the christian conservative crows are comin' home to roost george.....

you'll be sorry soon, i told you, you just can't invite these people to the party, they always get drunk with power and rowdy and raise holy hell, i told you george.

well, hardee har har george, tough shit, deal with em'.

How will he be sorry? Is he not going to be elected? Are the religious right going to suddenly shift to the Democratic party?

Yes they are going to make a bunch of noise. But in the end they have two options. Leave (which some really are considering) or keep putting pressure on the GOP to support more of their issues.

The public perception of everything to come is going to be governed by the media and the message that flows from it. And the GOP/Neocons have that sewn up.

they're so touchy and sensitive.



and then there's THIS guy.........

But I will believe it had an impact when we get a Dem in the WH again.

When he raised taxes, the neo-Cons abandoned him, saying he went back on his promise.

Of course, Bush the Moraler doesn't have to worry about re-election, but Jeb...?

Perhaps this will help a Democrat win the White House if the fundies stay home in 2008, due to this fiasco. This GOP mess needs to be kept front and center...

was wouldn't it be funny if after all the war crimes and nonsense that W has done they call for his head after this? :crazy:

For them, that's the party of abortionists, evolutionists, and homosexuals. What they'd probably do is either break of on their own or join some other far right party that's sufficiently hateful and god-fearing for them.

There is a serious movement amongst some members of the religious right to have a large number of Christians move to SC and effectively take it over. After that they would suceed from the nation and form their own perfect Christian Nation. This may be the boost they needed to really get some support for it.

Even though it's damn shame that old Strom Thurmond is burmning in hell right now, he would have made a fine King for the asses, even though Stromy Jr is around...and know what they say, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree...I'm sure he's like his Daddy..lol

It will split the vote a la Ross Perot and WE get the presidency.

It's one of the problems we have with environmentalists out here - they're more than willing to protest Halliburton drilling or Georgia-Pacific logging, but getting them to get out and register to vote or collect signatures or vote... let's not be silly.

The situations are somewhat the same - in the 70s in Colorado, the environmentalists made a lot of headway, but in the 80s and 90s, lost a lot of that forward momentum, to the point where they just don't see the political profit in caring about politicians. Many of them see not a lick of difference between the two (and with some, on some points, I can see their point) and basically give up on the political system.

I see it with a lot of other advocacy oriented types, too, to the point where several of the people I like best in the world are ready to give up on the whole system, move to Montana, build a fort, and launch rockets into space to try to get to the Moon. (I'm serious.) They're liberal, but they're science types, who feel burned by the Dems under Clinton (who was not, admittedly, a space advocate) and doubly so by *, who doesn't know what he's talking about when he talks about militarizing the Moon, and doesn't put money or real space advocates in charge at NASA. (These folks are just an example of the disillusioned types running around out there.)

It happens on the right, too. Anyone can be pushed too far, and I think the lifers have been. They feel used and betrayed, as do the Libertarian-Republicans, the fiscal conservatives, and the old style, small government, individual liberty, research and progress Republicans. And the Rethugs could afford to lose those people - which are probably only 10-15% of the party, all things considered - if they had big margins. But they don't. At this point, all it would take is the abdication of 500,000 Republicans nationwide to turn the tide of the 06 elections, if otherwise voting patterns stay the same. That's a very small percentage, and probably smaller, since a lot of people on both sides don't vote in the mid-terms.

I don't know if the Republicans are going to break apart, but I can foresee disillusionment on the horizon. And for me, that's as good as a schism. Ineffective is fine with me.

We like to caricature the fundies because (a) it's so easy to do; and (2) they play to type so well.

However, there are some fundy-type thoughts running around out there that we could corral for the Democratic party: Thoughts such as our concern for the poor; championing of the little guy; and good stewardship of the environment.

Can we win every fundy vote? Of course not. Can we peel away some of the fundy support for every repressive program that the Republicans dream up? I think so. We don't have to become the substitute party of Gawd -- no sense trying to out-Taliban the American Taliban -- but we can shear off a few of their votes. I suspect right now a lot of the fundies are feeling pretty taken for granted. Let's go steal a few of them away.

There is nothing about the Christians that the Dem Party can use. The Dems think with their hearts, but the Christians think with their book. Democrats are motivated by the highest of ideals, but most so called Christians are like bureaucrats of Christ, people of little merit who need another authority to give their being any authority. They all too willingly resort to coercion and abandon the moral argument, because the moral argument finds them wanting. They accept the old testament when Christianity has little need or use of that document, and this because it better backs up their true faith, which is capitalism. Capitalism is the true faith of this land. To that we give our lives, our children, and our futures. The failure of socialism as a scientific and archaic approach to economy is the result of its juxtaposition with an economic system founded upon a religious mystery no less profound than the virgin birth: the spontaneous creation of capital without the contribution of labor. No wonder the Muslims think we are idolater.

