Rapture Me Up, Scotty

Well, I see that Saturday is the big day–all the saved” Christians will evidently be leaving the rest of us (aka me and all of my friends) as they are Raptured. I know this because my email is filled with messages about “Rapture cocktails” and post-Rapture looting parties, and because a Facebook friend posted helpful information about a site that–for a relatively modest fee–will take care of your pet after you leave.

News accounts have taken note of the true believers who have given away all of their worldly goods in anticipation of their imminent departure.

Not being a biblical literalist, I have some lingering questions: for example, will self-identified “bible-believing” Christians like Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee and Michelle Bachmann be leaving us?  If not, can we send them to the Afterlife anyway?  What should we do with all the tacky lawn ornaments True Believers will leave behind? And most important of all, what kind of dreadful world will the rest of us create? How will we know who to despise?

What will we do without the elect to tell us how to live and who to love? How will we know who Jesus doesn’t want us to tax?

Come to think of it, I am sure I’m one of the damned, because a post-Rapture world sounds heavenly to me.

Comments

True Colors

Sponsors of anti-gay legislation and proponents of measures to “save marriage” nearly always deny that they are homophobic. They just love their gay friends, and care deeply about the welfare of their gay neighbors. In a phrase I’ve heard so often it makes me want to upchuck, they “hate the sin, but love the sinner.”

Sure they do.

As gay equality becomes ever more inevitable, and these bigots become more hysterical, the mask of goodwill–never very persuasive–slips further. Two recent, glaring examples come from Wisconsin and Michigan.

In Wisconsin, demonstrably crazy Governor Scott Walker has evidently taken a break from demonizing public sector employees and harassing public school teachers, in order to pursue his latest “policy” initiative: reversing laws that grant hospital visitation rights to same-sex partners. Walker claims that allowing such visits violates language in the Wisconsin Constitution.(Interestingly, the language Walker is relying on is exactly the same as the language Republicans are trying to add to the Indiana Constitution–language denying same-sex couples not only the right to marry, but the right to any benefit “substantially similar” to marriage.)

In Michigan, the House of Representatives–with the strong endorsement of Rick Snyder, Michigan’s Governor (and strong contender for America’s Nuttiest Chief Executive)– has approved an amendment to that state’s education budget that would impose a five-percent penalty on colleges and universities that offer domestic partnership benefits to same-sex partners.

The only reason to deny hospital visitation rights is to hurt people at their most vulnerable. Such a measure serves no other purpose. The effort to “punish” universities makes it more difficult for them to offer a high-quality education–not just because of the lost revenue, but because an anti-gay message coupled with an inability to offer partner benefits is a huge roadblock to recruitment of good faculty–gay or straight.

These measures, and others like them, are desperate, last-gasp efforts to deny cultural change. They will undoubtedly be reversed, if they become law at all. But they offer us a very valuable look at the real face of anti-gay activism–a face contorted by hate and fear.

Whatever else they may be, when the mask comes off, these are small, mean-spirited people.

Comments

Voting for Indiana

I see that John Gregg is throwing the proverbial hat in the ring, and running for Governor against Pious Mike Pence.

I know relatively little about Gregg.  What I do know is that he was once Speaker of the Indiana House, that he is more socially conservative than I am, and that he’s a folksy public speaker. But I really don’t need to know much more, because I do know Mike Pence. And I also know that the last thing Indiana needs is a preacher-in-chief–a Governor with an extreme religious agenda and a very limited grasp of Constitutional history and principles. (Whether that “limited grasp” is a matter of political convenience or genuine ignorance is irrelevant in this context.)

We have seen the harm that can be done when a crop of zealots is elected to the legislature only to be enabled by a Governor who really does know better, but who sacrifices sound policy (not to mention human compassion) to political expediency. The last thing Indiana needs is a Governor who would be a cheerleader for the intolerant, “Christian Nation” elements of that legislature.

I’ve heard very good things about John Gregg, and I hope they are true. But he has my vote because he isn’t Mike Pence.

Comments

The Age of Disinformation

The news over the weekend brought more evidence of the danger posed by the combination of civic ignorance and propaganda.

The Huffington Post ran a story about a Tea Party affiliated “educational” organization that is offering to come in to high school classes on Constitution Day to teach students about (their version of) the Constitution. Given what we know about the state of civics education in this country, their version may well be the only one these students encounter.

Meanwhile, in his upcoming column, Morton Marcus takes aim at another–highly successful–bit of propaganda: the widely-repeated “fact” that large numbers of Americans pay no taxes at all. Marcus checked this out, and concurs–but his concurrence comes with a twist. As he says, it is absolutely true that  “Most income tax filers do not pay any income tax ….. at the time of filing. The liars leave off those final five words. Are the politicians and pundits who make these pronouncements aware of the falsehood of their “facts”? Surely those who repeat such “facts” have not thought about them and certainly they do not challenge them because they come from “reliable” sources.”

How many times have we heard earnest pundits explain that the wealthy bear too much of the burden of taxation now, because “most Americans don’t even owe taxes”?

In this case, I have been among the ignorant. Unlike Morton Marcus, I did not bother to check the accuracy of the assertion. I just assumed that lower-income folks probably didn’t owe federal taxes, although they obviously pay local sales and property taxes. What I now realize is that I am one of the presumed free rider/deadbeats, because I take care to have my employer withhold the very substantial federal taxes I pay from my monthly paycheck. Like so many Americans, I want to avoid that nasty April surprise, so that at the time of filing, I don’t owe much more than has been withheld.

File under: what you don’t know can help the ideologues mislead you.

Comments

If Only Every High School Sophomore Was Like This One!

From the American Constitution Society Blog:

Citing Rep. Michele Bachmann’s frequent inaccuracies and “gross distortions,” a high school sophomore from New Jersey has challenged the Minnesota congresswoman to a debate on the U.S. Constitution, U.S. history and civics, The Minnesota Independent reports.

In an open letter to Bachmann, student Amy Myers writes:

As a typical high school student, I have found quite a few of your statements regarding The Constitution of the United States, the quality of public school education and general U.S. civics matters to be factually incorrect, inaccurately applied or grossly distorted. The frequency and scope of these comments prompted me to write this letter.

… Rep. Bachmann, the frequent inability you have shown to accurately and factually present even the most basic information about the United States led me to submit the follow challenge, pitting my public education against your advanced legal education:

I, Amy Myers, do hereby challenge Representative Michele Bachmann to a Public Forum Debate and/or Fact Test on The Constitution of the United States, United States History and United States Civics.

Read the full letter here.

I predict great things for Ms. Amy Myers. And we should all be working for the time that most high school sophomores know enough about the Constitution to see through the charlatans like David Barton and the ‘useful idiots’ like Michelle Bachmann.

Comments