New Jersey

Ever since the news broke that many right-wing leaders were considering abandoning the Republican Party if Rudy Giuliani secures the presidential nomination, lots of ink has been spilled speculating about just how serious they are about carrying out the threat and discussing what it could mean for the 2008 election. 

Today, Bloomberg ran an article that pretty well encapsulates the utter confusion plaguing the movement at the moment by quoting a variety of leaders and activists, none of whom seem to agree with each other:

- “I am asking them to at least consider Voltaire's question: Do you make the perfect the enemy of the good?'' said Richard Land, a leader of the 16-million-member Southern Baptist Convention, based in Nashville.

- If Clinton, 59, wins, “her administration would declare war on social conservatives,'' Bauer said. “She'll go after conservative talk radio, she'll go after Christian radio' … Bauer said that with some “serious negotiations'' over his platform, religious conservatives could find a way to support Giuliani. He declined to provide specifics, citing a need to maintain his bargaining position if Giuliani is the Republican nominee.

- “Some leaders will hold to principle and will not vote for someone who is pro-abortion,'' said Tom Minnery, the political director of Focus on the Family.

- Michael Farris, the chancellor of Patrick Henry College, an evangelical school in Purcellville, Virginia, said he would consider supporting Giuliani only if “he named my mother as vice president.''

- “The entire conservative movement is going to be united because Hillary is going to be on the ballot and the Supreme Court is going to be at stake,'' said Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, a Washington-based anti- tax advocacy group.  Land sees things differently. “I know a lot more evangelicals than Grover does,'' he said. “If Giuliani is the nominee, Grover will be shocked.'

As a number of right-wing activists—and presidential candidates—have pounced upon a tragic multiple-homicide in Newark as a rallying point for mobilizing anti-immigrant sentiment and pushing a mandate for local police to vigorously enforce immigration status violations, it’s no surprise to see Pat Buchanan join in denouncing so-called “sanctuary cities.” Buchanan, a host and frequent commentator on MSNBC, writes that the incident “has the makings of a Willie Horton issue in 2008”—a reference to an infamous racially-tinged attack ad used against Michael Dukakis in the 1988 presidential election.

At this point, one would expect Buchanan to launch into a diatribe against Hispanic immigration, which he has blamed in part for “The Death of the West,” the title of his most recent book. But surprisingly, Buchanan takes a different turn: Jumping to a Washington Post article on a study showing that nearly half of murder victims are black, he complains that “[u]tterly absent” are “white victims.”

The real repository of racism in America -- manifest in violent interracial assault, rape and murder -- is to be found not in the white community, but the African-American community. In almost all interracial attacks, whites are the victims, not the victimizers.

The Washington Times reports that the English-only movement is “building momentum,” citing Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa)’s plans to reintroduce his English Language Unity Act in the new Congress and “seven states pushing legislation to make English the official language or to strengthen laws already in place."

“This is the strongest push for official English legislation that I have seen in the last 15 years,” crowed Mauro Mujica, chairman of US English. Rep. King claimed that “There's been such strong support. And it's gaining momentum.” Of course, with Republican immigration hawks out of power, King’s bill may have even less chance of becoming law than last year, when it languished in committee. And while King may use his skills in exaggeration to magnify the “momentum” and to try to create a wedge issue to motivate the anti-immigrant base, the real focus may be on proposed state laws.

"The states have been wonderful on this,” said Jim Boulet Jr., the executive director of English First, a group most recently involved in a failed attempt to prevent Florida Sen. Mel Martinez from being named general chairman of the Republican National Committee. The Washington Times cites efforts by legislators in Georgia, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey and Oklahoma, as well as an English-only referendum that passed last year in Arizona. King himself is devoting his energy to the state level by suing the governor of Iowa for supposedly violating the English-only law King crafted as a state legislator.

Last week we mentioned David Paszkiewicz, the teacher at Kearny High School in New Jersey, who has been using class time when he should have been teaching U.S. History to tell his students that they are going to hell if they “reject [Jesus’] gift of salvation.”

On Wednesday, the Kearny Observer published a letter to the editor from Paszkiewicz that puts forth the standard right-wing claim that the separation of church and state is bogus and reads as if it were written by David Barton, the Right’s premier pseudo-historian whose work has been described as "laced with exaggerations, half-truths and misstatements of fact."    

In fact, just about every quote Paszkiewicz offers up that is attributed to one of the nation’s Founding Fathers appears to have come directly from the WallBuilders website:

Paszkiewicz: “And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are a gift from God? That they are not to be violated but with His wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, and that His justice cannot sleep forever.”

WallBuilders: “And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are of the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with His wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep forever.”

Paszkiewicz: “It is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits and humbly to implore his protection and favors.”

WallBuilders: “Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor.”

Paszkiewicz: “God governs in the affairs of man. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid? We have been assured in the sacred writings that except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it. I firmly believe this. I also believe that, without His concurring aid, we shall succeed in this political building no better than the builders of Babel.”

WallBuilders: “God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the sacred writings, that "except the Lord build the House they labour in vain that build it." I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without his concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better than the Builders of Babel.”

Paszkiewicz also offers this quote which he attributes to George Washington: “What students would learn in American schools above all is the religion of Jesus Christ.”  WallBuilders offers a slightly different interpretation of this quote, saying “in his speech on May 12, 1779, [Washington] claimed that what children needed to learn ‘above all’ was the ‘religion of Jesus Christ.’”

In fact, what Washington said on that day in his “Speech to the Delaware Chiefs” was entirely different:

I am glad you have brought three of the Children of your principal Chiefs to be educated with us. I am sure Congress will open the Arms of love to them, and will look upon them as their own Children, and will have them educated accordingly. This is a great mark of your confidence and of your desire to preserve the friendship between the Two Nations to the end of time, and to become One people with your Brethren of the United States. My ears hear with pleasure the other matters you mention. Congress will be glad to hear them too. You do well to wish to learn our arts and ways of life, and above all, the religion of Jesus Christ.

As a history teacher, Paszkiewicz ought to know better than to rely on a "historian" whose credentials are as suspect as Barton's. If he keeps this up, Paszkiewicz may soon need to issue his own list of “Unconfirmed Quotations.”