At the Values Voter Summit, Wing-Nut Christian Right Plots Its Comeback

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Numerous speakers stated that the very existence of the country is at stake.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee said things have gotten so bad that, "It is at times a country that is almost difficult to recognize."

His solution? "Send a bunch of congressmen home next year," Huckabee thundered. (He also called for abolishing the IRS so that preachers would be free to endorse candidates from the pulpit.)

"Here we are gutting the integrity of the CIA and calling them liars, while at the same time treating suspected terrorists like rock stars and giving them refuge in Bermuda," Huckabee wailed. "Much of the problem in our nation today is that it's appearing that we've lost our way and forgotten who we are as a people."

House Minority Whip Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Va., sounded similar themes, asserting that, thanks to the president, the very institutions of our nation are at risk.

"We do need your help right now," Cantor told the crowd. "The battle for our democracy is being fought today, this hour, in the halls of Congress and throughout 435 congressional districts across this country. We must win this battle to change the troubling course America is now on.

"Right now, millions of Americans are waking up and realizing that they don't recognize their own country anymore."

Former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell (now an FRC staffer) used nearly apocalyptic terms to warn the crowd of Obama's plan to travel down "the European path of big-government socialism" and spark the "total demise" of the economy.

He implored conference attendees to change people by converting them to fundamentalism, adding, "If we don't do it, America, in its third century, will be redefined."

Star Parker, an African American conservative popular with the religious right, warned that people have to choose between God and government because Americans with a secular worldview cannot coexist with those who have a church-based worldview.

Prone to shout out her speeches and lace them with over-the-top rhetoric, Parker asserted that the country could be on the verge of a new civil war over abortion.

On health care, Parker said there really is no problem. Doctors, she asserted, are happy to treat the poor for free.

"It is an absolute lie that we don't have access for everyone who is sick," Parker said.

Amazingly, after howling at the audience for 20 minutes, blasting Obama repeatedly and calling the people who disagree with her "lewd leftists," Parker asserted that the grassroots needs to consider "toning down the anger."

The drumbeat continued.

Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, asserted that Obama's first eight months in office were "nothing short of breath-taking" -- he didn't mean it as a compliment -- and said the president wants to force everyone to put an outlet in their house for hybrid cars.

But there's good news, according to Boehner: "We're in the midst of a political rebellion in America!" People, he said, have had enough.

"They want their country back, and we can take our country back."

Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., asserted that the country faces a crisis that is "moral in nature" and faces the possibility of "an avalanche of socialism." Luckily, Pence has a Boehner-like solution: "We will take this country back in 2010, and we will take this country back in 2012."

The appearance of Boehner, Pence, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and a bevy of other GOP bigwigs served to underscore the partisan nature of the event. In years past, religious right groups have occasionally put a conservative Democrat on the program. The FRC doesn't even bother.