US Politics - All He Wants for Christmas Was His Two Dead Sheep

[DMC]

2 hours ago, Freshwater Spartan said:

Evangelical and Republican do not always go together as Christianity today shows.

Again, 80% of white evangelicals supporting Trump still means 1 in 5 do not, so yes, "not always."  But it's silly to suggest that type of support doesn't reflect a clear and strong relationship between white evangelicals and the GOP.  It'd be just as disingenuous to claim African Americans aren't overwhelmingly Democrats.  That doesn't mean there isn't diversity within black communities or even that they behave "monolithically," it's simply recognizing the cold hard facts.  

And when you couple that with the clear trend that the majority of white protestants now identify as evangelical/born again, that means it's quite the exaggeration to say "moderate" Christians "far exceed" staunch partisans (among whites).  Especially as the proportion of the population that identifies as Christian continues to shrink overall.

[AverageGuy]

7 hours ago, DMC said:

But, as Ty pointed out, the fact that 8 in 10 white evangelics support Trump (and literally 99% opposed impeachment back in October) indicates "moderate" Christians decidedly do not "far exceed" the evangelics that overwhelmingly compose the Christian right.

Doesn't surprise me. Lines up with the majority of white people voting for Trump. Whenever I see a white person walking down the street, I can say they were statistically more likely to be a Trump voter.

[Zorral]

Does this mean, since Bloomberg's campaign is funded by himself, he won't be debating at all?

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/five-democrats-have-qualified-for-the-january-debate-who-else-might-make-it/

 

[Freshwater Spartan]

5 hours ago, DMC said:

Again, 80% of white evangelicals supporting Trump still means 1 in 5 do not, so yes, "not always."  But it's silly to suggest that type of support doesn't reflect a clear and strong relationship between white evangelicals and the GOP.  It'd be just as disingenuous to claim African Americans aren't overwhelmingly Democrats.  That doesn't mean there isn't diversity within black communities or even that they behave "monolithically," it's simply recognizing the cold hard facts.  

And when you couple that with the clear trend that the majority of white protestants now identify as evangelical/born again, that means it's quite the exaggeration to say "moderate" Christians "far exceed" staunch partisans (among whites).  Especially as the proportion of the population that identifies as Christian continues to shrink overall.

Again Evangelical does not equal christian and Christian does not equal republican. You leave out catholics , mainline protestants, orthodox christians and many other denominations that do not match up with the stereotypes held by atheist types. Those groups voting patterns are more complex and nuanced as well. Interesting you mention African Americans. They make up some of the most devout Christians in this country and they generally vote democrat.

Perhaps we are not disagreeing with anything. Yes most evangelicals are republican. I'm only trying to say that the picture of Christianity in America is much more diverse than our secular country is often willing to acknowledge. Evangelists just tend to he the loudest.

[ThinkerX]

10 hours ago, DMC said:

The data doesn't really support this.  Among white protestants, 56% identify as evangelical or born again.  Now, overall, 65% of white adults identify as Christian - 46% protestant and 17% catholic.  And, of course, Catholics are considerably more moderate in general (although certainly not all of them).  But, as Ty pointed out, the fact that 8 in 10 white evangelics support Trump (and literally 99% opposed impeachment back in October) indicates "moderate" Christians decidedly do not "far exceed" the evangelics that overwhelmingly compose the Christian right.

As a result, white Christians overall are becoming remarkably less bipartisan.  In 2009, white Christians made up 40% of Democrats.  A decade later, that number has dropped to 25%.  34% of Democrats are now religiously unaffiliated.  Obviously, even if 80% of white evangelicals support Trump, that means 1 in 5 do not, so it's hardly a surprise that an evangelical magazine Billy Graham explicitly founded to be "middle of the road" would support impeachment.  But that doesn't change the fact white Christians are continually becoming staunchly partisan - especially when you throw religiosity into the mix.

I freely admit its been twenty years since I last looked into this.  Looks like things have changed: back then it was Falwell and a couple others claiming to speak for 40-50 million 'true Christians' - and ignoring another 100+ million more more moderate types.  

 

That said, the internal theological divisions remain deep.  A sufficiently charismatic and ruthless sort might impose unity - but only for a short while.

[DMC]

2 hours ago, Freshwater Spartan said:

You leave out catholics , mainline protestants, orthodox christians and many other denominations that do not match up with the stereotypes held by atheist types. 

I did not.  Mentioned catholics and mainline protestants.  Other denominations don't really register statistically - Mormons are by far the highest at two percent.

2 hours ago, Freshwater Spartan said:

I'm only trying to say that the picture of Christianity in America is much more diverse than our secular country is often willing to acknowledge.

This seems like projecting on your part.  While I am decidedly non-affiliated when it comes to religion, I also respect the fact most places of worship are generally great centers to build community, social capital, and most importantly outreach to the most needy.  But that's no reason to ignore data and trends.

3 hours ago, Zorral said:

Does this mean, since Bloomberg's campaign is funded by himself, he won't be debating at all?

Yes.  Unless his dumbass Super Tuesday strategy works somehow, in which case the DNC will change the rules.

[Ormond]

16 hours ago, Jeor said:

Thanks, yes I wasn't sure exactly how the Christian landscape played out in the USA.

And I would agree with this - there are a very large number of moderate Christians, who are generally the quieter ones but who are a great benefit to society. You'll still find a lot of charities are faith-driven (Christian or other faiths) and there are an abundance of churches that look after the poor, advocate for refugees, care for the marginalised and so on. It's just a pity that the Christians in politics are generally the fundamentalist right-wingers who get a lot of airtime and are generally single-issue people, which really turns off non-believers and does a lot of damage to Christianity in general.

In addition to the moderate to liberal Christians, you have to remember that most African-Americans are Protestants who theologically are close to White Evangelicals, but politically are very different.

[mormont]

Washington State rep Matt Shea 'participated in domestic terrorism', according to an official report:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/dec/20/matt-shea-domestic-terrorism-washington-state-report

Quote

 

The Republican Washington state representative Matthew Shea “participated in an act of domestic terrorism against the United States” and represents a threat of political violence, according to a report produced for the Washington state legislature.

Shea is a far-right figure who holds extremist Christian, nationalist and Islamophobic beliefs. The report said it had made the judgment over terrorism by his actions before and during an armed takeover and standoff at the Malheur national wildlife refuge in 2016 in Oregon.

The report further contends that in a document entitled the Biblical Basis for War, Shea “advocated the replacement of US democracy with a theocracy and the killing of all males who do not agree”.

In its conclusion, while commenting that Shea is not an “imminent direct threat … it is more probable than not that Representative Shea is likely to plan, direct and engage in additional future conflicts that could carry with them significant risk of bloodshed and loss of life”.

It adds: “Representative Shea presents a present and growing threat of risk to others through political violence.”

In response to the report, the Washington Republican state legislative minority leader, JT Wilcox, announced on Twitter that Shea had been suspended from the house Republican caucus.

 

But of course Shea is refusing to resign: citing Trump, he's denouncing the investigation as unfair, a conspiracy, etc.

[Paladin of Ice]

On 12/20/2019 at 10:32 PM, Jeor said:

As someone who identifies as a Christian, albeit in Australia, the particular flavour of American evangelicalism is a little perplexing to me.

...

Yet somehow in the USA, the vast bulk of Christians have become fused with the political right-wing. This is odd, because I think the general trend for Christians is to be left of centre on economics, and right of center on social issues which should result in an even split depending on which you prioritise. What's even harder to understand is that, having identified with the right presumably because of its stance on so-called "moral" and social issues, they don't have a problem with Trump, who is just about as bad as you can get when it comes to personal moral values.

It might help to know the history that is at play. Southern Baptists are the largest group among Evangelicals, (and the single largest protestant group in the US) and the reason that Southern always appears in their name is because before the US Civil War, the Southern Baptists and the Northern ones split over the issue of slavery. Baptists in the north were strongly for the release and freeing of slaves, Baptists in the south had gotten their way into the favor of the southern ruling class by giving up all that talk, and they weren't about to give up all the sweet influence and power they got as a result.

