Hey Teabaggers! Look what your newly adopted Thomas Paine had to say about religion!

[arcadian]

Got any comments on these quotes, Glenn Beck?

-------

What is it the New Testament teaches us? To believe that the Almighty committed debauchery with a woman engaged to be married; and the belief of this debauchery is called faith.
-- Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason (1794)

The Bible: a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalise mankind.
-- Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason (1793-5),... See More

The Christian system of religion is an outrage on common sense.
-- Thomas Paine

No falsehood is so fatal as that which is made an article of faith.
-- Thomas Paine

The study of theology, as it stands in Christian churches, is the study of nothing; it is founded on nothing; it rests on nothing; it proceeds by no authorities; it has no data; it can demonstrate nothing and admits of no conclusion.
-- Thomas Paine

It is from the Bible that man has learned cruelty, rapine and murder; for the belief of a cruel God makes a cruel man.
-- Thomas Paine

Any system of religion that has anything in it that shocks the mind of a child, cannot be a true system.
-- Thomas Paine

[Speck Tater]

1. +1000. But how do we get them to stop denying reality? nt

[crim son]

2. Great quotes, but

what do you mean when you say Paine has been adopted by the teabaggers?

[arcadian]

4. Glenn Beck has been using imagery of the "Founding Fathers"

He seems to really like Thomas Paine, but knows nothing about Thomas Paine.

[Enthusiast]

17. You mean Glenn Beck has been

palling around with bible haters? This cannot be!

[Journeyman]

20. The thing Beck doesn't realize is, "Common Sense" isn't . . .

leastwise, not common at all among Beck and his audience. . .

[girl gone mad]

21. He's into historical revisionism.

He's recently been pimping a book about George Washington's supposed fundamentalist beliefs.

The book is temporarily out of print, but if you want to make a quick buck off of Beck's feckless minions, go list a copy on Ebay, available for delivery in 4 to 6 weeks. Those dopes will bid it up to a nice fat profit margin for you.

[Toucano]

27. That is an offensive image!

:hi:

Why do people buy that man's stupid ramblings?

[pnorman]

56. Thanks!

I was also looking for that "Tom Paine" connection,

[Hissyspit]

26. Glenn Beck has called himself today's Tom Paine, or something to that effect.

[onager]

29. Hmm. I hope that's true, in one sense.

i.e., that Beck will become today's Tom Paine.

Tom Paine died flat broke and alone in a New York flophouse. Only 6 mourners came to his funeral. Though two of them were African-Americans, not very likely in Beck's case.

From that famous troublemaker Robert G. Ingersoll:

Thomas Paine had passed the legendary limit of life. One by one most of his old friends and acquaintances had deserted him.

Maligned on every side, execrated, shunned and abhorred – his virtues denounced as vices – his services forgotten – his character blackened, he preserved the poise and balance of his soul.

He was a victim of the people, but his convictions remained unshaken. He was still a soldier in the army of freedom, and still tried to enlighten and civilize those who were impatiently waiting for his death. Even those who loved their enemies hated him, their friend – the friend of the whole world – with all their hearts.

On the 8th of June, 1809, death came – Death, almost his only friend. At his funeral no pomp, no pageantry, no civic procession, no military display. In a carriage, a woman and her son who had lived on the bounty of the dead – on horseback, a Quaker, the humanity of whose heart dominated the creed of his head – and, following on foot, two negroes filled with gratitude – constituted the funeral cortege of Thomas Paine.

[Dr.Phool]

58. Three things tea-baggers have never actually read.

The Constitution
Thomas Paine
The New Testament.

If they did, and happened to comprehend what they were reading, their heads would explode.

[secondwind]

46. I think the new TX textbooks elevate Paine, while diminishing Jefferson's importance.

[Arugula Latte]

3. Ha ha!

Love it! :thumbsup:

As for this: "The study of theology, as it stands in Christian churches, is the study of nothing; it is founded on nothing; it rests on nothing; it proceeds by no authorities; it has no data; it can demonstrate nothing and admits of no conclusion." That can be said for all religions. Religion might as well be called "A pantload that some dude/s made up out of thin air."

[RagAss]

13. Yes....and made a shitload of money and killed all their enemies !

[byronius]

37. Uh, your sig line? Is brilliant.

Smith is the quintessential Teabagger.

