Evolution

David Barton never lets the facts get in the way of his promoting of right-wing view of history and political causes, no matter the issue. Today on his radio show WallBuilders Live with co-host Rick Green, the pseudo-historian claimed that under President Obama the Department of Justice stopped prosecuting cases of child pornography because the department has reduced its attention to obscenity. The de-emphasis on obscenity cases started well before the Obama Administration, as Religious Right groups even complained that the Bush Administration wasn’t prosecuting enough obscenity cases.

Barton told co-host Rick Green that the Justice Department has now “encouraged” licentiousness and that the department is turning a blind eye to people who “use underage kids on these movies.” But earlier this year the Associated Press reported that prosecutions for child pornography are rapidly increasing, and just since the beginning of this year the Justice Department announced convictions in at least 19 cases involving child pornography.

Barton: We’ve got laws against illegal pornography, and you can’t stop all pornography but even the liberals recognize that some pornography is over the top.

Green: I mean an easy one is child pornography.

Barton: Simple. And you’ve had this Administration in three years has not prosecuted a single what’s called ‘obscenity,’ which is hardcore pornography. Not a single case. Now what’s that tell all the pornographers and all the movie guys and all the internet guys what they can do?

Green: Do whatever you want now

Barton: Man, we can push the limits, we can get over the top, we can use underage kids on these movies, we can do snuff movies because they’re not prosecuting nothing. So what we got today is—

Green: They’ve basically given a license for licentiousness—

Barton: Exactly. They’ve encouraged it, and that’s what happened with the Justice Department.

The creationist group Answers In Genesis, the Young Earth organization behind the Kentucky-based Creation Museum, wants parents to know that while evolution may explain why some people identify as transgender, Creationism unequivocally rejects transgender identity. Responding to a San Francisco Chronicle article about a one-hour discussion on gender diversity in an Oakland school, Answers In Genesis claims that “when human beings suffer physical problems with gender identity, they are suffering from a medical condition as real as other physical infirmities” that resulted from The Fall in the Garden of Eden, and “to teach children that choosing to change gender is perfectly moral and right is wrong”:

Transgender clownfish, transgender people—what’s the difference?

None—according to the mandatory curriculum at California’s Redwood Heights Elementary School. Principal Sara Stone says, “Really, the message behind this curriculum is there are different ways to be boys. There are different ways to be girls.”

After teaching about “the crazy world of gender within the animal kingdom with lessons about single-sex Hawaiian geckos, fish that switch genders and boy snakes that act ‘girly,’” Gender Spectrum trainer Joel Baum tells fourth and fifth graders, “Evolution comes up with some pretty funny ways for animals to reproduce.”

Then he extrapolates from animals to people, teaching “some boys can act like girls; some girls can have boy body parts; and some biological boys feel like a girl inside their hearts. . . . There are not just two options.” Gender Spectrum bases its curriculum on the evolutionary notion that humans are animals.

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When human beings suffer physical problems with gender identity, they are suffering from a medical condition as real as other physical infirmities (consequences of the Fall of Genesis 3). Human physical gender identity can be ambiguous or at variance with the “gender genes” a person possesses due to conditions interfering with correct expression of the genome.

Human beings are designed to live a life identified as a particular gender without the prerogative to alter it at will. To teach children to be kind and loving to all people is good. But to teach children that choosing to change gender is perfectly moral and right is wrong.

Ergun Caner, the former head of Liberty University’s seminary, was demoted last year after media attention, including an article I wrote for AlterNet, forced Liberty officials to investigate glaring discrepancies in the “Jihad to Jesus” life story Caner had peddled after 9-11 to raise his profile in the evangelical world. Caner told some audiences that he had been raised in Turkey to be a jihadist and learned about America from watching television. In fact, he was born in Sweden (to a Turkish father) and raised in Ohio.

Norris, founder of both Arlington Baptist College and the World Baptist Fellowship, was a fundamentalist Baptist leader in Texas in the first half of the 20th century. The one-time editor of the Baptist Standard and longtime pastor of First Baptist Church in Forth Worth was nicknamed the “Texas Tornado” during a long-running feud with the Southern Baptists.

 

Once loyal to the Southern Baptist Convention, Norris became alienated by the Seventy-Five Million Campaign, forerunner to today’s Cooperative Program of unified budget support of both state and national Baptist conventions. He spent the rest of his days seeking to undermine the SBC, accusing Baptist schools of teaching evolution and tolerating “modernist” theories of Bible study.

