Post by peterfredson on Feb 24, 2005 10:37:35 GMT -5
BEING GODLY
By Peter Fredson
George Bush II is Godly. Although he doesn’t know enough theology to fill a peanut shell, he says he Loves Jesus and talks to God, and that is enough nowadays to get him elected President. He says he loves the 10 Commandments and wants to see them posted in every public place, and declares everybody should pray, and that is enough to raise 100 million dollars and several million votes. He says he wants bible passages about gays and marriage to be put in the Constitution and that is enough to get the entire Far Right solidly behind any stupidity he pronounces.
George Bush II used deception, stealth and misdirection in his quest for power, modern fundamentalist characteristics, and instituted a self-imposed war against Iraq on specious pretexts. He presented himself as a Warrior for Jesus, complete in Air Force Flight uniform, which he uses to show that he courageously fights “for the right.” (Pun Intended). As Poster Boy of the Far Right, he is sometimes illustrated with a small halo above his head. He fervently believes that he was selected by an invisible intangible omnipotent omnipresent entity to detect evil and eradicate it, and perhaps to bring about the APOCALYPSE when everybody (except himself and Jerry Falwell) will go screaming into hell and all real estate investment on earth will suddenly vanish.
After failing to catch Osama bin Laden, he found Evil and Oil in Iraq instead. Then he began threatening Iran and Syria with indications that he will do the same whenever and wherever he desires, for who will naysay him? His lawyers told him that he has absolute power to do anything he pleases. And, indeed, He turned Congress into an adjunct of the Oval Office, with sycophant senators eagerly awaiting his latest attack on the Constitution, and falling all over themselves to excuse his murderous intentions, preemptions and stupidities. They know he has his finger on the nuclear trigger, and how little contemplation it would take him if religion mixed with corporate greed dominated the discussion.. But, he Loves Jesus, talks to God! You Da Man!
He hesitates about going to war with North Korea though, for North Korea has a million men under arms, well trained and disciplined. The case against North Korea possessing weapons of mass destruction and having a ruthless leader is even stronger than that of Iraq and Saddam Hussein. But, you see, North Korea is not biblical, nor does it have resources to seize for corporate profit. Going to War with North Korea will not further God’s plans for humanity. It would be a secular nightmare. It’s not Goddist!
A horrifying aspect of the Christian Far-Right is the firm belief that a World War will spread and turn into a fore-ordained Apocalypse, during which their God will destroy the world and all humans, except for a few previously selected who will go to heaven, exact location never specified. We are not sure if the chosen few will all be given virgins with which to dally, like the suicide bombers of Islam, but hope springs eternal. The only consolation is that about 99.99% of Republicans will be cast screaming into the fiery pit, despite all their annoying hopeful rhetoric while on earth. Fare thee well, Rick. Good luck, Orin. Bye bye, Dick. Scream long and hard, Rumsfeld! Surprise, Jerry!
The Far Right believes that George W. Bush is their messiah, the coiled spring to bring about the long-desired end of everything. They would give their money, votes, labor and even your lives to bring that about. They would abolish all opposition to their “divine” plans. They would stop at nothing, including mass murder, to make their nothingness God supreme ruler of the soon-to-be destroyed world.
Can we say that people who think like that are ill-advised, suckers, victims of brain-washing? Are they fanatic, mad, crazy, stupid, gullible, credulous, over-trusting, foolish, extreme, monomaniacal, out of touch with reality? Or were they indoctrinated when very young, and exposed to church propaganda incessantly, to the point that they are now unable to distinguish fact from myth? Or that they wish to “belong” to some group for support against the dark?
Whatever the reason be for their accepting any Christian version of nothingness, they are usually ignorant of any other possibility, and resent any attempt to wean them from long-held beliefs. People do not like to be made aware that their lives have been ruled by mistaken beliefs. George II especially seems unable to admit to making any mistakes. When asked what mistakes he might have made, he replied that he couldn’t think of any. The fact that some bloggers have come up with several hundred instances of his stupidity, blunders, lies and incompetence does not seem to register in his brain cells.
Priests, preachers and parsons do not believe they are “lying.” Most of them went to priest schools where they were subjected for a period of years to only one religious view, and where they could not possibly get a degree or professional work if they dared complain of the paucity of evidence, or the impossibility of some stories, or debate the non-existence of whatever entity their school was named for.
They all sincerely “believe” and must swear they will never learn or believe anything else. Priest Schools have taught the same subjects, in the same way, for several thousand years. All allusions for their graduates are in Christian terms. If they wish to preach a sermon, or illustrate some belief, they are shown how to pick a verse from the Bible that will exactly “prove” their point. Linguistically-adept preachers can forge an hour sermon out of practically any Bible passage. So, the word “lying” is not appropriate for modern bible-thumpers and passage-pointers. “Mistaken” might be more like it.
Too bad they don’t generally read Shakespeare, or Don Quixote, or any of the other thousands of really good classics illustrating the vast diversity of humankind. There is many a good lesson in Gargantua and Pantagruel, as there is in Candide. Or, how about Dorothy Parker and Stephen Leacock, Rudyard Kipling and Frank Harris, H. L. Mencken and Alexander Woolcott, Yeats and Robbie Burns? I might even suggest reading Robert Ingersoll, Herodotus, Homer, or Confucius to broaden their perspective. It takes a lot more than listening to Billy Graham, Ann Coulter, Pat Robertson, Benny Hinn, or the other 47,000 televangelists to be “educated.” Reading only one anthology written by religious zealots, and ignoring all the rest of the world’s literature, makes for monomaniacal creationism.
This country can easily slide back into a medieval darkness on the slippery slope of Under God dogmatism with a Born Again messiah at the helm. Would it be too heavy satire to say: “Heaven help us?”<br>
