Religious Fundamentalism in Orwell and Pynchon

[Terrance]

> Born-again Bush, Slayer of Evil-doers vs. Osama bin
> Laden and his band of Islamic terrorists is one
> religious war that has received a lot of attention
> recently.  That's the religious war that forms the
> "circa 2003" context for Pynchon's _1984_ Foreword.

But is it a religious war form the Bush government's (USA) perspective?
The fact that Osama bin Laden is a fundamentalist and his war is
religious is easy enough for anyone to see. And I can almost understand
how one can say that  Bush's being a born again christian who uses the
rhetoric of crusade and the like, has the imagination of a crusader (the
term I prefer is moralist), wages wars on fundamentalists, is also a
fundamentalist at war... and I know his so-called "religious war" has
gotten lots of attention (a day doesn't go by when we don't read this
narrative right here in P-L), but isn't  this "evil slayer Bush" and
"great Satan Osama" or the "religious war " formula one that has been
fabricated by the Bush administration and the media? Sure it is.  The
reality is far more complex.