Last updated on July 17th, 2023 at 07:18 pm
Speaker of the House Paul Ryan is always trying to put a happy spin on House Republicans doing nothing that needs doing. Republicans talk about all the great change Ryan wrought by basically being a carbon copy of John Boehner. They talk about “our vision for a confident America” even while their candidate, Donald Trump, is describing a America as a dystopian nightmare.
What a way to build confidence. Especially when so many people are not included in this vision, like ethnic and religious minorities, women and gays, to name just a few of the rejected “other.” You have only to check Trump’s post to see which minority group he has insulted today.
Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay told The Christian Post the other day that the Declaration of Independence and Constitution, which make absolutely no mention of God – any god – have God at their core, and that therefore everyone must be subjected to a “God-centered revolution,” which by excluding millions, would somehow result in a “rebirth” and not a death, of our culture:
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I hope readers will be strengthened in their faith and understand that as we walk with the Lord we must bring Him into the public square with us.
God is at the core of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, and the Constitution is at the core of our government; thus, we need a God-centered revolution for the Constitution, resulting in a rebirth of our culture.
When we pray for this … and for our nation generally, it must not be simply for our own self-focused comfort, but for God’s purpose, and that He will be glorified.
Actually, what’s at the core of our government is a relentlessly secular Constitution. No God, not anywhere. Just “We the people.” You know, mortals. We instituted the government for ourselves, not for God, and certainly not God for us. Like Trump, it seems DeLay has not actually read the Constitution.
But hey, whatever gets them to sleep at night. I just hope they remember that if they insist on bringing their god into the public square that they have to be taxed like the rest of us.
If DeLay’s misreading of our founding documents isn’t bad enough, Gary Dull of the American Pastors Network outright rejects a roll for women in leadership positions based on his understanding of the Bible.
“In God’s line of authority, “it seems very clear in the scripture that a woman should not be in authority over men, which would limit a woman from being the president of the United States of America or even a queen of some other particular nation.”
Dull is hardly alone. Trump supporter James Edwards, the white nationalist host of The Political Cesspool, says “under God’s law, a woman should not even have dominion over her household,†let alone be president.
For Edwards, who doesn’t even think women should have the right to vote, “The husband is the ruler of the house under God’s law, and that’s the law that I abide by.â€
Which is fine. Nobody is forcing him to vote for a woman, or even work for a woman, if it violates his sense of right and wrong. But the Constitution, which again, makes no mention of God, does not restrict women from roles in government. So his God’s law is not and cannot be the law of the land.
Fortunately for the rest of us, Gary is out of luck because the Constitution is not based on the Bible. Not on any portion of it, and women can be president.
If all this seems self-defeating, it is. If there is anybody left for Republicans to offend, it is difficult to imagine who.
These unceasing attacks on everybody who isn’t white or Christian seems like a less than optimal way to scrape up votes. Easier by far to just lay the blame in advance on a corrupt elite rigging the election so the guy who has pissed off the majority of voters doesn’t win.
Hrafnkell Haraldsson, a social liberal with leanings toward centrist politics has degrees in history and philosophy. His interests include, besides history and philosophy, human rights issues, freedom of choice, religion, and the precarious dichotomy of freedom of speech and intolerance. He brings a slightly different perspective to his writing, being that he is neither a follower of an Abrahamic faith nor an atheist but a polytheist, a modern-day Heathen who follows the customs and traditions of his Norse ancestors. He maintains his own blog, A Heathen’s Day, which deals with Heathen and Pagan matters, and Mos Maiorum Foundation www.mosmaiorum.org, dedicated to ethnic religion. He has also contributed to NewsJunkiePost, GodsOwnParty and Pagan+Politics.
