 PIMP MY FAITH: MITT ROMNEY GETS HIS GOD ON!
I was raised Catholic and given what I know about the One True Church, I pretty much refuse to vote for anyone who professes to be a "good Catholic." That isn't due to prejudice (in as much as one can be prejudiced against oneself) as it is the dictates of the Church itself.
Roughly 2,000 years of Catholic doctrine dictates that obideience to Rome and the acceptence of Papal infallibility are non-negotiable positions of a practicing Catholic. As a matter of fact, the Church has repeatedly hinted at the possibility of excuminication for Catholic legislators who don't vote their way on issues like abortion and gay marriage and some have been publicly denied communion.
I also take strong exception to Catholics who constantly state their faith, but opine that the Church is "misguided" on certain issues. Actually, no they aren't. Religions aren't democratic institutions, they're faiths and faith doesn't allow for disagreement. That's doubly true when that faith dictates that the head guy cannot be wrong. Nobody argued with Koresh about eating Kraft Dinner all the time and no Catholic should argue with the Pope about something as fundamental as abortion. You can deny the Church, but you do so at your peril.
For that reason, I don't want to be a party to putting a lawmaker in a position where he can be persecuted by his Church for carrying out his secular duties. And if he or she actually agrees with the Church's positions wholeheartedly, I wouldn't vote for that candidate because I disagree with them on the issues. The positions that the Church takes on most issues are patently silly.
Furthermore, if elected officials should be taking orders from anyone, it should be me - y'know, the guy who pays taxes, and not some foreign group that is exempt from such obligations.
If the Church would shut the fuck up and stay out of politics, I might feel differently, but they won't so I can't. That isn't bigotry, that's voting my interests and conscience, which is precisely what my vote is supposed to represent. Even though my country is 50% Catholic, that means that 50% aren't Catholics and shouldn't have my former Church's ridiculous moral dictates imposed on them.
Besides, I learned a long time ago never to trust anyone who speaks Latin fluently.
If it were up to me, I wouldn't even know the spiritual beliefs of any candidate for public office. Faith is a personal thing and politics isn't. I distrust any candidate who uses his or her faith as a means of collecting votes just as strongly as I distrust those who would deny religious or other liberty to those different from themselves. Politicians appealing to the religious passions of the public is pimping of the very worst kind.
Jack Kennedy faced the Catholic quandry head on in a 1960 speech in Houston. During that speech, the second Catholic to be nominated by a major party declared that if his official duties conflicted with his faith, he would resign the presidency.
Fortunately for Kennedy, history has pretty clearly demonstrated that he wasn't all that serious about his faith. After all, the Catholic Church has taken pretty strong positions on issues like the assassination of foreign leaders, stealing the votes of Texas and Cook County, Illlinois, and sharing your maritial bed with drug-addled blonde movie stars, East German spies and Sam Giancana's girlfriend. Kennedy may have actually been a worse Catholic than myself or Rudy Giuliani!
In that he was the worst Catholic ever, Kennedy managed to dodge that particular bullet in Houston. He wouldn't be as lucky with another one in Dallas three years later.
The reasons for my legendary fear and hatred of Mitt Romney are many for they are legion. But they have almost nothing to do with the fact that his prayer group includes Warren Jeffs. Do I think that Mormonism is silly? Yes, but I believe that all organized religions are. Even if the president of the United States had the absolute, unilateral power to legalize polygamy, I don't think Romney would do it. Therefore, his intrepretation of what some invisible man who lives in the sky is completely meaningless to me. Also, unlike Catholism, the Mormons don't have a head guy in Salt Lake City who would be looking over the president's shoulder.
But since the a good number of Americans are determined to make the United States to Christianity what the Islamic Republic of Iran is to, well, Islamic Republics, the issue of Mitt's faith has been something of an issue. Not only is Jesus important, your version of Jesus is even more important.
That being the case, let's look at what exactly those Latter Day Saints folks believe, shall we?
Mormons believe that God is of the same species as humans and will one day return to Missouri. I know people from Missouri, and they sure as shit don't want to go back. Why would God?
And I'm more than a little creeped out by the assertion that God has more in common with O.J Simpson or Hitler than not.
They believe in the Book Of Mormon as well as the New Testament, they believe in a Heavenly Mother, believe the dead can be baptized and some wear religious undergarments they claim offer protective powers. Ah, the famous magic underpants. To be fair, women have always had the most magical effect on me when they aren't wearing any underpants at all. But that's just me.
