Goodhair Perry vs. the Mormons

James Moore writes about Rick's Perry Tales Huffington Post 10/17/2011, and more specifically on the anti-Mormon campaign directed at Mitt Romney by Perry, his other Republican rivals and conservative Protestant leaders. Moore assumes based on circumstantial evidence that Perry is supportive of the anti-Mormon campaign:

In the south, it is not a secret that evangelical Christians view Mormonism with a wary eye. According to a 2007 survey by the Pew Center, 57 percent of voters identifying themselves as Christians don't think of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints as being a part of traditional Christendom. Consequently, logic suggests they might not vote for a person of that faith.

And Rick Perry is not going to ignore those numbers or that logic. The reason the Texas governor informally launched his campaign at a gigantic prayer rally with evangelical southern Christians was to let all of them know that he came from their tribe. He might as well have been telling them, "Vote for me. I'm not a Mormon," which, in a fairly obvious manner, is exactly what he accomplished. Perry did not denounce Mitt Romney's religious belief system but he knew there were others to do that important political work.

Moore also reminds us that the emphasis on anti-Mormon agitation by Republicans and conservative Protestants the last several years intensifies the significance of religion in Republican politics: "The argument that a person's faith ought not to play a role in the debate in the public square falls apart if a Muslim candidate enters the race; consequently, it is of relevance to the Republicans when they look to their nominee".

Moore doesn't claim to have "smoking gun" proof of Perry's involvement in that aspect of his campaign. But I agree that it's a safe assumption. Perry would clearly distance himself and tell his supporters to knock it off if he weren't in approval of it. On the other hand, Sarah Posner looks critically at a claim of a more direct link in The David Lane Effect Religion Dispatches 10/17/2011, and finds it wanting. But she's looking very specifically at the anti-Mormon messaging. She agrees that, with or without explicit anti-Mormonism, the Perry campaign is pushing hard on the idea that only a conservative Protestant Christian is fit to be President:

Yes, the anti-Mormonism is front and center [in the Republican Party]. But the problem with these Christian right players backing Perry is not just their anti-Mormonism, it's their demand that evangelicalism is a pre-requisite for the White House. That's the clear message the Perry campaign has authorized.

Tags: christian right, republican party, rick perry, sarah posner

Perry and Cain

Columnist Bud Kennedy On GOP debate stage, Rick is no Reagan Fort Worth Star-Telegram 11/11/2011 does some amusing theater criticism of Gov. Goodhair Perry's performance in Tuesday's Presidential debate:

Awkward and often confused, he has become less of a participant in the Republican debates than a comic sidekick doing walk-ons, shouting about how we're "sittin' on a treasure-trove of energy!" and then grinning for applause.

But he does remind us that Perry is still a well-financed contender:

Yet Perry remains the top challenger, said Richard Murray, professor of political policy at the University of Houston.

"He's the only candidate who has the funding," Murray said.

"Cain has no personal money and shows little ability to raise it. So as we move into the primaries, Perry will remain the only realistic alternative [to Romney]."

Speaking of the supposed front-runner for the moment, Steven Thomma of McClatchy Newspapers explains Cain's 9-9-9 plan: Good for the rich, bad for the poor12/12/2011. Like most everything the Republicans support.

Cain proposes to scrap the current tax code and replace it with a flat 9 percent tax on personal income, a second 9 percent tax on corporate income, and a third 9 percent tax on sales. It also would eliminate the payroll tax paid for Medicare and Social Security, the estate tax, and capital gains taxes.

While the Cain campaign has not produced enough details for thorough independent analysis, a flat 9 percent income tax and a 9 percent national sales tax would almost certainly mean higher taxes for at least the 30 million U.S. households that now pay no federal taxes.

And it almost certainly would mean big tax cuts for the wealthy, who now pay a 35 percent marginal rate on their income above $379,150.

Tags: 2012 election, herman cain, rick perry

June convocation of Christian Right leaders against President Obama

Brian Kaylor of Ethics Daily has been reporting on private meetings of Christian Right leaders that they use to plan strategy. In a two-part series called "Behind Closed Doors," he describes a major convocation in Dallas this past June, convened by Southern Baptist minister and longtime Christian Right leader James Robison.

