I sometimes wonder it would be better in the long run if a religious fruitcake DID gain power in the US. Right now the fundies remain shielded by the almost universally held view that a religious person is, by definition, a basically good person. So an extremely religious person must be extremely good. Well, as long as they're some kind of christian of course. This view will probably only change when the masses see what harm they can do, which won't happen until they're in power. In Europe we got theocracy out of our systems hundreds of years ago. Perhaps the US needs to experience it before the electorate realises that they really don't want it. Short-term pain for long-term gain.

All that's purely theorectical of course. I'm certainly not advocating that the rational people of the US stop fighting tooth and nail to prevent the religious right from taking over. This could be a crunch year. A solid Obama win would send a signal to the Republicans that they need moderate candidates if they want to gain the presidency.