Bad Moon Rising: How Reverend Moon Created the Washington Times, Seduced the Religious Right, and Built an American Kingdom
by John Gorenfeld
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Book Summary Information
Author: John GorenfeldEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2008-03-01
ISBN: 0979482232
Number of pages: 329
Publisher: PoliPointPress
Book Reviews of Bad Moon Rising: How Reverend Moon Created the Washington Times, Seduced the Religious Right, and Built an American Kingdom
Book Review: Important But Disorganized
Summary: 3 Stars
Important But Disorganized
The interest and importance of the information in John Gorenfeld's book "Bad Moon Rising" rates five stars out of five. The way this information is organized rates about one star. Gorenfeld is a skilled writer of sentences and paragraphs but there is little detectable structure to the book. It jumps from topic to topic and back and forth in time. The same incidents are re-described here and there in various chapters. The punction " * * * " appears every few pages to separate various sections, but how one section relates to another is usually not clear.
I speculate that a reader with certain skills and proclivities would enjoy the book. Such a reader would have on the tip of his tongue the names many politicians, religious leaders, and journalists. He would also enjoy (or at least have objectivity about) criticism of prominent conservative personalities. To a reader with those prerequisites, the book would be like hearing juicy gossip about people that he already knows. The jumping around from victim to victim and year to year would not be so distracting.
The information in the book is fascinating. A summary is this: Reverend Moon and his Unification Church espouse beliefs and practices that are repulsive, amusing and bizarre to any person who holds traditional conservative religious or political beliefs. Organizations controlled by Moon have been convicted of tax evasion (for which Moon himself served prison time in the USA) and fraud (e.g. in Japan, certain spiritual mediums convince eldery widows that their dead husbands wish them to make contributions to Rev. Moon's organizations). Yet many conservative political figures and journalists accept money from organizations controlled by Rev. Moon and associate themselves with the activities of those organizations. The Unification Church seeks to influence the US media. It controls the UPI wire service (not to be confused with the API wire service). Moon also controls the Washington Times newspaper ( not to be confused with the Washington Post or New York Times newspapers). Fox News commentators sometimes cite articles from the Washington Times.
A reader who does not have the patience to put up with Gorenfeld's chaotic presentation can nevertheless enjoy browsing the book and marveling at the claims of Rev. Moon and his followers.
A brief sampling of these is:
1. Jesus failed in his mission to save mankind and Rev. Moon is the Messiah who will accomplish this mission. Hence it is not correct for Christians to use the cross a symbol of their faith since this symbolizes failure. Instead, they should use a crown, which symbolizes Rev. Moon.
2. Children should look to Rev. Moon as their "True Parent" instead of being loyal to their birth parents.
3. The secular governments of the nations of the world should be replaced with governments run by followers of Rev. Moon.
4. It right to lie for a good cause and God tells lies.
5. Through a human medium, thirtysix dead US presidents have issued statements from beyond the grave that support Rev. Moon.
6. Rev. Moon interceded to get Hitler out of hell.
7. Men should punish their penises every day by using pliers to cut the skin a little bit.
Gorenfeld does not attribute Moon's influence on certain conservatives to any sort of vast conspiracy on the part of conservatives. The Unification Church and its front organizations select prominent conservative figures as allies in preference to selecting liberals. One historical reason for this trend is that Rev. Moon is nominally a staunch anti-communist. The number of conservative politicians, journalists and religious leaders who have some association with the Unification Church is not proof that liberals are morally superior. It merely shows that liberals are less often targets.
The relationships that public figures have with the Unification Church can take many forms. Some possiblities are:
1. The person may tricked into giving a boilerplate endorsement of Moon via a front organization. (e.g. After Dwight Eisenhour left Office, he was wiling to hear a group of child singers called "The Little Angels". When the group wished him to meet with a "special guest", the guest turned out to be Rev. Moon.)
2. Front organizations of Rev. Moon may give unsolicited help to the person (e.g. pro-Nixon demonstrations) and then expect a return favor.
3. The person my give a boilerplate endorsement of Moon in order to obtain money from his organizations. Such a person may understand what he is doing but rationalize it by thinking that he is tricking the Unification Church. The person may feel that the Unification Church is too wacky to be a political threat to government and may ignore the harm done by its cult activities.
4. The person may give substantial endorsements and assistance to Moon in an actual quid pro quo arrangement.
Gorenfeld presents the observable facts about particular public figures (e.g. George H. W. Bush, Jerry Falwell). It is left to the reader to infer how each public figure manages his relationship with Rev. Moon. Although the book is disorganized, it does have an index. It also has "notes by pages" in an appendix (rather than numbered footnotes within the text).
There is some truth to a cliche such as "Every US citizen should read this book from cover to cover". However, as civic duties go, this would be an onerous one.
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Summary of Bad Moon Rising: How Reverend Moon Created the Washington Times, Seduced the Religious Right, and Built an American Kingdom
John Gorenfeld's Bad Moon Rising takes readers into the chilling Washington underworld of the Reverend Sun Myung Moon, whose cult-like Unification Church calls him the True Father. Whether claiming endorsements from George Washington, pronouncing Jesus obsolete or dictating sex positions to his followers, Moon has pursued loopy schemes for decades. For the first time, Bad Moon Rising tells the full story of the reverend's coronation in U.S. Senate offices in 2004; his quest to become world leader; his founding of a media empire with the creation of The Washington Times and purchase of United Press International; and his unlikely influence on the GOP propaganda machine, financing the stories that make Fox News Channel. Although Beltway conservatives rarely acknowledge their embarrassing patron, Gorenfeld is not afraid to follow the money to famous names and shameful secrets, revealing a hidden saga of political corruption, lost souls, and megalomania.General Books
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