According to a Mason Dixon poll commissioned by the Argus Leader, the supporters of the abortion ban are trailing the in the polls 52 percent to 42 percent with 6 percent still undecided.
I have no way of knowing for sure what will happen on Tuesday, but it looks as if common sense may be starting to reassert itself after a fairly intense period of mass hysteria. Perhaps I’m being too simplistic, but I honestly think the turning pointwas in the spring of 2005 when Bush flew home from his 689th Crawford vacation to sign that Terry Schiavo legislation. Even though people may not have know it at the time, and even though it may not have registered as being important, I think it was the sight of this that broke the trance:
Suddenly the spectre of the radical left didn’t seem a potent as it once did. The old image of the dirty hippies had been replaced by something much more contemporarily radical.
And now we have the leaders of the Christian Right and the Republican moral majority proving their decadent hypocrisy on top of an ideological and administrative failure of epic proportions. The veil has fallen.
Update: I am remiss in not acknowleging that where Bérubé goes, trouble follows. Might I suggest that his publicist schedule a stop in Phoenix and Memphis over the next few days?
It is rather interesting to read some of the evangelical websites grapple with the Haggard story. And in a very real sense, the hypocrisy is simply mind-boggling. I have heard rightwing evangelicals oppose gay marriage by describing anal sex in graphic detail. I have read descriptions of evil gay demons from Haggard’s own church. The uproar over the Lawrence decision was literally apocalyptic.
But Haggard, as odious a man as modern christianism has produced, a man who was on the verge of running for political office, he’s a “good” Christian who gave into temptation.
Nope. And let’s use a little of the terminology the christianists employ – sin – to show why that won’t fly.*
Haggard’s sins – or to be more precise, the only sins that concern the public – are not that he may enjoy methamphetamine or sex with other guys. It may not be healthy for Haggard to take speed, but that’s his own problem. And if he’s breaking his marriage vows, that’s for his family to deal with.
The Haggard sins that concern us are different. And one crucial thing to realize about them is that they are common to all christianist leaders:
1. By shamefully asserting that “intelligent design” creationism had equal plausibility to evolution, Haggard made a covenant with his own ignorance, actively celebrating his lack of knowledge as well as his inherent incapacity to apprehend the world. Worse, he advocated that others emulate him by remaining ignorant of science, and urged them to privilege ignorance – not religion, but simply ignorance – over reason.
2. Haggard, by advocating a unique state of grace for his particular set of beliefs, propagated not only a sinful lack of intellectual curiousity among his followers, but also the most disgusting kind of moral relativism.
He told his followers that when they do wrong, that their state of grace, as followers of Haggard, meant they will enter Heaven (after some penance, of course, and I’ll bet it involved donations to Haggard’s groups). But regardless of whether Gandhi did great deeds, he suffers in Hell. Haggard’s attempt to express tolerance of other faiths was, at best, tepid, and at worse a wink-wink to those in the know that “political correctness” required him to pretend he was tolerant so he could advance the Cause.
This isn’t the mindset of a genuine religious leader. This is the mindset of a fascist cloaking his will to power in the robes of pseudo-religion.
3. Haggard’s enjoyment of a particular kind of physical intimacy is absolutely immaterial to the damage he’s done to others by falsely characterizing same-sex relationships as innately sinful. Even if James Dobson has never fellated another man and therefore is not the hypocrite Haggard is, that hardly makes Dobson a higher paragon of virtue. The attitude of christianists towards gay relationships, that they are perverted merely because two guys or two girls enjoy sex together, is simply bigotry of the ugliest sort.
Of course, it is morally indefensible for Haggard to advocate such garbage and to campaign against equal social rights for all couples who ask that society recognize their relationship. But it is equally morally indefensible for a heterosexual James Dobson to do so.
Part Two
Right now, we have a good opportunity to confront naive followers of christianism who are just spiritual seekers gulled by their bullshit. And it is important that we do so, not so much in the hopes that many will come to their senses, but rather that some may, and that others who have given the Haggards and the Dobsons a free pass, might look a little more askance at the very real, very dangerous theocracy movement. And we can confront them to a great extent on christianist morality, or rather, the lack of any.
