Current affairs

There used to be a message painted on the side of a barn that was visible from the freeway south of Salem: “Soldiers of the Lord, Armor Up!” I had a creepy feeling every time I saw it.

That feeling is still with me, even stronger now. For the Christian armoring-up is no longer an admonition but a reality. Fundamentalists are fighting battles on many fronts. And they mean business. This is no joke. It’s war.

Read T.A. Barnhart’s excellent essay that was posted today on BlueOregon, “The Religious Right’s Coming Civil War?” Barnhart includes a question mark in his title, but this reformed fundamentalist is confident that the war is coming:

There is a battle coming, and it won’t be restricted to politics and elections. Those who believe they are God’s chosen will act upon that belief…I just know the mind set, the vast and unshakable belief in the holy righteousness of their thoughts and opinions. They have created God in their own image, and they will seek to force us all to kneel before their self-created idol. What happens when we necessarily refuse?

I don’t know. Nobody does. I’m sure that it won’t be a well-mannered fight, however. The progressives, independents, humanists, and other tolerant people believe in being reasonable.

Reason means squat to a fundamentalist Christian, Muslim, Jew, or adherent of any other faith-based religion. Fundamentalists don’t believe in reason; they believe in the revelation of their holy book or religion’s founder. Unbelievers are toast, fit only to be buttered up and crunched into oblivion.

I’m reading Charles Freeman’s excellent (though scholarly) book about the rise of Christianity, appropriately titled “The Closing of the Western Mind: The Rise of Faith and the Fall of Reason.” This morning I got to the cheery part about the Christian emperor Justinian massacring 30,000 to 50,000 of his own citizens in 532.

A contemporary historian, Procopius, said: “Justinian did not see it as murder if the victims did not share his own beliefs.” Christians were excusing the killing of infidels way before al-Qaeda.

Now, I’m not suggesting that non-religious folks like me and my wife need to worry about the Christian right causing us physical harm. (Laurel does, however, fret about the imposition of a fundamentalist dress code for women, since she’s guessing that it wouldn’t be based on the teals and purples that she favors, nor would fused glass earrings likely be on the approved jewelry list, which would render meaningless countless hours of Laurel’s shopping.).

But the Christian jihadists are unabashedly out to dominate American culture. That’s why they consider themselves to be fighting a “culture war” to defend traditional values.

Hmmmm, that’s funny. I’ve always thought that my non-Christian beliefs were a lot more traditional. After all, I’ve been a vegetarian most of my life and find the theory of karma/reincarnation to be a pretty compelling basis for morality. This has been a traditional Hindu belief for way longer than Christianity has been around.

No matter. Fundies like Cal Thomas, whom I saw interviewed on a Nightline program last week along with the more moderate conservative George Will, come right out and say that debates over single issues like the teaching of intelligent design can’t be isolated from the Grand Christian Fundamentalist Culture War.

Thomas said that Christian red-staters are fed up with having their values shut out of public schools and rejected by godless judges. He ran off a bunch of interrelated battles that all coalesce in the broader culture war: gay rights, Terri Schiavo, display of the Ten Commandments, prayer in schools, teaching of intelligent design/creationism.

Christians like Thomas don’t want to peacefully coexist in a diverse culture where many faiths and non-faiths are practiced. They want to make Christianity the state religion, just as in the good old days (to Christians, not for pagans) of Constantine. Witness yesterday’s religious rally that attacked “arrogant” judges, broadcast to churches all across the country.

Gosh, for some reason I thought Christians went to church on Sunday to be spiritual, not political. Obviously I misunderstand Christianity; I guess it doesn’t have much to do with Christ.

If you want more proof that T.A. Barnhart is correct—the Christian right is out to start a culture war that could tear this country apart—I offer as evidence a portion of an email message that I received recently from Ford Vox. Ford is the founder of Universism, a faithless approach to spirituality that matches up well with my own churchless leanings.

