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The Serialization (4) of The 15% Solution: Author's (SJ) Preface: Part 2

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Being the continuation of Preface to the book in my, Steven Jonas', voice, Part 1 of which was published on OpEdNews on March 8, 2018. This Preface, was written for the current, third version of the book published in 2013. (The first version was published in 1996, by the Thomas Jefferson Press [an imprint of mine] under the fictional author's name [unfortunately mis-spelled "Johnathan"].) The Preface is quite long and is in this series be published in three parts. Indeed, it should have been published before the second installment, which was the book's Chapter One, written in the voice of the fictional author, Jonathan Westminster. Please forgive the mistake. For continuity, following the publication of the Preface (in its three parts), I will be beginning the body of the book again, with Chapter One.

III. The Modern U.S. Republican Party

As it happened, I was one of those political observers who, after the election of 1980, said "oh well, we'll have to live through four years of Reagan. The electorate will see through him immediately and surely the Democratic Party will be able to mount an effective opposition to him and his policies. Let's hope he won't do too much damage. Then we can get the Democrats back in in 1984." Little did I know how effective Reagan and the Right-wing Republican machine would be at mobilizing various social prejudices for political purposes. So doing in turn enabled them to fairly easily pull the "economic wool" over the eyes of too many white working-class Americans, who became aptly known as "Reagan Democrats." This assured his easy re-election in 1984, although the ineffectiveness of Walter Mondale as the Democratic candidate and of the Democratic Party as a party certainly helped.

So what did Reagan do? First, he clearly indicated that he was going to follow Richard Nixon's "Southern [let's use racism to our advantage] Strategy." For example, he began his primary campaign in 1980 by giving a speech at Philadelphia, Mississippi, which had been the site of the famous murder of the three young civil rights workers, James Cheney, Andrew Goodman (who happened to be a son of a close friend of my mother's), and Michael Schwerner, in the "Freedom Summer" of 1964. Already in his primary campaign of 1976 Reagan had taken to describing welfare recipients as "Welfare Queens" from Chicago's South Side (an African-American neighborhood). This despite the fact that majority of persons receiving Aid to Mothers with Dependent Children (the formal name of the law) were white. Further, in 1979 his campaign was already at work to mobilize the right-wing Christian vote for him (6).

Reagan Airport.  Lots of glitter, just like the man himself.
Reagan Airport. Lots of glitter, just like the man himself.
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Although the Christian Temperance Movement was one of the early supporters of the nascent Republican Party in the 1850s, and the Republicans had led the battle for Prohibition partly because of that alliance, the Reagan campaign's move marked the first time in the modern U.S. that religion and religious prejudice against all so-called "non-believers" was mobilized for political purposes. "Non-believers" for the Christian Right means persons of whatever religious or non-religious belief who do not happen to agree with their stance on a variety of social and political matters. That stance is usually based on their interpretation of selected passages of Biblical text as found in one particular English translation of the Bible, the "King James Version." (It should be noted that that translation was actually the product of the work of 52 selected academics, scholars and theologians in early 17th century England.) By the mid-80s, turning the emerging AIDS crisis to political use, the Reaganite Republicans had added homophobia to their own rapidly developing arsenal of hate politics.

Over the time from Reagan, through G.H.W. Bush to Bill Clinton, I observed what the Republican Party was doing and becoming. European history has provided a useful background for understanding the implications of those developments. Religious anti-Semitism had been developed in the Roman Catholic Church starting as early as the Fourth Century, C.E. Political anti-Semitism, that is the use of anti-Semitism specifically both for party/electoral political purposes and for political mass mobilization, was developed in Europe in the late 19th century. We know well what political anti-Semitism eventually led to on that continent.

On the North American continent racism, the White Supremacy Hypothesis, and anti-Native American prejudice had been used politically on the territory of what became the United States since well before there was a United States, beginning with the institution of slavery in 1619. But here was a political party that was attempting to mobilize additional prejudices and hatreds, such as homophobia, for political purposes. And they were doing it in a political context where no one and certainly no political party (namely the Democrats) of any influence was challenging them on that fact. And so, I considered a variety of possible scenarios of what might happen if they kept going, unchallenged by any opposition that focused on what they were really doing and what they were really after. Of course, the true Reaganite political/economic agenda had not changed much since the time right-wing capitalists had begun challenging the New Deal, from the time of its inception in 1930s (7). But just as at the time of this present writing that was hardly an agenda that they could run and expect to win with.

