While there is some doubt as to the author of this article in AlterNet (the byline says it’s by Clive Anderson, while the bio down the bottom says it’s by Australia’s own Clive Hamilton), the subject matter is fascinating. And a little bemusing. I had always assumed that George W. Bush’s religiosity was a sham, a cynical attempt to convince the unthinking American God-fearing public to go along with his crazy schemes. This article, however, claims that Bush told French President Jacques Chirac that:

"This confrontation is willed by God, who wants to use this conflict to erase his people’s enemies before a New Age begins".

Apparently Chirac himself confirms this in a new book published in France last March and the conversation had been published earlier by a French theology professor who the French government turned to for clarification about what the hell Bush might have been talking about.

I seriously never thought of Bush as really nuts. I figured he just put on the whole Jesus-lovin’ Texan ol’ boy routine purely as manipulation, just as a way to squeeze extra votes out of the Religious Right. Could I have been wrong? Is Bush simply insane?

And if Obama continues his "war" in Afghanistan (I still laugh at how the US likes to declare that it’s a war but refuse to classify their prisoners as Prisoners Of WAR under the Geneva Convention), is he perpetuating Bush’s Holy Jihad?

Yet again we see Christianity used as a justification for the murder of tens of thousands of civilians. It’s just another reason why we need to treat Christianity in the same way we treat any other intolerant, violent philosophy – with extreme disdain and our own (non-violent) intolerance.