[dgibby]

5. Wonder what Tom

would have to say about The Noodley Appendage?

[dmallind]

7. Probably "Yeah - that's a good way of showing how stupid the idea of religion is!" NT

[Enthusiast]

16. He would be touched by

His Noodly Appendage.

[nxylas]

6. Why would that bother Glenn Beck?

The message he'd take away from it is "don't read the Bible, read the Book of Mormon instead".

[arcadian]

8. If only

He'd loose 80% of his audience.

[yellowcanine]

9. Yeah well Beck is high on Hamilton also and he wanted to have the President appoint all of the

state governors - not to mention that he was a strong proponent of a national bank, and supposedly the Federal Reserve is something the baggers want abolished.

[rurallib]

10. So they will rewrite and reinterpret Paine

They will make it seem like Paine was a RW christian crazy before they are done.
It is not Paine they like but the concept of Paine as they interpret him which is the way they interpret Franklin et al.

[nxylas]

11. And make up a bunch of fake Paine quotes

Like they did with Thomas Jefferson.

[arcane1]

12. hell, it's the way they interpret even Jesus! n/t

[gratuitous]

14. There's nothing wrong with having a fifth grade understanding of the Bible

As long as you're in fifth grade.

[LongTomH]

15. He also held views that are still radical!

Might I say 'Socialist?' He advocated for a progressive income tax, free public education, and a guaranteed minimum income, the last being something we have yet to adopt.

[Scuba]

18. Yeah, but prayer works....

...just look at how long people have been praying for peace. Prayer worked to keep them occupied during the time they were praying !!

[ejpoeta]

42. i say prayer is fine and all, but god helps those who help themselves.

these guys don't like that kind of talk. which is funny because they are always whining about people not doing things for themselves.

[jgraz]

19. Those quotes were made up by a Communist Nazi Baby-Killing ACORN member!!!!!

:silly:

[Capitalocracy]

43. You think ACORN is gone? Think again!

Those sleeping dogs wake up and bite out the throat of democracy!

[Avalux]

22. They are latching on to Paine's radicalism, without delving in to why.

These people lack the ability to THINK on the level that would enable them to realize their cause is in opposition to Paine's views. They simply (and I put emphasis on the word simply) don't understand.

Paine might be mildly by their use of his name, if it wasn't so appalling.

[G_j]

23. the belief of a cruel God makes a cruel man

YES!!!!!

[Mojeoux]

24. So Kick and Reccomend

Thomas Paine was very insightful.
So glad he wrote those words.

[Swamp Rat]

25. *pop!*

[byronius]

38. ohthankyouforthat.

Swamp Rat Rules.

[Swamp Rat]

40. au contraire mon frere

:fistbump:

[Panorama]

28. Thomas Paine was an interesting man. n/t

[Odin2005]

30. I love Tom Paine!

[obxhead]

31. My 'god' I'm in love

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

[AnArmyVeteran]

32. Hawaiians never had a word for 'steal' until Christians tainted their purity & taught them evil...

There wasn't even a word in the Hawaiian language for the word 'steal' until Christian missionaries took a beautiful culture and infected it with all the ugliness and even evil that so defines their mutant faith.

So-called 'Christians' burned innocent people at the stake, calling them witches, just so they could take their property. So-called 'Christians' slaughtered native American men, women and children and stole all their land. So-called 'Christians' captured and enslaved millions of blacks. And these so-called 'Christians' even wore white hoods and sheets to terrorize and murder black people with 'Christian' organizations like the KKK.

And yet moronic Christian conservatives say they are the only ones who are moral in this country. Christian conservatives hate everything about their beloved 'Jesus' and would certainly nail him to a cross if he returned. And if somehow Jesus was pulled down from the cross bleeding and needing medical care they would deny him that care and allow him to die.

Christian conservatives are by their very deeds perfect examples of the evil they profess to abhor. Their hypocrisy is as boundless as the evil that lurks within each one of them. They are living examples of evil.

Any 'hereafter' that allowed conservative Christians would not be one where I would want to spend an eternity with. Spending the rest of time with so much evil would be absolute hell...



