Pat Robertson

SOME years ago I had to decide whether to ask that th respirator that was keeping my 85-year-old mother alive be turned off. I did ask. She died. The decision was painful. It was not difficult.Mom had made her wishes clear in a living will, and her body's systems were misfiring randomly and shutting down one by one. Postponing death meant needless, if only subconscious, torment for her.As unpleasant as all that was, I can't even imagine how much more traumatic it would have been if a grandstanding governor and state legislator had forced me to fight in the courts for the right to make a decision that state law permits.

The Rev. Pat Robertson seemed to delight years ago in waving before his television flock an American Civil Liberties Union letter showing his photograph alongside two other prominent Christian conservatives under the headline: "The Most Dangerous Men in America?" His significance as menace or inspiration is less clear now than it was then, due not least to Robertson's success making Christian conservatism a force in mainstream national politics. Many scholars who have written on Christian conservatism say the 75-year-old evangelist is well past his peak of influence.

WASHINGTON -- Humbled by his crushing defeat on Super Tuesday, former Sen. Bill Bradley will withdraw from the race for the Democratic nomination today and endorse his triumphant rival, Vice President Al Gore, aides said yesterday. On the Republican side, Sen. John McCain huddled with his top advisers and campaign staff, reviewing options ranging from a hasty withdrawal to a possible third-party bid. His campaign said last night that McCain would make a statement at noon today amid reports that the Arizona senator will announce his withdrawal from the race.

WASHINGTON -- Call me paranoid, but sometimes I think the mainstream media give maximum coverage to the Rev. Pat Robertson in order to discredit him. Or at least to discredit politically active TV evangelists who have enough connections to get their phone calls returned from the White House. Either way, it hasn't worked. Mr. Robertson is still in business. His latest fatwa, delivered on The 700 Club, his daily Virginia-based television show, is directed at "the good citizens of Dover," a Pennsylvania town that Mr. Robertson says has "rejected" God. Their sinful deed, Mr. Robertson says, was to vote out of office all of Dover's school board members who were up for re-election and supported intelligent design.

WASHINGTON -- If there ever was any doubt about the political intentions of the Christian Coalition, it has surely been dispelled by the tape recording of Pat Robertson's blunt talk to the some of the group's leaders at a private breakfast in Atlanta the other day.Mr. Robertson said the coalition could claim credit for electing the Republican Congress in 1994. He was clear about what he wanted in return. ''We just tell these guys, 'Look, we put you in power in 1994 and we want you to deliver.

THE SIMILARITIES among the radical wings of religious fundamentalism are striking and frightening. In Iran, for example, the mullahs issue fatwas, the exhortations to assassinate people they don't like. The most notorious of these in recent times was the fatwa issued in 1989 by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini against the Indian-born author Salman Rushdie. The ayatollah was incensed because Mr. Rushdie's novel Satanic Verses seemed to insult Islam. We have our own religious nuts here in America.

PHILADELPHIA - Dick Cheney's soooo boring he makes Al Gore look almost life-like! AIN'T THAT FUNNY? George W. Bush is -DUH! - a big, dumb pothead! Heee-heeeee! Get it? OK, so there's not much to be got. But don't shoot the messengers, those being the comedians who have to make a living off the Republican National Convention and will have at least as much of a challenge in two weeks when the Democrats gather in Los Angeles. And their message? This convention is slightly less funny than an industrial accident.

American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America Chris Hedges Free Press / 256 pages / $25 President Eisenhower famously said, "Our government makes no sense unless it is founded in a deeply felt religious faith, and I don't care what that faith is." The people Chris Hedges writes about in his new book have a different view: They care a lot about the religion on which our government is based and they think it should be Christianity - their version, of course. American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America is a call to arms against what Hedges sees as the efforts of Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and the operators of Trinity Broadcasting Network, among others, to turn the United States into a Christian nation.

Concerning the presidential debate Wednesday night ("Battle is joined over jobs, taxes," Oct. 4), I heard Pat Robertson speak when he ran for president in 1988 and was very impressed. Someone, however, told me, "Don't pay any attention to what the candidates say, listen to what their supporters are saying. " David Ingalls, Severna Park

A year after the Supreme Court banned prayer at public school graduation ceremonies, many students will still be receiving the traditional blessing as they leave high school this spring.In school districts throughout Maryland, graduating seniors will have the chance to attend privately sponsored baccalaureates, ceremonies typically including prayers, hymns and other religious trappings.For generations, most public high schools in Baltimore and surrounding counties had an opening or closing prayer at graduations.