The Family

Dear Friends,

I was going to write about going to my precinct caucus tomorrow night, but a friend (thank you Steve if you are reading) sent me an article from AlterNet by Adele M. Stan entitled  "At National Prayer Breakfast, Obama to Address Shadowy Christian Group Tied to Unganda's 'Kill the Gays' Bill". (here) 

The upcoming National Prayer Breakfast gives me an opportunity to strongly urge all of you to read The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power by Jeff Sharlet.  It is an amazing and very scary book.  Jeff Sharlet essentially went inside the Family and provides a fascinating history of the Family which is inexorably linked with American history.  He does a fantastic job of tracing the Family back to the beginning to the European settlements in North America.  The power exerted by this group cannot be underestimated and certainly cannot and should not be ignored.

It was the Family that started the National Prayer Breakfast and continues to control it today.  Apparently, the invitations to the National Prayer Breakfast go out on Congressional letterhead notwithstanding the overtly Christian slant of the meeting.  It is not open to the press either.  The Family uses it as an opportunity for networking for their associates throughout the world to engage with Representatives, Senators, high ranking administration and political officials.  It is not just a Republican event although primarily so.

Recently thanks to Jeff Sharlet's book and Rachael Maddow's focus both on his book and the Uganda Kill the Gays legislation, the shadow in which the Family likes to live is a little less dark to some in this country.  The mainstream media still refuses to expose the Family, I suspect because of the power that the Family wields. 

For those who listen closely, the recent sex scandals for the likes of Governor Sanford, Senator Ensign and Representative Chip Pickering have also shed some light on the Family.  All of those "public" servants have been counseled about their affairs at the C Street house owned by the Family and a house where many Representatives and Senator members of the Family live in Washington, DC.  In fact it has been alleged that Representative Pickering conducted his affair in part at the C Street house.

When Uganda proposed the Kill the Gays legislation, the relationship between the Family and Uganda and in particular the person that proposed the Kill the Gays legislation came under significant scrutiny.  Ultimately, members of the Family were forced to condemn the legislation although it took a long time.  In fact the main proponent of the legislation was scheduled to attend the National Prayer Breakfast until his invitation was revoked in mid-January.

All United States Presidents have addressed the National Prayer Breakfast since President Eisenhower.  President Obama addressed the breakfast last year and is slated to address the breakfast again this year.  Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington ("CREW") (here)  is calling on him to cancel his appearance which would be the right thing to do, but I doubt that President Obama has the political will to do so.  

Send the President a note if you think he should cancel his appearance at the National Prayer Breakfast.

Thanks for reading and please comment,

The Unabashed Liberal