 

After his exclusion from his local association, state convention and the Southern Baptist Convention, Norris founded his own independent fundamentalist group, originally called the Premillennial Baptist Missionary Fellowship but renamed the World Baptist Fellowship after a split over his authoritarian leadership.
 

• Chris Rodda @ Dispatches: David Barton's Lies in Action: Randy Forbes Reintroduces 'Spiritual Heritage' Resolution.

• Hate Watch: David Barton – Extremist 'Historian' for the Christian Right.

• Lauri Lebo @ RD: Evolution Debunked by I.D. of Bin Laden’s Body.

• Truth Wins Out: Have You Had 'Ex-Gay' Therapy With Marcus Bachmann?

• American Prospect: Republicans' Tireless War on Women.

Solomon’s Temple was destroyed in 587 BCE by Nebuchadnezzar II, and the Second Temple was razed in 70 CE by the Romans. Now, the Creation Museum of Petersburg, Kentucky is weighing a plan to rebuild the Temple after it finishes construction of Noah’s Ark and the Tower of Babel (with taxpayer funding). The Creation Museum is run by the anti-evolution group Answers in Genesis, whose leader Ken Ham recently found himself fighting with other creationists after he fiercely criticized a fellow creationist speaker. Mark Looy, the cofounder of Answers in Genesis, told a giddy Matt Friedeman of American Family Radio that the Creation Museum is considering plans to reproduce the Temple. “We’ve been thinking about that,” Looy said, “but it’s not going to be some kind of secular temple where all sorts of weird religious ceremonies are held.”

According to Rod Parsley, if judges overturn laws that are supported by conservatives, they are outcome-based activist judges who don’t care about the Constitution. However, Parsley says that it isn’t judicial activism if courts overturn laws backed by progressives, such as campaign finance reform and health care reform. Rather than argue for judicial modesty or restraint, Parsley supports judges overturning laws as long as they are laws traditionally supported by the left.

Illogically, after praising himself for decrying “judicial activism,” Parsley slams liberals for accusing the courts of activism when they disagree with their rulings.

“See, when liberals realize they can’t win on the arguments of the facts, they attempt to win in the war of words, and often they do win,” Parsley says, “that’s how abortion came to be known as ‘women’s health care,’ and perverting the definition of family became ‘marriage equality,’ lately, they’ve taken to calling Bible-believing Christians ‘evolution deniers.’ and now this, calling fidelity to the Constitution judicial activism. Words mean things.”

Oklahoma state Rep. Sally Kern wants to make it clear that her new legislation protecting the rights of science teachers to "teach all science instead of just the Darwin model" is in no way an attempt to introduce creationism or Intelligent Design into the classroom.

It is, in fact, just an attempt to let teachers teach "pure science" about "all of evolution" ... and apparently Kern just wants the teaching of "all of evolution" to include the religious theories about how evolution is utterly false: 

"It stays 100 miles away from creationism and ID. It's not in any way trying to get those in there," said Rep. Sally Kern, (R) Oklahoma City.

Representative Sally Kern said her bill doesn't change any current science curriculum or textbook and doesn't alter Oklahoma's past standards for science education. The bill simply protects teachers who feel they don't have the freedom to fully explore controversial science topics.

"Some people say there's no problem. Yes, there is. I have some surveys that show that many teachers fear for their jobs. That they will be reprimanded or lose their jobs if they teach just pure science. If they teach all of science instead of just the Darwin model," said Rep. Kern.

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"This bill is not anti-evolution. This bill is ‘Let's teach all of evolution.' Let's teach our children how to have inquiring minds. Let's teach them how to be critical thinkers, to look at both sides of an issue, scientific issue, and be able to examine what is the plausible thing there," said Kern.

After the news broke that Rep. Michele Bachmann was considering a bid for the Presidency, the Minnesota Congresswoman immediately found strong support in the GOP’s far-right base. While much attention has been paid to her leadership role in the Tea Party, as she chairs both the Tea Party and the Constitutional Conservative Caucuses, Bachmann is also one of the Religious Right’s most beloved members of Congress. She built her political career in Minnesota as a fierce opponent of the teaching of evolution, reproductive rights, and LGBT equality. Once elected to the House of Representatives, she became a Religious Right leader on a national level, finding favor with figures like David Barton, Rick Scarborough, Tony Perkins, and Lou Engle, along with a whole litany of far-right organizations and radical religious groups. Stephanie Mencimer of Mother Jones details the Congresswoman’s close ties to the Dominionist movement, which believes that fundamentalist Christians must run the government to hasten the end-times, most notably Coral Ridge Ministries.

Today, Bachmann received a ringing endorsement from Matt Barber, the Liberty Counsel’s Director of Cultural Affairs and a ferociously anti-gay leader, who calls her “Reagan in pumps.” Barber praises Bachmann for being the most conservative member of the House, and believes her mix of Tea Party bravado and Religious Right fundamentalism makes her the perfect presidential contender that would “mop the floor” with Obama:

From the instant his fruitful eight-year reign ended, Republicans have pined for the next Ronald Reagan. To date, no man has succeeded in filling the conservative standard-bearer's legendary boots. Well, maybe it's time to swap boots for pumps. Could he be a she?

Sarah Palin, you say? Perhaps, but there's actually another outspoken, attractive, fearlessly conservative Tea Party favorite firing up the center-right grass roots: Rep. Michele Bachmann, Minnesota Republican.

Forget a Senate run. The buzz inside the Beltway is that Mrs. Bachmann may be looking to add a woman's touch to the Oval Office (beyond just sprucing up its temporary occupant's eyesore decor). Her spokesman, Doug Sachtleben, has confirmed to media that the congresswoman is considering a potential presidential run, saying: "Nothing's off the table."

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Mrs. Bachmann has been a stalwart in advocating on behalf of constitutional conservatism. She's chairman of the HouseTea Party Caucus and has put her money where her mouth is, voting consistently in Congress to limit the size and scope of government, fortify national security and protect life, liberty and the natural family. National Journal rated Mrs. Bachmann among the most conservative members of Congress in 2009.

Moreover, as with Reagan, it's principle over popularity with the feminine firebrand. She's evidently indifferent to what the moonbat media and the larger loony left think about her. This is an indispensable quality in a leader "We the People" can get behind. She's a maverick's maverick, not the media's.

Still, Mrs. Bachmann is not afraid to shake things up in her own Republican Party. What she lacks in physical stature, she makes up for in - to borrow one of the mainstream media's favorite terms - gravitas. If it takes a step stool to kick a moderate Republican in name only's tail into line, the counterestablishment lawmaker will climb it and kick it.

True, a House member hasn't been elected president since James Garfield, and a woman never has. But as Barack Obama, our first black president, might tell you: We live in an age of firsts.

And speaking of Mr. Obama: In the unlikely event that you could untether him from his tele-prompter binky long enough to debate Mrs. Bachmann, I'd bet my share of the stimulus money that she'd mop the floor with him.

Will she run? Could she win? It remains to be seen. But one thing's for sure: The fireworks leading up to the 2012 presidential election will be something to behold. Based on her penchant for telling it like it is, her existing widespread Tea Party support and her fast-growing national popularity, if this intelligent, principled, bomb-dropping bombshell were to run, I suspect her campaign might just catch fire.

In addition, Larry Klayman, the former founder of Judicial Watch and Freedom Watch, is also excited about a Bachmann presidential bid. Writing for WorldNetDaily, Klayman believes that Bachmann is the best Republican suited to take on Obama’s “socialist, anti-white and anti-Judeo-Christian policies” and is “the next Ronald Reagan”:

Still smug that it can retain the White House in 2012, even after President Obama has alienated most of the nation with his socialist, anti-white and anti-Judeo-Christian policies, the left has set out to destroy the one truly principled politician who can unite conservatives, libertarians, independents, tea partiers, people of faith and any American who truly believes in constrained government, fiscal and individual responsibility, a strong national defense, life, and yes, freedom under God! Her name is Michele Bachmann, and she is a congresswoman from Minnesota.

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Last Thursday, as I was flying to New York City on Virgin America (it would be nice if the nation and the media were still "Virgin America" and not run by whores) to attend a proceeding before the New York Supreme Court in my case against the Ground Zero mosque and its terrorist-connected Imam Rauf, I tuned in Matthews, Obermann, Maddow and O'Donnell on the airline's in-flight television system. Not surprisingly, Matthews, with his characteristic nasty sneer, immediately mocked Michele's having been recently appointed to the House Intelligence Committee, implying that she is stupid and has no "intelligence." Then, as he did in a low-class way on election night 2010, Matthews mocked her again for having previously challenged the media to discuss the anti-American rhetoric that spews from many Democratic members of Congress, not to mention the Mullah in Chief himself, Barack Hussein Obama. To add insult to injury, Matthews then also insinuated that Michele is mentally ill, saying that she always has that weird gaze when she comes on camera. And, if this were not enough, Matthews and his leftist media guests boasted that Michele cannot be trusted and, with the age-old stereotype for "chatty women," would surely reveal national security secrets once on the House Intelligence Committee. They also made fun of her Christian beliefs. All in all, it was a disgusting display.

