Rod Dreher’s latest post is quite long, but well worth reading. God save us all if ex-governor Palin becomes President:
Did you catch this response Sarah Palin made last week to Barbara Walters, when Walters asked about the West Bank settlements?:
“I disagree with the Obama administration on that. I believe that the Jewish settlements should be allowed to be expanded upon, because that population of Israel is, is going to grow. More and more Jewish people will be flocking to Israel in the days and weeks and months ahead. And I don’t think that the Obama administration has any right to tell Israel that the Jewish settlements cannot expand.”
When I heard that, I thought, oh, here we go. It’s not because of her view on the settlements, even though I disagree with her. It’s her bizarro view that Jews are going to be “flocking” to Israel in the days and months ahead. I thought that this was probably evidence that she’s a Late Great Planet Earther.
More evidence, from the Charlotte Observer today:
Sarah Palin, the hottest name in the Republican Party, took a detour from her book-signing tour Sunday to dine with Billy Graham at his mountaintop home in Montreat. “He’s followed her career and likes her strong stand on faith,” said son Franklin Graham, who was present for the 2 1/2-hour get-together. “Daddy feels God was using her to wake America up.”
The former Alaska governor and 2008 GOP vice presidential candidate told Billy Graham about how she came to faith in God as a girl in Bible camp.
“What the Bible says about Israel, Iran and Iraq.” That’s a tip-off that she reads the Bible as a guide to geopolitical events in the End Times. This is very common among a large portion of Evangelical Christians — according to a leading expert, between 50 and 60 million Americans hold Palin’s belief about the Jewish ingathering to Israel in advance of the Apocalypse — but can you imagine an American president making her foreign policy based on a belief that “The Late, Great Planet Earth” is a reliable source of information about the future?
Well, this is great news if you are one of the Protestants who do hold these beliefs. But if you are not, then you should be alarmed. I admit that I think Evangelicals get a bad rap from liberal Jews, many of whom are so repulsed by the Evangelicals’ political and social conservatism that they unfairly and unwisely devalue the value of their Zionism. But supporting the settlements policy because there has to be room for all the Jews in the world to come home to Israel in advance of Armageddon? Astonishing. Again, though, if you are convinced that we’re in the Last Days, and history’s end game will involve this particular set of events, then you thank God that the U.S. might be led by A President Who Gets It.
Which brings us to the following e-mail I received from a friend who’s a conservative reader of this blog, and who writes to defend Andrew Sullivan’s relentless criticism of Palin. Read on for that text, posted with her permission:
I think Andrew Sullivan deserves a medal for his ongoing investigation of all things Palin. She is a menace to this country, as he suggests. She is a toxic mix of ignorance, charisma (or so they say), anger (I would even say hatred), and millions and millions of dollars in funding from the Murdoch empire and from a big chunk of the Christian right. People who should know better, like the Grahams, are giving her significant financial and moral backing – note the use of Franklin Graham’s organization’s airplane to take her to Fort Bragg (where she raised donations to her PAC, and had her father attack the President’s foreign policy): http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34110893/ns/politics-more_politics/ And she’ll be heading off to Fort Hood soon.
Her words have an impact on millions of her followers, and she is capable of leading a large percentage of the US population in the direction of some terribly dangerous policies. Just to pick one example, consider what she said to Barbara Walters about why the US should support Israeli settlements. Do you really think that US foreign policy should be based on the “Left Behind” novels? I don’t. (To read more about Palin and the Rapture, please scroll down).
Andrew has not concentrated solely on the Trig Truther issue – right from the moment Palin stepped on that Ohio stage with McCain, he has been one of the only prominent mainstream journalists looking into her career in Alaska. Through his site, I have found many links to Alaska-based sites that have provided a wealth of information on her record as mayor of Wasilla and governor of Alaska, and which I continue to read on a regular basis. Let me tell you, it ain’t a pretty picture. Yet, she is now selling millions of books, and has convinced a lot of people that she has been subjected to unusual scrutiny by the media. Baloney! I will admit that my initial opposition to her was based on personal reasons – I was horrified that a woman with a special needs infant would run for VP, and the discovery that her 17-year-old daughter was pregnant was icing on that cake. But my investigation of her actual record as an elected official made me realize the full enormity of McCain’s decision to put her “a heartbeat away” from controlling the US military.
I have written to you before about my worry that someone will try to kill the President, and, if something like that happens (God forbid), Palin will have to share some of the blame. She is more dangerous than Glenn Beck in that she could actually end up holding political power. He is just an entertainer, and I think he knows it. Palin really has people convinced that she is on a mission from God. I have friends who are fairly sophisticated, well-educated people who will not so much as listen to any of the facts about Palin. They seem to be mesmerized by her.
I don’t defend everything Andrew writes – I’m sick to death of his attacks on Pope Benedict, and I was furious that he accused you of “smearing” him when you pointed out, quite accurately, that he it is not clear why he stays in the Catholic Church, since he quite obviously doesn’t believe a lot of what the Church teaches. is a cafeteria Catholic. But when it comes to Palin, he has done a real service to this country.
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