More Religion

I'm delighted bloggers are pushing back on the onslaught of fundamentalists and Glenn Beck types against the Founding Fathers. Harvey Wasserman posts on www.dailykos.com this morning "The Founders were not Fundamentalists". Actually, for the record, 99.9% of Christians globally are not fundamentalists. But Harvey adds to the debate, reminding us we should embrace our history without blinkers. Wasserman's own history of the United States is www.harveywasserman.com ,which also includes the number of pot-smoking founders.

He reminds us that Ethan Allen, the guerrilla leader of the Green Mountain Boys, was a militant atheist as were many of the farmers and artisans who supported the Revolution. So, Boycott Ethan Allen Furniture. Harvey's a little too tame on Thomas Paine, where he says he never mentioned religion. Paine, Glenn Beck's first hero when he appeared on Fox News, was a non-believer and a proto-socialist. The best part of Wasserman's post is his embrace of Benjamin Franklin and his amorous affairs.

But he adds some critical items to the whole debate. Thomas Jefferson, the hero of David Barton's Christian revisionism, wrote his own gospel, editing out all references of the miraculous to Jesus and portrayed Jesus as an activist and moral leader and a mortal. Founding fathers--John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe and John Quincy Adams--were all freethinkers.

George Washington became an Anglican as was required to join the British Army at the time. He rarely went to church, sometimes to the Presbyterian Church one block away from my house, and refused last rites. As we know from recent films, George Washington was a Mason. He also opined that religion should be regulated so that it would have no influence on politics.

In a 1796 treaty he signed, Washington wrote ,"the government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion."

To assure early American Jews, George Washington in a letter to the Jews in Truro, Mass, he wrote, the "Government of the United States , which gives bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistances, requires only that they live under its protection,should demean themselves as good citizens."

For those of us concerned about the past Administration's embrace of torture, it should be remembered that it was George Washington with his Revolutionary Army, who established the historical prohibitions of our military against using torture.

Since yesterday was Abraham Lincoln's Birthday, we might remind everyone that Lincoln was also notorious for his anti-religious sentiments and even sacriligious remarks. As Fred Kaplan noted in his book on Lincoln's reading, he learned his rhetoric by reading the Bible and Shakespeare and that his use of language with biblical allusions did not reflect his religious views.

Or Ronald Reagan, who once told conservative Christians, "you can't be for me, but I'm for you", actually didn't go to Church and was excused by his supporters because he claimed,"it was too much bother for the rest of the congregation."

When we see these assaults by fundamentalists on American history, we should remember that this is nothing new but dates back to the 1930s. With the country mired in the Great Depression, most denominations of Christians embraced a social gospel, stressing assistance to the poor and the Americans marginalized from our society. Within some of these denominations were factions who felt there was a Christian basis for capitalism and that Christian embrace of science and sociology eroded the message of salvation. Former Christian right leader Frank Schaeffer's father was among those who went the fundamentalist way. My grandfather took the directly opposite direction becoming an advocate of the social gospel, even being socialist. This faultline in protestantism led to the the Christian Nationalist Movement and the attempts to revise American history as a saga of a Christian country. Even though this has morphed in the last few decades into a more radical right agenda, it was in the Depression that the struggle began in earnest.

When you see modern fundamentalist embracing the notion of a white Jesus, the picture seen on many churches throughout the country, and arguing a biblical basis for laissez-faire capitalism, you only have to go back to the 1920s to locate where this is coming from. A blogger recently wrote from Pennsylvania that churches there actually gave seminars on the Christian basis for laissez-faire capitalism, arguing that both Sweden and Canada are "failed states" and that the old Confederacy was a model state. I wonder whether the AMZ Baptist Church would agree. But the Christian argument for slavery lasted well-beyond Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation and it seems to persist.

