Hack Of The Day

Preacher turned Governor turned Presidential Candidate turned millionaire political hack Mike Huckabee knows why the massacre at Shady Hook Elementary School happened - his god was pissed off.

Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee attributed the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in part to restrictions on school prayer and religious materials in the classroom.

"We ask why there is violence in our schools, but we have systematically removed God from our schools," Huckabee said on Fox News, discussing the murder spree that took the lives of 20 children and 6 adults in Newtown, CT that morning. "Should we be so surprised that schools would become a place of carnage?"
Law enforcement has released few details on the alleged gunman, but Huckabee suggested that the separation of church and state may have spurred his rampage.

So his angry god allowed 20 young children to be killed  because it was not getting enough attention.  Sorry Mike, I want no part of such a god.  I am sad to see what you have become.  When you first came on the national scene I didn't agree with your religious views but you seemed to be a populist kind if nice guy.  Those millions you get from FOX have turned you into a Pat Robertson with a bigger congregation.
Update:
Great post by Tom Levenson at Balloon Juice:

In other words: Twenty-eight deaths, including the murder of twenty kids, was the fault not of the shooter, nor of a gun lobby that portrays military weapons as household tools. Rather, said Huckabee, it was your fault and mine for having failed to appease his angry god by public worship in school.
Saying so is to implicate not just America at large in the crime. It also adds up to a claim that those involved in the Sandy Hook Elementary School in particular were complicit in this massacre, for the banishment of one deity or another occured in that particular school too. Lost a kid? Too bad. Shoulda prayed harder; shoulda held up a cross; shoulda, coulda, sorry old chum.
I can’t begin to write the rage and disgust I feel for that sanctimonious shit. (Whether the word “shit” in that sentence applies to the man or the thought I’ll leave it to the reader to decide.) I want to say that it seems to me that there is a special place in hell Mike Huckabee.

Dinesh D'Souza can't keep it in his pants

The pseudo intellectual responsible for the anti Obama film 2016 has some problems with the flock:

The above is a photo of the woman who the Evangelical magazine World reported today is allegedly at a center of a storm around the conservative pundit and president of The King's College, a Christian institution, Dinesh D'Souza.
Denise Odie Joseph II, who according to her Facebook page graduated high school in 2002, is pictured with a copy of D'Souza's book Obama's America. The photo comes from her blog, www.ideniselustafter.com, which has been taken down but can be accessed via a cached copy.
D'Souza, who is separated from his wife but, according to the World story not technically divorced, shared a hotel room with Joseph at a Christian authors conference in South Carolina. He reportedly told attendees that they were engaged.

Like many false Bible thumpers D'Souza has some problems when it comes to hormones.  As it turns out the real Bible thumpers  are not pleased:

The evangelical magazine WORLD is reporting that Dinesh D’Souza, whose book The Roots of Obama’s Rage was the basis for his anti-Obama movie 2016, showed up at a Christian conference last month with his fiancé. He shared a hotel room with the young woman, but, he assured a conference organizer in Clinton-esque fashion, “nothing happened.”

So you figure that conservative Christians might overlook an innocent, pre-marital shared hotel room, right? Perhaps. The real problem is that D’Souza is still married to his wife of 20 years.

According to WORLD’s Warren Smith, D’Souza, whose $10,000 per speech honoraria places him in the “top tier” of Christian speakers, was in South Carolina to speak at a Baptist church, which was hosting “high-profile Christians speak on defending the faith and applying a Christian worldview to their lives.” (Cue guffaws here.)
Smith describes one conference organizer, Alex McFarland, being “distressed” at the behavior of their celebrity speaker. According to Smith, D’Souza told McFarland that he had “recently” filed for divorce, although Smith found in court records that D'Souza filed for divorce about a week after the South Carolina conference took place.
D’Souza is also the president of The King’s College, and Smith reports that he's expected to be under scrutiny by the school’s board over this incident. (Smith’s boss, Marvin Olasky,resigned his post as TKC’s provost shortly after D’Souza was named president in 2010.) After TKC began looking into the matter, D’Souza texted Smith: “I have decided to suspend the engagement.”

Couldn't happen to a nicer guy.  He is such a slime ball.  I wonder how many more $10,000 a shot gigs he will get.

The Lunatics Really Have Taken Over The Asylum

We all know what a lunatic Tod Akin (R-MO) is and he's on the House Science Committee.  Well here is another Republican on that Committee, Paul Broun (R-GA).

And guess what this guy is a physician with an M.D. and a bachelors in chemistry.  Let's take a closer look at what Broun said.

“All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell,” Broun said. “And it’s lies to try to keep me and all the folks who were taught that from understanding that they need a savior.”
According to Broun, the scientific plot was primarily concerned with hiding the true age of the Earth.

 Now this guy should no be able to practice medicine.  And there is more:

“You see, there are a lot of scientific data that I’ve found out as a scientist that actually show that this is really a young Earth,” he said. “I don’t believe that the Earth’s but about 9,000 years old. I believe it was created in six days as we know them. That’s what the Bible says.”

