In the new Vanity Fair, Christopher Hitchens recounts his experiences touring the U.S. to promote his book, God Is Not Great. It’s an amusing article, and there’s an especially good paragraph on Austin’s own Marvin Olasky, the man who invented the term “compassionate conservativism.” Olasky apparently claimed that the Americans won the Revolutionary War because George Washington enforced Christian morality among the troops:
Olasky’s book on presidential morality (which sadly was written before this president took office) says that George Washington won the Revolutionary War because he forbade drinking and swearing in the ranks of his army, whereas the British forces were awash in immorality. I argue that the war was won largely by the French, who were not strangers to wine or oaths, and that the American troops at Valley Forge were much inspired by Thomas Paine, who may not have cursed all that much but who never left the brandy bottle alone and who thought that Christianity was a joke. Moreover, the Brits—indicted by Olasky for their indulgence in adultery and even buggery—did manage to hold on to Canada, India, much of the Caribbean, and much of Africa in spite of divine disapproval. “God on Our Side” is one of the oldest and weakest arguments in human history.
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