The Christian right has mythologized Jesus to the point I doubt he bears any resemblance to the real individual, if he even existed. Jesus is always in complete agreement with what ever preacher is speaking at the moment. It's only natural they would attempt to mythologize Washington as well, as it fits their preferred narrative. Facts simply do not matter to people devoted to post-hoc rationalizations.
Just as they are continuously spreading the young earth creation myth with made up fabrications and heavy borrowing of popular science fiction franchises to "create" a so falsely-called science showing a white skinned Adam and Eve living in a 6,000 year old earth, which was created "ex nihilio" (Latin for "out of nothing") within 6 normal 24 hour days, alongside strict vegetarian animals both living and extinct in the Garden of Eden only to get kicked out for eating an apple (or a purple raspberry according to Dumb Idiot Ken Ham's version of the tale).
Then the whole world was covered with a mythical global Flood made up of volcanoes, earthquakes, rapid moving continents, meteor showers, hurricanes, and every other unnatural disasters all happening at the very same time an oil tanker shaped wooden ark (or a elongated warehouse shaped ark) sailed along with Noah his family and a zoo full of animals living and extinct inside it while the rest outside the ark get destroyed and changed into "billions of dead things" as repetitively said by Dumb Idiot Ham like a broken record in form of fossils people have been digging up to this day.
No such world has ever existed due to lack of evidence and the fossil records is completely void of the said billions of dead things as falsely claimed by Dumb Idiot Ham who also made up many unfounded, imaginative lies and falsehoods about dead things getting dissolved away by acid if he thinks there were 20+ billions of people and animals (within Soylent Green territory) in the mythical pre-Flood world with giants wrestling with dinosaurs in the Roman style arena, and vegetarian mats carried ark survivors to a new world after the Flood ended, etc.
For the Biblical account of creation to be true, then almost everything we think we know about the life sciences, geology, and astrophysics have to be wrong, while some Bronze Age goat herders who didn't know where the sun went at night got it exactly right.
One creationist tried to claim that Hitler based that whole ethnic genocide thing on evolution. In fact, if you bother to read Mein Kampf he never once mentions evolution. Nope, what is actually in there is a whole lot of references to god.
Myths can serve a very important purpose in the nation's zeitgeist. What is truly dangerous is when the mythmakers demonize those of us who are realists.
This particular myth is all three, depending on the motives of the teller. Benign, if it is being used to highlight the general character of Washington. Problematic if it is being used to suggest that religious belief is the sole reason for that character. Malignant if it is being used to force others to follow the same religious rules the teller has. The DUI hire is being malignant.
"Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind, those which are caused by a difference in sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate and distressing, and ought to be deprecated. I was in hopes that the enlightened and liberal policy, which has marked the present age, would have at least reconciled Christians of every denomination so far that we should never again see the religious disputes carried to such a pitch as to endanger the peace of society,"
-- George Washington, in a letter to Sir Edward Newenham dated Saturday, October 20th, 1792
They bring their biblical cherry-picking skills to the writings of the founders. To the DUI hire, that quote doesn't exist/ doesn't mean what we say/ is taken out of context. If he's sober enough to understand the words.
Just like they bring their cherry-picking skills to scientists who write and make quotes about evolution and the old age of earth, Darwin, Huxley, and even the Bible itself to which they did exactly as they did to the quotes and writings from scientists-- change the meetings of the verses around to fit their false narratives about evolution being a lie, non-avian dinosaurs live alongside man and modern extant animals, the earth is thousands of years old, etc.
Christians lie about who's a Christian and what they did. Water is wet, the sun rises in the east, and days (in English) end in "Y." Hegseth is only the latest among too many other Christian jingoists who want us to believe his bullshit.
And while we're at it, how about something else that Washington said:
I'm currently reading the fascinating 2005 book "1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus" by American science writer Charles C. Mann. One major section of it is devoted to the horrible plagues that beset indigenous peoples in the Americas because they lacked the immunities of their European incomers. One such plague, of smallpox, was devastating the Indian tribes of New England during 1775-1778, and miserable conditions at Valley Forge were ripe for the revolutionaries to be seriously laid low by it, but George Washington had taken pains to make sure his troops had made use of the newfangled idea of inoculation (infusion of a mild case via scratch or incision to establish immunity). He organized inoculations in stages, so the army was never entirely incapacitated by the mild cases of smallpox the inoculation induced, and they were spared the deadly cases and thus remained in fighting condition.
