[lbo-talk] religion in the US

[B.]

You know, that book _Right Nation_, the one that came
out a year or two ago, also basically argues as much.
IIRC, near the end of the book the authors question
the idea of America as a radical nation forged in the
crucible of Enlightenment revolution, emphasizing the
backwards elements that were at play not just in many
of the Founders' ideas but in the population itself.
This seems like a given to many of us on the list, but
the impression I was left with about just *how*
conservative a lot of the US's founding elements were
-- it really stuck with me, how they conveyed it.

-B.

Wojtek Sokolowski wrote:

"[WS:] Try Richard Hofstadter "Anti-intellectualism in
the American Life"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-intellectualism_in_American_Life

He argues that populist religiosity and
anti-intellectualism it promoted are the defining
characteristics of the American psyche.