Category Archives: Religion

September 5, 2010 · 8:29 pm

America’s History of Fear

Great Op Ed piece in the NY Times from Nicholas Kristof.

A radio interviewer asked me the other day if I thought bigotry was the only reason why someone might oppose the Islamic center in Lower Manhattan. No, I don’t. Most of the opponents aren’t bigots but well-meaning worriers — and during earlier waves of intolerance in American history, it was just the same.

Screeds against Catholics from the 19th century sounded just like the invective today against the Not-at-Ground-Zero Mosque. The starting point isn’t hatred but fear: an alarm among patriots that newcomers don’t share their values, don’t believe in democracy, and may harm innocent Americans.

Followers of these movements against Irish, Germans, Italians, Chinese and other immigrants were mostly decent, well-meaning people trying to protect their country. But they were manipulated by demagogues playing upon their fears — the 19th- and 20th-century equivalents of Glenn Beck.

Most Americans stayed on the sidelines during these spasms of bigotry, and only a small number of hoodlums killed or tormented Catholics, Mormons or others. But the assaults were possible because so many middle-of-the-road Americans were ambivalent.

Suspicion of outsiders, of people who behave or worship differently, may be an ingrained element of the human condition, a survival instinct from our cave-man days. But we should also recognize that historically this distrust has led us to burn witches, intern Japanese-Americans, and turn away Jewish refugees from the Holocaust.

Perhaps the closest parallel to today’s hysteria about Islam is the 19th-century fear spread by the Know Nothing movement about “the Catholic menace.” One book warned that Catholicism was “the primary source” of all of America’s misfortunes, and there were whispering campaigns that presidents including Martin Van Buren and William McKinley were secretly working with the pope. Does that sound familiar?

Link to full Column:  via Op-Ed Columnist – America’s History of Fear – NYTimes.com.

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September 5, 2010 · 11:41 am

Beck and Palin’s mysterious 9/11 event: 5 theories – The Week

Can I be sick now?

Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin are appearing together at the Dena’ina Center in Anchorage on Sept. 11, and nobody’s sure why. Beck, on his radio show, confirmed the event but would say only, “I’m gonna give a speech up there, and Sarah’s gonna give a speech, too, but that’s it.” Beck’s coyness, along with Palin’s silence and the provocative date, have only amped up the speculation about this “mysterious” event. (Watch a Russia Today discussion about the pair of leaders.) Here’s five theories on what Palin and Beck are up to on 9/11:

1. This is the launch of Palin-Beck 2012

“The symbolic date of 9/11 invests this event with the inescapable possibility that he and Palin plan to announce their Presidential candidacy for 2012,” says Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times. Such a ticket is “not exactly unexpected,” but launching it on 9/11 is a cynical way to “benefit from the paranoia” they’ve helped create about a threat from America’s Muslims and “Obama’s fictitious Islamic religion.”

More:  via Beck and Palin’s mysterious 9/11 event: 5 theories – The Week.

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September 4, 2010 · 10:17 am

Beliefs – ChristWire Web Site Mixes Satire, Religion and the Weather – NYTimes.com

Great article in today’s NY Times about Christwire.org, a site I have quoted and linked to frequently.   The most popular post was “Is My Husband Gay?”

I love that site and am glad to see them get some good publicity.

Since 2008, ChristWire.org has emerged as the leading Internet site for ultraconservative Christian news, commentary and weather reportage.

“Hurricane Earl Projected Path, Gay East Coast of America,” ChristWire opined on Monday. One headline in late August proclaimed, “Warning! Black Music Infiltrates the Minds of Future Homemaking White Women.” Last week, referring to Ken Mehlman, the former Republican Party chairman who came out of the closet last month, ChristWire asked, “Why does Ken Mehlman think that choosing the homosexual lifestyle is more important to him than the Republican values he once held so dear?”

ChristWire has lately reached new levels of popularity, in part thanks to an Aug. 14 column, “Is My Husband Gay?” Written by Stephenson Billings, the piece is a 15-point checklist to help wives detect possibly closeted husbands. “Gym membership but no interest in sports” is one warning sign. So is “Sassy, sarcastic and ironic around his friends” and “Love of pop culture.”

“Is My Husband Gay?” was picked up on The Huffington Post and mentioned by Ryan Seacrest on his radio show; so far it has been viewed 8.3 million times.

Oh, by the way: ChristWire is all one big joke.

via Beliefs – ChristWire Web Site Mixes Satire, Religion and the Weather – NYTimes.com.

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September 3, 2010 · 8:02 pm

Margaret and Helen

This is a great blog from two women in their 80’s who have been best friends for over 60 years.

Here is an excerpt from their latest entry:

I just can’t believe 87,000 people are dumb enough to buy that crap. If Beck and Palin want a government so focused on one God and one religion, they should visit the Middle East and see how that concept is working out.  It’s gotten to the point where you can’t distinguish Fox News from the Christian Broadcasting Network.   It’s nauseating.