The Right-Wing Republican economic agenda, then as now, included such items as: increasing the share of both national income and national wealth going to the super-rich (the distance, in dollars and political power between the "merely rich" --usually millionaires--and the super-rich --multibillionaire class--is enormous, as to almost constitute a social divide between the two wings of the privileged); increasing the burden of state and local taxation, especially regressive taxation; priming the economic pump (if any priming were to be done) with increased military but not needed national domestic spending; cutting government aid to education at all levels; destroying the middle class's safety net, including programs such as social security, Medicare, Medicaid, and so on; punishing the poor for being poor by eliminating programs aimed at overcoming or compensating for poverty; ravaging the environment for the benefit of both extractive industries and property developers; breaking what was left of the American trade union movement for the benefit of corporate profits; encouraging the concentration of industrial ownership and the decline of competition, leading to the contraction of the so-called "free market" for goods and services; encouraging the export of capital; reducing to the greatest extent possible the regulation of the extractive industries, the financial markets, and the workplace. And so, the Republican Party turned to a focus on what are politely called the "Social Issues" but which are correctly called the "Issues of Personal Prejudice;" those of racism, religious discrimination, homophobia, and more recently, Islamophobia (8). The preceding should not be read as exculpating the Democrats, who, on far too many occasions, simply did nothing to stop the Republicans or actively collaborated, albeit more surreptitiously and behind a curtain of demagogic populism, in pushing for exactly the same economic and military goals.

Bob Corker - Won his seat in 2006 by running a last-minute racist ad against Harold Ford, Jr.
Bob Corker - Won his seat in 2006 by running a last-minute racist ad against Harold Ford, Jr.
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I also looked at where the political use, particularly of anti-Semitism (not in play [yet] in the United States, for obvious reasons), took the German Nazi Party (which represented the same economic interests that the Republican Party represents) and Germany. (One should note that there have been a wide variety of fascist governments appearing in countries around the world, most recently in Latin America in the 1970s [e.g., Chile, Argentina, and Brazil], since the first of them arose in Hungary in 1920, under Admiral Horthy. None of them ever ran on as virulent a form of anti-Semitism that Nazi Germany did.) Then, over time, I began to put the pieces together to project where the use of the several prejudices mobilized for political purposes, in defense of the same economic interest, might take the Republican Party in this country, in the absence of course of a real opposition to them. For example, see "The Second Final Solution," described in Chap. 18. If you think that that projection is far-fetched, in North Carolina in 2012 a man described as a "pastor," one Charles Worley, seriously proposed rounding up all "lesbians, queers and homosexuals," and depositing them in an open camp surrounded by an electrified fence, and except for air-dropping food, leaving them there to die (9, 10). When he delivered his proposal as part of a sermon in his church he received a standing ovation from his congregation.

In Germany, there was, on paper, a real opposition to the Nazis. But the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) and the Socialist Party of Germany (SPD)--a variant of early social democracy--were at each other's throats almost as much as they were opposed to the Nazis. The former, under the thumb of Josef Stalin's Communist International, spent much of its time attacking the "social fascists" of the latter, believing that "after Hitler, our turn would come" (11). There were also centrist parties opposed to the Nazis. But given the Socialist/Communist split in Germany, no united front ever developed. In the United States, however, the task for the Right was even easier.

Any meaningful truly left-wing political presence was destroyed by a combination of McCarthyite "anti-Communism" and the continuing assault on the never-too-strong-anyway U.S. labor movement following the passage of the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947. Then in the 1980s, whatever had been left of the very modest New Dealist left-wing influence in the Democratic Party was destroyed by its takeover by the "Republican-lite" Democratic Leadership Council, otherwise known as "DINO's," Democrats In Name Only. One need only look at the record of President Bill Clinton. For example, he destroyed most of what was left of the welfare system at the time, opened the floodgates for the export of U.S. capital, provided for the concentration of ownership of the print and electronic media, in his first State of the Union Address announced that "the era of big government was over" (a very Reaganite sentiment), and went to war in the former Yugoslavia (the first major war fought under the pretext of "humane intervention") without asking for Congressional approval, as required under the Constitution.

Turning back to the German lessons-of-history, Hitler still would have faced real, substantive opposition from both the Communist Party of Germany and the Socialist Party of Germany, despite the fact that they were never able to form a United Front against him. That is, if they had they been given a chance to get organized. However, from the day (January 30, 1933) he was appointed Chancellor of the Germany by the then President of the Weimar Republic, former Field-Marshall Paul von Hindenburg (known as the "first Hindenburg Disaster," the second being the one that four years later overcame the hydrogen-filled airship of the same name at Lakehurst, NJ), he used force to secure his control of the German government. Within 24 hours of taking power, the Nazis began rounding up Communists and imprisoning them in the first concentration camps. Given that the DLC-Democrats offered no real opposition and in some cases a good deal of support for the real goals of the Republican Religious Right, I figured that nothing like what had happened in Germany would be necessary for the latter as they began to take power here.

