America: Insanity Or Performance Art?

Egypt. Wisconsin. Union rights. The Anti-Christ.

It seems Glenn Beck and Fox News are on the loose again. This time they’ve brought in a self-proclaimed prophet as “expert” on comparing Obama to the Anti-Christ and why the goings-on in Wisconsin are about the end of days and turning America into an Islamic state and not about union rights after all. And while we’ve all gotten used to this kind of rhetoric being tossed about on a daily basis and shaking our collective heads at the absurdity of it all –so much so that we barely notice it anymore– there are more than a few people out there taking all this nonsense very seriously. After all, Fox News brought in an “expert!”

And while 35% of those polled in New Jersey either believe or are willing to consider the possibility that Obama is the Anti-Christ, Rachel Maddow, as always, has a rather enlightened take on the whole affair.

The Ugly Americans: Reverend Jones & Friends

I’ll start out by saying that I’m thrilled to see so many people standing up to oppose Reverend Terry Jones’ intention to hold a “Burn A Quran Day” event on September 11th. In the face of the overwhelming ignorance, hatred and blatant religious and ethnic bigotry opposing the proposed building of an Islamic Community Center near Ground Zero, Rev. Jones’ disgusting intent just adds fuel to an already out of control fire raging through America. Add the lunatic-gathering at Glenn Beck’s “Take Back America” rally and Sarah Palin’s daily tweets of extreme ignorance and vile attacks, and we have a picture of a dangerous country succumbing to its own panicked state of fearfulness.

What would the American picture of Islam be if some nut-job over in Afghanistan gathered people together to start burning copies of the Christian Bible? Or the Jewish Bible? Would we easily be able to separate an extremist like this–that one in a million religious kook–from the rest of the population? Hell, we already know we can’t separate a group of terrorists from an entire nation and/or religious belief.

And even when Gen. David Petraeus claims that Jones’ actions, if carried out, will almost certainly endanger American soldiers overseas as well as place Americans everywhere (including right here at home) in even more peril, and the Reverend still insists that “Burn A Quran Day” is enacting God’s will… Well, one has to question whether Jones’ God cares all that much about this little country of ours or whether he’s just a vengeful entity who likes to “stir the pot” and see what happens.

Sadly, it’s people like Reverend Jones who are, in my opinion, no better than the terrorists who attacked this country. He is putting his personal beliefs over the lives of lord knows how many people and claims to be on a mission from God. “We actually feel this is a message that we have been called to bring forth,” claims Jones. “And because of that, we do not feel like we can back down.”

Irony of ironies.

“Maybe it’s time to stand up. Maybe it’s time to send a message to radical Islam that we will not tolerate their behavior,” added Jones.

Hmmm… What if we changed the words radical Islam and replaced it with America and placed that same sentence into the mouths of the terrorists who attacked us on 9/11.

“Maybe it’s to time to stand up. Maybe it’s time to send a message to America that we will not tolerate their behavior.”

As a result of his actions and some of the negative attention it has drawn, Rev. Jones has started wearing a .40-caliber pistol strapped to his hip. Now there’s a good picture. A man of God insisting on endangering human lives (American lives, for those that separate) and carrying a pistol in case someone tries to stop him from going through with his “religious obligation…”

And so the lines blur even more…

“Islam is of the Devil,” read the signs Rev. Jones has posted in front of his church.

Wasn’t America the incarnation of the devil in the eyes and words of the Al Qaeda?

The Quran, according to the all-knowing Rev. Jones is “evil because it espouses something other than biblical truth and incites radical, violent behavior among Muslims.”

Is that what it does? Cause I’m guessing the same could be said about the Torah. It certainly espouses some different biblical truths than Rev. Jones’ preferred version of the holy book. And if you’re Palestinian, you might well believe that it also incites radical, violent behavior in Jews.

Why, it seems to me that Rev. Jones’ bible is inciting radical behavior in him and his followers. Behavior that may well lead to violence and killing as a direct result. Violence and killing Rev. Jones is well aware of. If he wasn’t, do you think he’d still be armed with that .40-caliber pistol strapped lovingly to his hip?

There’s that fine line again. I just can’t keep it all straight…

Who exactly are the good guys?

Anti-Muslim Fear. America In Transition.

