The Republican Party Is Turning Into A Cult

[kristopher]

The Republican Party Is Turning Into A Cult
Johann Hari
Columnist, London Independent

Something strange has happened in America in the nine months since Barack Obama was elected. It has best been summarized by the comedian Bill Maher: "The Democrats have moved to the right, and the Republicans have moved to a mental hospital."

The election of Obama -- a center-left black man -- as a successor to George W. Bush has scrambled the core American right's view of their country. In their gut, they saw the US as a white-skinned, right-wing nation forever shaped like Sarah Palin. When this image was repudiated by a majority of Americans in a massive landslide, it simply didn't compute. How could this have happened? How could the cry of "Drill, baby, drill" have been beaten by a supposedly big government black guy? So a streak that has always been there in the American right's world-view -- to deny reality, and argue against a demonic phantasm of their own creation -- has swollen. Now it is all they can see.

Since Obama's rise, the US right has been skipping frantically from one fantasy to another, like a person in the throes of a mental breakdown. It started when they claimed he was a secret Muslim, and -- at the same time -- that he was a member of a black nationalist church that hated white people. Then, once these arguments were rejected and Obama won, they began to argue he was born in Kenya and secretly smuggled into the United States as a baby, and the Hawaiian authorities conspired to fake his US birth certificate. So he is ineligible to rule and the office of President should pass to... the Republican runner-up, John McCain.

These aren't fringe phenomena: a Research 2000 poll found that...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/johann-hari/the-republican-party-is-t_b_262594.html?view=print

[Joanne98]

1. DUH

[hobbit709]

2. TURNING!?!?!?

[charlie]

6. No kidding

And Limbaugh is turning into a gasbag.

[ixion]

7. my response exactly

turning? It's done been turned, IMO.

[HillbillyBob]

8. I seem to recall that the RunnyRaygun asministration

depended on the religious ...
I m with you 'turning?!".

It has has as its heart for 30 years, the Cult of money, the Cult of Kreestians who think because they say they are 'Saved' or 'Born Again' they can use the statement "Gawd says (fill in what ever it is they want to be a seeun today)or name a segment such as gays that we should be killed with prejudice or a person of different ethnic back ground. WE queers really got it in the A__ from these jerks for years.
Equating us with child molestors, or bestiality, or something else heinous.

I know it did not start in 1970s it just came to a pustule in American society when RunnyRaygun was put in office.

Recall that the Kings and Emperors of Europe were rulers 'by Divine Right'
and the things they did?

Religious hysteria goes way back in our country. The Puritans come to mind.
They may have been early settlers, but they did not FOUND the country that happened at the Revolutionary war. They were not the only brand of Religion that came to our shores for freedom to worship in their own way. Quakers, Jews, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, Confucian, Non Religious, Catholic, Protestant(Wesleyan, Baptist, Methodist etc etc, but we have one main bunch calling them selves Fundamentalists.
Taking the fun out and putting the Mental in fundamental.

Remember Jamestown was settled as a for profit venture to exploit the New World,
It may have been religious folks that were the peons, but the British Corporation owned it.
It was the Money and Property guys that broke away from the British, and they were Deists (there maybe God, but he does not run the country).
They were well aware of what putting a religion in charge of law could do.
Inquisition anyone? I think its a bit insane to let the Talibabtists(sic) run our country and they have been for the last 30 years in cahoots with the Fascist corporatist who use their wealth to drum up the Religious angst against anyone who displeases the corpses.

I have been seeing the sick context of the religious right since I was a teen going to evangelical churches. They speak forgiveness in Church, yet gang up on anyone different.

I had 2 friends in 2 different states a 500 miles apart that were butchered, I don't mean just murdered , butchered. Starting with castration and dismemberment then finally cutting their throats. These acts were both committed by those who claimed to be Christian and that Gawd told them to rid the world of humaseksuals.
The really galling thing was neither story appeared in local papers let alone reached the national media. It was about 20 years ago but such horrific murders should have gotten more attention. One murderer turned himself in, the other was caught during another crime. One got life and was out in 5 years, the other I do not know the fate of beyond he was sentenced to 10 years for homicide, not murder.

I guess it was ok to harass and murder gay folks, but now that the Straight world is Finally taking notice they are scared..welcome to our place in society.
The right is ready and willing to start a revolution to place a theo/fascist government over the rest of us. I guess they are too damned dumb to realize that same theo/fascist government they want so bad will be over them too.

Author Robert Heinlein realized the danger religious hysteria posed many years ago read his writings.

[kenfrequed]

10. Agreed

The Dems have been going corporate for decades and the Repukes have been insane since before Reagan.

[polichick]

3. imo it's been a cult since Reagan - the cult idol. nt

[kedrys]

4. "...HAS turned..."

There. Fixed that for ya, Johann. :eyes:

[Tennessee Gal]

5. Nut Jobs R US = Republican Right Wing Extremists

Thus it is so.

[Bandit]

9. I love seeing articles like this that are so right on...

The truth is reaching more and more people all the time..

[formercia]

11. Conservatism is a mental illness.

The GOP is in the final stages of Dementia.

[EOTE]

12. The republican party is turning into a cult like Antarctica is turning cold. NT

[Jennicut]

13. Its culminated after twenty plus years of the Rethug party allowing crazies to dictate

their agenda. I first came to know the Rethug party, really pay attention to it, during the 1992 Repug Convention. Pat Buchanan and others made me feel slimy and disgusting just by watching them. This is nothing new, its been happening for years and a mere center left black man has them really making fools of themselves on a daily basis.