Pulpits over America

Religious dreams for a secular land

© Bryan Zepp Jamieson
http://www.zeppscommentaries.com/Religious/pulpits.htm
3/21/08

I watched Barack Obama’s speech about his relationship with his pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, and the much broader and more convoluted issue of race in America. It was a masterful speech, and it answered, in part, the deep nagging question I had: “Does this man have what it takes to face the right?”

He does. He has.

That doesn’t mean he defeated the issue. The right is going to keep on chewing it, and you’ll see the inflammatory quotes from Wright on every website and blog that caters to the right, and on You Tube videos, and Rush and Tucker and Sean and Ann will rant about it daily for the next seven and a half months.

Obama did a masterful job, but he hasn’t won, and here’s why. The media.

It isn’t just the right wing media. It’s “mainstream” outlets like CNN and the major networks, and AP and Reuters, the outfits that control what a vast majority of Americans see and hear and think.

They are ignoring the speech as much as they can, and dwelling on what Wright said, and asking “why didn’t Obama walk out of his church?” and even claiming that Obama didn’t address that very issue.

You have to remember that the same people who own the GOP also own the blow-dried whores on your television screen, the ranters on your radio, and the journalistic hacks that write most of the material that appears in your local paper. Even the ones who haven’t consciously decided that America must remain under Republican rule will shoot at the Democrats on the grounds that it panders to the most vocal of their readers and/or viewers.

That’s why, on the same day that Reuters was asking why Obama didn’t disown Wright, Wolf Blitzer was showing doctored footage of McCain’s stunt trip to Iraq, which seemed to show McCain immediately correcting a patently false claim he made that Iran was training alQaida. In fact, McCain made the same claim three times over the previous 24 hours before Joe Lieberman finally leaned over and whispered in his ear, at which point McCain backed away from the claim. Wolf, like most of the television presenters who covered McCain’s trip, was carefully not mentioning what a joke the previous such trip had been. Nor did they mention that McCain’s claim to be descended from Scottish hero/rogue Robert the Bruce was met with incredulity and outright derision by the people in Britain who track genealogies.

Instead, the mainstream media are obsessing over whether a man who had a firebrand as his pastor could be trusted to be President of the United States. Nice of them to wonder.

Where have they been for the past 30 years, I wonder? Haven’t they noticed the flocks of wild-eyed, bible-banging Jesus ranters that have been hanging off the GOP like carrion off a Christmas tree for the past generation? Have they never heard of Don Wildemon, Billy Graham, James Bakker, Francis Schaeffer, and a galaxy of other crackpots and haters who played such an instrumental role in convincing otherwise good Christians that Republicans and only Republicans were good and moral, and that Jesus was a supply sider who had nothing but contempt for the poor?

I decided to go find some juicy quotes from some right wing preachers to back up what I was saying.

Big mistake.

It was a bit like firing at mosquitoes with a shotgun. In a muskeg in Alaska in high summer. Doesn’t much matter where you aim the shotgun; you’ll hit mosquitoes.

I didn’t bother with preachers who didn’t have open ties with the GOP, and also eliminated obvious nuts like the Reverend Phelps, a crazed, hate-filled individual so poisonous that even Republicans are uneasy around him.

In a few minutes, I had twenty five pages of quotes from politically right wing preachers, and right wing politicians willing to bang the bible in order to deprive people of their rights, to choose from.

Five of them ran for President as Republicans. Two of them made it. One is on the Supreme Court. One was called “the nation’s preacher” and considered himself spiritual mentor to half a dozen presidents.

Right wingers play a different game. They like to wrap themselves up in the flag – I’m convinced that a lot of people on that side think Jesus was an American – and so they don’t overtly attack the country. Instead, they attack the courts, or the constitution, and especially, the people. Many of them believe the people should be serving the country, rather than the other way around, and some believe both should be serving God. But the anger and the contempt for American values is there, just the same.

The Huffington Post had an article written by Frank Schaeffer. It said, in part, “When Senator Obama's preacher thundered about racism and injustice Obama suffered smear-by-association. But when my late father – Religious Right leader Francis Schaeffer – denounced America and even called for the violent overthrow of the US government, he was invited to lunch with presidents Ford, Reagan and Bush, Sr.
“Every Sunday thousands of right wing white preachers (following in my father's footsteps) rail against America's sins from tens of thousands of pulpits. They tell us that America is complicit in the ‘murder of the unborn,’ has become ‘Sodom’ by coddling gays, and that our public schools are sinful places full of evolutionists and sex educators hell-bent on corrupting children. They say, as my dad often did, that we are, ‘under the judgment of God.’ They call America evil and warn of immanent destruction. By comparison Obama's minister's shouted ‘controversial’ comments were mild. All he said was that God should damn America for our racism and violence and that no one had ever used the N-word about Hillary Clinton.” – Frank Schaeffer, son of Francis. Frank used to be a strong advocate of religious right causes. As an American, he was sickened by the contempt the religious right had for the freedoms of men, and as a human, appalled by the hypocrisy.

