My horrible right-wing past: Confessions of a one-time religious right icon - Salon.com

I am a white, privileged, well-off, 61-year-old former Republican religious right-wing activist who changed his mind about religion and politics long ago. The New York Times profiled my change of heart saying that to my former friends I’m considered a “traitorous prince” since my religious-right family was once thought of as “evangelical royalty.”

You see, only in the Mafia, the British Royal family and big time American religion is a nepotistic rise to power seen as normal. And I was good at it. And I hated it while hypocritically profiting from it — until, that is, in the mid-1980s, I quit. These days I describe myself as an atheist who believes in God.

Ironically I helped my father become famous in the religion sector. In the 1970s I directed and produced two film series featuring Dad with book companions that became evangelical bestsellers: “How Should We Then Live?” and “Whatever Happened to the Human Race?” By the time Dad and I completed two nationwide seminar tours launching those projects, I was being invited to speak at the biggest religious gatherings, including the Southern Baptist Convention and the annual meeting of the National Religious Broadcasters.

The leaders of the new religious right were gleefully betting on American failure. If secular, democratic, diverse and pluralistic America survived, then wouldn’t that prove that we were wrong about God only wanting to bless “Christian America?” If, for instance, crime went down dramatically in New York City, for any other reason than a reformation and revival, wouldn’t that make the prophets of doom look silly? And if the economy was booming without anyone repenting, what did that mean?

What began to bother me was that so many of our new “friends” on the religious right seemed to be rooting for one form of apocalypse or another. In the crudest form this was part of the evangelical fascination with the so-called end times. The worse things got, the sooner Jesus would come back. But there was another component. The worse everything got, the more it proved that America needed saving, by us! Plus, it was good for fundraising.

Some 30 years later, what we helped start — I am sorry! — continues. With the Republicans in control of the House and Senate the question arises — again — Where does the American far right find the energy to oppose everything and everyone again and again?

[,,,]
The difference between now and then is that back then we were religious fanatics knocking on the doors of normal political leaders. Today the fanatics are the political leaders.

You can’t understand why the GOP was so successful in winning back both houses of congress in 2014, and wrecking most of what Obama has tried to do, unless you understand what we did back then.

[,,,]
And that strategy was simple: Republican leaders would affirm their anti-abortion commitment to evangelicals, and in turn we’d vote for them — by the tens of millions. Once Republicans controlled both houses of Congress and the presidency, “we” would reverse Roe, through a constitutional amendment and/or through the appointment of anti-abortion judges to the Supreme Court or, if need be, through civil disobedience and even violence, though this was only hinted at at first. In 2016, the dream we had will become a reality unless America wakes up. The Republicans are poised to destroy women’s rights. They have a majority on the Court to back them up.

My horrible right-wing past: Confessions of a one-time religious right icon - Salon.com

Conservatives up in arms over video game with sovereign citizen Tea Partiers as the bad guys

I know nothing about video games as I am still in the Pac-Man world (and I suck at that as well.) But I find this game concept unconventional and a bit unnerving. Not because I abhor violence of any kind, real or make believe. Not because I am anti-gun, because I am not. But as much as I hate to admit it, I agree in part with Glen Beck, "“Let’s go to the game that has just come out that makes American constitutionalists and Tea Party people the enemy. And you can go and shoot them,” Beck said on his radio show.“Anybody have a problem with this?”"

I do. But, I also see a bit of hypocrisy: the alleged "targeting" of political opponents that may have contributed to the Gifford shooting in 2011.  The numerous calls for lynching the President. The Cliven Bundy fiasco and its influence. While the list is endless I think y'all get my point.

All that aside, there are three points being missed by Beck. One, the Tea Party is made up of radical extremists; although they don't see themselves as such, many outside individuals do. Two, Beck and the "American constitutionalists and Tea Party people" claim this game portrays them. Are they identifying with the extremists? Either they aren't like the people portrayed, or they are. And three,"Beck and his guests wondered how younger people will be able to “differentiate” between the bad guys in the video game, and real life Tea Party types." This game is rated M (17+), "younger people" shouldn't be playing it in the first place. For those non-younger individuals that do play, If they can't differentiate between game violence and real violence, the problem is not with the game.

If the shoe fits Glen,,,

Conservatives up in arms over video game with sovereign citizen Tea Partiers as the bad guys

Tea Parties As A Fundamentalist Religious Movement | Breitbart Unmasked

The other day the attached article was shared in a post by Rob Robertson of The Free World Project. (Please note that Rob and I are friends and we share similar thoughts in regards to politics, religion and the world in general.  As independent bloggers, we do our best to support each others' work).  The article is a response to a Jack Schwartz piece over at The Daily Beast The Tea Party Isn’t a Political Movement, It’s a Religious One.

