Would they rather win elections or go to heaven?

Can you throw God under a bus so big that he can’t lift it?

Giving Up on God

By Kathleen Parker

Wednesday, November 19, 2008; 12:00 AM

As Republicans sort out the reasons for their defeat, they likely will overlook or dismiss the gorilla in the pulpit.

Three little letters, great big problem: G-O-D.

I’m bathing in holy water as I type.

To be more specific, the evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy branch of the GOP is what ails the erstwhile conservative party and will continue to afflict and marginalize its constituents if reckoning doesn’t soon cometh.

Simply put: Armband religion is killing the Republican Party. And, the truth — as long as we’re setting ourselves free — is that if one were to eavesdrop on private conversations among the party intelligentsia, one would hear precisely that.

I think she’s figured it out. I don’t envy her email inbox though. It will soon be scorched with the rantings of the True Believers, who really seem to think that overreach is impossible if it’s in the service of the Sky Fairy.

Since the 80s, the GOP has angled for the votes of the Christian Right, and now they’re having trouble separating themselves from the delusion-prone. It’s a lose-lose for them.

Option 1: Continue to play to the Christianist right, and alienate even more moderate voters and intellectual conservatives until the Republican Party really is a tiny regional faction, or

Option 2: Cut the Christianists loose in an effort to move center-ward. They won’t be happy about that, and they don’t have to stay with the GOP. Watch as some of them move ever farther into extremist country. The Constitution Party (or worse) will experience an influx, and the Republican Party will shrink.

Too bad for them that the trouble centers around an all-powerful being whose will must be guessed at. That makes this conflict both high-stakes and unresolvable. An explosive combination.