Tempting faith in an American Theocracy
The nexus of faith and politics part one. I'm working up to writing more coherently about this as it seems to me important in understanding the development of policy here. It is also something which I am profoundly interested in, and have always been troubled by. But to warm up, a vignette.
Before I left, my men's group at church kindly gave me a book called American Theocracy written by Kevin Phillips. Phillips is an ex Republican strategist and was, I believe, a staffer in the Nixon White House. He is not, therefore, a typical critic of the Bush administration. He is, nevertheless, a trenchant one. His thesis is essentially that the Bush administration has been a “perfect storm” of fundamentalist religion having far too much power, manipulation of policy to suit the needs of oil men, and excessive borrowing at federal, corporate and individual level (which is clearly a great crime for fiscal conservatives). Such a combination he sees as analogous to the end stages of all historic empires from Rome to Britain and hence presages bad times ahead for America. Part of his thesis is, of course, the millennial obsession of the end-timers and its influence on Republican middle east policy (which he sees as disastrously one-eyed).
In contrast, the last two weeks have seen much discussion over here about the release of another book, Tempting Faith by David Kuo. Kuo is interesting, he was the deputy director of the faith-based initiative office inside the Bush White House, the department responsible for hiving off the provision of social services to church groups. Now I think this is a bad policy for a whole host of reasons, but, to be fair, Kuo seems to have been sincerely motivated by a concern for the poor: and to be someone who could be held up as evidence that “compassionate conservative” is not always an oxymoron. He was also either a bit naïve going into work in the White House or he has had some sort of crisis of conscience since. Kuo has raised interest and hackles in equal measure by exposing the dishonesty, cynicism and hypocrisy with which the administration viewed and used the faith based programme.
From what I have seen from news reports and reviews of the book, his critique is basically four-fold.
1 The Republican machine publicly lauded the more notorious leaders of the religious right while privately holding them in contempt. They had no concern for the religious right's agenda but wanted their votes.
2 The president deliberately lied about a new $8bn dollars being made available for faith based welfare programmes, when this money was in fact already available to the programmes – the actual new money was less than 1 per cent of $8bn.
3 The mega tax-cut for the mega-wealthy was paid for by stopping the very federal programmes that were actually funding faith based welfare, and so the poor suffered.
4 There was political chicanery around how the office was used which was designed to help Republicans in close seats.
Of these charges, 1 and 4 seem to me of lesser significance. Of course, politicians will seek to exploit programmes to win marginal seats, name one place where that doesn't happen. I also detect a distinct whiff of hypocrisy around the horror that has greeted the news that Rove (or was it Rove's office) thought Pat Robertson was “nuts”, Jerry Falwell “goofy” and James Dobson “out of control”. Er- I think that's what most people think actually, particularly the media commentators saying how outrageous it was that Rove said it.
The second accusation is again fairly unsurprising, double counting new money is kind of de rigeur; although there is something pretty distasteful about the casual way that Bush apparently decided to lie.
The third charge seems to me the really serious one. This is the substantive policy decision, this is the substantial moral issue. To take from the poor to give to the rich is a serious issue, something which is profoundly destructive to individuals and to society – especially in a society with such a flimsy welfare safety net as the US. There is also something ironic, if not nauseating, about trumpeting your Christian credentials and then ignoring Amos and Micah, even Christ himself (eg Luke 6:20-26 ) while taking from the indigent to give to the “haves and have mores”.
Leaving that aside, the complex issue is who is right, Phillips or Kuo? Logically, it cannot be true that the administration is dominated by dangerous fundamentalists but regards them with contempt at the same time. It cannot be the case that the religious right's agenda is distorting policy and being ignored simultaneously. So who is using who?
I suspect that the answer is that both are seeking to use the other. 'Twas ever the case with coalitions. There is little logical common ground between social authoritarians and small-government libertarians, beyond a dislike of “big government” (although both mean different things by this). Who has most successfully used the other? Well probably the administration (notably the 2004 election victory – although one needs to be a little careful about how this is interpreted). Does the Kuo book represent a severing of the religious right's umbilical link with the Republican Party? I think it is unlikely that the GOP will get such a large proportion of self-identified conservative evangelicals voting for them at the mid-terms, but I think the situation is far more fractured and less monolithic than one assumes from England. I also think that some of these terms need translation to be properly understood.
