Stupid arguments

MediaMatters flagged a blog by one of the nutball religious right organizations, the American Family Association ("We love all families...so long as they're straight and Christian."). In it, the author argues, with apparent seriousness, that we ought to adopt a policy to stop Muslims from immigrating to America and ship off the ones who are already here.

After I read it, shaking my head, I read the next blog post by the same author, and I just literally can't believe how stupid it is. First, I don't know of any liberal "elitist" who thinks all cultures are "equal" in the way that he pretends. Rather, most postmoderns think that certain customs or traditions within culture are difficult to objectively evaluate. I don't think anyone would say that there aren't valuable things within all cultures, as well as some things that we should perhaps all be critical of (e.g., Western culture promotes materialism and Social Darwinism).

The last part of his post just has to be a spoof. I hope. Read this part:

My point all along has been that the more devout a Muslim becomes, the more of a threat he becomes to our national security. And we just can't know when a "moderate" Muslim, like Maj. Hasan, will suddenly decide to get serious about his faith and wind up going jihadi on Americans.

The question then, which regrettably I failed to ask Imran, is this: how can we tell the difference between the Muslims we don't have to worry about (such as Imran) and the ones we do (such as Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan)? I've yet to receive a satisfactory answer to that question. Once Muslims help us to find a foolproof way to identify the troublesome Muslims, it might make sense to loosen immigration restrictions. Until that day comes, unrestricted Islamic immigration remains a threat to our national security.

Ok. So let me change a few words around there and give that back to this idiot:

My point all along has been that the more devout a Christian becomes, the more of a threat he becomes to our national security. And we just can't know when a "moderate" Christian may evolve into "Christian" militias or Tim McVeigh, and suddenly decide to get serious about his (or her) beliefs and wind up killing Americans.

The question then, which regrettably I failed to ask Bryan Fischer, is this: how can we tell the difference between the Christians we don't have to worry about (such as Bryan Fischer) and the ones we do (such as "Christian" militias or Tim McVeigh)? I've yet to receive a satisfactory answer to that question. Once Christians help us to find a foolproof way to identify the troublesome Christians, it might make sense to loosen immigration restrictions. Until that day comes, unrestricted Christian immigration remains a threat to our national security. We should send devout Christians back to their home countries.

I wonder how he would feel if someone said this to him? I mean, hey, our country is not (to Bryan Fischer's chagrin) a "Christian nation", but an explicitly secular state. We can't afford to have all these devout Christians running around trying to make everyone do what they want them to do.

Focus on the Family poon video #2

The last time we saw this poon Stuart Shepard, he was against helping the poor (like Jesus, I guess). This time, he's asking God to smite the Democratic convention with rain. Olbermann had him as the "Worst Person in the World" last night:


You can see the YouTube video of his imprecation below the fold:

I mean, sure, people are starving to death and dying of disease all over the place, but why waste your time asking God to do something about that?

Stats on sliding Evangelicalism

I'm just not hopeful enough to conclude that the new book by Christine Wicker, The Fall of the Evangelical Church, is anything but hyperbolic and premature in its proclamation. However, she does have some neat stats on her website which support her thesis, which I'll copy the text of below the fold.

I was talking to my dad the other day about how the Southern Baptists always over-report their membership b/c if you're ever baptized in their church, you're on the books as a "member" for life.

In addition, the stats I've compiled on atheism, the new Paul and Zuckerman article and the recent Pew Poll reports are handy references.

A preview of statistics showing the evangelical slide
06/13/2008

The 25 percent of Americans who say they are evangelicals don’t go to church as evangelicals are expected to, don’t act as evangelicals are expected to, and don’t believe as evangelicals are expected to.

So are they evangelicals? No. Not in any way that would justify their dominance in national discussions of ethical and moral values.

Other Christians (67 percent of the population) outnumber traditionalist evangelicals (12.7) by more than five to one, according to the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life Study )

HOW MANY EVANGELICALS ARE THERE?

The most commonly heard statistic about evangelicals is that they are 25 percent of the country, one out of four Americans. That stat comes from what Americans say about their religious practice, which is notoriously unreliable.

In fact, traditionalist evangelicals are 7 percent of the population or 1 out of 14 Americans. Only 7 percent of self-identified evangelicals believe the most central tenets of so-called Bible-based belief and fewer than 7 percent are in church on a given Sunday.

