Name 'em for the hypocrites they are, reject their phony moralizing and condescension, excoriate the cult of leader worship that's festered in our national mythology... and don't give the bastards an inch of ground.
It's about time (hell, PAST time!) that someone spoke up about how those who espouse Christian Nationalism are far less about the supposed goodness of Jesus than they are about their desire for power and exclusivity over that power. Personally, I'd like to hear a LOT more commentary like that of Senator Hunt.
George Washington? How about they try quoting Thomas Paine, who never owned a single slave and who found slavery cruel, as Christians rather belatedly decided after the fact and decided they'd led the fight for abolition after having participated of profited from that institution.
Oh wait. Paine was a staunch Deist who despised the Christian book and religion. Guess we won't be seeing faux patriot Christians quoting him.
The entire Open University series of videos are a hoot and an indication of how provincial an US basic public education REALLY is. He's also got Beethoven, Darwin, Newton, Pankhurst, and others in their with their actual revolutionary sentiments.
For Christian politicians defending Christian prayer/invocations and bible studies...
Did you not swear an oath to support and "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States?" Did you not read that document? Did you lie and have your fingers crossed when you took that oath? And what about disobeying your Jesus by praying in public, which he told his alleged followers NOT to do? Why call him Lord, yet don't do what he tells you?
You bring up George Washington? He was a Deist and didn't much like or trust Christians and said so. Oops! He owned slaves and passed them on. He freed one slave, which is one more than Jesus freed. Jesus. Your savior who gave instructions on how to beat slaves, even if they weren't doing anything wrong. Slavery, the institution you waved your bibles as "justification" for.
Jesus did not give instructions on how to beat slaves dude. He instructed every rich person to give away their possessions to the poor. I was 100% with you until that, our best way of dealing with these people (I think) is by pointing out how they fall short of Jesus’ standard.
Jesus was speaking to his apostles when he said this. He did not speak out against the absolute wrongness of slavery. He merely stated how slaves should be beaten, whether they were bad OR good.
Paine recognized the evil of slavery. Why couldn't Jesus? Oh, that's right. Paine actually existed and had a moral compass.
I prefer to admire the president whose prosecution of the Civil War evolved into ending slavery. Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address is the finest piece of political rhetoric in the English language.
At his untimely death, he owned no slaves crying for freedom.
With amazing facility, the Republican party convinces Americans to vote against their interests, making them slaves to ideology, using a toxic brew of lies and religion. The most contemptible Americans express their love of God, while they ignore the needs of the people
It was a learning process for Lincoln. At first, he was more concerned about keeping the country together rather than freeing slaves.
"If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could do it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that."
- From Lincoln's letter to Horace Greeley, August 22 1862
Thankfully, he did evolve and would say the following 3 years later...
"Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to try it on him personally."
- from Lincoln's speech to the 104th Indiana Regiment, March 17th 1865
Yes! As Commander-in-Chief, he saw his main job as preserving the union, but saw the advantage of freeing slaves in confederate states, who won their freedom if they could get to a Union fortress. His Emancipation Proclamation was a turning point in the war, and also in his personal thinking about slavery.
Please, please, please tell me we get to keep her. There's a desperate shortage of good sense in political office, I would hate to lose any more of it.
Funny how most of the people that seem to be able to excoriate the lunatics in US politics are women – at least most of the ones I've come across. I'm a great fan of Katie Porter. She could emigrate here any time.
I'm glad someone finally shot back (and saying that you don't like Washington is bold, holy shit), but this still veers into No True Scotsman territory.
When George Washington was alive he had more than a few political enemies, many of whom ridiculed him quite mercilessly. For instance, a number of them mentioned in their private correspondence that he had a grotesquely large backside. When they wanted to piss him off in public, they'd refer to his posterior as "Greater Virginia." But, hey, we have to speak about him with nothing but hushed reverence today. Got it.
