This post has been updated
We were so looking forward to the One Nation Under God event organized by Champion the Vote, the national campaign that seeks to register evangelical Christians to vote. But now it seems our main reason for tuning in won’t even be there.
Gov. Rick Perry’s likeness and his name as an invited speaker have been scrubbed from onenationundergodevent.com, leaving Newt Gingrich as the only other Republican presidential candidate scheduled to appear.
If you’re unfamiliar with this event, it is billed as yet another The Response-type gathering. Except in this case there would be no mass gathering at a gigantic football stadium. Instead, One Nation Under God will be a DVD featuring religious-right activists like “forgotten history” propagandist David Barton, Focus on the Family Founder James Dobson and Gingrich, among others.
As was the case for The Response, One Nation Under God speakers are set to talk about the so-called crumbling of America because the country, they say, has turned away from God. From the One Nation website:
We’ve lost sight of our great heritage as a nation founded on Biblical truth, and the consequences are dire: schools are failing, the divorce rate is climbing, and our society is rife with scandal and corruption. It’s time to reclaim our Biblical heritage and bring God back to the center of American life. Where do we start?
So where did the governor go on this one? He’s always been willing to join religious-right extremists for this kind of event, either at a setting like The Response in Houston or Texas Restoration Project events or the upcoming Iowa Renewal Project. Whatever the reason for skipping out on this one, we’re still disappointed.
We’re left with only this as a memory of what could have been:
Update:
It turns out that in spite of being removed from the One Nation website as one of the invited speakers, Gov. Perry will be on the DVD. Our friends at Right Wing Watch pointed us to this blog entry in the Orlando Sentinel and to tweets by Florida Family Policy Council President John Stemberger indicating Gov. Perry did in fact participate in the making of the DVD. Gov. Perry gave a speech and took question via satellite.
We will, of course, report back on what Gov. Perry had to say.
Taking the country “back” implies either that something else has taken America from where it was to somewhere else that pre-existed, Or that America drifted away from something back then which is less Godly than some unidentified place that used to be.
a. When was this “back” period?
b. What at this back time have that is not any more?
c. Who moved America away from the back whenever era?
d. What is the state of the Union supposed to be based on back when?
So long as David Barton is identified as their “historian”, the era to this rather vague back when period is pin pointed as that Constitution that existed before Appomattox Court House, and before Lincoln was assassinated. It is the Constitution that only had twelve Amendments. Barton’s view of the Bill of Rights is that they don’t apply to the states, except the 10th Amendment. This view is consistent with was in place before the Reconstruction Amendments (13, 14, 15) were ratified.
So long as Barton stands on the same podium with candidates for high office, it must be assumed that their hidden agenda is the abolition of these amendments and all the twelve amendments that followed Reconstruction including the two term limit for President.
Given the existence of the Stepford Faction of the GOP, it is reasonable to expect a Rump Congress with a Supreme Court to match. It is not reasonable, however, that the selection of a series of Neo-Confederate Presidents will conform to Stepford Standards.
DVD? I’ll wait for it to come out on cable.
I jumped off the boat early here, specifically at “a nation founded on Biblical truth.” The nation was not truly “founded” until all 13 colonies agreed in 1787 to move forward as a single entity. And if there is a single “truth” that untied the founders, everybody from Madison and Jefferson to Samuel and John Adams and all points in between, it is the “truth” to be found in the writings of John Locke, the most prominent of the Enlightenment thinkers. His work had a profound effect on the founding generation. They were all extremely well versed in Lockean theory and pointed to his work as being the major influence on their political thinking.
So where is the thing that they want to go “back” to? That is very simple: They want what Pat Buchannan wants, something that never existed: A White America. Woops, make that a CHRISTIAN WHITE AMERICA.
Buchannan laments that the multiplicity of new cultures to this country are hastening the day when white people will be a minority. I once heard a woman at a Tea Party function (on TV) crying that “I want my white America back.”
What they want NEVER EXISTED! This has never been a Christian country; it has never been lily all white and with the help of God it never will be. David Barton is a liar. He has nothing to go on except his own bigoted recollections that never existed.
