Mark Crispin Miller wrote:

"The Family" by Jeff Sharlet is an amazing book. One of those rare books that changes how one looks at the whole world, providing a profound corrective to a range of well-established misconceptions. Not only does "The Family" help us grasp the true threat posed by 'Christian fundamentalism,' but, even more important, it also utterly explodes the tidy leftist view that those who run the show are merely cynical, interested only in the numbers, and using 'faith' only to keep the masses hypnotized, the better to pick their pockets. While there surely is such cynicism at the top, the situation is, as Sharlet demonstrates, far more complex than that, and therefore a lot scarier. And to find out that such widespread and powerful fanaticism played such a crucial role throughout the Cold War is simply staggering -- one of those truths that will, I think, take quite a long time to sink in."

Mark Crispin Miller hosts "The Family" as part of the First Tuesdays Series. This monthly series hosted by author and activist Mark Crispin Miller features authors whose books tackle political and public issues from a stance outside the mainstream. Jeff Sharlet addresses the untold story of Christian fundamentalism's most elite organization. Sharlet is a contributing editor for "Rolling Stone" and "Harper's" and a research scholar at NYU's Center for Religion and Media.