So was Phillips wrong in his assessment? Not entirely, but doing him justice will require a lot more time and space than I have here.
Before I left, my men's group at church kindly gave me a book called American Theocracy written by Kevin Phillips. Phillips is an ex Republican strategist and was, I believe, a staffer in the Nixon White House. He is not, therefore, a typical critic of the Bush administration. He is, nevertheless, a trenchant one. His thesis is essentially that the Bush administration has been a “perfect storm” of fundamentalist religion having far too much power, manipulation of policy to suit the needs of oil men, and excessive borrowing at federal, corporate and individual level (which is clearly a great crime for fiscal conservatives). Such a combination he sees as analogous to the end stages of all historic empires from Rome to Britain and hence presages bad times ahead for America. Part of his thesis is, of course, the millennial obsession of the end-timers and its influence on Republican middle east policy (which he sees as disastrously one-eyed).
In contrast, the last two weeks have seen much discussion over here about the release of another book, Tempting Faith by David Kuo. Kuo is interesting, he was the deputy director of the faith-based initiative office inside the Bush White House, the department responsible for hiving off the provision of social services to church groups. Now I think this is a bad policy for a whole host of reasons, but, to be fair, Kuo seems to have been sincerely motivated by a concern for the poor: and to be someone who could be held up as evidence that “compassionate conservative” is not always an oxymoron. He was also either a bit naïve going into work in the White House or he has had some sort of crisis of conscience since. Kuo has raised interest and hackles in equal measure by exposing the dishonesty, cynicism and hypocrisy with which the administration viewed and used the faith based programme.
From what I have seen from news reports and reviews of the book, his critique is basically four-fold.
1 The Republican machine publicly lauded the more notorious leaders of the religious right while privately holding them in contempt. They had no concern for the religious right's agenda but wanted their votes.
2 The president deliberately lied about a new $8bn dollars being made available for faith based welfare programmes, when this money was in fact already available to the programmes – the actual new money was less than 1 per cent of $8bn.
3 The mega tax-cut for the mega-wealthy was paid for by stopping the very federal programmes that were actually funding faith based welfare, and so the poor suffered.
4 There was political chicanery around how the office was used which was designed to help Republicans in close seats.
Of these charges, 1 and 4 seem to me of lesser significance. Of course, politicians will seek to exploit programmes to win marginal seats, name one place where that doesn't happen. I also detect a distinct whiff of hypocrisy around the horror that has greeted the news that Rove (or was it Rove's office) thought Pat Robertson was “nuts”, Jerry Falwell “goofy” and James Dobson “out of control”. Er- I think that's what most people think actually, particularly the media commentators saying how outrageous it was that Rove said it.
The second accusation is again fairly unsurprising, double counting new money is kind of de rigeur; although there is something pretty distasteful about the casual way that Bush apparently decided to lie.
The third charge seems to me the really serious one. This is the substantive policy decision, this is the substantial moral issue. To take from the poor to give to the rich is a serious issue, something which is profoundly destructive to individuals and to society – especially in a society with such a flimsy welfare safety net as the US. There is also something ironic, if not nauseating, about trumpeting your Christian credentials and then ignoring Amos and Micah, even Christ himself (eg Luke 6:20-26 ) while taking from the indigent to give to the “haves and have mores”.
Leaving that aside, the complex issue is who is right, Phillips or Kuo? Logically, it cannot be true that the administration is dominated by dangerous fundamentalists but regards them with contempt at the same time. It cannot be the case that the religious right's agenda is distorting policy and being ignored simultaneously. So who is using who?
