Stepford Harpers

Ok, he's no wife exactly, but he sure is purty: meet Ralph Reed, head of the Christian Coalition. I would hasten to add that Dr. Reed may be in for some good'ol indictments for defrauding Native Americans (*cough* Abramoff *cough*) but that's not for here.

Thanks to Flashpoint Canada for drawing my attention to this G&M piece: "U.S. Religious Right Enters Electoral Fray: Bush ex-advisor appeals to faithful to get involved and get the vote out"

On the surface, Ralph is said to be pleading with Canadian "Christians" to vote for Harper. What he's really after is something like the American model of using Christians as get-out-the-vote footsoldiers (Stepford Harpers). He will also use them as ATM machines, but I'm not sure how well that will work up here (I'm not sure our new-ish campaign finance laws allow for much of that, but I'm not certain). I don't have the heart to provide excerpts from the article but I find it interesting that the Globe doesn't point out the casinos/fraud probe. Not very Christianish behaviour, but WTF do I know?