The Santorums and the Bully's Defense: Rick and Karen Play the Victim Card

by Nomad

Victimhood and the Messiah-Complex

I saw this interesting video clip at The Raw Story.
Here’s the background information to the clip. At  a question-and-answer event in South Carolina for mothers, “Moms Matter 2012″ Rick and Karen Santorum alleged that the gay community has been attempting to vilify her husband by portraying him as a gay-hating religious bigot.

Nothing could be further from the truth, Karen Santorum declared to the friendly audience. She took the microphone to defend her husband who meanwhile wore his best victim expression.

“As Rick’s wife, I have known him and loved him for 23 years,” she said. “I think it’s very sad what the gay activists have done out there. They vilify him. It is so wrong. He loves them. What he has simply said is marriage shouldn’t happen.”

It’s all very confused in Karen Santorum’s mind, it seems. She somehow managed to twist things around a great deal. Very conveniently.

“As far as hating, it’s very unfortunate that has happened. A lot of it is backyard bullying, where people will come up to us and they’ll say something. And we’ll ask them to give us an example, and they can’t even provide one example as to why they took the position they took.”

Santorum then told the audience that he was “doing what I’m called to do, which is to love everyone and accept everybody.” A revealing choice of words, even if the statement means a big fat zero in the light of all of the other things he has said. I found the phrase “what I am called to do” particularly compelling. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand by Whom he believes he has been called. 

It would not be the first time a politician has had what they call a Messiah-complex. As a matter of fact, it’s pretty much a standard psychoses of modern political leadership. Let’s see what it entails:

We all have a "messiah complex" dwelling deep within. But not everyone becomes completely possessed and grandiosely inflated by it. The desire to redeem and "save the world," when kept in check, can be a very positive force in life, motivating us to do good and to leave the world a better place--if only infinitesimally--than when we came into it.

Doesn’t sound so evil, now does it?

Many religions share this archetypal concept of Messiah, including Christianity, Judaism and Islam. Much like the archetypal notion of God, identifying oneself as God or Messiah is a disastrous form of ego-inflation. Such inflation is a grandiose narcissistic defense against profound feelings of inferiority and powerlessness. The wounded ego, with its debilitating, neurotic feelings of guilt, badness, shame, emptiness, unworthiness and helplessness falls prey to the equally neurotic (or psychotic) compensatory spiritual pride the ancient Greeks called hubris, providing self-righteous justification for evil deeds.

Ok, that makes me a bit woozy and perhaps that’s unfair. Santorum probably doesn’t deserve to join the ranks of Hitler, or Bin Laden or Charles Manson, Jim Jones or David Koresh. At least not yet.

The Bully's Defense

Still, try as I might, I personally find it hard to see Santorum as a victim of backyard bullying- or anything except his own outspoken reglio-egocentricity. (Take that, pretentious phrase hunters!) 

You see this type of thing a lot. After making outrageous remarks or doing something unacceptable, illegal or anti-social, it comes as shock to these people when they are eventually called upon to explain themselves or to accept responsibility for their actions. Undoubtedly, it's just not a comfortable feeling and so they apply the Bully's defense. Suddenly it's all about their OWN victimhood. This line of rationalization doesn't need to make sense, as long as it is portrayed convincingly enough to fool a few people. 

I didn't find it convincing when Sarah Palin tried to claim her victimhood after the Gifford shooting (and a hundred times before and since.) In another post, we saw how Clarence Thomas effectively used this method to thwart any opposition to his nomination to the Supreme Court. Herman Cain attempted it when alleged sexually harassed victims kept popping up like gophers. When it was discovered that his favorite hunting lodge used a racially divisive word (the n-word) as its name, Rick Perry blamed the media for the controversy.

Even the infamous Bernie Madoff, after masterminding a $65 billion Ponzi scheme, told reporters that he detested being called evil. Later in prison he reportedly said, “F--- my victims. I carried them for twenty years, and now I’m doing 150 years.” He carried them by looting their savings, of course.
According to a fascinating article in New York Magazine:

“It was a nightmare for me,” he told investigators, using the word over and over, as if he were the real victim. “

As Doug Mataconis, writing for the blog, Outside the Beltway, gives his take on this phenomena:

The mentality of victimization, not to mention a disdain for the “MSM.” as most of them refer to the media, is something that seems to run pretty strong in conservative circles these days. The entire movement seems to see itself as put-upon and subject to conspiracies coming from all sides, and when something bad happens to the likes of Sarah Palin it’s viewed as evidence of some conspiracy against her when in reality it’s usually just the media repeating exactly what she said.

They appear to be telling us that it's unfair when people react negatively to their remarks. And a lot of people appear to be persuaded by that kind of manipulation. 
I suppose it’s a variation on victim blaming which “occurs when the victim of a crime, an accident, or any type of abusive maltreatment are held entirely or partially responsible for the transgressions committed against them.” That phrase became familiar to us when it was used in courts to describe the ill-ltreatment of rape victims by defensive attorneys who sought to put the responsibility for the attack on the woman, instead of the actual alleged perpetrator.

It shouldn’t surprise anybody that this type of manipulation has become more and more common in the conservative camps. Just look at the history of the term. William Ryan coined the phrase in his 1971 book Blaming the Victim. In this book, Ryan describes victim blaming as an ideology used to justify racism and social injustice against black people in the United States. At the time it came out, his book was considered "a devastating critique of the mindset that causes us to blame the poor for their poverty and the powerless for their powerlessness" That’s pretty standard stuff among the true Right Wing Republicans, except now it's not black people, it's gay people.