I suspect that the answer is that both are seeking to use the other. 'Twas ever the case with coalitions. There is little logical common ground between social authoritarians and small-government libertarians, beyond a dislike of “big government” (although both mean different things by this). Who has most successfully used the other? Well probably the administration (notably the 2004 election victory – although one needs to be a little careful about how this is interpreted). Does the Kuo book represent a severing of the religious right's umbilical link with the Republican Party? I think it is unlikely that the GOP will get such a large proportion of self-identified conservative evangelicals voting for them at the mid-terms, but I think the situation is far more fractured and less monolithic than one assumes from England. I also think that some of these terms need translation to be properly understood.
So was Phillips wrong in his assessment? Not entirely, but doing him justice will require a lot more time and space than I have here.
posted by Exiled in mainstream at
11:43 PM
1 Comments:
Hello Exile,
More stunning proof that Christians are easily duped into supporting blatant evil
The latest book of stunning revelations titled "Tempting Faith" by former Bush Administration insider David Kuo presents compelling first-hand evidence that the Christian Right was purposely duped into providing pivotal political support and cover for a host of crimes and excesses by Republican leaders and the Whitehouse. This book and the Foley fiasco are serving to awaken Christians to the undeniable fact that they have been deceived into abetting the evil deeds of duplicitous scoundrels, once again.
The events of recent years and the several millennia before them have provided us with comprehensive proof that religion is the chosen and purposeful tool of great deceivers. Whether we view the actions of the Temple priesthood of ancient Israel that conspired with Greco-Roman invaders, the sad and sordid history of the Vatican and Papacy, Christian crusaders and colonizers, injustices by leaders and followers of Islam, the oppression of Palestinians by the State of Israel, or the more recent activities of the so-called Christian Right and Republican Party, religious followers are regularly and easily misled into supporting obvious evil.
In recent years, I have produced stunning and comprehensive proof of purposeful deception in the canons of all three Faiths of Abraham and struggled to alert people to this and to related upcoming events and situations. Due to "poisoning of the waters" by deluded religious leaders and followers over the centuries, most have greeted my efforts with derision or indifference, thereby failing to pay attention long enough to discern the accuracy of my research and assertions. Starting with the perfectly timed Atlantic hurricanes of 2004 and 2005, a small number of people, some of them in government leadership positions, began to recognize the truth of my conclusions and assertions. The events of the last year-plus, starting with the ramifications from hurricanes Katrina and Rita, have helped to sweep away many of the facades erected by the Bush-Cheney crew and cohorts. Many of their deceptions have been exposed, their greed and arrogance proven, the myth of their competence destroyed, and most recently the depths of their duplicity and hypocrisy have been illuminated by a series of stunning revelations.
Nonetheless, the so-called Christian Right has continued faithfully supporting them, in spite of mountains of evidence that should have dissuaded any clear-thinking soul. The recent non-stop flood of stunning evidence leaves little doubt that the so-called liberals and the left were 100% correct about the Bush-Cheney crew. Despite assertions to the contrary, conservatives and the Christian Right are now exposed as having arrogantly and foolishly supported blatantly evil scoundrels. We now have proof, beyond disproof, that Republican leaders viewed them as little more than marks and dupes to be milked of their faith, money, political support, and the lifeblood of their son's and daughter's on the battlefields of Bush's and Cheney’s deceptive wars.
It is a sad but true statement that deceived and deluded Christians are much more responsible for the evils perpetrated by the Bush administration than any other group. They have arrogantly and foolishly supported those who simply pretended to have the same beliefs, even though their deeds provided stark and irrefutable evidence to the contrary. My recent articles and book expound upon the reasons why religious followers are so easily duped into doing and supporting blatant evil. Now the events of recent weeks have provided stunning evidence that these assertions and conclusions are true. Christians and conservatives must now come to grips with the sickening reality of the great harm they have caused to everyone else because of their blind support of scoundrels who merely pretended to serve the Creator, as a purposeful ploy to gain wealth and power.
What then is the purpose of "faith" but to prevent otherwise good people from seeking to understand truth and wisdom?
Read More...
Here is Wisdom !!
Peace...
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Seven Star Hand, at 3:26 PM
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