Is Bush the Antichrist?

I always figured if the Antichrist showed up he, or she, would cloak themselves in Christian rhetoric and righteousness while perverting the gospel of peace and love. You might imagine it an inside joke between God and his former angel of light.

So are the last days near? Is Bush the Antichrist? Only God knows and anyone who tells you they know just hasn't read their Bible, or is lying to you, or both.

What I find worrisome, like many others, is the pact between the Republicans and the religious right in their attempt to seize the reins of power in this country. So just how bad is it? For a glimpse, read Tim Appelo's take on this. Here are a tidbit from his article, Is Bush the Antichrist?:

"Bush is one of the key figures leading the church away from Jesus," says Christian author Don Miller, who wrote the nonbluenose Christian best seller Blue Like Jazz. Miller is no pantywaist—he had the balls to run a ministry at Reed College in Portland, Ore., which is so godless that its soccer team is said in campus legend to have once staged a halftime crucifixion in a game against a Christian school. But he couldn't stomach it when, for instance, Texas Gov. Bush not only allowed the execution of his fellow born-again Christian, the penitent ax murderer Karla Faye Tucker, but made vicious fun of her on TV ("Please don't kill me!" Bush said, mocking her prayerful plea for God's mercy). Miller classifies Bush Christians as modern Pharisees—the allegedly proud, rigid, legalistic hypocrites John the Baptist called "a generation of vipers." "The worst condemnation that Jesus has for anybody, I mean the worst, is for Pharisees," says Miller. "If you asked Jerry Falwell who the Pharisees are in our society, they can't point anybody out." There are no mirrors in Bush's church.

He goes on to explain how concept of the Antichrist evolved though history and deals with "why people cling to millennial dreams."

You can can see the consequences of thinking the Rapture is near in current policy proposals. Social Security, the environment, deficit reduction, and peace in the Middle East, who needs any of this if it's only going to be left behind for the heathens and unbelievers?

In mind my that kind of thinking, that lack of charity, goes against everything the Christan message stands for and, in reality, is Anti-Christ...