Saturday, November 09, 2013

Rachel Maddow's chilling report about George W. Bush and his world ending, Rapture ready, foreign policies. If you have not seen this, you must take the time to listen now.

"It wasn't just an accident that we were almost bringing about the end of the world, that was the point."

I started this blog in November of 2004. And I started it right after George W. Bush beat John Kerry to start his second term.

In fact it is that victory which is the only reason that you are reading these words today.

Somebody had to speak out.

They had to speak out about politics, and religion, and more importantly religion's impact on our politics.

They had to talk about those subject that are always considered taboo in polite get-togethers, family holidays, and conversations with coworkers.

What Rachel is reporting is not new information to me, that was what I was blogging about way back during the Bush administration. I typed until my fingers bled, but it seemed to make little difference.

Until that is 2008 rolled around.

But we are by no means out of the woods yet.

There is a reason that you will rarely see me talk about Astrology, Scientology, Shintoism, Hinduism, or any number of other beliefs which I find ridiculous and potentially damaging. And that is because they do not present the kind of threat that fundamentalism in Christianity and Islam do to this country.

Currently these two, and to be honest mostly Christianity, are to blame for most of the problems we are dealing with right now with public policy toward education, women's health, terrorism, LGBT rights, foreign relations, and numerous others which may or may not seem directly tied to religion.

Like I have said before I do not care if you carry a rabbit's foot for good luck on your key chain, check your horoscope every morning before deciding whether to go into work or not, or if you drop to your knees in prayer when you are confused about what choice to make next. None of those are any of my business, until you force them into the public forum and use them to make public policy, or attempt to force those beliefs onto our childen.

THEN it is our business. And it is especially our business if you use superstitious nonsense as a factor when deciding when or where to wage war, who does or does not deserve to live, or whether the planet will be around long enough for us to worry about a little thing like man made climate change.

20 comments:

  1. Anonymous12:41 PM

    Amen.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous12:52 PM

    George Bush’s Second Coming – Dubya on a Christian mission to convert Jews



    If George W Bush thought he was done being controversial, it appears he was mistaken. Next week, the 43rd US president will deliver the keynote address at a fundraising event for the Messianic Jewish Bible Institute (MBJI), a global organisation that trains its members to convert Jews to Christianity, in the hope of bringing about the Second Coming of Christ.

    Messianic Judaism first emerged as an evangelical force in the 1960s. Its adherents are made up of Christians who have adopted Jewish ritual and customs, and Jewish people who believe that Jesus is the Messiah and the son of God. The sect is frequently criticised by Jews of other denominations for its claim that Christian beliefs are consistent with Jewish theology.

    In 2010, former Republican Senator Rick Santorum spoke at the Messianic Jewish Alliance of America’s annual conference. Abraham Foxman, president of the Anti-Defamation League, which is devoted to battling anti-Semitism, described Santorum’s decision to appear as “insensitive and offensive”.

    According to a report by Mother Jones, the MBJI is based in Dallas but has Bible schools in 12 countries as well as an online “Messianic theology” school and training programmes for aspiring Messianic rabbis or pastors.

    Mr Bush is scheduled to recount his White House experiences to MBJI supporters on 14 November at the Irving Convention Centre in Texas. Tickets for the fundraising event range from $100 to $100,000. The guest speaker at the MBJI’s 2012 fundraiser was the right-wing television personality Glenn Beck.

    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/george-bushs-second-coming--dubya-on-a-christian-mission-to-convert-jews-8929958.html

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    Replies
    1. Thanks for this perfectly disgusting update on Dubya's efforts to "save" Jews. As a Jew, I find the so-called "Messianic Jews" to be both alarming and deeply deceptive.

      I don't need to be "saved," W., thankyouverymuch!

      Delete
    2. Anonymous3:32 AM

      That should arouse some ire among Israelis and most American Jews as well.
      Beaglemom

      Delete
  3. There is not a walking-upright, breathing politician -Republican or Democrat- in this country that believes in any God but money. But the Republicans, by far, are the worst injecting it into their rhetoric to get the stupid to vote against their own interests.

    Does anyone truly think that if Bush and Cheney really believed they faced an accounting in some next life, they'd ever be able to sleep again?

