Your Bigots Are More Bigoted Than Our Bigots
Looks like a Battle Of The Bigots is brewing between the Obama and McCain camps.
Go to the link to see the latest video of Obama’s Pastor Jeremiah Wright’s racist sermons. You’ll see where Michelle Obama goes to get her “not proud of America” opinions reinforced. Among other things, Wright preaches that we should not say “God Bless America” but instead “God Damn America”. He claims Jesus was a black man who was killed by rich white folks. He calls our country The United States of the KKKA—the fun just goes on and on. Obama isn’t just cozying up to Wright to pander to the extremists of his party, he calls Wright a “spiritual leader” and has attended this church for 20 years.
On the other side, Rod Parsley, the minister of a Pentecostal mega-church has endorsed McCain, but is an anti-Islam bigot and promotes what could only be described as a Christian-led, anti-Islam Holy War.
Of course, the undercard of the Battle Of The Bigoted Pastors was fought earlier, with Obama’s embrace of moonbat Farrakhan and McCain accepting the endorsement of wacko John Hagee, who is anti-Catholic and anti-Jewish.
What to do about these bigots masquerading as religious leaders?
On the one hand, everyone has a right to vote and support the candidate of his/her choice.
We also need to understand that both Wright and Parsley represent the extremes of religious thought, such as it is, and both Democrats and Republicans need to make nice with them to a certain degree, no matter how distasteful. McCain needs the support of the religious right and Obama can’t very well denouce his 20 years as a member of Wright’s church.
The “Reject And Denounce Game” is becoming a major factor in the current POTUS race, especially on the Dem side, but there have been no rules established for how to deal with these outliers.
The only thing for certain is that no matter how strongly a candidate “rejects and denounces”, the other side will consider it insufficient.
my grandpa loves hagee. no idea why. i have always thought he was a hateful nut job. and my grandpa is one of the most logical even minded people i know. but hagee is one of his faves…
regarding the issue in general, i find it funyn how people overreact to endorsements. like is fred phelps was to endorse obama or mccain, would it mean their campaigns reflected his f-ed up ideals? wouldn’t it just mean that phelps liked one of them?
Comment by Robbie | March 13, 2008
I agree with you completely—even racist, bigoted nutjob wackos like Wright and Parsley have a right to vote and support the candidate of their choice.
This religious stuff is just another cudgel for candidates to beat each other over the head with.
I’ve been thinking of doing a post about the “Reject and Denounce Game”, but honestly, there are just too many examples piling up; the latest being Samantha Power and her Hillary is a “monster” comment and Ferraro and her “Obama is a viable POTUS candidate because of Affirmative Action” comment, etc.
At this rate, the POTUS campaigns will be bereft of workers by August!
Comment by qcexaminer | March 13, 2008
I don’t know Parsley – have never heard him speak and hardly know what he said to cause the comotion. I suggest that his comments may have been over the top, but again, I don’t even know what they are.
However, I have read a book of his and others on Islam and the historical aspect of their religion and their efforts. I would suggest that anyone who dismisses him as a crank and a bigot is only a reasonable critic should they have read the materials that he has written on the subject – and understand the issue beyond that of…
“islam is a religion of peace and the terrorists are just a few extremists” – his books show, historically, that this is not an accurate historical perspective.
Comment by sunshine | March 13, 2008
And that is why Religious Leaders belong behind the pulpit, and not in public expounding on political, or personal, issues. The biggest, most horrendous battles seem to be fought over religious ideology. Their version of GOD, being better. And you need not read their material, to know their true god is HATE. Content of character is something that can be measured by normal humans – suggest all do so.
Comment by John E. | March 14, 2008
Good point John E.,
1. Don’t learn someone’s perspective (in case it’s accurate),
2. Just accept it when someone tells you that ‘Islam is a religion of peace,’(even if it is a lie),
3. Sing ‘Kumbyay’, and
4. By all means – don’t ruffle any feathers!
Thank you for the tremendous insight!
Comment by tiger woods | March 14, 2008
You have a point tiger/sunshine/Mr. X—I’m not familiar with any of the pastors I mentioned in my post except Farrakhan.
It is possible that since only the left attacks the McCain endorsement of Parsley and Hagee, they are agenda-driven partisans.
I probably shouldn’t have characterized any of the pastors that I didn’t have first hand knowledge of, but for my post, that was beside the point—guilt by association is the rule of the day, no matter what the content of the sermons.
Comment by qcexaminer | March 14, 2008
I have yet to see the fascist leftwing come down on Wright or Obama. They have had no problem coming down on Bush and others for the slightest allegiance with any evangelical leadership that has said questionable things. Where is the usual wisdom of the left condemning and using the word biblethumpers like a bludgeon on political figures aligned with religious figures with messages that offend. Perhaps the problem lays in that the Wright message is the actual mantra of the leftwing.
Comment by Bruce Banner | March 15, 2008
Bruce, you are right. The Left goes crazy is an endorsement is given to a Republican candidate, or if a Republican candidate says anything nice about a Pastor that has positions that the Left feels are offensive.
However, Wright is Obama’s 20-year friend and Pastor. I find it hard to believe that Obama was unaware of Wright’s sermons or positions. Wright is a known race-bating flamethrower – and always has been.
Obama CHOSE to remain friends with the man for 20-years.