Fundamentalist Christians share with Islamists the same attitude toward sacred texts. Historically, the Church fathers always argued that the interpretation of the Bible must be tempered by tradition. The Bible was to be interpreted but not literally. In the Muslim faith, the same standards apply; the Quran must be interpreted along other sacred texts to understand its real meaning. The Reformation led to the availability of the Bible for all worshippers with the intent that Catholic priests could not prevent the believer from reading God's Word. But reformation theologians never argued for the literal interpretation of the Bible like American fundamentalists do. In fact, it is manifestly absurd. Sometime check out fundamentalist preachers on television as they use Concordances and other materials to explain a biblical passage. They don't even preach a literal Bible.

Not all fundamentalist Christians are dangerous. That right goes in my mind to what Andrew Sullivan calls "Christianist" for their worship of the apocalypse. This strain of Christian worships the Book of Revelations, not the Gospel. These are the Left Behind Christians, who celebrate the coming end days and the notion of Rapture. Unfortunately for us, there are about 15 million such believers in the United States. This mindset is behind Rev. Hagee's Christians for Israel, which supports the state of Israel for the purpose of provoking a global holocaust, which will lead to Christians being raised in rapture, while Jews and non-believers are cannon fodder for the judgement of Jesus Christ. This is the group supported by Senator Joe Lieberman and which backed John McCain for President. The most interesting twist to these end-timers is Sarah Palin, whose own minister said the Rapture would occur in Wasilla, Alaska.

The "Christianist" dimension here is that the end-timers aim to "infiltrate" the political structures in the United States to influence policy so as to activate the end-time scenario. They hold the mirror religious view of the Iranian President. The other aspect is their profound anti-Americanism. These American fundamentalists despise American society in all its manifestations. Edited out of Republican narratives is the denunciations of our society by Pat Robertson and the late Jerry Falwell whenever they applauded 9/11 or Hurrcane Katrina as God's judgment on us. It is also for that reason they support the creation of parallel institutions, home-schooling, anti-science and revisionist history. If you follow the Prop 8 trial like I do, they even want to create a Christianist legal system, which would regulate personal behavior and lifestyles. One of the more shocking displays of Christianist thinking has been the fundamentalist opposition to Health Care Reform. But this is rooted in a firm belief that our government is fundamentally corrupt and non-Christian. And , horrors of horrors, secular.

Fired Up. Ready To Go

As we head to the dog days of summer, at least one public official seems to enjoy his job--President Barack Obama. Missing for the first six m0nths has been some of the heat of his campaign. Yesterday in New Jersey, at a campaign rally for Governor Jon Corzine President Obama was in total campaign mode with some of the fire we've been missing lately. I wish he would give one of these speeches per week. Later he addressed the centennial of the NAACP and delivered a masterful speech on racism, prejudice and the enduring problems of inequality in the United States. The MSM basically covered the speech as calling for a new mindset for blacks--which it did--but he also talked at length at the "structural inequalities" within American society--something conveniently left out of the press coverage.

From there we went straight to Pat Buchanan appearing on the Rachel Maddow Show remindingeveryone that white males wrote the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and built everything ( with the help of slave labor) died at Gettysburg (a cause Pat would reject today), died on the beaches of Normandy and naturally deserve to have been 108 of the last 112 SupremeCourt Judges. Pat attacked Sotomayor as an affirmative action nominee. He also asserted that everyone graduates from Ivy league school these days cum laude--he didn't mention her graduating summa cum laude--which might strain the affirmative action theory. She also was her high school's valedictorian.But no matter--she hasn't demonstrated the type of intellect of Anthony Scalia or a Bob Bork. Instead of my idea of an Indian justice, let's finally put Laurence Tribe on the Court the next time to assuage the white males and see whether the Republicans will ooh and aah about his brilliance.

Pat went off on reverse discrimination faced by white males. But he didn't say that the white male problem is one of unemployment and the transfer of jobs abroad as facilitated by the white guys Bush and Cheney.