But when religion is thrown into the mix, all that is lost. Religion here doesn’t mean theology but a distinct belief system which, in totality, provides basic answers regarding how to live one’s life, how society should function, how to deal with social and political issues, what is right and wrong, who should lead us, and who should not. It does so in ways that fulfill deep-seated emotional needs that, at their profoundest level, are devotional. Given the confusions of a secular world being rapidly transformed by technology, demography, and globalization, this movement has assumed a spiritual aspect whose adepts have undergone a religious experience which, if not in name, then in virtually every other aspect, can be considered a faith.

Seen in this light, the behavior of Tea Party adherents makes sense. Their zeal is not the mercurial enthusiasm of a traditional Republican or Democrat that waxes and wanes with the party’s fortunes, much less the average voter who may not exercise the franchise at every election. These people are true believers who turn out faithfully at the primaries, giving them political clout in great excess to their actual numbers. Collectively, this can make it appear as if they are preponderant, enabling their tribunes to declare that they represent the will of the American people.

Now here is what struck me, in light of this article posted previously, which discusses the mix of Randian economic ideologies with a social platform built on so-called on “Christian” values. (Keep this factoid in mind as you digest this. Rand railed against big government programs, calling for personal responsibility but yet was collecting social security when she died.)

While a traditional political party may have a line that it won’t cross,the Tea Party has a stone-engraved set of principles, all of which are sacrosanct. This is not a political platform to be negotiated but a catechism with only a single answer.  It is now a commonplace for Tea Party candidates to vow they won’t sacrifice an iota of their principles. In this light, shutting down the Government rather than bending on legislation becomes a moral imperative. While critics may decry such a tactic as “rule or ruin,” Tea Party brethren celebrate it, rather, as the act of a defiant Samson pulling down the pillars of the temple. For them, this is not demolition but reclamation, cleansing the sanctuary that has been profaned by liberals. They see themselves engaged in nothing less than a project of national salvation. The refusal to compromise is a watchword of their candidates who wear it as a badge of pride. This would seem disastrous in the give-and-take of politics but it is in keeping with sectarian religious doctrine. One doesn’t compromise on an article of faith.

This explains why the Tea Party faithful often appear to be so bellicose. You and I can have a reasonable disagreement about fiscal policy or foreign policy but if I attack your religious beliefs you will become understandably outraged. And if I challenge the credibility of your doctrine you will respond with righteous indignation. To question the validity of Moses parting the Red Sea or the Virgin Birth or Mohammed ascending to heaven on a flying horse is to confront the basis of a believer’s deepest values.

Consequently, on the issues of government, economics, race, and sex, the Tea Party promulgates a doctrine to which the faithful must subscribe. Democrats and independents who oppose their dogma are infidels. Republicans who don’t obey all the tenants are heretics, who are primaried rather than burned at the stake.

So let's take a look at what Matt Obsorne of Breitbart Unmasked has to say.

What I find intriguing in citing a 2011 PewResearch poll, "[t]he analysis shows that most people who agree with the religious right also support the Tea Party. But support for the Tea Party is not synonymous with support for the religious right."

While tea parties are a conservative brand born of the religious right, their fundamentalism is not identifiable by leaders, denominational identities, or even an explicit sectarianism. Instead, tea parties must be understood as a discrete, but related, phenomenon,,,

Rather than wait for a top-down counterrevolution against modernity, tea parties have turned our state governments into laboratories for tax cuts, climate change denial, “Agenda 21″ lunacy, anti-sharia laws, and most tellingly, another wave of creative new abortion restrictions.  The last one is significant, because tea party activists sometimes go to great lengths to deny the meaningfulness of their ideological overlap with the evangelical right, but in practice tea parties invariably default to the kind of patriarchal authoritarianism represented by the Hobby Lobby decision.

A point that also highlights the Dominionist Movement in some aspects, "Not all Christians are Dominionists, but all Dominonists claim Christianity." As there are those in the Realm that deny its existence or influence.

You might think this would create tensions with Christians, who are called upon to oppose the dehumanizing idolatry of mammon. Unlike their Jesus, the god of tea parties doesn’t care about social justice, or healing the sick, or caring for the poor. But so far, those dissonances have not disturbed the conservative culture war coalition in any appreciable way, nor am I holding my breath waiting to see it happen; their united, existential war against a godless 21st Century is simply far too important to them.

 (Oh look, there's Ayn Rand again!)

