Pro-life teen in Lou Engle's "The Call"
"I want you to just let a wave of intolerance wash over you. I want you to let a wave of hatred wash over you. Yes, hate is good ... Our goal is a Christian nation. We have a biblical duty, we are called by God to conquer this country. We don'twant equal time. We don't want pluralism."
Above quote RANDALL TERRY (Founder of Operation Rescue )[TheNews-Sentinel (Fort Wayne, Indiana), August 16, 1993]
This extremism in the Religious Right's agenda is not new and goes back at least to the 1960s:
"The idea that a coordinated campaign by “secular humanists” was aimed at displacing Christianity as the moral bedrock of America actually traces back to a group of Catholic ideologues in the 1960s. It was Protestant evangelicals, especially fundamentalists, who brought this concept into the public political arena and developed a plan to mobilize grassroots activists as foot soldiers in what became known as the Culture Wars of the 1980s…."Quote from: The New Secular Fundamentalist Conspiracy! By Frederick Clarkson Publiceye.org Spring 2008 Vol. 23, No. 1
At that time the Religious Right's views, policies and agenda was a fringe group that many believed would eventually disappear or at least have little influence in social policies or over America's politics but now they have become more mainstream . Akins problem is that he laid bare the ideology and theology of the Religious Right when it comes to issues they are concerned about.
Akins did not carefully select his words so he could be understood as saying one thing to the Religious Right and yet appear to the public at large willing to compromise on these issues. For instance this is why some of Mitt Romney's statements can appear somewhat baffling as it were. Romney tries to be careful in his wording so he can later backtrack to appease the Mainstream Media if necessary but doing so does not change his or his party's core beliefs.
Akins did not carefully select his words so he could be understood as saying one thing to the Religious Right and yet appear to the public at large willing to compromise on these issues. For instance this is why some of Mitt Romney's statements can appear somewhat baffling as it were. Romney tries to be careful in his wording so he can later backtrack to appease the Mainstream Media if necessary but doing so does not change his or his party's core beliefs.
Right wing Christian Bryan Fischer argues that Critiques by the media and others of Akins Christian beliefs concerning the issue of abortion is equivalent to the treatment of Jesus by the Pharisees. So anyone arguing in favor of the Right to Life and anti-abortion is taking on the mantle of Jesus .
The Pharisees Fischer claims were the first people to engage in "gotcha" politics.
Is Fischer saying in effect that Akins is to be compared to Jesus by taking the heat for defending his pro-life extremist stand that abortion should be criminalized without exception .
Fischer and Akins actually represent the core beliefs of the anti-abortion pro-life right wing uberconservative Christians including Evangelical Fundamentalist and Conservative Catholics and The Church of Jesus Christ and latter Day Saints (Mormons/LDS) and other religious conservatives.
To the leaders and average members of the Pro-Life Movement from the late 1970s insisted that there be few if any exceptions in which an abortion would be permitted. Todd Akins has just added a new twist by commenting that there are two sorts of rape victims those forced and those who were willing partners in the rape.
Francis Schaeffer an historian . philosopher and theologian is considered the founder of the Religious Right in the 1970s often compared abortion to the NAZI Holocaust or other acts of genocide and mass murder.
Schaeffer promoted the belief that the unborn child should have its right to life defended and protected through the legal system and enforced by law. In their view killing a fetus or even a Zygot is equivalent to murder .
Reading the books of Francis Schaeffer and watching his films is rather disturbing as he characterizes the enemy of Christianity or of Judeo-Christian traditions and beliefs as being "secular humanism " which he argued led to cultural and moral relativism .
Secular Humanism is he claims a philosophy which is ultimately based upon a materialistic view of the world in which the world and humankind are merely the result of chance and the laws of nature and not created by God or in any way shaped by God or other supernatural or metaphysical forces.
Secular Humanism he argued led to an immoral ,materialistic, hedonistic society based upon arbitrary laws which were changed based upon the whims of the people since the laws had no real foundation without God and the Scriptures. Without this foundation Secular Humanism cannot argue in favor of the sacredness of life or the existence of the human soul so a Zygot or fetus is considered to be a soulless, mindless, unfeeling amassing of cells which can easily be disposed of by the mother and sanctioned by the state.