Entitlement is My Authority

There’s another angle to Santorum’s use of the Bully's Defense. At the heart of it is a sense of unassailable entitlement. 
Being white, being rich, being outwardly religious, especially Christian, being married with children are all factors which, in the conservative mind, gives them the right and the moral authority not merely to decide how the rest of the population should live but also the right to claim that any questioning or reaction or objection is an attempt to “villify” them. It’s like saying “How dare you question my authority in this matter! Don't you know who I am and what I represent?”

In Santorum’s mind, he is entitled to make as many outrageous, often bigoted or inflammatory remarks as he likes, based on nothing more than this imaginary authority.
Take a look at this quote from his book, It Takes a Family. In a way, it's a key to understanding what Santorum is really all about.

“The elementary error of relativism becomes clear when we look at multiculturalism. Sometime in the 1980s, universities began to champion the importance of “diversity” as a central educational value.”

Multiculturalism, according to Santorum, is a late invention by the liberal academics that infested universities in the 1980s. Like his phony intellectual argument against separation of Church and State (which was based on a lie), here too Santorum uses a misstatement to confuse the history. He seems to be muddling the education of multiculturalism with the concept itself. 

It is true that multicultural education was a reflection of the new awareness brought about by the civil rights movements in the 1960s. Black minorities, women’s rights and gay liberation movements all demanded an equal voice and representation in society and that education was a suitable place to start. Take the women’s rights movement as an example:

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the women's rights movement joined this push for education reform. Women's rights groups challenged inequities in employment and educational opportunities as well as income, identifying education as a primary contributing factor in institutionalized and systemic sexism. Feminist scholars and other women activists, like groups of color before them, insisted on curricula more inclusive of their histories and experiences. They challenged the discrepancy low number of female administrators relative to the percentage of female teachers.

While the historical roots of multicultural education date from the civil rights movements of various historically oppressed groups, the concept of cultural diversity and tolerance for it has been an integral part of the American scene, nearly from its inception. It is a globally shared idea and is based on mutual respect and a keen sense of equality. It is one of the best things that the United States has to offer the world.

Apparently Santorum did not fully understand the phrase in The Declaration of Independence “all men are created equal.” It doesn’t say that Christian values (or even family values) make any citizen a higher rank or more privileged. It doesn’t attempt to distinguish family values from any other set of values. That, it may be assumed, was a matter not for governments, but for the Church. This historical document is all inclusive and not, therefore a matter for Santorum or a religious minority to debate. In their wisdom, our founding fathers realized that there should be no national religion and that the country would be large enough to tolerate diversity. The original immigrants came to the New World to escape from intolerance and many modern-day immigrants still come for that reason. 

Oh Lord, Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood

Rick Santorum would like us to believe that he has been misrepresented by vicious axe-grinding gay activists and that his opinions are not really an attack on the gay minority. He claims that this is only a legal-political discussion and no offense was meant. He claims:  

“The problem is that some see this political policy difference as a personal assault.”

That line of defense would, perhaps, be more credible had, in other interviews, Santorum not gone further than merely expressing his policy views on gay marriage. He is also on record as saying that he did not have a problem with homosexuals, but "a problem with homosexual acts.” That’s like saying “I have nothing against black people except when they do those negro things” or “I have nothing against Jews except when they behave excessively Jewish.” 

See how easy it is to misunderstand him?

If an openly gay politician, charged with representing all of his or her constituents, announced that he was not really against heterosexuality but only against heterosexual acts, who wouldn’t take it personally? What is Santorum actually saying anyway? Is homosexuality acceptable as long as it remains theoretical and not practically unexpressed. Although Marcus Bachmann, wife husband of the former candidate, Michele Bachmann, made nearly the same statement, it is hardly a political policy difference, as Rick Santorum claims. And it is hardly a reassuring way of thinking for a wannabe president of a diverse and tolerant society.

Whether it’s by design or by ignorance, Santorum also has made some fairly indefensible leaps in logic when speaking about homosexuality. Here is a comment he made back in April 2003 with regards to Catholic priests sexually abusing children:

“In this case, what we’re talking about, basically, is priests who were having sexual relations with post-pubescent men. We’re not talking about priests with 3-year-olds, or 5-year-olds. We’re talking about a basic homosexual relationship. Which, again, according to the world view sense is a perfectly fine relationship as long as it’s consensual between people. If you view the world that way, and you say that’s fine, you would assume that you would see more of it.”

Most people I know wouldn't define a basic homosexual relationship as a sex act with same-sex minors. And Santorum's remarks are factually incorrect. The BBC has this article about investigators probing some 300 cases of alleged sexual abuse by Roman Catholic clergy in a Belgium scandal:

Peter Adriaenssens said cases of abuse, mostly involving minors, had been found in nearly every diocese, and 13 alleged victims had committed suicide. Two-thirds of victims were boys but 100 girls also suffered, he said.  

In a wide-ranging report released by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. researchers found that sexual orientation, specifically gayness, was not the cause of child sexual abuse by priests. 

The investigators labeled the majority of abusing priests 'generalists,' or indiscriminate offenders," as opposed to offenders with exclusive sexual preferences. "Very few of them were driven by a pathological attraction to a type of child and instead what we see is priest abusers are very much like sex offenders in the general population and many of them regress to the abuse of minors in certain time periods,"  [Karen Terry, the lead investigator from John Jay College]  said. "What we also see is opportunities for them to abuse really played a critical role in who they chose to abuse."