So instead of heroic images of the great man in a boat or on his knees, something more historically accurate (and important) would show him distributing powdered smallpox dust to his men. But that would illustrate the advantages of science over religion, wouldn't it? Can't have that if you're a MAGAt in today's America.
All in furtherance of their goal to eventually make their version of Christianity compulsory. How long before one of them states out loud and on the record that not only should the US be officially Christian, but that non-Christians should be stripped of citizenship and deported or killed? At first that will be seen as nonsense from a far right lunatic, but if the Regime holds on to power the way they so openly lust for, that will slowly become their default position. Look at how the nonsense Trump has spouted went from unthinkable to routine in just a decade or so.
Following the Nazi playbook, make the outlandish statements become common. Then follow through by with making the outlandish actions becoming common. Finally, the worst acts are then supported by the public or the public turns a blind eye to it!
Exactly what all Christian fundies are doing to spread lies and fantasies about young earth creation, the end times according to the Left Behind series, about what secular public schools are doing to children, and so much more.
And the Internet says: "Twelve U.S. presidents owned slaves at some point in their lives; of these, eight owned slaves while in office. Ten of the first twelve American presidents owned slaves,"
So we are a slaveholding country and should immediately return to that condition in order to honor our founding father, George Washington.
I've been retired for 13 years so, no, not lately. And I was lucky, I loved my job and was paid well. But I understand that some workers are wage slaves and companies are not as generous as they used to be.
Public‑school and religious‑school history often isn’t designed to teach real history. It’s crafted to serve a social purpose: to present a story of triumph, virtue, and inevitability that flatters the ruling class or religous class and reinforces a particular national mythology. Because of that, students rarely encounter a truly accurate or nuanced history until college, and even then, the quality depends far more on the individual instructor than on any state standards.
The irony is that when students are finally exposed to real history, they’re fascinated. Authentic history is full of conflict, contradiction, struggle, and human drama. It’s anything but boring, and it actually prepares people to understand the world they live in.
Unfortunately, many adults only remember the simplified, sanitized version they learned in grade school. That early historiography leaves them unprepared for the complexity, and the uncomfortable truths, of their own nation’s past.
Thank you for sharing this well thought out and written article. Jeff
Public school education is fascinating, especially when it comes to history. My wife went to school in the South and she learn all about the "War of Northern Aggression". Meanwhile, I learned about the only Civil War conflict that happened in Arizona.
They couldn't ignore the Trail of Tears in Oklahoma History but it was taught dry and not as something that happened to real people. OTOH in elementary school we re-enacted the "Land Run" (Hey we took your land and gave you scrubland, but now we want that too)
The “I cannot tell a lie” attributed to young George Washington in response to his father’s questioning is from the same Cherry Tree tale Weems put in his book. That he also includes this story shows us he is a true propagandist…say anything, however false, to advance the narrative. Even lie about fidelity to the truth.
The best GW story I heard was a joke Fromm my Sicilian relatives.
When crossing the Delaware, George Washington, skimpily clad in those tight pants he wore, said "Fra Freda Questa Notte" (It's cold tonight) and an Indian in the boat, even more skimpily clad, said, "Du sei pura Siciliana?" (Are you Sicilian too?)
Maybe it helps to be Sicilian. it’s quite warm in Sicily and no one there can imagine going out in winter as scantily clad as George Washington and the Indian were in that boat.
OT - Hi everybody, I guess I have missed quite a bit of Hemant's substack. I don't know when I'll have time to go back and read them all, as I have been unexpectedly swimming in boxes for the last four weeks. First packing up an entire house with two weeks' notice, then driving down here to Florida where my husband wanted to move into mom's house that I inherited. Boxes and furniture wall to wall (we are trying to sell some of Mom's old stuff) and the usual disasters that come with any old house.