So the Southern Baptists became a branch of Christianity tailored for the (then future) Confederacy, and were tied to the specific culture and power structure of the South for a generation before the Civil War. After the War the Baptist Church and the centers of power in the South were more or less one and the same. It's no accident that Southern Baptist Churches were some of the biggest pushers for Jim Crow laws and segregation, or that fundamentalist Christian schools like Bob Jones University or Jerry Falwell's Liberty University were founded as "Segregation Academies", schools that opened as whites only private schools in response to the Supreme Court decision that public schools had to desegregate. (In fact in the 50s and 60s Falwell was specifically fighting against civil rights and MLK in particular, and the modern religious right movement got started when first Ford and then Carter threatened to crack down on and strip the tax free status from schools that didn't integrate or churches that continued to preach against integration.)

Now to be fair, (probably more fair than I'd like to be, as I have a metric fuckton of loathing for the religious right in the U.S.) there has been a split between the Conservative old timer and wannabe Confederacy and more moderate leaders within the Southern Baptist Convention that has emerged within the last few years, with their most notable victory probably being the official SBC resolution they gave condemning the alt-right in 2017, although that only came after a bitter and protracted fight with the old guard, who are now clinging to power all the more jealously for it.

Hopefully that's helpful when it comes to understanding the leadership of the U.S. religious right, and what they've been preaching/where they've been leading their followers.

[Zorral]

One of the many ways to kick off the second war of the rebellion:

Thousands of cops, veterans, supporters pledge to join militia in Virginia to combat unconstitutional laws

https://www.lawenforcementtoday.com/thousands-of-cops-veterans-supporters-pledge-to-join-militia-in-virginia/

Quote

 

Things are getting really bad in Virginia. But this group isn’t going down without a fight.  

Virginia – Monday morning, Law Enforcement Today reported on how Tazewell County, Virginia is crafting a militia to defend the Constitution in the state.  And within hours, we were flooded with thousands of emails from people across the state – police officers, veterans, and patriotic Americans – who said they are joining.

And it’s a movement that’s gaining traction across the state.

Wrote one man:

“I am Vietnam vet, ex-police, retired and am behind your ideas 100% , anything I can do I would like to help.

I live in Franklin County, which voted down being a sanctuary city being the council is Democratic, a moonshine county giving up their guns is dumb.

The South gave up their flag, their statues and now they want their guns, sounds like Hitler’s Germany.”

 

The idea is to create 'sanctuary' counties, meaning no enforcement of any gun control legislation whatsoever, and the creation of a state-wide militia composed of vets and cops and moonshiners and anyone else who demands the right to own and carry and use weapons anytime, anywhere, who swear they'll go after anyone in law enforcement who attempts to enforce gun legislation by any means at their disposal including defunding and 'de-frocking' them -- and gun fighting too, of course.

The staff of this publication:

Quote

LET Staff
The staff of Law Enforcement Today is comprised of career cops. Cumulatively we possess nearly a century of experience in the business of police work. Our backgrounds derive from the East Coast, West Coast, South and Upper Midwest. We are the voice of law enforcement, connecting with our readers throughout the entire country and uniting the Blue Family. We have our finger on the pulse of American law enforcement and endlessly support our brothers and sisters who hold the Thin Blue Line.

Your police, keepin' you and yours safe!

[Tywin Manderly]

1 hour ago, Zorral said:

Your police, keepin' you and yours safe!

With cops like that, you don't need criminals.

[Jeor]

4 hours ago, Paladin of Ice said:

Hopefully that's helpful when it comes to understanding the leadership of the U.S. religious right, and what they've been preaching/where they've been leading their followers.

That is helpful, thanks. Yes, I think race introduces an extra component into the conversation given (as has been mentioned previously) that a very high proportion of the African-American Christian population votes Democrat.

[Zorral]

14 minutes ago, Triskele said:

Alex Pareene has a piece here (TNR, unlimited clicks!) called A Decade of Liberal Delusion and Failure that makes for some tough reading, but I think he's largely correct.  I assume that his main point is that recent liberal leaders have messed around with too many half-measures that have not impressed voters.  

Interesting reading, certainly.

