The New York Review of Books
November 16, 2006
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/19590?email
[excerpt]

A Country Ruled by Faith
By Garry Wills

The right wing in America likes to think that the United States
government was, at its inception, highly religious, specifically
highly Christian, and even more specifically highly biblical. That was
not true of that government or any later government--until 2000, when
the fiction of the past became the reality of the present. George W.
Bush was not only born-again, like Jimmy Carter. His religious
conversion came late, and took place in the political setting of Billy
Graham's ministry to the powerful. He was converted during a stroll
with Graham on his father's Kennebunkport compound. It is true that
Dwight Eisenhower was guided to baptism by Graham. But Eisenhower was
a famous and formed man, the principal military figure of World War
II, the leader of NATO, the president of Columbia University--his
change in religious orientation was just an addition to many prior
achievements. Bush's conversion at a comparatively young stage in his
life was a wrenching away from mainly wasted years. He joined a Bible
study culture in Texas that was unlike anything Eisenhower bought
into.
[end excerpt]

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You are invited to check out the following:

The Rise of the Theocratic States of America
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/theocracy.htm

American Theocrats - Past and Present
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/theocrats.htm

The Constitutional Principle: Separation of Church and State
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/index.html

[and to join the discussion group for the above site and/or Separation of
Church and State in general, listed below]

HRSepCnS · Hampton Roads [Virginia] SepChurch&State
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HRSepCnS/

[Its not just Hampton Roads folks who are members, there are members from
all over the US and a couple from overseas as well]

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. . . You can't understand a phrase such as "Congress shall make no law
respecting an establishment of religion" by syllogistic reasoning. Words
take their meaning from social as well as textual contexts, which is why
"a
page of history is worth a volume of logic." New York Trust Co. v.
Eisner,
256 U.S. 345, 349, 41 S.Ct. 506, 507, 65 L.Ed. 963 (1921) (Holmes, J.).
Sherman v. Community Consol. Dist. 21, 980 F.2d 437, 445 (7th Cir. 1992)
. . .
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USAF LT. COL (Ret) Buffman (Glen P. Goffin) wrote

"You pilot always into an unknown future;
facts are your only clue. Get the facts!"

That philosophy 'snipit' helped to get me, and my crew, through a good
many combat missions and far too many scary, inflight, emergencies.

It has also played a significant role in helping me to expose the
plethora of radical Christian propaganda and lies that we find at
almost every media turn.

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THE CONSTITUTIONAL PRINCIPLE:
SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE

http://members.tripod.com/~candst/index.html
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