Santorum's attempt to blame all adult homosexual relationships for the sexual abuse of children and minors by Catholic priests is beyond simple ignorance. It is a foul deception and an insult to the victims.  It's really a mystery why he feels it is his personal duty to drag the whole country into his personal crusade against gay citizens. If Santorum has been vilified by gay activists that he has only himself to blame. 

It is the price he must pay for trying to equate the molestation of children to consensual sex between adults. It is the price he must pay for trying to play upon every long-feared stereotype against the gay community.

It’s not new. In the late 1970s, former Miss Oklahoma beauty pageant winner, and gay rights opponent, Anita Bryant, temporarily made a name for herself by issuing the same kinds of ill-conceived fearmonging arguments as Santorum.

"If gays are granted rights, next we'll have to give rights to prostitutes and to people who sleep with St. Bernards and to nail biters."

Like Bryant, Santorum has previously warned that allowing same-sex marriage could pave the way for the legitimacy of “man on dog” or “man on child” relationships. (Unlike Bryant, however, he seems to have recognized that prostitutes and nail-biters already have equal rights.) 

Santorum the Firm Believer
Additionally, when speaking about the then-pending U.S. Supreme Court case Lawrence v. Texas, which challenged a Texas sodomy law, Santorum said that sodomy laws properly exist to prevent acts which "undermine the basic tenets of our society and the family." 

The definition and enforcement of this law was always the major problem because- among other things- heterosexuals enjoy the privacy of their bedrooms as much as homosexuals do. Even though many of these laws target both heterosexual and homosexual acts, they are often selectively enforced only against homosexuals. This alone created constitutional problems. The definition of sodomy was also much too vague and the term “unnatural” left too much room for bias. In any case, by 2002, 36 of the 50 states had repealed all sodomy laws or had them overturned by court rulings. The remaining laws regarding the act were later invalidated by this 2003 U.S. Supreme Court decision. 

In response to this decision, Santorum stated:

"If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual (gay) sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything."

So where are the nail-biting floozies with the St Bernards? In same interview he was quoted as saying:

It all comes from, I would argue, this right to privacy that doesn't exist in my opinion in the United States Constitution.

There is also no mention of any right to marriage but nobody is attempting to blame liberal judges for that. The reason for no mention of privacy in the Constiution, as Director of Public Policy for the American Liberty Foundation, Harry Browne observes, is simple:

The Constitution also doesn't include the right to buy products from foreigners, or to have children, or to read a book, or even to eat food to survive.

How could the Constitution have overlooked such basic human rights?

Because the Constitution isn't about what people can do; it's about what government can do.

The Constitution was created to spell out the limited rights or powers given to the federal government. And it was clearly understood that the government had no powers that weren't authorized in the Constitution.

Using the Nine and Tenth Amendments in the Bill of Rights, Browne makes a pretty good case against Santorum's nonsense about no provision on privacy. It's worth a look.
Thus, although the highest court in the nation has established legal policy, Santorum continues to argue the matter. Why shouldn’t any minority see that as a personal assault? 

Later when his remarks created more controversy, he back-peddled, saying, 

"I am a firm believer that all are equal under the Constitution. My comments should not be construed in any way as a statement on individual lifestyles."

You liberals are too being too sensitive, that's all. Well, that's what he'd like us to believe. 
However, as we have seen, he is not a believer in equality in any way, shape or form, no matter how he would like to spin it. 

One Easy Answer to Difficult Questions

There is another example of intellectual dishonesty that Santorum’s wife tries to promote in the clip. Contrary to what she would like to claim, objections to Santorum’s views are not at all limited to gay activists groups and not even limited to civil rights organizations. Of course there are plenty of those but there also been a bi-partisan “thumbs-down” for Santorum’s viewpoint. 

Former Governor of Vermont Howard Dean, objected to Santorum’s remarks saying "gay-bashing is not a legitimate public policy discussion; it is immoral" and called upon him to resign from his post as Republican Conference chairman. Similarly, Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle commented that remarks from Santorum were "out of step with our country's respect for tolerance". 
And criticism to these remarks are not limited according to party lines. Republicans Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins Senators from Maine, Lincoln Chafee, Republicans governor and senator of Rhode Island and Oregon Senator, Gordon H. Smith have all voiced concern about his statements. Even John McCain of Arizona remarked, in his usual lily-livered style, that he thought Santorum,” may have been inartful in the way that he described it."

He does find some support with conservative Christian groups. Surprised? The group Concerned Women for America, stated that Santorum was "exactly right." Criticism, they claimed, was merely an attack by the "gay thought police". 

That inate bullying instinct suddenly re-surfaces in his supporters. Vice President for Communications at the conservative Family Research Council Genevieve Wood declared, "I think the Republican party would do well to follow Senator Santorum if they want to see pro-family voters show up on Election Day." This time they don't want to bully the gay minority. They are trying to bully the entire Republican party.

In the video clip we hear Rick Santorum speak with a righteous air. It must  be extremely impressive to the gullible. But the very things he says with such solemn authority are the very statements one has to consider even more carefully.

Santorum's views on same-sex marriage do not reflect the
national view.

“Marriage has existed before governments existed. Marriage has existed since the beginning of time. It’s how we were meant to be.”  