Until 1978, Mormons did not believe God allowed blacks to serve in their priesthood, but polygamy was outlawed in the church in 1890. 1978? That's gotta be a typo, right?
I guess my other problem with the LDS is that it was founded in 1830. I have enough problems with religion, but I categorically refuse to trust one that's less than a thousand years old. They must also have their holy sites anywhere but Missouri. But I hate pretty much all music made after 1994 and I don't like leaving the basement. What I'm trying to say is that I'm a pretty quirky guy and my feeling on these kind of things shouldn't mean a whole lot.
All things being equal, magical underpants and Missouri are pretty weird, but really no weirder than conducting mass in a dead language, telling people that the Jews killed Christ (which is demonstrably false. The fucking Italians did it.) and threatening hell on those who have a hot dog on Friday, which my former Church did until 1962. And the Catholic Church goes way further back than 1830. Magic panties are a good start, but you have to do a lot better than that to impress me with ridiculous rituals.
But 1978? That would be almost cool if it wasn't so fucking sad.
Anyhow, Mitt's currently getting his ass kicked by a guy who's religion is less odd than his own in the eyes of many Republican voters. And not only does Huckabee believe in the right model of Jesus, he lost a bunch of weight. That's a tough thing to beat in America, where the only book that sells better than the Bible is a weight-loss book by a fatass like Dr. Phil.
So Mitt did what any of us would do if we were in his position: he gave a speech that really doesn't say anything. But he gave it at the George H.W Bush Presidential Library, which should impress me because I love that President Bush. Who knew that he'd let a whore like Romney in without buying a ticket?
America faces a new generation of challenges. Radical violent Islam seeks to destroy us. An emerging China endeavors to surpass our economic leadership. And we are troubled at home by government overspending, overuse of foreign oil, and the breakdown of the family. This is what I love about modern conservatives. They believe that the government should have a very limited role in society and that it spends too much money as it is. However, they also should be empowered to halt the breakdown of the family. Not only is that decidedly not limited government, it can't be cheap either.
Can any really serious person equate "radical violent Islam seeks to destroy us" with "Oh my God, Timmy's parents are seperated. I think his mom's a lesbo?"
Over the last year, we have embarked on a national debate on how best to preserve American leadership. Today, I wish to address a topic which I believe is fundamental to America’s greatness: our religious liberty. I will also offer perspectives on how my own faith would inform my Presidency, if I were elected. But he'll do so only mentioning his faith by name once, and he will make no effort whatsoever to explain what it really means to the great number of American voters who find it goofy. Which is to say that he'll engage in a really well-dressed exercise in empty platitutudes.
Given our grand tradition of religious tolerance and liberty, some wonder whether there are any questions regarding an aspiring candidate’s religion that are appropriate. I believe there are. And I will answer them today. Actually, no he won't. But the speech is more fun if we pretend.
Almost 50 years ago another candidate from Massachusetts explained that he was an American running for president, not a Catholic running for president. Like him, I am an American running for president. I do not define my candidacy by my religion. A person should not be elected because of his faith nor should he be rejected because of his faith.
Let me assure you that no authorities of my church, or of any other church for that matter, will ever exert influence on presidential decisions. Their authority is theirs, within the province of church affairs, and it ends where the affairs of the nation begin. Actually, that's not quite what Kennedy said. He said that if Congress tried to make him have a steak to kick off the weekend, he'd resign.
Whatever issue may come before me as president — on birth control, divorce, censorship, gambling or any other subject — I will make my decision in accordance with these views, in accordance with what my conscience tells me to be the national interest, and without regard to outside religious pressures or dictates. And no power or threat of punishment could cause me to decide otherwise.
But if the time should ever come - and I do not concede any conflict to be even remotely possible - when my office would require me to either violate my conscience or violate the national interest, then I would resign the office; and I hope any conscientious public servant would do the same. What will Romney do if those heathen Democrats pass a magic underpants ban? He leaves that to the imagination.
As governor, I tried to do the right as best I knew it, serving the law and answering to the Constitution. I did not confuse the particular teachings of my church with the obligations of the office and of the Constitution - and of course, I would not do so as President. I will put no doctrine of any church above the plain duties of the office and the sovereign authority of the law. Unless of course you consider that Romney spent most of his adult life, including a great deal of his time as governor, believing in a constitutional right to abortion. That constitutional principle sort of fell by the wayside as the Republican primaries drew closer.