The idiot Dallas preacher who called the Mormons a cut said recently that John Jay, the first Chief Justice of SCOTUS, said something that we ought to be Christians. That was just a thought that went through his head at the time and has no legal or moral standing. Personally, I’m fed up with the bigots who feel that Christianity is the end all and be all of religion. I love to burst their bubble with facts, but there are other religions in the world; I belong to one of the smallest religions in the world with only about 14 million of us in the world.
How do you tell a bigot anything? YOU CAN’T tell them anything unless it agrees with their very narrow world view.
They think back to a time when there was no crime, when there was no graft, when everything was sunshine and lollypops; but what they want never existed. And they think back to a time when this country was a theocracy and THAT never happened either.
Who in their right mind wants to go back to the time when people could be jailed for not going to church? Who wants to go back when innocent women were burned at the stake or drowned because they were “witches.” They’re great at grabbing parts of a biblical sentence and wrongfully applying it.
Here is a quote from a Christian Church that claims to have 125,000 members and over $750,000 in cash in its coffers. This is from a sermon by Pastor Deacon Fred of the Landover Baptist Church. It should turn your stomach; this what they want to go “back” to:
“The United States of America is a Christian Nation. Sure, we’ve got some other religions here, but after seeing the cross go up at the site of the World Trade Center, it is clear that they don’t matter. The Christian God is going to win the war on those pig-hating, towel-headed, cavemen over there in Afghanistan because people like you and me are praying and working on bringing this nation back to Jesus! You don’t see a star of David or the moon of Islam or fat Buddha setting on that wreckage! It’s the Christian cross! Praise Jesus!
“We are supposed to be killing witches! If we don’t, we are disobeying God. Jesus would weep tears of joy if He leaned down off His cloud and sniffed up the burning flesh of a witch this Halloween. Wouldn’t that ruin Satan’s little birthday party! Praise God! It’s just a shame that the United States Government has placed restrictions on the Biblically-mandated practice of witch burning.”
Jesus would weep tears of joy if He leaned down off His cloud and sniffed up the burning flesh of a witch this Halloween? Wow, Jesus is on a cloud? I thought that only computer stuff could be in a cloud. The viciousness and hatred that that guy qualifies himself to be a Christian? I KNOW that is not what Christianity is about. Jesus said that you will know his followers by their LOVE, not their burning hatred and bigotry towards others.
I’ve met people I KNEW were Christians because they never went around tell others what they were. You could because of their love for others and their willingness to help out others when they needed help. To me, as a non-Christian, it should be that easy to spot a Christian. That fella Deacon Fred is not a Christian by any stripe. He has a hate monger and desires the death of anyone who isn’t him.
Oh, the phrase they borrowed from Torah? Exodus 22:18.
Landover Baptist is a spoof site, Beverly. It can be very hard to tell it from some sites that are for real, but it is all satire.
Beverly a little while back I read a biography of John Jay, the only of our seven core founding fathers that would today be considered a conservative Christian – four of the seven were in fact not Christians (Jefferson, Madison, Franklin and John Adams.) Jay was a smart and well respected guy and generally level-headed except when it came to religious bigotry. He hated, absolutely hated, the Catholic church and Catholics in general. While governor or New York he twice introduced legislation to exclude Catholics, first from holding any elected office and later from holding any state funded position. In both instances the New York legislature basically said “cram it clown.” Why the Catholic hatred? Well part of it was that there was a large Loyalist community New York City, and Jay had a number of Loyalist friends, and of course France was Catholic at the time and then there was the 100 year war and so on and so forth.
CNN gave him the kiss of death this evening—as did both conservative and liberal pundits. My: evaluation: The Perry candidacy is dead. It is time to come back home and commune with the rutabagas.
Charles, I think you’re right, as a practical matter, I don’t think he ever had a serious shot at being Pres. However, he’s still got lots of money to spend, and I hope he stays around long enough for Romney’s opp. research to hit something that will once and for all attract the attention of some prosecutors in the state, or the DOJ.
However, please don”t malign the noble and delicious rutabaga, they’re one of the most under-appreciated veggies we have. Just try steaming them and serve with a little butter and lemon, or braise or roast them with some pork or chicken. They’re great in a soup too. Turnips just don’t compare.
btw… the period these people want to return to is the fabulous ’50’s, when every family was modeled on “Ozzie and Harriet”, and every kid had a coonskin cap.