Every year hundreds of religious right leaders gather in Washington, D.C., to talk values and voting. At this year’s Values Voter Summit those values included some whoppers: a racist caricature of Sen. Barack Obama, fear-mongering by Gary Bauer, a campaign to save California from evil “homosexuals,” and the constant hyperbole of U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann.

The Values Voters Summit features a “who’s who” of the religious right, but who wasn’t there? Republican presidential nominee John McCain and his running mate, Sarah Palin, an absence that organizers weren’t very happy about.

After two days of displaying the racist, anti-Muslim and anti-Latino “Obama Waffles,” summit organizers finally got around to condemning it. “When the content of the materials was brought to the attention of FRC Action senior officials today, they were removed and the exhibit was dismantled by the vendor at our insistence,” said conference organizers as the summit headed into the last of its three-dayrun.

A fan of Bachmann, R-Minn., said she told him at the Republican National Convention that she wants an AR15 assault rifle.

Also, Bachmann glowed about the McCain-Palin ticket. “McCain is McBrilliant!” she exclaimed.

Members of the religious right have launched a fasting campaign for California at the summit. “A confrontation between lightness and the dark” will occur in November. It has a lot to do with rainbow flags and men holding hands. “Cry out to God for the deliverance of the homosexual,” the raspy and panic-stricken voice of the announcer shouts.

Saving the institution of marriage isn’t the only thing values voters worry about. Bauer, a prominent abortion foe, says if we don’t vote for McCain, we are all going to die.