Nevertheless, I knew that, given their true economic and political program, which would necessarily lead to increasing economic and social misery for an ever-increasing number of Americans, in order to remain in power, the Republican Religious Right would eventually have to impose some version of fascism here. And so, after pondering the problem off and on for a number of years, I came up with the scenario of this book. "The 15% Solution" was actually a real, named Christian Rightist/Republican electoral strategy designed in the early 1990s to take over the political system with a minority of eligible voters voting. It is explained in detail in chap. 2. I surmised that the Republican Religious Right, given the lack of any meaningful opposition, would triumph at the polls and thus take power electorally (just as its current incarnation, the carefully manufactured "Tea Party," is currently in the process of doing). They would not need to use oppressive force to stay in power until some years had passed. They would essentially use the U.S. Constitution and Constitutional processes to take over the system and eventually destroy the remnants of Constitutional democracy, already drastically diminished through bipartisan complicity.

IV. The Republican Party and the "Rightward Imperative"

An essential element of this process is what can be called the "Right-Wing Imperative". For example, consider that in the 2012 Republican primaries a candidate for his party's nomination known as 'moderate' would propose to abolish Medicare as then known, adopting something similar to the infamous (Rep.) Paul Ryan plan (which happened to sink any presidential aspirations Ryan himself might have had; but of course tone-deaf Romney did give him the consolation prize). In boasting about it, this candidate said: "I'll end Medicare faster than Newt Gingrich." He also supported the proposed Mississippi Constitutional "Personhood" amendment to ensconce a particular religious belief as to when life begins (turned down by the voters of Mississippi!) Yes, that was Mitt Romney, who continued to have all sorts of trouble cozying up to the Republican Far Right, because of that awful label 'moderate' earned when he was Governor of Massachusetts.

Then there was the "traditional conservative" Rick Santorum who said (12): "As long as abortion is legal in this country . . . we will never rest because that law does not comport with God's law." In other words, Santorum, as in that Mississippi "Personhood" Constitutional Amendment initiative that Romney supported, would put "God's law" above the U.S. Constitution. (Romney, it should be noted, believes that the Constitution was "divinely inspired.") None of the other Republican candidates pointed out either of two major features of Santorum's position. First, the central feature of the Islamic "Sharia Law" that they all so eagerly pounce on as if its institution were just around the corner in the United States, is that it proclaims that "God's law" is to stand above any civil constitution that happens to be in place in the country. Second, "God's law" in any country that is governed even in part by it is means simply what some group of men happen to say it is, of course always citing some "holy book" (that just happens to have been written by men). But the Republican Party was by then so far to the Right that this position of Santorum's is not challenged within it (13). (See also "Rick Santorum's Most Outrageous Campaign Moments," The Progress Report, Jan. 5, 2012.)

2012 Republican Presidential Candidates
2012 Republican Presidential Candidates
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Then there was another "conservative," Ron Paul. The bulk of the Republican establishment doesn't like him, because he would like to cut out virtually all of the US imperialistic overseas involvements, military and otherwise. That of course would lead to a major reduction in US military spending, but it would also end the cash cow that the war industry provides for its owners and their Congressional stooges in the US. It would also put an end to the central element of Cheneyism (14), the establishment of Orwellian Permanent War. It is this element of Paulism that attracts certain elements of the Left to him. But Paul also takes these positions, as The Nation's Katha Pollitt has pointed out (15):

"In a Ron Paul America, there would be no environmental protection, no Social Security, no Medicaid or Medicare, no help for the poor, no public education, . . . no anti-discrimination law, no Americans With Disabilities Act, no laws ensuring the safety of food or drugs or consumer products, no workers' rights, [no] Federal Aviation Authority and its pesky air traffic controllers."

On the other hand, this so-called "libertarian" would let the states criminalize any belief that life begins other than at the time of conception, and (quoting again from Pollitt) "he maintains his opposition to the 1964 Civil Rights Act and opposes restrictions on the 'freedom' of business owners to refuse service to blacks. . . . No wonder they love him over at Stormfront, a white-supremacist website with neo-Nazi tendencies."

