Limbaugh and this character, Joseph Farah, have their bowels in a boil.
Limbaugh gave his reasons for wishing President Obama bad luck, and today I read about another malcontent who actually asks his followers to pray to God for America to fail. Yes. You read that correctly, for surely if our president fails in carrying out the duties of his office, America does too.
And yet these two men, so outraged by a liberal having won the presidency and in turning red states blue, would wish the worst for their country to salve their wounded egos. Because the American people, in voting President Obama into office, have told them that they are wrong, that they are extremists, that they--the American people--reject their rhetoric of fear, hatred, and divisiveness.
This Joseph Farah claims that President Obama is evil, and that God commands that his subjects need not obey evil leaders.
Since Farah [and Limbaugh] can't argue that the American people didn't want President Obama to lead them--the evidence to the contrary was obvious on Nov. 4, 2008, and on January 20, 2009, when almost two million people gathered to celebrate President Obama's inauguration--he uses God to try to turn Americans away from their freely elected leader.
His reasoning is: President Obama is evil; God hates evil; therefore God must hate President Obama. If this is true, anything any malcontented and frightened person can do to defeat this evil is sanctioned by God.
Does anyone besides me see what this seditious reasoning can lead to?
Once Farah uses a deity to justify his and, in turn, his listeners' hatred and disloyalty to the president, he crosses into very dangerous territory. Many weak-minded people who may be convinced by Farah's insane reasoning, may also be convinced to, well fill in the blank yourselves.
It is one thing to use your radio show to rant and rave against the Obama presidency as Limbaugh does, it is quite another thing, a terrible, terrible thing, to invoke God as a reason to hate.
Joseph Farah:
"I want Obama to fail because his agenda is 100 percent at odds with God's. Pretending it is not simply makes a mockery of God's straightforward Commandments.
If government commands you to do evil, as a Christian you must resist. There is no alternative. Citing the "render unto Caesar" line is an apologetic for accountability to God – nothing more, nothing less.
Furthermore, it needs to be pointed out that in America we don't have a Caesar. Never have, never will. You see, our system of government is called a free republic, and it is based on the concept of constitutional self-government. We have no "rulers" in America – except ourselves and our God. We believe in the rule of law, not the rule of men.
This is an important distinction, not a semantic one.
Nowhere in the Bible does it teach us to obey evil rulers. Nowhere.
This is a time for principled biblical resistance, not phony Christian appeasement.
"Principled biblical resistance?" I'm not a Biblical scholar, but I recall that in that book, God treats evil-doers quite harshly, and exhorts his favored ones to do the same. And if I remember correctly, that treatment includes a lot of blood letting.
I'm for free speech.
Don't shut this odious excuse for skin and vital organs down.
I post this here so that we know what is being put out there in some parts of the most radical conservative blogsphere.
The conservatives I've come to know and respect reject this nonsense, as all reasonable Americans do.
36 comments:
That is nothing short of a bonafide sickness. Period. Then again, most religious stuff is pretty sick.
Joseph Farah ejaculated:
"I want Obama to fail because his agenda is 100 percent at odds with God's. Pretending it is not simply makes a mockery of God's straightforward Commandments. "
Who would Jesus water board?
Funny how the extremists in various religions insist on My Way Or The Highway. Leading followers to violence is not part of any holy creed accepted by any religion I'm familiar with.
Obama is a piece of SHIT. And one of the mosy dangerous persons in America.
Just Me said...
Obama is a piece of SHIT. And one of the mosy dangerous persons in America.
"Why attribute to malice what can more easily explained by stupidity."
President Obama has been in office two days and this jerk says he's an evil ruler?
What an asshole.
What he is is an American jihadist.
He's inciting violence against the American president and saying God sanctions it.
Shaw, it is people like this that make my job so hard.
I wish what you said were true about the conservatives you read being outraged by this type of comment.
Just recently my personal faith was completely called into question by one of our mutual conservative bloggers who said that there was no way I could be a Christian and support someone like Barack Obama.
They even went so far as to tell me to reexamnine and change my life to bring it more inline with God.
It is people like this who would deny that people like Tony Campolo, Jim Wallis, and Ron Sider, all champions of the poor, and all democrats are Christians or lovers of God.
