I won’t comment on the result. I predicted weeks ago that Bush would get what he wants: The support of the lazy ignorants who refuse to see the truth and adore his empty rethoric juiced with religious undertones.
While I was watching the coverage this included interviews with people who were asked why they voted for Bush.
Many of them came up with reasons like “He is a Christian” and “He stands for our values as a Christian”.
Several of the comments made by people invited in the studio (I mainly watched the BBC coverage) also mentioned Christianity as one of the factors that counted heavily in favour of Bush.
Months ago I posted a thread asking how the USA can be considered secular when religion plays such a role in how elections are prepared and won.
Although I received honest and interesting reactions, the thread was completely killed by people who were only out on posting personal attacks, invented personal comments and hijacks, which derailed the thread to a point it became worthless for me to spend my time on.
Nevertheless my questions were in my opinion valid ones and they are even more now. The USA re-elected a president who claimed to be guided/is inspired by God Himself and who in my view clearly defends a Christian inspired agenda (inspired by his brand of Christianity).
So how secular is the USA when it comes to attributing law making powers and how secular shall it be the next four years?
Salaam. A
The Republican party is strongly influenced if not controlled by the evangelical Protestant movement. Religion is very important in understanding this election and it is an excellent question. I wonder how many economic conservatives like myself are profoundly uneasy with this influence. There must be many Bush voters (I am not one) who continue to vote Republican while feeling very uneasy about the religious conservativism of the party.
The big news coming from election polling was how many people cited ‘moral values’ as a primary issue for them. That is invariably taken as a code phrase for religious values. I have hoped for some time that the more moderate wing of the Republican party might develop some power, hell they might even get my vote someday. That day appears further away than I had anticipated.
i was on the road last night at about midnight in western indiana (hence the lack of radio station choices) and listened to some christian station reporting on the election results. they focused in on the gay marriage issue, which has to be the core of the religious right affiliataion with bush. at least that’s all anyone is talking about. abortion has had a suprisingly small hold on the candidates this year. if it wasn’t for gay marraige and terrorism, bush would have nothing.
anyway, these people were so condescending it was painful to listen. first of all, how do gay people destroy marriage? we straight people seem to be destroying it pretty well on our own. then, the guy was like, if we let gays wed, what’s stopping bigamy, polygamy, people marrying themselves, PEOPLE MARRYING ANIMALS!!! then he has the gall to say, “we are not saying gays can’t marry, just that they must marry people of the opposite sex.” what the fuck? was that supposed to be a joke?
in the future people will look back on george w bush as they look back on the segregationists, especially if he gets his precious amendment through.
This election, in the end, had nothing to do with Iraq, terror, economy, health care or any other issues. It came down to morals and values.
The Bush white house was questioned why they were supporting a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage even though it had no chance of passing. They knew it had no chance of passing but what it was really saying to all those Christian evangelicals is that “we have your back”. Karl Rove knew 4 mill evangelicals stayed home in 2000, He also knew there were thousands of Catholics in the swing states that were already opposed the DNC stance on abortion that where ripe to be driven to the GOP with another wedge issue, gay rights. It worked.
In addition the GOP was able to get a banning gay marriage amendment on the ballot in Ohio, I haven’t scene the numbers on the amendment yet but I am wiling to bet those supporting the ban and those who voted for W to be remarkably similar.
This country is moving more and more to becoming a theocracy and it is freighting.
Not quite. Bush won Ohio by 51% to 49%. The Marriage ammendment passed by 62% to 38%. So unless you postulate a very large number of voters who voted for the ammendment and not for president, you have to admit that the vast majority of people there supported the ammendment.
This is an issue that will take a long time to work itself out.
And before we go too far, let’s remember that the phrase “…who claimed to be guided/is inspired by God Himself and who in my view clearly defends a Christian inspired agenda (inspired by his brand of Christianity).” applies to Kerry as well. Also, Kerry supported the idea that Marriage should be between one man and one woman AND that states should be free to determine for themselves if they agree with this.
America is no more a theocracy now than it was 10 years ago.
The minute Kerry turned from “anyone but Bush” to a candidate I could wholeheartedly support was during the second debate, when he said,
“I’m a Catholic, raised a Catholic, I was an altar boy. Religion has been a huge part of my life. It helped lead me through a war, leads me today. But I can’t take what is an article of faith for me and legislate it for someone who doesn’t share that article of faith, whether they be agnostic, atheist, Jew, Protestant, whatever. I can’t do that . . . as a president, I have to represent all the people in the nation.”
Sadly, that attitude is now officially down the crapper. Can’t we have that quoted bronzed and sent to Bush in the hopes that he—or someone passing through his office—might take it to heart?