 He must have visited the Creationist Museum.

This is today's Republican Party.
via TPM

The Hypocrisy of the Bible Thumpers

Yes, I'm addicted to the blogs at The American Conservative  because as a progressive I find myself in agreement with them more often than not. In most cases my agreement involves foreign policy but this is an exception:
Ancient (and Modern) Ignorance

Mr. Gardner, may I introduce you to Leviticus 19? Yes, I know, that’s the chapter with the funny stuff about clothing made of two different materials, but notice this passage near the end:

When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God. 

Notice that the people of Israel are not only commanded to love their neighbors as themselves, but also love strangers as themselves. And notice also that in an ethnically diverse and multicultural ancient Middle East, the Israelites knew what it was like to be strangers in a strange land.

As I have noted before the  evangelical Christians do a hell of a job of cherry picking Leviticus.  They sit around eating pork and shell fish in their garments of mixed fabrics while condemning gays - justifying their homophobia.  So what does this say about those brown legals and illegals?  In addition it might be something Mr. Netanyahu might want to think about if he is truly a Jew. 

God VS Smart People

Doug Mataconis found this little gem :Rick Santorum: “The Smart People Will Never Be On Our Side”

The Family Research Council is holding its annual Values Voter Summit in Washington, D.C. again this weekend. Most of the speakers have been about what you’d expect. They’ve had people such as Kirk Cameron, who apparently thinks his time on an 1980s sitcom qualifies him as a political pundit, and Michele Bachmann, who yesterday called President Obama the most dangerous President ever. Today, it was Rick Santorum’s turn, and his speech in part focused on a favorite topic among Social Conservatives, the denigration of intellectualism: 

WASHINGTON, DC — Former presidential candidate Rick Santorum attacked the media and “smart people” for not being on the side of conservatives in a speech to the Values Voter Summit on Saturday. 

“We will never have the media on our side, ever, in this country,” Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator, told the audience at the Omni Shoreham hotel. “We will never have the elite, smart people on our side.” 

The media “doesn’t like the other side,” Santorum said. “And not necessarily, I would argue, because they agree with them, but because they can influence the country. “If just a few people make decisions about what this world looks like, what this country looks like, then you have people sitting in offices at major media outlets and Hollywood who think they can deal with a small group of people, to get them to jump through the hoops they want you to,” Santorum said.

This is just the latest example of the populist anti-intellectualism that has become the conservative movement. It wasn't always this way.  There was a time when the conservative movement was represented by men like William F. Buckley Jr but today it's Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin.  The movement want's to return us to the 15th century.
Here's the video;

Too many Christians - Not enough lions!

Student Sues 'Anti-Christian' Teacher Over Remarks in Class

A student and his family have filed a federal lawsuit demanding that a popular European history teacher at California's Capistrano Valley High School be fired for what they say were anti-Christian remarks he made in the classroom.

And what were those "anti-Christian" remarks you ask?

Farnan recorded his teacher telling students in class: “What country has the highest murder rate? The South! What part of the country has the highest rape rate? The South! What part of the country has the highest rate of church attendance? The South!”

The facts hurt. Of course the teacher left out a few like the highest rate of teen pregnancy and the highest rate of driving while drunk.

The Wild West

The Republicans have a number of things going against them. A lack of money, a soiled brand name and a President with a 30 percent approval rating. The mountain west has been red for several election cycles but the western Republican is really a libertarian and if truth be known this western progressive has a libertarian side. All you have to do is go over to LewRockwell.com or the CATO Institute blog to discover that the Libertarians are not too crazy about the neocons and the Republican party. In the west that has translated into into this:
GOP ACHILLES HEEL
HOW REPUBLICANS LOST WEST

CHEERED as Republicans may be by the Clinton-Obama wars, the fact is that long-term trends still favor the Democrats this fall. To see the problem, consider the interior West - the eight states between the Midwest and the Pacific Coast: Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming.

This week, I spoke at a panel put on here in Denver by the America's Future Foundation, a youth-oriented libertarian-conservative group. The topic: "How the West Will Be Lost."

In fact, having heard my fellow panelists' takes on the situation in Colorado and the rest of the region, the use of the future tense looks optimistic: The GOP is already well on its way to losing the West.

The reasons were well summed up by the president of Colorado's Independence Institute and a popular conservative radio talk-show host in the state, Jon Caldara: "We lost our values. We lost our way."

It's been clear for years the interior West, once reliably Republican, was becoming a swing region. While 60,000 votes in Ohio would have thrown the presidential race to John Kerry in 2004, roughly the same number of votes, split between Colorado, Nevada and New Mexico, would have done the same thing. All three were on the verge of turning "blue" in 2004; they've since gone over that edge.

Not the party of Barry Goldwater!