For instance, David Wayne is clearly dismayed at Haggard and seeks a lesson for Christians to take away from it. Like La Shawn Barber, David – perhaps without realizing it – thinks he can finesse the issue of christianist immorality by turning Haggard’s tale into the oldest cliche in the book: we’re all sinners:
But lets also be careful that we not assume some moral superiority to, or moral authority over, Ted Haggard. Those of us who do not base our ministries on moral superiority and moral authority may feel morally superior to those who do. We may feel morally superior because we rely on grace not moral superiority.
The truth is, I am Ted Haggard, we are all Ted Haggard, and Ted Haggard is all of us.
The hell he is. Ted Haggard and I have in common only the fact that we both perform the bodily functions all humans must to live.
But I don’t go around telling people they’ll go to hell because the way they fuck doesn’t meet with God’s approval. I don’t go around advocating that bad theology be taught in public school science classes. I don’t go around defending coerced religious participation in the military. I don’t go around telling people that they can be confident that, no matter what, they are in a state of grace with God, while Jews can’t get into heaven no matter what. And I don’t bilk followers of millions upon millions of hard-earned cash while I’m doing so.
Do I feel morally superior to Ted Haggard? Damn right I do. And I don’t feel morally superior because I “rely on grace.” I don’t. In fact, I don’t “rely” on anything other than my ability to reason and to feel. So, I think this:
I am thrilled when two people who love each other wish to celebrate that publicly. I don’t care what their genders are. I think such an attitude is morally good.
I am curious about the world we all share and am starved for real information about how it works. I am humbled by my lack of scientific knowledge and strongly support rigorous science education. I think such an attitude is morally good.
I think knowing whether any human being is in a state of grace with God is impossible. Following Joan of Arc, the strongest attitude I think any religious person can honestly assert is to pray that if they are not, that God will lead them to grace. And if they are in a state of grace, that God will lead them to stay there. I think such an attitude is morally good.
As a corollary, I am equally respectful of all religious belief and observance, be it mainstream Christian or Inuit. More importantly, I am curious about these beliefs and want to learn more about how different people worship. I think such an attitude is morally good.
I think that some, not many, practices associated with particular religious beliefs are repugnant and it is only natural for me to object loudly to them. Among them are the mutilation of women and the attempt to eliminate the hard-fought wall of separation between church and state. I am strongly opposed to the corruption of Christian worship into fascist mega-churhes of Haggard’s sort. I think any genuinely pious religious leader rejects attempts to claim a unique grace, but rather encourages tolerance and privileges the essential sameness of the religious impulse across cultures. I think such an attitude is morally good.
I have my faults and God knows they are legion. But, David, I am no Ted Haggard. And I suspect you aren’t either. However, I will join you in hoping that God will show him some mercy. But given the amount of harm he’s done to non-christianists, to countless gay people, to intellectually curious children, and to the truly decent religous people in the US, I have precious little to show him.
*There are complex and, to some, fascinating epistemological issues swirling around a rhetorical discourse focused on the notions of sin and sinfullness, but they are not germane to this particular discussion which takes place, as does christianism in a much distorted fashion, within that discourse and doesn’t question the basic assumption.
You can’t help but feel kind of sorry for Ted Haggard (if it weren’t for his virulent homophobia and phony moral superiority, of course.) He’s digging himself in deeper. He just admitted to a TV reporter that he bought the meth a few times but says never used it and threw it away.
He also says he met the gay hooker through a referral for a massage from a hotel he can’t remember.
I don’t think even the true believers can buy that one. I’d put the guy on 24 hour watch. He looks haunted.
Jesus oh Jesus how I want to see Joe Lieberman lose. Connecticut Dems who say they are voting for Lieberman: you know not what you do.
Crooks and Liars has the video of Lieberman’s shameful, angry appearance on Imus this morning in which he says:
“You’ve gotta join one caucus or another to protect your seniority so I’ve said I’d caucus with the Democrats. But I’m gonna be very independent.”
