(Ir)religiosity

By now I’m sure most everyone has at least heard of Focus on the Family chairperson Dr. James Dobson‘s so-called “Letter from 2012.” You can read the entire diatribe here. To be honest I haven’t read it all — based on what I know of Dobson and his think tank, I consider it to be a colossal waste of time.

I won’t take the time to critque it or add my comment (there are some good ones worth reading here and here).

Being the good Web2.0 junkie that I am, I created a Wordle cloud from the text of the letter.  It is below.  Pretty revealing I think.

Click for larger view

It’s getting close to the election and since I received a few emails from readers about my personal biases I thought I would once again try to clear things up.  Or maybe make them more murky, whichever.

Unless the radical anarchist in me takes over at the last minute in the voting booth and I vote for Nader or register a blank ballot, I will be voting for Barack Obama.  But I do so with guarded and cautious realism.  I am a registered  independent.  I refuse to play the rules of our two-party — or one party, however you see it — system and I reject that standard being placed upon me. I do this for two reason.

First of all, as a Christian my first and deepest allegiance is to the kin-dom¹ of God and I believe that no political party — least of all the two pathetic excuses we have in America — unilaterally represents that alternate reality.  Some choices are noticeably better than others, but none of the choices will ever be good enough because that’s not how the kin-dom operates.  It’s not top down, it’s bottom up.  It’s not centralized, it’s decentralized.  It’s not hierarchical or patriarchal, it’s egalitarian.  It’s ethos is not based on power and greed, but on love and justice.  Barack Obama doesn’t represent it; John McCain doesn’t represent it; Joe Biden doesn’t represent it, and Sarah Palin doesn’t represent it.  A crucified God, executed by the established order, who stood for justice, subverted the status quo and forgave those who murdered him represents and defines the kin-dom. And that’s something of which no politician can ever claim to have exclusive rights.  Ever. Read the rest of this entry »

1. Using kin-dom rather than kingdom is a new idea I’ve been toying with.  More about that later.  For now, suffice it to say that I am using it as a means of intentional subversion and liberation of both patriarchy and hierarchy [↩]

In case you missed it, former Sec. of State Colin Powell endorsed Barack Obama this morning on Meet the Press.  The whole interview if worth watching, but a particular quote caught my attention.

I’m also troubled by, not what Senator McCain says, but what members of the party say. And it is permitted to be said such things as, “Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim.” Well, the correct answer is, he 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.

Here’s the video with more context.

Read the entire transcript of the interview here.

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It turns out that Joe isn’t really a plumber. At least not a licensed one. I’ve got nothing against Joe, I have more in common with him than the candidates, but I do have a problem with a campaign using someone for political gain.  It’s just patronizing.  “Like Sarah Palin, a great concept. But the McCain campaign needs to be able to vet its hood ornaments.” [Ht. Andrew Sullivan]

John McCain will have to manhandle Barack Obama — or in his own words “whip his you-know-what” — if he wants to stand a chance of winning the election.  I’m not sure what the chances of that are, but they’re not good that’s for sure.

Check back here for live updates at 9:00 PM EST.

At this point, I think it’s safe to say that the election is Obama’s to lose.  And I think the debate last night helped him in that regard.  I do agree with Dave, there wasn’t really anything new in terms of substance, but Obama came off as more relaxed, grounded, and in control whereas McCain — whose forte is supposed to be the town hall meeting — seemed annoyed, nervous, and anxious.  At times he just seemed to be trying too hard.  We get it John.  You want to connect with the average American.  But referring to us as “your friends” seems disingenuous and patronizing.

McCain barely made eye contact with Obama during the last debate.   While he did make and effort to actually look at him this time he still showed signs of disdain and even disgust.  At one point he referred to Sen. Obama as “that one,” a telling slip of the tongue methinks, and it looks like he even refused to shake his hand.

Though my mind has been made up for a while, I found an exchange between the two on health care to be very important.  If I was an undecided it would’ve been a game changer for me.

BROKAW: Quick discussion. Is health care in America a privilege, a right, or a responsibility?

Sen. McCain?

MCCAIN: I think it’s a responsibility, in this respect, in that we should have available and affordable health care to every American citizen, to every family member. And with the plan that — that I have, that will do that.

OBAMA: Well, I think it should be a right for every American. In a country as wealthy as ours, for us to have people who are going bankrupt because they can’t pay their medical bills — for my mother to die of cancer at the age of 53 and have to spend the last months of her life in the hospital room arguing with insurance companies because they’re saying that this may be a pre-existing condition and they don’t have to pay her treatment, there’s something fundamentally wrong about that.

The difference there is huge.  In my opinion, every person has a right to quality health care solely on the basis of being a person regardless of the costs.  Period.  It’s not a responsibility we have if we can afford it, it is fundamental right that should be afforded to us all.

With that revealing point, McCain loses and Obama becomes President.

Come one, come all, and join the awesomeness that is running debate commentary!

FYI, C-SPAN will have some really cool video features– like a timeline that makes it easy to find specific answers to questions and the ability to splice together video–once the debate gets going.

I’m not really interested in splitting hairs about who won and who lost.  I think Palin did surprisingly well simply by not fumbling and Biden maintained the status quo — of retatining the lead — simply by not saying anything inappropriate or flying off the handle.

I did find a quote by Palin very interesting if not disturbing.

“That world view that says that America is a nation of exceptionalism. And we are to be that shining city on a hill, as President Reagan so beautifully said, that we are a beacon of hope and that we are unapologetic here. We are not perfect as a nation. But together, we represent a perfect ideal. And that is democracy and tolerance and freedom and equal rights. Those things that we stand for that can be put to good use as a force for good in this world.”

I can’t underscore how dangerous this line of thinking is.  American exceptionalism is one of the greatest lies perpetrated by our government since this nation’s inception.  It is a myth that fuels nationalism and xenophobia and allows loose cannons like our current leadership to expand American imperialism under the guise of “spreading freedom and democracy.”  It is one of our biggest and most compelling fictions and it is present on both sides of the political spectrum.  More than a year ago, Barack Obama stated that “America is the last best hope for Earth.”  That sort thinking can — and has — justified some of the worst things imaginable.

American exceptionalism is false monomyth, indeed a false metanarrative, that can only be remedied by being destroyed.

I’d like to think the choices in the election will lead to that, but I wonder.

This was a lot of fun last week and I was fortunate enough to have several people participate in the commentary.  So — I thought we could have at it again.  There should definitely be more to talk this time around.

Check back here for live updates beginning at 9 PM EST.

As long as my notebook continues to hold up, I’m planning to liveblog the presidential debate starting in about an hour (9PM EST). Check back here for live updates. [Ht. to Matt Scott for the cool Cover it Live platform]