Salon/Conason: The zigzag man

[kskiska]

Zell Miller might have zigzagged to please his Big Tobacco benefactors, but his new far-right Christian friend won't like his cigarette breath.

Following his stunningly vituperative and dishonest convention speech, Zell Miller somehow insists that he will forever be "a Democrat." But toward the end of his keynote address, the belligerent Georgia senator offered a clue to his true ideology. "I have knocked on the door of this man's soul," he said of the president, "and found someone home, a God-fearing man with a good heart and a spine of tempered steel."

Whatever party registration he may find convenient to profess, "Zigzag Zell" apparently has looked into his own soul and discovered a powerful affinity for the most extreme wing of the religious right in his home state. In the act of abandoning old friends and savaging his political heritage, Miller has been "born again."

So he declared last spring during an appearance at a dinner for Family Concerns Inc. -- a Georgia group committed to a "spiritual and moral war" to "turn America back to the God of the Bible." Based in one of the state's most conservative northern counties, Family Concerns is run by Nancy Schaefer, a former radio talk-show host, anti-abortion lobbyist and somewhat paranoid activist who suspects that environmental regulations are really a plot by the United Nations to undermine American sovereignty.

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http://salon.com/opinion/conason/2004/09/03/zell/index.html