The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press finds that the share of voters who call themselves Republicans has dropped six points nationwide since 2004. That doesn't matter much in the Northeast (where the GOP's already locked out) or Down South (where the GOP remains dominant). But in the interior West, it's a big, big deal.

In 2000, none of these eight states had a Democratic governor. Now five do, including Colorado. A 2006 post-election Salt Lake City Tribune analysis showed that, where the GOP had beaten the Democrats by 20 points in the region's vote for the House in 2000, that advantage had fallen to one point in 2006. A few states, including Colorado, Nevada and New Mexico, had seen a majority of House votes cast for the Democrats.

In fact, Colorado now looks bluer than a half-drowned Smurf. It's got a Democratic governor, House, Senate and high court. The GOP lost both houses of the Legislature in 2004 after spending a session on such issues as gay marriage, the Pledge of Allegiance and the liberal biases of college professors - while the state faced a massive fiscal crisis.

At the federal level, the state's got a recently minted Democratic senator (Ken Salazar, replacing a Republican in 2004) and two recently acquired House seats (one picked up in 2004, one in '06). Turning Blue on the presidential ballot is all that's left in this metamorphosis.

As Caldara put it: "Colorado is, in fact, the test tube of how to export liberal expansion to the Western states." A moderately conservative state has been turned Blue, Caldara says, because of "the absolute demolishing of what the Right stood for, how the Republican Party turned into something it was never meant to be and went away from Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan ideas."

Under Clinton and the DLC the Democratic party abandoned it's progressive roots and lost the House and the Senate. Under George W. Bush, the neocons and social conservatives the Republican party abandoned it's Libertarian roots and that's how the west was lost.

Between a rock and a hard place II

I discussed John McCain's Hagee problem below. Well it's not getting any better.
McCain seeks distance from pastor

PHOENIX - John McCain is refusing to renounce the endorsement of a prominent Texas televangelist who Democrats say peddles anti-Catholic and other intolerant speech.

Instead, the Republican presidential candidate issued a statement Friday afternoon saying he had unspecified disagreements with the San Antonio megachurch leader, John Hagee. Hagee endorsed him at a news conference Wednesday in San Antonio.

"However, in no way did I intend for his endorsement to suggest that I in turn agree with all of Pastor Hagee's views, which I obviously do not," McCain said in the statement.

His campaign issued the statement after two days of criticism from the Democratic National Committee, the Catholic League and Catholics United.

Democrats quoted Hagee as saying the Catholic Church conspired with Nazis against the Jews and that Hurricane Katrina was God's retribution for homosexual sin, and they recited his demeaning comments about women and flip remarks about slavery.

"Hagee's hate speech has no place in public discourse, and McCain's embrace of this figure raises serious questions about John McCain's character and his willingness to do anything to win," said Tom McMahon, executive director of the Democratic National Committee.

Well it's not just the Democrats that are upset with McCain. Our often reasonable friend on the right, Rick Moran has some choice words for St John and a rather strong opinion about Mr Hagee.

How this man has amassed the influence and power he has is frankly beyond my comprehension. To realize that still, in this day and age, there is the kind of virulent anti-Catholic bigotry that animated so much of American history by coloring our attitudes toward newcomers from Ireland, Italy, and Slavic countries is depressing in the extreme. To the ignorant followers and believers in this man and what he teaches, I have nothing but contempt.

The question is, why doesn’t John McCain share that feeling of disgust? He has issued a milquetoast disclaimer that he doesn’t hold with all of Hagee’s beliefs. In fact, since his warm acceptance of Hagee’s endorsement, McCain has done nothing but try and backtrack, tripping over himself as he does:

McCain was pressed on the issue Friday morning in Round Rock, Texas. Hagee “supports what I stand for and believe in,” McCain said.

“When he endorses me, that does not mean that I endorse everything that he stands for and believes in,” McCain said. “I don’t have to agree with everyone who endorses my campaign.”

He added that he was “proud” of Hagee’s spiritual leadership of his congregation at the 17,000-member Cornerstone Church.

Doesn’t McCain realize that Hagee’s “spiritual leadership” includes filling the heads of the faithful with hate filled rants against Muslims, gays, Catholics, and others? How can a presidential candidate who says he wants to change the quality of dialogue in this country accept the endorsement of this bigot?

McCain is no stranger to controversies like this. In the 2000 campaign, he spoke at the notorious Bob Jones University where interracial dating was against school policy.

(As an aside, why aren’t these people read out of the conservative movement the same way the Birchers and other extremists were kicked out by Buckley and others in the 1950’s?)

Simply saying you don’t agree with everything Hagee says isn’t good enough. There are some endorsements that should be rejected out of hand. Saying “I reject John Hagee’s endorsement and all the bigoted statements he has made…” would be political suicide with a segment of evangelicals but might be the start of sweeping these extremists out of the party.

