Christian Right? IMHO they are just as bad as the Muslim fundamentalists. Do the Christian right think there religion is better than the Pope's? That is almost like asking who's shit stinks the most.

Gun control? Be damn glad the majority of Americans know what it is. That means hitting what you are shooting at. Recent news article about senior citizen killing a man with a gun, the old geezer used hand to hand combat and offed the punk; the two other punks ran away. That should explain that guns don't kill people, people kill people, unarmed, baseball bats, knives, etc.

When are the average American people going to wake up that we are in a war to preserve our way of living? Bring the troops home? Fuck no, get them out of Iraq and put them in the just war, Afghanistan.

We all know Bush lied to invade Iraq, however he had and still has support for Afghanistan. But as a social idiot, he cannot understand that, and neither can the rest of his crooks.

This so called war in Iraq is BULLSHIT. It is Bush's war, and no, the Demo's don't need a plan for it, the Repugs do. They started it, let them finish it. Simple.

All you right leaning Bush ass kissing people don't like this, too bad, but it's the truth. Yes, Saddam did deserve to be taken out. One bullet could have done that. Why now the surge, should have surge at the beginning, like the military leaders wanted to do. But hell no, a AWOL CIC, and a 5 deferment VP knows better than people who have been in the military, studied warfare, etc.

So please explain your dribble BS on this one.

I fear that "post" is going cause some burst blood vessels due to extreme cognitive dissonance among the leftist readers of this "weblog".

OK, case in point immediately above my first "post".

Allen,

You COMPLETELY left out the H in your IMHO.

In other words, there was nothing H in your O.

But that's probably still over your head.

Oh well.

I don't see any great difference between fundamentalist Christians, and fundamentalist Muslims. They both want the same thing... To enforce their morality in order to create and preserve power for them through whatever means are available.

For Christians right now, it's political power. Back in the good old days, it was the sword or the rack or the burning stake. Islam is perhaps 400 years younger. They're still at the sword, rack and burning stake stage, except the implements are much, much better today.

Both of them view controlling women as their perogative, whether via a burqua or controlling what she can and can't do with her body and sexuality. Both attempt to limit what you can read, both attempt to control thought through gaining control over the education system. Both consider it the most noble sacrifice to give one's life for their god. Both want to establish a legal system and a government guided by their religious texts.

Each consider the other "Evil".

Frankly, they are both evil.

The really sick part of all of this is the religious texts that they would like to base their legal and governmental framework on are nothing but fables, fairy tales, and campfire stories told by a frightned, simple, and superstitious people to explain the natural world.

As a Christian with a firm understanding of my religion, and a good understanding of other world religions, I can tell you there is very little truth in the bible, other than some good stories about morality.

Genesis? Didn't happen that way. Revelations? Not going to happen. Everything else in between? Noah? Cain and Abel? Moses? Solomon? Joshua? All good stories, to be sure. True? Feh...

Folks, I hate to be the person to break it to you that Santa is really dad, and the tooth fairy is really mom, but their is no heaven. When you die, you are dead. Period. No god, no white robes, no wings, no harp.

To INSIST that a religious text contains absolute truth and therefore MUST be used to control all law, governence and personal interaction is.... well... for lack of a better word "Evil".

Its not just the way people interpret their books that is the most evil. The various skullduggery's that shaped the modern Bible make the history of the few versions of the Koran pale in comparison. Amazingly all layered in the "search for truth." That is a sad evil.

I ain't no lefty. I'm not a church goer. But I share some of the moral principals that some on the left consider Fundamentalist, and others they consider fundamental: I do believe that abortion is murder, for example. I don't think homosexuality is a sin. I've felt a greater spiritual presence, but I doubt any human book appropriately describes it.

Current Republican strategy courted the Fundamentalists. While it allowed for some interesting Republican victories, it also gave more power to the Fundamentalists. But their power is in no way similar to the power wielded by Islamic leaders. That is what makes the Islamic movement so dangerous.

...so if Christian sacred texts are "false" because they promote a particular set of religious beliefs, why should anyone listen to a lefty's opinion about his or her own lefitist religious belief, that promotes said lefty's own religion above all other religions, especially Christianity?

me thinks said lefty thinks himself sacred...or God...??

oy vei...

"Both of them view controlling women as their perogative, whether via a burqua or controlling what she can and can't do with her body and sexuality."

Not so. I am not so pretentious to think I should tell a woman what she can or cannot do with her body aor her sexuality.

Once she makes her "choice," however, then she must be responsible for the outcome of that choice. And I question the sanity of anyone who views the destruction of a human being because it would cramp their desired lifestyle to be responsible.