 Tea Parties As A Fundamentalist Religious Movement | Breitbart Unmasked

How Hypocrisy Is Simply Not a Factor in the Right-Wing Mind | Alternet

While acknowledging “government isn’t the solution to every problem,” Warren says that she hopes to one day ask Grimm: “Would you rather fly in an airplane without the Federal Aviation Administration checking air traffic control? Would you rather swallow a pill without the Food and Drug Administration testing drug safety? Would you rather defend our nation without a military and fight fires without our firefighters?”

Warren nails it. The collective thinking of today’s conservatives accounts for little more than magic wand waving, the dangerous belief that if we eliminate all forms of the federal government, all our problems will vanish into thin air. Rarely does campaign rhetoric move policy, no matter how soaring its high notes, but campaign words do have the ability to wreak immeasurable havoc on a country, and it’s arguable that the most damaging 11 words ever uttered by a U.S. president are Reagan’s “government is not part of the solution, government is the problem.” Or how about Reagan’s other famous line: “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”

Those two phrases have blanketed an entire generation of Republicans with hypocritical habits

[,,,]
Hypocrisy allows Republicans to ignore that it was the federal government that built the great American middle class through labor laws, reforms in the financial and banking industry, and a progressive tax code that shared the prosperity. It was also the federal government that created the interstate highway system, so that private enterprise could deliver to expanded markets. We tackled poverty with Social Security and Medicare, and on and so on. But instead of trying to starve the government or drown it in the bathtub, “we need to tackle our problems head-on, and that will require better government.”

How Hypocrisy Is Simply Not a Factor in the Right-Wing Mind | Alternet

The Tea Party, the John Birch Society, and the Fear of “Mob Rule”: An Interview with Claire Conner | Political Research Associates

This article is from 2013 but still very pertinent and offers interesting background information concerning the JBS and what we now call the Tea Party. I found it interesting that the author speaks to the elimination of the 16th Amendment as I have a few articles that speak to the "new" impetus within the Reich to do just that. You will notice that much of the JBS ideology has been carried forward in regards to poverty, food insecurity, and voter rights to name a few. Fascinating read,,,

For example, the John Birch Society said that Social Security should never exist, because it is a giant embezzlement. They also held that the 16th Amendment to the Constitution—the amendment creating a federal income tax—should be repealed because the federal government did not have the authority to collect those sorts of taxes. The John Birch Society basically believes that anything the federal government does, beyond what is specifically mentioned in the Constitution, is wrong.

[,,,]
I said to my mother one time, “What would happen if we actually did all these things?” What if there was no Social Security, Medicare, unemployment compensation, food stamps—no safety net at all. And she said, “Oh, it would be glorious. It would be what the Constitution intended.” I’d say, “Mom, the Constitution is not going to feed a hungry child”. I can still see her face looking up from her teacup, saying, “That’s not my concern, dear.”

[,,,]
Robert Welch made no bones that he thought democracy was the worst form of government—not just for his organization, but for a country. The John Birch Society believes that democracy is mob rule. So, that explains a lot about the way the government is organized. It also explains a lot about some of the things that are happening in the United States today, in terms of that belief system.

A whole bunch of people on the Right don’t think that everyone ought to vote. Why? Because if you’ve got everybody voting, you have yourself a mob. And that idea comes from [National Review founder and editor] Bill Buckley, who is sort of a patron saint of the Right. Buckley, the John Birch Society, my father, and a very prominent political science professor [who taught at Yale], Willmoore Kendall, all believed that the franchise, or the right to vote, had to be limited, as it was in colonial in times, when you had to be White, free, over a particular age, and a landowner in order to vote.

The Tea Party, the John Birch Society, and the Fear of “Mob Rule”: An Interview with Claire Conner | Political Research Associates

Republican Insiders Fret That Right-Wing Crazies Will Upset GOP's Election Chances | Alternet

With the Republican Party being torn apart by its internal civil war, an ideological battle that pits establishment Republicans against the no-compromise Tea Party/Christian Right, party backers are doing their best to suppress the craziness as the 2014 midterms approach. But are they succeeding?

[,,,]
The establishment wing is discovering that it’s hard to keep the crazy quiet when your party’s voter base consists of neo-confederates, white supremacists, know-nothing libertarians, and evangelical theocrats. Moreover, social conservatives are no wilting wallflowers when it comes to raising campaign money. A recent Politico piece reported that roughly 25 socially conservative groups combined to pull in more than $280 million in 2011 and 2012. Notwithstanding the fact that much of the Koch brother’s political spending goes to the ideologically insane, too.

[,,,]
"This election is when the Tea Party movement will professionalize how it engages in politics," says Drew Ryun, the political director of the Madison Project, a conservative campaign group. "We are getting a game plan."

