Michael Crowley, in his fun Slate bio of L. Ron Hubbard, writes:
Comparable crackpots-in-chief like Lyndon LaRouche and Sun Myung Moon have had almost no detectable national influence.
Originally, I was going to say, "tell that to John Gorenfeld." But when I surfed to his site for the link, turned out he'd already written a better response to exactly the same quote. So I'll just copy-and-paste:
The late Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard has a high profile, that's for sure. But only in his most feverish, drug-fueled dreams could the inspiration for Mind Head see himself hailed at a U.S. Senate building, toasted in South America by President Bush, or transformed into a major media mogul who's poured a fortune into the Religious Right and the old anti-Communist lobby.
The guy owns UPI and The Washington Times. All Hubbard's done is turn Tom Cruise ridiculous. Cults are bad, but let's not pretend they're worse than a messianic nutbag deeply insinuated into the ruling party's media and financial structure.