I don’t doubt it. He’s made it clear that he’s caucusing with the Democrats purely for the purpose of maintaining his seniority. If this thing comes out 50/50, I don’t suppose there’s any chance the Republicans will offer him up a juicy chairmanship and give him seniority to jump, do you? Nah, they wouldn’t do that. And surely he wouldn’t agree to such a thing after promising he wouldn’t, right?
I also heard him say:
“He [Chris Dodd] has been a disappointment… He says he’s gonna bring a food taster to our first lunch meeting. I’m gonna bring Michael Corleone.
Even Imus didn’t laugh.
This is fairly typical for the pissed-off Tricky Joe we’ve seen emerge in this campaign. Rick Perlstein has a great piece running in Connecticut* today about Joe’s Nixonian rhetoric on the war. I hope lots of locals see it:
There’s a taboo in American politics against using the “N”-word—comparing a politician to Richard Nixon. But after spending five years writing a book on Nixon, I couldn’t help but notice some similarities with Connecticut’s junior senator—and I don’t just mean the mystery of how Joe Lieberman spent the mysterious $387,000 his campaign listed as “petty cash” in the days before the August 8 primary.
I’m not the first to point out Nixonian traits in Lieberman. There’s an ad going around the Internet that shows clips from a Nixon speech on Vietnam, then similar words from Joe Lieberman. The senator has commented of it, “that’s not the kind of debate we ought to have.” But speaking as one who knows Richard Nixon backwards and forwards, I believe that’s exactly the debate we ought to have. As a historian, I find the ad fair—uncannily so.
By 1969, most Americans wanted out of Vietnam. So many, in fact, that on October 15, 1969, an astonishing 2 million—Democrat and Republican, young and old people—took the day off from work and school to hit the streets to beg President Nixon to end the war. One of them was Tom Seaver, star of 1969’s “Miracle Mets.” He said, “If the Mets can win the World Series, the U.S. can get out of Vietnam.”
Both notions seemed like miracles. Everyone knew Nixon was a hawk. He would say things, as the war was ramping up in the mid-’60s, like “We are fighting in Vietnam to prevent World War III.” Running for president in 1968, he pledged that “new leadership will end the war and win the peace.” By the fall of 1969, few believed him. The war was still raging, less popular than ever.
And so, two weeks after that largest antiwar demonstration in U.S. history, Richard Nixon gave a speech to the nation pledging that he was anti-war, too.
This is the speech that shows up in the new anti-Lieberman ad. Promising, “I want peace as much as you do,” he pledged an eventual withdrawal, while simultaneously warning that everyone else’s plans for withdrawal would lead to “defeat and humiliation.”
It was a thoroughly fudging performance. Nixon started making token troop withdrawals—and made up for it by escalating aerial bombardment. The following April, he dangled this sweet enticement before the American people: “we finally have in sight the just peace we are seeking. … we can say with confidence that all American combat forces can and will be withdrawn.” Ten days later, American troops invaded a second, neighboring country: neutral Cambodia.
Tricky Joe Lieberman couldn’t be making it more clear that he is going to stab Democrats in the back when he gets his six year extension. And he will back Bush all the way on Iraq, repeating his new talking points, making the case that Bush is changing course, doing whatever he needs to do to dance with them that brung him.
If you are a praying type, pray for a Lieberman proof Senate majority. If he wins and holds the key to a Democratic majority he will turn the party into boot-licking sycophants and bleed them dry to get back at them for forsaking him. He’s a vindictive man. His bipartisan congeniality and moderate temperament is an act. Just like his mentor Dick Nixon.
*this piece is also running in the Connecticut Journal Inquirer. .
Wow. Andrea Mitchell just reported that the Secretary of State went on Laura Ingraham’s wingnut propaganda show and said the “Army of Davids” documents proved that Saddam was working on a nuclear program. Lucky for us that Mitchell pointed out that the documents were from before the first Gulf War.
