General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsChristian delusions are driving the GOP insane
Why arent 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 isnt 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 dont care about the consequences, while Democrats do.
So why arent 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 doesnt 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. Its no wonder, since so many of themparticularly those in leadershipare fundamentalist Christians whose religions have distorted their worldview until they cannot actually see what theyre doing and what kind of damage it would cause.
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Its not just that the rogues gallery of congress people who are pushing the hardest for hostage-taking as a negotiation tactic also happens to be a bench full of Bible thumpers. Pew Research shows that people who align with the Tea Party are more likely to not only agree with the views of religious conservatives, but are likely to cite religious belief as their prime motivation for their political views. White evangelicals are the religious group most likely to approve of the Tea Party. Looking over the data, it becomes evident that the Tea Party is just a new name for the same old white fundamentalists who would rather burn this country to the ground than share it with everyone else, and this latest power play from the Republicans is, in essence, a move from that demographic to assert their right to control the country, even if their politicians arent in power.
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http://www.salon.com/2013/10/10/christian_delusions_are_driving_the_gop_insane/
Delphinus
(11,830 posts)I am amazed that they actually think this - the ACA is the root of this or is it just a symptom?
cali
(114,904 posts)and the ACA is just a symptom.
el_bryanto
(11,804 posts)a fascist world or fascist America. They believe that this is what they prophecies are pointing to - a time in which Christians suffer terrible persecution (a mirror of the Christian Persecutions in the early church). They then blend that with a John Birch society libertarianism and it becomes obvious that the persecution will come from the Government, an organization they already don't trust. Thus any attempt to make Government more efficient or to use Government to solve societies ills is terribly sinister. It's an attempt to make that Government, that one day will persecute the Christians and create terrible misery, more powerful.
Bryant
hobbit709
(41,694 posts)Arkansas Granny
(31,517 posts)You can't have a rational conversation with them about it because they are convinced that "gawd is on their side".
Laelth
(32,017 posts)-Laelth
randome
(34,845 posts)Religious belief in general is undergoing self-examination along the ediges, I think. Just my opinion, of course.
The longer the Apocalypse does not happen, the more people will start to wonder if there isn't more to life than faith.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]I'm always right. When I'm wrong I admit it.
So then I'm right about being wrong.[/center][/font][hr]
dawg
(10,624 posts)Presuming to know the mind of God, and being certain that he holds all the same prejudices and dispositions as one's self, is the problem.
exactly
WillyT
(72,631 posts)cali
(114,904 posts)are illustrating it brilliantly.