“The Sanctimonious Fakers”: Border Crisis Tests Religious Faith — And Some Fail Badly
Flamboyant piety has long been fashionable on the political right, where activists, commentators, and elected officials never hesitate to hector us about their great moral and theological rectitude. Wielding the Scriptures like a weapon, these righteous ’wingers are always eager to condemn the alleged sins of others but reluctant to examine their own. They seem to spend far more time on posturing and preening than spiritual reflection. Rarely does anyone call them out on their failures to fulfill their proclaimed devotion because, in this country, that is considered rude.
But occasionally, something happens that separates the people of faith from the sanctimonious fakers. With thousands of defenseless children now gathered on America’s southern border, seeking asylum from deprivation and deadly violence, something like that is happening right now.
Nobody in the House of Representatives is more vociferous about her reverence for God’s word than Michele Bachmann (R-MN) –the Tea Party queen bee who often has said she believes that America is a “Christian nation.” When Bachmann opened her mouth on television about those hungry and fearful children, she demonized them as “invaders” and incipient criminals who could be expected to rape American women and break American laws.
Then there is Bachmann’s colleague Louie Gohmert (R-TX), whose religious zeal is so overpowering that he cannot restrain himself, even during House proceedings – like that committee hearing last month when he proclaimed his belief that anyone who doesn’t accept Jesus is destined for hell. But when the subject is the innocent kids at the border of his home state, most of whom are girls under 13 years of age, Gohmert speaks of “invasion” and urges the governor of Texas to unilaterally initiate a state of war. Like many of his fellow far-rightists, he stokes rumors that these children are harbingers of disease and gangsterism.
So does Phil Gingrey (R-GA), a medical doctor who went so far as to accuse the young migrants of bringing the Ebola virus – seen only in Africa — with them from Central America. And so does Sandy Rios, the religious-right talk-show host who speaks of the “hope” that the Lord bestowed on her, but warns that we should treat the border children like “lepers.” And so does Ann Coulter, the Church Lady who suspects that all those kids, no matter how small, probably belong to the murderous MS-13 narcotics syndicate.
Now among the theological ideas shared by many of these figures is a fondness for the Old Testament, which they routinely quote to justify cruel strictures against gays, women, and anybody else they wish to suppress. At the moment, however, these Biblical literalists ought to be studying the very plain instruction of Leviticus:
“The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the Lord your God.”
More recently, Pope Francis laid down a clear edict on the border crisis that springs from his own Biblical understanding, urging Americans to “welcome and protect” the children arriving on our border. (He didn’t mention anything about immediate deportations.) The Holy Father expressed deep concern for the “tens of thousands of children who migrate alone, unaccompanied, to escape poverty and violence…in pursuit of a hope that in most cases turns out to be vain”.
“Many people forced to emigrate suffer, and often, die tragically; many of their rights are violated, they are obliged to separate from their families and, unfortunately, continue to be the subject of racist and xenophobic attitudes,” he said. Francis went on to say that only development and security in their own countries would ever stem the flow of migrants heading northward – and that in the meantime, the rest of us should abandon “attitudes of defensiveness and fear, indifference and marginalization.” Attitudes like those displayed by goons waving flags and guns and “Go Home” signs, who don’t care whether these little strangers live or die.
Where are the real Christians? Where are the true people of faith? They may be found in houses of worship near the border and around the country, where people of all political persuasions realize that they are called to feed, clothe, shelter, and heal God’s children, even when they arrive on a bus without papers. If there is a kingdom of heaven, it is these generous souls who will be admitted when they reach its border.
The hypocrites will be sent somewhere else.
By: Joe Conason, The National Memo, July 18, 2014
“An Emboldened Anti-Choice Movement”: Republican Family Values Put Women’s Lives In Danger Worldwide
Last week, a committee in the US House of Representatives approved a spending bill that would slash funding for international family planning and reimpose a harmful policy that reduces contraceptive access and tramples on the rights of healthcare providers.
On Monday, the supreme court ruled that some US employers could deny employees access to birth control coverage if they claim a religious objection to contraception.
Is it just me, or do we seem to be in retreat? This latest disregard for women – in the US and overseas – is not unexpected, but it is certainly disappointing. In many ways, we have been fighting the same battle for the past 30 years. But the battle lines have shifted and, frequently, we have to struggle to retain hard-won ground.