Part 1 of that pair of articles, Conservative Christian Group Plots Political Revival 06/22/2011, gives a helpful list of some of the leaders in attendance. Like other political groups, the leaders and participants are continually in flux, so we need solid reporting to keep up with them:

According to a list obtained by EthicsDaily.com, among the attendees at the meeting were several Southern Baptist leaders: Robert Jeffress, pastor of First Baptist Church of Dallas who recently suggested on Fox News that Obama was a Muslim; Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission; Richard Lee, pastor and the editor of the controversial The American Patriot's Bible; and former North American Mission Board head Bob Reccord, who now heads the semi-secretive group the Council for National Policy, founded by Tim LaHaye. Jerry Falwell Jr., president of Liberty University and son of the late founder of the Moral Majority, was scheduled to attend but couldn't make it.

Also attending the meeting were: Jacob Aranza, a minister who in the 1980s helped popularize the theory that rock ’n’ roll music included backmasked messages promoting drug use and sex; Vonette Bright, widow of Campus Crusade for Christ founder Bill Bright, who played a key role in conservative religious-political efforts that birthed the so-called "Religious Right"; Jerry Boykin, a former Pentagon official rebuked for violating policies by speaking in churches in uniform; Jim Garlow, chairman of Newt Gingrich's organization, Renewing American Leadership; Ruth Graham, daughter of evangelist Billy Graham; Harry Jackson, a politically active conservative pastor; David Lane, who has led several efforts to politically mobilize pastors; Ron Luce of Teen Mania Ministries; former Republican U.S. Rep. Bob McEwen; Rod Parsley, a controversial megachurch pastor who endorsed John McCain in 2008 before being rejected by McCain; Samuel Rodriguez of the National Hispanic Christian Leaders Conference; and Don Wildmon of the American Family Association.

Also attending the meeting was Rabbi Daniel Lapin, whom Robison described to EthicsDaily.com as someone who is "convinced that Christians hold the hope for stability on earth." Lapin, who has been heavily involved in various Republican efforts, was part of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff's financing work that landed Abramoff in prison. [my emphasis]

That "backmasking" paranoia was one of the most idiotic Christian Right fads I can remember.

Part 2, Conservative Christian Group Seeks New Reagan 06/23/2011, explains some of their priority policy goals at that conference:

"Along with many national and church leaders, I'm seeking to know what must be done in order to effectively deal with present-day challenges," Robison wrote. "We must hold fast to moral principles and also make wise decisions concerning fiscal policies and practices."

Robison then listed his conservative agenda for candidates to meet, including being pro-life, pro-Israel, against same-sex marriage, for smaller government and reducing government spending, for a strong defense to fight "Radical Islam," for the free market, and against "excessive, foolish taxation."

This is a reminder of how futile it is to expect a major split between the Christian Right and corporate interests in the Republican Party, or between Main Street and Wall Street factions, as it's sometimes expressed. Low taxes and light regulations for the rich are just as much Christian moral principles for them as shaming the sluts who gets pregnant without being married preserving the lives of innocent unborn children.

Kaylor reports in a later article, Conservative Christian Group Met with Rick Perry07/05/2011, that then-not-yet-Presidential-candidate Gov. Goodhair met with the groups to talk, uh, spiritual values:

Robison's first blog post following the gathering dealt with issues of spiritual renewal and politics.

"Active participation is both a privilege and responsibility to choose wise leaders who will support sound policy and legislation in order for good government to become a reality," Robison wrote. "Now is the time to fall on our knees before God and then stand on our feet before men. We must demonstrate the power of God's transforming grace. All legitimate concerns and painful issues must be addressed with prayer, love and compassion. When we stand tall for His truth, we will see the transformation of people leading to the restoration of sound principles."

Robison said, "It is time to pray, then take action with boldness and love as we call all men to return to the rock-solid foundation of God's truth. Keep in mind, our economic challenges will not be corrected until we address moral decay. We should remember what President Reagan said: 'If America ceases to be a nation under God, we will be a nation gone under.'"

