Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee for President, has manged to so far escape reprisal from voters for his connections to some of the most scurrilous members of the right wing christian evangelical movement . He “made up” with Jerry Falwell, has visited and made supportive public statements about that hot bed of evangelical indoctrination other wise known as Bob Jones “University”. He has been ecstatic about the support of megachurch preachers like Ohio’s Ron Parsley, who says, speaking about Islam,
“The fact is that America was founded, in part, with the intention of seeing this false religion destroyed, and I believe September 11, 2001, was a generational call to arms that we can no longer ignore
Or Pat Robertson of the “700 Club” another “much apppreciated”right wing evangelical McCain supporter/endorser::
“I want to say it again, and again, and again: Islam is not a religion, it is a political system meant on — bent on world domination, not a religion. It masquerades as a religion, but the religion covers a worldwide attempt to exercise power and to subjugate the world to their way of thinking.”
But really, none of this is particularly fresh news.
But what is disturbing is how little attention continues to be paid to Senator MCain’s ongoing pandering to far right wing evangelicals.
Frank Rich, my favorite NY Times columnist, wrote about Hagee’s views this past Sunday and provided a url address to one of “pastor” Hagee’s outrageous rantings on YouTube, shown below. You have to see it to believe it. As a very lapsed Catholic I have no great fondness for the Catholic church’s positions on many issues, from gay’s to abortion…but when I viewed this video the hair on my neck literally stood up.
This guy is a complete NUT JOB, A WACKO LUNATIC FRINGER...who happens to have very large following. And John McCain refuses to disavow Hagee or any of of the other racist, homophobic, war mongering preachers, while his seemingly Teflon coated status insulates him from the same kind of media firestorm surrounding Barack Obama’s relationship with Rev Wright. Rev. Wright never had the unmitigated gall to come even close to the vitriolic and malignant statements made by Hagee in this much under viewed video. McCain desperately needs the pro-life Catholic vote, wider exposure of Hagees rantings will help to undermine that strategy.
It isn’t enough to just watch the video, that is far too passive. As offended as I??
Tell Mr McCain:
You can contact the Senator at
DC Address:
The Honorable John McCain
United States Senate
241 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510-0303
This is a link to an extensive interview that the Buzzflash bloggers conducted with Cliff Schecter, the author of The Real McCain: Why Conservatives Don’t Trust Him and Why Independents Shouldn’t. Schecter has collected real evidence regarding McCain’s temper tantrums, his vitriol, his flip flop position changing and much much more.
Read this interview and you will want to get the book.
The defendants say the money they took was authorized by the diocese’s financial and legal secretary, a priest they accuse of also routing payments to himself and to his girlfriend. The chancery’s “system of secret compensation” involved dummy corporations and hundreds of bank accounts, the defendants say, including a $500,000 off-book account for former Bishop Anthony Pilla.
Why do cases of financial abuses within the Church interest us?
Over and over again, we’re seeing that the Church’s financial and sexual crises are entangled in the same skein of secrecy and lawlessness. Tug one thread and you pull the other.
And when embezzlement is reported to the chancery, we’ve seen the diocese punish the whistleblower, not the priest.
In the Cleveland case, the Church has fought to block the release of financial documents, despite the judge’s order. A lot is at stake for the diocese. And for you and me. If the contents of the documents become public during the upcoming trials, we’ll learn how high the corruption went in Cleveland. And we’ll have a pattern to look for in other dioceses.
LEFT OF DAYTON 