More Betrayal from Barack. Barack Obama has revealed himself yet again as completely untrustworthy, with his announcement yesterday that he favors using Government money to help religious organizations, in a worsening of the unconstitutional behavior of the Republicans' "faith-based initiatives" scam. I, a militant atheist, am to pay taxes to churches, synagogs, mosques, and temples that do socially useful things? I don't think so.
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There are hosts of seriously underfunded secular organizations doing enormously important work for the social good, at great personal hardship for the people involved. Not one cent of my tax moneys should be given to religious organizations. Not one cent. To make the case most plainly, so that even the stupidest Rightwinger might — might — understand, do you really want money taken from the pockets of Christians and Jews to go to Moslem organizations that feed the homeless in an inner city? Do you really trust the Moslem social-service workers — say, Louis Farrakhan's people — counseling residents of halfway houses for black ex-cons, to avoid all mention of Islam — a militant form of which they may have encountered inside prison? I don't.
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Nor do I trust evangelical Christians to provide social services without even implying that there is a God who is looking after them, cares about them, and will help them turn their lives around, if only they believe and put their faith in Jesus.
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Anyone who expects a whole range of social services to be provided by religious organizations without so much as a mention of God — their particular version of a particular God — is a fool. We're not talking here of, say, a Catholic hospital whose emergency room is religiously neutral. We're talking about soup kitchens and services for the homeless and drug-addicted and alcoholics who are to be told they can turn their life around, but only with the help of Jesus or a "higher power" into which they must place their trust (faith). So in order to get the services they want, they must play the game and listen to the preaching. Obama pretends that he would fund only activities in which there is no preaching, but there is ALWAYS preaching, open or implied, in all social-service agencies run by religious groups. So what Obama really wants is for that preaching to be paid for with my money. NO!
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To make this even clearer, so clear that even evangelicals can understand, if government money can go to the "Grace of God Soup Kitchen", why not to the "There Is No God Soup Kitchen"? If Alcoholics Anonymous can tell people to accept that they have no power over their compulsions but must trust in a higher power, why can't a competing organization say that there is no such thing as a higher power, and only internal strength can save you? How about the "All Religion Is Evil Homeless Shelter"? Should that be getting Federal funds? "God Is a Monster Invented by Con Artists Halfway House"? "Heaven Is a Scam Daycare Center"? "No Afterlife Computer Training Center"? "Religion Is Idiotic Superstition Thrift Store"? "Renounce Religion Vocational Counseling Center"?
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The Religious Right pretends that there are only two choices for Government as regards faith: secularism or acknowledgment of the indispensable position of religion in society. But there's at least a third option: militant Governmental antireligion, comprising zealous Government action to disabuse people of destructive superstitions. Russia went from an official religion, the Russian Orthodox Church, to official antireligion, and the Communists of the Soviet Union destroyed thousands and thousands of churches and killed uncounted priests, monks, and nuns. We can have an American version of the antireligious Russian Revolution if the Religious Right prefers. Back us into a corner and we will fite, with guns and firebombs.
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Ever hear of Lebanon? How about a Lebanon writ large, 3.6 million square miles in extent,* with 300 million people split into hundreds of sects killing each other and burning each other's churches, synagogs, mosques, temples, social-service agencies, and offices to the ground — while fully occupied? Look at Iraq for a sense of what we could have in the Good Old U.S. of A., with entire neighborhoods "cleansed" of people of "the wrong" religion.
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Evangelicals don't want a religiously neutral Government? How about an actively, rabidly antireligious Government? Your side is not the only side that Government can take. And if you wouldn't like Government to side against you, you cannot, as Christians, want Government to side with you but against the nonreligious. It's that pesky "Do unto others" thing. You remember that. Maybe you need to think about that more often. Like every day of your life.
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Speaking of the Golden Rule, Barack Obama was, bizarrely, attacked on Fox News Channel last nite in some newstalk show for undermining (heterosexual) marriage, whereas he has actually sided with the Radical Right against gay marriage. Now what? Obama will defend himself from charges of being soft on gay marriage by taking a very public stance against same-sex marriage, as part of his "move to the center"? 'Marriage is for us, not you.' So it would be alrite if marriage were reserved to homosexuals alone and heterosexuals were not allowed to marry? "As you would have others do to you, so too do to them." Or has that been changed, with the addition of "unless they are homosexual" or "black" or "[fill in group here]"?
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What will it take for Liberals / "Progressives" (the people too ashamed to call themselves "Liberals") to accept that Barack Obama is the wrong man, at the wrong time, to lead the Democratic Left? That he is a man of NO principles? That he will sell out anyone if he feels it will put him into the White House, because it's not about you, it's not about principle: it's about him and his personal ambitions for reasons of deep personal needs and insecurities. He is not the courageous, unflinching leader of a movement. He is just a deeply defective human being who needs attention, who craves validation, who wants to be President for no other reason than that he wants to be President, the exact same reason Bill and Hillary Clinton have wanted to be President. It's never about us. It's always about them. Wake up.
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The same can, of course, be said about John McCain, who didn't make admiral, the way his father and grandfather before him did. He has something to prove. President trumps admiral. That is all.
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So which do we go with, a personally ambitious black man who has no chance in hell of being elected, and shouldn't be elected because he has no integrity? Or a nice old white guy who will work across party lines to achieve something moderately good but not rock the boat too badly? A man who has 3 years' experience at the level of the national Government? Or a man who has 26 years of national experience?
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Until the Vice Presidential candidates are chosen, I cannot know whether I will vote for McCain or just for Congress. In my district and my very-blue state, New Jersey, I could just stay home, since there is no chance of my Democratic Congressman (Donald Payne) being defeated, and almost no chance of our Democratic Senator (Frank Lautenberg) being defeated. I cannot under any circumstance vote for a man so faithless and disloyal to his followers as Barack Obama.
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John McCain is a candidate. He doesn't pretend to be a movement. So unless he chooses a Veep — who could very well succeed to the Presidency, given McCain's age — who is utterly and completely unacceptable to me, this Democrat will be voting McCain on (my brother's birthday,) November 4, 2008. Because McCain is NOT Bush, and everybody knows it.
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* I double-checked the Internet for the United States' area, and found a page that plainly asks, "What is the area of the US in square miles?" and then answers in square KILOMETERS. No square-mile figure is given in answer to the question "What is the area of the US in square miles?" I have another question for WikiAnswers: "What the f(asterisk) is wrong with you?"
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(The current U.S. military death toll in Iraq, according to the website "Iraq Coalition Casualties", is 4,113 — for Israel.)



- posted by L. Craig Schoonmaker @ 10:35 AM