So yes, I had my ass dragged back to Fucking Crazy State. Barely enough time to put in my two weeks notice at work. I miss Minnesota. I miss my friends. I miss the bluffs and the Mississippi River, and I miss the snow. But it is what it is.
I don't want to take up too much space here with the story, so I'll be going over to my profile page with more detail, if anyone is interested.
Hope you guys had a Great Christmas and I want to wish everybody a Happy Near Year.
As for that smarmy painting of Washington I can say as a former Minnesota resident that kneeling in snow is not recommended unless you're wearing snow pants. Those pants of his must be some kind of high-quality leather or something to keep him warm, but still.... oh well, it's total fiction anyway.
I know, but it holds lots of memories. I spent my entire childhood in this house, and mom spent her entire adult married life here. My dad died ten years ago, and I still have some of his shirts and ties. I learned to let go of a few of them over the years, so I know it’s possible to part with things.
I am still working on sentiment versus practicality, especially when it comes to his stuff. I still miss him terribly.
Thanks! I did miss having time to come here, see what was going on in the country, and read everybody’s comments. I also lost my charge cord for my laptop during the move. Just bought a new one today. :)
Oh, that too. I have noticed the increased presence of evangelicals. Like a cafe with its entire storefront covered with "Jesus...the reason for the season" and "Jesus...our only hope" on the side of a gun/ammo store.
These are but two examples/ it has gone from being an occasional annoyance in Minnesota to swimming in evangelicals once again in Floriduh. I swear, I am so tired of that reason for the season BS already, I'll just have to learn not to see it.
And what if he did pray at Valley Forge? WHO FUCKING CARES? That doesn't prove that America was founded as a Christian nation AT ALL. In fact the VERY WORDS of the Founding Fathers prove that America was most certainly NOT founded as a Christian nation. And those words HAVE been verified as they appeared in letters and were signed by the very people that these Christian Nationalists are trying to deify.
Indeed. I'd love for one of them to show me where Yahweh or Jesus or Christianity is mentioned so much as ONCE in the US Constitution, which is the foundational document of this country.
Exactly. If America really was founded as a Christian nation then the Founders would have been VERY clear about that. Instead they wrote in their very FIRST Amendment "Congress shall make no law regarding the establishment of religion."
And then in the Treaty of Tripoli they wrote "America was in NO WAY founded as a Christian nation."
The first words of the Preamble of the Constitution are NOT:
• In the Name of Jesus or
• By Command of Yahweh
Those words are, of course, "WE THE PEOPLE." We create this government, we run it, we are responsible for it. No deities of any stripe have anything to do with it.
And those who would have it otherwise haven't the slightest idea what they are asking for or what would result from their misbegotten desire.
Maybe they are using our first president as a role model for displays of piety since they can't use the current president for anything remotely associated with ethics and morality.
"The Rev. Chase cites the testimony of Oney Judge as a way of pushing back against that pious mythologizing:
She says that she never received the least mental or moral instruction, of any kind, while she remained in Washington’s family. But, after she came to Portsmouth, she learned to read; and when Elias Smith first preached in Portsmouth, she professes to have been converted to Christianity.
She, and the woman with whom she lives, (who is nearly of her age), appear to be, and have the reputation of being imbued with the real spirit of Christianity. She says that the stories told of Washington’s piety and prayers, so far as she ever saw or heard while she was his slave, have no foundation. Card-playing and wine-drinking were the business at his parties, and he had more of such company Sundays than on any other day. I do not mention this as showing, in my estimation, his anti-Christian character, so much as the bare fact of being a slaveholder, and not a hundredth part so much as trying to kidnap this woman; but, in the minds of the community, it will weigh infinitely more.""
_____
What these gentlemen want is a god fashioned in their own image. A white, American, Evangelical god who loves capitalism, kicking ass, greed, and the United States of America.
Such a god demands nothing from them but play acting along with displays of piety. No sacrifices required. No demands for empathy or mercy. No consideration of one's own good fortune and the lesser fortunes of others. No moral obligations of any serious import. No obligation to the strangers, the refugees, the poor, the slave, the widows, or orphans except occasionally to be used as photo ops to glorify their supposed piety at being slightly less cruel once in their lives.
The last thing they want is a personal god placing demands on them. They want a corporate god, created in marketing to appeal to all of their baser instincts and make themselves feel good in their cupidity, vanity, and hatred. A dead, eternal image run through marketing and focus tests that gives them everything and demands nothing.
it’s especially annoying that since President Washington can’t argue against any of it, the liars will just keep on lying. Bad history doomed to repeat its bad self.
The Christian right has mythologized Jesus to the point I doubt he bears any resemblance to the real individual, if he even existed. Jesus is always in complete agreement with what ever preacher is speaking at the moment. It's only natural they would attempt to mythologize Washington as well, as it fits their preferred narrative. Facts simply do not matter to people devoted to post-hoc rationalizations.
You cannot reason with the unreasonable.
Dr. House: "If you could reason with religious people then there wouldn't be any religious people."
Just as they are continuously spreading the young earth creation myth with made up fabrications and heavy borrowing of popular science fiction franchises to "create" a so falsely-called science showing a white skinned Adam and Eve living in a 6,000 year old earth, which was created "ex nihilio" (Latin for "out of nothing") within 6 normal 24 hour days, alongside strict vegetarian animals both living and extinct in the Garden of Eden only to get kicked out for eating an apple (or a purple raspberry according to Dumb Idiot Ken Ham's version of the tale).
Then the whole world was covered with a mythical global Flood made up of volcanoes, earthquakes, rapid moving continents, meteor showers, hurricanes, and every other unnatural disasters all happening at the very same time an oil tanker shaped wooden ark (or a elongated warehouse shaped ark) sailed along with Noah his family and a zoo full of animals living and extinct inside it while the rest outside the ark get destroyed and changed into "billions of dead things" as repetitively said by Dumb Idiot Ham like a broken record in form of fossils people have been digging up to this day.
No such world has ever existed due to lack of evidence and the fossil records is completely void of the said billions of dead things as falsely claimed by Dumb Idiot Ham who also made up many unfounded, imaginative lies and falsehoods about dead things getting dissolved away by acid if he thinks there were 20+ billions of people and animals (within Soylent Green territory) in the mythical pre-Flood world with giants wrestling with dinosaurs in the Roman style arena, and vegetarian mats carried ark survivors to a new world after the Flood ended, etc.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a9fc5e6e49f1a0202cfeb391eae6a631d5c6af1a83ea0f00e79c6899677b4890.jpg
Archaeology is fascinating. Somehow I missed that.
For the Biblical account of creation to be true, then almost everything we think we know about the life sciences, geology, and astrophysics have to be wrong, while some Bronze Age goat herders who didn't know where the sun went at night got it exactly right.
That's what the creationists want to see, but can't. Because the truth is the exact opposite of what they want to see.
They are impervious to facts and reason.
https://youtu.be/imrFn6czYDk
The British troops prayed to Jesus at Valley Forge, too. Nobody seems to care. And it would ruin the narrative.
How many prayers, do you suppose, were offered up during the Holocaust, and to what effect?
A horrific event that occurred in Christian Europe.
In a war fought primarily between countries who considered themselves Christian.
It is always amusing to watch Christians try to argue that the Germans/Nazis were not “Really” Christian.
They thought they were. Hitler didn't say anything about the Jews the German people had not been hearing from the pulpits for centuries.
One creationist tried to claim that Hitler based that whole ethnic genocide thing on evolution. In fact, if you bother to read Mein Kampf he never once mentions evolution. Nope, what is actually in there is a whole lot of references to god.
The British seems to be all Catholic with a lot of Hail Marys thrown in the mix.
Many of their Irish troops were. The English, Scots & Welsh? Not so much.
God is an American, doncha know?
And I'm afraid of Americans.
youtu.be/LT3cERVRoQo
That's why He cares so much about whether your football team wins the game, dontchaknow.
"God is an American" North or South American?
God Bless America?
Omni American.
And btw, 👎
The amazing apologetics on both sides.
Happy New Year!
When the legend becomes fact, print the legend, never more true when it cover the christain mythoes.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/6ca119ffc634b8c092e5848874d01cbd9b49ef2b96504f628c020acc93ace7f5.jpg
Whenever they say : "The Bible says", You can be sure that it is their interpretation of what they are about to say.
Jesus spoke unto me and He wants you to send me money. Do you dare displease Him by failing to obey His will?
Myths can serve a very important purpose in the nation's zeitgeist. What is truly dangerous is when the mythmakers demonize those of us who are realists.
There are benign myths, problematic myths, and malignant myths. Which one Hegseth is indulging here is left as an exercise for the student.
This particular myth is all three, depending on the motives of the teller. Benign, if it is being used to highlight the general character of Washington. Problematic if it is being used to suggest that religious belief is the sole reason for that character. Malignant if it is being used to force others to follow the same religious rules the teller has. The DUI hire is being malignant.
LOL, "DUI hire". Good one. 🤣
"Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind, those which are caused by a difference in sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate and distressing, and ought to be deprecated. I was in hopes that the enlightened and liberal policy, which has marked the present age, would have at least reconciled Christians of every denomination so far that we should never again see the religious disputes carried to such a pitch as to endanger the peace of society,"
-- George Washington, in a letter to Sir Edward Newenham dated Saturday, October 20th, 1792
You listening, Kegbreath? Who am I kidding? Of course, he isn't! 😝
They bring their biblical cherry-picking skills to the writings of the founders. To the DUI hire, that quote doesn't exist/ doesn't mean what we say/ is taken out of context. If he's sober enough to understand the words.
I made sure to do an edit to include the attribution to that quote by Washington. Always helps to know the exact source of said quotes.
Just like they bring their cherry-picking skills to scientists who write and make quotes about evolution and the old age of earth, Darwin, Huxley, and even the Bible itself to which they did exactly as they did to the quotes and writings from scientists-- change the meetings of the verses around to fit their false narratives about evolution being a lie, non-avian dinosaurs live alongside man and modern extant animals, the earth is thousands of years old, etc.
Why it's almost as though they're not arguing in good faith.
Christians lie about who's a Christian and what they did. Water is wet, the sun rises in the east, and days (in English) end in "Y." Hegseth is only the latest among too many other Christian jingoists who want us to believe his bullshit.
And while we're at it, how about something else that Washington said:
𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑈𝑛𝑖𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑆𝑡𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑠 𝑠ℎ𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝑎 𝑓𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑑𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝑒 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑛𝑓𝑙𝑢𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑐𝑙𝑒𝑟𝑔𝑦.
-- George Washington
To xtians who buy into this bushwa...
Washington was a Deist. That is NOT the same thing as being an xtian at all. Learn the difference.
Deist has DEI in it. That will trigger these christstains.
Eat well, stay fit, DEI Anyway. 😁
I thought I saw something about the Justice Dept targeting company DEI programs.
ms.now/opinion/doj-dei-corporations-probe-fraud
I'm currently reading the fascinating 2005 book "1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus" by American science writer Charles C. Mann. One major section of it is devoted to the horrible plagues that beset indigenous peoples in the Americas because they lacked the immunities of their European incomers. One such plague, of smallpox, was devastating the Indian tribes of New England during 1775-1778, and miserable conditions at Valley Forge were ripe for the revolutionaries to be seriously laid low by it, but George Washington had taken pains to make sure his troops had made use of the newfangled idea of inoculation (infusion of a mild case via scratch or incision to establish immunity). He organized inoculations in stages, so the army was never entirely incapacitated by the mild cases of smallpox the inoculation induced, and they were spared the deadly cases and thus remained in fighting condition.
So instead of heroic images of the great man in a boat or on his knees, something more historically accurate (and important) would show him distributing powdered smallpox dust to his men. But that would illustrate the advantages of science over religion, wouldn't it? Can't have that if you're a MAGAt in today's America.
Inoculation is close to vaccination and that is a dirty word thanks to Andrew Wakefield.
(A situation that is not being helped by the fact this year's flu vaccine missed a rather virulent strain)
That one ashole's assholery has caused more harm than we'll ever be able to calculate.
I may have read that book. Or something in the same vein. It was fascinating.
Thank you for acknowledging the MAGA cult with their imperialistic "America" ideology.
God Bless The Gulf of America?
𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐶ℎ𝑟𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑎𝑛 𝑁𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑎𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑠 𝑖𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑇𝑟𝑢𝑚𝑝 𝑎𝑑𝑚𝑖𝑛𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑜𝑛𝑒𝑠 𝑤ℎ𝑜 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑝 𝑢𝑝 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑖𝑟 𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑠𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑡 𝑙𝑖𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑟𝑒 𝑢𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑖𝑚𝑎𝑔𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑠𝑢𝑔𝑔𝑒𝑠𝑡 𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑛𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑖𝑠, 𝑓𝑖𝑟𝑠𝑡 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑓𝑜𝑟𝑒𝑚𝑜𝑠𝑡, 𝑎 𝐶ℎ𝑟𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑎𝑛 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑑𝑒𝑠𝑝𝑖𝑡𝑒 𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑒𝑣𝑖𝑑𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑟𝑦.
All in furtherance of their goal to eventually make their version of Christianity compulsory. How long before one of them states out loud and on the record that not only should the US be officially Christian, but that non-Christians should be stripped of citizenship and deported or killed? At first that will be seen as nonsense from a far right lunatic, but if the Regime holds on to power the way they so openly lust for, that will slowly become their default position. Look at how the nonsense Trump has spouted went from unthinkable to routine in just a decade or so.
Following the Nazi playbook, make the outlandish statements become common. Then follow through by with making the outlandish actions becoming common. Finally, the worst acts are then supported by the public or the public turns a blind eye to it!
Exactly what all Christian fundies are doing to spread lies and fantasies about young earth creation, the end times according to the Left Behind series, about what secular public schools are doing to children, and so much more.
And then the real battle will begin when they fight over which of their 40,000 myths are the correct one.
A cult based on stolen mythology peddles more myths. Whoodathunk?
And the Internet says: "Twelve U.S. presidents owned slaves at some point in their lives; of these, eight owned slaves while in office. Ten of the first twelve American presidents owned slaves,"
So we are a slaveholding country and should immediately return to that condition in order to honor our founding father, George Washington.
I agree but think Maga will make poor slaves due to their abject stupidity.
And being overweight, have very few skills (unless cooking roadkill, and inbreeding count as skills), and extreme gullibility.
Tell 'em it's a working vacation. They'll eat it up with a spoon!
Have you worked in a corporate environment lately? Who says we ever left it?
I've been retired for 13 years so, no, not lately. And I was lucky, I loved my job and was paid well. But I understand that some workers are wage slaves and companies are not as generous as they used to be.
Public‑school and religious‑school history often isn’t designed to teach real history. It’s crafted to serve a social purpose: to present a story of triumph, virtue, and inevitability that flatters the ruling class or religous class and reinforces a particular national mythology. Because of that, students rarely encounter a truly accurate or nuanced history until college, and even then, the quality depends far more on the individual instructor than on any state standards.
The irony is that when students are finally exposed to real history, they’re fascinated. Authentic history is full of conflict, contradiction, struggle, and human drama. It’s anything but boring, and it actually prepares people to understand the world they live in.
Unfortunately, many adults only remember the simplified, sanitized version they learned in grade school. That early historiography leaves them unprepared for the complexity, and the uncomfortable truths, of their own nation’s past.
Thank you for sharing this well thought out and written article. Jeff
Public school education is fascinating, especially when it comes to history. My wife went to school in the South and she learn all about the "War of Northern Aggression". Meanwhile, I learned about the only Civil War conflict that happened in Arizona.
They couldn't ignore the Trail of Tears in Oklahoma History but it was taught dry and not as something that happened to real people. OTOH in elementary school we re-enacted the "Land Run" (Hey we took your land and gave you scrubland, but now we want that too)
oh jeesh, I didn't learn about the Trail of Tears until I was in my 20s. I was over 40 before I learned about the Tulsa massacre.
The “I cannot tell a lie” attributed to young George Washington in response to his father’s questioning is from the same Cherry Tree tale Weems put in his book. That he also includes this story shows us he is a true propagandist…say anything, however false, to advance the narrative. Even lie about fidelity to the truth.
I was told outright that the cherry tree story was a lie and should not be told anymore.
And add in that BS about Washington throwing a coin across the Potomac. The man was a surveyor and a general, not Captain America!
The best GW story I heard was a joke Fromm my Sicilian relatives.
When crossing the Delaware, George Washington, skimpily clad in those tight pants he wore, said "Fra Freda Questa Notte" (It's cold tonight) and an Indian in the boat, even more skimpily clad, said, "Du sei pura Siciliana?" (Are you Sicilian too?)
Call me "clueless" (Yer CLUELESS!), but I don't get the joke. 😝
Maybe it helps to be Sicilian. it’s quite warm in Sicily and no one there can imagine going out in winter as scantily clad as George Washington and the Indian were in that boat.
Also, George Washington and the Indian were Sicilian! How likely is that?
I have been married to a beautiful Sicilian lady for 53 years.
OT - Hi everybody, I guess I have missed quite a bit of Hemant's substack. I don't know when I'll have time to go back and read them all, as I have been unexpectedly swimming in boxes for the last four weeks. First packing up an entire house with two weeks' notice, then driving down here to Florida where my husband wanted to move into mom's house that I inherited. Boxes and furniture wall to wall (we are trying to sell some of Mom's old stuff) and the usual disasters that come with any old house.
So yes, I had my ass dragged back to Fucking Crazy State. Barely enough time to put in my two weeks notice at work. I miss Minnesota. I miss my friends. I miss the bluffs and the Mississippi River, and I miss the snow. But it is what it is.
I don't want to take up too much space here with the story, so I'll be going over to my profile page with more detail, if anyone is interested.
Hope you guys had a Great Christmas and I want to wish everybody a Happy Near Year.
As for that smarmy painting of Washington I can say as a former Minnesota resident that kneeling in snow is not recommended unless you're wearing snow pants. Those pants of his must be some kind of high-quality leather or something to keep him warm, but still.... oh well, it's total fiction anyway.
take care, y'all.
4 week summary of FA. Christians behaving badly. Rinse. Repeat. : )
Florida and Texas. Two Governors in a race to see who can dig to the Indian Ocean first.
if they get there, they'll just keep digging. Cuz that's what MAGA idiots do.
My unsolicited advice: don’t worry overly much about selling stuff you don’t want or need. Your primary objective is getting free of it.
I know, but it holds lots of memories. I spent my entire childhood in this house, and mom spent her entire adult married life here. My dad died ten years ago, and I still have some of his shirts and ties. I learned to let go of a few of them over the years, so I know it’s possible to part with things.
I am still working on sentiment versus practicality, especially when it comes to his stuff. I still miss him terribly.
Wish me luck!
Glad you're back. Glad you're okay!
Welcome back?
Thanks! I did miss having time to come here, see what was going on in the country, and read everybody’s comments. I also lost my charge cord for my laptop during the move. Just bought a new one today. :)
Well, I meant back to floriduh. Hence the question mark.
Oh, that too. I have noticed the increased presence of evangelicals. Like a cafe with its entire storefront covered with "Jesus...the reason for the season" and "Jesus...our only hope" on the side of a gun/ammo store.
These are but two examples/ it has gone from being an occasional annoyance in Minnesota to swimming in evangelicals once again in Floriduh. I swear, I am so tired of that reason for the season BS already, I'll just have to learn not to see it.
Panhandle? I don't see that stuff in Pinellas.
Near Tallahassee.
And what if he did pray at Valley Forge? WHO FUCKING CARES? That doesn't prove that America was founded as a Christian nation AT ALL. In fact the VERY WORDS of the Founding Fathers prove that America was most certainly NOT founded as a Christian nation. And those words HAVE been verified as they appeared in letters and were signed by the very people that these Christian Nationalists are trying to deify.
Indeed. I'd love for one of them to show me where Yahweh or Jesus or Christianity is mentioned so much as ONCE in the US Constitution, which is the foundational document of this country.
Methinks they'll be looking for a while.
Exactly. If America really was founded as a Christian nation then the Founders would have been VERY clear about that. Instead they wrote in their very FIRST Amendment "Congress shall make no law regarding the establishment of religion."
And then in the Treaty of Tripoli they wrote "America was in NO WAY founded as a Christian nation."
Seems pretty fucking crystal clear to my eyes.
The first words of the Preamble of the Constitution are NOT:
• In the Name of Jesus or
• By Command of Yahweh
Those words are, of course, "WE THE PEOPLE." We create this government, we run it, we are responsible for it. No deities of any stripe have anything to do with it.
And those who would have it otherwise haven't the slightest idea what they are asking for or what would result from their misbegotten desire.
They are asking for absolute power. They refuse to realize that leads to guillotines.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMHCw3RqulY
[Jedi hand wave] “These aren’t the Founders you are looking for.”
But they don't believe in the Force or Jedi. Though even without it they *define* the Dark Side. I think I'd rather deal with Palpatine.
"If America" the land mass, including North and South America. Unfortunately the MAGA cult has succeeded in convincing many America is a country.
God Bless America?
👎
Maybe they are using our first president as a role model for displays of piety since they can't use the current president for anything remotely associated with ethics and morality.
Of course he can be. Ask what would Trump do and you know the moral and/or ethical thing to do is the exact opposite.
Consewertive politicians and apparatchiks ask themselves WWJD? Then they do the opposite.
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/2016/12/09/unjust-piety-safe-evangelical-environments-oney-judge-larycia-hawkins/
"The Rev. Chase cites the testimony of Oney Judge as a way of pushing back against that pious mythologizing:
She says that she never received the least mental or moral instruction, of any kind, while she remained in Washington’s family. But, after she came to Portsmouth, she learned to read; and when Elias Smith first preached in Portsmouth, she professes to have been converted to Christianity.
She, and the woman with whom she lives, (who is nearly of her age), appear to be, and have the reputation of being imbued with the real spirit of Christianity. She says that the stories told of Washington’s piety and prayers, so far as she ever saw or heard while she was his slave, have no foundation. Card-playing and wine-drinking were the business at his parties, and he had more of such company Sundays than on any other day. I do not mention this as showing, in my estimation, his anti-Christian character, so much as the bare fact of being a slaveholder, and not a hundredth part so much as trying to kidnap this woman; but, in the minds of the community, it will weigh infinitely more.""
_____
What these gentlemen want is a god fashioned in their own image. A white, American, Evangelical god who loves capitalism, kicking ass, greed, and the United States of America.
Such a god demands nothing from them but play acting along with displays of piety. No sacrifices required. No demands for empathy or mercy. No consideration of one's own good fortune and the lesser fortunes of others. No moral obligations of any serious import. No obligation to the strangers, the refugees, the poor, the slave, the widows, or orphans except occasionally to be used as photo ops to glorify their supposed piety at being slightly less cruel once in their lives.
The last thing they want is a personal god placing demands on them. They want a corporate god, created in marketing to appeal to all of their baser instincts and make themselves feel good in their cupidity, vanity, and hatred. A dead, eternal image run through marketing and focus tests that gives them everything and demands nothing.
She, and the woman with whom she lives, (who is nearly of her age)
Roommates or ...
it’s especially annoying that since President Washington can’t argue against any of it, the liars will just keep on lying. Bad history doomed to repeat its bad self.
What Christian deity would deliver us Donald Trump as President--twice? George Washington's worst nightmare has come true. Thank you, Stupid Murica.
Trump thinks he IS a deity.
If YHVH were real, Trump would've gotten a lightning bolt enema by now.
If YHWH were real, Ted would have been the one left behind in the dark, freezing house, not Snowball.
Oh, who am I kidding, not even a benevolent, omnipotent deity could make Ted Cruz a decent human being.
https://www.zentaur.org/memes/this-human-suit-is-itchy.jpg
The suit is itchy because he was removed from the vat before the skin congealed.
🤣🤣🤣
"Stupid Murica" God Bless Murcia, the MAGA cult loves Murica.
In God We Trust?