Horowitz and Front Page Attack a Christian for Being ChristianDavid Horowitz - the great authority on Christianity (chortle) has employed Mark Tooley (note the word "tool" in the name) to try to demean the good work of Bob Edgar and the NCC (National Council of Churches). The delicious part is that Tooley is accusing Reverend Edgar of doing precisely what the Christian Right has been doing for several decades (and what is vastly different from Rev. Edgar's stand on the line separating Church and State). Tooley and Horowitz should be concerned, and I understand why they are lashing out. They are not going to be able to win this theological argument and they know it. I've seen Bob Edgar speak, and his love for the works and words of Jesus Christ is as sincere as anything I've witnessed. Demonizing him as a Democrat will simply hold no water when it comes to attempting to debunk his undeniable New Testament-based message. There is a fullness of scope regarding Christian values that Rev. Edgar is asking Americans to publically debate, of which our government should consider when forming democratic policy for a just society. Contrasting Rev. Edgar's position and scope of issues and the position and scope of issues of the Christian Right is akin to looking at a Hubble-telescope-generated vista of the universe compared to the bowling-alley narrowness (and decidedly unenlightened nature) of the values that the Christian Right activists promote.
David Horowitz just can't get over his dislike for Christianity. Alas, Rev. Edgar's world view doesn't match Horowitz's - so Front Page magazine would naturally attack Rev. Edgar as if he was a demonic heretic, which is so far from the truth that Christians like me begin to pity people like the Front Pagers - locked in their little ideological cages. I won't go as far as to sit back, complacent in my pity, and let these idiots take America and Christian theology down the tubes, though.
Frederick Clarkson recently stated that "every effective movement for social justice will be met with smart and formidable opposition." In Horowitz' case, how smart is it to have his particular right-wing neoconservative rag attacking a Christian and dividing the church?
SOTU Highlights LossLast night in his SOTU speech, President Bush reminded me of all we have lost since he has come to lead this nation.
The President said that the 911 attacks could have been stopped if the phone calls of two hijackers had been monitored under his domestic eavesdropping program. Dick Cheney had asserted the same thing previous to last night's speech. FBI Director Robert Mueller told Congress that The National Security Agency's secret domestic spying hasn't nabbed any Al Qaeda agents in the U.S. since the Sept. 11 attacks! Kristen Brietweiser was made a widow when her husband Ronald was killed in New York City on 911. Ak her what she thinks about those assertions of Bush and Cheney. Read 'NSA Director Hayden--One Needle in a Growing Bush "Hay"stack of Lies' by Mrs. Breitweiser.Kristen lost someone she loved. She wants Bush to stop deliberately and grossly misleading the American public.Last night in the gallery, Cindy Sheehan - mother of American soldier Casey Sheehan who was killed in Iraq - was removed from her seat. She wasn't simply ejected, but she was arrested for wearing a t-shirt that displayed a message that was not allowed because it criticized Bush.
After booting the mother of a dead soldier who came to listen, Bush spoke a lot more about the criticisms about the Iraq war that he would not accept - all the while chiming lofty rhetoric about something called "liberty." I thought about the Bill of Rights and the many incredibly difficult issues that our Founding Fathers must have discussed in order to agree upon them. We certainly don't see a willingness in teh Executive or Legislative branch for that kind of dissent and debate today. We are losing the Founding Fathers' concept of an enlightened society.
I kept thinking about George Washington's ghost looking at Bush and tossing rotten tomatoes at him - knowing that he deliberately avoided going overseas during Viet Nam - knowing he was attempting, with all his bully might up on his podium, to squelch freedom for Americans to express dissent - knowing how he has completely (and determinedly) divided America - knowing he was hosting one mother of a brave and loyal soldier who'd died in the war on terror while ejecting and arresting a mother of an equally brave and loyal KIA soldier because she dared to express her dissent about the war on a T-shirt.
Although Mrs. Sheehan's act of civil disobedience got her a result she likely suspected and probably surprised few people, the contrast Bush showed us last night between his version of a soldier's "good mother" and a soldier's "bad mother" should be highlighted.
Why should I highlight the contrast? Because they were both soldier's mothers. Can you imagine if Bush had allowed Cindy Sheehan to stay in the gallery and introduced her, all teary-eyed, alongside the other family? If the soldiers' mothers had been allowed to publically hug one another in solidarity over the honrable young men they'd lost? It would have raised Bush up to look so generous in spirit - but no. He couldn't have any of that. He couldn't bring himself to a point where his ego (and his misleading rhetoric) wouldn't have been threatened.Cindy lost someone she loved. She wants Bush to stop deliberately and grossly misleading the American public.I kept wondering why Bush was wasting so much time talking about isolationism when it came to war. It was pure fiction. The Democratic leadership has never called for any isolationism! Pat Buchanan (and this fellow) is the only pundit in the mainstream that I've heard going on and on about isolationism. Bush is apparently defending his administration from the rumblings of dissent from members of his own party (as if Democratic criticism wasn't enough).
In essence, Bush has been the one who has isolated the U.S. from international progress because he insisted on unilateralism while plunging headlong into Iraq without a plan - and I'm convinced that he values war over diplomacy. The world can see his stubby little chickenhawk claw - constantly on the trigger.I am losing something I love - American freedom and democracy. I want Bush to stop deliberately and grossly misleading the American public.
