- Jun 16, 2009
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- Jun 16, 2009
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We now have the liberal party taking the labor party to the supreme court for defamation over an advertisement about bailleu!
- Apr 2, 2009
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I have put this where it was meant to go. Excuse me if you have already read this in the "Why capitalism screws us" thread.
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 "infiltrate" 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!
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 "infiltrate" 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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Cobblestones said:
Nope, we've discussed this before. In cases like this we can't separate the one from the other, however much it might make one feel uncomfortable.
This, however, is the actual state of affairs within a significant membership at the upper echelons of the US government and its military establishment.
Truly shocking and positively alarming. Namely that some among the country's leadership class actually assume that their political and military actions are being guided by a Higher Power, that one's means are justified by a sacred mission. Naturally as a privileged select, who, in this way, have directly garnished the support of divinity.
I can only simply drop my arms in earnest disbelief, being that we are in the year 2010 of the common era, and not in the Middle Ages. And yet, I deceive myself.
Beyond this I'm just speechless.
- May 13, 2009
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rhubroma said:
Is that really news? I've always been under the impression that a lot of the GWB middle east policies were guided by some weird belief of bringing along the rapture. It was actually a pretty big point among religious conservatives and it wasn't really kept a secret.
Yes, I agree politics and religion get mixed up sometimes (unfortunately), but some of the posts here were entirely focused on religion.
- Nov 2, 2009
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Cobblestones said:
It might not be news, but perhaps it can't be said often enough. It seems to me, at least, that not enough people notice it or care about it. People will jump up and down about Islam influencing policy in Iran, but not see that the US has exactly the same kind of thing going on, but with a different religion.
- Nov 2, 2009
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Spare Tyre said:You love a bit of drama, don't you ACF?
You do realise you're talking to the Official Breaker of the Contador Story in Australia?
- Jun 14, 2010
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Cobblestones said:
I disagree that W's foreign policy was guided by a belief of bringing along the rapture.
While i hope some posters (should be singular really) will be able to go beyond name calling, accusations of lying and comparisons to the kkk, i dont have high hopes where thats concerned.
Anyway here is my argument.
W's church, The United Methodist church, strongly opposed W's wars. THat i would say is a big point. Unless W then had these delusions all on his own, which would be, even by his standards a bit far fetched. Anyway historically people who have these delusions go on to form their own religions, especially if in power.
The televangelists and Rush Limbaugh types supported the wars, but solely because it was Republican policy, and didnt know much about it at all. In 1991 after listening to Charlton Heston give a speech in favour of attacking Iraq, the real Hitch asked Mr Heston to list the countries who have a border with Iraq. Needless to say, he failed. The creationists are the people the world laughs at, when they say that Americans cant point out their own country on a map. The idea that these guys would have a say in fp is a bit far fetched for me. There are just too many real brains there. Lobbying against stem cell, abortion etc, yes. Funding candidates yes. But running fp. I dont see it.
The idea that religious nuts in America wanted to attack the Middle East as a form of summoning Jesus, came, to me at least, in Richard Dawkins 2006 programme, "the root of all evil", in which one part looked at creationists in America. He says that high profile fraudsters, i mean pastors with phone lines to the president held this belief, but these guys, once again, have no real influence on fp. And if theres anyone who is good at taking the extreme as the norm with religion, its Richard Dawkins, who suggested creationism is rife in England as well.
When i think of the people who planned the wars in iraq and Afghanistan, i cant think of any particularly religious types beside Bush. Colin Powel. Condi. General Ordinero. General Petreus. General Sanchez. Behind all these people are vast organisations with top brains. Not idiots who think that evolution is a "liberal creation myth". These guys supported, presented the case for and run the wars.
Bush up until 9 11 showed no real signs that he was going to engage in foreign intervention, certainatly not Invasion of another country. In fact precisely the opposite. In the 2000 election he run strongly against the idea of foreign intervention, critiscising Clinton for Somalia and Bosnia. The idea of invading Iraq was hatched up in the first place in the 1998 Iraq liberation act passed by Clinton not Bush and voted for by 99 senators.
I cant really see many arguments for the idea that any middle east policy was remotely influence by concepts of bringing about the rapture, besides Bushes own allegiance to the religious right and the fact that Nutty pastors supported him. Both are imo weak arguments, when taking account just what the accusations is.
I do understand though that you simply said that you were "under the impression", and taking into account Bushes religion, i can see where you are coming from. But personally i think a lot of Bushes religious crap "God saved me from alcochol" or " Jesus is my favourite philosopher" was to get elected. The religious right was his base, and looking at his elections -South Carolina primary 2000, Tenesee Florida election 2000, and big big time Ohio 2004, he won by getting out the religious vote in droves to compensate for all the centrists who turned away.
THere it is.
As for other examples where foreign policy is run by religion, the Danish cartoon thing, where arab countries foreign ministers, were telling the Danish Prime Minister he should change his own constitution. Or demands from ****stan that the great Salman Rushdie should not be knighted.
