[you can vote up this story on reddit.com]
I've been picking through PDF files on Sharon Angle's campaign website and was startled to come across the following, in an Angle for Senate press release about her campaign's endorsement by the National Federation of Republican Assemblies. Here's the second paragraph:
NFRA President Rod D. Martin was jubilant in endorsing Angle: "Sharon Angle is uniquely qualified to beat Harry Reid and to serve in the U.S. Senate, and she has proven time and time again that she will uphold true conservative values for the citizens of Nevada and the nation."
Rod D. Martin isn't merely the head of the NFRA, he's also a leading Christian Reconstructionist, as I wrote about at length in January 2008 in a piece titled Huckabee Endorses His Christian Reconstructionist Arkansas Policy Adviser.
The NFRA, in turn, bills itself as the "Republican Wing of the Republican Party" but is in fact heavily influenced by the Christian Reconstructionist movement. So, what's Christian Reconstructionism ? Here's Talk To Action Co-Founder Frederick Clarkson's thumbnail definition, from Christian Reconstructionism: Theocratic Dominionism Gains Influence published in the March/June 1994 issue of The Public Eye:
Generally, Reconstructionism seeks to replace democracy with a theocratic elite that would govern by imposing their interpretation of "Biblical Law." Reconstructionism would eliminate not only democracy but many of its manifestations, such as labor unions, civil rights laws, and public schools. Women would be generally relegated to hearth and home. Insufficiently Christian men would be denied citizenship, perhaps executed. So severe is this theocracy that it would extend capital punishment beyond such crimes as kidnapping, rape, and murder to include, among other things, blasphemy, heresy, adultery, and homosexuality.
Over the past several week, spadework and coverage from a small number of alternative press journalists has tied Nevada Republican U.S. Senate candidate Sharron Angle to American theocratic political parties and to the Christian Reconstructionist movement - Adele Stan of Alternet.org [1, 2], Justin Elliot of Talking Points Memo [1], Julie Ingersol for Religion Dispatches [1, 2], and my own coverage [1, 2, 3]