I know a lot of very serious Christians who scoff at the mention of Trump's name.

But that's not unusual -- he's a thrice-married serial philanderer, liar, and cheater from the seamy world of porn stars, casinos, and reality TV. What could be more off-putting to a group of people who have continually rejected even the blandest candidates for the fatal crimes of being not committed and not Christian enough?

What is unusual is that I know a LOT MORE very serious Christians who voted for him, and continue to praise him, and will vote for him again.

Where is this coming from? Establishment types like John McCain and Romney, and even candidates on the more extreme side of "family values" like Ted Cruz and Rick Santorum were throwaways, but this guy is the one? For dedicated culture warriors who have bemoaned for decades our culture's slide toward rampant immorality and decadent selfishness to back Trump, who practically idealizes that trend in one person, seems like the height of hypocrisy.

I was hoping this book would delve into this baffling phenomenon, and help me understand. It... sort of did, and sort of didn't.

Because it's a little difficult to find, here is the author's thesis up front:

His 'base' is not an accident of his unconventional foray into politics, or a quirk of this particular political moment. The vast majority of white evangelicals are all in with Trump because he has given them political power and allowed them to carry out a Christian supremacist agenda, inextricably intertwined with his administration's white nationalist agenda.

The first chapter or two go right to the heart of the thing with a matter-of-fact exploration of the "religious" figures Trump surrounds himself with. I have spent the last four years looking away from politics and generally wincing, so most of this was new to me. I had wondered, when stories like the Paula White "satanic pregnancy" speech break, where he was getting all these insane people; it makes sense that they're all prosperity gospel televangelists.

The nature of televangelists is to be snake oil salesmen, and turn defrauding the vulnerable into something praiseworthy. It's a good gig, too -- in what other business can you blatantly enrich yourself off the backs of others and claim it's a sign of your faith? It makes perfect sense how Trump would fall in with these people, since they are cut from the same cloth.

As the author says:

Trump has succeeded in captivating white evangelical voters not just because he has befriended certain high-level leaders in the evangelical world. He has succeeded because there is virtually no leader in the evangelical world he wouldn't welcome by his side--as long as that leader pledged allegiance to him.

Sickening, but probably true. These hucksters are perfectly willing to hail him as the divinely anointed savior of America, and he is perfectly willing to be called so. A match made in heaven, and then on the ground all the middle-aged women get to share poorly-made meme graphics on Facebook praising Trump for having prayer meetings in the White House.

Most will be too afraid to repost the truth. Share if you're praying for our leader!!!

This book overall is written in a flat style that reads, in some places, more like a dense list of names and facts than anything else. Still, it starts off strong, tying Trump and the televangelists together with undeniable insight. Next, the book turns its focus to the other piece of the puzzle: the alt-right. Its portrait of the mixed coterie of old guard political racists, veterans of the segregation fights, and the young up-and-coming neo-fascists tired of the oppression of "political correctness" and filled with a deep anxiety about their place in the world is stirring and scary.

Anti-immigrant sentiment is one of the most powerful political trends lately, and probably the biggest thing all of Trump's base would agree on. It's clear how both the "white pride" of the alt-right and the anti-Islamic, anti-Mexican (sometimes anti-Catholic and anti-Jewish) feelings of the white evangelical voters stem from the same place: fear of losing power.

After the first chapter covering the alt-right, though... the book gets even denser. I waded deeper and deeper into the soup of political history, hoping that eventually the framework of a tight argument would become clear. But it didn't. The author relates, essentially, the story of the rise of the modern conservative political establishment. She excavates its roots in pro-segregation activism, claims they never cared about abortion as much as they say, dives into NGO after NGO, think tank after think tank, journalism and activism over the decades since the sixties -- all this to paint a picture of the powerful right-wing apparatus that stood ready to drive into action, reshaping the government in its own image, as soon as anyone was brave or stupid enough to give them the chance.

Trump was that someone, the author claims, and it's not even about Trump. Going back to the thesis laid out in the epilogue, it's about the power.

I haven't even touched on the chapters about the right wing's global affinity for nationalist strongmen, which were interesting (if a little bit mind-numbingly thorough.) This author is an experienced journalist and considered an expert on the religious right. She clearly has spent decades marinating in these particular circles, which is interesting because she seems to have absolutely no regard for any of their beliefs.

This book is not an argument about whether anything claimed about Trump or his followers is true or not true. Trump's racism and lies are presupposed facts. The undercover Planned Parenthood videos are "deceptive." Religious freedom is a crock argument put forward today by the same conservatives and for the same reasons as they wielded it against racial integration of schools.

"Religion, though, is just a cover for the endgame," says the author.

But is it? Certainly, she makes an excellent case that at the national level, anyone arguing religion is just doing it because it serves their rhetorical purposes. I do believe her that it's all about the power. But on the ground, in our homes? Is the everyday white evangelical voter watching the news and thinking to himself "I'm so glad all this 'God' claptrap is putting us back in power so that we can destroy democratic institutions around the globe." Not the ones I know.

I'm still mostly mystified as to what these people ARE thinking. So, while I got quite the political history education from this book, unfortunately I didn't accomplish my goal.

I might have to do my own research and then write my own book. Some things I can tell you already. There is an amount of genuine fear of legal persecution. There is a vast amount of genuine moral outrage at issues like abortion. There is an amount of blended nationalistic-anxiety-racism-nostalgia about what inevitable demographic changes will mean. And the author was absolutely right about one thing:

IT IS ALL. ABOUT. THE SUPREME COURT.