Dec 06, 2003
So driving to meet the kid at Grandma's I hear Bill O'Reilley say something so singularly stupid and false that I forgot the other amazingly stupid and false thing he said before that. Commenting on the Supreme Court review of the "under God" adulteration of the Pledge Of Allegiance, he said "God is not a religious term". Or, ((G|g)(o|-)d) for religiously sensitive regex freaks. Either way.
*choke*
Lying liar, or troglodytic moron? I report, you decide. Personally, I'll vote for both. "God" is the precise definition of what distinguishes the religious from the non-religious. When I hear someone say something so incomprehensibly deceitful and spin-ful, I have to remind myself why we aren't allowed to sterilize people like that. The only consolation is knowing that Bill O'Reilley thinks even less of the intelligence of his audience than I do.
If only the troglodytic hordes of talk radio were like the Mongol hordes. then at least we'd be able to smell them coming and flee from the stench before the horrible perception of their sight or sound. And at least the Mongols were a civilizing influence, once they got their tribute.
And so it continues. Michael Savage, or some other indistinguishable soulless enemy of reason and humanity, said today, I shit you not - and I am paraphrasing, but I'd swear my left nut on the general content of the rant - "The problem with Liberals is that, the way I see it, there's the Old Testament and the New Testament. and the Liberals want to take literally the wrong parts, and ignore the parts that should be taken literally. You can't just have people picking and choosing which way they want to interpret the Bible." Actually, that's exactly what you must have. It's the first principle America was founded to protect. That and "thou shalt not create a police state", and you've pretty much got the gist of the whole beef with the Brits back then. If you miss those two things, you know less about being an American than the last guy who ran across the Tex-Mex border.
But maybe I got it wrong, and what people need is someone to show them true from false with the end of an axeblade. A strong man to make them recognize truth from evil masquerading as truth. I think we've heard this story before, and again and again and again and again and again. The problem is, in fact, we pretty much solved "G-d" as a political issue over 200 years ago, but apparently the crusaders of talk radio hate America so badly that they can't rest a day until they tear down the one thing we Americans got righter than the rest of the entire fucking planet. They won't rest a minute until we are crushed under the iron heel of a corrupt aristocracy (or even better, monarchy) with a religious agenda that all must obey. They'd love to restore us to the Restoration. Ah, well, maybe we should cut Savage a break. He was responding to an 80 year old woman who said that the problem with most conservatives is that they are weak-minded and want someone to tell them how to live their lives. Truth hurts. Battle. Wits. Unarmed man.
Of course, someone with such an avowed distaste for the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the founding values of America will, when they get the opportunity, commit treason. And I'm pretty sure we can still hang people for that. Watch your ass, savage.
Note that there is a big difference between banning religious expressions from public life and forbidding civil authorities from using their office to advance their religious beliefs. Those with wisdom recognize this; those who don't are dangerous anachronisms (and may G-d punish you for your lack of faith and your lack of compassion).
And it's very sad indeed that so many have not the ears to hear the words of their Lord and Savior, who advised them to be respectful of civil authorities, to choose practice of their faith in secret over confrontation with secular leaders, and to distrust utterly those who make a big show of their piety.
it's the kind of thing that makes us want to make "jesus was a liberal" bumper stickers just to see people's true colors.
