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Loading... Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian Nationalismby Michelle Goldberg
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will love Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. 1   madcatnip72 | Dec 22, 2009 |  I liked Michelle Goldberg's take on the "religious right" and its power in current American politics. I also enjoyed (and was scared by) her implications of the power of the religious right at the end of each chapter. (  ) 06nwingert | Dec 1, 2008 | You may have noticed this is you live in the United States, but what is arguably the most mythomaniac country on Earth has been enduring a seismic shift in the way it understands itself for the last decade or so. One of the great new ideas is that the wall of separation between church and state is just too high. "Kingdom Coming" is a fascinating exploration of the folks who want to lower or eliminate that wall, and how their carefully couched, reasonable words mask some fairly alarming beliefs. (  ) popejephei | Jun 17, 2008 | Scary stuff, and almost unbelievable, but it's all documented in black and white. Goldberg does an excellent job showing how this tiny radical minority has already wielded enormous influence in the Republican Party and the Bush administration. It's like a paranoid fascist nation within the nation, impervious to facts and reason. Yikes. Goldberg ends by arguing that there is no compromise or negotiating with these folks. They need to be defeated, plain and simple. Amen to that. ( ) sabreader | Jun 13, 2008 | I've just started reading the book. So far I do know this: she's [Michelle Goldberg] absolutely gorgeous. She looks a little bit like Karen O. from the band Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs. Check out their CD's.  ckavich | Apr 22, 2008 |  no reviews | add a review
Amazon.com Product Description (ISBN 0393060942, Hardcover)Michelle Goldberg, a senior political reporter for Salon.com, has been covering the intersection of politics and ideology for years. Before the 2004 election, and during the ensuing months when many Americans were trying to understand how an administration marked by cronyism, disregard for the national budget, and poorly disguised self-interest had been reinstated, Goldberg traveled through the heartland of a country in the grips of a fevered religious radicalism: the America of our time. From the classroom to the mega-church to the federal court, she saw how the growing influence of dominionism-the doctrine that Christians have the right to rule nonbelievers-is threatening the foundations of democracy.In Kingdom Coming, Goldberg demonstrates how an increasingly bellicose fundamentalism is gaining traction throughout our national life, taking us on a tour of the parallel right-wing evangelical culture that is buoyed by Republican political patronage. Deep within the red zones of a divided America, we meet military retirees pledging to seize the nation in Christ's name, perfidious congressmen courting the confidence of neo-confederates and proponents of theocracy, and leaders of federally funded programs offering Jesus as the solution to the country's social problems. With her trenchant interviews and the telling testimonies of the people behind this movement, Goldberg gains access into the hearts and minds of citizens who are striving to remake the secular Republic bequeathed by our founders into a Christian nation run according to their interpretation of scripture. In her examination of the ever-widening divide between believers and nonbelievers, Goldberg illustrates the subversive effect of this conservative stranglehold nationwide. In an age when faith rather than reason is heralded and the values of the Enlightenment are threatened by a mystical nationalism claiming divine sanction, Kingdom Coming brings us face to face with the irrational forces that are remaking much of America. (retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:58:18 -0400) The first test round has been closed. Visit the Open Shelves Classification group for details. |
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Wikipedia in English (2)
She's pretty professionally dispassionate in the face of a scary totalitarian worldview that
a) Is clear in its desire to destroy American pluralism and democracy
b) Doesn't let facts, science or reason get in the way of its ideology - in fact is deliberately anti-intellectual and insular
c) Has a pathological, paranoid persecution complex
d) Is naked in its ravenous desire for political power.
I got the sense that the people Goldberg interviewed would be eager to toss homosexuals and other "adulterers" into concentration camps and worse.
Definitely recommended; one of the first books in what has become a series to touch this subject, such as Kevin Phillips' American Theocracy and Max Blumenthal's Republican Gomorrah. (