Moonwatch

Bad Moon Rising: How Reverend Moon Created the Washington Times, Seduced the Religious Right, and Built an American Kingdom. Author John Gorenfeld (Order here)

Imagine someone with a net worth approaching Warren Buffet's, the international reach of a rock superstar, who enjoys the same access to the conservative elite as the most successful K-Street lobbyist, and worst of all, sharing the fringe messianic delusions of someone like David Koresh all rolled into one power-mad cult leader. Now imagine that that individual successfully buys their way into the heart of the GOP, with the oft stated goal of destroying both Christianity and representative government. Well, stop imagining: that's a decent synopsis of Sun-myung Moon, protected darling of the religious right.

Even though he does have this stunning sort of international reach and influence, people just tune it out, maybe because it does sound so ludicrous. It is a shock to realize the conservative movement has gone this far off the rails. Perhaps a simpler aspect of the scandal to write about would be the moral emptiness of Washington conservatives helping to keep kids in an emotionally abusive cult that is literally obsessed with ending Christianity and democracy. -- John Gorenfeld (Blog)

It's old news that dominionist zealots have taken over a big chunk of the Republican Party. But what's amazing is the media -- along with so-called moderate conservative commentators -- have in large part let a guy as twisted as Moon do it in the wide open for over two decades. It's under that self-imposed, multi-decadal media embargo that "Father" Moon and his "True Family" (Moon's term for his nuclear family) along with the "36 Families" (Moon's name for the 36 families he has 'perfected' and which function as the core of his empire) have infiltrated a surprising number of key nooks and crannies in the GOP.

...the [Unification] church has established a network of affiliated organizations and connections in almost every conservative organization in Washington, including the Heritage Foundation, the largest of the conservative think tanks and an important source of government personnel during the Reagan administration...  "Most people are afraid to address the issue because they don't want to publicize the extent of the church's involvement," says Amy Moritz of the Conservative National Center for Public Policy Research. (Source -- U.S. News & World Report, 3/27/89)

Well ... we're not afraid to publicize it. Until then, for those with any embarrassing cozy links to this profoundly un-American cult figure, fair warning: now would be the time to sever them.