Is Sarah Palin leaving politics to pursue a higher calling?

I made mention way back on November 15 that Palin's book was written for a very specific audience. And as it turns out I was not alone in that observation.

Though most of the talk surrounding the release of Going Rogue revolves around how it affects Palin's standing as a political figure, including her chances of winning the White House, should she choose to run, the book is as much poised to heighten Palin's profile as a Christian leader. "It's a mistake to frame all this in the context of her potential candidacy," Mark DeMoss, one of the country's top Christian media specialists, says of Going Rogue. "She wants to tell her story and the story of her personal faith journey." At a time when politically conservative evangelicals lack a national figurehead, Palin's ability to connect with them could also deepen her appeal to a key part of the Republican base. "Christian audiences could respond to this like they did when George W. Bush talked about his faith," says John Green, a religion and politics expert at the University of Akron. "This community takes faith very seriously and likes people who talk about their faith journey."

Until now, that part of Palin's story has been mostly implied. As John McCain's vice presidential running mate last year, she generally avoided talk of her faith and its influence on her politics. But word of her decision to carry her pregnancy to term despite knowing her son Trig would be born with Down syndrome was an inspiration to antiabortion activists, mostly Roman Catholics and evangelicals. (NOW do you understand how important Trig is to Palin's mythology?) News that Palin's unwed teen daughter Bristol was pregnant and would give birth had a similar effect. "[The Palins] should be commended once again for not just talking about their pro-life and pro-family values," Focus on the Family's James Dobson said at the time, "but living them out even in the midst of trying circumstances."


In promoting the book, Palin is building on that Christian outsider theme. She accuses the news media of singling out conservative religious politicians like her for unfair treatment.(And firmly connects herself to the persecution complex promoted by Evangelical Christians in this country) "I do absolutely notice that some of the conservative Christians who are members of Congress . . .it seems like the leftist media treats them a little bit different," she said during a recent interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network. Such sentiments are likely to resonate with evangelicals, many of whom feel embattled by the secular culture. "A lot of evangelicals say, 'The press covers us the same way—she must be one of us,' " says Green.

That solidarity may help the 45-year-old Palin become an heir to Focus's Dobson, who is giving up his decades-old radio show, and other graying Christian right leaders. "What makes her different from other political leaders is that she sees politics as a vocation, as something you're called to do," says Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the antiabortion group the Susan B. Anthony List, who is hoping Palin steps up her role in the conservative values movement. Whether she winds up doing so is an open question. But after Palin governed Alaska as a centrist, Going Rogue is helping solidify her national reputation as a poster child for religious conservatives.

Can you just picture it? "Sarah Palin's Wasilla Hour of Gospel Power" beaming into your home from the last frontier, and the last best refuge from the coming Rapture.

Well I have been saying for quite some time that Palin is acting more like a televangelist then a person with political aspirations. She is focused almost exclusively on making money and gathering disciples, and seems to be forming some kind of base camp in Fairbanks, where writers from C4P have ensconced themselves and seem to be awaiting further instructions.

I have been struggling to decide if she was helping to form a third political party or a new religious movement, But now I am wondering if what she ends up creating will not be some hybrid of both!

One of the main focuses of the Religious Right has been a campaign to remove the separation of church and state and to make constitutional law subordinate to biblical law. In other words they want to form a Theocracy. And what better way to do that then to form a third political party defined both by its ultra-conservatism as well as its unrestrained promotion of their brand of Christianity?

The internal battle within the GOP between the social conservatives and the old guard, fiscal conservatives has rendered the party useless for moving swiftly to find and promote candidates that the followers of Sarah Palin, James Dobson, and Franklin Graham can give their seal of approval.

A third party where the lines between politics and religion are blurred to form a "Christocrats" party, which can funnel evangelical candidates (and money raised directly from the pulpit) into local elections all over the country, would be just the thing to satiate their hunger for power and control. A party which could very well saturate state governments, city governments, and school boards with Warriors for Christ in just a few years.

These "Christocrats" would focus all of their attention on fighting to repeal Roe vs Wade, getting prayer back into the classroom, and establishing Christianity as the one true religion in America. They would not be distracted by such mundane things as balancing a budget, maintaining roads and highways, or promoting equality for minorities.

So the question that we need to ask is, will a party like this be able to compete with the two parties we currently have? The answer is yes, it can. Truthfully it has already begun.

We have seen how easily it is to agitate and mobilize these people by watching it being done on Fox News by Glenn Beck. We have also seen a totally unqualified candidate, supported by Palin and her ilk, crush a Republican candidate in New York and come within a hair's breath of defeating the Democratic challenger.

The same teabaggers who were directed to vote for Doug Hoffman are just looking for a new party to lead them forward, and they already believe that Sarah Palin is God's gift (literally) to politics. It is only a hop, skip, and a jump from there to starting a new all white, all Christian, all coo-coo, third party that will gladly, and energetically, push their agenda forward on the House and Senate floors.

Sure at first they will have no power and will get laughed out of Chambers. But what happens when there are three of them, and five of them, and twenty five of them? Who will be laughing then? And we have already seen Republican politicians embracing this primitive brand of conservatism in an effort to hold onto their positions so we can definitely expect more of the same.

No my friends, we are in for a battle for the very heart of our nation. And there is coming a time when those who decide to sit out elections because "voting doesn't help anyhow" will find themselves living in a country where their rights to religious freedom, their right to a secular education for their children, and their right to be treated equally will be a thing of the past.

If you think I am overreacting then just take a moment and think back to when you believed that there was no way in hell that somebody as ignorant and untalented as George W. Bush would EVER be elected to the Presidency. But it happened didn't it?

Yep, it sure did.