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The lesson is simple. Michele Bachmann, because she is a principled anti-establishment conservative who not only talks the talk but walks the walk, is a real threat to the establishment left in particular. An attractive anti-feminist woman who is a Christian and is not afraid to be part of our revolution to take Washington apart at the seams, she could well be the next president of the United States. And, not only is the left scared, so much so that it will disgrace itself by mocking a highly intelligent, well-educated and experienced straight female who believes in individual freedom and the vision of our Founding Fathers, it is catatonic. This in and of itself tells us who the next Ronald Reagan could well be.

Politico’s Ben Smith discussed today the unforeseen possibility that right wing activist Herman Cain could be a surprise Republican candidate for president, after he bested all other Republicans in an online straw poll conducted by the conservative blog RedState. Cain, an African American businessman and radio talk show host, even topped Sarah Palin, who came in second, to be the favorite of the right wing blogosphere. Erick Erickson of RedState writes, “I like Herman Cain and, though truth be told I never thought he’d make it past Mike Pence, I am delightfully surprised by the results.”

There is already a Draft Cain movement and he operates his own political action committee, called The Hermanator PAC (seriously). He has received praise from conservative darlings from Bishop Harry Jackson and Bryan Fischer to Joe the Plumber, and Cain himself is talking-up his chances at a presidential bid, telling The Daily Caller: “I will run proudly as a non-establishment candidate. I think the public has an appetite for a non-establishment candidate.” More recently, Cain told Fischer on the American Family Association’s radio program that after Republican gains in November, he is “one step closer” to running for President. When pondering a run, he explained: “No I don’t want to…but I feel like I must run.”

Of course, a 2012 presidential run wouldn’t be Cain’s first foray into politics. Cain is closely involved with Tea Party organizations and co-signed a letter with prominent right wing leaders asking the GOP leadership make “restoring traditional moral values” a key part of their agenda. He also ran for US Senate in 2004 in his home state of Georgia but garnered just 26% of the vote and lost to Senator Johnny Isakson in the GOP primary.

During the 2006 election, Cain was the public face of America’s PAC, a group that used stereotypical language and imagery when calling on Black voters to support Republicans. Cain, who voiced many of the group’s ads, maintained, “The main thing that America’s Pac is up to is it basically is challenging the thesis or the belief on the part of the Republican Party that they cannot attract the black vote.” America’s PAC suggested that Democrats were “decimating our population” by supporting abortion rights:

“Black babies are terminated at triple the rate of white babies,” a female announcer in one of the ads says, as rain, thunder, and a crying infant are heard in the background.

“The Democratic Party supports these abortion laws that are decimating our people, but the individual's right to life is protected in the Republican platform. Democrats say they want our vote. Why don't they want our lives?”

Or as put in another ad:

Michael: And if you make a little mistake with one of your ho’s, you’ll want to dispose of that problem toot sweet, no questions asked, right?

Dennis: Naw, that’s too cold. I don’t snuff my own seed …

Michael: Huh. Really? (pause) Well, maybe you do have a reason to vote Republican!

America’s PAC was heavily backed by Republican financiers and led by a conservative activist who said that teaching evolution is “tantamount to teaching atheism.” Another one of their ads suggested that Democrats who opposed the Iraq War were treacherously allied with racist and right wing leader David Duke, who also opposed the war:

Now, I can understand why a Ku Klux Klan cracker like David Duke makes nice with the terrorists. They fight voting rights in Iraq, just like he does back home. But what I want to know is why so many of the Democrat politicians I helped elect are on the same side of the Iraq war as David Duke.

According to a report by the New York Sun, “Many of the ads with conservative social themes are sandwiched between hip-hop songs that convey blunt sexual messages. A spokesman for America’s Pac, John Altevogt, said no stations have refused the ads, but a few asked for minor edits, such as the removal of the word ‘cracker’ from the David Duke spot.”

However, the ads failed to produce significant gains for the GOP among Black voters, as nine in ten African Americans backed Democratic candidates in 2006.

Certainly, the Tea Party, the Religious Right, and the GOP will seek Cain’s help to attract Black voters in case his presidential run fails to get off the ground. Judging by his track record at America’s PAC in 2006, they may want to look elsewhere.