Tags: 2012 election, christian right, radical right, republican party, rick perry

The New Apostolic Reformation and today's Republican Party

Forrest Wilder and Rachel Tabachnick have used the occasion of Rick Perry's "The Response" religious rally to take a closer look at the Christian Right network on which he is pinning his apparent Presidential hopes at the moment. The role of the Pentecostal New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) movement is particularly important in this context. The NAR is also the religious trend with which Sarah Palin has been most closely associated both religiously and politically. Forrest Wilder writes about them in the Texas Observer in Rick Perry's Army of God 08/03/2011 and The Mainstream Media's Shallow Coverage of The Response 08/09/2011, and Rachel Tabachnick in Five Points About Rick Perry's Prayer Rally Not Yet in Mainstream Press Talk to Action 08/08/2011. Kyle Mantyla at Right Wing Watch includes Rachel Maddow's news report relying heavily on Wilder's reporting in Understanding The "Apostle" In The New Apostolic Reformation 08/11/2011.

Jezebel: mastermind of the Democratic Party?

Wilder reminds us what a particular and narrow trend the NAR is within American Protestantism, despite their very outsized clout in today's increasingly radicalized Republican Party:

Some of the fiercest critics of the New Apostolic Reformation come from within the Pentecostal and charismatic world. The Assemblies of God Church, the largest organized Pentecostal denomination, specifically repudiated self-proclaimed prophets and apostles in 2000, calling their creed a "deviant teaching" that could rapidly "become dictatorial, presumptuous, and carnal." Assemblies authorities also rejected the notion that the church is supposed to assume dominion over earthly institutions, labeling it "unscriptural triumphalism." The New Apostles talk about taking dominion over American society in pastoral terms. They refer to the "Seven Mountains" of society: family, religion, arts and entertainment, media, government, education, and business. These are the nerve centers of society that God (or his people) must control.

One long-standing temptation of Radical Right groups is to model themselves along mirror-image lines of their enemies do or are imagined to do. The John Birch Society in its early years structured itself in a sort of secret cell manner, which they understood to be the way their main bogeyman, the Communist Party, operated. And for a variety of reason, not least of them concerns about protecting the tax-exempt status of the religious institutions that are their main basis, theocratic religious activists engage in no small amount of double-talk about the nature of their goals.

Baal (old-school version)

The New Apostolic Reformation, as Wilder explains, relies on a real network organized on authoritarian lines, with the leaders understood to be prophets and apostles with direct lines to God in the same way a "literalist"/fundamentalist reading of the Christian Scriptures would understand Biblical prophets and apostles to have. So it's always interesting to see what they have to say about the secrecy and clandestine intentions of the groups they perceived to be active tools of Satan:

Some of these groups' beliefs and activities will be startling, even to many conservative evangelicals. For example, in 2010 Texas prayer warriors visited every Masonic lodge in the state attempting to cast out the demon Baal, whom they believe controls Freemasonry. At each site, the warriors read a decree—written in legalese—divorcing Baal from the "People of God" and recited a lengthy prayer referring to Freemasonry as "witchcraft." Asked whether he shares these views, Stringer launches into a long treatise about secrecy during which he manages to lump together Mormonism, Freemasonry and college fraternities. "I think there has been a lot of damage and polarization over decades because of the influence of some areas of Freemasonry that have been corrupted," he says. "In fact, if you look at the original founder of the Mormon Church, Joseph Smith, he had a huge influence by Masonry. Bottom-line, anything that is so secretive that has to be hidden in darkness ... is not biblical. The Bible says that everything needs to be brought to the light. That's why I would never be part of a fraternity, like on campus."

Baal (counter-Trinity version)

The Charisma website reflelcts the NAR outlook. Their brief summary news report of Perry's "Response" rally is Jennifer LeClaire, 30,000 Unite In Fasting, Prayer at The Response 08/08/2011. Except on the most formal and highly-publicized occasions, like The Response rally, leaders of the NAR often don't make much effort to show their partisan preferences based on what they claim is Godly guidance:

Consider Alice Patterson. She’s in charge of mobilizing churches in Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas and Oklahoma for The Response. A field director for the Texas Christian Coalition in the 1990s, she’s now a significant figure in apostolic circles and runs a San Antonio-based organization called Justice at the Gate. Patterson, citing teachings by Cindy Jacobs, Chuck Pierce and Lou Engle, has written that the Democratic Party is controlled by “an invisible network of evil comprising an unholy structure” unleashed by the biblical figure Jezebel. Patterson claims to have seen demons with her own eyes. In 2009, at a prophetic meeting in Houston, Patterson says she saw the figure of Jezebel and "saw Jezebel’s skirt lifted to expose tiny Baal, Asherah, and a few other spirits. There they were - small, cowering, trembling little spirits that were only ankle high on Jezebel's skinny legs."

