Obama the Anti-Christ?

It's no surprise that the new Harris Poll, out Wednesday and inspired by John Avlon's book Wingnuts, suggests that political leanings shape how Americans perceive Obama. In fact, over half of surveyed Republicans said they believe that the president is a socialist Muslim who wants to take away gun rights and turn over U.S. sovereignty to the U.N. What’s deeper, though, is the vitriol of those beliefs, with a substantial number of Republicans believing that Obama resents America's heritage (47 percent), is the "domestic enemy that the U.S. Constitution speaks of" (45 percent), wants to use an economic or terrorist event as an excuse to take dictatorial powers (41 percent), is doing some of the same stuff that Hitler did (38 percent), and may, in fact, be the Anti-Christ (24 percent). Education also appears to play a strong role in beliefs. People who have not been to college were far more likely than those with a post-college education to believe, for example, that Obama is a Muslim (43 percent compared with 9 percent), a socialist (45 percent to 20 percent), or anti-American (27 percent to 9 percent).