Prevailing Winds "For the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom . . ." 2 Cor. 3:17, TNIV

September 18, 2009

Really? You Have To Ask?

Filed under: Uncategorized — keelyem @ 4:34 pm

A Tea Party organizer says Barack Obama is “a Muslim and a thug.”

Rush Limbaugh says his presidency now gives black kids permission to beat up white kids with impunity.

The “birthers” are convinced a newborn Obama somehow arranged for a fake birth notice to be printed in a Hawaiian newspaper announcing his birth. Even a local pastor speculates that there’s something sinister the President is trying to hide regarding the circumstances of his birth to a white woman and a Black African man.

Racist “Christians” announced his election with a knock-knock joke: “Who’s there?” “Ise.” “Ise, who?” A grinning Barack Obama — “Ise Yo New President!”

Another jokes about his entering the pearly gates a mere 20 minutes after his inauguration.

Others rejoice over a Black pastor — a lunatic they would never otherwise quote — who condemns Obama as “a pimp daddy.”

And still others yuk it up over a satirical news article, printed for undiscerning, hot-headed readers without reference to its fictional nature, about his attempts to grant statehood to Kenya — the home of his father and the nation in which the crazies say he was born.

An acquaintance sends me dire emails noting that Obama has “never renounced his Muslim faith.”

Congressional bully Joe Wilson, of “you lie!” fame, is a dedicated defender of the Confederate flag. Cries of “the battle continues!” ring out from those poor, deluded folks who think the Civil War was nothing more than a program of race-mixing, white-hating, plantation-busting federal oppression of the Anglo-Celts living in Dixie. To what effect?

Well, while 90 percent of whites in the Northeast believe the President was, in fact, born in the United States, fewer than half of white Southerners agree.

And you have to ask if racism is at all behind the recent mass protests against Barack Obama, demonstrations that have little to do with policy and much to do with ontology — who he is as a person, the product of a white American woman and a Black African man, a “secret Muslim,” a shadowy, radical, deceptive pretender with “proven” socialist intentions and terrorist ties?

Not every protester is a racist. But not every protester is a clear-thinking, rational, sincerely concerned citizen, either, and when the fringe Right decides to call in the troops and go on the rampage, only the foolish would accept that love of country and concern for policy is what leads them to ugly rhetoric, vicious slander, and the insouciant carrying of weapons while reminding each other that bloodshed is a necessary part of revolution — not just dissent, but revolution.

And every single person who engages in the kind of talk I’ve outlined is guilty already of slander, malice, gossip and troublemaking. I just pray they don’t become, all of them, guilty of abetting the murder of this man they hate so much.

Yeah. That includes local pastors and blogmeisters and “Christian” elders who damned well know better and choose not to do it.

4 Comments »

  1. “Not every protester is a racist. But not every protester is a clear-thinking, rational, sincerely concerned citizen, either, and when the fringe Right decides to call in the troops and go on the rampage, only the foolish would accept that love of country and concern for policy is what leads them to ugly rhetoric, vicious slander, and the insouciant carrying of weapons while reminding each other that bloodshed is a necessary part of revolution — not just dissent, but revolution.”

    You would do well to remember that the left is not immune plumbing such depths of indecency. In fact, it it the left that pioneered these methods – starting with the French Revolution, on to the Russian and they would have more if they could.

    And not just in America. The leftist parties in India are fuelled by such crackpot hatred for everything that is not themselves that they would (and have) willingly ally with India’s enemies time and again.

    The love of your “neighbour” on the other side of the world while the constantly hating him who actually lives next to you is a very leftist failing. The right-wing generally is “guilty” of the opposite – favouring solidarity with immediate neighbour.

    Comment by Ashwin — September 18, 2009 @ 7:12 pm

  2. I can’t comment on “leftists” in world history. I can say, however, that left-wing terrorism in the U.S. in this and the previous century generally tends to take the form of eco- and animal-rights terrorists. Are there exceptions? Of course. However, the fervor with which many on the left, myself included, protested the abuses and evils of the Bush administration was accompanied by anger without deteriorating into bigotry and blind rage. Of course no group is blameless; these days, though, one group in particular embodies all that is wrong with both civil society and the Gospel, and how the respectable Right can remain silent is beyond me.
    Keely

    Comment by Keely Emerine Mix — September 18, 2009 @ 8:36 pm

  3. KMM: “protested the abuses and evils of the Bush administration was accompanied by anger without deteriorating into bigotry and blind rage. “

    You must realise that the in the case of the demographic you represent – middle class upbringing, excellent education, fabulous material wealth (compared to your counterparts anywhere in the world) – maintaining decorum is the LEAST that could be expected of you.

    You are comparing yourself favourably with uneducated, rough folk who would in another place be rightly termed peasants. They do not have the benefit of a wonderful education to articulate their points. They therefore resort to bad behaviour as an outlet to the turmoil within them.

    It is expected from those like yourself who are very privileged with learning as well as with material wealth to accomodate these brothers of yours. To try to hide their failings. To make restitution to those they have hurt. To gently rebuke them.

    It is not expected from to to sink to their level and then congratulate yourself on not going all the way.

    Comment by Ashwin — September 18, 2009 @ 10:14 pm

  4. Keely wrote:

    I can’t comment on “leftists” in world history. I can say, however, that left-wing terrorism in the U.S. in this and the previous century generally tends to take the form of eco- and animal-rights terrorists.
    ———–

    Just in case someone may read this response to this earlier posting/thread:

    Though I am not an expert on the history of “terrorism” in the US, I disagree, given the research I have done on this subject.

    I think that the claim that what might be termed “left-wing terrorism” in the US has been mostly eco or animal rights related, is questionable (putting aside the complexities and uncertainties in defining what is “left-wing,” and how to define “terrorism” e. g. sometimes one persons terrorist is another persons freedom fighter).

    I immediately thought of the large number of events that many would now define as “terrorist” and “left-wing” during the Vietnam war era, that in total surpass in severity the acts of destruction or violence by eco and animal rights activists, or at least what I have been able to find in admittedly limited reseach.

    The Navy Building on the U of I campus was fire bombed (as were many buildings across the US), there was the Weather Underground, a major issue in the presidential campaign, given Bill Ayers membership in that “terrorist” group and Obama’s association with Ayers, the Black Panthers were considered promoters of violence, Students for a Democratic society had connections to the Weaher Underground; and though perhaps not focused so much on Vietnam war protests, the Symbionese Liberation Army makes most eco or animals rights activists look tame in comparison (they kidnapped Patty Hearst). I think many would define their agenda as “left-wing.”
    They committed murders and kidnappings; and I have yet to find one example of eco or animals rights activists who have committed outright murder or kidnapping, which frankly has surprised me, so perhaps my research is insufficient.

    Prove me wrong!

    Ted Moffett

    Comment by Ted Moffett — September 21, 2009 @ 10:07 pm

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