Palin and Beck don’t care about you, me or anyone except themselves.  They are getting filthy rich pandering to angry white mobs so transparent in their racist feelings toward the President that a sheet of Saran Wrap would cast a darker shadow.

The greatest threat against America is not terrorism.  It’s not a mosque in Manhattan.  It’s not gay marriage.  It’s not healthcare reform.  And, believe it or not, it’s not even Beck or Palin.  The greatest threat against America are the tens of millions of Americans who won’t turn out to vote this November effectively giving power to 87,000 angry assholes.

Sarah Palin is an idiot.  Glenn Beck is a moron.  And I am sick of Fox News.  I mean it.  Really.

via Margaret and Helen.

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September 3, 2010 · 8:58 am

Betty Bowers Explains Traditional Marriage to Everyone Else

A clear explanation from “America’s Best Christian”.

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September 1, 2010 · 7:14 pm

Mitchell Bard: Is the GOP Looking Out for You?

Great blog over at the Huffington Post:

With the midterms just over two months away, we are inundated with daily media reports on the election, most of them predicting doom for the Democrats. But what jumps out at me is how telling so many of the proposals and actions from Republican officeholders and candidates are, since they reveal that they are acting on behalf of a small group of right-wing extremists, not in the best interests of the American people.

To be clear, I’m all for political debate. I think for democracy to work, there has to be a free exchange of ideas, with the best solution to a problem winning the day. But in the current American political environment, we are missing two key elements necessary for our democracy to work. First, thanks to the dissolution of the mass media and the rise of a right-wing propaganda machine (Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, etc.), there is no longer an accepted common set of facts on which to base a debate. Instead, the right wing has decided to use lies and fear-mongering (everything from inventing death panels to questioning the ideological and religious beliefs of the president, including where he was born, to stoking fear of Islam) as a strategic method to win elections. As a result, we have a situation where, according to a recent Newsweek poll, 52 percent of Republicans think President Obama “sympathizes with the goals of Islamic fundamentalists who want to impose Islamic law around the world,” and nearly a quarter think he is, in fact, a Muslim. Second, regarding the tea party-dominated Republican Party, in most cases, their proposals and tactics are not chosen with the best interests of the majority of Americans in mind, but are instead cynical attempts to win elections.

via Mitchell Bard: Is the GOP Looking Out for You?.

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August 29, 2010 · 3:51 pm

“When Fascism Comes to America It Will Come Wrapped in the Flag and Waving a Cross”

This is a famous quote.  Variously attributed to Sinclair Lewis and to Huey Long.

I was researching it on the web today and came across this extremely interesting article about the situation in America in the 1930’s.

It is still very timely.  Maybe even more so than in 1938 when Prof. Luccock originally delivered this message.

New York Times:  September 12, 1938


Image:Fascism.png

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August 29, 2010 · 11:07 am

The Billionaires Bankrolling the Tea Party – NYTimes.com

Frank Rich’s column today is a “must read”.  It is about how a few wealthy people are bank rolling the Tea Party Movement and  how Fox News, owned by one of these folks, drives the narrative.

These Tea Party idiots are being manipulated into working against their own best interests by a few wealthy people and the Corporate Elite.  Just like the Republicans have done for the last 30 years…

Here are a couple of excerpts, but I strongly urge you to click the link and read the entire article:

There’s just one element missing from these snapshots of America’s ostensibly spontaneous and leaderless populist uprising: the sugar daddies who are bankrolling it, and have been doing so since well before the “death panel” warm-up acts of last summer. Three heavy hitters rule. You’ve heard of one of them, Rupert Murdoch. The other two, the brothers David and Charles Koch, are even richer, with a combined wealth exceeded only by that of Bill Gates and Warren Buffett among Americans. But even those carrying the Kochs’ banner may not know who these brothers are.

Their self-interested and at times radical agendas, like Murdoch’s, go well beyond, and sometimes counter to, the interests of those who serve as spear carriers in the political pageants hawked on Fox News. The country will be in for quite a ride should these potentates gain power, and given the recession-battered electorate’s unchecked anger and the Obama White House’s unfocused political strategy, they might.

All three tycoons are the latest incarnation of what the historian Kim Phillips-Fein labeled “Invisible Hands” in her prescient 2009 book of that title: those corporate players who have financed the far right ever since the du Pont brothers spawned the American Liberty League in 1934 to bring down F.D.R. You can draw a straight line from the Liberty League’s crusade against the New Deal “socialism” of Social Security, the Securities and Exchange Commission and child labor laws to the John Birch Society-Barry Goldwater assault on J.F.K. and Medicare to the Koch-Murdoch-backed juggernaut against our “socialist” president.

