by B. R. GOWANI
“Phyllis Schlafly talked about her book, No Higher Power: Obama’s War on Religious Freedom, at the 19th annual Eagle Forum Collegians Leadership Summit from the Allison Auditorium of the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C.” PHOTO/C-SPAN
Obama’s secularism pricks Schlafly
Recently, conservative activist Phyllis Schlafly, while talking about her book on President Barack Obama, criticized him for maintaining a separation of religion and politics!
This hawkish, anti-ERA, anti-LGBT, Christian fanatic has all the time in the world to gather and then list examples of Obama’s avoidance of mention of “Jesus” and “God” during his public appearances and speeches.
Some of the things she talked about included:
She says Obama’s goal is to transform the United States from “One nation under God” “to a totally secular nation” where the only “higher power” people are permitted to acknowledge is the “federal government”, “especially the executive branch”.
One wonders what’s wrong if a country is totally secular. The one thing that Obama is doing right, Schlafly hates it. As far as the power of the federal government is concerned, is her Republican Party going to weaken the power of the federal government? Just a glance at the Bush Sr. and Bush Jr. administrations will make it clear. The money for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan weren’t provided by the private corporations. Instead, the private corporations, mainly Vice President Dick Cheney’s Haliburton and Ronald Reagan’s Secretary of State George Schultz’ Bechtel, made huge profits.
She has trouble with Obama not mentioning “God” in his Thanksgiving speech. But he had mentioned “God” in his earlier written speech.
She says Obama is hostile to “religion”, which has “never before [been] seen in any other president.” That is not correct.
She also accuses Obama’s staff for asking the Georgetown University, where Obama was to give a speech, to cover up religious motifs. It’s a misrepresentation as can be observed from the MSNBC video.
Obama is also blamed for cancelling the National Day of Prayer. This is false.
Wise God
There are no restrictions in the US on worshiping gods, goddesses, or God of your choice and people are free to go to their temples, synagogues, churches, gurudwaras, mosques etc. (Muslims have experienced difficulties in the wake of September 11, 2001 attack, but have not been prevented from going to mosques.) What Schlafly wants is to bring religion (that is, Christianity) and her God (that is, Jesus) into politics, and expects politicians to publicly invoke Christian symbols and God, more correctly, her “wise God”.
Once, she affectionately praised this God for giving the United States an atom bomb: “[It was] a marvelous gift that was given to our country by a wise God.”
It is this “wise God” that she wants Obama to keep on invoking and drag Him into politics like his opponent Republicans do so frequently.
Is she aware of the consequences? For that she just has to look at the US ally/enemy, Pakistan. Allah and Islam are at large in Pakistan through fanatics who have a pretty good hold over the news media and are scaring the hell out of the sane voices. The country has come to an almost standstill. That was one example.
Already the US is suffering from one serious disease — capitalism. Instead of concentrating on reducing the economic disparities and easing people’s pain, Schlafly wants to compound this disease with religion.
Christian Republic
Let’s say the Republican candidate Mitt Romney wins the presidential election in November and becomes the next US president. He then declares the US a religious country. Now one has to remember that he is a Mormon Christian, so, of course, he is going to favor Mormonism. Would Schlafly be comfortable with statues of Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism or of Angel Moroni in government buildings? The Republican Party has, very hesitantly, accepted Romney as their candidate.
Angle Moroni/PHOTO/Wikipedia
Mormons are only 1.7% of the US population, whereas the Protestant Christians are 51% and so any such plan on part of Romney is doomed to fail–unless he forms a coalition of Mormons, Catholic Christians, Hindus, Muslims, Jews, and other religious minorities. And in the bargain permits them to display their religious symbols too, and offers them posts in his government and ambassadorship abroad.
With the availability of the weapons in the US, this is like creating a mixture of Ireland of the 1970s, present day Pakistan, post-Saddam Iraq, and India post Babri Masjid demolition.
With the availability of the weapons in the US, this is like creating a mixture of Ireland of the 1970s, present day Pakistan, post-Saddam Iraq, India-post Babri Masjid demolition, and so on.
Wade Michael Page
PHOTO/Huffington Post
A white supremacist, Wade Michael Page, a former military man, killed six people in a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin on August 5. White supremacists are not only racists, they’re also communalists, that is, hating people of other religions. They hate Jews, despite the fact that many of the Jews are white, and are indistinguishable from white Christians. Now imagine how many of these white supremacists will openly flaunt their power and hate, and create mayhem if this country is turned into an openly Christian Republic.
B. R. Gowani can be reached at brgowani@hotmail.com