A look at the National Association of Evangelicals and Southern Baptists, the two biggest evangelical groups, shows how inflated the commonly quoted figures are.

The NAE claims to have 30 million members. I counted. It actually has 7.6 million, at most, and perhaps half that actually attend church.

Southern Baptists claim to have 16 million members, but more than five million of those don’t live in the towns where their churches are located.

Five million are actually in church on average and about 4 million attend Sunday school/bible studies (which is how Baptist insiders gauge the health of a church.)

ARE THEY GROWING?

*The percentage of Americans who are evangelicals has been dropping since 1900 when they constituted 42 percent of the population.

*About a thousand evangelicals leave the faith every day.

*The proportion of young American adults who are evangelicals has declined from 22 percent in the 1970s to 20 percent in 2002.

*The percentage of young adult evangelicals who are Biblical literalists (about 55 percent) and has not increased since 1984.

*Most evangelical teens leave church after high school. Southern Baptists lose 88 percent. The Church of Christ loses up to 80 percent. Only 12 percent ever return. Other evangelicals estimate up to 94 percent leave within two years after finishing high school.

*In the country’s most successful churches, 1 out of 4 evangelicals is dissatisfied with the spiritual nourishment and growth provided in their churches. Many are considering leaving.

And that’s not the worst of it, the most dissatisfied are core members who give the most time and money to the church. Without them, the churches could not survive.

Southern Baptists are by far the largest evangelical denomination and the largest group of Protestants in the country. The following statistics came from them.

* Their rate of growth has been falling since the 1950s. (SBC researcher Thom Rainer has put out a graph that shows a diagonal line going straight down.) This means they haven’t resurged at all. They’ve grown but less each year. Try to sell that kind of performance on Wall Street.

* Southern Baptists say they more than 16 million members, but more than five million of them (some say 8 million) don’t live in the towns where their churches are located.

*Five million are actually in church on average I got those figures because they estimate that one out eight people in church is unsaved and about 4 million attend Sunday school/bible studies (which is how Baptist insiders gauge the health of a church.)

*Total baptisms have fallen for seven years out of eight. Last year they fell more than 5 percent.

*Half of the denomination’s 43,000 churches baptize 3 or fewer persons a year.

* Baptisms are falling in every age group except children under five.

*From 1980 to 2005, baptisms among the critical 18 to 34 age group fell 40 percent, from 100,000 to 60,000.

*Only 7 percent of those baptized have grown up without church or in a non-Christian family. At the same time, Americans who say they have no institutional affiliation is growing faster than any other spiritual group. (I have figures.) That means the pool that SBC is least able to tap is growing hugely.

*Total membership went down by 40,000 from 2006 to 2007.

*Members are less dedicated. In 1991, 85 percent of Southern Baptists attended worship and Sunday School. In 2006, the number was down to 68 percent.

* Southern Baptists are establishing churches at half the rate they did in the 1950s. That’s very bad news because a new church attracts new members at twice the rate a three-year-old church does and three times the rate of a 15-year-old church.

DO THEY ACT AS EVANGELICALS ARE THOUGHT TO ACT?

*From sexual behavior to abortion, from divorce to drug taking, the behavior of self-identified evangelicals is almost identical to the rest of the country.

DO THEY BELIEVE AS TRADITIONAL EVANGELICALS ARE THOUGHT TO BELIEVE?

When evangelical pollster George Barna asked nine questions of faith that characterize evangelical belief, he found that only 7 percent of the country qualified. When he went to cities, he couldn’t find one city where one out of four people were evangelicals.

The other 18 percent of Americans who are so often characterized as evangelicals are “self-identified” evangelicals. When pollsters ask them more than their religious affiliation, that number starts to drop. Because this is a very mixed group.

What does this mean politically?

It tells us why only 20 percent of self-identified evangelicals say they are members of the Religious Right. (Because it’s the truth.)

It tells us why James Dobson said he would sit out the election if McCain was the Republican nominee, and then when his bluff was called, decided that he would reconsider. (Because he isn’t the kingmaker he styles himself to be.)

It tells us why abortion is still legal and gay rights are being extended more each year. After more than 20 years of fighting these issues, Religious Right evangelicals haven’t been able to legislate their core issues. They can swing an election but they don’t have enough people to make unpopular laws.