The argument that long-established traditions must be maintained was once made for slavery- which had also existed prior to governments and the beginning of time- and yet, wisdom and tolerance and a common sense of humanity demanded their abolition and have moved our leaders to take an enlightened examination of this institution. This excuse had kept women from voting, and it kept schools segregated. In fact, all of the great reforms to society by the civil rights movements have all been opposed using exactly the same argument. What Santorum represents isn't merely an attack on gay minorities- and that's bad enough- but on the civil rights reforms for all minorities that took place in the 1960s and before. 

“The reason governments include marriage in their laws is because we need to encourage what is best for mothers and father and children.” 

The question is, of course, who decides what is best and based on what criteria. Supported by his collection of well-organized and politically powerful Christian Right Wing groups, (whose narrow views seem to represent a smaller and smaller number of American voters) Candidate Rick Santorum, of course, can always fall back on the easy answer to those difficult questions that diversity presents to our society. 

"Elect me," he seems to be telling people," and I will take this decision- all of the difficult decisions- out of your hands, out of the hands of all citizens.. I will decide for everybody. It's what I have been called  to do.”

A Tiny Fringe

Finally, I will close this post with related news. 

Last week, Santorum received an endorsement from a collection of evangelist organizations after about 150 influential Christian conservative leaders met at a ranch outside of Houston, Texas. Organizers included Gary Bauer, president of American Values in Washington, and Donald Wildmon, founder of the American Family Association of Tupelo, Mississippi, Perkins said. Also attending was Richard Land, president of the Nashville, Tennessee-based Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention.
A few days ago, a 6th Circuit Appellate panel in Cincinnati began hearing arguments last week from the president of the American Family Association of Michigan, Gary Glenn and three Michigan ministers, who are suing Eric Holder and the Department of Justice to overturn the expansion of federal hate crimes protections.
In February of 2011, Glenn and the ministers, filed a lawsuit to overturn a federal hate crime law, claiming the law was trying to promote "thought crimes" and “eradicate religious beliefs opposing the homosexual agenda.”

The law was passed passed by Congress in 2009 and protects a variety of minorities who have had reason to fear hate-motivated attacks. According to Jillian Redfeild of TalkingPointsMemo.com

It carves out criminal penalties for anyone who attempts to or “willfully causes bodily injury” to a person and “is motivated by prejudice based on the actual or perceived race, color, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability of the victim.

Early in 2010, Gary Glenn spoke out on the anti-bullying bill before the state of Michigan legislature. He argued that

the sole purpose of this law is to criminalize the Bible and use the threat of federal prosecutions and long jail sentences to silence Christians from expressing their Biblically-based religious belief that homosexual conduct is a sin.

The bill, in fact was roundly condemned on all sides. According to some critics, because of pressure by conservative religious groups, the final law managed "to protect school bullies instead of those they victimize. It accomplishes this impressive feat by allowing students, teachers, and other school employees to claim that 'a sincerely held religious belief or moral conviction” justifies their harassment.'" As one source states:

In an emotional speech on the Senate floor, Democratic Leader Gretchen Whitmer accused her colleagues of creating a blueprint for consequence-free bullying. “As passed today,” said Whitmer, “bullying kids is okay if a student, parent, teacher or school employee can come up with a moral or religious reason for doing it.”

Evangelists, like Glenn, were equally dissatisfied. He called the bill an attack on religious liberty. It would seem that what he and so many other religious supporters of Rick Santorum really desire is a license to bully and a sanction to hate. He stated:

‘It just makes the point all the more that public policy in this state should not be driven or dictated by such a tiny fringe minority of society." 

The irony seems to have escaped him. 

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Evangelical Candidates: Personal Faith vs. Public Policy

by Nomad

A Sin Against God

In the 2012 election year, the subject of a presidential candidate’s religious beliefs is once again becoming a matter of public discussion. Of course, this isn’t, by any measure, the first time. In fact, in modern American politics, the issue of personal faith has become a more or less common feature in American elections. 

What has changed is to what degree this once personal issue has become a candidate's "selling point" to the politically powerful Christian Right Wing of the Republican party. 

When this problem was brought up in the 1960 Kennedy vs. Nixon election the matter was mentioned because some people were concerned that Kennedy could not represent all people and that there might well be conflicts between the Catholic doctrine and the Constitution. How this problematic issue was dealt with, the answer Kennedy gave to critics, is an example of the kind of politics and politicians that have come and gone.

The excellent chronicle, The Making of a President-1960, gives us more details. During the primaries, Kennedy had begun to face strong resistance in the Midwest among Protestant voters. Much of that was based on the issue of his faith. Up until that time, Kennedy had believed that a single statement was enough to clarify the matter. “I refuse to believe that I was denied the right to be President on the day I was baptized.”

In the West Virginia Democratic primary, however, Kennedy decided that it was time to confront the challenge. Despite Kennedy’s seeming advantages, a Lou Harris poll three days before the election showed Humphrey with a 45-42 edge. 
In a paid telecast on the Sunday evening before the election he tried to defuse the religious issue. In fact, Kennedy used almost ten or twelve minutes of the half hour show to answer the religious question. As Theodore White writes:

He reviewed the long war of the church on state and state on church and that greatest of all constitutional decisions: to separate church from state. Then, peering into the camera and talking directly to the people of West Virginia, he proceeded:

.. so when any man stands on the steps of the Capitol and takes the oath of office of the President, he is swearing to support the separation of church and state; he puts one hand on the Bible and raises the other hand to God as he takes the oath. And if he breaks his oath, he is not only committing a crime against the Constitution, for which the Congress can impeach him- and should impeach him- but he is committing a sin against God.

