The Republicans Still Don’t Get It

ugh, I really hope this guy doesn’t get elected president. As for Mcain; this is surprising: I have heard him say he believes in evolution before. I’m wondering if he isn’t saying this to kiss up to the evangelicals to get their vote. They’re having trouble agreeing on who to vote for, I would imagine each Republican candidate is going to try and get their vote however he can. It’s amazing how low some politicians will sink. I just recently read that there is a rumor that Karl Rove might be an atheist-does anyone know if there is any truth to it?

http://atheistrevolution.blogspot.com/2007/04/karl-rove-is-atheist-more-evidence-and.html

I’m so embarrased that Mike is from my state.

McCain is totally pandering, which is stupid. The religious right know he’s not “one of them”. So why bother pandering to them? Be honest and try to get the votes of the conservatives that use reason and logic to make their decisions.
I’d have to say, if McCain or Guiliani end up with the nomination, that would have to be quite a blow to the Christian conservatives. I also have to admit that would put a smile on my face. Not nice, but honest…

To be fair, the muddled religion of the Republicans is preferable to the feigned religion of the Democrats.

I appreciated the words of Senator John Edwards at the Sojourners Presidential Forum Monday night about this same question:

“I believe in evolution… I think it’s perfectly possible to make our faith, my faith belief system consistent with a recognition that there is real science out there and scientific evidence of evolution. I don’t think those things are inconsistent. I think a belief in God and a belief in Christ, in my case, is not in any way inconsistent with that.”

Sam Brownback, Tom Tancredo, and Mike Huckabee all said they did not believe in evolution.

I kind of find that encouraging. If those three stooges came out for it I might start wondering what was wrong with it.

I heard that Huckabee said he wasn’t descended from a primate. Which, as a primate, I’m glad to know.

Sometimes this argument strikes me as completely asinine. If you look at the over-arcing story in the bible, you see a pattern. Process. Everything from human history, to personal faith, everything is evolving, maturing, in process. Why is it so hard to believe that God would create nature to be any different? Even if you read the Genesis account completely literally, it is process. I mean, it is process. 1st, God created, THEN God created, and so on. Evolution puts forth this process. Seems sensible to me. A good introductory book to read on this subject is Brian McClaren’s The Story We Find Ourselves In, from his A New Kind of Christian trilogy. No matter what faith, these are great books to spark conversation. This argument being kept alive by our religious and political leaders is NOT the view of all Christians, evangelical or otherwise.

I submit that the republicans are typically more outspoken about their religion than democrats and are assing it up with their idiotic evolution stances. However, where was your coverage of the democrats jesus love-in wherein hillary declared her faith? It was the same event in which john edwards is doing his best to sound as religious as possible with his declaration that he sins and prays every day because “I have a deep and abiding love for my Lord, Jesus Christ”.

As an atheist are you willing to give a pass to the democrats simply because they proclaim a belief in evolution?

I am a Christian, currently studying to be a Minister, and I believe in evolution. I don’t believe that we as humans evolved from monkeys and things like that, but I believe in the concept of a species evolving, changing, to fit their environment.

Hi David, and welcome! Darwin’s theory states that all species currently alive today evolved from common ancestors. That means, specifically, that homo sapiens and today’s primates split from a common evolutionary line many, many years ago. The theory has been hugely bolstered just in the last few years by our new ability to sequence the genetic code, which explains perfectly why we share something like 99% of our genes with our closest living relatives, chimpanzees.

You can get lots more great information about evolution at talkorigins.org.

I heard that Huckabee said he wasn’t descended from a primate. Which, as a primate, I’m glad to know.

Yes, it was quite a relief to the rest of us primates that we don’t have to claim him a cousin! 🙂

One of the commentators on CNN last night made an interesting point. When JFK was asked about his Catholicism, which was an issue in his presidential campaign, he made a speech reinforcing the separation of church and state. When Romney has been asked about his Mormonism, he reinforces how important it is for the country to have a religious leader and then blurs the line between Mormon and Christian doctrine.

A sad commentary, in my view, on how far we’ve come in the last half century.

Does anyone else have a problem with the use of the word “believe” in the same sentence with the word “evolution” or “science”?