All in all, seven of the 12 GOP senators up for reelection in 2014 are facing primary opponents, which is a record number of challenges. The far right also plans to target 25 House races, highlighting the deep divisions within the Republican Party. Tea Party Express says, “The false narrative continues to be written that the Tea Party is dead and that 2014 will not be like 2010, but every month we see a strong example to the contrary.”

Republican Insiders Fret That Right-Wing Crazies Will Upset GOP's Election Chances | Alternet

Sen. Mitch McConnell's Biggest Foe May Be Conspiracy Theorist Greg Fettig

Fettig is no marginal activist. U.S. News and World Report highlighted his role in Kentucky last week, noting that Fettig was the organizer behind the effort that helped challenger Richard Mourdock topple Indiana Republican Sen. Richard Lugar, which cost the GOP the general election race. Fettig said he sees that race as a victory nonetheless, and hopes to replicate it in Kentucky. If "we beat McConnell, we can prove we can do back-to-back Senate races and we can take anybody out if we work together," he told U.S. News.

When it comes to the 2014 race in Kentucky, Fettig thinks tea party challenger Matt Bevin is the horse to back. McConnell’s primary opponent has won the support of a coalition of tea party activists, and Fettig has been brought in to help run the group's outreach effort they are calling “Unbridled Liberty.” Fettig has also launched a super PAC bearing that name.

Unbridled Liberty plans to draw in and organize tea party activists from surrounding states -- Fettig lives in Indiana -- and already has commitments from activists to help knock on doors, staff phone banks, and stage events in support of Bevin and other like-minded candidates in down-ballot races. Organizers say Unbridled has been in discussion for a few months. An organizational meeting at a Lexington Holiday Inn two weeks ago was standing room only, said Garth Kuhnhein of northern Kentucky.

Sen. Mitch McConnell's Biggest Foe May Be Conspiracy Theorist Greg Fettig

I guess someone felt left out of all the craziness.

Also many wonder why not single-payer, this is why. It would have been opposed from the get go, just as the ACA.

Coulter blasted the health care law, suggesting it was “designed to fail so they can move it to a single-payer system,” and said that now it’s very clear how effective the shutdown was. She said, “The shutdown was so magnificent, run beautifully, I’m so proud of these Republicans.”

[,,,] Coulter even lamented how some of “our media” was too busy going after Cruz, and argued the liberal media wouldn’t be this critical if a House Democratic majority attempted what the Republicans did.

Must be the early signs of dementia (btw - hope she has good insurance), given that the Dems had the same opportunity in 2003 when Medicare D came out, but neither party tried to repeal it 42 times, then when that was not accomplished, shut the government down. And why is ACA considered a socialist mandate and Med D not, both are reforms to better our health care system?

So are the Repukes now taking credit for the shutdown now that the pundits thinks it was so "beautifully" executed? Thought it was the Dems fault?

Anyone else confused??

Hypocrisy at its best

"You're an idiot." Think that sums it up quite well,,,

"This is a matter of shutdown priorities. Now, our military, our vets…our vets have proven that they have not been timid. Now we will not be timid in calling out any who would use our military, our vets, as pawns in a political game."

Tea Party Candidate Greg Collett Explains Taking Medicaid For His 10 Kids While "Adamantly" Opposing The Program

A two-time failed right-wing political candidate who opposes all government programs says he is not a hypocrite even though his 10 kids are on the government health plan, Medicaid.

“As with all welfare programs, Medicaid should not exist,” wrote Greg Collett on his web site, after receiving a stream of negative policy when he was quoted in an NBC News online article headlined, “Health care holdouts: Uninsured but resisting.”

[,,,]
“If you don't want my kids on Medicaid, get them off by terminating the entire program,” he wrote. “I would be the most thrilled if that were to happen.”

[,,,]
“If families are not able to help, they should go to churches or other charitable organizations for assistance. Government should not be involved, period,” Collett wrote. However, he says that when he chose to go into business for himself, he couldn’t find a health insurance plan he could afford.

Where’s John Kuzmanich?

I guess personal financial responsibility doesn't count,,,

Kuzmanich, for example, appeared on KATU Channel 2’s Your Voice, Your Vote on Oct. 6, where he told host Steve Dunn the forced budget austerity would help Americans return to “fiscal and personal responsibility.”

“We are just good and decent principled Americans who believe in the Constitution and a fiscally responsible government,” said Kuzmanich.

Even as he spoke those words, Kuzmanich was on the run from his own financial responsibilities.