The pro-life movement has since its conception been radical in its views on abortion because abortion at any stage of the fetus' from Zygot to born child is in their view the murder of another human being . So given this view there is little or no room for compromise. So from the get-go this has been the Pro-Life's core belief. So a pregnancy which is the result of rape is a living soul which God intended to be born otherwise the rape victim would not have gotten pregnant. It's all just part of God's plan.
Fischer Says Media Treating Akin Like Pharisees Treated Jesus by Brian Tashman at People For the American Way, 08/21/2012
American Family Association spokesman Bryan Fischer is continuing his full-throated defense of embattled Congressman and U.S. Senate candidate Todd Akin, who said this weekend that women can’t get pregnant from what he called “legitimate rape.” Speaking with AFA president Tim Wildmon on Today’s Issues, Fischer compared the media’s criticism of Akin with the Pharisees’ attacks on Jesus, saying that “the scribes and Pharisees were the first ones to play gotcha politics.”
“You know the Gospel writers say that they kept looking for some way to trap Jesus in something that he might say, just one single word they could jump on to try to discredit him and that’s what they did with Todd Akin and his comments about rape,” Fischer said.
Watch:
The radical religious Right's spokespersons. leaders and its theologians are quite clear about their own agenda to make America into a Christian nation as we see in these quotes below. For more see:
Religious Right page on this blog and relevant books at http://gordspoetryfactory.blogspot.ca/p/theocracy-usa.html ">Theocracy USA.
"This is our government. They (the secular humanists) stole it. And we're coming to take it back."Oliver North ( Iran/Contra scandal-right-wing hero Only Following Orders)
"What Christians have got to do is to take back this country,one precinct at a time, one neighborhood at a time and one state at a time ... I honestly believe that in my lifetime wewill see a country once again governed by Christians ... and Christian values."(Religious News Service, May 15, 1990)RALPH REED (Executive director of the Christian Coalition)
"In winning a nation to the gospel, the sword as well as the pen must be used." R.J. Rushdooney (reconstructionist)
In the next clip we see Fischer for once on the side of contemporary science when he and his right-wing constituency are more often than not attacking science because they see science as a threat to their own stands on evolution, global warming, and their distorted views on race and gender and homosexuality.
God they say is present in each and every human action. God they state created gender differences and differences in race but not differences in human sexuality ie homosexuality GLBT And by extension God knew (all knowing) a specific rape was going to take place and yet allows it to happen (free agency). Is either party being punished or is being offered a lesson which only God knows or could possibly understand since humans are supposed to have faith in God, Jesus, the Bible , Billy Grhahham, Rec. Falwell, Rev. Pat Robertson ,
The Religious right in the USA has created a whole pantheon of American prophets and saints including George W. Bush, Ronald Reagan , Joseph McCarthy , J Edgar Hoover
Now Fischer is giving God an escape clause for "legitimate rape victims" that is God intervenes or human biology does and prevents these women from getting pregnant so Fischer claims. And by the way God made whites superiour to Hispanics and Blacks and a host of other races . God also made women inferiour to men Fischer and his religious right and conservative secular right want us to believe. Otherwise the Bible might be wrong but if it is wrong then God's word is flawed which means God is flawed . If God says he made the sun stand still then that's what happened even though it is not the sun that moves but the earth.
Fischer Calls Out Limbaugh, Hannity, & Palin for Refusing to 'Stand With Todd Akin and Modern Science'by Kyle Mantyla at people for The American Way, Aug. 22, 2012
Bryan Fischer continues his one man crusade to prove that Todd Akin was right when he claimed that that women have a biological defense against pregnancy in the case of "legitimate rape" by pointing to an article in the Daily Mail that reports that "scientists [have] found that [women] with high levels of a stress hormone stop ovulating and are therefore unable to conceive."
To Fischer, this is proof that Akin was right and so now he is calling out, by name, all those conservatives who have joined in the "mindless, freakish, frenzied forcible assault" on Akin by suggesting that he should drop out of his Senate race, including Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Mark Levin, and Sarah Palin for not standing with "Todd Akin and modern science" and instead siding with the "jackals" who are attacking him:
When the Religious Right talk about making America a Christian nation we should take them seriously especially with their increasing influence on the Republican Party and on numerous state governments as social conservative baked legislation are argued about seriously and are even put into law.
