LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

This NYT op-ed by former Republican senator John Danforth addresses the infiltration and domination of the Republican party by Dominionist Christians. An excerpt:

St. Louis — BY a series of recent initiatives, Republicans have transformed our party into the political arm of conservative Christians. The elements of this transformation have included advocacy of a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, opposition to stem cell research involving both frozen embryos and human cells in petri dishes, and the extraordinary effort to keep Terri Schiavo hooked up to a feeding tube.

Standing alone, each of these initiatives has its advocates, within the Republican Party and beyond. But the distinct elements do not stand alone. Rather they are parts of a larger package, an agenda of positions common to conservative Christians and the dominant wing of the Republican Party.

Christian activists, eager to take credit for recent electoral successes, would not be likely to concede that Republican adoption of their political agenda is merely the natural convergence of conservative religious and political values. Correctly, they would see a causal relationship between the activism of the churches and the responsiveness of Republican politicians. In turn, pragmatic Republicans would agree that motivating Christian conservatives has contributed to their successes.

High-profile Republican efforts to prolong the life of Ms. Schiavo, including departures from Republican principles like approving Congressional involvement in private decisions and empowering a federal court to overrule a state court, can rightfully be interpreted as yielding to the pressure of religious power blocs.( Read more... )

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

I have gotten my plane tickets and reservations to the Examining the Religious Right conference in NYC at the Open Center. I hope to meet Katherine Yurica, and the Theocracy Watch folks and other interested parties.

Of course, I'll report on it for the folks here- and perhaps we can arrange a meetup for those in the NYC area while I'm there. It'll be a whirlwind trip- in Friday, out noon Sunday. My budget is too thin for other plans.

So, in for a penny, in for a pound!

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

Katherine Yurica, author of "The Yurica Report" sent me this in an email:

First, we want you to know about the conference being held in New York City on April 29th and 30th. Titled: "Examining the Real Agenda of the Religious Far Right." It is drawing a lot of media attention and people are signing up from as far away as California! If you live near NYC--don't miss this opportunity!

Co-sponsored by the New York Open Center
and CUNY Graduate Center Public Programs
(At Fifth Ave & 34th St. Manhattan)

Friday Evening, April 29, 7:30-10 pm and
Saturday, April 30, 10 am-5:30 pm

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

This Salon (day pass or subscription required) article talks about the Christian Right's interference in what should be a private affair:

"This has nothing to do with the sanctity of life"

The Rev. John Paris, professor of bioethics, says Terri Schiavo has the moral and legal right to die, and only the Christian right is keeping her alive.

***

So what do you think this case is really about?

The power of the Christian right. This case has nothing to do with the legal issues involving a feeding tube. The feeding tube issue was definitively resolved by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1990 in Cruzan vs. Director. The United States Supreme Court ruled that competent patients have the right to decline any and all unwanted treatment, and unconscious patients have the same right, depending upon the evidentiary standard established by the state. And Florida law says that Terri Schiavo has more than met the standard in this state. So there is no legal issue. ( Read more... )

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY thedemonprist)

Was randomly surfing around and found this link. ( Text of article inside )

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY hummingwolf)

Via rssworldmag: Evangelicals for government power?

The Gospel is simply not reducible to the institution of laws amenable to Christian morality. And a disproportionate emphasis on such laws tends toward a position that is inimical to Christianity. Yet the perception often remains that the way the church is to “engage culture” is primarily, if not solely, through public policy.

Beyond these theological problems lies a prudential question of the wise use of political power. In the broad area of decency standards, this third problem flows out of the coercive nature of governmental power.

While Christians maintain the influence to form policy in a certain area, the laws are likely to remain in accord with Christian morality. The danger is that once the power of such regulation of speech and free expression has been ceded to the government, it is nearly impossible to get it back. And it is almost certain that the current season of Christian political influence will eventually wane.

Today perhaps the antics of a Howard Stern will be outlawed by increased governmental regulation. But tomorrow it may well be that simply reading from Paul’s letter to the Romans will be prohibited as hate speech, indecent, or otherwise intolerant. We have already seen threats of this in other countries. In the words of Jesus, “All who draw the sword will die by the sword” (Matthew 26:52 NIV).

religionnewsblo

Evangelical Christians are God's wing of the GOP.

President Bush invites their leaders to the White House. Magazine covers feature their faces. Talk-show hosts put them on the air.

