Washblog

Blumenthal's book is an excellent summary going in some cases as far back to the 1960's Goldwater days of Republican Conservatism.

It's a long summary that on the one hand was sufficiently informative as to fill in many of the historical and contemporary blanks of information regarding the most prominent conservative religious and political personalities who were on stage for most of my adult lifetime.

On the other hand, once the pattern of behavior, public advocacy, political rhetoric and blatantly partisan manipulation on the part of the radical religious right becomes apparent, the long litany of outrage and hypocritical actions runs the risk of toxic overdose.

Personality after personality parades on stage often with fanfare of adoration on the part of socially conservative religious congregations almost worshipful of these celebrities.

Included in the mix of course are the Republican politicians - almost every one of which have been forced to kow-tow to that voting base that came to dominate an old and previously respected political identity. Mitt Romney's limited choices during his presidential campaign fully reflect the problems faced by all the candidates.

Personality after personality - religious and political - never seemed to make it all the way through their own bizarre political burlesque routine without slipping on the proverbial banana: From the likes of Ted Haggard and his scandalized co-preachers to Tom Delay, Larry Craig and Newt Gingrich, never was "do as I say, not as I do" so meaningful.

If there has been a historical "power that is" behind the god-&-politics crowd, that political godfather would be James Dobson and his weapon of choice, Focus on the Family.

These are the people still at the helm of what has deteriorated to a regional political party whose base of strength has shrunk to a hard coalition of rigid, inflexible and socially abusive organizations.

These are the people the LDS church got in bed with and now - as Joanna Brooks, an active Mormon, and author of 8: The Mormon Proposition gets it right points out - is seen by many as THE church leading the bigot charge in this country.

It also appears that where goes the LDS Church, there goes the state of Utah. Follow the political news cycle and you cannot help but note the radical political and socially conservative viewpoints that in Salt Lake City tend to be treated as required doctrinal purity.

Many good people, devout, totally trustworthy, compassionate and caring - among them  my own loved ones who live within the LDS version of physical and spiritual reality - take issue with these sentiments. But these sentiments are hard to contradict factually.

Once persuaded into the murky waters of political activism, as any activist will tell you, lots of stuff you do not want gets stuck between your toes.

Even inside a society where individual moral parameters are often measured and constantly expressed by deep and sincere spiritual vows and covenants, you cannot escape the odor of those with whom you have joined in your Jesus walk.

Perceptually the personal righteousness of individual Mormons gets lost within the judgmental hypocrisy of the pretended biblical righteousness of the Dobson, LaHaye, Hagee and Robertson crowd.

The almost mindless and consistently partisan voting patterns of Utah's national political personalities reflect this same narrow rigidity.

Conscious of their own integrity and heavily invested in sustaining and protecting that personal sanctity, individual Mormons have nevertheless been betrayed by what has been revealed after the fact as a short-sighted decision. It seems to have been a corporate decision by church leadership that was possibly was based on a perceived opportunity to join with the evangelical masses and perhaps take a leading role as part of the imagined moral majority in this country.

Unfortunately, with the help and encouragement of that clique of unsavory religious bigots - the Dobsons, the Parsleys ... even the Fred Phelps variety, the LDS church now finds itself strapped to the masthead of the god-politics flagship in a losing war.

However Mormons believed themselves to be supporting their corporate vision of Christ, I don't think that what has come to pass is what they had in mind.

Arthur Ruger

Ref: The company they keep: