Religion – Page 48 – Politics Plus

Supply-side Bible on the Way

Posted by TomCat at 1:37 am Religion

Oct 072009

Isn’t it enough that the extreme religious right has replaced the real Jesus with Supply-side Jesus to justify their dogma of fear, greed and intolerance? Apparently not. Next on their agenda is to rewrite the Bible to strip it of references of such horrid things as forgiveness and obligation to the poor.

…According to Conservapedia, there is no "fully conservative translation" which properly meets their guidelines, so the project is much needed. Among other things, they want to:

Better explain how certain parables actually promote free market ideology, because apparently the actual language of the Bible doesn’t do a very good job of that.

Exclude certain, "later-inserted liberal passages." Given that there is a great deal of dispute among Bible scholars over what was original language in the ancient texts and what wasn’t, it will be fascinating to see what passages make their list as "later inserted." I have some guesses.

Identify pro-liberal terms in existing translations such as "government" and just get rid of them. It’s great how you can solve these inconvenient problems so easily.

Conversely, of course, identify conservative words and phrases that have been mysteriously omitted from existing translations, and figure out cool ways to stick them into the Bible stories.

Some of their examples are fun, too. When Jesus says, "Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing," they are quite suspicious. That quote only appears once in the Bible, they say, plus it sounds way too liberal – it must be wrong. I guess they’ll just define that as "later-inserted." And then there are certain words that just appear way too often, like laborer and labored – apparently, they will just get rid of/re-translate stuff like that, too.

Now there are no suggestions about what this new translation might do with all those inconvenient references to the poor – feeding them, housing them, justice for them, etc. There are several hundred of those, so you would have a lot of editing to do to get rid of all that, or make it more "free market oriented." And if you just got rid of it entirely by ascribing it all to "later insertions," you would have a noticeably thinner Bible. And all those references to peace-making, the rich having trouble getting into heaven, etc.- all that would have to go, too… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <Huffington Post>

The extreme right already bases much of their doctrinal error on poor translation in existing Bibles. For example, logos and graphe, two unrelated words in koine, are both translated ‘word’ in English. Logos refers to Jesus (and the Word became flesh), while graphe means writings, and is generally taken to refer to Scripture. Now what conservative Christianity has done is to interpret “word” as the Bible in all cases, thus mistakenly imputing all the attributes of God to a book. Now please don’t think I’m trying to push any faith at you at all. Your faith is your business. The religious right makes their faith my business only because they are trying to legislate cramming it down my throat.

The Supply-side Bible should prove most entertaining. I guarantee that Supply-side Jesus will love it!

Ensign Exemplifies GOP Meltdown

Posted by TomCat at 3:28 am Politics, Religion

Oct 032009

John Ensign is the lone Pentecostal in the US Senate, and his days may be numbered.

The Justice Department and the Senate Ethics Committee are expected to conduct preliminary inquiries into whether Senator John Ensign violated federal law or ethics rules as part of an effort to conceal an affair with the wife of an aide, current and former officials said Friday.

“Whenever allegations of improper conduct are brought to the attention of Senate Ethics Committee, we open a preliminary inquiry,” said Natalie Ravitz, a spokeswoman for Senator Barbara Boxer, Democrat of California and chairwoman of the committee.

The inquiries will most likely examine whether Mr. Ensign, a Nevada Republican, or Douglas Hampton, his one-time administrative assistant, broke the law after Mr. Hampton, immediately upon leaving his Congressional job last year, began to lobby Mr. Ensign’s office. Mr. Hampton, as a senior aide, was subject to a one-year lobbying ban, lawyers who specialize in ethics law said.

“It is difficult for me to imagine they would not look into it,” said Kenneth A. Gross, a former associate general counsel at the Federal Election Commission. As a lawyer at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, Mr. Gross has represented Washington officials in ethics investigations.

Mr. Ensign could be legally at risk if he knew that Mr. Hampton was violating the one-year ban, or if he actually directed him to do so, as Mr. Hampton has said, ethics lawyers said… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <NY Times>

This one should be a slam dunk, because more that one source has apparently revealed that Ensign personally set up Hampton’s hiring and subsequently supported positions favorable to Hampton’s new employer. He did this to cover up his affair and avoid being exposed as a hypocrite who supports enforcing theocratic values on everyone else, while considering himself above having to follow them himself.

Not only is this typical for C Street, but also, it’s symptomatic of the Republican leadership as a whole. Max Blumenthal explains this in a new book, Republican Gomorrah. Video Nation has a review.

I think what we’re witnessing here is the final meltdown of the once great Republican Party, that has driven all but most extreme radical right wingers from the party, and that now represents only corporate greed, racism, and the American Taliban.

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