Raptured Republicans

My National Writers Union colleague Mel Friedman just forwarded the article in the NYRB by Joan Didion, on the "Left Behind" series about the last days of the world before Christ returns to defeat the Antichrist. This happens after all the true believers have been taken into Heaven in the Rapture. Didion's point is that G. W. Bush actually believes this stuff -- or at least has decided to pretend to. Mel promised a "frisson" from reading it.

Quel frisson! It's left my hair curled like a bichon frisé.

Actually, I hope it's true -- the Rapture, I mean. It would be a great thing if all the True Believers suddenly disappeared, leaving behind only their clothes and pacemakers and surgical pins. Then maybe we could get back to work on some sane politics. Fwoop! There goes Bush. Fwoop! there goes Ashcroft. We'd be left with Cheney (who believes only in cash), Wolfowitz (who believes only in power), and Rumsfeld (who believes only in himself), but we'd have a better chance of overcoming them once the Christian host has wafted off to glory.

Here's the Joan Didion article (New York Review of Books)
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