Shaw,
Ignorance leads to fear. Fear leads to anger and frustration which in turn leads to hate.
The attacks like this will escalate no matter what Obama does.
Righteousness has become self righteousness.
With Gitmo, abortion, and stem cell all hitting the news yesterday and today there is no doubt that the Secret Service has got their hands full.
It can only get worse....
It should come as no shock that the right uses this bullsh%t as their campaign message. Their policies and ideals are failures. All they have to appeal to is bigots and idiots that are idiots by choice.
Limbaugh brings up race yet again!
Limbaugh also recently complained, "We are being told that we have to hope he succeeds, that we have to bend over, grab the ankles, bend over forward, backward, whichever, because his father was black, because this is the first black president."
@shaw: ""Why attribute to malice what can more easily explained by stupidity."
All is for naught when faced with a mosy dangerous leader.
"Who would Jesus water board?"
the answer; the same ones he used a whip on
and shaw, as the old saying goes; clean up your own house before telling others how dirty their house is"
Griper,
If your cryptic comment refers to liberals or Democrats, please enlighten me.
Are there any liberals who encouraged Americans to pray for George Bush's failure?
I don't think liberals believed they needed to pray for that.
Mr. Bush was capable of failing without anyone's prayers.
And zI certainly don't believe anyone could pray to a god to bring failure on America, no more than I believe a god would deliver failure to America just because a group of people prayed for it.
That is true insanity.
Ah Mr. Griper. Jesus didn't whip the moneychangers in the temple. And he certainly didn't torture them.
And let's relieve Reverend Farah of his church's tax exempt status while were at it. If ones going to play partisan politics one should bear all the obligation which goes with.
It seems odd to me that you would conflate the two men's opinions. After all, in your earlier post, you acknowledged that Limbaugh wants Obama's policies to fail. That's significantly different from wishing America to fail.
And I think it's fairly dangerous to equate America's "success" to the success of the president. The president is head of state. But he is not the state.
Or am I wrong, and you consider Obama to be the crowned king? His will be done on earth?
Le etat, c'est moi? Not here.
@shaw: "Are there any liberals who encouraged Americans to pray for George Bush's failure?"
I know he didn't pray for it, but I remember George McGovern saying that he hoped that the terrorists won. I know it is not the same, but it is similar.
How can a president's policies fail without his or her being a failure?
If a doctor's methods fail in saving a patient's life, has not that doctor, who chose those methods, also failed? Will the hospital in which that doctor performed be subject of a wrongful death suit as well as the doctor?Can a doctor say her method for saving the patient failed, but she, the doctor, was a success?
If a teacher's policies/method for teaching her students fail year after year, doesn't that reflect on the teacher? Will the teacher receive rewards for her failure to teach her students? Will she be able to say I'm successful, it's my policies that failed? Will the school be proud of that teacher and keep her on the faculty year after year? Will parents fight to get their children enrolled in a school that keeps a teacher such as this on their faculty
If the president of a lending institute's policies for lending money to people fail and as a result the institute collapses in bankruptcy, does the president of that institute get to say, "My policies failed, my institute is bankrupt, but I'm a success?" Should that institute receive money because it chose to keep as its leader a person who made bad decisions in lending? Won't that institute be a failure as well?
Tell me how one can be separate from the other?
If they can, then I'm to believe that Limbaugh hopes Obama's policies fail, but that Obama is somehow a success?
Farah has taken this lunacy a step further and proclaimed to his readers that President Obama is EVIL, that God has said a people have no obligation to follow an EVIL leader.
Obama was president for, what? 2 days, when Farah wrote that.
If that isn't anyone's definition of a seriously mentally impaired person, I don't know what is.
dmarks,
I googled "McGovern" and "hope terrorists win" and came up with nothing.
Please provide a link to that quote.
PS. The other day someone somewhere (can't remember) crowed that MLK was a Republican.
I then remembered how Ronald Reagan said the Civil Rights Act was an insult to the south, and that Reagan also called MLK an "near Communist."
You can google those two quotes and Reagan's name and you'll find the references immediately.
