[Buddha-l] What's wrong with a little Dharma?

[Dan Lusthaus]

> Evangelical
> Christianity today seems to be more cult-like and less populist.

Check
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/28/AR2005082800981.html?nav=most_emailed_emailafriend

This degree of organization, ubiquity, and successfully executed planning
hardly merits the diminuitive label "cult-like." There is hardly an sphere
of public devoid of this "cult's" influence, and in many spheres increasing
control: Federal, State and Local governments; the military; health care;
the judiciary; the media (popular and news); entertainment industry; etc.

Today South Carolina, tomorrow a neighborhood near you -- check out

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-exodus28aug28,0,4065923.story?track=hpmostemailedlink

an LA Times piece today, titled: Strategizing a Christian Coup d'Etat

Cults hold up in places like Waco, Texas. They don't run the White House
from there, control the Supreme Court and Congress, nor control the News
media (let's face it, Fox News is the most popular source of News in this
country, with growing influence overseas -- it tells its viewers not only
what to think, but how to out argue anyone with a divergent view; if you
want to know the Right's arguments and talking points, just watch Fox news
every morning -- you'll get the whole ingenious daily script, rhetorical
tricks and all -- and then watch the politicians and polled civilians
regurgitate the rhetoric verbatim). As the latter piece shows, it will be
hard to stuff this genie back in the bottle easily, since they are ready for
another Civil War (don't let the euphemism of "secede from the Union" fool
you -- that's code for what got the last War Between the States started).

What's a Buddhist to do? Chanting Om won't be any more effective against
this growing scourge than it's been chasing the Chinese out of Lhasa.

Dan Lusthaus