The religious nutcase angle is the most damaging to Palin ...

first of all, I agree that the Obama campaign should focus on McCain instead of Palin. But we in the netroots and I'm sure commentators in the media are going to keep digging on this woman, and I think that portraying her as a religious fundamentalist who said in church that the Iraq War was a "task from God" and who wants abortion illegal even in cases of rape and incest will scare a lot of people.

And ultimately, I think that with an unknown politician with a lot of superficial appeal like Palin, voters have to have outright FEAR in the back of their mind to make them look elsewhere. I don't think her being inexperienced and unknowledgable will work- many will see it as kind of cute in a "Gidget Goes to Washington" kind of way.

But I think the "Iraq War is a task from God" remark will have some people wondering whether she might be Greg Stillson in high heels. And I therefore think that's the tack we should take. After Bush, a lot of people are justifiably scared of those who look at foreign policy in religious/messianic terms.

:P

...when she refers to visiting other churches and being told ahead of time that she may find some of their behavior unusual.

Quick digression - among various protestant denominations, there are a variety of worship styles. Some are quietly meditative and stoic, some pray on their knees, some pray holding hands together, some pray reaching skyward, in some churches its okay to shout out "amen" and "hallejuah", some of them get up and dance... it's all quite a spectrum.

In any event at the end of the video where Iraq is a mission from God, who also likes pipelines, it is an "amusing anecdote" to the Wassilla AoG group there that she is sometimes briefed upon visiting another church that she might find their worship style surprising. Then, she says something to effect of nothing in other churches would weird her out since she belongs to this congregation.

which believes in tongues. More specifically, her pastor does too. The video and audio archive of the Wassila Assembies of God was taken down, but I was able to see a list of the archived sermons on the wayback machine. One was called "God's Heavenly Language" and undoubtedly was a positive sermon on tongues.

...since there were also people who understood the tongues at Pentecost. In the view of such groups, the incoherent and untranslated babbling done by this crowd is unBiblical.

Don't like extremes on either side.

That's why independents and moderates are what they are...because the extreme flank of either party scares them off and most often it's the religious quackery of the right that pushes people our way.

This is why Republicans like Eisenhower, Chaffee, and Whitman are waxing with such concern over the GOP...because of the radical fundemantalism inherent within it.

These indies and moderates must know we have a radical extremist this close to being the VP.

We need to play this angle, and play it hard, but you can rest assure we need to be VERY smart about it. Any questioning of Palins fruity faith will be met with a rounding chorus of headlines like, 'Dems bash Palins religion', 'Democrats attack on Christianity'....it will be played that way.

environmentalist (BIG on my list of issues), lies, has trampled over a lot of people, hasn't done such a great job with her kids, her husband was a member of the anti-American whacko Alaskan Party (or whatever they're called)... I haven't read a single thing about her that was 'OK' in my book.

Telling them that it is God's will for people to work with the oil companies, etc. Totally nutso.

(I don't have the link handy, it's in another thread.)

I keep mentioning Laura Roslin (U.S. president on Battlestar Galactica) here, but I don't think anyone gets it.

where the "task appointed by God" thing came up, as well as the "Pray for the pipeline"... she mentioned one other thing that I've been puzzling over.

She instructs these youth ministers or whatever they are to "be prepared to help the large influx of Americans from the lower 48 that is coming". First I thought "maybe she really DOES believe in Global Warming and expects migrations due to loss of farmland and habitat suitable for humans. But after thinking about the teachings of her church and the other fundie theocrats... I don't think that's it at all. They believe in Armageddon, a world destroying war that starts in Israel but consumes both the West and the East. So now I'm thinking that she wants these kids to prepare for the influx of refugees from that war. A war which is needed to hasten the return of Christ to rule for a 1000 years. A war which will happen in the lifetimes of these teenagers she was talking to. Very likely a full out nuclear (new-clear for her) war. A war she might well be able to start (given that gramps is 72).

Just a thought.

...in the direct context of Armageddon.

that's pretty much par for the course.

Having been schooled in "end times" stuff, they can smell it a mile away. And, regardless of what Pastor says, they also know enough not to vote for an Armageddon cheerleader - precisely BECAUSE they know the mindset.

No falsehoods in the e-mails, the truth is scary enough after 8 years of Bush.

look how bush invoked religion and faith as his guide for invading iraq

the electorate falls for this crap

hopefully people have been educated by events.

Bush is just garden variety religious. Palin is completely nuts. That scares people.