In a rather remarkable way Libertarians--chiefly by practicing ahistoricalism--have succeeded in selling themselves to a wide section of the electorate as "reasonable conservatives" but, in reality, in many areas, as Pollitt enumerates, they hold radical right-wing positions. Nobody in today's GOTP [Grand Old Tea Party] would get anywhere by challenging any of them. Today's GOP is a far cry from that of Dwight D. Eisenhower who said publicly that the New Deal reforms were accepted and acceptable public policy and that the only differences between Democrats and Republicans on them were how they should be implemented. But how did the Republican Party get from Ike to Mitt and Newt and Rick (either of them) and Ron? Through what I have already referred to as the Imperative of the Right-Wing Imperative (12). It started with Goldwater and has proceeded through Reagan and the Bushes down to the present day.

Then we have this truly crazy Presidential electoral system in which truly tiny numbers of people in small states have an inordinate influence on who wins the Republican Presidential nomination. In 2012 little more than 200,000 generally far-right voters in Iowa determined who "won," Romney and Santorum with about 30,000 (!) each, and who "lost," all of the others. The Iowa caucuses are then followed by primaries in two more small states with right-wing Republican bases, New Hampshire and South Carolina, and then by Florida, which while not small also houses a right-wing Republican electorate. Thus to have a chance of winning the nomination, more and more the Republican candidates' pitches have to be pitched to the Right.

It was left for Norman Orenstein of the (formerly right-wing) U.S. "think tank," the American Enterprise Institute, no liberal he, to say, with Thomas Mann of the (no longer liberal) Brookings Institution, in their book It's Even Worse than It Looks (16): "[Today's Republican Party] is an insurgent outlier --- ideologically extreme, contemptuous of the inherited social and economic policy regime; scornful of compromise; not persuaded by conventional understanding of facts, evidence, and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition."

V. Further Examples of the Thinking of Leading Candidates for the Republican Presidential Nomination, 2012

Let's start with Newt Gingrich (17). In 1995 he proposed executing "drug smugglers." In 1994, before the election returns were in, he referred to the President and Mrs. [Bill] Clinton as "counterculture (sic)." He said that he would seek to portray Clinton Democrats as the "enemy of normal people," and in a speech during the campaign he described America as a "battleground" between men of God, like himself, and the "secular anti-religious view of the left." He also blamed a tragic murder-suicide by a young mother in South Carolina on the "values" of the Democratic Party. In 1995, he said: "We are the only society in history that says that power comes from God to you . . . and if you don't tell the truth about the role of God and the centrality of God in America, you can't explain the rest of our civilization. I look forward to the day when a belief in God is once more at the center of the definition of being an American."

In 1985 he addressed the issue of AIDS, which at that time appeared to be a disease that would affect only homosexuals. At one point he said: "AIDS is a real crisis. It is worth paying attention to, to study. It's something one ought to be looking at. . . . [For] AIDS will do more to direct America back to the cost of violating traditional values, and to make America aware of the danger of certain behavior than anything we've seen. For us [the GOP], it's a great rallying cry." Finally, in March, 2012, in discussing the possible imposition of (Islamic) Sharia Law in the United States (sic) that so many of his Republican colleagues seem to perceive as such a real threat, he said: "I am convinced that if we do not decisively win the struggle over the nature of America, by the time [my grandchildren] are my age they will be in a secular atheist country, potentially [one] dominated by radical Islamists." (How can a man of his reputed intellectual stature proclaim in one breath such nonsensical contradiction is typical of the range of unchallenged imbecility that exists today in America's political culture. I, for one would like to know how radical Islamists, known for their deep religiosity, would dominate in a nation defined by Newt as "secular" and "atheist.")

Let's consider Rick Santorum next. (18, 19) He is the most like my fictional "Jefferson Davis Hague," (who, as the nominee of the "Republican-Christian Alliance" becomes President in "2004"). A major exception is that Santorum really believes the religious doctrines he pronounces while Hague doesn't believe the stuff at all. Hague just used it to get to the Presidency and then spouted it as necessary in order to remain unchallenged in office. If Mitt Romney does not win the Presidency in (the real) 2012, Santorum will be quickly nominated, by the Fox"News"Channel at least, as the Republican "front-runner" for their nomination in 2016. (Fox "news" actually performed the same service for Romney in December, 2008.)

Santorum has referred to the science behind our understanding of global warming and the threats to humanity and indeed many of the Earth's species that it presents as "punk science." He feels that we should continue to rely on fossil fuels and indeed would vastly expand the extraction of same regardless of the pollution of the air, water and ground that such extraction causes (see the book's "Resource Based Economy" [chap. 14]) . He seems to be bothered by homosexuals and homosexuality to a rather extraordinary degree. He has compared homosexual intercourse to "bestiality," for example, and would outlaw it (see Chapter 11, "The Proclamation of Right." Then see Chapter 18, "The Second Final Solution.") In referring to the excesses of the French Revolution, he inferred that he believes in the "eternal values" upheld by the absolute monarchy that it overthrew.

On abortion policy, based on his religious belief about when life begins he is against it and wants it to be criminalized (see Chap. 7, "The Morality Amendment," which would put the contemporary "Personhood Amendment" also supported by Mitt Romney, almost word-for-word into the Constitution.) In the process he would of course criminalize the religious/secular belief of those of us who hold that life begins at the time of viability. He does not tell us if he would be for sending just the abortion providers to prison, or would he include those women who have them too (see also Chapter 7). He has not told us how he would go about paying for the massive increase in the size and scope of the criminal justice system that the criminalization of abortion in the way he contemplates it would entail. Finally, he has said that he would outlaw contraception, for it is "a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be."

Then we come again to Mitt Romney. Particularly interesting is his Mormon faith, discussed very little during the campaign, but which is the basic formative influence in his thinking about life and the United States (20). For those concerned with the central political issue of the separation of church and state and the ever-expanding intrusion of religious doctrine into the law and politics (that is, the subject of this book at its core), in a word: yes. According to Frank Rich, "[Romney's] great passion [his Mormonism] is something he is determined to keep secret" (21). It is well-known that many Right-wing Christians (usually referred to by the polite name "evangelicals" even though there are many evangelicals who are not right-wing) refer to Mormonism as a cult, and the evidence contained in the Book of Mormon 22) (see also 23) to the contrary notwithstanding, "not Christian." But such complaints generally don't make it to the national stage.

A New York Times article about Romney, Mormonism and his personal Mormonism also deserves mention (24). The information contained in it, drawn from friends, colleagues and fellow Mormon activists (and he is, or at least has been, a Mormon activist), raised some serious concerns. In historical Mormonism, the church and state were fully integrated in the person of Brigham Young. Of course, it has not been, on paper at least, since 1890 when Utah made its deal to join the Union. But the important point was, where did Romney stand on this question? As of this writing (August, 2012) he had not answered it directly. But what he did say in the vicinity of the question must give pause for thought to those of us concerned with maintaining that separation.

His Liberty University Commencement Address (25) of 2012 contained such phrases as: "Marriage is the relationship between one man and one woman," a definition that is derived from religious texts (and of course a definition to which the Mormon Church did not adhere until 1890, and at least one of his grandfather's had five wives, one of which was presumably one of his grandmothers [but those are other stories]). And "But from the beginning, this nation trusted in God, not man." And "there is no greater force for good in the nation than Christian conscience in action." Rhetorically at least, he believes that the United States was chosen by God to play a special role in history, and that our Constitution was "divinely inspired." He has also professed the view that "America is the [Biblical] Promised Land." Finally, Romney prays frequently, feels that he has a direct connection to "God," and indeed engages in conversations with "God," asking for guidance in making decisions, even about matters of investment. Now, one would have no objection to Tevye talking with "God" in "Fiddler on the Roof." But for someone who would be President of the United States the questions do arise: what is the nature of these conversations; how often do they occur; what influence do "God's" answers have on his decision-making, does "God" accept the principle of the separation of church and state and if so, how does Romney find that his conversations with "God" are consistent with this principle.

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References (for the whole of the "Author's Preface, repeated):

1. Stevens, W.K., "Scientists Say Earth's Warming Could Set Off Wide Disruptions," New York Times, September 18, 1995, p. 1.

2. Center for Biological Diversity, Endangered Earth, Winter, 2012.

3. Specter, M., "The Climate Fixers," The New Yorker, May 14, 2012

4. McKibben, B., "Global Warming's Terrifying New Math," Rolling Stone, July 19, 2012, click here.

5. Lizza, R., "The Second Term: What Would Obama Do if Re-elected?" The New Yorker, June 18, 2012, p. 44.

6. Phillips-Fein, K., Invisible Hands, New York: WW Norton, 2009, p. 254.

7. ibid., Introduction.