Now what my friend Rick should realize is that McCain or any other Republican is truly between a rock and a hard place. The intolerant Christian Taliban are part of the base created by Lee Attwater and Karl Rove. While they may cost McCain independent and even moderate Republican voters if they are offended it almost guarantees a third party candidate that will syphon off votes for McCain. Yes Republicans you reap what you sow and you can't win without them and you can't win with them.

Between a rock and a hard place

St John McBush finds himself caught in the middle of dueling Christian wingnuts. St John gladly accepted the endorsement of the apocalyptic Texas evangelicalist John Hagee. The problem is Hagee is very anti Catholic, in fact a bigot. As a result the right wing faction of the Catholic Church is none to pleased with St John of McCain.
McCAIN EMBRACES BIGOT

Yesterday, Senator John McCain said he was “very honored by Pastor John Hagee’s endorsement.” The Republican presidential hopeful also called Hagee “the staunchest leader of our Christian evangelical movement,” citing the minister’s pro-Israel stance.

Catholic League president Bill Donohue addressed this today:

“There are plenty of staunch evangelical leaders who are pro-Israel, but are not anti-Catholic. John Hagee is not one of them. Indeed, for the past few decades, he has waged an unrelenting war against the Catholic Church. For example, he likes calling it ‘The Great Whore,’ an ‘apostate church,’ the ‘anti-Christ,’ and a ‘false cult system.’ To hear the bigot in his own words, click here. Note: he isn’t talking about the Buddhists.

“In Hagee’s latest book, Jerusalem Countdown, he calls Hitler a Catholic who murdered Jews while the Catholic Church did nothing. ‘The sell-out of Catholicism to Hitler began not with the people but with the Vatican itself,’ he writes.

“For the record, Hitler persecuted the Catholic Church and was automatically excommunicated in 1931—two years before he assumed power—when he acted as best man at Joseph Goebbel’s Protestant wedding. Hitler even bragged about his separation from the Church. As for doing nothing about the Holocaust, Sir Martin Gilbert reminds us that Goebbels denounced Pope Pius XII for his 1942 Christmas message criticizing the Nazis (the New York Times lauded the pope for doing so in an editorial for two years in a row). Much to Hagee’s chagrin, Gilbert also says that Pius XII saved three quarters of the Jews in Rome, and that more Jews were saved proportionately in Catholic countries than Protestant countries. Indeed, Israeli diplomat Pinchas Lapide credited the Catholic Church with saving 860,000 Jews. No religion can match that.

“Senator Obama has repudiated the endorsement of Louis Farrakhan, another bigot. McCain should follow suit and retract his embrace of Hagee.”

I'm not a Catholic or a Christian but I have to side with the Catholic League on this one. But Hagee is a lunatic and a bigot which makes him a member in good standing of today's Republican party.

The Republicans as Faust

Faustian
Something that is faustian refers to a wider interpretation of the events of Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. In part one of Goethe's Faust, the central character's pact with the devil allows him to have energy, life and youth unless he becomes so entranced by the passing moment that he wishes that things will never change. When Faust stumbles unthinkingly into that wish, his world and his life are forfeit to Mephistopheles.

The Republicans owe their success to the 15th century loving evangelical Christians. For their support the American Taliban received lip service from the party while their medieval aspirations were marginalized. The Republicans wished that things would never change but change they did. The evangelicals were not getting what they want and are no longer willing to vote against their own economic best interest for lip service alone. According to Captain Ed it's all the evangelicals fault.

This is commonly known as being hoisted by one's own petard. The problem the Religious Right had in this primary was the hang-up over religion, which their movement had avoided for most of its period of influence. In the end, their leaders couldn't see past religion to policy, and that left Romney twisting in the wind.

The evangelical leadership didn't make that mistake with Ronald Reagan or George H. W. Bush. Neither man expressed any personal enthusiasm as evangelicals; Reagan had been divorced once on top of that. Yet the evangelicals supported them enthusiastically for their agendas, not for their particular churching.

For some reason, evangelicals seemed primed for petulance this cycle, and Gilgoff speculates that post-W malaise could have been part of the reason. They got used to having an evangelical in the White House and didn't want to consider supporting any other kind of candidate. Dobson and Tony Perkins announced last year that they might form a third party for evangelicals because of their dissatisfaction with the slate of Republican candidates -- even though the first primaries were months out and they could have found Republicans to support around the country.

When they finally engaged with Romney, they liked his agenda and his ability to organize. Pat Robertson endorsed Rudy Giuliani, but most evangelical leaders lined up behind Romney, but refused to support Romney rather than just attack everyone else. They could not bring themselves to explain why Romney's Mormonism shouldn't matter, and indeed emphasized their analysis of it as a non-Christian religion, something Mormons hotly dispute. They lost sight of the political agenda and instead got tripped by their doctrinal agenda.

Their constituents simply didn't follow them at the polls. Instead, they voted for Mike Huckabee in Iowa and in the South. The voters followed the leadership's obvious desire to see an evangelical in the White House rather than the focus on policy -- and then discovered that evangelicals still represent only a portion of the Republican vote. Huckabee couldn't convince non-evangelicals to turn out in large numbers, and that left the field to John McCain.

