cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/48329761
Nelson: I wrote Shadow Network out of a sense of civic duty. I observed some trends in our national life that were anti-democratic and detrimental to our public welfare. I’m deeply concerned by the epidemic of gun violence in our schools, the growing disdain for science and fact-based reporting, and, gravest of all, the campaigns against climate science and environmental protections.
Interviewer: Third, the Southern Baptist Convention was founded to defend slaveowners before the Civil War. I don’t see the issue of race playing out in the same way, but I do perceive many echoes of Civil War-era resentment of federal authority in its culture.
Nelson: Same here. Not least in the ways this movement has focused on “state’s rights.” Paul Weyrich, the key organizer of the Council for National Policy (CNP) in its beginnings, saw the importance of state governments to his goal of subverting representational democracy. What has this movement done in statehouses to ensure its agenda can move forward without popular support?
Older article from 2020, but definitely worth a read to understand the network that started to take shape with the Heritage Foundation in the 70's, Movement Conservatives, the Moral Majority and eventually grew into Project 2025 and the current Christian Nationalist movement.
Rush Limbaugh
You can thank Heritage Foundation creator, Paul Weyrich for him too
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/gops-strike-force-49909/
Weyrich was even Newt Gingrich's mentor. He took him under his wing after Gingrich decided he wanted to somehow become involved in politics and paid to attend one of his workshops.
My grandad listened to him while I was growing up, and even as a child, I was grossed out by the shit Limbaugh spewed.