This whole notion of a “Ground Zero Mosque” is a complete fabrication created and spurred on by politicians who are using Americans’ misguided fear as a tool. And the consequences are dire. Now simply being a Muslim is reason enough to fear for your life. Is this America? Yes, it’s America in transition. It’s America learning that it is no better or worse, no stronger or more immune to mass hatred and bigotry than any other country in the world.

Here’s just one example of a politician fueling hatred and twisting facts into a misguided, fear-based movement:

“The folks who want to build this mosque, who are really radical Islamists, who want to triumphfully (sic) prove they can build a mosque next to a place where 3,000 Americans were killed by radical Islamists. Those folks don’t have any interest in reaching out to the community. They’re trying to make a case about supremacy… This happens all the time in America. Nazis don’t have the right to put up a sign next to the Holocaust Museum in Washington. We would never accept the Japanese putting up a site next to Pearl Harbor.”  –Newt Gingrich

Ironic that Gingrich equated Muslims with Nazis and yet the type of hatred he espouses is far more akin to the early stages of Naziism than anything being promoted by an Islamic Cultural Center. And isn’t a Holocaust Museum’s purpose to forever remind people of the bigotry and hatred that caused the Holocaust in the first place in the hopes of recognizing it and stopping it before it happens again?

One such consequence of Gingrich and others’ fueling of people’s misconceptions and feeding into their fear is that New York Muslim cab driver Ahmed Sharif was slashed from throat to cheek by his fare when he admitted to being Muslim. By a drunk 21 year old Michael Enright caught up in the anti-Muslim fervor.

Or how about the man mistaken for a Muslim who was violently harassed by anti-Mosque ralliers?

While the face of American bigotry and small-mindedness rears its ugly head and reveals its face to the world at large, at least a voice of reason can be heard alongside it as 9/11 families and others stand in protest to the anti-Muslim sentiment sweeping the nation and vocally support the building of the Islamic Cultural Center 2 blocks from Ground Zero that Fox News and a handful of politicians have misleadingly dubbed the “Ground Zero Mosque.” New York Neighbors for American Values rallied yesterday near Ground Zero:

“I lost a 23-year-old son, a paramedic who gave his life saving Americans and their values,” Talat Hamdani said, and supporting the Islamic center and mosque “has nothing to do with religion. It has to do with standing up for our human rights, including freedom of religion.”

Rabbi Arthur Waskow, director of New York’s Shalom Center, said the project will show the world a form of Islam that espouses peace – not the Islam of the terrorists.

“It is right; it is wise to build it,” he told hundreds of people gathered under the arches of Manhattan’s Municipal Building, a short walk from ground zero.

Several coalition members noted that the mosque site’s developer, Sharif el-Gamal, modeled it after the Jewish Community Center on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. It serves anyone who wishes to participate, they said, and so will the Muslim center near ground zero.

Stand up for what is right. Don’t be a pawn. And support freedom of religion in America. See the Islamic Cultural Center blocks away from Ground Zero for what it is. Not what you may fear it is.

American Shame & Alienation

This video will be replayed for generations. And our shame will be insurmountable.

This Silly “Mosque” Business & John Stewart

We all know the arguments by now so I won’t repeat them. But what I will say is simply this: In order for a Muslim community center being built several blocks away from the 9/11 site to be disrespectful of those who suffered on 9/11, one must first believe that the Muslim community as a whole were somehow responsible for the 9/11 attacks. No one takes issue with the two churches that overlook the 9/11 site. Nor would there be any argument against the building of a Jewish community center. So the issue here is simply that there are enough people who have not managed to separate the Muslim community from the extremists who attacked us on September 11, 2001.

This is not an issue of sensitivity to loss and suffering. It is an issue of sensitivity to fear and doubt and a gross misunderstanding of what it means to be Muslim and what it means to be a terrorist. It is mired in misconception. There can be no insensitivity regarding this issue without religious inequality. They are simply inseparable. If they were not, no one would take offense. No, one has to believe that Muslims were somehow responsible for the attacks and that allowing the building of a Muslim community center near (not on, mind you) Ground Zero would somehow be an act of support for the attacks themselves.

It is not. The men who attacked us may have been Muslim (and that faith, like all others, has many different interpretations and sects), but the men and women building the community center did not fly planes into the World Trade Center Towers. No more than the Jewish population in Germany during the 30′s and 40′s was trying to destroy that country and its values. Or that all members of the NRA supported the Columbine massacre.

