Sometimes, you can be so depressed that nothing seems to have a spark.  You can appreciate humor, but it won't make you laugh from deep in your gut.  But occasionally something so phenomenal happens that it's all wiped away in an instant.  Life has obviously been a bit topsy-turvy lately, but this is one of those things.  The money quote:

"The pastor whose prayer Sarah Palin says helped her to become governor of Alaska founded his ministry with a witchhunt". 

This is not a metaphorical witchunt, or a crusade.  This guy actually accused a woman of causing car accidents with magic.  In fact, he demanded she leave town or repent, whipping up the public to stone her.  "Public outrage eventually led the police to raid her home, where they fired gunshots, killing a pet python which they believed to be a demon."

I'm just going to go ahead and quote the last couple paragraphs here because it's too ludicrous to even attempt to paraphrase.

"It was during that these sermons that Mrs Palin, who was then preparing for her gubernatorial run, was anointed by Pastor Muthee. His intercession, she says, was "awesome".

Her June 8 speech was to mark the graduation of students from the Wasilla Assembly of God's Masters' Commission, which, as Pastor Ed Kalins explains, believes Alaska will be the refuge for American evangelicals upon the coming "End of Days". After her speech, Mrs Palin was presented with an honorary Masters' Commission diploma."

And then you stop to think about it, and the smile is gone from your face. 
 
Freedom of religion is obviously a founding principle of our democracy, and I'm certainly no stranger to some of the weirder evangelical groups.  From elementary to middle school I went to a private 'Christian' school where we were taught that the earth was six thousand years old, the rapture was imminent, Christians were a persecuted minority under direct and constant attack, evolution was a lie from Satan to deceive the unwary, and more.  In fact, the other things were much more interesting.  There's an entire subculture that grew from at the intersection of urban legends and evangelical belief structures. When you place blind faith in not just the Scriptures but in other people's interpretations of it, questioning the source just isn't common.  So urban legends get a new spin and are used as examples of the wickedness of the world.  Some of the things taught to me by teachers were that people commonly place AIDS infected needles in the coin returns of payphones, and at the mall homosexuals will place rohypnol in drinks if you don't pay attention constantly.

Some of this was intended more as parable than literal truth, but literalism is their worldview.   It teaches blind obedience rather than informed submission.  It teaches not to ask questions.  And in its most extreme form, it ends in witch hunts.

This is the kind of person who may end up a heartbeat away from the presidency.  And that heartbeat has advanced age and a history of melanoma.  Make no mistake, that is not considered a negative by a substantial chunk of the evangelical population, and is the reason they'll work so hard for it.  Winning an election would be near impossible for them, and they know it: they're the persecuted minority after all.

But God works in mysterious ways.