Struggling to find an identity and a larger audience, a number of long-time hard-core Religious Right groups have joined together to launch the Freedom Federation

The summer had barely begun. Worldwide attention was focused on the death of Michael Jackson and the cable news shock troops were on it 24/7. Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama's nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court, had yet to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee. The Tea Party movement, which showed some signs of life on Tax Day, was fizzling out. "Birthers" - right wing activists convinced that President Obama was not born in the U.S. - were smoldering on the sidelines. The right's assault on Obama's health care proposals was still weeks away.    

With the Christian right grasping at anti-Obama straws, a group of seasoned "culture warriors" filed into the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., in late June, to announce the formation of the Freedom Foundation, a new consortium of Christian conservative organizations.  

Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld might have called it a meeting of dead-enders. Some might have seen it as a gathering of the bewitched, bothered and bewildered!

Now, nearly two months later, in an attempt to counter President Obama's health care reform outreach to the faith community, the Freedom Federation - touting "Real Hope. Real Change. Real Freedom" at it website -- held another Washington, D.C. press conference to warn legislators not to act precipitously on health care when they return from their August recess.

Mark DeMoss, a long-time conservative public relations expert has launched `The Civility Project' which calls for civility in the public discourse.

One could slice and dice just about any period in American history and determine that a "civility" project might have been useful. Nevertheless, it has been over the past few decades that churlish and bombastic invective has prevailed over carefully calibrated discourse. Back in the day, when William F. Buckley was eviscerating liberal foes on his PBS television program, he did it with a sparkle in his eye. (Buckley got considerably less civil with Gore Vidal during ABC's coverage of the 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYymnxoQnf8).

A few days ago, when Sarah Palin talked about Barack Obama's health care reform initiatives and claimed that his "death panels" would decide who would live and who wouldf die, she was - to put it mildly -- decidely uncivil. She later reversed course and came out in favor of civility. However sincere or insincere she may be, it is highly unlikely that the likes of Bill O'Reilly, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, and Rush Limbaugh, will be signing up for Mark DeMoss' "Civility Project."      

DeMoss, a long-time Christian Right/GOP-oriented public relations expert thinks today's political landscape is completely out of whack, and he's offering up his "Civility Project" as a way of learning how political opponents can disagree without being disagreeable.

So if you were DeMoss, and you were launching something as high-minded as "The Civility Project," why would you start off by bashing gays and lesbians?  

National Endowment for the Arts back in conservative crosshairs

It used to be that the mere mention of the National Endowment for the Arts (http://www.nea.gov/) would immediately draw fire from the right. In the 1990s, "Defund the NEA" became a rallying cry that was regularly heard in the halls of Congress. Direct mail packages, designed by conservative public relations pros and delivered directly to your mailbox by the U.S. Postal Service, claimed that the agency supported anti-Christian and pornographic art projects. Demonizing the NEA was a fundraising tool that kept giving and giving and giving.

Over the past decade, however, in part because the agency appeared to consciously distance itself from funding controversial art projects, and in part because the Christian Right moved on to other issues (abortion, same-sex marriage, immigration), fighting funding for the NEA was no longer at the top of their agenda.  

Concern over how President Barack Obama's stimulus money is being used is again focusing attention on the NEA. A July 30 Fox News report (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/07/29/stimulus-funds-art-hou ses-showing-pervert-revues-underground-pornography/) pointed out that some stimulus money (the Recovery and Reinvestment Act) earmarked for the NEA, wound up stimulating an NEA-funded "pornographic" film project, a long-running pansexual performance series, and a dance production featuring naked dancers.

As I described in a June 11, 2009 story Ensign's "C Street House" Owned By Group Touting Plans For Christian World Control, founder of Youth With a Mission Loren Cunningham, whose organization owns the house where GOP Senators John Ensign and Tom Coburn enjoy cheap rent, espouses a doctrine known as the "Seven Mountains Mandate" in which believers seek to gain world control, by gaining influence over seven key sectors of society: religion, government, media, education, arts and entertainment, family, and business.