"I can tell you there is very little truth in the bible, ...their is no heaven. When you die, you are dead. Period. No god, no white robes, no wings, no harp."

"As a Christian with a firm understanding of my religion..."

Upon what do you base your claim that you are a Christian? You just stated there is no God nor life after death...

"I don't see any great difference between fundamentalist Christians, and fundamentalist Muslims. They both want the same thing... To enforce their morality in order to create and preserve power for them through whatever means are available."

"Frankly, they are both evil."

lol........ I say Christians and Muslims should get together, *remove*/ wink* all the liberals, then divvy up the world and live in peace.

Sound like a plan? That's one way to get Christians and Muslims treated equal.

Ghost Rider writes;

...so if Christian sacred texts are "false" because they promote a particular set of religious beliefs,....

No. I never said that.

The sacred texts are parables and stories. Many are completly untrue based on historical evidence e.g. Noah's flood. Others are internaly inconsistant, e.g. the fact that the four gospels tell different stories about the resurection. More is externaly inconsistant, e.g. the gospels were not written by the stated authors - they were written much later, and by different people, not the eye witnesses.

Finaly, the stories of creation and heaven are not logical. If man is too complex to have evolved, thus requiring a creator, how did the even more complex creator come to be? This just wraps a puzzle in a larger enigma, and answers nothing. Secondly, if heaven is eternal, and hell too, you'll be punished, or rewarded for more than 100 trillion years for every second you spent on earth. What kind of justice is that?

Epador also makes an important point. If you understand how the collection of texts that are now The Bible came to be selected, and which sacred texts were deselected, and if once you understand the history of the early church, you'll have a better feel for the politics that went into this book. I have a copy of the Gnostic scriptures, and I've stood in the chambers of the Luna Pope's place of exile in Spain. Google both.

Lastly the christian bible is the latest in a series of fairy tales. God was once a rock. Or a tree, or a turtle. Today, christians are a religious minority. For the vast expanse of human history, for all but the last bit, christians didn't even exist. It may seem normal for you to be a christian, but most people in the world, and most of human history do not agree with you.

Knightbrigade chortles;

lol........ I say Christians and Muslims should get together, *remove*/ wink* all the liberals, then divvy up the world and live in peace.

I think both parties would be in favor of your first idea. Liberals are not well tolerated by either ideology, which is one reason I find little difference.

Without a liberal moderating influence, good luck at your second idea - divy and live in peace. It's not really in eiether of your natures.

Good luck with that, once we're gone.

braney435,

Are you in favor of sexual education in school? Free access to birth control? Should a girl save herself until marrage? Is it ok for girls to have sex with other girls? Does it matter if a girl is a virgin? Or doesn't get pregnant, but has a lot of sex partners? Is it OK if a girl goes topless at the beach? Nude?

You do in fact think you have the right to tell a girl what to do with her body and sexuality... I just want to know where you draw the line.

Knightbrigade, that's just our resident moron John. He's an idiot. We laugh at him. Pay no attention to his rantings.

Hey Jo,

Did you check out those links on the other thead? What did you think?

In my 66 years i've never seen anything that required me to be a christian and don't know anyone that has lost their head (literally) because they chose to leave the christian faith.

Maybe the christians should fire up the lions pits and feed the lefties to the lions. Can't do that, PETA would be after us for feeding contaminated or poison meat to the lions.

The only worry I have about the lefties is their total desire to downgrade the United States and their lack of brain power to know that they can't turn off the hate like a light switch. The feeble minded have swallowed the hype hook, line and sinker and will carry the hate of something or everthing with them to the grave. When they figure out the right isn't listening to their rot they'll turn on their own. Hey, they're already doing that. LIke too many guppies in a tank they are eating their own and i'm loving it.
Who would have thought that losting an election would bring on such comedy from the winners.

I've always found it odd that liberals are prepared to go to such lengths to protect the muslim "right" to jihad when they (the libs) would be the first ones up against the wall if the muslims took control.

I think the dissonance in outrage between christians and muslims stems from all of our "rebel against the system" crap from the 1960 (just one more thing we can thank the baby boomers for). Christians, mostly westerners and white, are therefore evil by definition. Muslims, mosltly non-western and brown, are therefore morally superior, as we all know that white males are the root of all evil in the world throughout all time (at least that is how my Psych-101 professore explained it to me).

Speaking as a confirmed agnostic, let me say that in the fight between the Islamists and the "Christofascists" (I think that's the hip new term all the cool kids are using), I'll take the Christofascists.

They're seeking political power, and I can vote against them.

The Islamists want to blow me up or cut off my head.

Maybe I'm just naive or gullible or innocent, but I think I see a slight difference between the two tactics -- and my best way of fighting both.