Everything Iran does (if you consider trying to get a nuke part of the state religion, which if it isnt yet, soon will be)
- Nov 2, 2009
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Re US foreign policy: Didn't the neocons pick up on the Wolfowitz Doctrine, work it up a bit and turn it into official GWB government policy? (When I read the Wolfowitz Doctrine I think it is no wonder that people want to do America harm.)
I think it was a campaign manager of G H W Bush who discovered that if you target Christians as a voting bloc by appealing to their moral conservatism and professing similar beliefs you can turn it into a handy advantage come election time. (But perhaps I'm wrong and it was someone even earlier. Regardless, it arose from a presidential campaign strategy.)
Re the influence of Christianity on American politics - I wish separation of church and state would come back into fashion. There are exceptionally good reasons for it.
I think it was a campaign manager of G H W Bush who discovered that if you target Christians as a voting bloc by appealing to their moral conservatism and professing similar beliefs you can turn it into a handy advantage come election time. (But perhaps I'm wrong and it was someone even earlier. Regardless, it arose from a presidential campaign strategy.)
Re the influence of Christianity on American politics - I wish separation of church and state would come back into fashion. There are exceptionally good reasons for it.
This crusade, this war on terrorism is going to take a while.
-- George W Bush
Perhaps Bush wouldn't pursue wars in the middle east as a prelude to the 2nd coming but Sarah Palin would and Bush's religious base would. The volume of their support for anything war like or crusade like would overwhelm his motives, but luckily his time ran out. Bush's motives are his father's...The "new world order" which pits islamic extremism against Soviet leaning interests in central Asia all the way to Bosnia..The Neocon objection to Clinton's intervention in Bosnia and Kosovo was not out of any concern for serbian aggression towards muslims.
-- George W Bush
Perhaps Bush wouldn't pursue wars in the middle east as a prelude to the 2nd coming but Sarah Palin would and Bush's religious base would. The volume of their support for anything war like or crusade like would overwhelm his motives, but luckily his time ran out. Bush's motives are his father's...The "new world order" which pits islamic extremism against Soviet leaning interests in central Asia all the way to Bosnia..The Neocon objection to Clinton's intervention in Bosnia and Kosovo was not out of any concern for serbian aggression towards muslims.
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Spare Tyre said:
1 Paul Wolfowitz is hardly someone who wants to bring on the rapture by foreign policy.
2 What do you mean by "do america harm"?
3 The first ammendment of the US constitution guarantees seperation from state. This is more than the countries where you and i live, seeing as our head of state is also the head of a church. The problems with founding a church on the principles of Henry the 8th and all that.
Though in reality, the US does have religious bigotry in government. When i say this i have in mind GWHB who said that atheists are not welcome in america (though thanks to the constitution, he can do nothing about it). In my eyes, one big problem is that churches still get money from the government
- May 13, 2009
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Hitch, you're focusing on the Iraq war which is pretty irrelevant in this context. This whole rapture thing is mostly about Israel and Jerusalem in particular.
""""The very first act of the new Bush administration was to have a Protestant Evangelist minister officially dedicate the inauguration to Jesus Christ, whom he declared to be 'our savior.' Invoking 'the Father, the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ' and 'the Holy Spirit,' Billy Graham's son, the man selected by President George W Bush to bless his presidency, excluded the tens of millions of Americans who are Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Shintoists, Unitarians, agnostics, and atheists from his blessing by his particularistic and parochial language.
"The plain message conveyed by the new administration is that George W Bush's America is a Christian nation and that non-Christians are welcome into the tent so long as they agree to accept their status as a tolerated minority rather than as fully equal citizens. In effect, Bush is saying: 'This is our home, and in our home we pray to Jesus as our savior. If you want to be a guest in our home, you must accept the way we pray.'"
-- Alan M Dershowitz, in "Bush Starts Off by Defying the the Constitution," Los Angeles Times, January 24, 2001""
"The plain message conveyed by the new administration is that George W Bush's America is a Christian nation and that non-Christians are welcome into the tent so long as they agree to accept their status as a tolerated minority rather than as fully equal citizens. In effect, Bush is saying: 'This is our home, and in our home we pray to Jesus as our savior. If you want to be a guest in our home, you must accept the way we pray.'"
-- Alan M Dershowitz, in "Bush Starts Off by Defying the the Constitution," Los Angeles Times, January 24, 2001""
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It could be said that Bush's placement of Wolfowitz, Feith, Kristol, was to be as incendiary as possible towards a complete policy breakdown in the middle east.. I'm sure Rev Hagee would advocate their worst ideas to Bush as being biblical providence.
Bush still needed that "new pearl harbor" though.
Bush still needed that "new pearl harbor" though.
simo1733 said:
rapture ready dot com is one of the funniest sites on the internet...You can get banned from there in minutes for talking about their cokehead savior george bush.
Skandar Akbar
BANNED
- Nov 20, 2010
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bush not president anymore
The good thing is that Bush is no longer the president of the United States. It is better now and the relationship that the Israel had is different now.
The good thing is that Bush is no longer the president of the United States. It is better now and the relationship that the Israel had is different now.
- Nov 2, 2009
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