Perhaps it is time to put pressure on the media to report on Hillary's "The Family" international political right wing spiritual group/cult
In light of recent events we should consider a campaign to get this to the media.
see Barbara Ehrenreich's article on The Huffington Post
which Starts:
Posted March 19, 2008 | 01:11 PM (EST)
There's a reason why 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.
You can find all about it in a widely under-read article in the September 2007 issue of Mother Jones, in which Kathryn Joyce and Jeff Sharlet reported that "through all of her years in Washington, Clinton has been an active participant in conservative Bible study and prayer circles that are part of a secretive Capitol Hill group known as the "Fellowship," aka The Family. But it won't be a secret much longer. Jeff Sharlet's shocking exposé, The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power will be published in May.
FOR MORE INFO SEE:
Mother Jones Article LINK
also see the blog of the author of the soon to be published book
The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power
(thanks to Quicksilver for link Jeff Sharlet's blog)
Harpers Article by Jeff Sharlet
NOW THE ISSUES
Whether or not one's religious affiliation should in general be an issue in an election is besides the point. "The Family" is a group that is explicitly ABOUT political power, an approach to governing, and an attitude about the governed.
They believe that, in mass societies, it's only the elites who matter, the political leaders who can build God's "dominion" on earth. Insofar as the Family has a consistent philosophy, it's all about power -- cultivating it, building it, and networking it together into ever-stronger units, or "cells." "We work with power where we can," Doug Coe has said, and "build new power where we can't."
A person who is a member of a group who feel called as elites to gain as much power as possible..and which includes many fascist state leaders etc.
During the 1960s the Family forged relationships between the U.S. government and some of the most anti-Communist (and dictatorial) elements within Africa's postcolonial leadership. The Brazilian dictator General Costa e Silva, with Family support, was overseeing regular fellowship groups for Latin American leaders, while, in Indonesia, General Suharto (whose tally of several hundred thousand "Communists" killed marks him as one of the century's most murderous dictators) was presiding over a group of fifty Indonesian legislators. During the Reagan Administration the Family helped build friendships between the U.S. government and men such as Salvadoran general Carlos Eugenios Vides Casanova, convicted by a Florida jury of the torture of thousands, and Honduran general Gustavo Alvarez Martinez, himself an evangelical minister, who was linked to both the CIA and death squads before his own demise.
This is not just a pastor/spiritual director It has direct bearing on her politics and political associations throughout the world.
This has not been a casual connection for Clinton. She has written of Doug Coe, the Family's publicity-averse leader, that he is "a unique presence in Washington: a genuinely loving spiritual mentor and guide to anyone, regardless of party or faith, who wants to deepen his or her relationship with God."
Furthermore, the Family takes credit for some of Clinton's rightward legislative tendencies, including her support for a law guaranteeing "religious freedom" in the workplace, such as for pharmacists who refuse to fill birth control prescriptions and police officers who refuse to guard abortion clinics.