J.

So lets add this up:

Muslims and their agenda easily kill 100,000's every year.

Libs, or Sec-Progs and their agenda easily kill over a million a year,

Christians kill how many?

The far left wants to try to paint every Christian as some far left right wackjob. Thats no more accurate than to think every lib is as kookie as Barney fudgepackin Frank.

Libs clearly didnt stand up as Klinton allowed over a million to be killed in Africa on his watch, and they clearly didnt stand up to protest the over 4000 military deaths that occured in 'peacetime' under Klinton.

Libs are all about the power, and, like the idiot gov from Mass, mayor of Philly, once they get it, they abuse it.

From John ...

As a Christian with a firm understanding of my religion, .....

....

but their is no heaven. When you die, you are dead. Period. No god, no white robes, no wings, no harp.

John, not only do you not have a "firm" understanding of the Christian faith, you don't have a basic understanding of it either.

Both of them view controlling women as their perogative, whether via a burqua or controlling what she can and can't do with her body and sexuality.

Why do you define women SOLELY by her sexuality?

I'm curious.

My Christian faith not only supports education for women, but actively promotes it. The best education in leading and organizing in my life came from my church activity. I first taught in Church - and now it is my career.

In my church, I am treated as a PERSON with concerns about family, career and community - not simply as a uterus with legs as John apparently sees all women.

Totally agree with Ohiovoter - she sounds exactly like my wife.

I'd like to know what the Lefties think about the fact that it was Christian women that were working alone in Afganistan during the Clinton regime trying to save Muslim women from those barbarians. Where were the Libs (esp Hillary!) than?

gc (also an Ohioan)

Anyone concerned with the intregrity of the Christian faith should be wary of too much political involvement, especially if it appears partisan in nature. This undermines the church as a meeting place of faith and the house of God, and turns it into just another mere institution of man, serving merely the interests of man, not God. In the Bible, the kingdom of God, not the kingdom of man is promoted. Too much politics makes a church a false religion in conflict with the goals and teachings of God.

On the other hand, any on the left who ignore the threat to freedom presented by Muslim extremists are blind to an extremist view of faith that often uses violence to promote political or religious ends. This should be a grave concern to any who respect the freedoms in Western society.

Both the American Christian right and Muslim extremists should show a greater concern for their faith and better respect it for the interests of God, and better support the integrity of their faith.

I believe the Bush/Cheney policy to take Muslim Fundamentalists at their word and bait, and confront them violently in Iraq and perhaps Iran is an incoherent policy..Why risk alienating the majority of Muslms who are peaceful god fearing people. Afterall they are the ones under threat of the veil, far more than Americans or in Europe is where the rise of Islam, mainly democraphically. far more acute than in the USA..The European policy of coexistence seems much more sensible than high tech, high casualty, military confrontration, in the Middle East..Christian fundamentalism? No one seriously is suggesting that is the same kettle of fish as miltant Islam.

"braney435,

Are you in favor of sexual education in school? Free access to birth control? Should a girl save herself until marrage? Is it ok for girls to have sex with other girls? Does it matter if a girl is a virgin? Or doesn't get pregnant, but has a lot of sex partners? Is it OK if a girl goes topless at the beach? Nude?

You do in fact think you have the right to tell a girl what to do with her body and sexuality... I just want to know where you draw the line."

I've had sex ed since I was in grade school, and my daughters will as well. Doesn't bother me, as long as I know exactly what they're being taught.

I don't believe in free access to birth control. Not that I'm against birth control, I see it as responsible if you don't want a kid, I'm just against using government money to subsidize peoples sex lives.

The only girls whose sex lives are of any interrest to me are my daughters and my wife....well, and maybe Jennifer Aniston, but I digress. As long as they take responsibility for the choices thay make, I don't care.

If women want to run around topless on a beach reserved for that kind of behavior, so people can decide if they want to expose their children to it or not, is fine with me too. Where, exactly is this beach, anyway? Wait, let me get a pen and paper...

I'm not interrested in telling people what they can or cannot do to THEMSELVES. I'm against slaughtering children because they would be bothersome, though.

I don't want to leave the impression that my statements are congruent with John's. The current popular versions of the Bible have a twisted origin. The New Testament, especially, had many books challenged and expunged in various power struggles. But the words of a core of the books are the ancient world's version of blogdom - folks on the fringes of popular society trying desperately to record and spread the truth as they saw it. Rather than electronic transmissions, the scrolls were hand copied (and presumably embellished and edited by the copiers to meed their own prejudices and political aims). The editing of the original works, submission hundreds of years later of "original" works, and the power struggle between sects are the evils I spoke of.

