another by this sect. Patriotic dominionist leaders and their organizations have been closely interlocked financially and politically with the conservatives from the political Right. The secular conservatives purport to uphold morality, which appeals to evangelicals. The combined force of conservatives and evangelicals flexes its political muscles in Washington. One of its most powerful leaders is James Dobson of Focus on the Family. Patriotic dominionism was widely disseminated through the activities of Jay Grimstead, founder of Coalition on Revival (COR). From its earliest inception COR managed to successfully bring together key leaders from all three dominionist sects, including the Reconstructionists, to promote the most ruthless doctrines of dominionism.
Houston we have a problem.
9:30 AM PT: A video to explain quickly the situation: