This Week in God (Maddow blog)

First up from the God Machine this week a look at the religious right movement’s largest annual event, which kicked off yesterday in Washington, D.C. In fact, the Family Research Council’s Values Voter Summit is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year – which will reportedly be the largest summit to date.

So, what’d we learn from the right-wing gathering? For one thing, most of the Republicans running for president see the social conservative attendees as their natural base.

There is a lot of conservative star power shining out of the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington on Friday morning. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky and Sarah Palin are just a few of the Republican Party’s luminaries headlining the Values Voter Summit, which is running through the weekend.

Mr. Cruz rallied the Republican base by reminding them of the anniversary of his filibuster, which he said “elevated the debate about Obamacare.” He also invoked former President Ronald Reagan, suggesting that a new wave of conservatism was nearing. “Morning is coming,” Cruz said. “Morning is coming.”

In all, eight White House hopefuls – Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Rick Santorum, Donald Trump, Mike Huckabee, Ben Carson, Bobby Jindal, and Lindsey Graham – will make their pitch to the far-right crowd. They’ll be joined by five House Republicans, another Senate Republican, another Republican governor, and a former Republican presidential candidate (Rick Perry).

It’s almost enough to give someone the impression that the lines between the GOP and the religious right movement have blurred to the point of non-existence.


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The rest:

http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/week-god-92615?cid=sm_fb_maddow