http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Birch_Society

established in Indianapolis, Indiana, on December 9, 1958

By the time of Welch's death in 1985, the society's membership and influence had dramatically declined

co-sponsor of the 2010 Conservative Political Action Conference, ending its decades-long exile from the mainstream conservative movement.

Oh, well those dates (coupled with my entrance into caring/commenting about politics at Davis' recall election in 2003) explains why I'd never heard of them.

supports anti-communism, limited government, a constitutional republic[1][2] and personal freedom.

They don't sound too bad...

upholds an originalist interpretation of the U.S. Constitution, which it identifies with fundamental Christian principles, seeks to limit governmental powers, and opposes wealth redistribution, and economic interventionism.

Sounds good so far...

"There are many stages of welfarism, socialism, and collectivism in general," he wrote, "but Communism is the ultimate state of them all, and they all lead inevitably in that direction."

Starting to go a little over the top, but I understand the underlying sentiment.

It not only opposes the practices it terms collectivism, totalitarianism, and communism, but socialism and fascism as well, which it asserts is infiltrating US governmental administration.

Wait, really?

both the U.S. and Soviet governments are controlled by the same furtive conspiratorial cabal of internationalists, greedy bankers, and corrupt politicians.

Wow.

People in power being greedy for more power I can fully understand and get behind (does a more true truism exist?) - after all, once a politician gets elected the answer to every single question in their own mind is always "Which answer will get me re-elected?" - but I draw the line at seeing multinational conspiracies. Talk about jumping the shark. No thanks.

JT