Wow. Strong words coming from the Washington Post this Sunday:
Now that the GOP has been transformed by the rise of the South, the trauma of terrorism and George W. Bush's conviction that God wanted him to be president, a deeper conclusion can be drawn: The Republican Party has become the first religious party in U.S. history.We have had small-scale theocracies in North America before -- in Puritan New England and later in Mormon Utah. Today, a leading power such as the United States approaches theocracy when it meets the conditions currently on display: an elected leader who believes himself to speak for the Almighty, a ruling political party that represents religious true believers, the certainty of many Republican voters that government should be guided by religion and, on top of it all, a White House that adopts agendas seemingly animated by biblical worldviews.
I'm not enough of an expert on 19th century American history to make a firm call on whether the extent to which today's Republican party has become dominated by religionists is unprecedented or not. You can definitely argue that other American political movements and parties have been deeply influenced by religion. Even if it is not unprecedented, though, it's still troubling.
I'm amazed that the Post had the testicular fortitude to say so, though.