It tells us that McCain must keep his 7 percent base awake and afraid enough to vote but he won’t court them too much for fear of alienating the rest of America, including the 18 percent evangelical swing vote that has been lumped with the Religious Right. Obama has a good chance at that swing vote, which is made up of nominal evangelicals, cultural conservatives and increasingly progressive “emergent church” evangelicals.

He does indeed. McCain has problems there, although people like Dobson will go wherever they still have control.

Christians and campaign finance

I don't remember why this never interested me before, but hearing people like James Dobson argue against campaign finance reform has finally made me stop and think. Let's concede the obvious: making politics fair is not in the best interests of money/power-hungry politicians and their lobbyists.

I mentioned Dobson's recently-founded 501(c)(4) group a while ago, and it looks like a clear reason for him to oppose campaign finance reform is his own organization.

The main thrust of campaign finance reform since the '90s has been targeting soft money. Soft money is contributed not directly to a campaign or candidate, but to a PAC like Dobson's, which then have very little regulation or disclosure requirements with the public. It's basically a way to try to buy elections, and the Supreme Court agreed in 2003 to uphold limitations on soft money. While I agree that our constitutional civil liberties must be protected, the issue is being obfuscated in much the same way that church-state issues are (by the same players): the Constitution protects individual liberties, not those of PACs. While I personally have the right to say and do as I wish with respect to advertising and campaigning for a candidate, the state has a vested interest in regulating the activity of collective efforts backed by corporate dollars.

Any time that transparency mixes with politics, those who practice in the dark fight furiously against the intrusion of light. We should be quite suspicious of those who are so vocal and adamantly opposed to this legislation via sheer demagoguery (using lies about limits on individual religious expression).

I don't actually think that Dobson wants to hide something of his own personal fortune. I mean, hell, Dobson only makes around $300 K himself in his $200M FoF empire (plus $30M for the FoF "Action" political branch), just chump change, really. I think the real fear that these people have is the way that the money flows from their non-profit religious groups to their political action groups. That, combined with who is funding those action groups. I think Dobson doesn't want the public to know that he is bankrolled by the same machinations that Ralph Reed, with the Christian Coalition, was: Jack Abramoff and crooks just like him. I think Dobson and Perkins and others like them are in bed with the same corrupt lobbyists that all the politicians are, and they don't want anyone to know about it. The money they receive from their religious fronts are siphoned over to PACs. They are able to take politicians out to dinner and on trips to influence their votes for their own special interests. Dobson and his ilk are no better than any other politicians or lobbyists in DC, they just don't want anyone to know about it.

Child preachers, abortion & the RR, oh my!

1. This video on child preachers just makes me sad. Check out Marjoe. I did.


2. The new documentary, "Lake of Fire," has stirred up some controversy. Anti-choicers would do well to read up on the facts, and a new WHO study shows that abortion rates are highest in countries where it is illegal, and lowest in countries which have comprehensive sex ed programs and abundant contraception choices. Contrary to all the spin and stupidity, although the US is much more religious than European countries, we have higher rates of teen pregnancy, STDs and abortions than them. Why? Because the religiosity of our country blinds people to the reality that curtailing these things is only accomplished through sex ed for teens and widely-available contraceptive choices. In other words, if they really care about "saving" fetuses, they should be pushing contraception. Instead, they push failed "abstinence-only" policies that lead to more teen pregnancies and STDs. These people don't care about other people, just about controlling them.


3. The RR still doesn't know quite what to do: back the serial-adulterer Giuliani with a liberal track-record on judicial appointments, Mormon "Magic Underwear" Romney -- someone they know only became "pro-life" 5 minutes ago (both he and Giuiliani fit into this category), or someone they know will not win? Dobson swears he'll choose the latter.
   

Conservative weighs in on the fall of the GOP

Respected former Republican John Cole explains why he is voting out the GOP come November:

For starters, people got tired of being associated with these drooling retards. Then, when they realized that these drooling retards had ideological allies running the show in the Bush administration and then began to experience their idiotic policies, they moved from disgusted to outright hostile.

Like me. It had nothing to do with Burke, and everything to do with what the party had become. A bunch of bedwetting, loudmouth, corrupt, hypocritical, and incompetent boobs with a mean streak a mile long and no sense of fair play or proportion.