The outcome of this masterful political move? Herb Little, writing for the Wext Virginia Encyclopedia explains:

After that Sunday evening telecast, Lou Harris conducted another poll. The result gave Kennedy a slight edge. His edge was anything but slight in the voting two days later. The statewide totals: Kennedy 236,510; Humphrey 152,187. Once the outcome was clear, Humphrey announced he was no longer a presidential candidate, and Kennedy said, ‘‘I think we have now buried the religious issue once and for all.’’

To Shape Government 

Years later, the matter of faith became if not a critical, then a much-discussed issue with Jimmy Carter who, as a born-again Christian, was seen as something of a novelty when he ran against Gerald Ford in 1976. Being America's first unelected president, Ford was considered by many to be a product of cronyism and of the corruption that had plagued  the Nixon administration. There was an intense desire to put Watergate  and Vietnam and all the shadiness of Washington politics into the past. The nation was disgusted by what it saw as the stink of Washington and sought a clean, moral outsider. From the Deep South emerged a soft-spoken Baptist completely alien to the machinations of high politics. The mainstream media were, at times, curious, suspicious and cynical of Carter's open declaration of faith. Most of the jaded journalists seemed convinced it was gimmick and that, if you scratched the surface, you'd find just another ambitious candidate. 
Active for many years in public relations in the evangelical community, writer Jim Jewell, gives us this description of Carter

Jimmy Carter was different, and observers of his 1976 bid for the presidency readily recognized it. As a candidate, Carter spoke very openly and candidly about his faith, his commitment to Christ, his love for Scripture, and his desire to bring “a new spirit” to government. He quickly became a symbol of the rekindled religious and political vigor of American evangelicalism.
 Carter said: “I’m a father and I’m a Christian; I’m a businessman and I’m a Christian; I’m a farmer and I’m a Christian; I’m a politician and I’m a Christian. The most important thing in my life beyond all else is Jesus Christ.”
Based on his Christian testimony and toothy optimism, I—like many other Christian believers–supported Jimmy Carter in 1976 and delayed my final college work to become part of his Iowa campaign staff. I considered his election a harbinger of good will and healing for our nation, and marveled that such an outspoken Christian was sitting in the Oval Office.
As president, he continued to teach Sunday school, found occasions to share his faith with foreign leaders, readily admits in his post-presidential works that religion was an indispensable guide for his presidential behavior, and believes that Americans “have a responsibility to try to shape government so that it does exemplify the will of God.”

Ironically, two of Jimmy Carter’s campaign workers in 1976 were none other than Marcus Bachmann and candidate-to-be Michele Marie Amble. More ironic still, the pair dropped their support for Carter when the president proved not quite as willing to mix and match religious and political views. According to one biography of Bachmann:

But throughout Carter's presidency, Bachmann says she grew disappointed with his liberal approach to public policy, from support for legalized abortion to economic decisions that sent gas prices soaring. Next election she voted for Reagan.

The Bachmanns weren’t the only ones disappointed with President Carter and his failure to implement “true Christian values.” Many felt that Carter had, in effect, betrayed them with, of all things, his humanitarianism. The Evangelicals had mistakenly assumed that Carter, as president, would be as conservative as they themselves were. 
Pat Robertson took Carter to task on a range of issues, none of which were directly related to matters of faith. In 1978, he criticized Carter for not keeping his campaign promises such as reducing the budget deficit, controlling spending and cuttig the size of the federal government. He complained about Carter creating 52,000 new federal jobs and he attacked the newly proposed Departments of Education and Energy. 
The final straw for Robertson came when Health and Human Services Patrica Harris (who he claimed was an avowed enemy of Christianity) told audiences at Princeton University that "Any attempt to Christianize America would be dangerous for democracy."
It wasn't long before the Christian Right, with all of its newly politically-mobilized members, began a search for a replacement for Carter. Somebody with charisma, a person more willing to put his faith first. By 1980, Ronald Reagan, saw the opportunity and stepped up to seize the mantle as the Christianity's next best hope.   

As the book, Jimmy Carter, the Politics of Family, and the Rise of the Religious Right, observes:

In California, polls prior to the election indicated that born-again Christians supported Reagan over Carter by a two-to-one margin. In Carter's own Georgia, conservative ministers formed the GEorgia Pastor's Forum to fight for "Christian issues,"specifically the fight against abortion, homosexuality and feminism. Larry Johnson, a spokesman for the group, explained: "In 1976, many pastors were sold on Jimmy Carter because of his "born-again" Christian claims. Since then we've found out that this "born-again man supports the Equal Right Amendment (ERA) and is not against homosexuality as a life preference." The forum, Johnson concluded, supported Reagan.

Unheeded Warnings on Both Sides
Meanwhile. Reagan was attempting to woo the Christian conservatives with statements that must have sent shivers of glee up the spines of politically-minded religious leaders like Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell. Reagan masterfully courted the conservative religious groups with various promises based on “family values.”
The marriage of the Republican party to the Christian Right was official when Reagan made statements before the 1976 election about “the increasing tendency of the state interfering with religion."  Reagan, in a press conference, urged schools to teach the biblical story of creation alongside the theory of evolution. While many Americans had thought this subject had been laid rest some 50 years before, Reagan's message was clearly received. And when he described abortion as "taking of a life," it was music to the ears of the evangelists.
This direct appeal to the Christian activists by Reagan signified a formal alliance between Republican Neo-Conservatives and the Christian Coalition. The Christian Right, once a rather benign fixture on the American political scene since the 70s now was about to take on a whole new life as king-maker for the Republican party.

