Why I Won't Weep Over Jerry Falwell

So now, the old Snail has gotten to write again.

It has been a few weeks but I did not have the opportunity to do some proper research on anything for a while. I’ve been dealing with a few personal matters, and with me personal matters get very sticky.

Thank heavens Jerry Falwell reminded me of where my true focus should be!

Falwell was an interesting man who was a paradox in some ways yet in most he was very predictable. Pardon me, but I’ll stick to what made him predictable.

I always found his demeanor to be smug and condescending. It was as if he felt that he knew the secrets of the universe, and we were all merely his acolytes.

He did some good things. In 1967, Falwell created the Lynchburg Christian Academy, a fully accredited K-12 day school. He created and built up the Thomas Road Baptist congregation from a handful to a mega church. His founding of Liberty University and even the Moral Majority were all par for the course. If you believe in something create the mechanisms to attain your goal.

However, what I remember is that smug, blustering boob that pontificated to all, and condemned the innocent and undeserving to damnation, all according to his own special criteria.

His tunnel vision was strikingly obvious when he actually had the temerity to blame 9/11 on the courts, gays, lesbians, feminists, abortion, the A.C.L.U. and civil libertarians!

According to the Washington Post,"On September 14, 2001, on Pat Robertson’s show he said:

The abortionists have got to bear some burden for this because God will not be mocked. And when we destroy 40 million little innocent babies, we make God mad. I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way -- all of them who have tried to secularize America -- I point the finger in their face and say, 'You helped this happen.'

How’s that? The A.C.L.U. and P.F.AW. left us open to terrorism? Hardly! The inattention of the Bush gang to the red flags like a PDB of possible terrorism as well as our basically one-sided policy in the Middle East might actually have had something to do with 9/11. If anything, the intolerance manifested in Falwell’s statement is closer to that of bin Laden’s than anything the A.C.L.U. or the P.F.A.W. believes in.

All his life he had a tunnel vision that allowed him to make such divisive statements. In the Sixties, Falwell was pro segregation, and called the Civil Rights movement the “Civil Wrongs” movement. In the Eighties he, a man of God, defended the use of nuclear weapons.

Of course, after every gaffe Jerry would get religion and apologize after the nation showed appropriate indignation, outrage, or ridicule.

Which reminds me of Falwell the buffoon.

Poor, sweat Tinky Winky! How could he have known that carrying a purple purse constitutes portraying a gay character? Poor clumsy Falwell! Shouldn’t he have double checked his editor’s article on Tinky Winky in his National Liberty Journal? I don’t sem to recall him trying to distance himself from that article.

Falwell always made mountains out of molehills, whether it was prayer in schools, or same sex marriage. And of course, Falwell always made himself out to be more important than he was.

“Some people,” as Hannity would say, even postulated that Falwell’s importance to American politics was a little inflated.

Jonathan Alter was not as impressed with Falwell as most people were:

According to lore (and much of the coverage of his death), November, 1980 found Falwell at the peak of his powers. That was the month Ronald Reagan was elected president, after having met with Falwell and other members of his brilliantly-named organization, "The Moral Majority." While Falwell might have contributed slightly to Reagan's margin of victory, he was not even close to being instrumental in his election. With incumbent Jimmy Carter bogged down with the Iranian hostage crisis and double-digit inflation and interest rates, Reagan won with 57 percent of the vote -- a huge landslide. At best, the Moral Majority added a point or two to Reagan's totals. More likely, it contributed nothing. Exit polls showed that Carter bested Reagan among Southern Baptists, 50-46 percent. And abortion ranked well behind foreign policy and economics among issues that mattered most to voters that year.

Look, someone will undoubtedly feel the loss for Falwell's passing. It just won't be me. Too much water has passed under the bridge for too many people.

Wikipedia - Jerry Falwell

The National Liberty Journal

Positive Atheism's Big Scary List of
Jerry Falwell
Quotations

Fallwell's Liberty University Bio

No Freedom of Speech for Don Imus?

