One other group I should address specifically - the elite. The politicians, journalists, prominent business and corporate leaders, etc. These people USE religion, but not to guide their personal lives. They use it like a kind of robe. It identifies them as one of the elite, and maintains their image among 'the commoners'. They are the priests of the culture, and see themselves as above the common culture. Being religious is part of the whole image.

I think people outside the US see a lot of this posturing and think the average US citizen is like that. In my view they are not, but most of them buy the image. On one hand they know their leaders are corrupt, but on the other hand they try to hold them to these ideals which they themselves do not really believe in. It is some kind of twisted play-acting. The judgmentalness of it all does inform much of the political and social debate in the US, but not much of it filters into actual daily life, except in the form of laws and rules that are circumvented in any way possible by most people.