Seriously- what does the current Republican party stand for? Permanent war, fear, the nanny state, big spending, torture, execution on demand, complete paranoia regarding the media, control over your body, denial of evolution and outright rejection of science, AND ZOMG THEY ARE GONNA MAKE US WEAR BURKHAS, all the while demanding that in order to be a good American I have to spend most of every damned day condemning half my fellow Americans as terrorist appeasers.

And that isn’t even getting into the COMPLETE and TOTAL corruption of our political processes at every level. The shit is really going to hit the fan after we vote these jackasses out of power in 2008.

Screw them. I got out. They can have their party. I will vote for Democrats and little L libertarians and isolationists until the crazy people aren’t running the GOP. The threat of higher taxes in the short term isn’t enough to keep me from voting out crazy people and voting for sane people with whom I merely disagree regarding policy. Hillarycare doesn’t scare me as much as Frank Gaffney having a line to the person with the nuclear football or Dobson and company crafting domestic policy.

That is why the Republican party is in shambles. The majority of us have decided that the movers and shakers in the GOP and the blogospheric right are certified lunatics who, in a decent and sane society, we would have in controlled environments in rocking chairs under shade trees for most of the day, wheeled in at night for tapioca pudding and some karaoke.

Fighting poverty is liberal and thus anti-Christian

Only in the bizzaro world of the Religious Right can one find such tortured convolutions of logic as evidenced in the video below, in which Focus on the Family Action attempts to argue that helping the poor is a liberal cause that should be opposed and the only way to help poor people is to get rid of those goddamned queers and fornicators...while maintaining their staunch Christian credentials throughout, of course:

Quoting Jesus (Matt 25:31-46 NIV):

The Sheep and the Goats



31"When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. 32All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.



34"Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.'



37"Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?'



40"The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.'



41"Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.'



44"They also will answer, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?'



45"He will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.'



46"Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."

Boy, do I feel for them *muffles laughter*

Those poor ol' anti-choicers, who want to control women's medical decisions, they're having a tough time these days:

As they gathered Tuesday for a national strategy session, anti-abortion activists faced an unexpected revolt in their own ranks.

Some of the biggest groups in the movement, including Focus on the Family and National Right to Life, are under attack from fellow activists who accuse them of turning the cause into a money-grubbing industry.

Nooooo...surely not! Surely Dobson and the Religious Right have no interest in money, since Jesus went on and on about how hard it was for a rich man to get into heaven and the Bible says the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil! Falwell's ministries only pulled down a paltry $200M / annum, and Dobson only makes around $300 K himself in his $200M FoF empire (plus $30M for the FoF "Action" political branch), just chump change.

They are also "pro-life", after all, so much so that they don't want the sperm of AIDS-infected persons to suffocate in a rubber, but be liberated to make more little born-again babies!

Read more at the WaPo. HT: DefCon

***UPDATE: You have to read this to believe it. Christian anti-choice group American Life League's youth outreach director says, QUOTE, "It is shameful that Christians would rally around the physical needs of the poor." OMGZ

This idiot needs to go read his Bibbel.***
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Technorati tags: God, Religion, Church-state, Politics

Dobson Breaks the Law -- Pull His Tax-Exemption

So James Dobson (believe it or not) has supported a candidate via his tax-exempt religious organization. He sent out an email to Maryland voters from the FOF politico-religious database. I bet you can't guess which party, can you? Surely, you can't... [HT: Evangelical Right]

Dear Maryland Friend,

I hope you'll take a few moments to read this important and very timely update ... and then forward it to friends, family and fellow church members.

In just a few days, Maryland voters will be going to the polls to elect new leaders, and I have reason to be both very concerned and very hopeful about where your candidates for U.S. Senate stand on the biggest moral issues of our day—life and marriage.

Let me be specific: One of your candidates—Congressman Ben Cardin—is a die-hard supporter of abortion. For more than a decade, he has maintained a 100-percent voting record from the pro-abortion group NARAL and from Planned Parenthood, the largest abortion provider in the world.

What does a perfect pro-abortion voting record look like? Ben Cardin supports abortion through all nine months of pregnancy and even favors the ghastly practice of partial-birth abortion. He voted against the Unborn Victims of Violence Act (also known as "Laci and Conner's Law"), and he faithfully supports making you, the taxpayer, pay for abortions! It's hard to get any more pro-abortion than that!

