Religious right leader James Dobson says former GOP Senator Fred Thompson is "not a Christian"

Dobson is the most powerful religious right leader in the Republican party. He is THE leader of the entire movement. He is THE man that Republicans turn to when they want to talk to the religious right. He is the only religious right leader who actually has any significant pull in the Republican party (the others, my conservative GOP friends tell me, are considered kind of kooky and irrelevant). And today he threw a Republican presidential candidate out of Christianity. Absolutely astounding. Who does Dobson think he is, Jesus Christ himself?

At least one religious right Republican, former Maryland Lt. Governor Michael Steele, criticized Dobson today on CNN, calling Dobson "the extremes" of the Republican party that needs to be avoided.