Its emergence on the political scene was little noticed until the 1980 elections, when the Republican Party not only achieved a landslide presidential election, but turned 12 seats in the U.S. Senate and took majority status. Few had predicted such an outcome, and political observers search for an explanation for having missed the incoming political upheaval. The late Rev. Jerry Falwell, then the head of the religious conservative group, Moral Majority, had an answer: that he and his organization has helped to mobilize as many as four million previously apolitical evangelicals into electoral participation that year and they had supported Ronald Reagan and the GOP.

Not everyone saw this coalition as a fine and noble thing. Rev. Billy Graham, who had maintained close friendships with several Republican leaders in the past, urged the the Christian Right to keep its distance from conservative political causes. He told Falwell in February, 1981, "The hard right has no interest in religion except to manipulate it."
Essayist and author Jane Devin, in an article for Huffington Post, sums up the rise of this new political force this way:

The Moral Majority, Focus on the Family, and The Christian Coalition were all formed within years of each other as religio-political groups. Jerry Falwell, James Dobson, and Pat Robertson, the respective leaders of these movements, formed a triad that sought to influence politics through a gospel of neo-conservative Christian rhetoric aimed at millions of faithful adherents whose votes, it was hoped, could swing the socio-political pendulum away from progress and back to "traditional values."

Since that time, in one respect or another, the Christian Right has adroitly manipulated and has, in turn, been manipulated by the Republican conservatives. Generally speaking, the Republicans have got much more from the alliance than the Christian organizations. At least, in the short term. By throwing in a few well-chosen phrases aimed at perking Christian ears, Republicans successfully won over the mobilized Christian voters in search of a friend in Washington. After the election, of course, things changed.
However, taking in the larger perspective, it isn’t easy to distinguish the winners from the losers. The - some would say, backward views of the Evangelicals regarding such issues as the teaching of creationism and intelligent design, the removal of sexual education in public schools in favor of abstinence-only programs, and the banning of most things related to same-sex relationships have limited the party's overall appeal to moderate Republican voters.
Over time, the narrow agenda of the Christian political groups has pushed the conservatives further and further to the right until moderate Republicans are very nearly extinct. Devin suggests that the Christian Right is the chief suspect of the murder of the Republican Party itself:

There was no room for the moderate middle in this "with us or against us" equation, as witnessed by the public shredding of moderate Republican politicians like Arlen Specter, a Jew, and a vocal critic of the Christian right. "What some are trying to do is take over the party," Specter warned in 1994. "That's bad for the Republican Party and bad for the country." Specter became a target of the religious right for his support of Roe v. Wade, and his refusal to bend to the will of religious power brokers like Dobson, who attempted to use his influence to block Specter's 2005 bid to become chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The Evangelists are quite open about their goal. Evangelist Pat Robertson's determination to wrest the reins of power away from secular control and to create an American Christian theocracy are hardly secret. Back in 1992, he stated:

If Christian people work together, they can succeed during this decade in winning back control of the institutions that have been taken from them over the past 70 years. Expect confrontations that will be not only unpleasant but at times physically bloody.... This decade will not be for the faint of heart, but the resolute. Institutions will be plunged into wrenching change. We will be living through one of the most tumultuous periods of human history. When it is over, I am convinced God's people will emerge victorious.

His crusade carries on with a younger generation of leaders and faux historian scholars with faux interpretations of the Constitution. United with obedient politicians willing to do the bidding of God's people and politically aligned corporations, the Christian Far Right has had no shortage of political muscle.

Outrage of the Gingerbread Men

However, the Christian Right has in some ways been undermined by its own success. Over-confidence in their own moral authority has led them to embarrass themselves repeatedly on the national stage. For example, when the Maryland Moral Majority attracted national ridicule when it began a campaign against "anatomically correct" gingerbread figures that a bakery was selling. The negative attention backfired when gingerbread sales suddenly skyrocketed.

Pat Robertson is constantly cast as a national laughingstock with such pronouncements as blaming the catastrophic earthquake and subsequent misery on the legend of a Satanic pact made in the beleaguered island's early history. 

Sometimes, it is far less of a laughing matter. For example, The Santa Clara chapter of the Moral Majority created a stir with its leader called for the death penalty against homosexuals. While intolerance become more and more of a theme within the politically active Christian groups, homosexuality and abortion are two perennial issues that seem to preoccupy them most. 
Most notably, gay groups were concerned when Falwell attempted to link AIDS pandemic to LGBT issues he stated, "AIDS is not just God's punishment for homosexuals, it is God's punishment for the society that tolerates homosexuals." Perhaps this attitude by a politically-powerful religious figure, they argued, explained Reagan's reluctance to confront, to even discuss the then-developing AIDS crisis, leading to inaction that resulted in greater public catastrophe.  

Other subsequent statements by Falwell would later divide the nation during its most difficult hours:

After the September 11 attacks in 2001, Falwell said on Pat Robertson's The 700 Club, "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.'" Falwell further stated that the attacks were "probably deserved..."

