It's time for moderate Christians to start playing political hardball—after all, the other side has been doing it for years.
On November 3rd, Bob Jones, the president of Bob Jones University (a Christian college most famous for, until recently, prohibiting interracial dating) wrote President Bush a letter congratulating him on his victory. Here are two excerpts from that letter:…
Article comments
26 - andy marsh
Pete - what you say about Dean is kinda true, he is a hothead, but he also wants to be the DNC Chairman!
27 - Steve S
According to daily kos, Dean won a major victory yesterday on his road to the DNC.
My thought is that Bush is the cowboy hothead. He surrounds himself with yes men/woman.
I wanted Dean for Pres. more than Kerry, I stood behind Kerry when he won the nomination, but I was disappointed and was pretty sure we'd lose. Dean, I do not see as an extremist, but yes, pretty liberal, look at his record in Vermont, it is a glowing endorsement.
When I look at the actions and read the words of Tom DeLay, Frist, Gingrich, Bush, Cheney, the WHOLE lot of them, it is clear to me that they hate Democrats, everything we stand for, and will NOT compromise or work together. The gerrymandering of Texas and the like are clear indications of the levels they will go to, to make this a one party nation.
So if Dean said that, then it is nothing more than an appropriate counter to what we face. (and I hope Dean wins the nomination, and I hope people don't let the Right define him like they did Kerry)
28 - Eric Olsen
if Dean wins, what form will his next meltdown take? Will he take the Democratic party with him?
29 - andy marsh
The right already has defined him...along with a good portion of the democratic party! He's a left wing nut job!
Steve - you can "read" into the things republicans say, but I challenge you to find a quote from a mainstream republican that comes close to "I hate republicans and everything they stand for".
Not rush or coulter or hannity...a pol, you know, someone along the lines of dean, that would utter anything like what those new england dems like to spew!
30 - Steve S
That 'scream' was funny sounding, but I saw it as trying to 'motivate the troops', and it just backfired. that's not my definition of a meltdown. Are you referring to something else?
31 - Steve S
Andy, no, I don't want to take your challenge, because I might not find anything. The difference between the Repubs and the Dems, in terms of organizational matters is huge.
Foxnews, Rush, email campaigns from right wing organizations, etc. do go on and on about the 'evils of liberalism'. So why would a Republican have to do it, when they have installed a marketing system to do it for them?
32 - andy marsh
You're right Steve, the WHOLE world is against you! Liberal? I thought you were a "progressive"?
33 - Eric Olsen
Steve, I have heard many try to explain away the scream, but it scared the shit out of a wide swath of the populace, including many sympathetic politically and as such I would definitely call it a meltdown, certainly from the political standpoint, and if thechairmanship of the Democratic party isn't a political position, I don't know what is.
34 - Steve S
Andy, how do you get out of my post that I think the whole world is against me? Nonsense.
The majority of the western world is more to the left than the right.
35 - Steve S
Eric, that is the sentiment of most, to be sure. To me, a meltdown is when you mentally fall apart, and while I know the snide comments that line opened up, I don't think his poorly given scream was due to mentally falling apart. Yes, it was a mistake, yes it cost him, yes people feared it, but I don't see it as a meltdown, he was fired up and ready to go, that's not a meltdown to me.
You all can relax anyway, ever since Clinton, everybody I've ever wanted to win anything anyway, never has.
36 - andy marsh
Maybe you should vote republican???
37 - Eric Olsen
with that definition of meltdown, I would agree with you, but I would specify this as a "politcal meltdown" in that that one action led to a political collapse by revealing, or giving the perception of revealing, a large hole in his judgment
38 - Steve S
and with that definition, I could agree with you.
I can't vote republican andy, I don't believe in voting our democracy away into a theocracy.
39 - andy marsh
All republicans are theocrats?
40 - Shark
Andy, if Bush is God (and we all know He is) then Republicans are theocrats.
Yer welcome.
41 - Steve S
No andy, all republicans are not theocrats.
42 - andy marsh
Now I'm confused...well...I've been confused most of my life...but...well...you get the picture!
43 - Eric Olsen
wouldn't the rigidly hierarchical Catholics be more inclined toward theocracy than Protestants? And aren't the majority of Catholics still Democrats?
44 - Steve S
sounds like you all are thinking I'm talking about the constituents, no, I'm talking about the people in power.
The Texas Republican Party has written God into their platform, the Republican party has their own fringe element (right wingers) who are far more powerful within their own party than the extremists on the left. The party has people like Scalia and Gonzalez, who openly question the separation of church and state. The party has people who want to put religious symbols in federal buildings, they want public schools to teach their religious moral values, the list just goes on and on.
Constituents don't see all this as a doorway to theocracy, I do.
45 - Eric Olsen
the big arrow of Western history is away from the entanglement of religion and the power of the state - I do not see that changing despite the efforts of some atavists
46 - Steve S
many don't, Eric. I do.