This needs to stop. Instead of taking out your anger on Muslims, look a bit deeper at the anger and loss created by the events of 9/11 and try to put them into a proper perspective that doesn’t instigate more hatred and misunderstanding. The men who attacked us on 9/11 did not understand who we were. As a nation. As a people. Let’s not make the same mistake they did.

In the meantime, go HERE to watch John Stewart once again put things clearly into perspective with his usual brand of dark, but often spot-on humor.

Trick Or Treat? The Life & Times Of Joe Lieberman

The Huffington Post culled a few instances of Sen Joe Lieberman’s actions over the past few years in addition to his recent announcement that he would support a filibuster of health care reform if it contained a public option. Though we all know most of these, it’s fun to see them stacked side  by side. Trick or treat, indeed.

On Election Day 2008, Lieberman told Glenn Beck he feared America as we know it would not survive if Democrats got a 60 seat majority in the Senate.

Back in 1993, Lieberman called Bill Clinton’s reform “too governmental, too regulatory and too costly.”

Lieberman condemned the 2005 bankruptcy bill as “seriously flawed” and touted his vote against it — but he voted to end a Democratic filibuster, which was when it mattered.

In 2005, Lieberman was part of the “Gang of 14″ that ended a Democratic filibuster of some of President Bush’s judicial nominees and promised that filibusters would end in “all but extraordinary circumstances.”

In 2005, Lieberman voted for Alberto Gonzales to become Attorney General andsaid when the disgraced official resigned that he “deserved our appreciation.”

During Bush’s Social Security privatization push, Lieberman refused to make his position clear. In 2008 he defended John McCain’s privatization plan.

When he lost the Democratic primary in 2006, Lieberman formed his own “Connecticut for Lieberman” party.

Lieberman repeatedly suggested that the U.S. might need to bomb Iran and claimed Iran was going to war with us.

In 2008, Lieberman backed the Republican candidate for president, John McCain.

During the 2008 election, Obama confronted Lieberman for issuing only half-hearted denials about rumors that the Democratic candidate was a Muslim.

Lieberman came to the defense of John Hagee, the pastor who said “Hitler was a hunter” sent by God to get “the Jewish people” to “come back to the land of Israel.”

In 2008, Lieberman refused to condemn waterboarding as torture and voted against banning it.

For years, Lieberman has championed the Iraq war and savagely attacked its critics.

During the 2008 campaign, Lieberman said it was “a good question” to ask whether Sen. Barack Obama was a “Marxist.”

On Election Day 2008, Lieberman told Glenn Beck he feared America as we know it would not survive if Democrats got a 60 seat majority in the Senate.

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/27/top-15-lieberman-betrayal_n_336024.html?slidenumber=Gzu%2FXemjlx0%3D#slide_image

Jesus Was Not A Jew! Good Ol’ Fashioned American Common Sense

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to argue with acquaintances to convince them that Jesus was a Jew. “Jesus was not a Jew! He was a Christian!” is the answer I most often get. It takes me a full 3 to 4 seconds before I recompose myself, lift my jaw back into a closed-mouth position, and explain how all this actually works.

But no matter how often I find myself in this strange predicament, I’m always just as horrified and saddened by the lack of education and basic intelligence so often flaunted by some of my fellow Americans. And I’m no genius, mind you! Just some dude with a basic education who’s trying to keep up and always feeling one step behind. Sometimes two! But, man-o-man, the ignorance I’ve bumped up against on my own little journeys.

I remember taking a poll once on how many people believed in god and, if they did, what their personal definition of god was. I remember there was a significant number of responders who, when asked if they believed, answered unequivocally “Yes!”. When asked as to their definition, I was often repelled with the angry response, “I don’t know! Who the hell thinks about that kind of stuff?!”

So maybe it’s not stupidity, but a lack of thinking that so many suffer from. Maybe it’s just laziness. I don’t know. But whatever the cause, the symptoms terrify me. Especially when faced with life or death decisions like war and health care.

So when I question the intelligence of some Americans and get the occasional angry response, I simply have to shrug. If you want me to think more Americans are smart, stop acting so stupid. When people I know vote for McCain because they believe Obama’s gonna take away their guns even though they don’t have the proper medical coverage, barely earn enough to buy the food they need, own a home that is in a mortgage crisis, complain about their kids’ education, can’t afford private school, have two family members with disabilities, live just above the poverty level, and want the right to have an abortion if need be, I have to wonder if they have a clue what they’re actually voting for.