Washington County court records show Kuzmanich is more than three years behind in mortgage payments on a Beaverton duplex. The lender, the Federal National Mortgage Association, better known as Fannie Mae, has gone to extraordinary lengths—unsuccessfully, so far—to find Kuzmanich and serve him with court papers.

Are you ready for round two?

All the while "he" made $900,000 while costing the US $24,000,000,0000,,,

“I would do anything, and I will continue to do anything I can to stop the train wreck that is Obamacare."




The Tea Party and Ted Cruz Getting Ready for ‘Shutdown: The Sequel’

Again, I have to ask: if Obamacare is a trainwreck with an approval of 38 percent, what kind of wreck is the tea party with an approval of 21 percent? The interview continued:

KARL: So you might do it?

CRUZ: What I intend to do is continue to stand with American people to stop Obamacare.

[,,,]
It’s difficult to fully encapsulate in words the dangerous repercussions of the whimsical, nihilistic behavior of this faction. American politics and government hinges upon a basic respect for certain unwritten rules and traditions. The tea party, as we’ve witnessed for years and most prominently this month, is actively engaged in a contemptuous effort to rewrite those rules. We’ve witnessed signs of this trend early on when yokels like Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) shouted “You lie!” at the president during a prime time joint session address. We’ve seen it when tea party members of Congress embraced Birthers and endorsed wild conspiracy theories. And since 2011, the brinksmanship with the debt ceiling has allowed a small, fringe congressional minority to not only have a staggeringly loud voice but also to be granted latitude to shove the entire economy to the edge of disaster in the name of its pet peeves and political action committees.

Maddow Blog says it so much better than I

Ok so I'm tooling around the vastness of the cyber-world, reading bits and pieces from the right, left, center and a few, well, all I can say are not from this planet (they can't be or at least they are not members of humanity).  It's the totally clueless I want to focus on here, those that don't understand that the government debacle we are currently witnessing was intelligently designed with one goal in mind, and the "needs" of the people, is not it.

• This is not just about Obamacare anymore. ~ Rep. Michael Grimm, R-N.Y. 

Oh, please do enlighten us as to why you have "slimmed down" the government?

• We’re not going to be disrespected. We have to get something out of this. And I don’t know what that even is. ~ Rep. Marlin Stutzman, R-Ind

You don't know what that "even" is??  WTF!  Might want to look into how your party is attempting to dismantle the government.

Scratch that,,,

Damn, I was off to a good start, when I ran across this gem of insight, How Congress reached this point from Steve Benen of "The Maddow Blog;"  he say it so much better than I possibly could:

This is critically important to understanding what's happening on Capitol Hill right now. If the House and Senate had gone to a conference committee back in the spring to work out their budget differences, Republicans would have been expected to compromise to reach a broader agreement -- but Republicans don't want to compromise.

So they decided to abandon the budget process they themselves had asked for so they could do precisely what they're doing now -- use extortion instead of compromise to try to get what they want.

The government may shut down in 15 hours, but it's not an accident. Indeed, it could have been easily avoided if Congress had just done what Congresses are supposed to do when the House and Senate disagree on the budget. But Republicans insisted on this confrontation, hoping that if they just threatened enough harm, maybe Democrats would put aside the election results and meet some or all of the GOP's demands. 

As Benen points out, this started back in May (I actually believe it started long before that, 40 years ago with Nixon's Southern Strategy among others, but that may be another post) the debacle didn't just appear over night.  By all appearances it's not going to end any time soon, referring to what Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) offered Democrats.  

Collins, along with GOP Sens. Kelly Ayotte (N.H.) and Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), worked with Democrats to draw up a 23-page draft that would have ended the shutdown and funded federal agencies for six months at current spending levels. It would have left intact the sequestration cuts scheduled to hit Jan. 15 but would have given agency officials flexibility to decide where the reductions should occur.

In addition, the proposal would raise the debt limit through Jan. 31, setting up a path for the two sides to have broad budget talks to try to tackle the issues of taxes and entitlement reform.

In exchange, Republicans sought tweaks to Obama’s Affordable Care Act, including a two-year delay of a 2.3 percent tax on medical devices that is unpopular in both parties.

Ignoring for the moment that it was a one-sided deal, there is another problem (child), even if Senate Democrats took Collins’ deal, it wouldn’t have made a difference since House Republicans said they’d refuse to even bring the bill to the floor. And why’s that? Because House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) is thinking ahead.

The leaders, however, began the meeting trying to prepare their troops for the likelihood that they would have to adopt a deal cut in the Senate. Both leaders explained that the White House is no longer willing to negotiate with the House, that McConnell and Reid were talking, and that a bipartisan agreement is likely to emerge that will need the House’s approval.