When you make a pact with the devil he won't settle for lip service for ever.

End of the coalition

Jack Balkin points out what we have we have been saying here that the coalition that has resulted in Republican wins since 1980 is all but dead and credits George W. Bush for it's death.

If 2008 turns out to be a pivotal election, defining a new political era, it is important to give credit where credit is due. Two key reasons for the change will be the crackup of the coalition of the dominant party of the era, the Republicans, and the almost complete political failure of George W. Bush and his chief political adviser, Karl Rove. Let me begin with the second reason, and then move to the first.

The Bush/Rove strategy of accentuating divisions along partisan lines was a bold gamble that ultimately failed, because it depended on the Bush presidency being successful. Think of it this way: If Bush does well at his task, then people at the margins gravitate toward the winning side and the Republican coalition slowly expands over time, rejuvenating the party and producing a post-Reagan vision (organized, for example, around the War on Terror and the opportunity society) that extends well into the future. But if Bush does badly, or as it turned out, very badly, the same strategy that encourages increased partisanship and divisiveness will tend to make Americans believe that these features of political life are also the cause of political failure. They will seek both change and a sense of unity. This is precisely what Obama has tapped into, which is why he has been successful so far. Obama, if you will, is what Bush's strategy has produced.

Now I think that the coalition was bound to unravel anyway but the failure of George W. Bush may have sped it up. The Reagan Revolution itself was responsible. The social conservatives could only be expected to vote against their own economic interests for so long. For that reason I think Huckabee may deserve more of the credit than Bush. As I explained the other day:

People are not voting for Huckabee because he's a likable guy they are voting for him because they are scared. Not of the Islamo terrorists but they are afraid of losing their jobs, their house and their medical insurance.

[.....]

They don't trust the leaders in government or the leaders in business to look out for them. And we are not just talking about the working poor - there are families with six figure incomes that have the same fears.

Biting the hand that empowers you

The Republicans are in between a rock and a hard place. The Republicans came to power because of the social conservatives. They are now experiencing the blow back in the form of Mike Huckabee. To stop the Huckster they have to insult the very base that empowered them and that's just what they are doing. It started before Iowa with Rich Lowry's pathetic rants at the National Review, here and here. Well post Iowa it has gotten really nasty. For example Steven Green at the Vodka Pundit:

I’ll put this in language even your tiny little Iowa brains can understand: What the f*** is wrong with you people?

[....]

All my love, you corn-sucking idiots,

Even the normally rational Rick Moran got in on the action.

Does any of this matter to the superstitious nincompoops in other states who are salivating to vote for this guy?

I understand Rick's frustration as a fellow atheist but Rick my friend it's not my base - I don't need these "nincompoops" but your party does if it ever wants to win another election.

A Christian Nation???

Over the last few years we have seen the theocons attempt to rewrite the constitution and the words of the founding fathers to demonstrate that the United States is a "Christian Nation". One of the most outrageous claims is that out legal system is based on the Ten Commandments. The latest to do this is the none too bright Mike Huckabee:

"The Ten Commandments form the basis of most of our laws and therefore, you know if you look through them does anybody find anything there that would be all that objectionable? I don't think most people would if they actually read them," he said.

Ed Brayton explains how this is utter nonsense. As it turns out commandants one through four are blatantly unconstitutional. Only two of the commandments, Thou shalt not kill and Thou shalt not steal, are actually part of our legal system and they are found in all legal systems in the world. The remaining four are simply not part of the legal system. Go read Brayton's post for the details.

Karl Rove's Frankenstein - Part II

A few days ago I discussed poor Rich Lowry's sudden realization the the crazy bible thumpers of the Religious Right had taken over the Republican party. I said at the time:

This was oh so predictable. Karl Rove marshaled the 16th century masses to vote against their own best interests in order to stop a woman's right to choose, an individuals right to die with dignity and to enforce selected portions of Leviticus. They all but took over the party. Well they are once again being ignored by the party's movers and shakers and they don't like it. Well guess what? They have their own guy in the race, Mike Huckabee, and they don't see any reason to support the anti Leviticus, Rudy, or the cultist, Mitt. A Frankenstein monster indeed.

Well poor Rich is at it again.
Huckacide
A shiny Christmas present for the Democrats

The GOP’s social conservatism inarguably has been an enormous benefit to the party throughout the past 30 years, winning over conservative Democrats and lower-income voters who otherwise might not find the Republican limited-government message appealing. That said, nominating a Southern Baptist pastor running on his religiosity would be rather overdoing it. Social conservatism has to be part of the Republican message, but it can’t be the message in its entirety.

Someone needs to tell Huckabee. His first TV ads in Iowa touted him as a “Christian leader,” and his target audience of evangelicals has responded. But according to a Pew poll released in early December, only 1 in 7 nonevangelical Republicans support him in Iowa and 1 in 20 nonevangelicals in New Hampshire and South Carolina.

