American Theocracy...

If this is the wrong place to post this, or if it has been addressed already (I did a search but nothing came up) then I apologize, in advance, and will repent in sackcloth and ashes...

I am reading a book just released by Kevin Phillips. Title is: "American Theocracy" (Viking, 2006).

In it, he uses past empires who succumbed to a combination of "global overreach, militant religion, diminishing resources, and ballooning debt" as a way of examining contemporary American issues.

Is anyone else in the forum reading this? What are some of your thoughts on it?

I am really resonating with it, and I just wonder if anyone else is.

Although everyone I know has stopped loaning out their books (including me), my acupuncturist friend just loaned American Theocracy to me, so I will start reading it and get back to you shortly.

It's interesting that the back inside book cover blurb on the author, Kevin Phillips, describes him as a former Republican strategist. So this book may venture beyond a rehashing of Liberal vs. Conservative positions in the U.S. The book also has a substantial notes section, so the author may have thoroughly documented his sources. Cool!

For me, this book got off to a somewhat slow start. I kept waiting for the author to explicitly say that Americans who are Fundamentalist Christians (or Orthodox Jews) have been having enough children in each generation recently to account for the growth of those religions in the U.S., and he finally does say that, but in typically long-winded academic fashion.

Where the book does come alive, however, is in the last few chapters. The author, Kevin Phillips, portrays the devastating economic and scientific problems emerging in the U.S. as an array of fundamentalist doctrines (you guessed it, anti-economic establishment and anti-science establishment) take hold. Ironically, the religious fundamentalist U.S. readers who made the "Left Behind" series of books perennial best-sellers for the last 10 years don't realize how much of the Bible that the "Left Behind" authors get wrong. Mr. Phillips, a former Republican party strategies, expresses deep dismay with the gradual takeover of "the party of Lincoln" by an increasingly theocratic voter base.

Definitely worth a read! I found particularly worthwhile the explanation of fundamentalist codewords such as "stewardship", as in the "environmental stewardship" doctrines that Republicans affiliated with the U.S. Christian Coalition keep espousing. Yup, now I understand.

It's especially interesting that today the Vatican joined with a variety of Jerusalem religious representatives to denounce what it terms "Christian Zionists", claiming that Christian Zionists look forward to Armageddon happening any time now... the Vatican says that these fundamentalist beliefs get in the way of supporting effective peace talks in the Middle East. Well, yes.

Book title: American Theocracy, by Kevin Phillips
Copyright 2006 by Viking Publishers

[edit on 31-8-2006 by FutureLibrarian]