I guess this would make Scalia one of those darned 'activist judges'.
47 - JR
if Dean wins, what form will his next meltdown take? Will he take the Democratic party with him?
You know, the guy was governor of Vermont for almost twelve years and nothing untoward happened. This "meltdown" crap is the kind of hyperbole I'd expect from Tom DeLay.
48 - Dave Nalle
Steve, have you READ the Texas Republican Party platform? It's one of the most amazing, progressive political documents I've read. It's nothing at all like the national party platform. Putting aside a couple of dumb religious planks it's basically a pure manifesto of classic Liberalism. You can find a link to it at http://www.fontcraft.com/csa/comments.php?id=89_0_1_30_C
Dave
49 - Steve S
Dave, from the link you gave me:
"Unfortunately, to get all those good ideas into the platform they also had to include some extreme positions on social issues [homosexuality]"
and you say:
Putting aside a couple of dumb religious planks
with all due respect, since these dumb planks would affect you and I differently, if I were in Texas, I think it's reasonable to assume we give them different weight.
I'm not going to "put aside" and dismiss as a dumb religious plank, the ostracization of my family, just so you all can use it to further your agenda (as evidenced by the quite I provided above). Gee thanks Republican party, with a thought process like that, I just can't wait to get into the nitty gritty on civil rights issues and your rationale for the Patriot Act.
It's one of the most amazing, progressive political documents I've read.
I'm familiar with it, it is far from progressive.
50 - Dave Nalle
It's very progressive compared to the national Republican party platform, and while it does have some backwards ideas which have a religious origin, it's remarkably forward thinking on issues of education, government accountability, foreign policy, civil rights and as you seem to have missed, limiting the excesses of the Partiot Act.
No platform will ever be perfect because they always represent the pet issues of a variety of constituent groups, but as party platforms go the Texas Republican one is way above average.
BTW, the link you give is only to the preamble. Have you read the full platform?
Dave
51 - Eric Olsen
JR, see #37, surely in the political sense he had a meltdown, and the position he is seeking is nothing if not political
52 - Steve S
and while it does have some backwards ideas which have a religious origin
so you are okay with violating the separation of church and state as long as it gets the really 'cool' stuff passed?
the link you give is only to the preamble. Have you read the full platform?
yes, although if I was to break it down with all that I see wrong with it, it would probably deserve it's own thread, it's kind of off topic here.
From the preamble:
Life begins at the moment of fertilization
human life...created in the image of God
Dumb planks, Dave? We DON'T know when life begins. We DON'T know that God created us in his image. You're just going to let these slide by though, to get other things accomplished? How is this different than putting in the platform Creationism? After all, we don't know that one either, but hey, if it helps to lower taxes, then WTF, is that it?
From the preamble:
We take a principled stand to preemptively defend the citizens of the United States against all foes, foreign or domestic, whose goal is to destroy our American way of life.
Yeah, I got it. I'm a 'domestic foe' whose goal is to destroy your American way of life. I know what throwing 'or domestic' in there means, Dave.
From the preamble:
while opposing judicial activism
Progressivists don't believe that judges are being politically motivated, they believe the judges are ruling on equality.
No, no, I don't see it as progressivist at all, I see it as a doorway to a theocracy.
53 - andy marsh
Steve - as a transplanted southerner I have to tell you that you're not speaking correctly. Several times in this post you've used the words 'you all'. It's ya'll dammit!
54 - Dave Nalle
I guess it's a matter of priorities. I place a relatively low priority on a lot of the items the Christian Right pushes for. I don't agree with them, but on the other hand I don't think the issues are really that important compared with economic and civil rights issues. I can live with the pledge of allegiance and some restrictions on abortion if it gets me social security reform, school choice and a leaner, less repressive government.
As for theocracy building, I just don't see it. The areas where they see a role for Christianity are pretty trivial in the bigger picture.
Dave
55 - Temple A. Stark
I think demonization is the right word here.
Nice numbers break down - sort of gives the Evangelists who won't shut up the ammo to shoot themselves in the foot.
56 - JR
Eric Olsen: JR, see #37, surely in the political sense he had a meltdown, and the position he is seeking is nothing if not political
See Comment 28 where you basically imply that Dean's alleged lack of mental stability is a threat to the entire Democratic party.
We get it, you don't like the guy. But your opinion of him doesn't really have much bearing on Dean's actual qualifications for political office. It's not like Bush exactly distinguished himself in the first debate, but he still won the election; and even I can admit that his petulance in a debate doesn't necessarily herald a nuclear holocaust during his second term.
57 - Eric Olsen
I really have no particular opinion about Dean one way or the other - I neither like nor dislike him, he didn't get far enough into the process that I paid all that much attention to him. I'm just observing from the outside.