James Dobson

My observation is that women are merely waiting for their husbands to assume leadership-James Dobson

I don't know how this happened. But James Dobson apparently has become one of the most powerful men in America. The lapdogs apparently seem to be waddling up to Colorado Springs, Republican men waiting to be anointed as who is the REAL conservative. As if this Christian patriarch is the one who is going to be the kingmaker. Does this scare the crap out of anybody else? I mean this guys supported such strong candidates as Gary Bauer and Alan Keyes. I sometimes feel like I was in a coma and the world just got really weird.

Now, here's a confession, I am a Christian, I go to church mostly every Sunday, I'm interested in the Bible and spirituality, and the teachings of Jesus and the idea of charity and good works but that may be where me and James Dobson stop having any similarities in our beliefs. I guess the only way I can describe it is it is the equivalent of me and Dobson being Christians is similar to the fact that both me and Michael Jordan enjoyed playing basketball when we were younger

I've always found fundamentalist Christians odd. They can do some great charity work, working with the poor, conducting missions to places that I'd never want to go. I remember a friend's mother who was a great woman, who used to deliver bread to those in need. As we used to say, do we have any real bread, or just Mrs. Pearson bread? Real Christians, those who believe in service and servant leadership, not social control and hypocrisy.

But then the weirdness starts, evolution. Do we really want someone choosing Presidential candidates, even influencing the process, that actually believes the Earth was was created in six days? And is only 6000 years old? That think that potentially life saving and life improving research on stem cells is the equivalent of murder. In fact, compared it to Nazi experiments in the Death Camps. Anyone who has had family member affected by diabetes, Alzheimer's or a host of other diseases should run as far away from a Dobson endorsed candidate as possible.

What's to think of folks that think that gay folks can just be healed back to straight? The right's obsession with gays is bizarre, I never knew how much danger they (homosexuals) posed to my marriage. I mean what's going to happen, a sudden burst of affection for a Liberacesque wardrobe and a singing of showtunes that will whip me in homophilia and a need to get divorced and marry a man. My church is open and affirming, c'mon down and join us in Christ! Hey, if gay folks can make Melrose into the South End, all power to 'em. C'mon in, the Welcome Wagon is on it's way, get to gentrifying.

There is a certain dismay that I have with all true believers, those who have no doubt. That they think their way is absolutely correct and that no gray area exists. There are thousands of references to doing good works in the Bible, particularly for working for those in poverty, and only a few obscure references to homosexuality so it is difficult for me to understand the obsession over couples that fall in love and want to sanctify and "legalize" that love under God and under the law. Slavery was a tradition, too, and we got over that. In several generations we are likely to feel the same way about banning people in love from marriage.

It will be interesting to see, as we begin to drive towards 2008, who will be the candidate for the GOP that pull away from the Christian ultra-right. If the political pendulum does begin to swing back from the right as the walking disaster of the George W. Bush administration forgets the common sense of "when you hit bottom, stop digging!", who is the Republican candidate that will be there to pick up the pieces and realize in fact, the evangelicals won't just stay home on Election Day. Former Governor Willard Romney has failed from the get go to pick up on this, that his true right center politics would have resonated with many Republicans and in fact the Reagan Democrats.