 

 

[mcbigski]

8 hours ago, mormont said:

Washington State rep Matt Shea 'participated in domestic terrorism', according to an official report:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/dec/20/matt-shea-domestic-terrorism-washington-state-report

But of course Shea is refusing to resign: citing Trump, he's denouncing the investigation as unfair, a conspiracy, etc.

This guy is probably an asshole, but maybe not engaging in unfair conspiratorial witch hunts would prevent these sorts of claims.

3 hours ago, Zorral said:

The idea is to create 'sanctuary' counties, meaning no enforcement of any gun control legislation whatsoever, and the creation of a state-wide militia composed of vets and cops and moonshiners and anyone else who demands the right to own and carry and use weapons anytime, anywhere, who swear they'll go after anyone in law enforcement who attempts to enforce gun legislation by any means at their disposal including defunding and 'de-frocking' them -- and gun fighting too, of course.

It's not like that's an original idea.  I know it's conservative to uphold the norms, but when democrat controlled areas promote sanctuary cities to inflate their ballot count, the norms will be trashed eventually.

[Altherion]

2 hours ago, Triskele said:

Alex Pareene has a piece here (TNR, unlimited clicks!) called A Decade of Liberal Delusion and Failure that makes for some tough reading, but I think he's largely correct.  I assume that his main point is that recent liberal leaders have messed around with too many half-measures that have not impressed voters.  

He's largely correct, but he misses the point that these half-measures were completely deliberate and the vast majority of Democrat politicians will not back measures that do not include the benefits to the finance, insurance, real estate and other industries that the article mentions -- that's what their donors pay them for. The Democrats' reply to this is that the Republicans are even more business friendly and this is true, but the difference is not nearly as large as advertised: the Democrats just favor different sectors of the economy and are sneakier about helping corporations in most of the latter.

[Rippounet]

19 minutes ago, Altherion said:

He's largely correct, but he misses the point that these half-measures were completely deliberate and the vast majority of Democrat politicians will not back measures that do not include the benefits to the finance, insurance, real estate and other industries that the article mentions -- that's what their donors pay them for.

I think it's hard to say the writer missed anything:

Quote

Indeed, instead of ostentatious acts of helping people, the administration almost preferred being seen standing athwart attempts to provide relief. A program that was supposed to help underwater homeowners turned down 70 percent of those applying for permanent loan modifications, even as over six million families lost their homes. The point of the program was never actually to help people stay in their homes, of course; it was to preserve the finance industry by spacing out foreclosures. In the end, it achieved its aim: The banks today are as profitable as ever, while more households are renting than in 50 years.

But what really chilled me to the bone was this bit:

Quote

Much of the decade we have just endured has shown how the Democratic addiction to dispensing benefits through the tax code in complicated, indirect ways—combined with the usual insufficiency of these benefits—was nearly perfectly designed to foment mass resentment of others, imagined or not, who might secretly be getting the Good Benefits. The political scientist Suzanne Mettler coined the term “the submerged state” in 2010 to refer to the jungle of hidden government “programs” designed not to call attention to themselves, often perpetuated not because they are still helping the neediest, but because they are lucrative to the finance, insurance, and/or real estate industries. One of her illustrations of the effect of the submerged state is a graph showing how many people who used particular government programs admitted so only after first telling researchers they’d received no assistance.

So there was a deliberate strategy not to present Obama as a new Roosevelt. Ok.
But why? The conservative backlash happened anyway. Since the Republicans never collaborated with the Obama administration there wasn't much to gain by hiding the good that government might be doing.
The only logical conclusion is that this was ideologically driven. Either because Obama & co thought Americans already distrusted the government too much... Or because they didn't want to change that.

What I take from this article isn't that the Dems under Obama wanted to help the banks more than the average joe (I already believed that). What's new to me is the idea that Obama may have been extremely careful not to change the bad image Americans have of government.
The implications are truly chilling.
 

[Altherion]

54 minutes ago, Rippounet said:

What's new to me is the idea that Obama may have been extremely careful not to change the bad image Americans have of government.