Coinciding with the rise of the religious wing of the Republican Party The phrase "family values" first entered the political lexicon in the 1976 Republican platform and was to become a frequently used mantra. However, the high-minded moralism and advocacy of family values also subjected the Republican party to close examination. Eventually this type of rhetoric would backfire and lead to a higher than average number of humiliating scandals among its ranks. From Mark Foley "sexting" congressional pages and Sen. Larry Craig's "wide stance" to Nevada Sen. John Ensign's affair with a former campaign staffer who is married to one of his legislative aides. Apparently, the Republicans themselves could not measure up to the standards their Christian supporters had demanded for the rest of the country. Caught up in their own hypocrisy, the Republican party has earned the mistrust of voters and the amused appreciation of late night talk show hosts.

The Wreckage Left Behind
Damage caused by the Christian political groups is not limited to the Republican party. Their support proved instrumental in the FCC repeal of the Fairness Doctrine during the Reagan administration. Mark Fowler, the FCC chairman successfully eliminated what he and others saw as government interference and an impediment to free speech and appealed directly to the National Religious Broadcasters for their support. As Devin notes:

Working in tandem with their pocketed politicians, the Christian right would rejoice at the FCC's repeal of the Fairness Doctrine, which gave rise to a slew of unchecked right-wing programs that hawked the myth of a vast "liberal media", even as markets narrowed and became dominated by a handful of corporations. 

As important as the wholesale destruction of the public forum for intelligent debate, the rise of the Christian Right has been particularly harmful to the long-standing fundamental concept of the separation of Church and State.  
Frederick Clarkson, author of the book, Eternal Hostility: The Struggle Between Theocracy and Democracy, explains how this battle for the soul of the nation has come full circle since Kennedy's struggle to define himself as a secular president with private religious beliefs. 

"The question of separation of church and state has been a defining issue for Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum. Both have given speeches in Texas to echo and answer John F. Kennedy’s famous 1960 campaign speech to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association that has been the model for how pols balance religion and public life for a generation. Both embraced the rhetoric of the religious right.
“Rick Santorum has made denunciation of Kennedy’s statement ‘I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute’ — a centerpiece of his campaign.
“When Santorum came to the Boston area last year, he denounced Kennedy before a Catholic audience. He blamed Kennedy for the alleged secularization of public life, calling Kennedy’s statement “radical” and that it has done ‘great damage.’
“Romney as a Mormon faced a similar obstacle to his candidacy that Kennedy faced in 1960. In his Texas speech in 2007 he sought to turn secularism into a bogeyman: ‘In recent years,’ he declared, ‘the notion of the separation of church and state has been taken by some well beyond its original meaning. … It is as if they are intent on establishing a new religion in America — the religion of secularism.'”

Santorum's history lesson is more than inaccurate or misleading: it is, as any scholar would tell you, an outright lie. In fact, the concept of separation of Church and State does not originate with Justice Hugo Black but with the writer of the Constitution, Thomas Jefferson. In a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association in 1802, he writes:

Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. [Congress thus inhibited from acts respecting religion, and the Executive authorised only to execute their acts, I have refrained from prescribing even those occasional performances of devotion, practiced indeed by the Executive of another nation as the legal head of its church, but subject here, as religious exercises only to the voluntary regulations and discipline of each respective sect.]

Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.

Still there is something  sadly ironic about the idea of Catholic Rick Santorum attempting to portray Catholic  John Kennedy for his secularist view of politics and for his adherence to the tradition of separation of Church and State.

Something of a Quandary
In some respects, Sarah Palin, Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann represent the last gasp of the Christian Right. Its insatiable  preoccupation with gay marriage, right to life and other so-called value issues are beginning more and more to take a backseat to the economy and unemployment. Many of its views are seen by moderate voters as extreme, intolerant and painfully out of touch with the real world. And there's another problem.

Despite initially having a large selection to choose from, the Evangelicals have suddenly, unexpectedly found themselves in something of a quandary. All of the potential Republican candidates have made their customary appeals and yet, none of them seem able to satisfy both the conservative Christian leaders and political strategists. 

From a purely political point of view, their overall detachment from the realities of consensus politics have led them to throw their weight behind essentially un-electable candidates like Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry and Rick Santorum. With such division amongst its own members, there is now the very real possibility that the Christian Right Wing is about to lose its power base. The only viable choice, Mitt Romney, or moderate Jon Huntsman seem unacceptable to the majority of conservative religious leaders. And the time to make up their minds is quickly running out. 

The impossible demands of the evangelical movement coupled with the strident denunciation of right wing media organizations like Fox News appear to have damaged the Republican party beyond repair, threatening to make  the GOP the constant runner-up in a two-party political system.

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Dusty's Corner - Head Figure Head, Helmet Head and Air Heads

WOW! I am blown away with the similarities of how the media has handled startling revelations concerning both Palin and Perry. Head Figure Head written by Glen Maxey was released this week and he writes of his failure to get the story of Rick Perry’s sexual encounters with men published by a multinational publishing company.  I found the book via Juanita Jean’s blog. Juanita included a link to a magazine article she authored for Out Smart. Love the jacket.

Glen started his quest in June 2011. He worked with the journalist by tapping his own network of contacts and Facebook while referring the guys to the journalist for first person interviews. I found it quite ironic that right in the beginning in the introduction there is this:

I learned a lot about not only many of his alleged former partners, but also the difficulty in exposing them to the wider public, particularly in a state where so many individuals’ jobs and livelihoods depend on not incurring the wrath of Texas’ longest-serving governor and his massive cronies, appointees and henchmen.

Then I read this in the next paragraph…the tension between the right to privacy of public figures and the potential forfeiture of privacy when hypocrisy about sexuality is used as a political tool.

