Thinking Outside The Box: Do We Dare Question NeoConservatives and Christofascists?

Or Reconstructionists? Or Televangelists? Or Preachers? Or...POLITICIANS?

"Everything's relative" is the phrase most people use to get out of an argument. However, that phrase might get you INTO a bigger argument. Most "relativists" are liberal and want to be able to see things through a different perspective. It doesn't make a difference if the conclusion is the same, they just want to have the freedom to "see" differently. They need to question and analyze. They also need to see the most inclusive picture: all possibilities, positions, status, renderings. They feel comfortable in making their decisions after having fully investigated something - and asked all the questions they can. Questions (sometimes along with reasonable answers) make a thing real. A lack of questions makes something un-real.

Viewing reality is sometimes like looking at an M.C. Escher painting: there are reasonable, concrete things going in different directions. At first, it may be puzzling, but isn't it wonderful to know that we can see different things in one painting?



Christofascists of the world want not only to change the way we see things, but how we should (or, more importantly, IF we should) think about them. Yes, it's the old Faith vs. Reason conflict, but neoconservatives say that NOT thinking is good for the soul. As one evangelical said in reviewing the Creation Museum in Kentucky: "The Creation Museum goes far beyond mere science. It doesn’t elevate man’s intellect by using science to “prove” Scripture. Instead, God’s Word is placed first and human reason is last. " (emphasis my own). At the entrance of the museum there is a command:

Don't Think - Believe!

Telling us WHAT to think is terrible enough - telling us NOT to think is unconscionable.

(To see what the Creation Museum is doing to keep 'em coming, just look at their new MUSICAL!)

Of course, there's spin. Is it free of conservative restraints? Not exactly. It's still telling you what to think. That even includes a kind of future historical revisionism , (I know that sounds silly and slightly oxymoronic, but YOU coin a phrase for the next paragraph.) Let's look at how Secretary of State Condaleeza Rice sees the preemptive strike on Iraq in an article she penned:

(From the Washington Independent)

Rice’s discussion of Iraq comes late in the article. She defends the invasion, and stretches the truth to do so. "The Iraq Survey Group showed [that] Saddam was ready and willing to reconstitute his weapons of mass destruction programs as soon as international pressure had dissipated," Rice writes. In fact, the Iraq Survey Group also showed that Iraq’s WMD programs were in a pitiful state of disrepair, meaning that Rice is neglecting the actual question of what Saddam Hussein could have done with the chimerical one of what he wanted to do. Ultimately, Rice punts on the Iraq war: "This story is still being written, and will be for many years to come." (Interestingly, the word "Afghanistan" appears only three times.)

In other words, George is still hunting for a legacy and he's hoping that "history" won't judge him so harshly. For what he's done to the American image, that's quite a dream!

The World's Oldest Choir Boy Attacks Same-Sex Marriage

I just read this two minutes ago. I subscribe to Tony Perkins' daily email from the Family Research Council (Hey, I get my laughs wherever I can!)

Here Come The Grooms

When the clock chimes 5:01 p.m. (PST), the California ruling that threatens to undo thousands of years of natural marriage will officially take effect, triggering five months of social chaos that could wreak havoc on every state in America.

Also:

Thanks to the courage of County Clerks Ann Barnett and Candace Grubbs, the local offices will stop performing wedding ceremonies altogether. To comply with the law, Kern and Butte Counties will still issue marriage licenses, but they refuse to subject their staff to the Supreme Court's blatant disregard for traditional morality and individual religious rights.

Too many nips, tucks facials and kitchen cleanser

In closing:

Meanwhile, FRC will continue to bring its educational message to the state, where our ads in Sacramento and Orange County are reminding voters what the California court has now done to injure families and undermine the well being of children.
Of course, to Tony Perkins, we're all just rabid child molesters trying to greedily demand rights we don't have the right to expect. But this particular post by the often ungrammatical and poorly phrased Perkins is hysterical:

"...thousands of years of natural marriage." Huh? It was only until very recently that women were thought of as human beings. Those thousands of years include all the men coveting dowries and treating wives as property. What about Solomon's 300 wives and 400 concubines? What about the biblically-sanctioned practice of bedding your slave if your wife hasn't born a son? What's so natural about boiling your wife in her bath because she lied to you? (Constantine the Great)

"...social chaos". Heterosexual men and women have done a good job at "social chaos" and don't need any help from homosexuals. If memory serves me correctly, there is a high rate of divorce amongst fundamentalists and "values voters" like Tony.