PS. Imagine MLK belonging to a political party whose beloved leader called him a "near Communist?" Ha! Or thought the Civil Rights Act was an insult to the south? Ha!
What the hell is a "near Communist?"
Imagine anyone calling someone a "near terrorist" today? Ha!
Shaw: Still looking. I've gone through about 60 things regarding McGovern and Iraq so far. Looking for where he wanted the terrorists to drive the U.S. out of there.
If I can't find it, I withdraw the claim. In fact, I withdraw it now. I don't want to look through another 60 pages on McGovern.
(No Arthurstone, this is not like the one about the very few left-wingers who wanted Bush assassinated. We found the relevant links, and stand by them).
----------
Shaw, the best source I found so far on Reagan and the voting rights act is this page.
"During the 1980 presidential campaign, he publicly branded the voting rights act "humiliating to the South." This delighted white Southerners. But once in office Reagan promptly did a volt face. In 1982, he approved a 25-year extension of the Act. This ensured that black voting rolls would continue to rise, the numbers of black elected officials continue to surge, and that the Democratic Party would remain competitive in local races in the South."
It isn't perfectly exactly "Civil Rights Act was an insult to the south", but it is close enough to be an accurate paraphrase. Just like it is accurate to say that Gore claimed he invented the Internet when his actual word was "create". :)
By your standard, then, Shaw, GWB was a successful president because his policy was to take the war to the terrorists and their sponsors. He did so, and we have not been attacked on US soil since. And thus America is a success.
And you and all who share your opinions were actually vile. Because, after all, you opposed the president and his policies, and wished for them to fail. You wanted America to fail!
Why do you hate America so much? ;-)
In other news:
"If a teacher's policies/method for teaching her students fail year after year, doesn't that reflect on the teacher? Will the teacher receive rewards for her failure to teach her students?"
Almost certainly she will, assuming she's teaching in the public schools and is a member of NEA.
Gordon: Good point. The goals of the NEA are antithetical to those who want to improve and ensure a quality education.
There's no room for education to be found within a union's goal of "get paid the most possible for doing the least work possible".
dmarks typed:
There's no room for education to be found within a union's goal of "get paid the most possible for doing the least work possible".
Who are you quoting dmarks? I didn't notice this on their website. Is it the same source for a virtually identical remark you made about the CWA?
Yourself?
Or, let me guess, you didn't save the link.
Arthurstone: Do you have a point in that comment? Between the CWA and link thing and the reference to a quote that was never made, you neither made a point nor asked a question.
By your standard, then, Shaw, GWB was a successful president because his policy was to take the war to the terrorists and their sponsors. He did so, and we have not been attacked on US soil since. And thus America is a success.
And you and all who share your opinions were actually vile. Because, after all, you opposed the president and his policies, and wished for them to fail. You wanted America to fail!
Gordon,
My examples were set out to illustrate Limbaugh's dishonest claim that he hopes Obama's POLICIES fail. And to illustrate Limbaugh's dishonest apologists who say Obama's POLICIES do not represent America, therefore, Limbaugh is NOT hoping for America to fail.
The conservatives always point out is the fact that after the worst attack on American soil occurred 9 months into Bush's administration, and shortly afterwards, a second terrorist attack in the form of deadly anthrax letters, no other attacks occurred on American soil.
Other attacks happend in other parts of the world, but, so far, none here.
BTW: 26 DAYS into Clinton's first administration, the WTC was bombed, and no other FOREIGN terrorist attack occurred. So Clinton was as good as Bush--maybe better on that item.
I don't recall any liberal talk show host hoping for Bush's failure two days into his administration. If you can find me a liberal demagogue who has 20 million listeners, and who crowed that he/she hoped Bush would fail, please direct me to him/her.
Meanwhile, America watched as BUSH himself became the failure.
No one wished it on him. He managed it all by himself.
It would enlighten you to look at his past record in the private sector to understand this.
I'll do the research for you, Gordon:
As explained by Kevin Phillips in his book, American Dynasty: Aristocracy, Fortune, and the Politics of Deceit in the House of Bush, George W. Bush's businesses fail but he makes millions. Among Mr. Bush's business ventures:
Arbusto, an oil exploration company, lost money, but it got considerable investments (nearly $5 million) because even losing oil investments were useful as tax shelters.
