James Dobson's War on America

Christian Century, Sept 24, 1997 by Timothy Frederick Simpson

GIL ALEXANDER-MOEGERLE was a co-founder and for ten years was senior vice-president of Focus on the Family. For eight years he served as co-host with, James Dobson of a daily radio broadcast. Now he is Dobson's bitter opponent. This very strident book provides an account of his change of mind.

According, to Alexander-Moegerle, Dobson tampered with the marital therapy that he and his first wife were undergoing and forced him out of his job when he announced his intention to remarry more than a year after his divorce. Following Alexander-Moegerle's, termination, Dobson pressured other potential employers not to hire him.

His reason for writing this book, Alexander-Moegerle tells us, is that Dobson thwarted all attempts to have this matter aired. Alexander-Moegerle this using a Christian arbitration service (one Dobson himself had recommended in his radio broadcast) so as to keep matters of civil law among Christians out of the courts, but Dobson refused. When that failed, Alexander-Moegerle and his new wife sued Dobson, but they lost in this venue as well. Dobson's claim that as the leather of a religious organization he was immune from civil litigation regarding employment practices was upheld by a judge, thereby prohibiting Alexander-Moegerle from mentioning in court either his invasion-of-privacy complaint or anything relating to his termination from Focus. Both parties agreed to stop the proceeding midtrial and settle out of court on the charges that Dobson hindered Alexander-Moegerle from employment.

Dobson, contends Alexander-Moegerle, is somewhat of a chameleon. At some moments, such as during his radio broadcasts or in his infamous interview with serial killer Ted Bundy on the eve of his death in Florida's electric chair, Dobson is a psychologist with a Ph.D., dispensing advice on how to manage life in the modern world. At other times, such as when he is in a courtroom, Dobson is a religious leader defending the American family and Christendom from the onslaughts of secular humanism. In the corridors of Washington, Dobson is a politico who can set 100,000 fax machines in motion at the mere mention of an issue or personality.

Each of these roles, we are told, is by design. According to Alexander-Moegerle, Dobson expends a great deal of energy crafting and cultivating his image. Unlike his more visible evangelical colleagues, Dobson heavily restricts his availability to the press. He does not like television news shows, for example, and any interviews he does give must submit to his final editing before publication.

Alexander-Moegerle provides a portrait of a control freak who runs his organization with an iron fist and who has profited immensely thereby. As he tells it, Dobson is the kind of CEO who stays after work going through his employees' trash, who stacks the board of directors with compliant persons, and who crushes professionally anyone who stands in his way. Dobson maintains his control over Focus on the Family by accepting no salary which makes him impervious to financial leverage by the board. At the same time, Dobson manipulates the organization by retaining all of his books, audiotapes and videos as his own personal intellectual property for which he receives huge royalties -- money earned through the tax-free advertising of his daily broadcasts, which are protected from taxation by virtue of Focus's being a religious enterprise. Alexander-Moegerle claims to have seen Dobson's personal financial statements in the mid-80s and that he was already a multimillionaire.

Alexander-Moegerle makes very serious charges of racism and sexism against his former boss, albeit on the basis on anecdotal evidence. These charges range from the garden variety (the hiring practices of Focus, Dobson's opposition to expanded civil rights legislation, Focus's move from Los Angeles to lily-white Colorado Springs) to the extreme (e.g., the sharing of racist jokes by Dobson, Dobson's views on the genetic makeup of African-Americans and the simple-mindedness of women). Also of interest is Dobson's theological belief that he himself is sinless, possessing, as a member of the holiness-inspired Nazarene Church, the "second work of grace." This sense of sinless perfection, asserts Alexander-Moegerle, is at the heart of Dobson's autocratic style.

It is tempting to treat this book as sour grapes on the part of a disgruntled former employee. However, Alexander-Moegerle's post as co-founder, senior vice-president and co-host of Focus must be factored in. If Dobson did and said such things, Alexander-Moegerle would certainly have been in a position to know. Perhaps this book will be a catalyst for Dobson to increase both his and his organization's accessibility, if for no other reason than to counter these charges.

The reviewer is Timothy Frederick Simpson, a pastor in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) who is a Ph.D student at Union Theological Seminary in Virginia.