Then add the fact that Obama’s a Muslim, was born in Kenya, hates whites, is a Nazi, and eats babies for breakfast… I start praying (and I’m technically an atheist) that some of the smarter individuals I know start spreading some facts around. I’m not saying you have to believe what I believe, but at least understand what YOU claim to believe!

Perhaps this is why I enjoyed Bill Maher’s rant SMART PRESIDENT ≠ SMART COUNTRY in The Huffington Post today. Here’s an excerpt:

…On the eve of the Iraq War, 69% of Americans thought Saddam Hussein was personally involved in 9/11. Four years later, 34% still did. Or take the health care debate we’re presently having: members of Congress have recessed now so they can go home and “listen to their constituents.” An urge they should resist because their constituents don’t know anything. At a recent town-hall meeting in South Carolina, a man stood up and told his Congressman to “keep your government hands off my Medicare,” which is kind of like driving cross country to protest highways.

I’m the bad guy for saying it’s a stupid country, yet polls show that a majority of Americans cannot name a single branch of government, or explain what the Bill of Rights is. 24% could not name the country America fought in the Revolutionary War. More than two-thirds of Americans don’t know what’s in Roe v. Wade. Two-thirds don’t know what the Food and Drug Administration does. Some of this stuff you should be able to pick up simply by being alive. You know, like the way the Slumdog kid knew about cricket.

Not here. Nearly half of Americans don’t know that states have two senators and more than half can’t name their congressman. And among Republican governors, only 30% got their wife’s name right on the first try.

Sarah Palin says she would never apologize for America. Even though a Gallup poll says 18% of Americans think the sun revolves around the earth. No, they’re not stupid. They’re interplanetary mavericks. A third of Republicans believe Obama is not a citizen, and a third of Democrats believe that George Bush had prior knowledge of the 9/11 attacks, which is an absurd sentence because it contains the words “Bush” and “knowledge.”

People bitch and moan about taxes and spending, but they have no idea what their government spends money on. The average voter thinks foreign aid consumes 24% of our federal budget. It’s actually less than 1%. And don’t even ask about cabinet members: seven in ten think Napolitano is a kind of three-flavored ice cream. And last election, a full one-third of voters forgot why they were in the booth, handed out their pants, and asked, “Do you have these in a relaxed-fit?”

And I haven’t even brought up America’s religious beliefs. But here’s one fun fact you can take away: did you know only about half of Americans are aware that Judaism is an older religion than Christianity? That’s right, half of America looks at books called the Old Testament and the New Testament and cannot figure out which one came first.

And these are the idiots we want to weigh in on the minutia of health care policy? Please, this country is like a college chick after two Long Island Iced Teas: we can be talked into anything, like wars, and we can be talked out of anything, like health care. We should forget town halls, and replace them with study halls. There’s a lot of populist anger directed towards Washington, but you know who concerned citizens should be most angry at? Their fellow citizens. “Inside the beltway” thinking may be wrong, but at least it’s thinking, which is more than you can say for what’s going on outside the beltway.

And if you want to call me an elitist for this, I say thank you. Yes, I want decisions made by an elite group of people who know what they’re talking about. That means Obama budget director Peter Orszag, not Sarah Palin.

And just to put the proper tag on all of this, Sarah Palin brought my point (and Mr. Maher’s) home beautifully today on her Facebook account by writing:

The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s “death panel” so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their “level of productivity in society,” whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil.

Yes, Sarah, not only is the moon made of cheese, but so is the space between your ears. I’m not sure which is more terrifying, the notion that Sarah Palin, like her protege Joe The Plumber, really has no clue what she is talking about, or that she knows very well what she is talking about and is purposefully misleading her brand of “followers” and other Americans for reasons other than their own best interests.

Ignorance or greed? Both are extremely dangerous and can lead to the same destructive end. And when lives are lost, they are not brought back. Not even by Jesus.

Sarah Palin Was Almost Our Vice President. WTF?!

Yes she’s still out there, folks. And while I do have second thoughts about giving her any attention at all, I think it is periodically a good idea to be reminded of what this nation and the world we live in might look like if Sarah Palin or someone as misguided as she is were to actually make it into a position of real power. Like it or not, she came close. Sarah Palin is the stuff of satire. She’s a character out of DR. STRANGELOVE, which was both funny and terrifying because we all know that real life can oftentimes be frighteningly absurd. 