Days after 9/11, Jerry Falwell observed that America “deserved” what it got because it tolerated gays and abortion. Former GOP presidential candidate Pat Robertson “concurred” with this assessment.

At the time, we believed six thousand people had died in the attacks. But according to Pat Robertson, who is still a major voice in the GOP, America had it coming.

Pat never did get the notion that people who disagreed with his moral stances had a say in America, too. He once wrote, “How can there be peace when drunkards, drug dealers, communists, atheists, New Age, worshipers of Satan, secular humanists, oppressive dictators, greedy moneychangers, revolutionary assassins, adulterers, and homosexuals are on top?” (Pat Robertson, in The New World Order, (1991)p.227)

Given the proclivities of right wing bible bangers, one wonders if Pat Robertson was talking about the political power of these individuals, or their sexual position relative to him.

GOP hero and anti-abortionist Randall Terry once said, “Let a wave of intolerance wash over you. I want you to let a wave of hatred wash over you. Yes, hate is good.... If a Christian voted for Clinton, he sinned against God. It's that simple.... Our goal is a Christian Nation... we have a biblical duty, we are called by God to conquer this country. We don't want equal time. We don't want Pluralism. We want theocracy. Theocracy means God rules. I've got a hot flash. God rules.”

Dan Quayle once said, “I pledge allegiance to the Christian flag, and to the Saviour, for whose Kingdom it stands, one Saviour, crucified, risen, and coming again, with life and liberty for all who believe.” No word on if the people who don’t believe what he does get any life or liberty. Probably not.

Ralph Reed, that baby-faced messenger of Christ, once said, “I want to be invisible. I do guerrilla warfare. I paint my face and travel at night. You don't know it's over until you're in a body bag. You don't know until election night.” Boy, if those aren’t good American values, then I ask you, what is? He doesn’t want God to damn America. He wants to do it himself.

John Ashcroft, while he was Attorney General of the United States, said, “We are a nation called to defend freedom – a tradition that is not a grant of any government or document, but is an endowment from God.” Nice understanding of how the Constitution works there, Johnny. It doesn’t grant rights; it acknowledges them, and if you don’t understand that, then fuck you. Here: have a calico cat.

Gary Bauer, another major GOP player and preacher, said once, “We are engaged in a social, political, and cultural war. There's a lot of talk in America about pluralism. But the bottom line is somebody's values will prevail. And the winner gets the right to teach our children what to believe.” Just another right winger who loves America but hates the United States.

“No, I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered as patriots. This is one nation under God.” That was George Bush the elder, taking what right wingers like to call a “strict constitutionalist approach” to the phrase “...and freedom for all”. Tony Scalia weighed in, saying, “Devout Christians are destined to be regarded as fools in modern society. We are fools for Christ's sake. We must pray for courage to endure the scorn of the sophisticated world.”

Hope Tony has lots of endurance. He’s going to need it.

Now, Bush’s son might be an idiot, but by gawd, he’s a RELIGIOUS idiot, so that makes it ok. He once said, “Making sure every child can read, making sure that we encourage faith-based organizations ... when it comes to helping neighbors in need, making sure that our neighborhoods are safe, making sure that the state of Texas recognizes that people from all walks of life have got a shot at the Texas dream but, most importantly, making sure that government is not the answer to people's problems.” Right, George. The government isn’t there to uphold the rights and freedoms of the people. That’s what the church is for. I’m sure Madison and Jefferson would have agreed.

“Good Christians, like slaves and soldiers, ask no questions.” – Rev Jerry Falwell. That’s fine, if you’re a Christian. I guess. But it really isn’t a very AMERICAN stance, you know? That’s maybe part of why the founders wanted separation of church and state. They didn’t want the people to be slaves or soldiers. Unless, of course, they were black, or just liked killing things.

Alan Keyes, another GOP presidential candidate, has a similarly weird view of the role of God and the Constitution. He wrote, “Rights come from God and only from God.” And I bet he thinks it was bloody rude of Madison not to mention that in his Constitution thingee.

Finally, there’s this quote from another politician intent on shaping the country into a mirror of his religious beliefs: “I believe today that my conduct is in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator.”

OK, that one was a bit of a cheat. He wasn’t a member of the GOP, and he wasn’t even an American, although he would have loved the religious right. It was Adolph Hitler.

Now: we have that out of the way. Who wants to talk about how awful Reverend Jeremiah Wright is?


Credits: Quotes came from a long-time contributor to my website, who is anonymous; the Huffington Post; Cliff Walker at PositiveAtheism.org; and Thinkprogress.com;