I don’t feel it’s a move toward theocracy that gay marriage is not wanted by a large number of Americans. It’s still a cultural value for a large number of Americans that homosexuality is immoral, like adultery is still considered immoral by a majority of people. They feel that the government putting a homosexual union on par with hetero marriage is like equating what swingers do with committed couples.
Calling them bigoted theocrats is a personal choice, of course.
The problem is that for a country to be defined as “non-secular” or as a “theocracy” religion has to control the state or directly define laws. So most will defend that Bush isn’t creating a theocracy… and they are technically correct.
Now if religion becomes the big key to winning elections… and if every politician has to be in favor of those issues that win these evangelicals and catholics… then its an indirect theocracy of sorts ? I think so.
So back to the OP... the role of religion in the US has been given a major boost today... and that is unfortunate. The notion of a secular america is weaker now. Naturally it won't approach Iran ... not in the foreseable future...
I am a Satanist and I voted for Bush, in spite of his xianity. I’d rather he kept his beliefs to himself, but I also have enough faith in this country and the Constitution to doubt that he will somehow take away my freedom to practice my religion.
Even though I lean left on many issues the Democratic Party disgusts me. This is the first year I ever voted straight ticket. The Democrats come off as a bunch of crybabies since the last election and appearing weak is not attractive. Instead of moving on they whined for four years about Bush stealing the election. Even now I drop in on places like the Democratic Underground and all I see is whining. You win some, you lose some, and when you lose you pick yourself up, learn from your mistakes and plan your next move.
Then there were the anti-war protests that turned into riots. Somehow I have a hard time believing rioters are about wanting peace. Instead they come off as immature brats who throw tantrums when they don’t get what they want. What they wanted was Bush out of office and that wasn’t going to happen.
My impression of the Democrats is that they say one thing and do another, and that there is absolutely no qualified leadship. I have no idea what Democrats stand for anymore, only what they stand against and that is Bush.
If the Dems want to win in 2008 then they need to grow up and get their act together instead of whining, pointing fingers, and name calling.
BTW I saw Satanism brought up in another thread a while back and didn’t have time to respond. We do NOT under any circumstance practice any type of animal or human sacrifice. Blood sacrifice is a judeo- xian and islamic tradition, it has no place in Satanism.
When did an anti-war protest turn into a riot? The closest thing to a riot that I can remember during these campaigns was the Republican National Convention, in which a protester was thrown to the ground and kicked by an angry mob.
Does this really appear like strength to you? Does the protester that was willing to risk personal physical injury for their belief really seem weak?
How about the campaign strategy used by the Bush campaign? Does Bush look strong for ditching his post for the national guard and for avoiding combat? Does Kerry look weak for his role in Vietnam? Does the Republican party look strong by sending 150,000 people to challenge minority and poor voters in Ohio? Strong how? Like a bully? Like a gang?
Grow up. Satanist rhetoric is even more irrationally distorted than Christian.
My faith affects everything that I do, in truth. There’s a great passage of the Bible that says, ‘What does it mean, my brother, to say you have faith if there are no deeds? Faith without works is dead.’ And I think that everything you do in public life has to be guided by your faith, affected by your faith, but without transferring it in any official way to other people. That’s why I fight against poverty. That’s why I fight to clean up the environment and protect this earth. That’s why I fight for equality and justice. All of those things come out of that fundamental teaching and belief of faith. bolding mine
It is the height of logical inconsistency to claim one’s faith as the foundation for one’s actions in one area, and then to deny that faith’s imperative regarding a fundamental issue such as a right to life. Without which, must I say once again, all other rights are moot?
I am constantly amazed at the sheer number of people who find faith’s teachings acceptable as long as they’re never practiced. Oh, no, it’s somehow not acceptable to base morals on faith’s precepts, but perfectly sound to base them on, what? Personal convenience? Anything? Nothing? And this has credibility how?
No, the integrity of the man is flawed. If, as Kerry insisted, life begins at conception, then he cannot morally then agree that taking that life is somehow beyond the bounds of moral and political address. Yet he does. And people commend him for…
his faith.
i’m so sick of hearing george bush talk about his faith. it’s nice, really. i’m glad is helped the guy stop snorting coke and driving drunk.
i want a candidate who won’t even mention religion. that’s the high road, folks. bush has such a long record of exploiting shit to his advantage, from terrorism to jesus, its disgusting to me. i don’t understand how more than half the nation doesn’t see that.
and do people in the bible belt realize that some people AREN’T christian? oh yeah, they know they’re out there, but they’re hellbound sinners that don’t matter to them in the least. like the gays.
There’s a great deal of difference between an office-holder forcing his/her faith onto someone else (I’m not even sure how one would go about that) and supporting policies which happen to coincide with their faith. Forced worship is one thing, public policy decision quite another.