The crack young staff of "The Hatemonger's Quarterly," run an entry that discusses the Liberal Left's disconnect when comparing the Christian Right with Muslim Fundamentalists.

What follows is:
The first Liberal commentor gave an incoherent rant about the war in Iraq.
The next came from a so-called Christian that does not believe in God.
And the next tried to argue that Christianity is obsolete.

Seems like the liberal left commentors of this blog made good the point of crack young staff of "The Hatemonger's Quarterly" very nicely.

I don't recall seeing any Christians, fundamentalists or otherwise, terrorizing women and children, blowing themselves up in markets or in airplanes, believing that they should conquer the planet and impose holy law.

Not even the wackiest Christian I know believes that.

There is no equivalence, except in the delusional musings of the Left.

John, you have no understanding of the Gospels. Luke was a physician who testified to his research into the life and dealth of Jesus Christ. You don't need understand Christianity, you need to excercise your faith. Lean not on your own understanding. I have no problem with you saying the bible is just made up stories as in Santa Claus, but please, do not call yourself a Christian. ww

Is it my imagination or have the liberals on this thread completely failed to answer the question?

"Lastly the christian bible is the latest in a series of fairy tales. God was once a rock. Or a tree, or a turtle. Today, christians are a religious minority. For the vast expanse of human history, for all but the last bit, christians didn't even exist. It may seem normal for you to be a christian, but most people in the world, and most of human history do not agree with you."

Read the above statement from John.

Does that sounds like a Christian talking? I'd say no. Not many Christians would denounce their faith, and then place themselves on the other side of Christian faith. Call me crazy. But John earlier tries to wrap himself in the Christian faith like a wolf in sheep's clothing by saying:

"As a Christian with a firm understanding of my religion, and a good understanding of other world religions, I can tell you there is very little truth in the bible, other than some good stories about morality."

Yep. Sounds like a "Christian" to me, the kind who doesn't believe his own faith or that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and was resurrected, etc. etc.

John, you can have your opinion and beliefs, but in my opinion, I believe that you should look inside and see if you are indeed a Christian, or something else, based on what you have written here.

The left props itself up with hysteria. It is totally about paranoia. They create a drumroll of villians that they fear and that we should all be saved from. McCarthy, Nixon, Walmart, DDT and Christians. To do this they must protect or create Communism, Clinton, malaria and Islamic Fascists. The result is irrational behavior and beliefs.
The left can't produce any Christianfacist acts, other than to worry about abortion or freedom of thought and action. They need strawmen to fear and create a great duststorm. Interestingly none of this is being accompanied by murder and torture, which does not seem to inconviences their argument at all.

John is a member of that "new" Christian church, the "Church of Oprah". They believe they can call themselves Christians and still get Christmas presents. What's the downside her, like "I" get to define what is the truth, Oprah told me so.

Unfortunately, this is what a lot of people who call themselves "Christians" think.

The Bible? Nice writing. That's even what the Episcopal church is starting to say. We need more "Christianity Lite". Please no Hell or Heaven, your not being multicultural!

Please don't post anything here that would lead them to believe a religion must have doctrine or it is not a religion, just a TV show. Goddess Oprah would be mad.

Kemp

you guys are so f'ing annoying.

there is a basic difference: the holy rollers are in america, and thus have much more of an effect on what happens here, as they can influence policy, become politicians, etc. the islamic fundamentalists are almost wholly absent form the continental united states and wield a frightening, but not especially concrete threat ( i know you're all gonna start carping about 9/11 now, so please go ahead). their ability to shape policies, laws, etc. in america is quite small.

additional news flash, the chances of muslims invading the us and instituting sharia law is virtually zero. the chances of th christian right instituting laws and policies is already happening- see mr. bush, darling of the holy rollers.

the right wing needs its boogeymen, and now that you've lost the commies, you have a better boogeyman, the jihadis. i say better, because those guys are almost all brown, so it's a good outlet for all the latent racists among you.

frankly, i think you're "question" is complete bullshit, but here's an answer. so now enjoy the rest of your afternoon ridculing "the left" as embodied by one poster. i know you have the need to feel superior, so i am sure you will come up with all kinds of reasons and non-reasons of why i am a "moonbat" and we are facing an existential threat that i simply "don't get," but that dear leader bush will save us from, if the liberals don't screw it up.

get a new act. this one's boring.

p.s. i am not saying terrorism is not a threat, just that the lot of you are hysterics and, in addition, can only conceive of one way of dealing with the problem- with a losing military strategy that you justify using more of the worse it gets, because of the "existential threat to the nation that we are facing."

have at it. enjoy your taunting and resulting feelings of superiority. won't get you anywhere in the end.