Spectrum 7 Energy Corp. bought out Arbusto in 1984 and hired Mr. Bush to run the company's oil interests in Midland, Texas. The oil business collapsed as oil prices plummeted by 1986, and Spectrum 7 Energy was near failure.
Harken Energy acquired Mr. Bush's Spectrum 7 Energy shares, and he got Harken shares, a directorship, and a consulting arrangement in return. Harken, under Bush, brought in Saudi real estate tycoon Sheikh Abdullah Bakhsh as a board member and a major investor.
Over the next few years, Harken would turn out to have links to: Saudi money, CIA-connected Filipinos, the Harvard Endowment, the emir of Bahrain, and the shadowy Bank of Credit and Commerce International.
A 1991 internal SEC document suggested George W. Bush violated federal securities law at least 4 times in the late 1980s and early 1990s in selling Harken stock while serving as a director of Harken. This is essentially the same kind of activity that Martha Stewart went to prison over. Except at the time of the investigation, Mr. Bush's father was president and the case was quietly dropped.
http://alaric3rh.home.sprynet.com/science/bceo.html
dmarks typed:
'There's no room for education to be found within a union's goal of "get paid the most possible for doing the least work possible".'
I wondered:
'Who are you quoting dmarks? I didn't notice this on their website.'
dmarks replied:
'Arthurstone: Do you have a point in that comment?
Seems simple enough. Who are you quoting as regards a 'unions goal to get paid the most possible (sic) for the least amount of work.'?
Arthur, I have observed them in action for years. Pushing for pay raises even when it is pointed out that it will cause increase in class size, cuts in the curriculum, and even closing schools. I've seen the Detroit school teachers union (one of the best paid and worst-performing in the state of Michigan: getting paid a lot to do a poor job) shoot down efforts to improve Detroit schools because it means they might have to worker harder and show something for the money they get.
The Detroit teachers the highest paid metropolitian teachers in the nation (about $47 an hour) but things like school supplies and toilet paper are a thing of the past in the school system.
The NEA is not screwing corporate fatcats like private-sector unions do. They are screwing the public school systems.
Surely you admit that private-sector unions fight for their workers "to get paid the most possible for doing the least work possible"? The main issues are always about getting more money while reducing the workload/workday.
Public sector unions have the exact same goals. When these goals succeed, it destroys the mission of government.
I like President Obama's public service plan, and one of his first acts was to restrict the excessive pay of some government employees. That is in the spirit of government in the goal of serving the public. The opposite of the spirit of the NEA.
dmarks typed:
'Surely you admit that private-sector unions fight for their workers "to get paid the most possible for doing the least work possible"? The main issues are always about getting more money while reducing the workload/workday.'
I admit nothing of the sort.
And once again you quoted yourself I see.
Collective bargaining through unions is a hard won right. Oddly enough business and employers can't always be counted on to act equitably. What a surprise.
Unions exist (in part) for:
'Negotiation of wages, work rules, complaint procedures, rules governing hiring, firing and promotion of workers, benefits, workplace safety'
(List from Wikipidea)
And as for the NEA specifically it's vision is a ;great public school for every student. It's mission is to 'fulfill the promise of public education'. Now 'getting paid the most for doing the least' is kind of an inexact way to sum all that up. Or is it how you approach your place in the workforce?
I've never met a teacher who went into teaching to get rich. I trust that their motives (as I do even yours) are honorable and they want to make a difference in people's lives. There are lots of things wrong with our schools. But I don't see teacher's unions at the top of the list.
I've worked in union shops. Been a union officer. Worked in management in companies large and small and owned my own businesses. All have been interesting experiences. None do I regret. One thing I've learned over the years is that simplistic slogans never convey the complexity of what I've experienced.
Just as every businessman isn't a tyrant (or the embodiment of perfect virtue) neither is every union member a lazy good for nothing.
"I don't recall any liberal talk show host hoping for Bush's failure two days into his administration. If you can find me a liberal demagogue who has 20 million listeners, and who crowed that he/she hoped Bush would fail, please direct me to him/her."