Hemant, I like your comment on Washington far better than either Murman's OR Hunt's. History and literature (and current events!) is filled with people who are neither villains nor heros, but have both good and bad in them. Opinions you will think are right on the money, and opinions you will find to be stupdi, wrong, or offensive. There is a tendency on both the left and right these days to try and shoehorn people into one or the other, villain or hero. This is not only bad history (for dead people) and bad sociology/politics (for live people), but when we do that we fail to teach our kids how to grapple with the real world and real people. But our kids need to be able to deal with people who are a mix of both, and people who have some opinions they agree with and some they don't. They need it so that they don't fall prey to "good people" who do bad things, or refuse to consider ideas and actions merely because they are initiated by "bad people." They need to learn about Washington as a good general, and a good President, and a racist slave-owner, both because he really was all those things at once, and because there are lots of people your kids will deal with who will also be a mix of the great and awful, the genius and idiot, the spectacular success and disappointing failure.
Thank you, Sen. Hunt. Would that more politicians would speak out against Christianity or any other religion encroaching on our secular government.
You already have politicians who complain about Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar. Isn't it enough ?
Yes. This.
More of this.
Everywhere, please.
Name 'em for the hypocrites they are, reject their phony moralizing and condescension, excoriate the cult of leader worship that's festered in our national mythology... and don't give the bastards an inch of ground.
It's about time (hell, PAST time!) that someone spoke up about how those who espouse Christian Nationalism are far less about the supposed goodness of Jesus than they are about their desire for power and exclusivity over that power. Personally, I'd like to hear a LOT more commentary like that of Senator Hunt.
Sadly, I don't expect it.
George Washington? How about they try quoting Thomas Paine, who never owned a single slave and who found slavery cruel, as Christians rather belatedly decided after the fact and decided they'd led the fight for abolition after having participated of profited from that institution.
Oh wait. Paine was a staunch Deist who despised the Christian book and religion. Guess we won't be seeing faux patriot Christians quoting him.
Mark Steel lectures on Paine:
Video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIhcDxTU1Og
Audio
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0m5ngPupHU
The entire Open University series of videos are a hoot and an indication of how provincial an US basic public education REALLY is. He's also got Beethoven, Darwin, Newton, Pankhurst, and others in their with their actual revolutionary sentiments.
https://www.wikiwand.com/en/The_Mark_Steel_Lectures
The videos on the others are available, but it's sorta a scavenger hunt to find them, now.
Brava, Sen. Hunt! Please consider moving to Pennsylvania and giving some hell to the Republican goons who control our senate.
Oh, I was hoping for a body slam. Maybe a suplex.
Off the ropes, into a table.
Ghostbuster, maybe?
We need more lawmakers like Sen Hunt? Personally I think we need fewer like Sen Murman, but I guess that might be a little difficult to arrange.
For Christian politicians defending Christian prayer/invocations and bible studies...
Did you not swear an oath to support and "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States?" Did you not read that document? Did you lie and have your fingers crossed when you took that oath? And what about disobeying your Jesus by praying in public, which he told his alleged followers NOT to do? Why call him Lord, yet don't do what he tells you?
You bring up George Washington? He was a Deist and didn't much like or trust Christians and said so. Oops! He owned slaves and passed them on. He freed one slave, which is one more than Jesus freed. Jesus. Your savior who gave instructions on how to beat slaves, even if they weren't doing anything wrong. Slavery, the institution you waved your bibles as "justification" for.
Jesus did not give instructions on how to beat slaves dude. He instructed every rich person to give away their possessions to the poor. I was 100% with you until that, our best way of dealing with these people (I think) is by pointing out how they fall short of Jesus’ standard.
Check out Luke 12:47-48.
Jesus was speaking to his apostles when he said this. He did not speak out against the absolute wrongness of slavery. He merely stated how slaves should be beaten, whether they were bad OR good.
Paine recognized the evil of slavery. Why couldn't Jesus? Oh, that's right. Paine actually existed and had a moral compass.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGgZG6O6aT0
OT but I caught this last night and it seemed interesting.
Hey, a guy's got a right to protect himself from toddlers, hasn't he?
I dunno. Take Cruz is for it so I don't even think about it before I'm against it.
I've agreed twice with Ted Cruz. Both times made me question my sanity.
I prefer to admire the president whose prosecution of the Civil War evolved into ending slavery. Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address is the finest piece of political rhetoric in the English language.
At his untimely death, he owned no slaves crying for freedom.
With amazing facility, the Republican party convinces Americans to vote against their interests, making them slaves to ideology, using a toxic brew of lies and religion. The most contemptible Americans express their love of God, while they ignore the needs of the people
It was a learning process for Lincoln. At first, he was more concerned about keeping the country together rather than freeing slaves.