Only the fat cats change — not their methods and not their pet bugaboos (taxes, corporate regulation, organized labor, and government “handouts” to the poor, unemployed, ill and elderly). Even the sources of their fortunes remain fairly constant. Koch Industries began with oil in the 1930s and now also spews an array of industrial products, from Dixie cups to Lycra, not unlike DuPont’s portfolio of paint and plastics. Sometimes the biological DNA persists as well. The Koch brothers’ father, Fred, was among the select group chosen to serve on the Birch Society’s top governing body. In a recorded 1963 speech that survives in a University of Michigan archive, he can be heard warning of “a takeover” of America in which Communists would “infiltrate the highest offices of government in the U.S. until the president is a Communist, unknown to the rest of us.” That rant could be delivered as is at any Tea Party rally today.

And:

The other major sponsor of the Tea Party movement is Dick Armey’s FreedomWorks, which, like Americans for Prosperity, is promoting events in Washington this weekend. Under its original name, Citizens for a Sound Economy, FreedomWorks received $12 million of its own from Koch family foundations. Using tax records, Mayer found that Koch-controlled foundations gave out $196 million from 1998 to 2008, much of it to conservative causes and institutions. That figure doesn’t include $50 million in Koch Industries lobbying and $4.8 million in campaign contributions by its political action committee, putting it first among energy company peers like Exxon Mobil and Chevron. Since tax law permits anonymous personal donations to nonprofit political groups, these figures may understate the case. The Kochs surely match the in-kind donations the Tea Party receives in free promotion 24/7 from Murdoch’s Fox News, where both Beck and Palin are on the payroll.

via Op-Ed Columnist – The Billionaires Bankrolling the Tea Party – NYTimes.com.

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August 28, 2010 · 9:55 pm

Andy Griffith: “A Face in the Crowd”

Seems like a good day to repost this….

This is one of my favorite films.  It’s also amazingly timely now, 53 years after it was made.  It could almost be called “The Glenn Beck Story.”

If you only think of Andy Griffith as Sheriff Andy Taylor of Mayberry, you really should see this movie.  He is amazing.  I can’t believe he didn’t get an Oscar nomination for this performance.  It also features a stellar performance by Patricia Neal, at her peak, and introduces Lee Remick in her first film.

Here is the original trailer:

There is also a great article in “Vanity Fair” about this film.  Here is the link:

http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2007/03/wolcott200703

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August 28, 2010 · 9:29 pm

Is Being Gay More Important to Ken Mehlman Than Being a Republican? | ChristWire

Very amusing t0ngue in cheek article from one of my favorite websites.  It’s about Ken Mehlman, George Bush’s Campaign manager and former head of the Republican National Committee’s coming out as gay this week.

Here are a couple of quotes and a link to the full article:

Ken Mehlman was a great man. As one of President George W. Bush’s most important political allies, he helped shape the groundbreaking conservative uprising of the 2000 election and saw that it was implemented with wisdom and discipline in the ensuing years. Despite the horrific wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the equally disturbing attempts to undermine Bush’s Evangelical Christian voice, Ken persevered. He became head of the Republican National Committee as a reward for his efforts and in that role he oversaw the ban of same-sex marriage in 21 states. In many issues large and small, Mehlman occupied a vital place, whether it was through his vocal support of Federal Marriage Amendment or campaigning for Senator Rick Santorum when he publicly condemned sodomy and homosexuality.

Yet now Mr. Mehlman has decided to throw all that away with his public confession that he is gay. In an interview he gave with Marc Ambinder of The Atlantic this week, Mehlman stated that the announcement of his sexual orientation has made him, “a happier and better person” and that, “it’s something I wish I had done years ago.”

Advocates for homosexuality were quick to jump on the story. “He needs to acknowledge the damage he caused and apologize for the lives he’s ruined,” Geoffrey Kors of Equality California said in a press release. Joe Jervis of Joe.My.God (not a religious site) was even more cruel when he called Mr. Mehlman a, “Repulsive Anti-Gay Quisling Homophobic Scumbag Asshat.” But, as the Washington Post noted, most “gay rights organizations generally welcomed his statement.” Fox News cut through all the rhetoric with the straightforward headline, “Disaster Looms If GOP Changes Course On Gay Marriage.” Other news organizations and journalists, including Townhall.com, World Net Daily, Andrew Brietbart, Michelle Malkin and Ann Coulter, have deemed this story just too gossipy and have decided against printing anything at all about Mr. Mehlman.

And:

The reason this is relevant is because Ken, a poster child of Republican power, is poised to do more damage than good to the party with his confession. Many will take this as a sign of the so-called hypocrisy of conservative morality. Others will see this as further evidence that those who fight hardest against the gay agenda are secretly gay themselves. It makes the Christian movement look rotten at its core, it makes Republicans look as if they live by double standards, and it makes the ideology of family values in America look like a shallow opportunistic ploy to use fear to gain political control.

via Is Being Gay More Important to Ken Mehlman Than Being a Republican? | ChristWire.

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