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - Beatrice Hall


Something troubles me.



It's not that I liked Don Imus. Frankly I despised him for his adolescent insensitivity. I still remember that obscene gesture that he did with a wet cigar around 1998 during the Lewinsky scandal. Despite whatever Bill Clinton did in the White House, he did not deserve that kind of treatment on national TV, even from a detractor like Imus. Captain Cowboy Hat and his crew has a long record of such abusive behavior of which the Rutgers incident was only the latest. He should be shunned. He should be ostracized. He is pond scum.



According to MediaMatters, Imus has a rap sheet on both arms. This year alone, he was accused of at least echoing a phrase that he attributed to his executive producer, "Besa mi culo," in reference to Gov. Bill Richardson. In March, executive producer Bernard McGuirk in character as "Cardinal Egan," equated Barack Obama's topping Hilary Clinton's fundraising to a stereotypical view of black criminals.



Imus & Co. are also is said to have cast racial slurs on Jews, Arabs, Latinos, you name it.



And women from all walks of life were special targets for Imus. The stronger, more powerful the woman, the more they got the Imus treatment.



Still, despite all that, his career shouldn't have been ended.



If Imus was fired because of something he said, and those girls were deeply offended, then we shouldn't castigate Bill O'Reilly's attempts get Keith Olbermann fired, because after all, despite the fact that Olbermann was being honest, O'Reilly was offended by what he said, and how he portrays O'Reilly. And what about Rosie O'Donnell?



Can we afford what may turn into a witch hunt?



Bill Maher is a man who may well understand the position that Imus is in because also lost a show for saying something which at the time, (somewhere after September 11, 2001,) was assumed to be contrary to the tensions and overwrought sensitivities of the time. According to Radio Ink, Maher rushed to Imus's show, and defended him with these words:

I just think there is so much in this country about making people go away for a mistake. It's a mistake, you apologized, and you know you don't lose your livelihood - I don't understand that people have to lose their livelihood because they made one rotten joke. It's like nobody in this country can have one moment of discomfort. If you were made to feel one moment of discomfort, the person who caused it has to go away and that's just ridiculous.

Yeah it was a bad joke, it was real creepy but after that people move on. You know? Don't listen to you any more. You will lose some black listeners and that should be your punishment.

Of course, Bill didn't take into account that Imus & Co. are repeat offenders, but essentially, he is right.



People on the Left have as much to fear from this business as well as the Right. While not nearly as caustic as a Michael Savage, Limbaugh and O'Reilly, radio Left of the dial has many provocative and envelope pushing talents that might one day go too far. Stephanie Miller mentioned fears of "a slight chilling effect." And I'm sure Mike Molloy his offended somebody with his acid tongue. Did I mention the outspoken Randi Rhodes? So many people ion the Left have been attacked and smeared for their speech by the Right, that we should be the first to defend anyone’s freedom of speech. And yet, sometimes even we turn on the A.C.L.U.



I really hate to say this, but there has always been a slight totalitarian streak in many on the Left. It manifests itself in their ability to dismiss out of hand ideas that they are opposed to. It gave rise to political correctness. It also manifests itself in uncalled for bullying, harassment and head hunting.



For this very post I fear there will be a very caustic reaction. Once again, I DO hate the sinner, and would consign him to a very special circle of Hell, as well as hate the sin. To those who tout all of Imus's charities and big heart I would say:

Forget it! He hurt people, and many of them were weaker than he!

But I would not consign freedom of speech to the shredder! just because someone abused it. That the Rutgers girls were deeply hurt and offended by what Imus said, I have no doubt, but those girls are at a point in their live where they can overcome this adversity. Imus, at his age lost his career.