When I started working on this issue in the early 80s, there was true, bipartisan support for family planning. Some of the most sincere anti-abortion Republicans realised that the consistent, commonsense public policy position for them to take would be to support overseas family planning funding. Better access to contraception would reduce unintended pregnancies and abortions, especially unsafe abortions.
The global gag rule, also known as the Mexico City Policy, was one of the first instances of the domestic anti-choice agenda interfering with the health and lives of women in developing countries. Introduced 30 years ago, during the Reagan administration, the policy bars foreign organisations that receive US family planning assistance from using their own private, non-US government funds to provide information, referrals, or services for legal abortion, or to advocate for the legalisation of abortion in their own countries.
Since it was introduced, the gag rule has been subject to the vagaries of US politics – imposed or kept in place by Republican presidents, and repealed by Democrat leaders. Though it was rescinded by President Obama on taking office in 2009, Republicans in the House have tried every year since to reinstate it.
Their efforts are testament to a rightward shift in US politics, including an emboldened anti-choice movement that has continued to gain political power. The middle has shrunk, the partisan divide has grown, and the Republicans being elected to Congress now are more extreme and bent on undermining women’s health and rights. Under the guise of “protecting the unborn”, the misguided policies they espouse threaten the health and lives of millions of women and families.
The US’s $610m contribution to international family planning and reproductive health in fiscal year 2014 helped 31 million women and couples receive contraceptive services and supplies. It prevented 7 million unintended pregnancies and 3 million abortions (2 million of them unsafe), and saved the lives of 13,000 women. In addition, 60,000 fewer children lost their mothers.
The fact is that family planning saves women’s lives. But in Washington these days, the facts do not matter. Last week Republicans on the House spending committee imposed a completely unnecessary cap on international family planning funding.
The House committee bill proposes cutting international family planning funding by $149m, almost 25% from current levels. Using analysis from the Guttmacher Institute, this would result in more than 7.7 million fewer couples using contraception, more than 1.6 million additional unintended pregnancies, and 745,000 more abortions. Almost 3,000 more women would die in pregnancy or childbirth, and 13,400 more children would lose their mothers. So much for family values.
We have been fortunate in that during the past few years, Republican attacks in the House have been blocked by Senate family planning champions, where, for now at least, Democrats retain control. This has essentially resulted in maintenance of the status quo on family planning policy and on funding. The Senate version of this year’s spending bill counters the House by including $644m for international family planning, and a permanent, legislative repeal of the global gag rule.
But this uneasy stalemate could change, depending on the outcomes in key races in November. If Republicans take control of the Senate, the truce will be broken and battle lines redrawn. The drastic cuts the House committee approved last week could be seriously considered in an omnibus spending bill, and an offensive could be mounted by opponents to attempt to force the gag rule on a pro-choice president.
The health of women around the world is far too important to continue to be thrust on to the frontline of US domestic culture wars.
By: Craig Lasher, Director of US Government Relations at Population Action International; The Guardian, July 17, 2014
“Conservative Victimhood”: Why The IRS Non-Scandal Perfectly Represents Today’s GOP
When John Boehner appointed South Carolina congressman Trey Gowdy to chair a select committee on Benghazi, it was like a manager taking the ball from a struggling starting pitcher and calling in a reliever to see if he might be able to carry the team to victory. Except in this case, the starter being pummelled—Darrell Issa, chair of the House Oversight Committee—was still pitching in another couple of games, with no improvement in results. Listening to this NPR story yesterday about Issa’s continued inability to get where Republicans want to go with the IRS scandalette, it occurred to me that it really is an almost perfect expression of contemporary congressional Republicanism.
There’s the obsession with conservative victimhood, (For the record, not one of the nonprofit groups scrutinized by the IRS for possible political activity was constrained from doing anything by having its 501(c)(4) application delayed; a group whose application is pending can operate as freely one whose nonprofit status is already approved.) There’s the utter disinterest in governing or the actual operation of government, in favor of a fruitless quest for partisan advantage. There’s the obliviousness to facts. There’s the fervent belief that even if they can’t find any malfeasance it must surely be there somewhere waiting to be uncovered, because it’s Barack Obama we’re talking about here, and we just know in our guts that he must have done something horrible. Consider these recent remarks from Issa:
An interesting question that gets asked is, “Are we close to the bottom?” The bottom turns out to be here in Washington, Lois Lerner and people directly related to her clearly have been shown to abuse conservatives for their views. Now the question is can we get to the top. So far, Lois Lerner is as high as we’ve been able to substantiate, but we do certainly understand that the IRS commissioners knew or should have known about her activities and made trips to the White House. That’s a big part of where—we may never get those answers, but it certainly looks like Lois Lerner didn’t act alone.
I’m not sure exactly what he means “we’ve been able to substantiate” about Lois Lerner, but he’s sure that the conspiracy goes higher, even up to the top. The IRS commissioner “made trips to the White House,” for pete’s sake! But the fact that in 2014 Issa is still talking about this particular component of the story after it was thoroughly debunked—in actuality, the commissioner made a small number of trips to the White House to attend meetings about implementation of the Affordable Care Act, which involves the IRS verifying income data—demonstrates just how far Issa is from ever getting the goods on the Obama administration. “Lois Lerner didn’t act alone,” he says, not because he actually has any evidence of a conspiracy, but because, well, c’mon!
Which brings us to the final way in which the IRS scandal is a microcosm of this entire era of Republican buffoonery: the hapless bumbling, culminating in humiliating failure. They really thought this scandal had potential. After all, it involved the most hated agency in Washington, and it seemed like they were sure to find the smoking gun. But then they didn’t, and the scandal goes on only in the fevered imaginations that flourish within the conservative bubble. They’ll still be talking about it years from now.
Having failed to catch the Obama administration in an impeachable act, Republicans could at least have used the story to put forward some reforms that could make the IRS work better. They could have proposed clarifying the law on charitable groups, or providing extra training for IRS workers (who plainly found current law vague and confusing to implement, because it is), or any of a number of reforms to make sure nothing even remotely like this happens again. But they didn’t propose those things. What are they advocating instead? Cutting the IRS’ enforcement budget, so it’s easier for people (especially rich people who can employ tax avoidance schemes) to get away with not paying their taxes.
When the scandal didn’t turn out to be what they thought it was, they could have turned it into something productive for the country, and with relatively little effort. (Democrats would surely have gone along with any productive reforms.) But they didn’t bother. And there you have it.
By: Paul Waldman, Contributing Editor, The American Prospect, July 16, 2014
“Being Rich In America Is Tough”: The Continuing Agonies Of The Super-Rich
As we well know by now, being rich in America is tough. Imagine driving your Porsche out the Goldman Sachs garage, intent on a relaxing weekend at your Hamptons retreat, only to find some wretched Occupy sympathizer giving you a dirty look through the haze of patchouli and resentment that surrounds him. Who could endure it? No wonder they keep comparing their fearful existence to that of the Jews of late-1930s Germany.
But now, according to the Washington Examiner, America’s plutocrats have a new worry:
Democratic super PACs have outraised their Republican counterparts by millions, a factor attributed in part to GOP donors’ fear of being targeted by the Internal Revenue Service—or “getting Koch’ed.”
Republican political operatives concede that there are multiple reasons for the Democrats’ advantage in super PAC money raised.
Among them: Labor unions have become among their largest and most consistent donors. But this election cycle, two new challenges have chilled GOP super PACs’ effort to raise cash from wealthy individuals and corporate donors: anxiety that they could get slapped with an IRS audit and unease that donating could lead to public demonization.
Not to let facts intrude on their paranoid fantasies, but let’s not forget what the IRS scandalette actually involved. There’s never been any credible allegation that anyone was audited because of their political beliefs. There’s never been any allegation that the IRS “targeted” donors to Republican super PACs. The worst thing that happened was that some Tea Party groups that had applied for 501(c)(4) status—claiming, utterly falsely, that they were charitable, non-political organizations, I might add—had to wait longer than they should have to get approval on their applications. (And, I have to repeat, when you’re waiting for your approval, you’re permitted under the law to act as though you’ve gotten your approval. You can raise and spend money, which they did.)
On the second point, I suppose one might be concerned that Harry Reid would go to the Senate floor and denounce you for undermining our democracy with your donations, even if those donations are perfectly legal. But in order for that to happen, you’re really going to have to get into the first rank of donors. A couple hundred thousand dollars isn’t going to do it; in order to be “demonized,” your contributions are going to have to reach at least eight figures.
Nevertheless, I’m sure it’s unpleasant for the Kochs to get criticized by politicians. But being criticized—even vigorously, and even sometimes unfairly—is the price you pay for certain choices you make. If you decide to do anything that puts your efforts in front of the public—running for office, becoming an actor, or being a writer, among other things—people who don’t like that work are going to tell you so. They may even say rude things, like “You’re an idiot” or “You suck,” or whatever other insults their limited creativity can produce. People track me down to tell me things like that all the time. It certainly isn’t fun to hear, but since I’ve chosen a profession where my work is public, it’s just part of the deal.
Spending large amounts of money on politics is both a right and a privilege. Some rights, like the right to practice your religion, are available to everyone. The right to spend significant political money is technically available to everyone, but in practice is only open to those who have large amounts of money to spend. In the same way, Lebron James and I are both free to dunk basketballs, but because the cruel genetic lottery left me a couple of ticks under six feet, I can’t actually exercise that freedom.
Obviously, the IRS shouldn’t audit anyone because of their political beliefs, and fortunately, we have no reason to think it does. Part of me suspects that a lot of conservative donors are using the fear of “demonization” and audits as an excuse to brush off requests for contributions, since once you become a big donor, you’re going to get besieged by candidates and organizations asking you for money. But if super-rich conservatives are sincerely afraid of the fallout from giving, they have two choices: they can make contributions that don’t put them quite on par with the Kochs, and thereby be ignored, or they can just decide to suffer the slings and arrows bravely in the cause of liberty. It’s up to them.
By: Paul Waldman, Contributing Editor, The American Prospect, July 16, 2014
“Unnecessary Deportations”: Ted Cruz’s New ‘Top Priority’
The humanitarian crisis at the border has clearly riled the political landscape in ways that are still unfolding, but which have changed the calculus of the immigration debate. Most notably, Democrats who were united behind a comprehensive solution, unified against Republican intransigence, are now splintered on how best to deal with these migrant children.
GOP officials would like nothing more than to keep Democrats off-balance and arguing among themselves, though Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) might have missed the memo.
Texas Sen. Ted Cruz plans to take a hard-line stand that could rile up conservatives just as lawmakers – including two from his home state – are struggling to address the growing humanitarian crisis along the southern border.
The conservative firebrand believes that any bill to deal with the unaccompanied migrant children at the border must also include language to stop a 2012 immigration directive from President Barack Obama – a proposal unlikely to go anywhere in the Democratic-controlled Senate.
The senator’s spokesperson told Politico that ending the White House’ deferred action plan is now Cruz’s “top priority.”
There are two broad angles to this: the policy and the politics. Cruz, true to form, is managing to screw up both.
Substantively, the far-right Texan, who’ll presumably find some allies in his new crusade, is pushing for unnecessary deportations for no particular reason. Remember, at issue here are two very different groups of young immigrants: one is the recent influx of unaccompanied migrant children from Central America; the other is the group of undocumented youths known as Dream Act kids – or “Dreamers” – who’ve been living, working, and studying in the United States for most of their lives.
This latter group is protected against deportation by President Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy, unveiled two years ago. Cruz’s “top priority” is to identify these young people, for whom the United States is the only country they’ve ever known, and kick them out of the country. Indeed, the Texas Republican is saying any solution to the humanitarian crisis involving the migrant children must undo the DACA policy.
For the far-right, DACA is to blame for the recent influx, which makes mass deportations necessary. Reality paints a very different picture.
As for the politics, Cruz’s new “top priority” does Democrats a favor: it gives Dems something to rally against, while reminding the public that many Republicans are pushing an aggressive and unpopular anti-immigrant campaign.
If the American mainstream opposed the Dream Act, this might be a smarter move, but all available evidence suggests the exact opposite: the Dream Act has traditionally been a bipartisan policy, and there’s no public appetite to kick these young people out.
If Democrats are really lucky, Cruz will rally the right to his cause.
By: Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, July 17, 2014
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