He had lunch with a director of Focus on the Family, a Christian right organization. After what he hoped would be a “diplomatic meeting” between two people on different sides of the culture war, Ford had this to say to his fellow Universists: (which I’ll include as a continuation to this post)

Suppose this happened to you, an American citizen. Your plane lands at the Montreal airport and Canadian officials hold you without charges. They don’t let you talk to a lawyer, then ship you off to another country to be tortured. After ten months you’re released without any charges being filed. Oops. Guess we made a mistake, says Canada. Sorry for all the torture. Hope there’s no hard feelings. Well, there should be. And in Maher Arar’s case, there are. For this is just what happened to him. Except, he holds joint Canadian/Syrian citizenship and it was American officials who seized…

I’m getting tired of reading stories like this: “Most House E-Board picks are from GOP: The ratio is 7 to 2; in Senate, Democrats get 5 of 8 members.” Good lord. Karen Minnis is speaker of the House, where her Republicans comprise 55% of the House members (33/60). Her blatantly lopsided appointments to the Emergency Board, which is a mini-legislature in between Oregon’s biennial sessions, were 78% Republican (7/9). Peter Courtney is president of the Senate, where his Democrats comprise 60% of the Senate members (18/30). His eminently fair appointments to the Emergency Board were 63% Democrat (5/8). So once…

Two days ago ABC’s Nightline was about the crisis in the central African nation of Niger, where several million people are in danger of starvation—including 800,000 children. I didn’t want to watch the program when it first ran. I didn’t want to see the faces of dying children. Last night I did. I forced myself to watch the recorded episode, which centered on video reports by the BBC’s Hillary Anderson. I saw starving children covered in sores, too weak to move or even drink water. I saw a family cooking a rat, their only meal of the day; the image…

Yesterday, after my Tai Chi class in downtown Salem, I walked a few blocks down Court Street to the Basic Rights Oregon rally on the steps of the Capitol. Laurel came directly from home and caught up with me on the sidewalk, matchingly dressed for the occasion, per usual. I’d told her that pre-rally info had suggested wearing the official SB 1000 t-shirt or other light blue attire. I stuck with basic black, figuring black goes with anything. A basic message at the rally. Who can disagree? Well, apparently the unloving Republican House Speaker Karen Minnis, who is refusing to…

At 4 pm PST (in a few minutes, that is) word is that a Universist representative will be on the (ugh!) national Lars Larson show. I just got an email from the Universists telling me that this appearance has been moved up to today instead of tomorrow because of Bush's forthcoming Supreme Court nominee announcement. More info is on the Universist website, including how to listen to the show on the Internet. Locally, you can listen on KXL 750 (just don't make it a habit--normally I can't stand Lars' right-wing rantings, but I'll be interested to hear him speak with…

Portland’s right-wing talk show host Lars Larson is notorious for spinning half-truths. And that’s on one of his good days. Usually he’s only able to reach the quarter-truth level, or less. Last month I heard Lars railing on about how an Astoria boy supposedly was attacked by a cougar. If those damn tree-hugging, gun-hating, cougar-loving liberals have their way, he frothed, cougars are going to be killing Oregonians like flies. Not likely. As I’ve noted before, a cougar never has attacked a human in Oregon. And I’m pretty confident that no cougar attacked the Astoria boy, Drew Weil, either. The…

As if there ever was any doubt that the Bush White House is composed of 100% pure bullshit, the final proof has arrived. More details can be found here and here.

Early indications are that an al Qaeda group is claiming responsibility for the horrific London bombings. Whoever turns out to be the culprit, I’m willing to bet that it isn’t Saddam Hussein. He’s in jail. Osama bin Laden isn’t. And therein lies the criticism that should be directed today, tomorrow, and the next days at President George W. Bush and his neo-con groupthinkers, whose obsession with overthrowing Saddam Hussein has diverted invaluable resources from pursuing Bin Laden and al Qaeda. Al Qaeda attacked the United States on 9/11. Al Qaeda almost certainly attacked London on 7/7. It’s been proven that…

I didn’t want to start the 4th of July holiday weekend outraged, but the Oregonian’s front page story about Oregon House Majority Leader Wayne Scott’s political shenanigans set off “What a jerk!” fireworks in my mind.