"...blatant disregard for traditional morality and individual religious rights." That means that Perkins wouldn't attend a Muslim wedding if you paid him. "Traditional morality" is relative - specifically because of "individual religious rights." Substitute "tradition" and "individual" with "Christian" and you'll see what Perkins is really saying.

"...undermine the well being of children." In many cases, religion has already done a good job of that too: the FLDS children were not tested for fumarase deficiency (which causes encephalopathy, severe mental retardation, unusual facial features, brain malformation, and epileptic seizures). Perkins really means that same-sex marriage might make kids more tolerant - something that is totally toxic to fundamentalists everywhere.

Perkins is always homophobic, but this post shows that rants can unhinge reason.

And that, of course, is funny.

Thousands of years of natural marriage

Keeper Of The Plame

And it never ends...

(From The Washington Independent):

For no particular reason, Attorney General Michael Mukasey has for months held on to documents relating to the Valerie Plame leak investigation. These include transcribed interviews special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald had with President George W. Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney. Today Henry A. Waxman, chair of the House oversight committee, issued a subpoena for their release. In a letter to Mukasey last week, Waxman pointed out that he requested these documents back in December, and the AG has neither provided them nor provided an explanation for why they shouldn't be released. The saga of Valerie Plame, the covert CIA agent whose identity was leaked in 2003, has come back to life since Scott McClellan released his tell-all, What Happened. McClellan wrote that the "president and vice president directed me to go out there and exonerate Scooter Libby." McClellan will testify before the House Judiciary Committee Friday about the Plame leak.

Way to go TWI. Just how much will this be covered in the mainstream media? It's been classified as "old news, therefore worthless." Old, because the present administration has looked like this from the beginning.

Worthless, let's, hope not.

The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder

It's strange: I used to live in the world of books (even being a book publicist on Talk America Radio), but I've never really tauted a book like this on this site.

I will admit: I haven't read it yet. It came out three weeks ago, but I had no way of getting an advance copy, so I'll have to pay full price (there are really no "used" copies yet). What I've read of the book, however, is shocking. No, it doesn't impart Bush's real policies in any way we haven't heard before, but Bugliosi points out how naive the American public was about Iraq. O.K., I'll say it: how stupid Americans were about Iraq.

The author points out how the act of pre-emptive war was carried out with intent. This was, in fact, premeditated murder. Bush was the instigator and not just some duped accomplice. Bush brazenly lied to the American public about WMDs and the Iraq-9/11 connection. The author is a very successful criminal prosecutor. And since he lays out all the evidence in the way a prosecutor would, this book should be read by everyone, even those who constitute the choir.

I will read it.

Prayer In Schools: Which Children Will Be Left Behind?

...and mocked... and bullied

... and scourged!

The Religious Right will be at it again today. It's the 45th anniversary of the Supreme Court's decision concerning prayer in public schools.

"Aw, come on! Let the RR have this one. It's totally harmless!"

No, it isn't. Allowing prayer in school is a short step from demanding prayer. And forget the bit about "let's have a moment of silence for prayer." Do you actually think that Fundamentalist teachers are going to say that? Be real! They will want prayers to be said their way or not at all. And woe betide any kid who doesn't say the prayer exactly as that teacher wants. Will the teacher protect the same kid from bullies and taunting in the schoolyard? Will the teacher fight the urge to send the kid to "counseling?"
No, to both questions.

Here's an idea to promote absolute tolerance: if the teacher/school encourages kids to pray in school, that school must offer a compulsory class in comparative theology (world religions). If you make them pray, we'll make you teach religious tolerance.

Fair enough?

Oh, I'll be called anti-Christian for sure. But isn't religious intolerance anti-Christian?

Today I saw a great platitude:

Don't Pray In My School
and
I Won't Think In Your Church