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  4. Randall1:35 PM

    Belief in superstitious nonsense is FAR from harmless.

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  5. Anonymous1:55 PM

    Amen.

    ...and posting this one more time to try and get it out there:


    http://www.patheos.com/blogs/frankschaeffer/2013/11/dumb-evangelicals-are-holding-the-us-hostage-the-story-the-media-wont-tell/

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  6. Anonymous2:23 PM

    My estimation of "W" is now even lower.........like the "limbo".....how low can you go....?

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  7. Anonymous4:17 PM

    https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BYphLimIUAAHS99.jpg

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  8. One of your better messages since I've started following the blog.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Anonymous5:49 PM

    People can do and believe whatever they want as long as they do it in private and don't try to share with me or my family. Superstition is a symptom of OCD and that is something that people should look into getting help for, same as believing in religion or horoscopes but as long as it's their business and not mine, whatever, go on folks and keep on keepin' on.

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  10. Anita Winecooler6:10 PM

    Yes, GW and his "Faith Based Initiatives" were the beginning of the framework for this load of horseshit. Anyone who pays a cent to attend this deserves to have their name published along with their business affiliations.
    Rachel is spot on with her assessment. History will not be kind to the previous administration, what they did to the american people, and their plan to make armageddon come true (How, exactly, does that work? God's supposed to know everything, yet relies on crazy evangelicals to get it in motion? What's right with this picture?)
    And Sarah's one of them. "Israel must prepare for the influx of jewish people in the days weeks and months ahead" WTF Crazy Lady?

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  11. Anonymous7:56 PM

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/08/stephen-breyer-atheist_n_4241515.html

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  12. If you wonder why France decided not to participate, this Vanity Fair Article lays out the reasons. The primary one it seems was Bush discussing Gog and Magog at work in the middle east. We should all be frightened of these people, who are working for what they believe God wants. The relevant exchange starts on page 5 of the article, although I would highly recommend the whole article. http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2012/10/kurt-eichenwald-500-days-excerpt

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    Replies
    1. Anonymous12:12 AM

      Thanks for the link.

      dowl

      Delete
    2. An European Viewpoint3:52 AM

      Seriously, how gullible one has to be to believe that governments decide to engage or not to engage in a war just because of the words used to persuade them ? Wars are not highschool drama : you don't engage in one when there's nothing to gain out of it !

      We French people are much closer and better informed than you American people seem to be about what's happening in the Middle East. Iraq had obviously no weapons of mass destruction. Iraq was also the only non-religious Arabic country - claiming Al Qaeda as a pretense to attack it was ludicrous and only fooled Americans ! But thanks to Bush, Islamism is now alive and well in Iraq too. Religious types love to deal with other religious types. The Talibans were founded and trained by the USA, remember.

      The primary reason was that the whole region is a powder keg. No country in its right mind would go running in there like an uneducated cow boy yelling hiyahh and firing rounds around (except the cowboy's poodle, aka United Kingdom). One didn't have to listen to Bush's cuckoo rethorics to know that he was not entirely there : acts speak better than words.

      We only learned later on that Bush had used this "Gog and Magog" stuff to try to persuade our government ; how we perceived it is "oh, so he didn't organize the mass murder of Iraqi soldiers and civilians (and American soldiers) only out of usual American greed and capitalistic disdain for the life of anyone who's not in his own class, he also thought we were stupid enough to be moved by some religious gibberish ?"

      Delete
  13. Anonymous9:02 PM

    Separation of Church and State? The Founding Fathers were wise in making sure that was clear.

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  14. Anonymous3:31 AM

    Last week I caught the last few minutes (thank God) of a local preacher on Local Access cable television. His rant was about how the Jews have been punished for over 2000 years for not accepting Jesus. (I guess that Hitler was doing God's work back in the 1930's and 1940's.) But then he assured his congregation (to "amens," etc.) that when Jesus comes again, the Jews will finally get the point and follow him and that will be good and we should all look forward to the moment. All followed by repeated "amens" from the congregation. I just do not understand pseudo-Christianity.
    Beaglemom

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  15. Sorry, but converting Jews to Jesus is not anti-semitic. They just want to change the flavor of your insanity. What is the harm in that?

    ReplyDelete

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