As a young man, Lincoln described what he called America’s ‘political religion’ — the commitment to defend the rule of law and the Constitution. When I place my hand on the Bible and take the oath of office, that oath becomes my highest promise to God. If I am fortunate to become your president, I will serve no one religion, no one group, no one cause, and no one interest. A President must serve only the common cause of the people of the United States.
There are some for whom these commitments are not enough. They would prefer it if I would simply distance myself from my religion, say that it is more a tradition than my personal conviction, or disavow one or another of its precepts. That I will not do. I believe in my Mormon faith and I endeavor to live by it. My faith is the faith of my fathers - I will be true to them and to my beliefs. Mitt Romney is so determined not to distance his religion that he'll only mention it by name once in a speech that is nominally about his religion. I'll say one thing for Mitt, he has a motherfucker of a speechwriter.
Some believe that such a confession of my faith will sink my candidacy. If they are right, so be it. But I think they underestimate the American people. Americans do not respect believers of convenience. . No Mitt, no they don't. And that's exactly what has you fucked.
Romney's entire political career has been based on his being a believer of convenience. In 1994 Romney based a senate campaign on the premise that Ted Kennedy was a fascist in comparison to him. Just thirteen years later, Ronald Reagan is a liberal pussy beside the mighty Mitt.
Look, I understand how one's views "evolve" with age, but not that many of them and not that late in life. Romney was 47 years old during the '94 race. If you don't have a pretty well-formed idea of who you are and what you believe by then, you might be too fucking impressionable to be president.
Americans tire of those who would jettison their beliefs, even to gain the world. You said it, not me.
There is one fundamental question about which I often am asked. What do I believe about Jesus Christ? I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the Savior of mankind. My church’s beliefs about Christ may not all be the same as those of other faiths. Each religion has its own unique doctrines and history. These are not bases for criticism but rather a test of our tolerance. Religious tolerance would be a shallow principle indeed if it were reserved only for faiths with which we agree.
There are some who would have a presidential candidate describe and explain his church’s distinctive doctrines. To do so would enable the very religious test the founders prohibited in the Constitution. No candidate should become the spokesman for his faith. For if he becomes President he will need the prayers of the people of all faiths. Let me translate this from the original horseshit and put it all in one short paragraph, k?
Hi, I'm Mitt and my Jesus is just like yours. Well, other than the fact that he vacations in Branson and wears a thong that cures cancer and lets Him levitate. I'd explain further, but you idiots with the normal underwear wouldn't pray for me if I did. But then Mitt goes off into wonderland and loses those who think with their heads and not their souls completely.
It is important to recognize that while differences in theology exist between the churches in America, we share a common creed of moral convictions. And where the affairs of our nation are concerned, it’s usually a sound rule to focus on the latter — on the great moral principles that urge us all on a common course. Whether it was the cause of abolition, or civil rights, or the right to life itself, no movement of conscience can succeed in America that cannot speak to the convictions of religious people.
We separate church and state affairs in this country, and for good reason. No religion should dictate to the state nor should the state interfere with the free practice of religion. But in recent years, the notion of the separation of church and state has been taken by some well beyond its original meaning. They seek to remove from the public domain any acknowledgment of God. Religion is seen as merely a private affair with no place in public life. It is as if they are intent on establishing a new religion in America - the religion of secularism. They are wrong. "All religious people are equal, but I think that we can all agree that if you aren't religious, then you're a monster and you will destroy America someday."
How do I know that's what he's saying? Because secularism isn't a religion, it's a lack thereof in the public forum. Secularists believe that if you want to build a big statue of Jesus, do so on your own dime and in your own yard.
But this is where he's actually fucking brilliant. He's managed to go off of the defensive on belonging to the Church of the Magic Underpants and go on the offensive against agnostics, athiests and assholes like me, thereby unifying himself with those who fear and hate him the most. And he does so as he preaches about tolerance.
You know, I always thought that Mitt Romney was an idiot, a braying jackal and a fucking whore. But I'm beginning to think that I may have been wrong. Yes, that Ken doll is all of those things to be sure. But he's something else ...
He just might be sleazy enough to be president after all.
Easy Listening Recommendation of the Day: I'm Looking Through You By: Steve Earle From: Train A-Comin'
PermalinkLabels: Clusterfuck to the White House, Fun With Politics, The Interfaith Dental Clinic
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