Everything Old is New Again
by digby
Sarah Posner has a blockbuster interview with one of the original wingnuts, David Noebel, who just a few short years ago sounded like something out of a 1950s scare documentary, and is suddenly relevant again with the rise of the Tea Party. I urge you to read it all because it’s a fascinating insight into the progression from cold war anti-communism to today’s Tea Baggers and everything in between. But this one little observation says it all:
If Noebel seems stuck in time with his fearmongering about a fifth column of “reds” aiming to take over America, his protégés continue to reinterpret his conspiratorial thinking in ways that reverberate throughout the conservative movement—despite the embarrassment over conspiracy theories from some conservative journalists. Noebel himself acknowledged the thread running from his activism to the Tea Party movement. “Most of them are evangelical Christian anti-communist, anti-socialist, anti-statist… Michele Bachmann is one of their leaders and she certainly is a fine Christian gal and she’s got her feet in that camp big time.” And, he added, “I would say Ron Paul, for example, Ron Paul is more Christian than anything, to tell the truth.”
I think he’s right.
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