PolitiFact documents the longstanding association between Daniel Webster -- the religious extremist who is challening Alan Grayson in Florida's 8th Congressional District -- and The Institute in Basic Life Principles, a radical right-wing religious organization that some consider cult-like:

The Institute in Basic Life Principles describes itself as a Christian teaching organization that provides training and instruction on how to find success by following God’s principles found in Scripture. Some of its specific teachings are controversial. Among them, the Institute teaches that a mother violates Scripture when she works outside the home, that married couples are to abstain from sex 40 days after the birth of a son, 80 days after the birth of a daughter and the evening prior to worship, and that people should avoid rock and even contemporary Christian music because it can be addictive. Webster has been involved with the group for nearly 30 years and continues to participate in training and also speaks at seminars. In a 2003 interview with the St. Petersburg Times, Webster said he home-schooled his six children on Institute curricula and said the group's teachings have had a major influence on his life. One of those Institute beliefs describes the complementary roles of a husband and wife. "The man provides servant leadership and the woman responds with reverent submission and assistance," according to the group's website, which goes on to quote Ephesians 5:22–33 -- Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. . . . Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it . . . . Let every one of you in particular so love his wife even as himself; and the wife see that she reverence her husband. According to the Institute, a wife is never supposed to "take over," writing that "in response to pressures within the family or within a marital relationship, a foolish wife will take matters into her own hands." A wife also is to "stay beautiful for her husband." "Resistance or indifference to your husband’s need for physical intimacy is the unspoken crushing of his spirit," the Institute says on its website. In other places on the website, the Institute talks about a wife's need to submit to a husband's spiritual leadership. In his 2003 interview with the Times, Webster declined to discuss specific teachings and whether he disagreed with any of them. "I believe what I believe," he said in the 2003 interview. "It has not affected the way I've served. I don't think anyone can tell you that I've forced my beliefs on anyone else."

Now here's there interesting thing about what PolitiFact wrote: it comes in the midst of an article meant to exonerate Webster from criticism levied by Grayson in Grayson's most recent ad. More on that later, but let me just say this: when those who are defending you nonetheless include a detailed accounting of your 30-year membership in a cultish group of religious extremists with radical views on the relationship between men and women, then you are way, way outside the mainstream.

Just how far outside the mainstream? Well consider this quote from Webster about the institute's leader, via Troutfishing's recommended diary, "BREAKING Grayson's opponent tied to "Biblical Stoning" movement":

I respect [Gothard] as much as anybody.

Now take a look at this quote, via Digby:

“I enjoy the advice he’s given,” Webster said of Gothard. “I think it’s been a major part of my life. I’m not ashamed of that. What he has said I believe to be the truth.”

And now, in light of Webster's praise for Gothard, sneak a peak at Gothard's gospel:

His opening lecture on self-acceptance closes with a prayer to "give God a vote of confidence for how he has made us so far." Next comes family life. Children must be totally obedient. A religious teenager, for example, should not attend a church college if atheistic parents order him not to. As for a man's wife, she "has to realize that God accomplishes his ultimate will through the decisions of the husband, even when the husband is wrong." Citing I Thessalonians 5:18 ("In every thing give thanks"), Gothard even advises a wife whose husband chastises her to say, "God, thank you for this beating." Besides following the chain of command in the family, Christians should also be obedient to their employers and their government, Gothard asserts. Only if an order from a parent, the state or a boss conflicts with God's explicit commandments may it be disobeyed.

Clearly, it's unfair for Grayson to link Webster and Gothard, right? And it's even more unfair to say Webster is an extremist, right? I mean, don't most people hang out with religious leaders who say that wives should bend to their husband's will?

And surely you must reject Grayson's new ad as a Shirely Sherrod-style smear because it includes quotes of Webster saying the exact same thing. Right?

PolitiFact says so:

Bill Gothard, founder and president of the Institute, said the image and video of Webster was taken from a talk to fathers at the group's 2009 Advanced Training Institute Conference in Nashville. The Advanced Training Institute is a home-education curriculum provided by the Institute in Basic Life Principles. In an interview with PolitiFact Florida, Gothard said the quote is severely distorted and manipulated. "It couldn't be any more starkly misused," Gothard said. "That gets my adrenaline up. A man who stoops to that level should not be in any office." Gothard said Webster was leading a talk to a group of fathers and was discussing prayers they should say. Webster's point was that they shouldn't pray for their wives to do something, rather they should pray for what they could control in their own life. "I am stunned how he could have taken what Daniel said, and turned it around to say the opposite of what Daniel was saying," Gothard said. PolitiFact Florida asked for, and received, a video with Webster's extended comments. The video confirms Gothard's recollection of the 2009 speech. "Have verses for (your) wife. I have verses for my wife," Webster said in an unedited excerpt provided by the Institute. "Don't pick the ones that say, 'she should submit to me.' That's in the Bible, but pick the ones you're supposed to do (laughs). So instead (laughs) that you'd love your wife -- even as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it ... and, as opposed to wives submit yourself to your own husband. She can pray that if she wants to, but don't you pray it." Webster goes on to make the same point about praying for children. "Pick out the ones that have your responsibility listed into it," Webster said. "Yes, children are to obey their parents, but more importantly we're as fathers to, um, not provoke them to wrath." So in his message Webster was telling fathers that they should not pray for the first half of the passage in Ephesians (Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands) but pray for the second (Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it). The Grayson ad clearly suggests that Webster thinks wives should submit to their husbands, and the repeated refrain of "Submit to me," is an effort to scare off potential female voters. But the lines in the video are clearly taken out of context thanks to some heavy-handed editing. The actual point of Webster's 2009 speech was that husbands should love their wives. Maybe Webster thinks wives should submit to their husbands. But there's no evidence in this ad, especially Webster's own words, to support that allegation. We rate Grayson's claim False.

At least PolitiFact doesn't go so far as to say that Webster was rejecting the notion that wives should submit to their husbands. But their assessment that "there's no evidence" to support the claim that Webster believes wives should submit to their husbands is ludicrous.

Even PolitiFact's own article provides evidence to support the claim. As do the statements cited by Digby. But most importantly of all, Webster's own words -- from the speech cited in the ad -- support the claim. As PolitiFact notes, Webster did tell men that they should pray for their wives to submit to them. He said that men should pray that they meet their own responsibilities. But he also described submission as part of a wife's responsibility to her husband, just as he described obeying as part of a child's responsibility to his or her parent. He described these responsibilities in parallel construction; to argue that he doesn't believe wives should submit to their husbands, you'd also have to argue he doesn't believe children should obey their parents. And in the full context of his remarks, it's plainly obvious that he believes both.

The claim that Taliban Dan Webster believes wives should submit to their husbands is clearly and abundantly true.

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