The Religious Right’s Obama Derangement Syndrome

[cbayer]

http://www.tnr.com/blog/plank/105960/the-religious-rights-obama-derangement-syndrome


Amy Sullivan
August 9, 2012 | 1:54 pm




Phyllis Schlafly has written a new book, No Higher Power: Obama’s War on Religious Freedom. If you’re like me, your reaction to that news is: Phyllis Schlafly is still alive? Yes, the 87-year-old conservative activist is not only still around, but out on book tour, making the case that Obama is a secularist who hates God. (She and Frank Gaffney really need to sit down and hash out whether Obama is a secularist, a Muslim, or a God-hating Muslim.)

One claim that Schlafly and others on the Religious Right repeatedly make is that Obama omits the word “Creator” whenever he quotes from the Declaration of Independence. (As in, “they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights…”) Selective hearing appears to be a key characteristic of what might be termed the Religious Right’s Obama Derangement Syndrome. For more than three years, they have also been up in arms about the idea that Obama has rhetorically replaced the principle of “freedom of religion” with “freedom of worship,” thus signaling a much more limited approach to protecting religious belief and practice.

These are curious charges. Curiouser still is the fact that they continue to be repeated despite the ease with which they could be checked by going to the tape or the transcript. A review of White House transcripts, for instance, will tell you that George W. Bush employed the phrase “freedom of worship” more often than Obama has—and to the consternation of exactly no one.

more at link

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

1. He's a dessert topping! No, he's a floor wax!

She and Frank Gaffney really need to sit down and hash out whether Obama is a secularist, a Muslim, or a God-hating Muslim.

On a now-defunct talkboard, one conservative said that Obama was a marxist, a socialist, a fascist and an anarchist. Simultaneously. Ignoring the obvious fact that Obama is none of these, three of them are mutually exclusive.

[demosincebirth]

2. If Jesus were alive today the religious right would be his nemisis just like in his time the high

priests of the Temple were scared shitless of what he was preaching. What?
Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, take care of the sick, etc, etc. ? You gotta be kidding!

[Freddie]

3. Why isn't she home in the kitchen making dinner for her husband??

She is personally responsible for the Equal Rights Amendment never passing. Some crap about unisex bathrooms.
Loathesome excuse for a human being. Hopefully soon she'll be in that very hot place where she belongs.

[pinto]

5. LOL. Why don't RW extremists of all stripes just coalesce - "Obama's just bad, bad, bad!"

Oh, they have...my bad.

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

6. I trust you are aware of her son

Phyllis Schlafly has a son, Andrew Schlafly, who is the creature who brought about Conservapedia, the world's stupidest wiki. I will always treasure the initial iteration of the article on Florence, Italy:

Florence is a medieval city of the Medicis on the River Ebro in the Italian region of Tucsony. It is known for David's statue, the baptistery and the Dome.

For those of you who are geography deprived, the Ebro is in Spain, Florence is on the Arno. Tucsony is obviously in Arizony. "Dome" is, I suspect, a typo for Duomo, Italian for "cathedral".

Here is the Conservapedia definition of "liberal":

A liberal is someone who favors censorship of Christianity plus increased government spending and power, as in ObamaCare. Increasingly liberals side with the homosexual agenda, including same-sex marriage. Many liberals favor a welfare state where people receive endless entitlements without working. Liberals are often anti-Christian, or otherwise disagree with moral or social principles held by many American Christians. The liberal ideology has worsened over the years and degenerated into economically delusional views and intolerant ideology. Some liberals simply support, in knee-jerk fashion, the opposite of conservative principles without having any meaningful values of their own.

I would just point out the intolerance of Conservapedia. I can say from personal experience that they will block any contributor who does not toe the party line.

In furtherance of its intolerance, it has articles on such topics as Liberalism and Bestiality. The article on Richard Dawkins includes a photograph of Hitler. There is an article Evolutionists who have had problems with being overweight and/or obese, which is simply impossible to parody.

There is an unfathomable bias in Conservapedia against the Theory of Relativity, and claims that physics has been corrupted by liberal influences. Apparently, Schlafly confuses relativity in physics with moral relativity. Schlafly believes that the mathematical method of proof by contradiction is somehow flawed. Schlafly is young earth creationist

Schlafly has some material for home schooling. I pity any student educated by this man.

[cbayer]

7. While I was aware of Conservapedia, I did not know of the Schafly connection.

Thanks for the info.