But the Seven Mountains idea is not unique to Loren Cunningham, and it is likely that Sarah Palin embraces the 7M Mandate's theocratic agenda:

In a 2005 religious ceremony (link to video footage) held as Palin was preparing to run for the Alaska governor's seat, two pastors publicly blessed and anointed Palin and in a short speech prior to the anointing, Kenyan religious leader Thomas Muthee gave an opening speech in whcih he clearly espoused, with Sarah Palin in the audience, the 7 Mountains Mandate.

The 7M Mandate is being promoted by a newly formed global Christian relational network, coalescing out of Pentecostalism and the Charismatic movement, which represents a radically different new form of Christianity, whose leaders Palin is extensively linked to, that most Americans do not even know exists: The New Apostolic Reformation.

Packin' Pistols for God and Country: NRA Christians stake claim on patriotism and the America

For many in this country the connection between guns and God is as American as burgers and fries, baseball and beer, and July 4th and fireworks. On Saturday, June 27, more than 200 people packing guns (albeit unloaded) gathered at the New Bethel Church in Louisville, Kentucky, where Pastor Ken Pagano welcomed them to an event called the "Open Carry Celebration."

According to the New Bethel Church website, the "Open Carry Celebration" was held on a Saturday instead of a Sunday, so that it was clear that it was "not a church worship service, where the focus is on Jesus and our responsibility to Him. Rather," Pagano, a former Marine weapons instructor, pointed out, "this is merely a church-hosted event, similar to any other event that any other church may do to celebrate their heritage."

"Open Carry" was held several weeks after Pagano had encouraged his parishioners to bring the guns to a church-sponsored picnic. "Honestly, I would really like to see this mushroom into a Thunder over Louisville, where we are just inundated with civil-minded responsible gun owners," Pagano said.

"As a Christian, I believe, and as an American this country was founded on the deep-seated belief in God and firearms -- without which we wouldn't be here today," Pagano told FOX News during the run-up to the "Open Carry" event.

"There is nothing illogical nor immoral about being a God-fearer and a decent community-minded individual who believes in rights to bear arms and use firearms for self-defense if necessary or just for sporting purposes."

"Future of Babylon" Project Preserves History to Some, Ushers in "End Times" to Others

On April 10, 2003, one day after U.S. forces established control over Iraq, a number of Iraqis took to doing, to paraphrase Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld "what a free people do"; running amok and looting whatever wasn't permanently nailed in place.

One of the hardest hit targets was Baghdad's Iraq Museum. While the pillaging of the Iraq Museum was covered fairly extensively by the media, the destabilization of antiquities in Babylon, where U.S. forces built a military base, Camp Alpha--received much less media attention.

In January 2005, the Boston Globe reported that according to a report by John Curtis, keeper of the British Museum's Near East department, "US-led troops using the ancient Iraqi city of Babylon as a base have damaged and contaminated artifacts dating back thousands of years in one of the most important archeological sites in the world."

Now, four years later, the State Department and the Iraqi State Board of Antiquities and Heritage have established a project aimed at preserving the remains that still exist, and developing a major tourist attraction.

For conservative Christian evangelicals Joel Rosenberg and Tim LaHaye, the project could move us all one step closer to the "End Times."  

After months of silence, the U.S. State Department finally condemns the murders of several dozen young men who were gay, or perceived to be gay.  

In 2005, during the height of internecine violence and resistance to the U.S. occupation, Iraq's most influential Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali a-Sistani, issued a religious decree that said that gay men and lesbians should be "punished, in fact, killed." He added, "The people should be killed in the worst, most severe way of killing."

According to the New York Times, "The language has since been removed from his Web site."

However, when al-Sistani speaks, many Iraqis listen!

In early April, the New York Times reported that "The relative freedom of a newly democratic Iraq and the recent improvement in security have allowed a gay subculture to flourish here. The response has been swift and deadly."