Is there any doubt that Mr. Cardin will listen to his pro-abortion financiers when it comes to confirming judges to the U.S. Supreme Court? There shouldn't be. The liberal-led filibusters against judicial nominees have been based almost entirely on one thing—where those judges stand on abortion. Indeed, Rep. Cardin announced he would have voted against U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, who indicated a willingness to challenge pro-abortion precedents.

But what about Ben Cardin's stance on marriage? The answer to that question depends on whether you believe his words or his actions. He says he believes in traditional marriage, but he hasn't lifted a finger to protect it. In fact, he has done just the opposite by opposing the very measures that would defend it against the attacks of gay radicals and activist judges.

In both 2004 and 2006, Mr. Cardin had the chance to demonstrate his commitment to traditional marriage, but instead he chose to vote against the federal Marriage Protection Amendment. Further, he even voted against the Marriage Protection Act, which would have taken simple steps to protect marriage.

Consequently, the Human Rights Campaign—the nation's largest lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender advocacy organization—has given significant campaign cash to Ben Cardin in each of the past three elections.

Fortunately, your other Senate candidate, Lt. Governor Michael Steele, has a much better track record, particularly on the sanctity of human life and marriage.

When it comes to life, there's no guessing where he stands. Michael Steele has repeatedly given his commitment to pro-life policies, from abortion to embryonic stem-cell research. Equally important, Lt. Gov. Steele's commitment to defending marriage from redefinition has been clear. He unequivocally supports the Marriage Protection Amendment that would keep liberal courts and radical gay activists from hijacking the institution of marriage.

Finally, when it comes to judges, who have triggered many of the problems on these issues, Steele has clearly underscored the need for judges who will interpret the law rather than make it. This effort to reform the out-of-control judiciary will outlast any politician and is critical to our nation's survival.

With this information in mind, what can you do?

First, please contact both candidates and let them know how you feel about the sanctity of life and the protection of traditional marriage as the union of one man and one woman. Specifically, encourage Michael Steele to continue his support for the sanctity of life and traditional marriage. And please urge Ben Cardin to renounce his pro-abortion and pro-homosexual marriage positions.

Second, if you have friends, family or fellow church members who feel as you do and who may benefit from this information, please forward this e-mail to them.

Don't let the abortion industry and advocates of homosexual marriage have their way in Maryland. Make your voice heard!

Sincerely,

James C. Dobson, Ph.D.
Founder and Chairman

P.S. In addition to contacting the candidates about their positions, please do everything within your power to vote. There is so much riding on this election, you cannot afford to sit this one out!

FOCUS ON THE FAMILY ACTION, INC., DOES NOT ENDORSE CANDIDATES AND NOTHING IN THIS E- MAIL SHOULD BE CONSIDERED AN ENDORSEMENT OF ANY CANDIDATE. THIS E- MAIL PROVIDES INFORMATION ON THE POSITIONS OF THE CANDIDATES AND COMPLIES WITH THE REGULATIONS THAT GOVERN FOCUS ON THE FAMILY ACTION, INC., A NONPARTISAN ISSUE-ADVOCACY ORGANIZATION UNDER SECTION 501(C)(4) OF THE INTERNAL REVENUE CODE.

I just love that ending. It's like me saying,

"Brandon Zewiwoewlkjwe is a child molestor. He is running for the Senate. Do you want to vote for child molestors? Contrariwise, David Qwsewepoqkeoq is a defender of children and loves them.

NOTHING IN THAT STATEMENT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED AN ENDORSEMENT OF EITHER CANDIDATE"

Perhaps Dobson needs to go re-familiarize himself with the 9th Commandment and Jesus' passioinate and multiple warnings against religious hypocrites. He broke the law. Tax his organization. There is no "tax shelter" for a religious organization that supports candidates.

It is far past time to expose these right-wing nutjobs when they clearly break the law. I so look forward to putting this self-described "Moral Majority" back where they belong -- freely feeding people their bullshit religion from pulpits, rather than sucking from the teat of government and being a tool thereof. Rebuilding the wall of separation will take some time, but it is an absolute necessity to the health and long-term wellbeing of our country's future.

Let the mystics and their ramblings be forever kept separate from our country's politics:

Keep the church and state forever separate.
(Ulysses S. Grant, 1875, Leo Pfeffer, Church, State, and Freedom, 1967, p. 337)

Amen, brother.
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Technorati tags: Politics, Religion