Huckabee has declared that he doesn’t believe in evolution. Even if there are many people in America who agree with him, his position would play into the image of Republicans as the anti-science party. This would tend to push away independents and upper-income Republicans. In short, Huckabee would take a strength of the GOP and, through overplaying it, make it a weakness.

I have to wonder how the Religious Right feels about suddenly becoming "a weakness". The Republican Party could not have won an election without the Social Conservatives. Over the last seven years they took control and did any number of nutty things that offended the majority of Americans making them a liability. John Cole reminds us that Lowry and his magazine were cheerleaders for much of that 16th century insanity.

Where the hell has Lowry been the last decade? Let’s review this GOP’s greatest hits:

Terri Schiavo
Marriage Amendments
Stem Cell Bans
Doctoring Scientific reports
Evolution Denial
Global Warming denial
Just Us Sunday
Abstinence Only
Faith-based initiatives
Election year anti-gay ballot initiatives

And so on and so on. The GOP is, quite simply, little more than freakish display of social conservatism. And you can go through the NRO archives and see what they had to say about every one of those issues and others (protip- they were supportive). Rather than trying to run from his creation, Lowry should embrace it- he and his cohort had a good hand in making the GOP what it is today. Enjoy, and quit pretending to be surprised when the villagers race to destroy your monster with pitchforks and torches.

To quote the Bible:

As you sow so shall you reap

~Galatians VI

Andrew Sullivan has some thoughts.

It's amazing to me to watch Rich Lowry and Charles Krauthammer begin to panic at the signs of Christianism taking over the Republican party. Where, one wonders, have they been for the past decade? They have long pooh-poohed those of us who have been warning about this for a long time, while cozying up to Christianists for cynical or instrumental reasons. But now they want to draw the line. Alas, it's too late, I think, for Charles to urge an openness toward atheism or non-religion in a party remade on explicitly religious grounds by Bush and Rove. Who was it, after all, who cited Jesus Christ as the most influential "philosopher" in his life as part of his electoral strategy? Who reorganized his party to base it on churches? The man whom Krauthammer eagerly supported in two consecutive elections.

And he concludes with this:

This, to me, is the critical distinction between a Christianist and a mere Christian. One wants to infuse politics with religion; the other wants to respect both, separately, and to keep religion private. I should add I do not want to banish the word "God" from the public square. But I do want that invocation to be as thin and as empty and as formal as the Founders intended. The current Republican party has reinvented itself as a force on opposite grounds. The party of Huckabee and Romney, the party of Hewitt and Dobson, the party of Ponnuru and Neuhaus is emphatically not a secular party.

And that is why part of me, I confess, wants Huckabee to win. So he can lose. So the GOP can lose - as spectacularly and humiliatingly as possible. If we are to rid conservatism of this theocratic cancer, we need to start over. Maybe it has to get worse before it can get better. But it is certainly too late for fellow-traveling Christianists like Lowry and Krauthammer to start whining now. This is their party. And they asked for every last bit of it.

The Road To Nowhere

Mitt Romney has spent a lot of money to fuel his campaign down the road to nowhere. As you can see in the latest RCP poll average he is in fifth. The general consensus is that after his "Faith In America" address he is still on the same road only going faster. I have discussed this ad nauseum already but there is some good analysis out there tonight you might want to check out.

• Lee Harris explains How and Why Romney Bombed

  The Mormon church is not Romney's problem; it is Romney's own personal religiosity. On the one hand, Romney is too religious for those who don't like religion in public life—a fact that alienates him from those who could care less about a candidate's religion, so long as the candidate doesn't much care about it himself. On the other hand, Romney offends precisely those Christian evangelicals who agree with him most on the importance of religion in our civic life, many of whom would be his natural supporters if only he was a "real" Christian like them, and not a Mormon instead.
  
  
  To say that someone is not a real Christian sounds rather insulting, like saying that he is not a good person. But when conservative Christians make this point about Romney, they are talking theology, not morality. Anyone with even a passing familiarity with the Mormon creed will understand at once why Romney felt little desire to debate its theological niceties with his target audience of Christian evangelicals, many of whom are inclined to see Mormonism not as a bona fide religion, but as a cult. In my state of Georgia, for example, there are Southern Baptist congregations that raise thousands of dollars to send missionaries to convert the Mormons to Christianity.

• In Romney's Terrible Speech Matthew Yglesias explains the theology.

  It's hard to see this as anything other than an effort to trick people; the Mormon emphasis on Gethsemane rather than the crucifiction is not a trivial theological difference, nor is the fact that Mormons believe in "another," more important, Testament of Jesus Christ in addition to the Christian Bible. I don't personally have a stake in that quarrel but I paid enough attention in Bible class at Grace Church School to know that this isn't some nothing to be papered over.
  