I understand that hacks like Limbaugh and Instapundit would try to pass this nonsense off to the neanderthal base, but for the Secretary of State to lower herself and her office to say such a thing is shocking. Even for these people.
Update: Dan Bartlet’s out there right now saying exactly the same thing. Mitchell corrected him, but this looks like the official party line. They really do think their base is completely braindead. They would know.
Oh, dear. Someone lost her reason when they heard about evangelical superstar Ted Haggard’s gay frolic.
Having said all that, I have to say this: No Christian should be surprised that Haggard may have given in to his perverted thoughts and turned them into perverted actions. It’s a temptation we all face.
LaShawn, honey, to use your terminology and not mine…
The only perverted thoughts Haggard may have given into were his willingness to betray his vows to his wife and to indulge his promiscuous talent for hypocrisy. (And also, to state the obvious, no one should be surprised that many christianist leaders are moral midgets who preach one thing and enthusiastically practice the exact opposite.)
In an update, LaShawn addresses this objection to her homophobia in time-honored Bible-thumpin’ style, by calling upon us all to embrace our sins. Neveryoumind that she’s trying to change the subject from her own particular sin – pride – LaShawn sees a lesson for you and me in Haggard’s acts:
Yes, sex outside of marriage is a perversion of what God intended, too. We all fall short of God’s standards, so in a sense, we’re all perverts. It’s a perverted world!
Hmm… Read that again, folks. Man, that is a REALLY weird set of beliefs.
LaShawn’s saying that there is something perverted with all sexual intimacy unless you’ve been issued a state license to perform it. And she’s cool with that. Sorry, LaShawn, but that is a woowoo weird idea. Just ’cause you can point to a bunch of judges at the Salem witch trials who believed the same thing doesn’t reduce its woowoo-osity.
And think about it for a second. LaShawn, and her fellow travelers…man, I just can’t believe it! They have the gall to say over and over and over that liberals grant too much power to the state! Seems like there’s a lot of that there [over-emphasize the word the way Bush does when he’s mocking someone] High-Paw-Cree-Sea going around these days. What could be more oppressive than having to petition your local government for permission to fuck?*
And then, check it out, she says we are all perverts. Well, she’s entitled to her opinion, of course. But with all due respect, I just think she’s been hanging around nothing but Republicans way too long.
—
*And LaShawn, trust me, you really don’t wanna argue that the state has no right to marry people, only ministers of God. You really care to defend that the marriages Haggard performed, that the pedophile priests performed are more authentic than a civil marriage by say, a Justice of the Peace who worships the Flying Spaghetti Monster but doesn’t go around banging underage boys or whores?
…that the Bush administration is as incompetent at keeping documents secret that (many reasonable folks agree) should be kept classified as they are at everything else.
9/11: Incompetence. Afghanistan: Incompetence. Pre-Iraq intelligence: incompetence. Post-Iraq intelligence: incompetence. Post-Iraq reconstruction: incompetence. Katrina: incompetence. Science and health: incompetence. Homeland security: incompetence. Global warming: incompetence. Diplomacy: incompetence. Education: incompetence. Torture and other human rights issues: incompetence. Nuclear proliferation: incompetence.
What the hell are these people doing still in charge of the United States? What will make this nation catch on that these people are fucking hopeless? What?
Y’know sometimes I think that the only way this country would wake up is if some really high official was shown to be so stupid and inept he accidentally shot someone in the face!
I’m sure that monumental examples of the hypocrisy of Ted Haggard, the president of the National Associations of Evangelicals (NAE), will be uncovered by the blogosphere in the next few days. And, by God, they should be.*
But that’s not the worst of it. Not by a long shot. I recently watched Haggard get interviewed by Richard Dawkins for the latter’s British tv special, The Root of All Evil? The subject was “intelligent design” creationism and Haggard was both woefully ignorant and incredibly arrogant.** Dawkins provoked him into a genuinely embarassing display of hostility, not only against Dawkins himself, but the very notion of rational inquiry.
Weinstein claims that evangelical Christians at the school have coerced attendance at religious services and prayers at official events, among other things.
