Frightening scenes from Rick Perry’s crazed religious jamboree taking place today deep in the heart of Texas…
1) Rabid anti-choice activists call on God to end abortions in America.
2) Feeling “surrounded by the forces of immorality,” Dr. James Dobson and his wife Shirley pray for a “miracle of Dunkirk” to save them from the evil, liberal Nazis.
More to come…
3) Mike Bickle, the batshit crazy head of the International House of Pancakes oops, Prayer (they both go by the acronym IHOP, which is a bit confusing) stridently rails against all things non-Jeebus related. Bickle is the “pastor” who believes that Oprah is a deceitful forerunner of the Anti-Christ (or, in the spirit of simultaneous translation, Oprah es un precursor engañosa de la Anti-Cristo).
4) Dobson prays for the next generation of financial donors. Vonette Bright (widow of deceased Campus Crusader Bill Bright) prays for Christianity to be reintroduced into a theocratic school system. Finally, a weeping “Student Mobilization” coordinator Laura Allred encourages young people to repent for… stuff and beg for forgiveness; vowing that the declining years of the oldsters they’ve heretofore failed to “esteem” will be just super! Presumably once their social security is “privatized”…
5) An assortment of crackpot religious nutters, hateful bigots, grifting swindlers and right-wing political hacks (not a mutually exclusive group, by any means) disingenuously pray for the “cloud of confusion and chaos” which they’ve sown through their cynical machinations and furious ignorance to be lifted from the blessed land of America.
Red Tory v.3.0.3 
Dunkirk was a miracle? Britain was saved by a “day of prayer?” Really? Religious fundamentalism – Muslim, Jewish, Christian or Hindu – is the scourge of the 21st century. Andrew Bacevich describes how radical Christianity has insinuated itself within the power structure of the American military. Crazy motherfuckers.
Churchill described the evacuation of troops from Dunkirk as “a miracle of deliverance” — an expression which idiots like Dobson naturally take in its most literal sense and distort to suit their own God-bothering purposes.
Oh Texas, you so CRAZY!
Where is the ACLU when you need them…
You have obviously run out of material when you have to pick on law-abiding citizens doing nothing more than peacefully exercising their right to practice their faith.
If you’re looking for “batshit crazy”, it’s staring you in the face every morning in the bathroom mirror. It’s those, like yourself, with the idea of an arbitrary moral framework (pulled from one’s ass) that enables you the “divine” right to label others as crackpots, religious nutters and hateful bigots, because their cause happens to be different from yours.
Castigating people for praying–sorry, who’s the bigot in all this?
Trainman is a “Moran” (as they spell it in the US South) …
Trainman is a “Moran”
Obviously, because I disagree with you, I must be a bigot.
Once again, who’s the bigot?
Trainman is a “Moran”
Obviously, because I disagree with you, I must be a moron.
Once again, who’s the bigot?
Hey Red
Fred Clark has a great post up over at the new Slacktivist that attacks the notion of low taxes at any cost, through invocation of the memory of and respect for the greatest generation.
The Greatest Degeneration
Why does the Right always use the memory of WWII to support their retarded economic or fiscal policies? That generation was nothing like this one. If conservatives get their way, our generation will leave absolutely NOTHING for the next.
As an addition to the above, the following comment from Dash1 on that post is, unfortunately, very true.
I really, really, really don’t like to say this, but an awful lot of the people who built the infrastructure, including those of “Greatest Generation,” became to a large degree both the selfish and short-sighted people who refused to keep up the payments, and the teachers, enablers and supporters of the next generation of same. And a lot of their willingness to support the Reagan claim that government is always the problem stemmed from the view that government was that obnoxious entity that insisted on granting civil rights to African Americans and women and taking their money away to give to all those not-like-us people on welfare.
