Shining City on a Hill. What Rank Bullshit!

I have been thinking of the phrase, as I saw some vid yesterday, of some tea bagger nutzo woman who was complaining about how P. Obama really doesn't love America.  Some lame, stupid, inarticulate shit.  One of the the things she said was that he was working against the idea that America  was  (should be) this shining city on a hill.  Crazy talk. 

Now I knew it was associated with Reagan.  And before that, it had some religious origin.  But I googled and apparently it's specifically  puritan.  And before that, has it's origin in the Bible.

So was her use of that in her critique of P. Obama  some christianist  dog whistle?

Beyond that. I don't get the metaphor, nationally.

We want the enormity of The Nation to be seen as a shiny city on the hill?

Doesn't work for me.  I know a metaphor when one bites me in the ass or pees on my leg and tells me it's raining.  But I don't get this one.  When I think of it.  But that is the hallmark of sophistry.  The cleverness in the message fails, as soon as you actually think of it.

But now that I am thinking about it.  Shining  . . . city.

Shiny  . . . thing.

Ohhhh! Shiny Thing!

I don't get it.  But I get why wing nuts and tea baggers like that shit.  It's all about the shiny thing.