Sound familiar anyone?  These lines instantly reminded me of the stories in Joe’s book about people who had offered him guns for his personal protection.  The guy who offered his home just in case Joe needed a safe place to get away from one or more of Palin's henchmen.  Also the stories we’ve heard of those in Alaska who are afraid to talk for fear of monetary and/ or physical harm.

Wonder how the taxpayers of Texas will feel once they or if they ever find out that their tax dollars paid for Perry to have his security team drive him to and from his alleged sexual encounters with other men. Bet they’ll feel just like some of the Alaskans who finally got their eyes opened regarding their own governor’s alleged behavior.

Head Figure Head is a good book and well worth the read. The author explains why his quest failed and leaves unanswered the question Why is some article allowed to be published without sources while other articles have the same criteria are not allowed to be published without further sources? Makes you wonder just who Herman Cain pissed off too. 

I am left to wonder when will enough be enough for those who control the strings in the media. When will they finally report the truth and stop protecting and pandering to those who are at a minimum a disgrace to all that is dear to this Nation.  Fake a pregnancy- make a million dollars, fake a marriage- run for national office, out your teen age pregnant daughter- oh here make another million dollars, fake your talent- oh here make another million.  Ironic isn’t it that these two clowns are two of the loudest screaming about government spending while their Master is spending millions to keep their secrets hidden.

Just when I thought I couldn’t be shocked anymore this week AzureGhost shocked me and a few others to the point of speechlessness. Yes I know, shocking isn’t it? Did you know Callista Gingrich is only 45 yrs old? Yes she is only 45 years old. 

Check out this story at Salon.com you’ll be amazed. However in true Dusty fashion what really got my attention was this: (bold is mine) 

The 45-year-old third wife of 67-year-old Newt Gingrich and, as of Wednesday, aspiring first lady, is a devout Catholic who began her relationship with her husband via a lengthy extramarital affair. She’s a small town girl from Wisconsin who plays the French horn in her local city band and has recently written a children’s book about American “exceptionalism.”

All I can say is How Republican of her and Thanks but No Thanks I’ll keep our current First Lady who is just 2 years older.

Next up in the Stupid Crap Rick (whom neither will ever be president) Says News

Santorum believes that poor children should suffer hunger and other hardships in life as a means to prevent them from relying on government programs. So says the guy who allowed a school district to pay for his children’s cyberschooling while not living in that school district or even in the same state.

Rick Santorum’s daughter is on the campaign trail with him- granted she is 20 years old not in the single digits like the daughter of oh what’s her name again…- she tries to explain her dad’s father’s stance on gay marriage and misses the point too:

"It's a policy thing, he thinks this is the right thing for America and the foundations of our country," she said of gay marriage. "People are entitled to live the way they want, but to project those values and say those are the best values for our country are a different thing."

Still makes you wonder just what the hell terrifies Ricky so much about gay marriage. Lose the sweater Ricky, like Palin’s wigs they are so fake.

Rick is now trash talking the United Kingdom’s development of a social safety net claiming it cost the nation its empire. WTH?  Way to go Rick you have now lost the vote of those who want a single payer option.

"If you look at every European country that has had world domination, a world presence, from the French to the British -- 100 years ago, the sun didn't set on the British Empire," Santorum said at an appearance in Sioux City, Iowa. "If you look at that empire today -- why? Because they lost heart and faith in their heart in themselves and in their mission, who they were and what values they wanted to spread around the world. Not just for the betterment of the world, but safety and security and the benefit of their country."

At least he got one thing right this week (see the bold)  

"I've seen the media completely try to shape this race," Santorum told radio host Mike Gallagher. "It's not just the liberal media. It's also Fox News. Bill O'Reilly has refused to put me on his program. As far as he was concerned, I wasn't a worthy enough candidate to earn a spot to sit across from him and be on his program."

On his constitutional ban on abortion he swings and misses with this little gem of republican stupidity:

The question is ... is that human life a person under the constitution? And Barack Obama says no. Well if that human life is not a person then ... I find it almost remarkable for a black man to say 'now we are going to decide who are people and who are not people.

Can’t let this little oops from our favorite married ‘christian’ Texas governor who allegedly also enjoys sex with men. 

In challenging rival Rick Santorum's support for home-state projects funded with federal money, the Texas governor referred to "the Bridge to Nowhere in Arizona."

Jeez the next thing out we’ll hear is if he becomes president he will issue a Presidential Mandate that all States will be named with a different first letter. Don’t laugh! Who wants to bet he doesn't know there are only 26 letters in the alphabet. Surely no one expected the great man to possibly remember that the Bridge to Nowhere was actually in Texas’s big sister state of Alaska.  Even a Palin knows that.

I am pleased to report that 2012 is off to a good start this year as Palin was on Fox today and the Twitterverse did not explode or ever tinkle with any reactions to her same old tired, bash Obama, blah blah blah, fawn over the donald, blah blah blah (word on the street is she must be auditioning for a spot on celebrity apprentice -snark) whimper about Paul, blah blah blah, tell everyone to shut up because only her and her minions are afforded the right to free speech, blah blah 19 minutes of air time. 

Who knew that fleece paired with a string of pearls are the latest fashion trend in the Fashion Mecca that is Wasilla, Alaska? 

+++

UPDATE BY PATRICK:

Dusty asked me to add the following picture to the post, which Katie Annie Oakley posted in the comments.

Here we are - it's a good one: