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• Religious conservatives' demands on government may spark backlash | A church-based rally in support of conservative judges has threatened to turn a political debate into a holy war over how much influence religious conservatives should have over both politics and policy. (Knight Ridder Newspapers)
• Jesus was no GOP lobbyist | A tortured version of his message is being marketed for political gain. (Jack Hitt,, Los Angeles Times)
• No need to fear theocratic coup | Whether the United States is on its way to becoming a theocracy is actually a silly question. No religion is going to impose laws on an unwilling Congress or the people of this country. (Michael Barone, Chicago Sun-Times)
• Crusader for a Christian nation | Dr. D. James Kennedy may not be as well-known as Falwell, Robertson, or Dobson, but he packs a powerful political punch in Washington (Bill Berkowitz, WorkingForChange)
• Playing the faith card | An ugly new chapter in the religious wars (Reason)
• Democratic moral values? | You can forgive Democrats in Washington for feeling somewhat vindicated by the way the controversy over Terri Schiavo played out. For years, after all, they waited in vain for the moment when Republicans might trip over their own arrogance while crusading for moral values, and finally, if polls are to be believed, it happened. (Reuters)
• GOP stressing Constitution in judge battle | Buffeted by poor poll numbers, Senate Republicans are stressing the Constitution rather than religion or retribution against activist judges as the reason to deny Democrats the right to block votes on President Bush's court nominees. (Associated Press)

God, politics, & culture:

• On a mission from God to sow faith | With Joseph Ratzinger, George Bush and Antonin Scalia about to share the world, body politic and soul between them, I'm beginning to get a feel for what it was like to be Jewish in 13th century Europe or Protestant in 17th century France or conservative in 1960s America for that matter, back when the country was emerging from its latest reactionary trance. (Daytona Beach News-Journal, Fla.)
• Benedict XVI and DeLay hard-liners have similarities | You could have called it "the week of the two Hammers.' Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the doctrinal enforcer of the Roman Catholic Church, was elected pope. And, in Washington, D.C., House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, escalated his efforts to keep himself in power. (Morton Kondracke, Whittier Daily News, Calif.)

Courts:

• Sparing America's courts | GOP would replace sitting judges with ideologues (Richard Larsen, Ventura County Star, Calif.)
• Faith 'war' rages in U.S., judge says | A Bush nominee central to the Senate's judicial controversy criticizes secular humanists. (Los Angeles Times)
• Judicial insanity | Provocation is no excuse for derangement. And there has been plenty of provocation: decades of an imperial judiciary unilaterally legislating radical social change on the flimsiest of constitutional pretexts. But while that may explain, it does not justify the flailing, sometimes delirious attacks on the judiciary mounted by House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and others in the wake of the Terri Schiavo case. (Charles Krauthammer, Washington Post)
• Faith-based courts | Promoters of the "Justice Sunday" sham doubtless hoped to build public support for their notion that the federal courts should be packed with judges predisposed to champion a particular set of religious values. One must hope that won't be the case. (Editorial, Courier-Journal, Louisville)

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April (Web-only) 2005, Vol. 49