I wonder if anyone remembers how many times certain groups tried to take a few library books off the shelves because they found some words or passages in those books to be objectionable? Some books I’m sure were like Mein Kampf, or maybe somebody didn’t like O’Reilly’s books. But then, some people didn’t like Mark Twain’s books like Huckleberry Finn, or Tom Sawyer, because they had the “N“ word in them. No one remembers what a great thinker Mark Twain was, or that his books were written with the best of intensions.

Freedom is only freedom if the least of us can have it. Otherwise it’s only privilege. And privilege only serves to control people.


Bill Maher

MediaMatters.org

Huffington Post - Michael Fauntroy, PhD "What's Next Al?"

A Poem about Don Imus

New York Times - Networks Condemn Remarks by Imus

George W. Bush's State of the Union: Train Wreck Due To Pilot Error

I hate to say this, but I found there to be nothing new in SOTU. . Bush's speech fell flat. It was predictable.



Although he seemed to be genuinely sincere in his congratulation of Nancy Pelosi as the first "Madame Speaker," he congratulated the new "Democrat" majority in Congress, with his usual "doublespeak," a backhanded complement if I ever heard one.



And a very revealing tell from a man who claims that he wants a bipartisan Congress. Funny, but it's only after control of Congress was wrested from a corrupt Republican party that he has revealed this new brotherly spirit. Before ‘06, ol' Dubya had a fine ol' time running over the Dems with his "Rubber Stamp faction. Now he's all lovey-dovey now that We Dems are back in power!

That's if you can assume that when he says things like:

Some in this chamber are new to the House and the Senate -- and I congratulate the Democrat majority. (Applause.) Congress has changed, but not our responsibilities. Each of us is guided by our own convictions -- and to these we must stay faithful. Yet we're all held to the same standards, and called to serve the same good purposes: To extend this nation's prosperity; to spend the people's money wisely; to solve problems, not leave them to future generations; to guard America against all evil; and to keep faith with those we have sent forth to defend us.

In other words: ‘‘it doesn't matter what all crazyass ideas you all have in Congress. We all are going to do things the right way - the Dubya way!" Bush's idea of bipartisan effort is where everyone shuts up and obeys every fiat from the Decider.



He showed how obstinately out of touch he was by bringing up some old failed chestnuts liked privatization, and the voodoo economics of balancing the budget and cutting the deficit without raising taxes on his precious "base."



On "No Child Left Behind," he has proved again to be intransigent, as he has refused to drop the impossible standards of the law, and called anyone who tried to reform the law "backsliders."



And then we heard the same old drivel desperately camouflaged to sneak past the public, like appointing judges only he likes, pretending that we are "fighting over there, so we don't have to fight them over here." And then, he had the NERVE to tell us that the responsibility for this war would be left to someone other than the guy who started it!



Of course Bush is decidedly simplistic about every last item of the rest of his speech. The Arabs who are terrorists "hate our freedom," as if poverty, tyranny weren't at all reasons to feel a great deal of antipathy toward the country that propped up the perpetuators of these conditions.



And it's all going to be Mickey-Mouse easy to bring democracy on the heels of those 21,000 new troops to Iraq right?



Wrong! "Some people," as Sean Hannity would say, believe that in the end we have only 3 choices: 1) Accept that there's a civil war on, and either back the Shia faction, which would be like backing your worst enemy, and make enemies out of the Middle East's Sunni majority. Or 2), we force a minority Sunni government on Iraq, which will oppress the Shiites once more.



Of course, Bush would not be Bush without brainlessly or thoughtlessly pushing on ahead with his plan without consulting with Congress. Most people tell him that 21,000 troops are not enough that more like 250,000 troops is necessary. But Bush doesn't see that as he accuses detractors of "stepping back.”

If American forces step back before Baghdad is secure, the Iraqi government would be overrun by extremists on all sides. We could expect an epic battle between Shia extremists backed by Iran, and Sunni extremists aided by al Qaeda and supporters of the old regime. A contagion of violence could spill out across the country -- and in time, the entire region could be drawn into the conflict.

In case, you hadn't noticed Dubya, too late to close the barn door!