Today I received an email from the group Brave New Films that makes liberal political videos for the web. This email was about one that they teamed with Mother Jones to produce regarding McCain's relationship with the Rev. Ron Parsley. It's worth taking a look at when you get the chance.

But it got me to thinking, is there really a racist bias in the MSM regarding this presidential campaign and might it show up particularly in stories involving religion?

Obama has Wright.
McCain has Hagee, Parsely, et al.
HILLARY HAS DOUG COE.

Obama's Rev. Wright is a total Progressive clergyman, doing the charitable work and supporting social justice through clear thinking and awareness of historical context.

McCain's pastors Hagee and Parsely and the rest of his group of Christianists with reactionary ideology and profiteering tactics, are total opportunists and succeed in their ambitions by manipulating their "flocks" (read that as $HEEP), and obviously act as petty crooks fingering their marks.

Hillary's Doug Coe of The Fellowship (aka The Family) is THE FASCISTS' PASTOR. Doug Coe works to fashion the death of Democratic Freedoms and insert THEOCRACY instead. And he admittedly, by choice, uses the methods of Hitler (see his written instructions to his devotees, below)! Doug Coe's goals are the goals of an anti-Constitution degenerate who desires to mold a new world religious order based on a twisted "morality" of solidarity and obedience to Authority in a fascist context!

HILLARY MUST BE THOROUGHLY VETTED! SHE MUST!

HILLARY'S CONNECTION TO DOUG COE AND THE FELLOWSHIP MUST BE MADE CLEAR AND KNOWN!  It's an anti-Constitution connection.

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David Broder chimes in today.

There's a reason Hillary Clinton has remained relatively silent during the flap over intemperate remarks by Barack Obama's former pastor, Jeremiah Wright. When it comes to unsavory religious affiliations, she's a lot more vulnerable than Obama.

Dear Presidential Candidates,
Get off the religious bus before it careens over the cliff taking all of us with it and crashes.

Okay, folks. Warning. This is going to be a long rant on a subject that I find most aggravating and discouraging—religion and politics—one that I wish I could just stop paying so much attention to; but like the Sword of Damocles it is always hanging over all of our heads. Does one dare to look away from what most threatens our well being? Second warning.  For those of you who get nauseous at the sight of cheesy clichés and mixed metaphors, if you go on you are about to walk into a metaphorical cheese warehouse. Sorry.

The founding fathers of the USA when writing our Constitution knew only too well that when you mix politics and religion together you create a virulent disease that could eat away at the very foundations of the nation. But, do we listen to our fathers? Of course not. Now we are sick, sick, sick. And all they are able to say is, "I told you so." Somehow, while being entranced by American Idol, survivor shows, and the like, we forgot that most prophetic warning.

On April 23, 2008 the UK Daily Mail reported on a new doll being marketed in the Ukraine, a Hitler doll with suitably Hitlerian attire and "a spare head" which, should demand for the doll be high enough said a spokesperson for the manufacturer, could lead to "a series of themed Third Reich toys, including interiors of Hitler's chancellery, toy concentration camps with barbed wire, barracks and operating models of gas chambers and crematoriums." Meanwhile, according to Norwegian journalist Tore Gjerstad, "Fellowship" head Doug Coe, described by Hillary Clinton as "loving" and a "spiritual mentor" but whom Gjerstad pegged as a "Hitler-admirer", was on the move. Coe's first stop: a meeting with the King of Norway...

Over the past few days, I've done some writing expressing concern regarding some revelations that Jeff Sharlet will be discussing extensively in his new book "The Family"--including information regarding apparently widespread and systemic use of pyramid-scheme-esque "cell church" groups, of which Hillary Clinton would appear to have been inducted through at least one, possibly two, levels of indoctrination within at least two separate cells within the group.  There's also some real concern that some of the same "bad habits" of this particular type of religious pyramid scheme may be showing up in "The Family's" cells as well--one of which we'll discuss today.

The news re cell-church groups in "The Family" is probably not going to be the only bombshell released by Sharlet's upcoming book.  My question is, what has "The Family" so spooked that they've apparently sealed all recent records about the group even to their own members?

On Friday, news reports started coming out to the effect that Hillary Clinton may be a member of a cell-church group run by the secretive "Family" nee "Fellowship" org; as the import of this is underappreciated by most (even by some researchers into dominionism), I posted a diagram of how cell groups work in "The Family".

There are actually a number of reasons--besides the obvious--why it should be a matter of concern that Hillary Clinton would appear to have been recruited into a religious pyramid scheme with strong political aspirations.  One reason I am gravely concerned for her right now is info I've dug up on the other reported members of her "cell church"--almost all of whom have strong history with dominionists...and it doesn't help that Hillary has also made some statements that point to her possible involvement in something very dangerous.