  Now if Romney had wanted to say that the nature of his beliefs about Jesus are irrelevant to the campaign, fine. Similarly, if he'd actually wanted to avoid discussing Mormon theology, fine. But he didn't stick to it. Instead, what he wanted to do was discuss just enough about Mormon theology to make it seem as similar as possible to orthodox Christianity while underscoring the idea that the nature of his belief in Christ is relevant to the campaign just insofar as his beliefs overlap with those of the Evangelical Protestants whose votes he's courting.
  
  All of this meshes with Romney's disgusting efforts to unite all people of faith under the banner of excluding atheists entirely from his account of virtue. And this, in turn, combines with his ludicrous "say something nice about everyone" paragraph:....

• And this brings us to an all important question: How is it playing in Iowa?. Not too well apparently.

  Not great.
  
  At least not in the most powerful paper in the state, The Des Moines Register.
  
  The arrival of snow here in the heartland as well as the Omaha tragedy has diminished some of the coverage, but The Speech still got considerable attention yesterday and today.
  
  It was above the fold, in the top right corner (the traditional lead story position) of yesterday's paper.
  
  "Romney takes risk with talk on faith," read the headline above David Lightman's syndicated story. The piece included significant skepticism about the political impact of Romney's speech. But worse for Mitt's camp, it included this key right under the story ended on page one: "Learn more about Mormonism" (yes, it was in bold).
  
  On the back of the front section was a list of bullet points under "Beliefs of the Mormon Church." Naturally, included were all the key differences between the LDS church and mainline Christianity.

Romney's real problem is Romney. He knows he needs the Evangelical Christian vote and as a result has done a recent 180 on every issue that's important to them. They noticed! And now this speech where he attempts to explain his faith without explaining it and once again it's a NO SALE. He was preaching tolerance to least tolerant group of people in the country. And they don't need him - they have Mike Huckabee.

More on Romney's "Faith In America"

I have given my thoughts on Mitt Romney's "Faith In America" address here and here. Well the MSM and the blogosphere are giving their opinions today including a commentary by the Washington Post. My own local paper, The Oregonian, a right leaning paper and supporter of Oregon's Mormon Senator Gordon Smith is critical of Romney's address.
Your America is too small
Mitt Romney may have defused some religious concerns within his Republican base, but he missed a larger opportunity

I n defending his Mormon faith on Thursday, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney may have gotten where he needed to go politically. He may have reassured some voters within his Republican base that he is, indeed, sufficiently Christian.

But, sadly, Romney failed to take the nation someplace new, as John F. Kennedy did in 1960, when he enlarged the nation's understanding not only of his Roman Catholic faith, but also of its own religious freedom.

Romney, similarly, had our attention. He could have articulated a vision of religious freedom so broad, so all-encompassing -- and so confident in itself -- that it could embrace even skeptics. But he didn't.

Instead, he took a predictable slap at "the religion of secularism." And he failed to offer even a stout defense of his own faith, barely mentioning the word "Mormon." The Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-day Saints has a strong presence in Oregon, and a strong record of public service here and elsewhere.

We know this not only because many Oregonians belong to it, but also because we have a senator, Gordon Smith, who is a Mormon, and whose religion has never interfered with his public service. The ignorant attacks on this faith tradition should sting all of us, at least vicariously, and Romney should have offered a more spirited defense.

Alas, the speech reminded us of the religious classic from a half-century ago, "Your God is Too Small." The portrait of America that Romney painted is too small. Not only did he miss a chance to illuminate his own faith, he also missed a larger opportunity to reach out to Americans who aren't affiliated with any denomination, and who keep the finer points of their religious -- or non-religious -- views to themselves.

That includes many Oregonians. And a few other people who didn't turn out too badly in office, like Abe Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson. (Romney did quote John Adams several times, but he should have gone on to explain that Adams, a Unitarian, might not stand a very good chance of being elected today.)

That's right, Abe Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams could never win the Republican nomination today. Even Peggy Noonan admits that her party is now controlled by people with their feet firmly planted in the 15th century.

Karl Rove's Frankenstein

This is an interesting little post by The National Review's Rich Lowry:
Revenge of the Evangelicals

Remember how evangelicals had "matured"? Remember how the war on terror had replaced social issues? It shouldn't be hard, since all those things were being said a couple of weeks ago (heck, still being said maybe even a few days ago). Part of what seems to be going on with the Huckabee surge is evangelicals sticking their thumbs in the eyes of the chattering class—we're still here, we still matter, and we still care about our signature issues. Remember the lack of excitement in the Republican race, especially among dispirited social conservatives? Well, now there is some excitement, and it isn't over free market economics or the war on terror, but a candidate who doesn't speak compellingly about either of those things but instead about social issues. As a friend I was talking to a little earlier points out, the most important moment of the campaign so far came when a social conservative excited a social conservative audience—Huckabee with his "I come from you" speech at the "values summit." This friend argues that the Huck surge makes it harder, not easier, for Rudy to win the nomination. Now that many evangelicals have a horse in this race, it would be very hard to tell them that not only will their guy not get the nomination, but they'll have to settle for a pro-choicer. I don't know about that, but Huck has certainly trashed about nine months-worth of conventional wisdom on the changing nature of social conservative voters.

This was oh so predictable. Karl Rove marshaled the 16th century masses to vote against their own best interests in order to stop a woman's right to choose, an individual's right to die with dignity and to enforce selected portions of Leviticus. They all but took over the party. Well they are once again being ignored by the party's movers and shakers and they don't like it. Well guess what? They have their own guy in the race, Mike Huckabee, and they don't see any reason to support the anti Leviticus, Rudy, or the cultist, Mitt. A Frankenstein monster indeed.

Quote of the day

Sully hits a bulls eye with this one so the entire post is the quote of the day.

Since the Bush right insists that Robertson is completely irrelevant to the current GOP, I have no idea why they are fixated by his endorsement of Giuliani. For me, however, it seals the deal. Robertson blamed Americans for causing 9/11. He is a charlatan and a religious phony. He has enriched himself at the expense of millions of gullible Christians who did not understand that this man's sole principle is his own power and wealth. It doesn't surprise me that he sees eye to eye with Giuliani. They are very similar characters. But he does represent what may be becoming the consensus among Christianists: that the war on Islamic terrorism is the prime issue; and that the way to tackle it is by increasing military aggression, bombing or occupying Muslim countries, preserving Israel solely to hasten the Apocalypse, and entrenching torture as a pillar of American national security policy. The fusion of Giuliani's authoritarianism with Robertson's Christianism is indeed one future path for the GOP. It is enlightening to me to witness two very similar politicians sink their differences to forge that new, fascistic direction.

The bold is mine.

Good For Grassley

Nixon did what no Democrat could do - he went to China. Now Iowa's Charles Grassley is again doing what no Democrat could do - take on big religion.
Senate Panel Probes 6 Top Televangelists
Sen. Charles Grassley Asks Ministries To Turn Over Financial Records Within One Month

CBS News has learned Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, is investigating six prominent televangelist ministries for possible financial misconduct.

Letters were sent Monday to the ministries demanding that financial statements and records be turned over to the committee by December 6th.

According to Grassley's office, the Iowa Republican is trying to determine whether or not these ministries are improperly using their tax-exempt status as churches to shield lavish lifestyles.

The six ministries identified as being under investigation by the committee are led by: Paula White, Joyce Meyer, Creflo Dollar, Eddie Long, Kenneth Copeland and Benny Hinn. Three of the six - Benny Hinn, Kenneth Copeland and Creflo Dollar - also sit on the Board of Regents for the Oral Roberts University.

This is something that should have been done a long time ago. These so called ministers have become multi millionaires by taking money from those who can least afford it. I have to wonder if this sudden interest is because there are questions about whether these millionaire preacher/business types can continue to deliver votes to the GOP.

Update
Bull Dog Pundit points out the downside

The one that interests me the most is my main man Benny Hinn? Have you ever caught his “This Is Your Day” show? The dude has cured everything from the common cold to cancer, merely by putting his hands on people and demanding that the “devil be gone!!!!”

I mean, if they take him off the air I’m going to be disappointed because when he’s on top of his game, which he usually is, Benny Hinn is the best thing going on TV.

His latest scam was asking people donated to fund his purchase of “Dove 1″ a luxury aircraft to spread the Lord’s word. How does he expect to save souls flying coach?

I have to say I view televangelists as some of the best entertainment on TV, especially Benny.

A Natural Transition - BDS to RDS

Phillip Klein writes:
Hating Rudy
The Angry Left finds a new target.

With the end of the dreaded Bush era approaching, Rudy Giuliani has slowly begun to supplant the president as the leading hate figure among liberals, a reality that will only help Mr. Giuliani in his efforts to overcome his differences with conservatives and win the Republican nomination.

Now there certainly is some truth in the statement above. With the lawless horrors of the Bush administration winding down the next potential constitution hating tyrant is certainly someone who is getting a lot of attention. There is a flaw in this however: "a reality that will only help Mr. Giuliani in his efforts to overcome his differences with conservatives and win the Republican nomination". It may help him when the nomination but not the general election. Rudy will simply be a continuation of what 70% of Americans have rejected - the policies of the Bush administration. There has been some talk about the Religious Right rejecting Rudy but I think a greater conservative threat comes from the Libertarians. The Bush administration's treatment of the constitution and law as inconvenient and irrelevant has shocked the Libertarians. When Rudy talks you hear someone who has even less respect for constitution.

Update

Digby explains why many of us are suddenly afflicted with RDS.

I'm finding myself more and more obsessed with the Giuliani campaign because it really appears to me that the Republicans may just nominate someone dumber than Bush and crazier than Cheney. And without the morals of either of them. How is that even possible?