That's like saying "if you can find me a left-handed cribbage player who got a perfect score on her LSAT."
There ain't none. Nor were there any liberal talk-show hosts in 2000 of any significance. For whatever reasons, liberalism doesn't work on radio talk shows. Which is wny Pelosi et al want to impose the censorship doctrine to destroy talk radio.
But there wasn't some wave of liberals calling for unity and healing on January 22, 2001, either. There were a lot of bumper stickers reading "Selected, not elected" and "He's not MY president."
Then there were the thrown eggs and other objects which forced Bush to cancel the inaugural parade for the spectators' safety.
Not to mention the usual cadre of liberals who broke their promises to move elsewhere if Bush won. Shoot, we even took up a collection to buy Alec Baldwin a plane ticket to Paris. The bum failed to follow through.
So don't expect the 48 percent of us who didn't vote for Obama to rejoice and sing hosannas. We didn't like his proposals, and still don't.
And we haven't forgotten how the left behaved four and eight years ago. We are, most of us, trying to set a better example.
"Collective bargaining through unions is a hard won right."
It is also a negation of rights, in "Closed Shop" situations when workers are bullied into the "collective" against their will.
"And as for the NEA specifically it's vision is a ;great public school for every student. It's mission is to 'fulfill the promise of public education'."
No, it is not. Its actions much more often than not make public schools worse and damage public education.
"None do I regret. One thing I've learned over the years is that simplistic slogans never convey the complexity of what I've experienced."
This is so true of the NEA's "official" mission, which is s simplistic and hollow slogan. One completely contradicted by their actions.
I have one teacher friend. One of the best teachers I've ever known. He tried to teach without paying dues to the NRA. He got harassed and threatened because of it. That he was a great teacher was not on the NEA's mind. They just wanted to shake him down for money.
This is why they oppose merit pay (a concept supported by many on the Left) and support tenure policies, whereby lousy teachers keep their jobs just because they have been there a while and are greasing the palms of union bosses.
I've never met a teacher who went into teaching to get rich"
If you are making $47 an hour to do a piss-poor job (like in Detroit), you are making out like a bandit.
"'Negotiation of wages, work rules, complaint procedures, rules governing hiring, firing and "
Getting the most money for doing the least work possible is a fair paraphrase of that list from Wikipedia. It's much better than "inexact".
I also suggest you look into the NEA "critical lists". These are lists of schools that are at critical condition for the NEA. So, what is the problem with these schools? Low graduation? Too many illiterated students? Too many dropouts? Why, no. These involve education, and the NEA never has that on its mind. These are the schools that are refusing to give the NEA more members. They are not the schools that are doing a poor job. Of course, whether or not a school is doing a poor job of educating is not of the NEA's concern. Nothing gets in the way of job 1: taking as much money from the schools as they can.
"Just as every businessman isn't a tyrant (or the embodiment of perfect virtue) neither is every union member a lazy good for nothing."
True. Most union members are forced into the union against their will. No choice. A lot of good workers (people who get ahead by doing a good job) find themselves in unions alongside sluggards because of this.
And I think it would be a good time now to bring the subject back to Barack Obama. He has made a great choice for Secretary of Education: a man who has put education first, even when the union has not liked it.
I think that serving the public should be the first mission of government agencies, not enriching special interests.
We'll have to agree to disagree on this one. I have made no claim the unions are perfect. They aren't.
Nor are they the sole cause of declining test scores.
'We have seen the enemy and it is us...'
In fact our host PatrickM in a thread here recently let slip a very interesting truefact. A truefact which goes a very long way to explain a lot of problems we face.
"I watch too much TV"
Cheers!
In fact our host PatrickM in a thread here recently let slip a very interesting truefact. A truefact which goes a very long way to explain a lot of problems we face.
Um, Arthur, my friend, this is me, Shaw Kenawe. Patrick can be found over at Sane Political Discourse.
Arthur said "Nor are they the sole cause of declining test scores"
We can agree to agree too. Administrative overhead and other factors sap the school system too. Yes, there are other reasons also.
Shaw-
Mea culpa.
Mea culpa.
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