Larison joins the Linker–Douthat–Poulos Moral Therapeutic Deism debate:
Perhaps if there had been more genuinely traditional and orthodox voices whispering to Mr. Bush that he was mortal, warning that pride is one of the most dangerous sins, or explaining to him that chiliasm and gnosticism were grave errors, he would not have been so ready to embark on path of mad revolutionary warfare and global transformation. Orthodoxy had no influence, but naturally Linker believes that it still had too much, which pretty well sums up his misreading of the religious and political landscape today.