In addition, the exception of their mutual lack of support for gay marriage, there are non-religious bases for every social policy position supported by either Kerry or Bush. So how is it that one is turning us into a wretched theocracy by supporting policies that coincide with his faith but also have other rationale behind them, but the other, who would have done the exact same thing is so much better in this regard.
Spell it out for me. If you honestly believe this, spell it out for me like I’m 6 years old, because the only basis I can see for making such a claim is that Bush is vocal about how his faith informs his life and that offends people, while Kerry is hypocritical about his faith, and that doesn’t seem to matter because his hypocrisies coincide with liberal diehard platform planks.
Do you need more links?
And if you weren’t frothing at the mouth about kerry’s loss, you would have read correctly that I said the Democratic Party looks weak, I didn’t name any specific people. I referred to the party in general. Just like the topic of this question. The dems want so badly to blame kerry’s loss on the xian vote, somehow they have to blame it on the xians. Instead of looking to themselves and seeing what they can do to fix the problems in the party, they have to find other people to blame. That is a sign of weakness. Pouting, whining, and refusing to get on with life is a sign of weakness. Denying that the party has a problem and resolving to fix it is a sign of weakness. I couldn’t begin to count the number of Democrats I know who are changing their party affiliation because of their disgust with the Democratic Party. It has nothing to do with their religion, many of them are atheists.
Oh yeah, that you had to get personal and attack my religion (which I doubt you know anything about) shows that you cannot debate the topic without losing control. That has become typical for Democrats.
Much more important, it seems to me, than the honeyed words of politicians claiming that their strength is the strength of ten because of the guidance of Deity or the teachings of one church or another is the plain and obvious fact that George Bush owes his reelection to the conservative Christians, Protestant evangelicals and hard line Catholics alike. Those people are going to want something out of the spoils system.
Gary Bowers was on NPR tonight blathering away about homosexual marriage, decent church going folks and the election. It was pretty clear that he is done accepting the lip service and crumbs that have been the conservative Christians and social conservatives allotment ever since the storied days of the Reagan Administration.
So what do they want as the price of their support this year and their future support. I suppose they want a couple or three Supreme Court Justices who are willing and eager to overturn Roe v. Wade and the Texas sodomy case. That seems to be in line with the President’s thinking. They will probably get it – the Chief Justice is bound to disappear soon, one way or another, Justice O’Connor is rumored to want to retire and Justice Stevens can’t hold on forever. Scalia and Thomas seem to be willing to do it now. Some pundit has suggested that the President’s victory speech was going to be, “Let the healing begin. I’m nominating John Ashcroft to the Supreme Court.” This sort of an approach pretty well ruins what appears to be a consensus that there should be an option for abortion with reasonable restrictions like a prohibition on late term abortions and a requirement for parental notification.
Bowers rattled on no end about homosexual marriage and condemned both it and anything that approximated it – pointing to the great public support for the Ohio constitutional amendment that comes down on civil unions as heavily as on something that calls itself marriage. Just why these people are so worked up about the characterization of a same sex partner as a surviving spouse for the purposes of the rules of testate and intestate distribution and income taxation and homestead exemption from execution is beyond my understanding. I would expect they will want another shot at an amendment to the US Constitution and a prohibition of treatment as a spouse for the purposes of federal taxation.
Do they require unequivocal support for Israel no mater what its policy – a policy of cleansing Arabs from metropolitan Israel and the Territories and an expansion to Biblical boundaries, for instance?
Do they require as their price the active encouragement of organized as government sanctioned worship as part of the education process? Do they call for the abolition of a doctrine of state-church separation built up over this last 50 years or so? Do they require all sorts of faith based social programs that amount to subsides for various septs and churches? Do they require the purge of moderate Republicans who think that Mr. Bower’s ideas might not be good ideas?
Does the GOP risk alienating its secular base in order to appease its religious base?
Actually, conservatives are also taking credit for it. I’m listening to Laura Ingraham, a well-known Bush cheerleader, and she is attributting her entire 3 hour radio show to how “values” won the election for Bush. There is some truth to it, but it is not absolute, not everyone who voted for Bush is xtian, vut a solid block of xtians voted for Bush with the idea of imposing their values on the nation.
Tell me, because i don’t know much about your philosophy, as a Satanist, do you wish to impose your values onto others, or should everyone be free to follow their own morals?
That’s the thing. I get one of three attitudes from every Christian I’ve ever met.
Smug friendliness. Oh, they’re nice, and they never talk about my religion in a bad way, but they know *they’re * going to heaven, and *I’m * not. There’s no doubt in their minds.
Genuine bafflement. What, there are people who really don’t worship Christ? Do they know they’re wrong?
Downright hate and disgust. We all know these people, do I need to talk about them?
I want all my political leaders to stop mentioning religion now and forever more. This is not a Christian country anymore, there are too many other people here and we’re people too. We’re not heathens or beneath importance. But I get the feeling this is how they feel about us.