Jezebel (new-school version)

Patterson's vision bears a distinct literary resemblance to this:

"Forgive me if I am not justified in what I ask," said Scrooge, looking intently at the Spirit's robe, "but I see something strange, and not belonging to yourself, protruding from your skirts. Is it a foot or a claw?"

"It might be a claw, for the flesh there is upon it," was the Spirit's sorrowful reply. "Look here."

From the foldings of its robe, it brought two children; wretched, abject, frightful, hideous, miserable. They knelt down at its feet, and clung upon the outside of its garment.

"Oh, Man, look here! Look, look, down here!" exclaimed the Ghost.

They were a boy and a girl. Yellow, meagre, ragged, scowling, wolfish; but prostrate, too, in their humility. Where graceful youth should have filled their features out, and touched them with its freshest tints, a stale and shrivelled hand, like that of age, had pinched, and twisted them, and pulled them into shreds. Where angels might have sat enthroned, devils lurked, and glared out menacing. No change, no degradation, no perversion of humanity, in any grade, through all the mysteries of wonderful creation, has monsters half so horrible and dread.

Scrooge started back, appalled. Having them shown to him in this way, he tried to say they were fine children, but the words choked themselves, rather than be parties to a lie of such enormous magnitude.

"Spirit, are they yours?" Scrooge could say no more.

"They are Man's," said the Spirit, looking down upon them. "And they cling to me, appealing from their fathers. This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased. Deny it!" cried the Spirit, stretching out its hand towards the city. "Slander those who tell it ye. Admit it for your factious purposes, and make it worse. And abide the end."

"Have they no refuge or resource?" cried Scrooge.

"Are there no prisons?" said the Spirit, turning on him for the last time with his own words. "Are there no workhouses?"

The bell struck twelve.

That is, of course, from Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol (1843), the concluding scene of the appearance of the Ghost of Christmas Present. It's safe to say that the social vision which Dickens' fictional vision represented is a more humane one that the one embodied in Patterson's.

The dove was a favorite symbol for Asherah

Incidentally, for those not up on ancient Near Eastern religion, Baal was a Canaanite storm god, some of whose attributes were incorporated into the ancient Israelites' concept of Yahweh. Asherah was a female diety whose worship was stubbornly persistent among the ancient Hebrews, much to the consternation of the hardcore Yahwists, whose views are preserved in the Hebrew Scriptures. How Jezebel got promoted among the NAR crowd from a naughty Phoenician queen to a the mega-demon controlling the Democratic Party, I can scarcely imagine. Except that it probably has something to do with Hillary Clinton. Tabachnick calls attention to the following:

Another shocker was that Mike Bickle led part of the event. The event organizers came from Mike Bickle's youth-oriented International House of Prayer (IHOP) and Lou Engle's The Call, based at IHOP Kansas City. After Lou Engle, Bickle is one of the most controversial figures in the movement and source of the "Oprah as forerunner of the anti-Christ" statement that made the news. However, Bickle is a toxic figure in much of the evangelical world. He was the leader of the "Kansas City Prophets" in the 1980 and 1990s and was at the center of a very divisive dispute in Charismatic evangelicalism. Continuing the point about Mike Bickle, this event did not represent all conservative evangelicals. Although the big name family values guys - James Dobson, Tony Perkins, Donald Wildmon, and others - have been joining forces with the apostles for several years, this partnership is very controversial. The apostles plans to revamp Protestantism, eradicate denominations, their radical end times theology, and boisterous Charismatic manifestations are feared, and rightfully so, by many fundamentalists and evangelicals. This event was a organized and led - from the prayer leaders and messaging to the band - by the NAR. It was a duplicate of The Call events that have been held around the country. [my emphasis]

Jezebel's unhappy end, as pictured by Gustav Doré; presumably the "apostolic" Pentecostals who see her as the controlling demon of the Democratic Party are hoping for a replay

Tags: christian right, christianism, new apostolic reformation, radical right, rick perry