But instead of absorbing this painful reality, some rank-and-file Republicans grew visibly excited about the prospect of opposing such a deal, said one person in the room. This defiance was fed by Ryan, who stood up and railed against the Collins proposal, saying the House could not accept either a debt-limit bill or a government-funding measure that would delay the next fight until the new year.

According to two Republicans familiar with the exchange, Ryan argued that the House would need those deadlines as “leverage” for delaying the health-care law’s individual mandate and adding a “conscience clause” — allowing employers and insurers to opt out of birth-control coverage if they find it objectionable on moral or religious grounds — and mentioned tax and entitlement goals Ryan had focused on in a recent op-ed in the Wall Street Journal.

So let me get this straight.  Paul Ryan, the man who believes rape is a form of conception, is pre-planning another crises at which point he’ll demand restrictions on access to contraception?  Wake up people!!  This is what happens when religious dogma becomes a political ideology:

The willingness of Republicans to take the debt ceiling and the federal budget hostage in order to try to extract concessions from Democrats is probably the most lasting gift that the Tea Party has granted the country. More reasonable Republican politicians fear being primaried by Tea Party candidates. A handful of wide-eyed fanatics in Congress have hijacked the party. The Tea Party base and the hard right politicians driving this entire thing seem oblivious to the consequences. It’s no wonder, since so many of them—particularly those in leadership—are fundamentalist Christians whose religions have distorted their worldview until they cannot actually see what they’re doing and what kind of damage it would cause.

[,,,]
Under the circumstances, it’s no surprise that it’s easy for Christian conservatives to worry more about imaginary threats from Obamacare than it is for them to worry about the very real threat to worldwide economic stability if the go along with their harebrained scheme of forcing the government into default. To make it worse, many have convinced themselves that it’s their opponents who are deluded.

IMHO what people are failing to see is the underlying mechanism that is driving the Reich - control; and control is the mainstay of Dominionism.  Hence the deep seated need and repeated efforts to control women (the consciousness clause and numerous attempts to ban abortion).  Chris Hedges sums it up quite well:

The cult of masculinity, as in all fascist movements, pervades the ideology of the Christian right. The movement uses religion to sanctify military and heroic “virtues,” glorify blind obedience and order over reason and conscience, and pander to the euphoria of collective emotions. Feminism and homosexuality, believers are told, have rendered the American male physically and spiritually impotent,,,

Dominionists believe they are engaged in an epic battle against the forces of Satan. They live in a binary world of black and white. They feel they are victims, surrounded by sinister groups bent on their destruction. They have anointed themselves as agents of God who alone know God’s will. They sanctify their rage. This rage lies at the center of the ideology,,,

Think about it people, this debacle has nothing to do with money.  In the minds of the Reich, it never was about money.  It is about "a world dominated by Christianity. Not just under the control of Christianity but completely and utterly dominated by it. According to Dominionists, every aspect of our lives is subject to the strictures of the Bible. Our personal lives and social lives must be lived in accordance with the word of God. Economics, politics, science, the arts and the law are all to be placed under the auspices of Christianity."

All ideological, theological and political debates with the radical Christian right are useless. It cares nothing for rational thought and discussion. Its adherents are using the space within the open society to destroy the open society itself. Our naive attempts to placate a movement bent on our destruction, to prove to it that we too have “values,” only strengthen its supposed legitimacy and increase our own weakness ~ Chris Hedges

Idiot Teabilly Congressman Tells Furloughed Workers: Just Get a Loan! | Americans Against the Tea Party

There's a novel solution, spend money you don't have. When the bill comes due, refuse to pay it,,,

This coming from one of the same people who is holding the country hostage over its borrowing policies it seems to be a bit on the hypocritical side. Isn’t that what they have been railing about, indiscriminate and irresponsible borrowing? Isn’t it irresponsible to borrow when you have no income and do not know how long you are going to be unemployed?

Eric Layer, a spokesman for the congressman claimed that it was a staffer and not Pearce who put the post up and admitted that it was a bit tacky since it is the fault of the House and not the workers that their paychecks have stopped.

Idiot Teabilly Congressman Tells Furloughed Workers: Just Get a Loan! | Americans Against the Tea Party

Christian delusions are driving the GOP insane - Salon.com

Altho the author doesn't quite come out and say it, this is Dominionism at it's core, "Fundamentalist religion is extremely good at convincing its followers to be more afraid of imaginary threats than real ones,,,"

Why aren’t Republicans more afraid? The entire premise of both the government shutdown and the threats to force the government into debt default is that Democrats care more about the consequences of these actions than the Republicans do. Republicans may go on TV and shed crocodile tears about national monuments being shut down, but the act isn’t really fooling the voters: The only way to understand these fights is to understand that the GOP is threatening to destroy the government and the world economy in order to get rid of Obamacare (as well as a panoply of other right wing demands). Just as terrorists use the fact that you care more about the lives of the hostages than they do to get leverage, Republican threats rely on believing they don’t care about the consequences, while Democrats do.