Nope. It’s the appropriate philosophical word. “Believe” simply means to affirm the truth of a proposition. Do you affirm that evolution is true? Then you believe in evolution. “Belief” is not an exclusively religious term.

Hi Mike

I still have a problem with it, despite the narrow definition you’re giving the term. When people like Huckabee and Brownback use the term they imply that they do not have faith that evolution is true. It is a religious statement for them. Look at the debate last night you blogged about. It was asked, and answered, in the context of questions about their faith. Their religious faith. They are making religious statements when they say that they don’t believe in evolution, rather than that they don’t believe evolution is true. The latter implies that they looked at the evidence and found it wanting. The former implies that they didn’t even bother, because they think it contradicts what they do beleive in.

Maybe it’s a stylistic much-ado-about-nothing, but somehow it grates on my ears when I hear it.

As an atheist are you willing to give a pass to the democrats simply because they proclaim a belief in evolution?

I don’t have a problem with anyone-Democrat or Republican-that has a faith in God. What I have a problem with are people that are easily swayed to blur the line between church and state, and that deny years of scientific evidence for evolution. It’s very rare that a Democrat would do either of those things.
My problem with McCain is that he has condemned conservative Christian leaders in the past, but now he seems to have flip flopped and is pandering to the people that hold those leaders in esteem.
From the 2000 Presidential campaign:
Risking a religious brawl within Republican ranks, John McCain condemned Pat Robertson and other prominent Christian conservatives Monday as “agents of intolerance” who “shame our faith, our party and our country.”

In a blistering speech delivered in Robertson’s hometown of Virginia Beach, Va., the Arizona senator expressed contempt for Robertson and televangelist Jerry Falwell, two influential pillars of the Christian conservative movement. He dismissed rival George W. Bush as a “Pat Robertson Republican” who panders to religious extremists.

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4196/is_20000229/ai_n10578394

Dialectical materialism, fear-based supernaturalism, dialectical materialism, fear-based supernaturalism. And on and on and on and on.

False dilemma.

Is anyone besides me bored and annoyed with Huckabee’s canned one-liners? The first one or two were fine, but now I’m waiting for them, and they’re so disappointing. If it takes clever quips to get noticed, he ought to bow out now. Typical preacher stuff: all glitter and no fire.

Did anyone happen to catch Pat Robertson’s bizare mathematical rant yesterday on the “700 Club?” The United States is four hundred years old, and it’s been forty years since Israel’s 6 Day War, and everything God likes to do is in forties, so the end is near…and it’s all clear if you just know how to see what’s in the Bible, right? Of course, after talking about the end of the world, Pat segues into something completely mindless like “Five Things Your Husband Won’t Tell You”. Nice. Thanks, Pat.

Hi Mike

I still have a problem with it, despite the narrow definition you’re giving the term.

In all technicality, my definition of “belief” is the broader one. Your definition of belief as a statement of religious conviction is the narrower one in that it is simply one type of belief.

But it’s an inconsequential point and you are entitled to let it get on your nerves if you like. 🙂

The years of over-the-top, lying, poisonous, mean-spirited hyper-partisanship by the Fox news/Hannity/Limbaugh talk-radio nuts, and by the despicable Republican ‘leaders’ in Congress (you know, those corrupt hypocrites that backed the war and the President all the way, name-called the Dems as “cut and run” Democrats, embraced Karl Rove and all his dirty tricks, participated in or covered up scandals, lied through their teeth, and put power and the retention of it above the People’s interests), as they pandered to and made a patsy of the stupid religious fundamentalists, are coming back to haunt them. I know the Bible too:

You reap what you sow.

The Republican Presidential candidates are having to out-Jesus each other; and poor Romney–he’s the ideal Republican candidate in any other time: he’s good looking, tall, accomplished, an ex-governor, a rich and successful businessman, he’s got more money than anybody else, he’s willing to pander to whomever is necessary–he’s perfect! Except for one thing: “A vote for Romney is a vote for Satan.” So says televangelist Bill Keller. I saw this idiot today being interviewed by Bill O’Reilly, and even O’Reilly thought the guy was nuts.

Oh, the irony of it all. I knew that if I could just hold out long enough, all the shit these pathetic specimens have done would come back upon them. They’re stuck with the situation they created, and there’s nothing they can do about it.