8. The Nation, "Islamophobia: A Double Issue," July 2/9, 2012.

9. Turley, J., click here.

10. Cooper, A., "360," CNN, May 28, 2012.

11. Wikipedia, "Social Fascism," http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_fascism.

12. Jonas, S., "The Imperative of the Republicans' Rightward Imperative," Published on BuzzFlash@Truthout on Thu, 02/09/2012 [not copyright]. URL: http://blog.buzzflash.com/node/13269. (For the specific references in the quoted version here, see the column as published.)

13. The Progress Report, "Rick Santorum's Most Outrageous Campaign Moments," Jan. 5, 2012.)

14. Jonas, S. "The Triumph of Cheneyism," BuzzFlash@Truthout, 11/03/11, http://blog.buzzflash.com/node/13119.

15. Pollitt, K., "Ron Paul's Strange Bedfellows," The Nation, Jan. 23, 2012, click here

16. Rich, F., "Nuke 'Em," New York (magazine). June 25 -- July 2, 2012, p. 37.

17. Jonas, S. "Ask Newt Gingrich," Published on BuzzFlash@Truthout on Tue, 12/13/2011 - 2:09pm [not copyright], URL: http://blog.buzzflash.com/node/13203. (For the specific references in the quoted version here, see the column as published.)

18. ibid., "Rick Santorum, Front-Runner --- For 2016," Published on BuzzFlash@Truthout on Thu, 02/09/2012 - 1:34pm [not copyright], URL: http://blog.buzzflash.com/node/13320. (For the specific references in the quoted version here, see the column as published.)

19. ibid., "Eleven Questions for Sen. Santorum," Published by BuzzFlash@Truthout on Fri, 02/24/2012 - 10:06am. URL: http://blog.buzzflash.com/node/13344. This column also appeared on The Greanville Post, http://www.greanvillepost.com/2012/02/23/ask-senator-santorum/. (For the specific references in the quoted version here, see the column as published.)

20. ibid., "Mitt Romney's Issues (that He Doesn't Want Discussed), Published on BuzzFlash@Truthout on Thu, 05/24/2012 - 12:36pm.URL: http://blog.buzzflash.com/node/13515 (For the specific references in the quoted version here, see the column as published.)

21. Rich, Frank, "Who in God's Name is Mitt Romney?" New York Magazine, Jan. 29, 2012.

22. The Book of Mormon, Salt Lake City, Utah: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints

23. Tarisco, V., "Former Mormon: What American Need to Know About Mormonism," Alternet.org, March 26, 2012.

24. Kantor, J., "Romney's Faith: Silent but Deep." The New York Times, May 19, 2012.

25. Mitt Romney Press, May 12, 2012.

26. Corn, D., "Buchanan Wins in New Hampshire," The Nation, 3/11/96.

27. Wilentz, S. "From Justice Scalia: A Chilling Vision of Religion's Authority in America," New York Times, July 8, 2002, p. A19.

28. Chernus, Ira, "Scalia and a Supreme Being," rd magazine: Politics, February 13, 2008, http://www.religiondispatches.org/archive/politics/70/scalia_and_a_supreme_being.

29. Haaretz, "'Road Map a Lifesaver for Us,' PM Abbas Tells Hamas," June 26, 2003, quoted in Floyd, C., "Global Eye --- Errand Boy," June 27, 2003, .tmtmetropolis.ru. Haaretz also has its own website, on which this material appeared.

30. Wikipedia, "David Barton," en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David Barton

31. Human Rights Campaign PAC, "If he were God, gays wouldn't exist," www.hrc.org, March 29, 2012.

32. Fineman, H., "Rise of Faith within GOP Has Created America's First Religious Party," click here

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Steven Jonas, MD, MPH, MS is a Professor Emeritus of Preventive Medicine at StonyBrookMedicine (NY). As well as having been a regular political columnist on several national websites for over 20 years, he is the author/co-author/editor/co-editor of 37 books Currently, on the columns side, in addition to his position on OpEdNews as a Trusted Author, he is a regular contributor to From The G-Man.  In the past he has been a contributor to, among other publications, The Greanville PostThe Planetary Movement, and Buzzflash.com.  He was also a triathlete for 37 seasons, doing over 250 multi-sport races.  Among his 37 books (from the late 1970s, mainly in the health, sports, and health care organization fields) are, on politics: The 15% Solution: How the Republican Religious Right Took Control of the U.S., 1981-2022; A Futuristic Novel (originally published 1996; the 3rd version was published by Trepper & Katz Impact Books, Punto Press Publishing, 2013, Brewster, NY, sadly beginning to come true, advertised on OpEdNews and available on  (more...)
 

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