So why aren’t they more afraid? Businessweek, hardly a liberal news organization, said the price of default would be “a financial apocalypse” that would cause a worldwide economic depression. This is the sort of thing that affects everyone. Having a right wing ideology doesn’t magically protect your investments from crashing alongside the rest of the stock market.

The willingness of Republicans to take the debt ceiling and the federal budget hostage in order to try to extract concessions from Democrats is probably the most lasting gift that the Tea Party has granted the country. More reasonable Republican politicians fear being primaried by Tea Party candidates. A handful of wide-eyed fanatics in Congress have hijacked the party. The Tea Party base and the hard right politicians driving this entire thing seem oblivious to the consequences. It’s no wonder, since so many of them—particularly those in leadership—are fundamentalist Christians whose religions have distorted their worldview until they cannot actually see what they’re doing and what kind of damage it would cause.

[,,,]
Under the circumstances, it’s no surprise that it’s easy for Christian conservatives to worry more about imaginary threats from Obamacare than it is for them to worry about the very real threat to worldwide economic stability if the go along with their harebrained scheme of forcing the government into default. To make it worse, many have convinced themselves that it’s their opponents who are deluded.

Christian delusions are driving the GOP insane - Salon.com

Enlightened Catholicism: More Up Is Down From The GOP Leadership And It's Evangelical Supporters

The interesting part of this individual's posting,,,

I have nothing to really add to the this article. I am in a state of shock that we have politicians that would stoop to this level, using sick kids, to attempt to blame the Democrats for the fact it was these very same 'noble' Republicans who voted to shutdown the government, causing the problem in the first place.

But if that wasn't enough, there is also the news that the religious right part of the Tea Party, those Evangelical Christians associated with the New Apostolic Reformation are calling for a military take over of the country. Here's the stirring words of Rick Joyner from a radio show "Prophetic Perspectives" broadcast on September 30th, as quoted in an article by Bruce Wilson at the blog Talk to Action.

I mean, there's no way our Republic can last much longer. It may not last through Obama's second term. There are a lot of people that feel, you know, it can't. There are forces right now seeking to undermine and to destroy the Republic. There's almost a glib and almost a joyful disregard of the constitution, and a belittling of the constitution. We can't make it without that -- that's our foundation, our moorings. We're heading for serious tyranny....Since it is this faction of the Republican Party which has made it their mission to undermine and destroy the government, this is another stunning example of Up is Down and Down Is Up reality.)

......I think we've been used in some wonderful and powerful ways by God, we've been one of the most generous nations in history, we've done so much good -- and that's why I appeal to the Lord -- don't let us be totally destroyed. Please, raise up those who will save us. And as I start telling friends from a long time that no election's going to get the right person in there that can restore us because the system is so broken, so undermined right now -- the whole system.
I believe our only hope is a military takeover: martial law.

I haven't been writing too much about the NAR and it's agenda to infiltrate the military for quite awhile, but maybe it's time to remind readers that this agenda is very real and this call for a military takeover is what this agenda has always been about and why the NAR has spent so much capital and effort on the Air Force Academy specifically and the military in general.

Enlightened Catholicism: More Up Is Down From The GOP Leadership And It's Evangelical Supporters

Tobacco, Tea Party, and Dirty Energy: Lobbyist C. Boyden Gray | The Checks and Balances Project

As someone with deep ties to right-wing political circles, and strong financial ties to the tobacco industry, C. Boyden Gray fits the bill as the ideal lobbyist for the dirty energy industry. Dirty energy in many ways is the successor to the tobacco industry, given how it uses front groups and pundits to avoid public health regulations.

With impending EPA regulations for coal and gas, Gray and other lobbyists are getting busy trying to block progress on rules that would curb pollution and global warming.

C. Boyden Gray is an heir to the RJ Reynolds tobacco fortune – his grandfather was CEO of the company – and the co-chair and board member of the Tea Party powerhouse FreedomWorks Foundation. Gray is also a lobbyist for one of the worst coal corporations in America – FirstEnergy – and an outspoken critic of reforms that would reduce greenhouse gas emissions and global warming.

Those three groups – tobacco, tea party, and dirty energy – have become inextricably tied together. Through fossil fuel-funded front groups, the dirty energy industry has copied tactics from Big Tobacco’s infamous operations to manufacture doubt about clear scientific evidence, with pundits and lobbyists like Gray fueling climate change denial and attacking environmental and health regulations.