Did anyone happen to catch Pat Robertson’s bizare mathematical rant yesterday on the “700 Club?” The United States is four hundred years old, and it’s been forty years since Israel’s 6 Day War, and everything God likes to do is in forties, so the end is near…and it’s all clear if you just know how to see what’s in the Bible, right? Of course, after talking about the end of the world, Pat segues into something completely mindless like “Five Things Your Husband Won’t Tell You”. Nice. Thanks, Pat.

You know, just when I think Pat Robertson can’t get any nuttier, he goes and proves me wrong!

Which of those two approaches do you think that a scientist like Newton agreed with? Since it seems like he, as a Christian and a scientist, is a major hero to the ID movement. But if he were still alive, for some reason I have the notion that he would argue with the ID movement on theological grounds.

…of course he’d also argue with Dawkins. To be fair, I expect zombie Newton would argue with a lot of people.

Which of those two approaches do you think that a scientist like Newton agreed with? Since it seems like he, as a Christian and a scientist, is a major hero to the ID movement.

I’ve always thought it was ironic that ID/creationism champion Newton because he was a Christian. For one thing, back then in the area that Newton lived, everyone was. For another, he was the original proposer of the idea that his mechanical universe followed universal laws–which is to say laws that act the same at any point in spacetime. Newton himself didn’t explore all of the consequences of this idea (although he did use it as an argument against miracles), but it nonetheless laid the foundation for all of the scientific ideas that ID/creationists gainsay. And finally, Newton also explored alchemy. I think we all realize that it’d be silly if a group of alchemers today were to point to Newton as proof that science and alchemy are compatible. It’s theoretically possible that religion and science are compatable, but the fact that Newton didn’t explicitly deny this possibility isn’t evidence for it.

But if he were still alive, for some reason I have the notion that he would argue with the ID movement on theological grounds.

I don’t know enough about Newton’s theology to have an opinion on that, but I’m fairly sure he’d argue against it on scientific grounds. Even without having any understanding of evolution, he’d be able to realize that ID wasn’t even a theory. While he purportedly read the Bible daily, etc., he also thought that things like creation were scientific and attempted to study them via the scientific method. ID, on the other hand, seems to be trying to discredit the very idea of the scientific method.

I’d guess that his vision of the universe was sort of like a clock set in motion by a designer and then left to its own functioning–if he’d lived a bit later on, I think he would have been a deist.

It is not only the Republicans that still don’t get it. I see this week that the Democratic Presidential candidates were out to prove their religious bona fides on CNN.

Unlike the simple-minded black-and-whiters, I can see the distinctions between these two Parties as to how they have cynically used religion as political tools. The fact that many Republicans actually believe such nonsense doesn’t make them any less culpable of demagoguery. I especially deplore those sinners that cry the loudest about the moral issues only to be discovered sometime later to have had close encounters of the naughty kind with people to whom they aren’t married, or people of the same sex (for shame!).

There are reasons why the Democrats have not made a show of their religion as have the Republicans–and no, it’s not because they’re evil, or secular humanists, or whatever. I guess they learned a bad lesson in the last two Presidential elections: you’ve got to appeal to the values-voter if you’re going to win. I doubt that attitudes toward religion have changed an iota for Clinton, Obama, Edwards, or whomever, since they decided to make the run for the White House. They have sacrificed principle for expediency. Now, at a time when religion is one of our primary problems to be solved, the Democrats are seeking cover. Very few politicians have the guts or the luxury to tell people the unpleasant truth.

Representative government is a wonderful idea that I embrace–I just wish I had someone to represent me and my views.

Criticize people who don’t believe in evolution is laughable. I was taught evolution and not questioned it until in the years when I persuite my graducate degree. After I evaluated the evidences, I concluded that micro evolution do exist but the evidence of all speices are of the same acestor is lacking. Watch this huge project that involved thousands of biologests in the world and still is lacking of any common ancestors in the links. You can see those cousin speices without any credible common ancestors.

http://www.tolweb.org/Mammalia

(this is just a portion of pages that interested most people, click on those blude links and you will find no direct common ancestors in most cases)

Research by yourself and you will find using evolution to explain the human origin is laughable.

Have fun to excercise your brain!!!!