A Leader of the Religious Right Just Died. His Terrible Legacy Still Looms over Modern Politics.

Some tasty food for worms was delivered on Thursday. One of the most truly horrible humans ever inflicted on this country has ceased to be, and all say, “Amen” and “about goddamn time.” From The New York Times:

Without a church or an ordained minister’s credentials, [Dr. James C. Dobson] reached vast audiences daily with “Focus on the Family” broadcasts over a network that, at its peak in the 1990s, included 2,000 radio stations and several television outlets in the United States. He said his radio programs were also translated into a dozen languages and heard by 220 million people in 157 countries worldwide.

And every word on every show, every word heard by those 220 million people in all 157 of those 157 countries, made the human condition immeasurably worse. He was a leader of the “religious right” whose every public action showed that he understood the message of the Gospels as well as I understand quantum mechanics. He was a bigot and a homophobe who encouraged more bigotry and more homophobia and weaponized it for the political advantage of American conservatism and its primary vehicle, the Republican party.

This is one of those moments when I ask all of our new Never Trump allies: Where were you people when this monster was running things? This guy, who once advised fathers to shower with their sons so they could see dad’s penis and know what it means to be a man. This guy, who wrote that fathers should hit their recalcitrant children, explaining in one of his books:

Yes, I believe there should be a limit. As long as the tears represent a genuine release of emotion, they should be permitted to fall. But crying can quickly change from inner sobbing to an expression of protest. … Real crying usually lasts two minutes or less but may continue for five. After that point, the child is merely complaining, and the change can be recognized in the tone and intensity of his voice. I would require him to stop the protest crying, usually by offering him a little more of whatever caused the original tears.

How many times did you appear on his radio show? How many times did you advise your candidate to get right with this creep? How much money did your campaign spend that he raised from his audience of idiots, suckers, and tiny monsters like himself? Where were you all when he was running things?

As a baby reporter for The Boston Phoenix, I watched the beginning of it in real time, during the 1980 presidential campaign, as the Reagan people cynically allied themselves with this group of whited sepulchers, who would inspire Barry Goldwater’s warning:

Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they’re sure trying to do so, it’s going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can’t and won’t compromise. I know, I’ve tried to deal with them.

Dobson was at the head of the parade that ultimately fulfilled Goldwater’s prophecy. And a lot of people, who would rather not remember it, were right behind him in that long march toward what’s upon us today. Where were you all when the monsters took over? And as if we needed any other reason to resent the oxygen consumed by this loathsome person, it was in a pickup basketball game that included Dobson that Pistol Pete Maravich suffered his fatal heart attack.