"If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could do it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that."
- From Lincoln's letter to Horace Greeley, August 22 1862
Thankfully, he did evolve and would say the following 3 years later...
"Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to try it on him personally."
- from Lincoln's speech to the 104th Indiana Regiment, March 17th 1865
𝘈𝘴 𝘐 𝘸𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘣𝘦 𝘢 𝘴𝘭𝘢𝘷𝘦, 𝘴𝘰 𝘐 𝘸𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘣𝘦 𝘢 𝘮𝘢𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳. 𝘛𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘦𝘴 𝘮𝘺 𝘪𝘥𝘦𝘢 𝘰𝘧 𝘥𝘦𝘮𝘰𝘤𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘺. 𝘞𝘩𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘥𝘪𝘧𝘧𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴, 𝘵𝘰 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘦𝘹𝘵𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘧𝘧𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦, 𝘪𝘴 𝘯𝘰 𝘥𝘦𝘮𝘰𝘤𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘺.
-- Abraham Lincoln
Yes! As Commander-in-Chief, he saw his main job as preserving the union, but saw the advantage of freeing slaves in confederate states, who won their freedom if they could get to a Union fortress. His Emancipation Proclamation was a turning point in the war, and also in his personal thinking about slavery.
Yep. :)
Oops! That should have been "140th Indiana Regiment."
Please, please, please tell me we get to keep her. There's a desperate shortage of good sense in political office, I would hate to lose any more of it.
Funny how most of the people that seem to be able to excoriate the lunatics in US politics are women – at least most of the ones I've come across. I'm a great fan of Katie Porter. She could emigrate here any time.
I had the great pleasure to vote for her :) it’s rare I get to be completely happy with my votes lol
We’ll see how the political violence shakes out in the near future.
I hope she can power through the verbal bs.
I'm glad someone finally shot back (and saying that you don't like Washington is bold, holy shit), but this still veers into No True Scotsman territory.
Washington can trace his ancestry back to Scotland.
We get a trifecta today https://friendlyatheist.substack.com/p/miami-beach-officials-are-considering
Not a betting man - so I prefer 'hat trick'. 😁
Bullwinkle does hat tricks. They never turn out well.
Surely by now it's "did"?
Idk, he keeps getting rebooted.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Adventures_of_Rocky_and_Bullwinkle_and_Friends#Reboots
Hockey.
Cricket silly. 😁
I am curious, does crickets play hockey on ice or grass ? If it's the former how do they stand the cold ? 🤔
Jimminy says he didn't, but Katydid.
Okay, you are now taking le piss out of something very, very sacred.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do4IvsqvYN4
one day, when you least expect it......
We are even, you called football "rugby" 😝
Let's see when the NEXT new one appears, though?!
When George Washington was alive he had more than a few political enemies, many of whom ridiculed him quite mercilessly. For instance, a number of them mentioned in their private correspondence that he had a grotesquely large backside. When they wanted to piss him off in public, they'd refer to his posterior as "Greater Virginia." But, hey, we have to speak about him with nothing but hushed reverence today. Got it.
He's a dead white guy from the past so conservatives love him.
I wasn't in the right high school to study philosophy but I am sure the "love" letters between Rousseau and Voltaire are not mentioned either.
Outstanding! We need so much more of that. Thank you, Senator Hunt.
Hemant, I like your comment on Washington far better than either Murman's OR Hunt's. History and literature (and current events!) is filled with people who are neither villains nor heros, but have both good and bad in them. Opinions you will think are right on the money, and opinions you will find to be stupdi, wrong, or offensive. There is a tendency on both the left and right these days to try and shoehorn people into one or the other, villain or hero. This is not only bad history (for dead people) and bad sociology/politics (for live people), but when we do that we fail to teach our kids how to grapple with the real world and real people. But our kids need to be able to deal with people who are a mix of both, and people who have some opinions they agree with and some they don't. They need it so that they don't fall prey to "good people" who do bad things, or refuse to consider ideas and actions merely because they are initiated by "bad people." They need to learn about Washington as a good general, and a good President, and a racist slave-owner, both because he really was all those things at once, and because there are lots of people your kids will deal with who will also be a mix of the great and awful, the genius and idiot, the spectacular success and disappointing failure.