"Obama is the Antichrist" - Hate Still Runs Amouk

From the Daily Beast comes more disturbing news about hate.

Oh, Sharron Angle. Fresh off a Fox interview in which the Nevada Senate hopeful insisted the sole and proper role of the free press was to fundraise for her campaign, bloggers are pouncing on a quote from her even more out there primary campaign likening President Obama's agenda to blasphemy:

"And these programs that you mentioned—that Obama has going with Reid and Pelosi pushing them forward—are all entitlement programs built to make government our God. And that's really what's happening in this country is a violation of the First Commandment. We have become a country entrenched in idolatry, and that idolatry is the dependency upon our government. We're supposed to depend upon God for our protection and our provision and for our daily bread, not for our government."

This might explain her disdain for the unemployed—clearly they just aren't praying hard enough. But before the usual Sharron Angle cycle of indignation, mockery, rinse, repeat, it's worth noting that nothing she says is actually that unusual among GOP candidates today. I'd argue Governor Rick Perry of Texas offered at least as much fire and brimstone in a speech in June where he said we were in a fight for our nation's "soul":

"That's the question: Who do you worship? Do you believe in the primacy of unrestrained federal government? Or do you worship the God of the universe, placing our trust in him?"

Then there's Missouri Congressional candidate Ed Martin, who said Obama was actively trying to keep Christians from finding "salvation":

"And that's one of the things that's most destructive about the growth of government is this taking away that freedom, the freedom, the ultimate freedom, to find your salvation, to get your salvation, and to find Christ for me and you, and I think that's one of the things we have to be very, very aware of that the Obama Administration and Congressman Carnahan are doing to us."

To some degree these are dogwhistles to the even greater fringe belief, embarassingly prevalent among the GOP base in polls, that Obama is the antichrist. So yes, mock Angle, but she's only a symptom of a much greater and increasingly widespread genre of crazy.

Enough with the hate!