Bush hire doesn’t believe in Church and State separation

Not exactly shocking, I know, but ridiculous just the same.
Beliefnet reported recently that the RNC has been employing a “Texas-based activist who believes the United States is a ‘Christian nation’ and the separation of church and state is ‘a myth.’”
Yikes! (Though it does sound right up Bush’s alley…)
David Barton, who founded Wallbuilders, an organization “dedicated to the restoration of the constitutional, moral, and religious foundation on which America was built,” has been speaking at RNC sponsored events for evangelical pastors across the country for about a year. At these events, Barton discusses “America’s Christian heritage,” and tells the pastors that they are allowed to endorse particular candidates from the pulpit. So far, Barton has pulled in $12,000 as a political consultant for the RNC.
Outside of Barton’s scary argument that the separation of church and state needs to go bye-bye, he also gets a little freaky with some education hypotheses:
Barton has said that God influenced his sense of mission. In America: To Pray Or Not To Pray? Barton writes: “In July 1987, God impressed me to do two things. First, I was to search the library and find the date that prayer had been prohibited in public schools. Second, I was to obtain a record of national SAT scores (the academic test given to prospective college-bound high school students) spanning several decades. I didn’t know why, but I somehow knew that these two pieces of information would be very important.”
As a result, Barton writes that he learned America has declined because of the 1962 and ’63 Supreme Court rulings banning school-sponsored prayer. He believes God is angry at the country and has retaliated.
Huh. And to think all this time I thought that bad SAT scores were due to lack of education and resources. Turns out, all I had to do was pray for a high score. Silly me.
This just goes to show you how far the Bush campaign will go, and how they really feel about the separation of church and state. And if you need a friendly reminder of how Bush puts faith above reality, make sure to check out the NY Times Magazine article, Without a Doubt.