But some leading Christian thinkers are questioning the evangelicals' priorities. Will partisan politics mute the church's prophetic voice — the courage, as intellectual Edward Said put it, to speak truth to power? Are evangelicals so focused on abortion and same-sex marriage that they are forgetting Christ's injunction to care for the sick and minister to the downtrodden?

A number of authors and essayists — both liberal and conservative — now are calling on Christians to form a biblically based, big-picture vision of how America should look.

And they are finding an audience.

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

This article talks about a lot of what we discuss on this board concerning the very real 'vast right wing conspiracy' and its takeover of the US government:

VAST RIGHT-WING CONSPIRACY 1

By Peter Fredson

Recently I had occasion to review thousands of files stored from the 1990’s. The reason to look backwards was to understand the immense progress that Conservatives, both religious and political, have made in taking control of the Republican Party specifically and the United States in general

One quickly found answer was their growing familiarity with computer abilities to construct data bases, send out endless messages, seize control of media and WWW sites, and make linkages for instant communication. The hundreds of Conservative sites (perhaps thousands) is a testament to creating organization using technology. A for-instance is the recent incident when Janet Jackson showed a bit of nipple. An outraged parson had his followers send 300,000 messages nearly overnight to Michael Powell asking for relief from this horrible deed. We have many other instances when issues like gays and abortion and reelection of a president, brought instant messaging from millions of True Believers hooked up to data bases. Previous tactics of conservatives to use stealth, deceit and misinformation have now given way to raw imposition and brute display of power.

Looking at the Reagan years, we see the growing linkage of politics to religion when Ronnie made a concordat with the Vatican, and Nancy had a Court Astrologer forecast the direction this country should take. We had an influx of preachers into halls of government, when some became installed in Congress. It soon became politically correct to defer to religious pronouncements and to avoid “alienating” sensibilities of True Believers. At this time several religious organizations began their announced strategy of destroying the Separation of Church and State which made the U.S. a true democracy.

Skipping to the Clinton Administration, we see an affable intelligent well-meaning person who was also indoctrinated into Christian dogma of Arkansas flavor and made references to Biblical passages. He allowed further intrusion of Christian pretensions into the halls of government. The Christian strategists were like the fabled Camel that thrust its nose into an Arab tent and gradually forced the owner out into the night air.

But the great thrust of the merging of Christianity with government took place because Bill Clinton got sucked into sexual situations. This infuriated the sexually repressed old Republican fogies, who exerted every effort to throw the horny rascal out of office. (Partly in revenge for what happened to Tricky Dick and losing their majority in Congress.) Their horrified fascination with fallatio created panic and consternation, probably staged. Religious Conservatives began scaring the populace with stories about Satanic connection, the Road to Hell, and tales of an imaginary deity who might again unleash destruction of the earth because of his anger toward sodomites, secular humanists, and atheists. (During the 9/11 period Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell pontificated that destruction occurred because God was angry at perverts.)

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

This Salon commentary by Joe Conason hits the nail on the head:

Watching the behavior of Republican politicians during the past several days, we are learning the true meaning of "compassionate conservatism." Not the public-relations version promoted by George W. Bush and his party propaganda apparatus, but the core philosophy enunciated by the deep thinkers of the religious right.

With legislative maneuvering designed to punish and deprive the least fortunate among us -- working people at the lower end of the American economy and their children -- the Republicans don't seem to be upholding the caring Christian ideals often proclaimed by the President. They're pushing down wages, snatching away tax credits and food stamps, slashing Medicaid and children's health insurance, and removing bankruptcy protections from families that suffer medical catastrophes. But they're extending tax cuts on dividends and capital gains, and making sure that those bankruptcy laws still protect the richest deadbeats.

In short, they are stealing bread from the mouths of the poor and stuffing cake into the maws of the wealthy.( Read more... )

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

This Daily Kos article talks about the Dominionist movement and its penchant for secrecy:

"We are no longer working to preserve the status quo. We are radicals, working to overturn the present power structure in this country." Paul Weyrich

Lots of detail, and some very interesting comments too. Here's a sample, where they talk about the very secretive "Council of National Policy":

In the summer of 1981, Woody Jenkins, a former Louisiana state lawmaker who served as the group's first executive director, told Newsweek bluntly, "One day before the end of this century, the Council will be so influential that no president, regardless of party or philosophy, will be able to ignore us or our concerns or shut us out of the highest levels of government."

From the beginning, the CNP sought to merge two strains of far-right thought: the theocratic Religious Right with the low-tax, anti-government wing of the GOP. The theory was that the Religious Right would provide the grassroots activism and the muscle. The other faction would put up the money.

