The Huck: Y'all are gonna live by God's law when I'm President - my version of it, anyway (and women will be required to stand two paces behind) - but, hey, I've got a great laxative joke for you
It seems to be Huck Friday at Salon today. Joe Conason weighs in with Holy Constitution! 01/18/08. He recounts the Huck's declaration that he wanted to change the Constitution to conform to "the word of the living God" as Huck hears those words when it comes to abortion and gay marriage. Conason continues:
He later denied that he meant to suggest that God wants him in the White House. But his deliberate reference this week to conforming the law to "God's standards" sounds uncomfortably like the ideology sometimes known as "Christian dominionism" or "Christian reconstructionism," which declares that America, indeed every nation on earth, is meant to be governed by biblical law.
The looniest dominionists publicly insist that a pious government would inflict Old Testament punishments, including death, on blasphemers, pornographers, homosexuals, adulterers and even disobedient children. They constantly talk about their duty to institute biblical rule in the United States.
As a Southern Baptist preacher, does Huckabee accept that bizarre interpretation of Christian ethics? The answer is that he probably doesn't (or is too shrewd to say so if he does). But the clues to Huckabee's affinity for religious extremism have been lying in plain sight for a long time.
He cites some examples from Kids Who Kill (1998), the Huck's book co-authored with the hardline Christian Reconstructionist George Grant.
And also describes the Huck's affinity for Christian dominionist Bill Gothard:
As governor, he also promoted the faith-based programs of a reconstructionist minister named Bill Gothard -- and even boasted that he had gone through Gothard's "basic program" himself. More reputable evangelicals consider Gothard to be a cultish fringe character, but he has built an enormous empire, which depends on funding from local and state governments to bring his authoritarian version of the Gospel to prisoners, police officers and welfare recipients, among others. He experienced a moment of unwelcome notoriety recently, when the Denver Post revealed that Matthew Murray, the 24-year-old gunman who killed four people at two Christian centers in Colorado in December, had been subjected as a teenager to Gothard's superstrict "home-schooling" programs. (my emphasis)
And the Huck's supporter Dr. Steven Hotze may be even scarier!
Years before he became a Republican Party activist, Hotze played a role in the Coalition on Revival, one of the early organizations promoting reconstructionist thought among evangelicals. The coalition's 1986 "manifesto for the Christian church" urged believers to accept the Bible as "the final measurement and depository of certain fundamental facts of reality and basic principles that God wants all mankind to know in the sphere of law, government, economics, business, education, arts and communication, medicine, psychology, and science. All theories and practices of these spheres of life are only true, right, and realistic to the degree that they agree with the Bible."
He doesn't just confine himself to saving souls and eliminating freedom of religion. According to this report, he promotes fraudulent medicine, as well: Doctor Nice by Craig Malisow Houston Press 07/21/05. Another fine Christian white man who can help rid our country of the plague of science. If the Huck becomes President, maybe he could appoint Hotze to be the Surgeon General, or to head the National Institutes of Health.
Also at Salon, Alex Koppelman and Vincent Rossmeier also take a look at Huckabee's radical religious friends 01/18/08. The also discuss George Grant and Steven Hotze, as well as Huck associates Michael Farris, Janet Folger, James Kennedy (died 2007), James Robison, Rick Scarborough, and Don Wildmon. Boy, hidy, if you think the neocons are bad, wait until the Huck's theocrats start running foreign and domestic policy!
Folger organized the Values Voter Presidential Debate in 2007, which memorably featured (with her encouragement), a choir singing, "Why Should God Bless America?"
And there's Mike Huckabee hearts Israel by Mike Madden 01/18/08 on how the Huck aligns with the "Christian Zionists" who want the most belligerent policies by the US and Israel to hurry up the end of the world when they expect most of the Jews in the world will be slaughtered and the rest will convert to Christianity, i.e., stop being Jews. Madden writes, "Huckabee's posturing on foreign policy boils down to two things: Get tough on terrorists, and stand strong with Israel."
Then there's the Huck's nativism, ethical challenges and support for plutocracy (despite the "populist" rhetoric and Gomer Pyle style): The real Mike Huckabee stands up by Max Brantley, Arkansas Blog 01/17/08.
The Huck: Y'all are gonna live by God's law when I'm President - my version of it, anyway (and women will be required to stand two paces behind) - but, hey, I've got a great laxative joke for you
