This should have gone in the general politics thread, but since that one's not up I'm constrained to put it here.
What would Republican Jesus Do? (Large Poster) Sorry but I'm not capable of posting this outrageous image here, but here's the link:
http://www.cafepress.com/strk3/1833274
This image accompanied an article in today's
la Repubblica newspaper about how Christian fundamentalism among certain American evangelical protestant religions has penetrated into the very upper leadership of US politics and the military, and specifically in connection with a secret religious organization in Washington called "The Fellowship". Now I have no intention of bringing up an old argument; so please don't see this as a provocation TFF. Seriously. I merely desire to bring this to the attention of those on this forum, in regards to the serious matter I had brought up about the role religion plays in US politics and the military. Other than an "atheists agenda," again pardon me if anyone should feel provoked. The article by Italian journalist and New York correspondent for
la Repubblica, Frederico Rampini, undeniably demonstrates how religion, when used inappropriately (and unfortunately this is not an isolated historical case), causes a public disaster and represents a type of obscurantism that the Enlightenment philosophies, which were ironically at the basis of the US democracy, fought bitterly to extirpate from human civilization through reason.
There is a photo in the article of the founder of The Fellowship in the 30's, Abraham Vereide, with republican president Eisenhower in 1953. After the war Vereide, helped by TV-evangelist Billy Graham, was able to create the "National Prayer Breakfast" association among whose adherents was Henry Ford, but also republican presidents Gerald Ford (who, according to the New York Times, once held such a morning prayer session at the White House to decide upon forgiving Nixon), Ronald Regan and George W. Bush. The article talks about The Fellowship, which has its office headquarters on 133 C Street in Washington, in terms of having a strong right-wing imprint, though it includes both republicans and democrats (its morning prayer sessions have even been frequented by Hillary Clinton for example). The proselitation of the group has permeated the US armed forces and has heavily influenced David Petraeus, commanding chief of the military in Afghanistan. The article references a book by New York Times reporter, Jeff Sharlet, the only "infiltrator" of the sect called
C Street (Little Brown and Company). The details brought to light in Sharlet's investigation are stupifying, surpassing the most paranoid of "conspiracy theories."
The New York times reporter was able to penetrate into a fundamentalist Christian community called Ivanwald in the Washington suburbs. Participating in their "spiritual exercises," Sharlet dicovers that behind the scenes of Ivanwald is another organization the adepts of which call "The Family". Ivanwald is merely one of many satellite centers that serve to select new recruits to be inserted into the "most secret structure of US conservative politics." Only the best, channeled through a political career, get to enter the headquarters on C Street. The Fellowship "helps them better understand the message of Christ, so that they can apply it to their work." At the hostel owned by the group reside members during their sessions in Congress and the Senate, like the republican senators Tom Coburn and Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma.
Sharlet states that these guys believe they are on a "divine mission" and go into competition with themselves to see who can surpass the others in the extreme right-wing US political spectrum. Coburn proposed the death penalty for medics who practice abortion. Inhofe defended the torturers of the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. At the C Street headquarters the group members hold seminars to prepare legislation in the energy field, Congressional voting, on foreign policy and intends to play a decisive role in the "conflict of civilizations" and thus the West's struggle against Islam. The most reactionary and conservative Supreme Court judge, Clarence Thomas, is also a Fellowship member (the full name of which is:
Jesus Over You Christian Fellowship). Yet, so too, is the democratic deputy of Michigan, Bart Stupak, famous for having kept Congress a hostage to Barack Obama's health care reform, unless it included the amendment that prohibited the federal government's financing of hospitals that practice abortion.
The group has strong affiliations with the Tea Party and behaves like a secret society a là Opus Dei (without recognizing any central religious authority) and the Masonic Temples. In the club is also the republican senator from South Carolina, Jime De Mint, who was quoted as stating that "the Bible has taught us that we can't both serve God and the State." There is also a twin sister organization in the very US army called "Officers' Christian Fellowship," the goal of which according to Lieutenant colonel D!ck Kail is to "conquer for Jesus Christ a place inside the armed forces." The military organization has a handbook manual called "Under Orders: A Spiritual Handbook for Military Personnel." Back in 1975 Playboy had published an article about The Fellowship, regarding the organization as a shadow-bank that arrogated loans to high-up US government members and within the military to finance the global arms trade. The article stated that The Fellowship had also flourished behind certain "foreign brothers" like the dictator Suharto in Indonesia, Ferdinando Marcos in the Philippines and the anti-gay laws of Uganda. Yet nobody till now has put the pieces of the mosaic together as Sharlet's investigative work has.
Here are some of the other precepts of the Fellowship:
In regards to the so called Kingdom: "Jesus has taught us that we have to put the New Kingdom above even our own mother and brother. And it is what Hitler, Lenin and Mao taught the youth." Thus Fellowship leader Doug Coe cites these men as role models (how bizarre!).
In regards to relationships: "We work not to wake-up the masses, but through private business, political and military relationships, with the kings and leaders of this world."
In regards to morals: "Even Kind David was a sinner, though he was also an elected one of the Lord. The will of God goes beyond all morals."
In regards to rules: "The first rule of C Street is that you never talk about C Street."
Their motto: "Jesus over you."
If this weren't entirely true it would merely be laughable. Unfortunately it is not. This religious fundamentalism within the US body politic and military is of course disgusting and abhorrent. The US army under such direction has become the world's largest international terrorist organization, "terrorist organization" underlined, with a capacity to kill and destroy that no petty Islamisists could ever even dream of, and is moreover under the aegis of the federal government. It is pure religious obscurantism and fascism at work within the US power structure. This demands to be denounced vehemently in the name of reason and enlightenment. This is a scary and slippery slope that America has found itself on. Such behavior is no better, indeed simply the mirror image of, the appalling Islamic fundamentalist political regimes and terrorist networks that represent the enemies of so called Western freedom and democracy in the so called "conflict of civilizations."
This along with the Nation's neoliberal capitalist regime has made the American democracy the promoters of selfish egoism, incivility and baseness in the fullest. I have lost my belief in miracles but people of America wake up!
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