Don't be afraid of the red-hot cross-shaped branding iron!

US Daily News Photo

That's Michael Gerson, apologist for all things Republican, writing in the Strib this morning. The photo is of Rick Perry, saying the same thing. Here are a couple of grafs from the Gerson piece:

"If you want to understand Michele Bachmann and Rick Perry," argues Michelle Goldberg in Newsweek/Daily Beast, "understanding Dominionism isn't optional." 

A recent New Yorker profile by Ryan Lizza contends that Bachmann has been influenced by a variety of theocratic thinkers who have preached Christian holy war. 

As befits a shadowy religious sect, its followers go under a variety of names: Reconstructionists, Theonomists. The New Apostolic Reformation. Republicans. 

All apparently share a belief, in Goldberg's words, that "Christians have a God-given right to rule all earthly institutions."

Gerson shakes his head sadly and says, "Now the heroes of the Tea Party movement, it turns out, are also closet theocrats."

Gee, Mike, I wonder where we got that idea? Maybe from Jason Lewis, who wrote Sunday about two tea bag favorites, Bachmann and Paul. I commented on Lewis yesterday in 4800 tea-stained Iowans cannot be wrong. Here's a quote picked out of the Lewis op-ed:

Millions of Americans who have seen their social norms vanquished on the alter of an absurd political correctness. Their social conservatism is branded as bigoted, fringe and, of course, hateful, but they no longer care, they've had enough. 

That's what Bachmann represents -- a leader who will make, if nothing else, a last stand for traditionalism. Someone willing to unapologetically declare that, all things being equal [my emphasis], children need both a mom and a dad.

 The idea, of course, that Bachmann and Perry are "closeted" theocrats is laughable. They've both been standing on the ramparts of the culture war really since there was one. Bachmann hired on one Peter Waldron, an evangelical type, as her personal gay roaster in Iowa. He's apparently going to be involved in gay roasting evangelism in other states, too! But as you'll see if you read up on Waldron, he's associated with Christians (that's what they call themselves, anyway) behind the proposed law to execute gays in Uganda.

Gerson is dead wrong -- as usual -- on this one. There are plenty of good reasons to be leery of Bachmann, Perry and the Tea Party. And that's true whether you are a liberal Christian (they're coming after you, too), Jew, Muslim, or an adherent to some other religion, an agnostic, or an atheist.