Everyone knows that right-wing conservatives are holy-rolling, snake-handling religious extremists who believe the Earth is flat, that it was created literally in seven days and that it doesn’t matter if we destroy it since Judgment Day is at hand.

What’s interesting is the mounting evidence that liberal Democrats are religious fundamentalists too, with their own creeds, sacred texts, articles of faith, their own hierarchies of angels and demons. When Felix Royhatan, investment banker and former ambassador to France, gave his reasons for supporting Kerry-Edwards to the Wall Street Journal, he used the language of belief and faith: “I believe that their view of America and of our domestic economic and social priorities will improve the prospects of a better future for all Americans. … I believe that their view of America’s position in the world and its relationship to our allies will make us safer in today’s dangerous global environment. … I have greater faith that a Kerry-Edwards administration will have the courage and creativity to deal with difficult issues.”

Writing about the liberal bias of The New York Times, “public editor” Daniel Okrent referred to his paper’s editorial page, “so saturated with liberal theology that when it occasionally strays from that point of view the shocked yelps from the left overwhelm even the ceaseless rumble of disapproval from the right.”

In other words, liberals aren’t that different from the fans of Rush Limbaugh. For all their pretensions of intellectuality, they too demand “preaching to the choir.” They want to have the orthodox party line parroted back to them and their opinions validated. They have no interest in the arguments of the other side.

Liberals’ foaming-at-the-mouth hatred of George Bush transcends reality. It has a metaphysical aspect. Bush is no mere fallible human being. He’s a demon. To destroy him, some kind of witchcraft must be employed. “Those of us who are demonizing George W. Bush are doing so not because of his morals but because we are scared of what another four years of his administration will do to this country and to the world,” wrote Janet Malcolm. We are living in a time, writes Malcolm, “that is as fearful as the period after Munich.” The implied comparison of Bush to Hitler and the doomsday perspective typify the apocalyptic hysteria of much liberal commentary today.

Michael Moore, of “Fahrenheit 9/11” fame, demonized half the country when he asserted that Republicans, “are up at six in the morning trying to figure out which minority group they’re going to screw today. The hate, they eat it for breakfast. They are going to fight and they are going to smear and they are going to lie and they are going to hate.” In a mock-parodic self-interview, Paul Slanksy — author of “The George W. Bush Quiz Book” — compared Bush and his cronies to “James Bond villains.” Bush “blew up frogs with firecrackers” when he was a kid and “branded fraternity pledges with hot wire hangers” when he was in college, Slansky wrote. When political opinion becomes inflamed with rabid polemics and reckless hyperbole, it has entered the realm of fanaticism.

In his recently published novel, “Checkpoint,” Nicholson Baker comes close to advocating assassination of the president, “for the good of mankind.” This is not the sort of idea that adds luster to the liberal cause. Reviewing the book, Leon Wieseltier accused liberal extremists of the “virulence that calls itself critical thinking, the merry diabolization of other opinions and the other people” and he wonders if American liberalism “may be losing its head.”

The proliferation of conspiracy theories arguing that the Bush White House was actually in league with the 9-11 attackers is another sign of rational lapse. The Pentagon was hit by a missile, not a plane, according to one theory. Flight 77 was diverted, its passengers were kidnapped and they’re being held somewhere so they can’t talk about not dying in the Pentagon crash. Another claims that Bush had the twin towers blown up so he and his cronies could install a regime in Afganistan that would be more cooperative than the Taliban with their scheme to build a natural gas pipe line in that country.

How different are such theories from the claims of evangelical preachers that 9-11 was God’s punishment for our sins?

On a recent trip, my wife and I returned from a short walk on the beach to find that the window of our rental car had been smashed, though nothing had been stolen. When I reported it to a liberal friend, he wrote back: “It is clearly a male thing. It’s about bullying. I’m sure it was done by guys, the very guys who, at their present age or in their older versions throughout the country, are all for pre-emptive strikes.” It was quite a leap, I thought, from my broken window to Bush and his warlords and the doctrine of pre-emptive strikes. My guess is that the perpetrators were teenagers, the kind who get thrills from the sound of broken glass.

My friend went on to express his amazement that anyone could vote Republican. “It is based on a social agenda,” he wrote. “Abortion, guns and gays. Even folks who are hurt by Republican policy indeed, lose their jobs stay loyal.

This has puzzled me for some time, but I have come to the conclusion that the heart of the matter is fear of change. The white man sees his control of the country threatened. The neo-conservatives discovered that the best disguise for drawing on this fear was religion and chauvinism. A lot of greed and meanness can be squeezed under these banners.” It was a restatement of Thomas Frank’s argument in “What’s the Matter with Kansas?” and a perfect example of contemporary liberal woolgathering. They can’t accept the fact that half the country disagrees with them. Some kind of witchcraft must be at work. Neo-conservative sorcerers have cast a spell over the Red States. People who vote Republican have been bewitched.

My Bush-hating friends grab me by the collar and start vilifying Bush before I have a chance to say hello. They’re no different from itinerant proselytizers who bang on the door and ask if you’ve been saved. I wouldn’t be surprised if they started speaking in tongues and carrying signs that say, “Repent, the end of the world is near.”

There are sound reasons for voting George Bush out of office without calling upon the black arts, filling the air with maledictions, evoking sinister phantoms and the specter of Armageddon. Liberal brothers and sisters: You’re wigging out over Bush even more than we conservatives wigged out over Clinton. Do you really want to join us on the lunatic fringe? Do you want to close your minds the way you we’ve closed ours? We’re not as different we like to think we are. The truth is that when Americans get into politics we become raving extremists, rather than rational human beings.

— George Gurley, who lives in rural Baldwin, writes a regular column for the Journal-World.