“It’s a shocking disgrace that I had to file this thing,” Weinstein told The Associated Press.
The Air Force declined immediate comment.
Cadets, watchdog groups and a former chaplain at the academy have alleged that religious intolerance is widespread at the school. On Aug. 29, the Air Force issued guidelines discouraging public prayer at official functions and urging commanders to be sensitive about personal expressions of religious faith.
There have been complaints at the academy that a Jewish cadet was told the Holocaust was revenge for the death of Jesus and that another Jew was called a Christ killer by a fellow cadet. A banner in the football team’s locker room read: “I am a Christian first and last … I am a member of Team Jesus Christ.”
Also, there have been complaints that cadets were pressured to attend chapel, that academy staffers put New Testament verses in government e-mail, and that cadets used the e-mail system to encourage others to see the Mel Gibson movie “The Passion of the Christ.”
…
The lawsuit, which names the Air Force and its acting secretary, Pete Geren, as defendants, asks the Air Force to prohibit its members — including chaplains — from evangelizing and proselytizing or in any related way attempting “to involuntarily convert, pressure, exhort or persuade a fellow member of the USAF to accept their own religious beliefs while on duty.”
“If this lawsuit prevails, we’ll have increased government supervision of religious speech,” Haggard said.
Weinstein said Haggard has mischaracterized his suit, which he says aims to protect men and women in uniform and on duty from being pressured to change their faith.
Weinstein is exactly right, as any fair reading of the lawsuit will confirm. Weinstein continues:
“I think Ted Haggard is the Prince of Darkness when it comes to religious freedom,” said Weinstein, reached by phone in Albuquerque, N.M.
“He’s the one who’s really trying to suppress religious freedom by ensuring that one particular biblical worldview becomes the official biblical worldview of the U.S. government, and particularly the Department of Defense.”
But why damn Haggard with Weinstein’s words when Haggard damns himself easily enough?
Asked about evangelicals’ reputation for a “my way or the highway” view about their beliefs, Haggard said evangelicals can be strong in their beliefs but yet protect the beliefs of others.
“We feel comfortable in a guaranteed right to heaven,” he said.
“We feel comfortable in a guaranteed right to heaven.”
And you thought white men had a burden. Imagine Ted Haggard’s. Secure in his faith that he and those who believe what he believes will go to heaven. And the unspoken corollary: Those who believe differently will go to Hell. Haggard has a solemn duty to save those souls from eternal fire and brimstone, the Constitution be damned.
Fair enough, if Haggard goes down because of his hypocrisy, good riddance. Hell, they got Capone for tax evasion, after all. But regardless of the hypocrisy of his alleged personal proclivities and his public posturing, his views are so bizarre and so odious they have no business having anything close to mainstream influence in American political discourse.*** But they do. As Digby notes below, Ted Haggard speaks to the president of the United States once a week.
Jesus Christ, what the hell is wrong with a country that would tolerate a leadership that not only respects but regularaly listens to an intellectual and spiritual midget like Ted Haggard?
*I’m assuming the assertion by an admitted male hooker that Haggard was a longtime client are substantive, as many appear to believe now.
**And Haggard’s not only a scientific illiterate. He claimed to Dawkins that the Bible is entirely free of contradiction. Apparently, Haggard has never read the early chapters of Genesis, with its two different creation stories.The question arises, “What does Haggard know anything about?” Well, he knows how to separate working people from their hard-earned cash so his megachurch can buy state of the art video projections for his services. And he also knows about…well, I’ll get back to you.
***Have you heard about the demons that infect people with homosexuality and other vices? You will, soon.
[Updated to include the observation of Haggard’s biblical illiteracy. Updated also to clarify one sentence. Haggard’s alleged “personal proclivities” are not the issue. The issue is his hypocrisy and the original version of the sentence made that point less clear than it should be.]
When you listen to this tape, it sure sounds like Pastor Ted Haggard and it sure sounds like he was setting up a drug buy with a gay hooker.