Trainman, you’re perfectly free to indulge your fundamentalist superstitions – in private. When you seek to import them, and your cultural and social values into the political arena, that’s where you cross the line. A radical Christian theocracy would be every bit as odious, probably even as murderous, as a fundamentalist Muslim theocracy.
I have two prejudices – against Rednecks and those of Willful Low Cognition. Hey ! I am killing two birds with one stone !
These people are fucked in the head. Praying to their Sugar Daddy in the sky for rain and an end to the US’ enormous debt. I can’t hear you… la la la.
@mos,
When you seek to import them, and your cultural and social values into the political arena, that’s where you cross the line.
Firstly, I think you had better take a PoliSci 101 course at your community college. “Importing cultural and social values” is pretty much all that politics is! Wake-up and smell the ideology.
Secondly, my post was only making the point that to suggest others can’t hold a prayer rally, is bigotry at it’s core.
To quote another poster, “I can’t hear you… la la la.”
Trainman, let me spell it out for you. Politics in the public forum, religion in the private forum. Try to insinuate your religious superstitions into the public forum, like that jackass Rick Perry, and you deserve every criticism thrown at you. We don’t need to tolerate Mullahs – Christian or Muslim – when they pursue theocracy. Now, piss off.
mos,
Politics in the public forum, religion in the private forum.
Apples and oranges. Politics is the activities associated with governance and the debate among parties hoping to achieve power. Religion is a system of thought or a worldview. In other words, politics deals with achieving our ideals, religion deals with shaping them. (Again, I’m sure there’s still time to register for that intro to PoliSci course, before the fall semester begins.)
And we don’t tell people how they must go about shaping their worldviews-that would be a dictatorship. There is no way to differentiate between religious belief and non-religious belief. They are both beliefs about the way things “ought to be” and they will motivate people to affect public policy.
No one’s pursuing theocracy–dont exaggerate.
Now, piss off. … And that’s usually a sign you’re wrong.
I like the way Dobson can’t help but lecture even God on the state of “this generation.
And we don’t tell people how they must go about shaping their worldviews-that would be a dictatorship. There is no way to differentiate between religious belief and non-religious belief. They are both beliefs about the way things “ought to be” and they will motivate people to affect public policy.
The difference between religious belief and non-religious belief is simple. If it’s a religious belief, then using it to justify policy is a silly insult to rational thought. In the end, the reasons for a policy must be non-religious. The supernatural has no place in politics.
philosoraptor,
If it’s a religious belief, then using it to justify policy is a silly insult to rational thought. In the end, the reasons for a policy must be non-religious. The supernatural has no place in politics.
Listen to yourself. You are suggesting that we can challenge a policy argument based on (what we can only assume is) the motivation for the argument!? Nothing could be more incorrect. That is exactly the definition of an ‘Appeal to motive’ logical fallacy.
Logical fallacies are an insult to rational thought.
The reasons for a policy DO NOT have to be non-religious–they only need to be good!
I’m sorry but you are just plain wrong.
You are suggesting that we can challenge a policy argument based on (what we can only assume is) the motivation for the argument!?
No. I’m not talking about the motivation for it. I’m talking about the justification for it, and I don’t think you’re suggesting that faith in a supernatural being and its desires is sufficient to justify policy. Even if you admit that a secular rationalization is required, then why bother with the superstitious nonsense. The secular reasons are good enough for everyone.
The reasons for a policy DO NOT have to be non-religious–they only need to be good!
What makes a reason good?
I’m talking about the justification for it
You’ll have to search high and low to find a mainstream conservative that is JUSTIFYING policy with religion. The people in the videos may have a different worldview than you (learn to accept the fact that you don’t have a monopoly on the 100% correct worldview) but I don’t believe any of them are going to ask that we make policy based solely on their religious beliefs.
Even if you admit that a secular rationalization is required, then why bother with the superstitious nonsense.
Why don’t we just make a rule that people (a) can’t do anything you don’t like, or (b) can’t think any thoughts that you don’t agree with. That may be the simplest way of satisfying your funny notions.