The CNP has always reflected this two-barreled approach. The group's first president was LaHaye, then president of Family Life Seminars in El Cajon Calif. LaHaye, a fundamentalist Baptist preacher who went on in the 1990s to launch the popular "Left Behind" series of apocalyptic potboilers, was an early anti-gay crusader and frequent basher of public education and he still is today.

* * *

Bringing together the two strains of the far right gave the CNP enormous leverage. The group, for example, could pick a candidate for public office and ply him or her with individual donations and PAC money from its well-endowed, business wing.

The goals of the CNP, then, are similarly two-pronged. Activists like Norquist, who once said he wanted to shrink the federal government to a size where it could be drowned in a bathtub, are drawn to the group for its exaltation of unfettered capitalism, hostility toward social-service spending and low (or no) tax ideology.

Dramatically scaling back the size of the federal government and abolishing the last remnants of the New Deal may be one goal of the CNP, but many of the foot soldiers of the Religious Right sign on for a different crusade: a desire to remake America in a Christian fundamentalist image.

Since 1981, CNP members have worked assiduously to pack government bodies with ultra-conservative lawmakers who agree that the nation needs a major shift to the right economically and socially. They rail against popular culture and progressive lawmakers, calling them the culprits of the nation's moral decay. Laws must be passed and enforced, the group argues, that will bring organized prayer back to the public schools, outlaw abortion, prevent gays from achieving full civil rights and fund private religious schools with tax funds.

http://www.politicalamazon.com/fcf-homeschooling.html

Very interesting article in regards to how the dominionists are explicitly using homeschooling to indoctrinate kids. (As an aside, something else interesting in the article--apparently the *exact same person* who is credited with many of the tenets of "Christian Reconstructionism" (the bits regarding taking over the government) is also the major party behind the push for dominionist parents to homeschool.)

One of the things mentioned in the article is how *secular* homeschoolers (folks whom may decide to homeschool because, for example, their kids have special needs or their school system is bad educationally) are having trouble in regards to support groups because many (if not most) of the homeschool support organisations are run by dominionists and are increasingly unfriendly to non-dominionist homeschoolers. It also talks about how secular homeschoolers are having increasing problems because they are being lumped in with the dominionists...

Another interesting aspect is that much of the info references things as far back as the 80's and the various links between dominionist groups operating today (to give you an idea of how far back the web has gone, and how it's been woven; for example, the LaHayes ("Left Behind" and a whole lot of other dominionist nonsense) were actually kicked out of Jack Kemp's presidential campaign for antisemitic remarks...)

http://www.politicalamazon.com/cr-ahmanson.html

Info on one of the major bankrollers of dominionist causes.

Includes info on the Coalition for National Policy, which (for at least the past fifteen or so years) has been the major think-tank of Religious Right policy and is in itself practically a who's who of dominionism; a separate link to info on the CNP is at http://watch.pair.com/cnp.html (a worthy successor to IFAS's lost, lamented pages on the CNP) and a list of present and past members is at http://watch.pair.com/cnpdbase.html for those interested. As an aside, the list has included not only major dominionist figures but also major politicians, some Democrats but also major planners for the GOP. (Article makes references to CNP meeting during the GOP national convention in 2004)

For those who are interested on what was on the IFAS's pages re the CNP, here's a mirror: http://www.buildingequality.us/ifas/cnp/index.html

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

The American Conservative, a flagship magazine of the far right, isn't the place that you would expect to find the following article. But its very presence is a sharp warning that even the most conservative people in the US are aware that the Dominionist-driven rot is spreading.

Hunger for Dictatorship

An excerpt:

Students of history inevitably think in terms of periods: the New Deal, McCarthyism, “the Sixties” (1964-1973), the NEP, the purge trials—all have their dates. Weimar, whose cultural excesses made effective propaganda for the Nazis, now seems like the antechamber to Nazism, though surely no Weimar figures perceived their time that way as they were living it. We may pretend to know what lies ahead, feigning certainty to score polemical points, but we never do.

Nonetheless, there are foreshadowings well worth noting. The last weeks of 2004 saw several explicit warnings from the antiwar Right about the coming of an American fascism. Paul Craig Roberts in these pages wrote of the “brownshirting” of American conservatism—a word that might not have surprised had it come from Michael Moore or Michael Lerner. But from a Hoover Institution senior fellow, former assistant secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration, and one-time Wall Street Journal editor, it was striking.