I think we may be at a point at which it would be easier to assume that all the most virulent gay marriage opponents and staunch family values conservatives are in the closet. Then we can get past all this ridiculous posturing and deal with their true issues. As it is they are all playing them out in destructive, sublimated fashion in politics and it’s hurting a lot of people.
Come out. Join the Log Cabin Republicans or dress in drag, we don’t care. Really. You’ll feel better and a grateful nation will appreciate it.
Ted Haggard, the head of the 30-million strong National Association of Evangelicals, jokes that the only disagreement between himself and the leader of the Western world is automotive: Mr. Bush drives a Ford pickup, whereas he prefers a Chevy.
Last March, the federal government set up a Web site to make public a vast archive of Iraqi documents captured during the war. The Bush administration did so under pressure from Congressional Republicans who said they hoped to “leverage the Internet” to find new evidence of the prewar dangers posed by Saddam Hussein.
But in recent weeks, the site has posted some documents that weapons experts say are a danger themselves: detailed accounts of Iraq’s secret nuclear research before the 1991 Persian Gulf war. The documents, the experts say, constitute a basic guide to building an atom bomb.
Last night, the government shut down the Web site after The New York Times asked about complaints from weapons experts and arms-control officials. A spokesman for the director of national intelligence said access to the site had been suspended “pending a review to ensure its content is appropriate for public viewing.”
Three years after the war in Iraq began, there is so much information about prewar Iraq that people have yet to see. The Iraqi Survey Group provided some answers, but it left open as many questions.
Sitting deep within a warehouse in Qatar are millions of documents that may shed some light on the issue.
Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte recently delivered meaningful news when he agreed to initiate a process that would declassify the 48,000 boxes of documents and hundreds of hours of taped conversations with Saddam Hussein and his key advisers.
Documents that I have personally reviewed reveal notes about Kuwaiti prisoners of war used as human shields in 2003 and missiles and chemical and biological weapons buried 40 feet below ground. They are not definitive. However, they are enough to raise eyebrows.
I can only speculate on exactly what the rest of the nearly 2 million documents will contain — perhaps very little new information but potentially a very great amount. The American public should have access to it now.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence has indicated that he will post the information on the Internet so the public, the press and academics can read, study and understand it.
The approach carries with it risks, but such risks are minimal. It will enable us to better understand information such as Saddam’s links to terrorism, weapons of mass destruction and violence against the Iraqi people.
[…]
Such material requires the entrepreneurial spirit of academia and others to help us to better understand it. It needs to be posted online so we can unleash the power of the World Wide Web and shine a spotlight on it.
The proposed approach will be a transparent process rather than one mired in secrecy. It will allow us to leverage the Internet to enable a mass examination as opposed to limiting it to a few exclusive elites. What would have once taken years and decades may now be done in real time.
We now only have a pixilated snapshot of Saddam Hussein’s regime prior to the war. As more of the information is posted online, we will begin to bring into focus the more complete picture of prewar Iraq that has thus far eluded us.
Yeah. That worked out well.
Hoekstra had actually been agitating for releasing the documents for quite some time. In February, Instapundit reported:
PAJAMAS MEDIA CORRESPONDENT Andrew Marcus interviews Rep. Peter Hoekstra about all those unread Iraqi WMD documents. Hoekstra suggests parceling them out to the blogosphere. Call in the Army of Davids!
It looks like the ole perfesser and his pals didn’t realize that the Army of Davids might include a few soldiers of jihad. Ooopsie!
It’s a good thing the government is launching an investigation to find the dastardly bastards who leaked that Pentagon chart that realistically assessed the conditions in Iraq the other day. That puts America at risk. “Shining a spotlight” on nuclear bombmaking plans (conveniently written in arabic)by putting them all over the internet, on the other hand, is a terrific idea. That’s what the Republicans are all about — “a transparent process rather than one mired in secrecy.”
You can sure see why these guys have such a reputation for being good on national security, can’t you?
Update: Sadly No! has much more from last spring on how the blogosphere was unleashed. Let’s just say Red State and Powerline play a large part. Feeling safer?