Note: This post is intended to describe the 'Conservative' Christians of today who seem to love war, destruction, defiling our environment and turning their backs on the poor and needy. They also seem to be the most hypocritical people on the planet because while they profess to walk in the footsteps of Jesus, they condemn everything Jesus taught. There are good Christians, just as their are good people of all faiths, or people with no need for faith. People do not need religion to be good. I find the opposite to be true. Religion builds more walls than bridges between people in this world. So how can that be 'good'? The more fundamentalist a Christian is, the more judgmental and condemning they are of anyone who does not share their blind, totally unsubstantiated faith...

[krkaufman]

36. This meshes with the opening of Howard Zinn's People's History of the US

... in which he includes descriptions of the "Indians" met by Columbus as willing to share whatever they had -- and a quote from Columbus to the effect that with very few men (and their weapons advantage) they could enslave them all.

[AnArmyVeteran]

39. But, but, but, the US was founded by Christians at the direction of God himself...

Conservatives extremists believe our country was founded by God, so using their premise, God endorsed slavery, murder, genocide, stealing and oppression. No matter how they try to present themselves, they are on the wrong side of good versus evil, right versus wrong and love versus hate. Hopefully, they will eventually be on the wrong side of history, and if man ever evolves beyond the point they are now, those who cling to the evil of the past will eventually be forgotten in the future. Without their reins of hatred constantly holding us back, good people who are unburdened by the needless strife and divisions of the past, will be able to take our country and our world forward toward a better future. We are at a crossroads to determine who will win this struggle. If they win, our country is doomed. If we win, a better future is ensured.

[donheld]

33. marvelous

[RandomThoughts]

34. Although I am not Glenn Beck, I do have some thoughts on those comments.

With the feeling of the love of the spirit of God, nothing is shocking. It is pretty wonderful, although some people might think it is shocking, I do think people see things differently.

Don't really know about the shocking stuff.

I do agree many people form opinions from interpretation, and the heart and mind given to a person should be part of how they see God and holy texts, but many of the things that you quote, I disagree with.

Those quotes are the type of interpretation, that he blames people of faith doing.

[defendandprotect]

35. Love Thomas Paine . . .

[Capitalocracy]

41. Great quotes in their own right

Not just as a teabag counterpunch.

[spicegal]

44. Don't believe we should be surprised. After all, the Tea Baggers are

morons operating in their own fact free world, why would they bother to do their homework?

[mikehiggins]

45. A Christian Nation? I think not

Besides the Treaty of Tripoli (if that's what its called) in which the US specifically denied being a "Christian Nation" the fact remains that the US was designed to be a MASONIC nation by an international cabal of FREEMASONS which included British royalty, many British generals and a not surprising number of our "Founding Fathers" including Franklin and Washington and many others, not to mention "internationalists" such as Lafayette and Pulaski. There is, in fact, a possibility that the British general staff "threw" the War Against the Colonies in order to facilitate Masonic domination of the US.

And if the Freemasons are the handmaidens of Satan, as many fundies have claimed (and still do). then the US is actually a Satanic nation, a viewpoint which our long history regrettably supports.

Try telling a fundie or a tea-bagger (the Beck-oid type of teabagger that is, not the other kind) that the Freemasons did it and see if his/her brain explodes.

[olegramps]

48. They don't have a brain to explode.

A Tea Bagger is by definition a brainless "moran."

[1776Forever]

47. Exactly - I have been researching this period called the "enlightenment" - Many of our "fathers"

said things just like this. I sent this e-mail to my Repub sister when she sent me an email that spewed religious "our country was founded on Christian faith" message:

You know there are a lot of people that think our founding fathers were very religious Christians but actually they were mostly Deists or Unitarians.

The Founding Fathers Were Not Christians
by Steven Morris, in Free Inquiry, Fall, 1995
http://skeptically.org/thinkersonreligion/id9.html

The early presidents and patriots were generally Deists or Unitarians, believing in some form of impersonal Providence but rejecting the divinity of Jesus and the absurdities of the Old and New testaments.

.........

George Washington, the first president of the United States, never declared himself a Christian according to contemporary reports or in any of his voluminous correspondence. Washington Championed the cause of freedom from religious intolerance and compulsion. When John Murray (a universalist who denied the existence of hell) was invited to become an army chaplain, the other chaplains petitioned Washington for his dismissal. Instead, Washington gave him the appointment. On his deathbed, Washinton uttered no words of a religious nature and did not call for a clergyman to be in attendance.