***

Stern points to the religious (and more explicitly Protestant) component in the rise of Nazism—but I don’t think the proto-fascist mood is strongest among the so-called Christian Right. The critical letters this magazine receives from self-identified evangelical Christians are almost always civil in tone; those from Christian Zionists may quote Scripture about the Israeli-Palestinian dispute in ways that are maddeningly nonrational and indisputably pre-Enlightenment—but these are not the letters foaming with a hatred for those with the presumption to oppose George W. Bush’s wars for freedom and democracy. The genuinely devout are perhaps less inclined to see the United States as “God marching on earth.”

Secondly, it is necessary to distinguish between a sudden proliferation of fascist tendencies and an imminent danger. There may be, among some neocons and some more populist right-wingers, unmistakable antidemocratic tendencies. But America hasn’t yet experienced organized street violence against dissenters or a state that is willing—in an unambiguous fashion—to jail its critics. The administration certainly has its far Right ideologues—the Washington Post’s recent profile of Alberto Gonzales, whose memos are literally written for him by Cheney aide David Addington, provides striking evidence. But the Bush administration still seems more embarrassed than proud of its most authoritarian aspects. Gonzales takes some pains to present himself as an opponent of torture; hypocrisy in this realm is perhaps preferable to open contempt for international law and the Bill of Rights.

And yet the very fact that the f-word can be seriously raised in an American context is evidence enough that we have moved into a new period. The invasion of Iraq has put the possibility of the end to American democracy on the table and has empowered groups on the Right that would acquiesce to and in some cases welcome the suppression of core American freedoms. That would be the titanic irony of course, the mother of them all—that a war initiated under the pretense of spreading democracy would lead to its destruction in one of its very birthplaces. But as historians know, history is full of ironies.

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

Media Matters talks about a new free tabloid in the DC area which was bankrolled by a mysterious and very conservative right wing billionaire:

On February 1, a free daily tabloid arrived on newsstands and in mailboxes in the Washington, DC area: the Washington Examiner. The new paper is owned by Denver billionaire Philip F. Anschutz, an Evangelical Presbyterian who has bankrolled numerous ultra-conservative causes and has donated at least half a million dollars to Republican committees and political candidates. The Examiner's first three editorials all took hardline conservative positions.

***

Anschutz has a history of supporting socially conservative causes. According to a recent Post article, Anschutz's family foundation gave James Dobson, the founder of the conservative Christian organization Focus on the Family, an award for his "contributions to the American Family." The Post noted that according to the foundation's website, Focus on the Family works to "counter the media-saturating message that homosexuality is inborn and unchangeable" and that one of the group's policy experts referred to abortion as an example of when "Satan temporarily succeeds in destroying God's creation." Further, as the Post mentioned, Anschutz contributed $10,000 in 1992 to Colorado Family Values in support of the group's efforts to pass a state constitutional amendment to invalidate state and local laws that prohibited discrimination based on sexual orientation. (The referendum passed, but the United States Supreme Court struck it down as unconstitutional.) According to the Post, "Anschutz's money helped pay for an ad campaign that said such anti-bias laws gave gays and lesbians 'special rights.'"

In May 2003, the Orange County Weekly reported that other Anschutz Foundation beneficiaries include the Institute for American Values, which according to the Weekly "campaigns against single parenting," and Enough is Enough, which "promotes Internet censorship." The San Francisco Chronicle noted on February 20, 2004, that Anschutz also funds Morality in Media. As Media Matters previously noted, the Institute for American Values also receives funding from the conservative Bradley and Scaife foundations, as well as grants from the John M. Olin Foundation, another major financer of conservative organizations. Enough is Enough and Morality in Media have also received funding from the conservative Castle Rock Foundation.

Anschutz has also made significant financial contributions to Republicans. The Washington Post described Anschutz as "an active Republican donor" stating that "he, his companies and members of his family have given more than $500,000 in campaign contributions to GOP candidates and committees" since 1996. Variety noted in its October 4, 2004, edition that Anschutz has supported "a number of Republican political candidates, including John Ashcroft and Peter Coors."

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY kalibex)

"If Republicans do what they've done in the past, which is say, 'Thanks so much for putting us in power: now we don't want to talk to you any more', they will pay a serious price."

Couldn't have happened to a nicer bunch.

So, Dominionists...(I would ask if I could) - whaddaya going to do about it... huh?

Do you have enough people embedded in the military and the House & Senate right now to have a successful coup?