I don't think that this was a goal, it was more of a side effect. The problem is that all American politicians play to two different audiences: their constituents and their donors. The Roosevelt way was to explicitly antagonize the wealthy who were opposed to him (see his "I welcome their hatred" speech). For reasons unknown to me, Obama chose not to take this path and instead to govern with the consent of the plutocracy. Everything else follows from this: it's not that he was careful not to change the bad image Americans have of government, but when the plutocrats are given a seat at the table (as was the case with all major policies such as finance and health care), the benefits that go out to the people are necessarily going to be insufficient and thus there will necessarily also be mass resentment.

[DMC]

7 hours ago, Triskele said:

Alex Pareene has a piece here (TNR, unlimited clicks!) called A Decade of Liberal Delusion and Failure that makes for some tough reading, but I think he's largely correct.

Ugh.  I expect better from you armed monkey.  That article does not deserve consideration in any way.  

3 hours ago, Altherion said:

For reasons unknown to me, Obama chose not to take this path and instead to govern with the consent of the plutocracy. Everything else follows from this: it's not that he was careful not to change the bad image Americans have of government, but when the plutocrats are given a seat at the table (as was the case with all major policies such as finance and health care), the benefits that go out to the people are necessarily going to be insufficient and thus there will necessarily also be mass resentment.

How in the fuck are you still whining about Obama?  And if it has changed since, how?  Or if not, why focus on Obama?  Your bitching about "plutocrats" is simply you wanting to paint some type of veneer over your nonsensical reasoning.  Own it dude.  You have no fucking idea what you're talking about.

[Paladin of Ice]

10 hours ago, Rippounet said:

What I take from this article isn't that the Dems under Obama wanted to help the banks more than the average joe (I already believed that). What's new to me is the idea that Obama may have been extremely careful not to change the bad image Americans have of government.
The implications are truly chilling.
 

8 hours ago, Triskele said:

I think that there has been a stated reason for why this is or at least a partial explanation which is that they were genuinely terrified that the financial system was close to collapse and that the situation was very delicate.  

But that doesn't do much to explain why they were not so great on other things like mortgages.

I think Obama simply wasn't a radical, was in favor of change but not radical change, (not that there should have been any surprise there, Obama was happy to say that he might have been a Republican if he'd come along a few decades earlier before their hard right shift) and he had a naive imagining that stable, long lasting, non-disruptive change that could be built could be accomplished if he got buy in to his plans from industries, from Republicans, etc. Because if they were all antagonistic they would fight tooth and nail and nothing would be done, or he could get them to commit to doing something, however small, and let them be dragged along and have to participate when that initial commitment inevitably got expanded on later.

Obama bought into the myths of cooperation and steady, gradual progress. And got kicked in the teeth for it.

The financial sector weren't grateful that Obama didn't give the people guillotines in the streets, (as some wanted) they were furious that he dared to forget his place and say a single bad word against them while they gave themselves multi-million dollar bonuses right in the middle of the recession. There was no Joe Kennedy figure who stepped up to the plate and reformed the system to save it despite a dubious past as an insider, just plenty of spit for Democrats and all the common people.

Republicans didn't care that Obama was willing to advocate for the same positions that their own presidential candidate had literally just campaigned on, they were playing a game of political bloodsport and would settle for nothing less than total control. The same way that in the present Trump can complain how Democrats are responsible for a fall in a stock market for impeaching him and then 4 days later brag and take full credit for the stock market reaching a new high without a trace of irony, once Obama was sworn in, Republicans didn't care what they'd been advocating 6 months earlier, if Obama was for it now, then it was bad wrong evil socialism. The only priority was to stall, make Obama look bad, and make sure he was a one term president, after all.

And so it went in other places too. At least, that's how I saw it.

 

[Larry of the Lawn]

11 hours ago, mcbigski said:

This guy is probably an asshole, but maybe not engaging in unfair conspiratorial witch hunts would prevent these sorts of claims.

It's not like that's an original idea.  I know it's conservative to uphold the norms, but when democrat controlled areas promote sanctuary cities to inflate their ballot count, the norms will be trashed eventually.

Care to offer any evidence that promoting sanctuary cities increases 'ballot count?'  You mean voter turnout?