# Really, Newsweek?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181
**Category:** The BBQ Pit
**Created:** [November 17, 2008, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181 "2008-11-17T21:27:37Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@yanceylebeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yanceylebeef)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/1 "2008-11-17T21:27:37Z")
Is [this](http://www.newsweek.com/id/169192) really what you want to put out as news? Whether or not Obama is the Antichrist?
Look, you guys did a fabulous job covering the campaigns. Your inside look into what went on was compelling and award winning journalism.
Then you print this garbage. I realize that this is “Belief Watch”, a regular column on religion and faith in America, but this kind of pandering bullshit is what legitimizes these people and their beliefs. These folks should be laughed at, long, loudly and in public. Not given a platform to espouse the tinfoil hat realm of Christianity as if it were as valid as say, a “Faith vs. Works” argument.
Sigh.
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### Author:  [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/2 "2008-11-17T21:38:56Z")
How are we supposed to laugh at them if you’re going to suppress news stories about them?
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### Author:  [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/3 "2008-11-17T21:41:34Z")
That is disgusting, plain and simple.
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### Author:  [@DianaG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DianaG)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/4 "2008-11-17T21:52:55Z")
She referred to Victoria Jackson as both “influential” and an “ingenue”. There’s faith-based, and then there’s batshitcrazyofftherailsinsane.
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### Author:  [@yanceylebeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yanceylebeef)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/5 "2008-11-17T22:11:09Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#):
>
> How are we supposed to laugh at them if you’re going to suppress news stories about them?
I don’t want it surpressed, I just don’t want it treated as if it were anything other that the delusional rantings of conspiriacy theorist, or the fanning of the flames by pastors and televagalists to pull in more money from the flock.
Look, anyone who refers to Victoria Jackson ans anything other than looney tunes is not doing the hard work of journalism.
On preview, what **DianaG** said.
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### Author:  [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/6 "2008-11-17T22:12:42Z")
> [@yanceylebeef](#):
>
> Look, anyone who refers to Victoria Jackson ans anything other than looney tunes is not doing the hard work of journalism.
But… but… I liked _UHF_! When did she go nutso?
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### Author:  [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/7 "2008-11-17T22:15:43Z")
(By the way, did you see _US News & World Report_ is now a monthly?)
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### Author:  [@WF\_Tomba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WF_Tomba)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/8 "2008-11-17T22:22:12Z")
The most elementary background research might have uncovered the fact that the Bible doesn’t even mention “the Antichrist”.
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### Author:  [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/9 "2008-11-17T22:27:02Z")
> [@WF\_Tomba](#):
>
> The most elementary background research might have uncovered the fact that the Bible doesn’t even mention “the Antichrist”.
It doesn’t?
> [@](#):
>
> _18_ Dear children, this is the last hour, and as you have heard that Antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come.
> _19_ They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us.
>
> \
>
> _22_ Who is such a liar? It is the man who denies that Jesus is the Christ. Such a man is the sort of antichrist I am warning you about—he denies the Father and the Son.
(John 2)
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### Author:  [@ShibbOleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShibbOleth)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/10 "2008-11-17T22:44:53Z")
Le sigh.
One of the indications, cited by the article, is that the Illinois Lottery came up with 6-6-6. On November 5th, the day after the election. It has also come up on the following dates:
10/23/2008
3/22/2008
1/16/2008
1/2/2007
12/25/2004 ← Christmas, fer crissakes! 😉
5/30/2003
11/5/2001
12/13/2000
4/24/1999
1/23/1999
7/25/1997
4/20/1996
12/31/1995
10/17/1990
5/20/1989
1/28/1988
3/15/1986
4/26/1985
3/17/1984
7/9/1980
And that’s JUST in Illinois. In Texas the numbers 6-6-6 have come up FOUR TIMES in that just 2008. Or 25% more evil in Bush’s home state.
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### Author:  [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/11 "2008-11-17T22:49:10Z")
I, too, find the most disturbing aspect of this is that apparently Victoria Jackson is now a crazy Christian fanatic. When did that happen?
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### Author:  [@WF\_Tomba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WF_Tomba)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/12 "2008-11-17T22:54:01Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#):
>
> It doesn’t?
>
> (John 2)
I know that quote, but it’s not talking about “the Antichrist” as most people think of him. It’s using the word _antichrist_ to refer to all unbelievers or unbelief in general. What people think of as “the Antichrist” is a very tenuous combination of that quote and either of the two Beasts from Revelation, even though as far as I know there isn’t any good reason to think they’re referring to the same creature. Also, the Beasts in Revelation are described as having horns, and making miracles, etc.
This is really a private obsession of mine, and I guess I can’t expect some random columnist to address it, but it just annoys me to hear people talk about “the Antichrist” as if it were a well-established idea when it’s really quite a tenuous interpolation.
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### Author:  [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/13 "2008-11-17T22:57:55Z")
> [@Baldwin](#):
>
> I, too, find the most disturbing aspect of this is that apparently Victoria Jackson is now a crazy Christian fanatic. When did that happen?
Sometime after she spent a couple of years being married to a cop who basically kept her confined to the house for the marriage, apparently.
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### Author:  [@Giraffe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giraffe)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/14 "2008-11-17T23:36:07Z")
I especially like it when people call Obama a socialist as evidence for him being the anti-Christ. Wouldn’t Jesus have been all over socialism?
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### Author:  [@DianaG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DianaG)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/15 "2008-11-17T23:39:27Z")
Apparently they don’t think so, since my “Jesus was a socialist” tshirt makes them all kinds of angry.
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### Author:  [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/16 "2008-11-17T23:48:21Z")
> [@DianaG](#):
>
> Apparently they don’t think so, since my “Jesus was a socialist” tshirt makes them all kinds of angry.
Wait, you mean the GOP _wasn’t_ started in 33 AD in Israel? 😕
😉
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### Author:  [@Morgyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgyn)
#### Post date: [November 17, 2008, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/17 "2008-11-17T23:51:07Z")
I rather liked the description of the Rapture as “a huge upward whoosh”. It made me think that the columnist might not take these Rapturists seriously.
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### Author:  [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2008, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/18 "2008-11-18T01:02:40Z")
> [@Tuckerfan](#):
>
> Wait, you mean the GOP _wasn’t_ started in 33 AD in Israel? 😕
The occasion for one of my favourite American politics stories. I understand that at the Republican convention in New York, retailers were selling buttons that said “GOP: God’s Own Party.”
Know what “God’s Own Party” is in Arabic? _Hizba-llâh._
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### Author:  [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2008, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/19 "2008-11-18T01:05:08Z")
> [@matt\_mcl](#):
>
> Know what “God’s Own Party” is in Arabic? _Hizba-llâh._
Anybody sell buttons of _that?_
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### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [November 18, 2008, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-newsweek/473181/20 "2008-11-18T01:56:39Z")
> [@yanceylebeef](#):
>
> I don’t want it surpressed, I just don’t want it treated as if it were anything other that the delusional rantings of conspiriacy theorist, or the fanning of the flames by pastors and televagalists to pull in more money from the flock.
Well, it **is** more, because it’s part of what the story is really about: Apocalyptic fever among American evangelicals and fundies, which is too big a phenomenon to ignore. Whether it’s really on an uptick because of Obama is debatable, but it’s certain he’s starting to play a role in the popular End Times narrative, and that’s an important thing to know even if it doesn’t get him assassinated. IOW, it’s all perfectly legitimate news.
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