Gray is a founding partner of the lobbying firm Boyden Gray & Associates, where he advocates for the fossil fuel corporation FirstEnergy Corp., named one of the top 10 worst corporations in America in 2006, among others. Prior to the founding of his firm, he was a lawyer and lobbyist at Wilmer, Cutler and Pickering (now WilmerHale), where he represented clients facing federal sanctions for violating environmental laws. Many of his clients faced significant federal criminal prosecutions under the Clean Water Act. He counseled the Trans-Alaska Pipeline Liability Fund in litigation from the Exxon Valdez and American Trader oil spills, and he lobbied against the REACH bill, which required manufacturers to test industrial chemicals and to gather health and safety data.

Tobacco, Tea Party, and Dirty Energy: Lobbyist C. Boyden Gray | The Checks and Balances Project

Conservatives Force Republicans To Delay ‘Defund Obamacare’ Gambit | TPMDC

Republicans are losing the battle with ultraconservatives over defunding Obamacare — for now.

House GOP leaders decided Wednesday to postpone consideration of their plan to defund Obamacare, which would have called for a Senate vote on defunding the law but also would have stopped short of threatening a government shutdown over the issue.

GOP leaders’ original strategy was to approve the rule in committee Wednesday for a full House vote on Thursday. But with a mutiny on their right flank and no help from Democrats, they have now concluded that they lack the votes to pass the plan and have put it off. The new strategy, aides say, is to take more time to build support and bring up the measure next week.

[,,,]
“Once again, House Republicans are in disarray, unable to govern as a result of division and dysfunction,” said House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD). “Even when promising a continuation of their policy of sequester and another defunding of the Affordable Care Act — gifts to the extreme wing of their party — Republicans lacked sufficient support and were unable to bring their bill to the Floor. Their my-way-or-the-highway strategy continues to fail because they are deeply divided and continue to balk at the prospect of working across the aisle to achieve results.”

Conservatives Force Republicans To Delay ‘Defund Obamacare’ Gambit | TPMDC

Fight Delayed | National Review Online

Majority Leader Eric Cantor spent 90 percent of a presentation to House Republicans in the Capitol basement this morning explaining and defending his convoluted plan to force the Senate to vote on defunding Obamacare before eventually allowing the upper chamber to send a “clean” CR to President Obama.

Towards the end, however, he dropped a big piece of news about the House Republican strategy heading into the next fiscal fight — over raising the debt ceiling. To increase the debt ceiling, Cantor said, Republicans will demand a one-year delay to Obamacare.

It was the first definitive announcement regarding what, specifically, the House will demand in exchange for raising the debt ceiling, and a big reason that some of the typical conservative hardliners came out of the meeting relatively placid.

“We think that as this thing is implemented there’s going to be an outcry, and that’s when the delay comes in,” said Representative John Fleming of Lousiana, who supports the plan.

That’s not to say that everyone is happy about Cantor’s CR idea, which will mean passing the funding bill under a House “rule” that forces the Senate to vote on defunding Obamacare before they can pass the CR itself.

The important line in this is the last, "which will mean passing the funding bill under a House “rule” that forces the Senate to vote on defunding Obamacare before they can pass the CR itself."  In other words Cantor wants to hold the economy hostage, it is domestic terrorism an we are the ones who will pay dearly.

How to explain this, or more aptly what I see:

1]  The Repugs are beholden to the Tea Party for their "power"

2]  This "plan," which quite possibly could (I say will) crash the weakened economy is to appease said TP by looking like they are defunding ObamaCare when they really aren’t,  it is a means of getting out of taking responsibility for their votes

3]  The big plan is to force the Senate to vote on defunding Obamacare before allowing them to present a continuing resolution (CR) to fund the government to the President.   They are basically sending 2 CRs to the Senate, one with ObamaCare attached one without.  But in order to get to the CR without they have to vote on the first

4] That is the "rule" that is mentioned above, it is a procedural "trick" that allows the Senate (which is in the hands of the Democrats) to decouple the two aspects of the bill.  This decoupling by the Democrats thereby talks the Repugs "off the hook," and as I said above, a means of getting out of taking responsibility for their votes

5]  What this all boils down to, the Repugs have embraced the economically damaging tactic of using the economy as a hostage.  They threaten to crash the economy for nothing except appeasing their own base and we all end of losing in the long run.

Fight Delayed | National Review Online 

See also: Report: House GOP Leadership Plan Procedural Trick to Avoid Obamacare Funding Fight