Here are some snippets from Palin’s speech the other day as she introduced conservative talk-show host and Ronald Reagan’s son,  Michael Reagan, to an audience in Anchorage.

“Since when can you get out of huge national debt by creating trillions of dollars of new debt? It all really is so backwards and skewed as to sound like absolute nonsense when some of this economic policy is explained.”

“We need to be aware of the creation of a fearful population, and fearful lawmakers, being led to believe that big government is the answer, to bail out the private sector, because then government gets to get in there and control it. And mark my words, this is going to be next, I fear, bail out next debt-ridden states. Then government gets to get in there and control the people.”

“Some in Washington would approach our economic woes in ways that absolutely defy Economics 101, and they fly in the face of principles, providing opportunity for industrious Americans to succeed or to fail on their own accord. Those principles it makes you wonder what the heck some in Washington are trying to accomplish here.“

And on the war in Iraq, Sarah Palin had this to add:

“The terrorists are still dead set against us… It is war over there, so it will not be war over here. And it had better still be our mission that we win, they lose.”

Meanwhile, President Obama continues to try and close the gap of difference and misunderstanding between the U.S. and the Muslim world/Middle East. Perhaps we would be better off if we were just more concerned with winning.

Colin Powell Endorses Obama

“I come to the conclusion that because of his ability to inspire, because of the inclusive nature of his campaign, because he is reaching out all across America, because of who he is and his rhetorical abilities — and you have to take that into account — as well as his substance — he has both style and substance. He has met the standard of being a successful president, being an exceptional president…

“Now that we have had a chance to watch [Sarah Palin] for some seven weeks, I don’t believe she’s ready to be president of the United States, which is the job of the vice president. And so that raised some question in my mind as to the judgment that Senator McCain made…

“Mr. McCain says that [Bill Ayers is] a washed up terrorist, but then why do we keep talking about him? And why do we have the robocalls going on around the country trying to suggest that because of this very, very limited relationship that Senator Obama has had with Mr. Ayers, somehow Mr. Obama is tainted. What they’re trying to connect him to is some kind of terrorist feelings. And I think that’s inappropriate. Now, I understand what politics is all about, I know how you can go after one another and that’s good. But I think this goes too far, and I think it has made the McCain campaign look a little narrow. It’s not what the American people are looking for…”

When asked about claims that Barack Obama is a Muslim, Powell stated:

“Well, the correct answer is, [Barack Obama] is not a Muslim, he’s a Christian. He’s always been a Christian. But the really right answer is, what if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer’s no, that’s not America. Is there something wrong with some seven-year-old Muslim-American kid believing that he or she could be president? Yet, I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion, ‘He’s a Muslim and he might be associated terrorists.’ This is not the way we should be doing it in America.

“[John McCain] is essentially going to execute the Republican agenda, the orthodoxy of the Republican agenda with a new face and a maverick approach to it, and he’d be quite good at it, but I think we need more than that. I think we need a generational change. I think Senator Obama has captured the feelings of the young people of America and is reaching out in a more diverse, inclusive way across our society…

“Those kinds of images going out on al Jazeera are killing us around the world. And we have got to say to the world, it doesn’t make any difference who you are or what you are, if you’re an American you’re an American. And this business of, for example a congresswoman from Minnesota going around saying let’s examine all congressmen to see who is pro America or not pro America, we have got to stop this kind of non-sense and pull ourselves together and remember that our great strength is in our unity and diversity. That really was driving me.”

When asked about the Democrats policies being “socialist”, Powell commented:

“We can’t judge our people and hold our elections on that kind of basis. Yes, that kind of negativity troubled me. And the constant shifting of the argument, I was troubled a couple of weeks ago when in the middle of the crisis the campaign said ‘we’re going to go negative,’ and they announced it. ‘We’re going to go negative and attack his character through Bill Ayers.’ Now I guess the message this week is we’re going to call him a socialist. Mr. Obama is now a socialist, because he dares to suggest that maybe we ought to look at the tax structure that we have. Taxes are always a redistribution of money. Most of the taxes that are redistributed go back to those who pay them, in roads and airports and hospitals and schools. And taxes are necessary for the common good. And there’s nothing wrong with examining what our tax structure is or who should be paying more or who should be paying les, and for us to say that makes you a socialist is an unfortunate characterization that I don’t think is accurate.”