A few days ago, I wrote a post expressing concern re Hillary Clinton's reported involvement in a cell-church group operated by the longest-running political dominionist group in existence--some folks considered this a wee bit controversial, in part because it was "OMG CANDIDATE DIARY" (to be honest, I'm worried about her) and partly because folks noted "there is no clear evidence this is coercive".

After some discussion with Jeff Sharlet over in Fred Clarkson's article on "The Family"--in which he's discussed info that will be included in his upcoming book--it would appear that not only does "The Family" use the same model as other coercive groups using pyramid-like structures, but may well have originated its use politically.

There has been quite a lot of writing recently on Talk to Action (and today in regards to a secretive political dominionist group known as "The Fellowship" or "The Family"--especially in relation to an upcoming book by Jeff Sharlet (titled The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power--you can pre-order here) which threatens to blow the  "Family Secret" wide open.

Frederick Clarkson here on DailyKos has recently reported on an NBC News report--along with a recent Mother Jones article re Sherlet's book--which give disturbing confirmation to something I've suspected for a time: Namely, that "The Family" uses a particularly abusive "discipling and shepherding" model common in neopentecostal dominionist cell churches.

The abusive tactics could have major implications politically--especially as Sharlet's book has noted that no less than Hillary Clinton is a member of one of the cell-churches linked to "The Family".

NBC News had a segment last night on the secretive, elite influence network, "The Family," featuring an interview with Jeff Sharlet, whose book by that title, will be published next month.

The segment also featured dramatic video of the elite fundamentalist "Family" leader Doug Coe preaching about the "covenant" that he says made Hitler among others, powerful -- commanding loyalty among his followers. The program transcript states:

What if there was a right-wing organization founded and operated by neoconservatives and funded in large part by Richard Mellon Scaife (and some of the other usual suspects) whose purpose was to attack religious denominations, congregations and church leaders who support what the right-wing views as "liberal" causes such as social justice, particularly if they embrace a liberation theology ?

What if that right-wing organization's tactics included smearing its targets with selective quotations or misquotes intended to distort and inflame?

What if the trail of those smears (picture if you will the slime trail of a slug) often led from this type of faux religious organization to the right-wing blog-patch, from there to the right-wing (F&B) media , and from there to the rest of the media and into our homes?

Some media have been struggling with the explosion of controversies over statements by prominent religious supporters of Clinton, McCain and Obama.  Of these, Obama's progressive pastor has received the lion's share of attention. The extreme views of Religious Right leaders Doug Coe, John Hagee and Rod Parsley, and their relationship to candidates Clinton and McCain, much less so. (At Talk to Action we have been covering these guys for a long time and discussed these things well ahead of the curve. for example, my first (but not the last!) post picking-up on Jeff Sharlet and Kathryn Joyce's Mother Jones story about Hillary Clinton and The Family, was in December. Our reporting on Hagee and Parley is better measured in years. I was the first to point out, for example, based on the reports of my Talk to Action colleagues, that McCain had courted Hagee for more than a year prior to his scoring the endorsement. I say this not so much to toot our horn, (not that it couldn't use a good tooting once in awhile) but because I want to underscore the value of ongoing research and reporting on these things.

Now that Hillary Clinton has gone and taken the low road on the Obama/Wright issue, she has opened herself up to a bevy of new scrutiny. There have been some great diaries here on DKOS detailing Hillary's association with The Family and it's cultish leader, Douglas Coe.  Now, Donna Brazile has weighed in on this issue with an overlooked and astute observation.

With all the media attention on Rev Wright - who took lots of heat for repeating Ambassador Edward Peck's remarks on FoxNews as though he weren't quoting Peck - Hillary Clinton's ties to Doug Coe and 'The Fellowship' or 'The Family' have been underreported.  This organization has far wider reaching implications in a potential President's agenda than Wright ever would.

Clinton has been part of a secretive religious organization called 'The Fellowship' or 'The Family' for the past 15 years.  Innocuous sounding enough, right?  Read below the fold...

[From the Frog Pond]

Hillary Clinton has gone too far.  In a conversation  with the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Clinton presumed to tell Barack Obama where he should worship his God.  She suggested that Reverend Wright is guilty of 'hate speech' and compared him to Don Imus.  

OK, so I know there is already a diary about this, and by the time I post this there will probably be several more, but I just read the Mother Jones article from last September and thought I'd give my 2 cents.  I found this article through Barbara Ehrenreich's short article in The Nation from Wednesday.  Both are must reads  

More below the fold.

Cross-posted at MyDD.  Their rec-list was driving me bonkers.  http://www.mydd.com/...

Tip of the hat tp Barbara Ehrenreich at the Nation; http://www.thenation.com/...