Obama CHOSE to remain in the man’s church for 20-years.
Yet the left, and the left-media choose to look the other way!
The nice thing is that the Independents (the one’s who hld the election in their hands) will see this for what it is.
Comment by tiger woods | March 15, 2008
There are so may ignorant and uninformed comments here, it is hard to sort them out.
First, in the original post QCE asserted that Obama and Farrakhan have any kind of relationship. They’re both black and for Chicago- that’s it. Farrakhan said he supports Obama, but Obama has uncategorically rejected Farrakhan’s message. Do draw any sort of equivalency between Farrakhan’s support of Obama and Hagee’s support of McCain is ridiculous. Find me one picture of the two embracing on stage or Obama accepting his support at a rally like McCain did with Hagee or please stop using that false analogy
Second, just because Parsley attempts to review a history of Islam and draw a conclusion that it indeed advocates terrorism is ridiculous. Having an extreme bias before taking on a historical “investigation” is hardly the stuff of strong science. Does Islam have a history of military action to support state and religious goals? Yes. So does Christianity. Christianity does not have a strong historical record of supporting peace and justice if looked at objectively.
Third, Jeremiah Wright was speaking out about a drug policy that he believed disproportionately attacked the African American community. There have been numerous studies that have since supported that assertion. In fact, they just changed the sentencing guidelines for crack cocaine so that they would be the same as cocaine because they disproportionately affected African American offenders. I guess it is the same right wing BS that if you criticize the United States in any way, then you are unpatriotic and should leave the country.
The larger point is that this guy is not running for President. GOP supporters want to dredge this crap up because they can’t win the election on the merits. Much like the Ferrarro dust up, this is a straw man argument. The economy is a disaster. Cutting taxes during war and doing nothing to control spending has been demonstrated to not work. After five years in Iraq we are no closer to any sort of resolution to the conflict. I have never even heard a quantifiable definition of “victory”. The Republicans own candidate has flip-flopped on immigration policy, which was a straw man from the beginning. Health care, education, homeland security investment; all losers for the Republicans.
The GOP has embraced nut job pastors and made them seem main stream. If you want the “left-wing fascists” to denounce Wright, start in your own house. Denounce Hagee for saying that new Orleans deserved Hurricane Katrina as God’s wrath, or denounce Falwell for saying that 9/11 was brought on by America’s tolerance for homosexuality of Robertson saying we out detonate a nuclear weapon at the State Department. Are those any more acceptable? Denounce those; you have some control over that.
Comment by Wes Mantooth | March 16, 2008
Wes, when you spun and rationalized Wright’s statements, you marginalized yourself.
Out of all the four “pastors” I mentioned in my post, Wright has the strongest ties to Obama. Hagee, Parsley and Farrakhan have all said incendiary things, but only Obama has had a 20 year relation with Wright, was married by him, had his daughters baptized by him, named his best selling book after one of his sermons, etc.
You present a false equivalency when you try to compare McCain’s religious nutjobs to obama’s religious nutjobs. McCain has not been attending either Hagee’s or Parsley’s church for 20 years, so just give it up.
From your comment, it looks that now the Democrats are embracing religious nutjobs and attempting to make them mainstream. Oh, goody, just what we need—-your nutjobs are worse than our nutjobs.
It was really cute the way you demand others to “denounce those”, but refuse to do so yourself—your hypocrites are better than their hypocrites, maybe?
The fun never ends—thanks for proving my point, Wes.
Comment by qcexaminer | March 16, 2008
I denounce what Jeremiah Wright said about “chickens coming home to roost”. No country has ever deserved what happened on 9/11, much less the United States. Happy?
Talk about equivalency. Are you suggesting that Wright has had or will have the same level of access to the executive branch that Falwell, Robertson et al have had under this administration?
Comment by Wes Mantooth | March 16, 2008
No, I’m saying the “Reject and Denounce Game” and the “Our Bigots Are Better Than Your Bigots” idiocy are beyond stupid, and not useful in choosing a POTUS, and are certainly NOT advancing public debate.
Comment by qcexaminer | March 16, 2008
I would suggest that what any of the so called ‘conservative nutjobs’ were doing was giving their personal observations on any particular situation. None of it anti-American. At most, they may have been saying that the lifestyle or morals of our country are substandard (and I would suggest that any man of God that did not agree with this would have to re-read his Bible).
What Wright was saying and promoting was the fact that America itself is evil and specifically promoting genocide of the african-american population. He was specifically race-baiting and attempting to incite hatred on the basis of color.
Wes, you can’t, in any reasonable sense, try to suggest that the comments made by these Pastors are even in the same ballpark.
Comment by tiger woods | March 16, 2008
I am a Republican who has been embarrassed about it for years but don’t feel Democrats act any more reasonably. John Hagee and Rod Parsley no doubt have their extremist Islamic counterparts but it still doesn’t make hatred right or looked upon with favor by Jesus. What did He say about those who persecute us? What did He say about turning the other cheek? I believe he meant those words in deathly seriousness not in jest. As for Rev. Wright; sure we as a nation have done a lot of ignorant and spiteful things. His rhetoric adds nothing positive to the debate. I have crazy friends who I am bonded to through other life experience. I will not abandon them but I will be very careful where I step.
Comment by Rick Reiley | June 10, 2008