Tea Party: dangerous or stupid?

[feuervogel]

I embrace the power of and. Article reproduced in full below.

Republican Senate nominee Christine O'Donnell of Delaware is questioning whether the U.S. Constitution prohibits the government from establishing religion.

In a debate at Widener University Law School, O'Donnell criticized Democratic nominee Chris Coons' position that teaching creationism in public school would violate the First Amendment by promoting religious doctrine.

O'Donnell asked where the Constitution calls for the separation of church and state. When Coons responded that the First Amendment bars Congress from making laws respecting the establishment of religion, O'Donnell asked: "You're telling me that's in the First Amendment?"

The exchange Tuesday aired on radio station WDEL generated a buzz among law professors and students in the audience.

These goddamned ignorant motherfucking shitheads claim to be the only true protectors of our precious American Constitution, yet their fucking poster child can't even be arsed to know what the fuck the fucking thing says.

I mean, it's right fucking here on the internet! And I'll even reproduce the entirety of the First Amendment right here on my internet journal!

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Americans: if you vote Tea Party, you're voting for ignorant bullshit. Oh, sure, they mouth the Libertarian paradise words "lower taxes" and "smaller government," but really they're the fucking Gingrich-Pat Robertson-Ralph Reed axis back in the spotlight.

And fuck them, and fuck YOU if you vote for them.

Comments

[alchemist]

You know about the teabagger_watch group? PLEASE repost this there - or I'll do so with permission. *grin*

[feuervogel]

I didn't know about them! I'm not sure my blood pressure can take reading the community, though ;) [Actually, it might be good for me, since my systolic hasn't seen three digits since I was severely dehydrated.]

Feel free to excerpt and link! This is a free internet, after all ;)

[acari]

Lemme guess, she's the type who thinks the First Amendments says "I can say whatever I want and you have no right no criticise me". I hate those people. :/

[feuervogel]

Possibly. I hate them, too.

I'm finding more and more terrifying stuff as I follow blog links, and damn. I'm terrified. She's pig ignorant on science, she thinks evolution is a myth (see my next post), and she doesn't see the problem with teaching religious doctrine in schools.

Expatriation keeps sounding like a better idea every day. But Zensursula, Thilo, Guido, and pals don't seem much better. I could watch Hertha play in person...

[kirin]

So I was skimming through the comments on that article (normally a terrible idea which I avoid, though actually most of them weren't that bad in this case), and came across the assertion that it's not that the wing-nuts actually don't know what's in the text of the first amendment, it's that they don't believe "make no law respecting an establishment of religion" actually correlated to "separation of church and state". Which is *ever so *slightly* less ignorant, but still completely terrible.

And not really that much less ignorant, *especially* if they're all up in it for "original intent", since Jefferson, who was certainly one of the biggest backers of the Bill of Rights, straight up *said* it was meant to imply separation of church and state in his own letters.

[feuervogel]

That thing I keep asking you not to do? You just did it.

[kirin]

Wait, what? Please explain, if you don't mind. I didn't even think we were talking about prejudice or privilege or personal experiences. I thought we were looking into exactly how stupid the tea party position is. I'm honestly confused.

[feuervogel]

We *are* looking at how stupid the tea party is. However, going in and pointing out "well, maybe the intent was to say 'the magic phrase "separation of church and state" isn't in the Constitution'" is a cousin of the problem.

It's making excuses for the behavior in question, in this case, being either willfully ignorant or a rules lawyer. Neither of these behaviors is worthy of having excuses made for them.

[kirin]

Well, yeah... half of my comment was pointing out how the alternate interpretation is *just as bad*. Or bad in slightly different ways. Whatever. Still terrible.

I'm agreeing with the whole premise and adding details. I'm having a lot of difficulty seeing what's undesirable about that.

[feuervogel]

It's the details-adding part. It's explaining what they really meant. It annoys me.

Anyway, I have to eat lunch and get dressed to go to the eye doctor.