Maddow on extremism in the Republican Party and the ongoing war on women's rights
Party platform No abortions permitted in cases of rape and incest.
The Rachel Maddow Show at MSNBC, August 22, 2012
McDonnell, too extreme for VP, brings anti-abortion agenda to GOP platform .
Rachel Maddow lists the declarations and legislative efforts that paint Virginia Governor Bob
"Ultrasound" McDonnell as holding a no-exceptions anti-abortion position - a position he has now overseen being written into the Republican Party platform.
Romney and his defenders erroneously argue that Ryan's views on abortion and pro-life legislation are different from those of Todd Akin when in fact they are not .
As Maddow pointed out the Republican Party has now adopted as part of it's party's platform a no-exceptions pro-life anti-abortion legislation which will grant the unborn personhood from the moment of conception . This means the morning after pill would be banned as would birth control pills .
So a woman found guilty of abortion would serve a life sentence in prison or possibly be executed by the state. The same goes for homosexuals, adulterers, heretics , members of other religious faiths and so forth . By what stoning. This is the American Christian Taliban hoping that they can push Romney to pass legislation supporting their twisted version of Christianity .
The new Puritans insist that whatever they do they do it to save the souls of everyone. Or at least the elect since it is their duty to purify America to make it a Christian Nation.
And to the "true believers" the notion of America as characterized by the Puritans as the City on the Hill doing God's work and being a beacon to the rest of the world was not a matter of hyperbole but that America was part of God's Divine plan for purifying Christianity and spreading the Gospel throughout the world .
So America it is argued is not just another nation but rather a unique nation chosen by God to lead the world and therefore to fulfill this role the laws of the land must reflect God's Law not man's law.
Why is Mitt Romney Outraged at Todd Akin and Not at Paul Ryan? by Michael Keegan at People For the American Way Aug. 20, 2012
What is Romney's "entirely different view"? That Rep. Akin doesn't have a basic understanding of the female anatomy that he's so interested in legislating? That Akin feels the need to draw a distinction between "legitimate rape" and "illegitimate rape"? That Akin thinks rape victims shouldn't be able to choose whether to carry their rapists' children?
Romney should start by directing his outrage at his own running mate. Rep. Paul Ryan not only opposes abortion rights for rape victims, he was a cosponsor of a so-called "personhood" amendment that would have classified abortion as first degree murder and outlawed common types of birth control. Ryan has also bought into the "legitimate rape" nonsense, cosponsoring legislation with Akin that would have limited federal services to victims of "forcible rape" - a deliberate attempt to write out some victims of date rape and statutory rape.
Romney himself has flirted with the "personhood" idea, telling Mike Huckabee during the primary that he'd "absolutely" support such a measure. When he was later confronted about the comment at a town hall meeting, it became clear that Romney had no idea how the process he wanted to legislate actually worked.
And Romney hasn't always been keen to stand up for the victims of rape. In a Republican debate in February, he actually got in an argument with Newt Gingrich over who was least in favor of requiring hospitals to provide emergency contraception to rape victims they were treating.
Now the Romney campaign is trying to distance itself from Akin by saying that "a Romney-Ryan administration would not oppose abortion in instances of rape." But Romney has also vowed to nominate Supreme Court justices who would overturn Roe v. Wade, returning to states the power to outlaw or allow abortion as they choose. If Romney and anti-choice activists get their wish from the Supreme Court, a Romney-Ryan administration would have no power to stop states from imposing whichever abortion bans they decide to impose. The promise to carve out an exception for rape victims is not a promise they would be able to keep.
The real scandal of Rep. Akin's comments isn't the faulty sex-ed he's teaching. Instead, his comments expose the anti-choice movement's skewed and condescending view of women. Akin can't accept that a woman who fits his definition of virtue - the victim of a "legitimate rape" - would also need to seek an abortion, and he has made up false science to support that assumption. But with or without the weird right-wing science, that same false distinction underlies all anti-choice policies - including those embraced by Romney and Ryan.
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