Or will you merely pull away from the Republican party, go form your own (Christo-Fascist) party, and Sulk?

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

This article is from the Herald Mail. It talks about biblical literalism and its threat to our society.

Fundamentalism: A return to Dark Ages

by Allan Powell

Since the rise of the Moral Majority some 30 years ago, it has become increasingly clear that fundamentalist Christianity is a harmful social movement. Its numbers and power should be a source of alarm. This mass movement, composed of highly charged biblical literalists, represents an in-your-face, we are the only way, absolutely true, old time religion.

The all-pervasive influence of this hubris-filled crowd became evident during the recent presidential election when politicians courted their favor. There were frequent interviews with fundamentalist families calculated to show their clout within the Republican party. These interviews merit serious thought.

In one family scene, a child of only about 9 years of age was shown saying that their way was the only way because Jesus had said, "No man cometh unto the father but by me."

Her parents beamed with approval. But, should a child of 9 present such exclusivism? Are they intellectually prepared to be making statements about dogmatic theology while so young? When she becomes an adult will she ever be able to cooperate with other types of religious persuasions?( Read more... )

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY kalibex)

Just an interesting tidbit:

'A mysterious committee backed by members of a secretive religious group whose members are forbidden to vote spent more than $500,000 on newspaper ads last year supporting President Bush and...

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

In this blog, Carol Wolman takes a critical look at the Religious Right and their hypocracy, and has the Scripture to prove it. Very interesting and insightful reading.

Sunfell

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY alostrael)

From Cursor:

Bill Berkowitz surveys the web sites of "powerful and well-funded political Christian fundamentalist organizations" and finds a post-tsunami compassion deficit.

While many Christian evangelical organizations have rushed to help the victims, why aren't the nation's major religious right political groups -- quick to claim the moral high-ground at every opportunity -- putting their organizational muscle to good use? Why hasn't the devastation from the earthquake/tsunami been on the radar screens of these groups? Are they all on a values vacation?

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

Read this article written by a bonafide Christian Conservative, Pastor Chuck Baldwin.

Folks, when people of his particular religious caliber start saying stuff like that, it's time to really pay attention.

An excerpt:

No one can honestly question my commitment to pro-life, pro-family, conservative causes. That being said, the Religious Right, as it now exists, scares me.

For one reason, on the whole, the Religious Right has obviously and patently become little more than a propaganda machine for the Republican Party in general and for President G.W. Bush in particular. This is in spite of the fact that both Bush and the Republican Party in Washington, D.C., have routinely ignored and even trampled the very principles which the Religious Right claims to represent.

Therefore, no longer does the Religious Right represent conservative, Christian values. Instead, they represent their own self-serving interests at the expense of those values.

It also appears painfully obvious to me that in order to sit at the king's table, the Religious Right is willing to compromise any principle, no matter how sacred. As such, it has become a hollow movement. Sadly, the Religious Right is now a movement without a cause, except the cause of advancing the Republican Party.

Beyond that, the Religious Right is actively assisting those who would destroy our freedoms. On the whole, the Religious Right comports with those within the Bush administration and within the Republican Party who, in the name of "fighting terrorism," are actually terrorizing constitutional protections of our liberties.

The Religious Right offered virtually no resistance to the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, the passage of the Patriot Act, or the recently created position of National Intelligence Director. Neither did the Religious Right offer even a whimper of protest as President Bush and Republicans in Congress created a first-ever national ID card in the new intelligence bill, which eerily has more in common with early Twentieth Century German and Russian intelligence institutions than anything envisioned by America's Founding Fathers.

Another disconcerting feature of today's Religious Right is its attempt to Christianize political entities which it supports and to demonize political entities which it opposes. This trend is especially scary.

When people are told that they are voting "Christian" by voting for Republican Party candidates, it is being intimated that they are voting non-Christian by voting for any other candidate. This is not only silly on its face, it is downright dangerous!

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY jrfrench)

http://are.as.wvu.edu/lebeau1.htm

I should say I have one issue with this series: the author refers to the Religious "Right" throughout, even though some of the positions that the group he his talking about advocated in the nineteenth century would today be considered "left-liberal". He is, in some places, discussing different groups of people. That being said, most of the information agrees with what I have found in a number of other places.

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

The American Prospect online magazine has a couple of articles of interest.

Carter's Crusade talks about how former President Jimmy Carter explains that the Christian Right really isn't "Christian" at all.

Here's a fascinating excerpt:( Read more... )