For the past week, we have been treated to the strange kibuki world of the hearings on confirming Judge Sotomayor by the Senate. Again, the Senate didn't disappoint in the clueless department. The Republican assault on the Judge was incomprehensible from a political point of view. Republican favorable ratings among Hispanics plunged to 7%. The cretinist level of questioning ranged from Sen. Coburn's imitation of Ricky Ricardo ( a Cuban, not Puerto Rican) to Sessions' whining about the "wise Latina". Some blogger remarked that the Republicans treated Judge Sotomayor as if she were a maid asking for a raise. The best blogging for the whole proceeding was Andrew Pincus over at www.talkingpointsmemo.com who actually tried to explain those rare moments when actual legal matters were discussed.

The Republicans tried out all their talking points from her alleged racism, her membership on a Puerto Rican civil rights group, to ruling against a white firefighter. In my mind, they only scored at the end when Sessions commented that she couldn't afford to be a Supreme Court judge--which might literally be true. He would know because he's filthy rich like most of the Senate. The process itself has been so degraded that a friend of Judge Sotomayor lamented that we didn't see the vibrant and intellectually engaging personality she knows. After the Bork debacle, the judges appearing for nomination have all been anodyne in their answers causing the head of the University of Virginia Law School to say we have lost a wonderful teaching moment about our Constitution and the art of law. In the end, Judge Sotomayor will be confirmed with 70+ votes.

Which raises the issue of why the Republican Party allowed Southerners to lead the charge against her and what strategy they had in alienating the growing Hispanic population. In a fight they knew they would not win, they should have backed off in my opinion. But then again, I've felt their total resistance to anything suggested by President Obama is suicidal. Pat Buchanan, the first culture warrior, has been espousing a return to the Nixon strategy of fueling white resentment against both minorities and those elites who graduate cum laude from Ivy League colleges. Pat's not alone. The American Spectator is predicting a "political earthquake" in the 2010 elections as a response to the Obama Administration. I'm afraid it's still true that you have to beat something with something. Republicans are counting on low turnouts of minorities in off-year elections so they can ramp up the white turnout for Republicans. Maybe that will succeed but they came off as assholes during the Sotomayor hearings.

My favorite moment was the exchange between Orrin Hatch and Sotomayor over her ruling in a case that involved nunchuks. Clearly Hatch had been prepped this was a staright Second Amenment case involving something to do with gun rights when it was nothing of the sort. Sotomayor at least could go "street" by explaining what nunchuks could do.

Another great moment was the discussion of our "god-given right of self-defense", terminology right out of the NRA presented by Senator Coburn. Obama's friendship with the reactionary Senator still amazes me.

This has also been the week when all of the Republican adulterers have been linked to the C Street refuge of the Family, a secretive Christianist cult where boarders share confidences that get them off the hook because they are "elected by God", a theme we will be seeing more in the next few years. Senator Ensign lodged there and Gov Sanford was given spiritual advice there. Senator Coburn, who knew of both men's infidelities, claims patient doctor confidentiality as well as some implied oath of silence since he is an ordained deacon--not minister--of his church. Yesterday, another former Republican Congressman from Mississippi was also exposed as having an affair, who lived there. The big winner of this was Jeff Sharlet, author of The Family, a book detailing the role of the Family in American politics and explaining the present state of fundamentalism and politics in the country. He lucked out because the affairs hit as his book was released in paperback.

I still am checking into www.themudflats.net --great Eagle shot the other day. They are reporting that the feds are in Alaska checking out the state's woeful medical situation. The week has seen Chief Evangelist Sarah Palin drifting out of the limelight despite tweeting about Bears. Apparently, the Alaska legislature is being called back into emergency session to deal with the succession, not secession issue and to overturn the Palin's veto on the stimulus funds.

Finally, kudos to Bob Costasfor the best interview with President Obama--twenty minutes solely on baseball. Obama admitted his first favorites were the old Oakland A's with Vida Blue and Reggie Jackson. A favorite team of mine. Remember when Charles Finley tried to get Vida to change his name to "True Blue.