But I still think they could have an impact in a country where the last couple of presidential elections came down to a handful of votes.

And there are any number of Christians who don't resort to coercion and abandon their morality at the first chance to turn a buck, and who hold the entirety of the New Testament as their creed. We find our authority through a variety of sources, including the Bible, individual experience, the shared experience of the community, common sense, and even (gasp!) the peculiar situation one might find oneself in.

However, if it comforts you to break out the broad brush on all Christians, there's really not much I can say or do about that. I would, however, if you are truly motivated by "the highest of ideals" to investigate a situation thoroughly before condemning out of hand such a broad segment of our country's populace.

I just try to not shit myself about the nature of my fellow man, or what religion we are really following. It is just too obvious what our religion is, being capitalism. What is sickening is how much Christ is used to beat and bruise others, and to justify the worst sort of crimes against humanity. Don't worry about the votes. They are good for nothing without the desire to back them up, and in this regard the true believers got it way up on the Dems. Yet, I am more interested in what people are willing to die for, and live for because far too many are willing to kill for far too little. Don't worry about votes, worry about giving people something to vote for. The Democrats and Republicans have all played for 51% of the vote. They all get elected with one goal, reelection. How about everyone setting their sights higher, like a 99 percent satisfaction rate. Look at why Christians vote repub. They are just as frustrated and angry as the rest of us; but being believers rather than thinkers they are easily manipulated. They want to follow. They want to feel superior. Their churches should be taxed into oblivion because they, more than anything else, inhibit the true exercise of religion.

Look at the meaning of that word, and try to realize for one moment how much Christianity has done to destroy community, and where Christianity has left off Law has taken over. Muslims have it way up on us and this is a fact not grasped by those who want to introduce western law into those regions. First, their religion supports their communities, and fosters a sense of group responsibility. Just like native American custom, or German law of a thousand years ago, it is the feud, and the threat of feud that made family within the group, and enemies without keenly aware that all were responsible, and all would be held responsible for any breach of the peace. Further, like those people, Muslims accept an absolute right to justice. We justify injustice by our demands for peace first. In our society it is legal to take because it is illegal to take back with force. Our communities are broke up into so many individuals, and this so law can become all powerful, and individuals better victims. No wonder we must try so desperately to hold our families together and build a sense of community. Law make injustice a certainty. Law makes lawlessness a certainty. It does not work.

They're not the Pharisee type, noisy, anti-everything not them, Literalist, Bible-banging, Rapture-baiting, wife-submitting, child-beating, fetus-loving, poor-hating types that seem cloned out of a secret facility at the Focus on the Family Visitor Center in Colorado Springs.

They're the quietly faithful, accepting, Beatitudes-quoting, non-proselytizing, lead by example, social justice, by their works ye shall know them, true Christian Humanists. And those Christians I like, admire for dedication, and can share a beer with, without worrying that one of them is going to decide that I need to be saved from my own horribly misguided atheism.

I, for one, am not willing to alienate these wonderful people by tarring them with the same brush as the Pharisees. While I wish that Liberal Christians would work harder to reclaim the name of Christian, and publicly speak out against the FotF clones, I realize that they have reasons for not doing so. And on this issue, I am content to let the Liberal Christian Humanists come to this conclusion in their own time. I feel that eventually, they will have to, just as Muslim Humanists did so when they were lumped in with Muslim extremists.

So please... don't give up on them. The person you insult with that kind of baiting might be the person standing next to you at the next health care reform rally.

Most of the ones I know are pretty dogmatic. Probably the best we can hope for is a schism in the Republican Party between the fundies and the greedmongers. Of course, many fundies are also greedmongers, so that's a problem. Those folks will have to decide which side they're on.

A big schism in the Republican Party would yield the same results as some of the fundies coming over to our side: we would win...but only if the voting machines aren't rigged.

that took it over with spurious and stealthy means and is now fanatically to the right, be couped by Christians using the same methods as they used to usurp them That would be a start,

Just a fantasy.

... wake up with fleas.

The fundies are going to demand more and more power. I'm hoping the rest of the country will say, "Hell, no!" If so, this could become very, very interesting. I would like for non-fundies to finally see what the religious reich is all about. :D

Don't judge until its over.