(learn to accept the fact that you don’t have a monopoly on the 100% correct worldview)
Why don’t we just make a rule that people (a) can’t do anything you don’t like, or (b) can’t think any thoughts that you don’t agree with. That may be the simplest way of satisfying your funny notions
These are but two reasons why this conversation got tedious very quickly. There are others.
These are but two reasons why this conversation got tedious very quickly.
There are others.
Being wrong can be tedious.
I pointed out one logical fallacy employed by philosraptor.
There were others.
Trainman: It’s amusing that you think I was “picking on” these “law-abiding citizens” as you somewhat oddly describe them because I never remotely suggested they were breaking the law.
I also wouldn’t regard my view of what I consider to be the demonstrably lunatic opinions of these cynical religious hucksters to be anything other than my own opinion – there’s nothing “divine” about it, as you sneeringly suggest.
Yes, my “moral framework” is admittedly “arbitrary” in the sense of being cobbled together from life experience and teachings drawn from many religious and philosophical sources (none however actually derived from my backside, as you assert – no pun intended). People who think that their “moral framework” is cut and dried, black and white, or as dictated verbatim by religion are, in my estimation, hopelessly naïve.
I was not castigating people for the act of praying per se, although I will admit to a visceral degree of revulsion to the collective act of doing so in public. I have always felt that prayer is meant to be a very personal thing… a private communion, if you will, with whatever “higher power” one happens to believe in.
What infuriated me about this event is the same feeling of outrage experienced when watching fraudulent hacks like Peter Popoff sell their “miracle water” to hysterically desperate “believers” on late-night infomercials.
Trainman: It’s amusing that you think I was “picking on” these “law-abiding citizens” as you somewhat oddly describe them because I never remotely suggested they were breaking the law.
You weren’t picking on them??
Rabid anti-choice activists…pray for a “miracle of Dunkirk” to save them from the evil, liberal Nazis…the batshit crazy head of the International House of Pancakes oops…rails against all things non-Jeebus related…crackpot religious nutters, hateful bigots, grifting swindlers and right-wing political hacks.
RT, to say you weren’t picking on them is both ignorant and childish.
I never remotely suggested they were breaking the law.
And I never remotely suggested that you did suggest they were breaking the law.
People who think that their “moral framework” is cut and dried, black and white, or as dictated verbatim by religion are, in my estimation, hopelessly naïve.
But that’s just your opinion, which as you suggest isn’t divine, just “cobbled together from life experience”, so I guess we should take your estimation of other’s opinions with a grain of salt.
I have always felt that prayer is meant to be a very personal thing… a private communion, if you will, with whatever “higher power” one happens to believe in.
And that’s also just your opinion–I doubt many folks approach you to draw upon your vast knowledge and understanding of what one’s prayer habits should be, so I’m sure the folks in Texas will breathe easy, in spite of your critique.
What infuriated me about this event is the same feeling of outrage experienced when watching fraudulent hacks like Peter Popoff sell their “miracle water” to hysterically desperate “believers” on late-night infomercials.
Yes, free speech is often infuriating, but often times it provides an opportunity to discuss things with those you disagree with–kind of like this blog.
Well, yes… I guess you could say that I was “picking on them” although to me that characterization is misleading as it implies that these poor dears are somehow being victimized. And I still don’t get why you felt compelled to describe them as “law abiding”… that was just weirdly inexplicable. But whatever.
As for the rest, of course it’s just my opinion and as such, readers can take it or leave it for whatever it’s worth. The difference however between me and these religious fanatics is that I don’t claim to be channeling God, nor do I have the outrageous temerity to claim that I’m speaking on His behalf or with His implicit authority, as do many of these phony demagogues.
p.s. “And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites [are]: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.” — Matthew 6:5
“But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.” — Matthew 6:6
“But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen [do]: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.” — Matthew 6:7