In the 1970s, 80s and 90s, deeply held religious beliefs became the scaffolding for a broad, and often violent, white nationalist movement    

Over the past few months, right-wing extremists have unleashed a series of attacks that have included the assassination of Dr. George Tiller, increased attacks on abortion clinics, the killing of three police officers in Pittsburgh, and the shootings at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum on Wednesday, June 10.

"In the 1970s, 80s and 90s, the deeply held religious beliefs of an assortment of white nationalists became the scaffolding for a broad, and often violent, movement of racists and anti-Semites. Leonard Zeskind's recent book, "Blood and Politics: The History of the White Nationalist Movement from the Margins to the Mainstream," details the growth of this movement and why they are not to be ignored.

Zeskind told CNN that at this point, the "shooting cannot be shown to be motivated by the fact that Barack Obama is president. "What white nationalists believe is that Barack Obama confirms their worst fears about the United States, that the government is in the hands of people that they consider racial aliens," Zeskind said. "It's a confirmation of long-held beliefs rather than something entirely new."

[ed: this story continues in part two, Col. Jim Ammerman, Apostle & New World Order Conspiracy Theorist]

What is New World Order conspiracy theory and how is it spreading through our society?

A few weeks ago I spoke at an event sponsored by one of the local chapters of the American Jewish Committee and emphasized the growing dangers of New World Order Conspiracy theories.  Included in my presentation were video clips and examples of the rapid mainstreaming of this conspiracy storyline.  However, my presentation was not focused on white supremacist groups but Christian Zionist leaders who freely and openly disseminate this paranoid conspiracy to millions worldwide in the guise of end times prophecy.  

Condemn the murder of Dr. George Tilller? Absolutely! Is condemnation enough? Not on your life!

Sometime during the day after the assasinastion of Dr. George Tiller, I received another condemnation of the murder in my in-box.

This one was from Faith In Public Life, an organization working hard to establish "common ground" amongst conservative and liberal religious leaders. (Thus far, I have generally been agnostic about "common ground" efforts.)

The headline read "Religious Leaders Seeking Common Ground on Abortion: Condemn George Tiller's Murder, Say Act Offends Us All"

What followed was a condemnation of the murder. I was sorry to see that it didn't go nearly far enough.

While everyone on both sides of the abortion issue seems to condemn the murder of George Tiller, few admit the malignant effects of "baby killer" rhetoric

In the immediate aftermath of the murder of Dr. George Tiller, words came flowing forth from every conceivable direction. The media reported, longtime anti-abortion activists "condemned," but few apologized for years of hate speech directed at Tiller.

In the hours following the murder and the subsequent condemnations from Religious Right leaders, I remembered Jerry Falwell's notorious post-9/11 remarks, blaming feminists and the ACLU, among others -- and the uncomfortable flip-flopping that followed. It was clear that his comments represented what he was thinking. Yet it was also clear, as he tried to backtrack and apologize, that he realized he had monumentally goofed.

I was reminded of those wretched Falwell maneuverings on Monday evening while watching Frank Schaeffer -- the son of the late Francis Schaeffer, one of the founding fathers and most revered figures on the Christian Right - point out during his appearance on MSNBC's The Rachel Maddow Show that the condemnations of Tiller's murder issued by leaders of the Christian Right seemed forced and empty.

French government agency report claims growing influence of religious sects and cults at UN and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe

A French government agency called MIVILUDES (Mission interministérielle de vigilance et de lutte contre les dérives sectaries -- Interministerial Mission for Monitoring and Combating Cultic Deviancy) recently issued a 199-page report claiming that religious sects and cults are exerting a growing influence in international bodies such as the United Nations.

According to a report at Digital Journal, "A sect is defined here as being any religious organization which can be characterized as employing any of the following methods; Mental destabilization, exorbitant financial demands, a rupture with members' original environment, power in the hands of one person, the invasion of a person's physical integrity, the recruitment of children, antisocial preaching and troubling public order, activities which lead it to be tried in a court of law, using parallel economic structures, attempts to infiltrate the workplace, schools, and public powers."