From: George Washington and Religion by Paul F. Boller Jr., pp. 16, 87, 88, 108, 113, 121, 127 (1963, Southern Methodist University Press, Dallas, TX)

.........Thomas Jefferson, third president and author of the Declaration of Independence, said:"I trust that there is not a young man now living in the United States who will not die a Unitarian." He referred to the Revelation of St. John as "the ravings of a maniac" and wrote:
The Christian priesthood, finding the doctrines of Christ levelled to every understanding and too plain to need explanation, saw, in the mysticisms of Plato, materials with which they might build up an artificial system which might, from its indistinctness, admit everlasting controversy, give employment for their order, and introduce it to profit, power, and pre-eminence. The doctrines which flowed from the lips of Jesus himself are within the comprehension of a child; but thousands of volumes have not yet explained the Platonisms engrafted on them: and for this obvious reason that nonsense can never be explained."

From: Thomas Jefferson, an Intimate History by Fawn M. Brodie, p. 453 (1974, W.W) Norton and Co. Inc. New York, NY) Quoting a letter by TJ to Alexander Smyth Jan 17, 1825, and Thomas Jefferson, Passionate Pilgrim by Alf Mapp Jr., pp. 246 (1991, Madison Books, Lanham, MD) quoting letter by TJ to John Adams, July 5, 1814.

...........Benjamin Franklin, delegate to the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention, said: As to Jesus of Nazareth, my Opinion of whom you particularly desire, I think the System of Morals and his Religion...has received various corrupting Changes, and I have, with most of the present dissenters in England, some doubts as to his Divinity; tho' it is a question I do not dogmatize upon, having never studied it, and think it needless to busy myself with it now, when I expect soon an opportunity of knowing the Truth with less trouble." He died a month later, and historians consider him, like so many great Americans of his time, to be a Deist, not a Christian.

From: Benjamin Franklin, A Biography in his Own Words, edited by Thomas Fleming, p. 404, (1972, Newsweek, New York, NY) quoting letter by BF to Exra Stiles March 9, 1970.

...................

There is more info at the link. They were also known to be Freemasons. I have studied some of this since I am a big fan of Thomas Jeffersons.

[PassingFair]

49. Jefferson was never a mason.

Jefferson did help to support Paine and visited
him on the sly for as long as he could.


Jefferson owed him for "The Crisis Papers" and
"Common Sense", but he couldn't afford to look
like his friend after the publication of
"The Rights of Man". Paine was politically toxic.

Paine just REFUSED to pay lip service to
Christianity.

[1776Forever]

52. I didn't state he was - I said there were a lot of them that were - n/t

[PassingFair]

53. You're right....

Just didn't want anyone to think that Jefferson was
among them.

:hi:

[smoogatz]

50. Most fundies have never heard of the enlightenment.

Hell, I'd hazard a guess that most American college students have never heard of it. Generally people are under the impression that the country was founded by the Puritan loons who burned witches in Massachusetts in the 1600s. Fundies view the Constitution's lack of any reference to God or Jesus Or the Bible or Christianity as an inconvenient oversight, if they're aware of it at all. They really don't get that the framers felt that the union of church and state would corrupt both and quickly lead the country back to monarchy.

[1776Forever]

54. Yes, I admit I had never known about it until recently.

My 78-year-old sister told me the other day the Internet is making people "too" smart! I laughed at her and said, "Maybe that's what we need"! I believe that the more we can learn the better off we are to making up our own minds! As the wonderful Eleanor Roosevelt said:

"Freedom makes a huge requirement of every human being. With freedom comes responsibility. For the person who is unwilling to grow up, the person who does not want to carry his own weight, this is a frightening prospect."

[Christa]

51. K & R nt

[AnArmyVeteran]

55. There are no differences between fundamentalist Christians or Muslims...

Both groups terrorize others in their own unique way. They are both born out of absolute evil. They are the perfect combination of ignorance and hatred, two traits required to be a fundamentalist in any of the man-made religions.

[Optimistic]

57. Everyone knows Obama Took over Paine's soul when these were written

[mzmolly]

59. Need T-shirts fast!

;)