As the story reports, Republican Scott refuses to have the House consider a bill that would upgrade North Bend’s runway and terminal because he wants to punish a freshman Democratic colleague for a school funding vote. The bill passed the Oregon Senate with strong bipartisan support, but Scott is majorly peeved at Rep. Arnie Roblan, a Democrat from Coos Bay.

So Scott, the House bully, wants to teach Roblan, the House new kid, a lesson about who’s boss. Jeez, Rep. Scott looks like he’s out of middle school, but he sure still likes to play childish games. “You dissed me, man! You gonna pay for that, sucka!” What a baby.

The sad thing is, he’s House Majority Leader, for god’s sake. Wayne Scott is the cream of the Republican crop. That’s pitiful. To me he represents the worst of divisive, nasty, my-way-or-the-highway American politics. He’s Oregon’s version of Tom DeLay, which is just about the most insulting thing I could say about Scott.

However, I did my best to come up with other pejorative phrases when I sent Scott a passionate email earlier today. I’m usually much more restrained when I write politicians about an issue. I think that what seriously tweaked me about Wayne Scott is that he blatantly admitted that his tiff with Roblan isn’t about the airport expansion issue. It’s all personal.

Roblan is doing his best to represent his constituents. All Scott cares about is shoring up his political power. I realize that quite a few readers of this weblog live in other states and also other countries, but I encourage you to send Rep. Scott an email, letting him know how you feel about this newest Republican outrage. Send a copy of your message to his boss too, House Speaker Karen Minnis.

Here’s what I told Scott. Getting my outrage off of my chest helped bring my mental fireworks down to earth. Now I can concentrate on enjoying the weekend and reflecting on what makes this country great. It sure isn’t Rep. Wayne Scott. (For political junkies, another article about this issue can be read here).

A Reuters article about Iran’s newly-elected “ultra-conservative” President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, got me to thinking about why conservatives are so afraid of other conservatives. The Bush administration is ultra-conservative. Iran’s leader is ultra-conservative. Sharing a similar position on the political spectrum, shouldn’t they get along wonderfully? Imagine (oh God, yes, imagine) that the United States had an ultra-liberal President and Iran had elected an equally liberal head of state. Would there be the same clash between like and like? No. Bush and his cronies can’t stand Ahmadinejad because he is religiously fundamentalist and politically nationalistic. Thus he’s just like them. Except,…

Humor is a great way of revealing the idiocy of bigotry. The next time somebody says to you, “If gays are able to marry, it will destroy the institution of marriage,” respond with “How true. That’s just the point a woman made in ‘How my Marriage was Destroyed by the Homosexual Agenda.’ You should read this revealing essay.” It’s a great piece of satire. Here’s a sample: Constance turned on the radio in the kitchen to the Christian AM station we always listen to, and that's when our family's fate was finally sealed. The Lord's news update was saying that…

“Wildlife Services.” The name of this USDA (U.S. Department of Agriculture) agency has such a nice ring to it. It conjures up a picture of distressed animals being tended to by kindly government employees. “How may I serve you today?” a needy deer or bear is asked when it gets to the front of the Wildlife Services clinic waiting line. The home page of the agency’s website tries to convey this sort of benign image. The reality is much different, as Laurel and I described on a “Coyotes don’t need killing by USDA Wildlife Services” page that we put up…

Before Laurel and I enter into our mellow yin Memorial Day weekend mood, it was balancing to experience some yang outrage this morning after reading a Statesman Journal story: “GOP sidesteps public on hunting bill.” I’ve got to hand it to the Oregon House Republicans. It isn’t easy to score a triple outrage, but they managed to do it through an amendment to a bill that would let counties overturn statewide voter-approved restrictions on cougar and bear hunting. A House committee approved the bill without advance notice, undoubtedly because if environmental and animal-rights activists had known about this move ahead…