With guest Rep. Randy Forbes (R-VA), pseudo-historian David Barton cast doubt on President Obama’s religious beliefs and maintained that he wants to take God out of government. Barton lauded a resolution championed by Forbes which reaffirms and encourages the existing motto “In God We Trust” and claimed that Obama is imposing a “secularist” agenda, adding that “when you forget that God is part of the equation, you will lose your prosperity, you will lose your rights, you will lose your stability.”
Barton, who believes that Obama has “a worldview that is devoid of God,” has previously (and erroneously) suggested that the President tried to suppress the phrase “endowed by their Creator.” Channeling many right-wing conspiracy theories, Barton now alleges that Obama wants to do the same with “In God We Trust.”
Along with co-host Rick Green, Barton tried to link Obama’s “secularist” views with his administration’s decision to end “conscience-protection” clauses, which allow health care workers to refuse medical care if they say it conflicts with their religious beliefs. According to Barton, the Bush-era medical regulations were supported by the Founders and their repeal shows that government is moving away from God:
Barton: I don’t care what Obama says about his faith. He says he’s a Christian, fine, lots of people say that. What I know for sure is that he’s a secularist. Because seven times he’s deliberately omitted the word ‘Creator’ when he said the Declaration of Independence, he said that national motto doesn’t have ‘In God We Trust.’
And so if you’re a secularist, then you believe rights come from government, which is why his administration right now is repealing conscience-protection. Now conscience-protection was considered by the Founders as an inalienable, God-given right. We’re the first nation in the world to protect the rights of conscience.
Green: And if it comes from God, government you can’t touch it and government should protect it.
Barton: That’s right. Government protects it. Well he’s saying, look, if you don’t want to perform abortions, you need to get out of the healthcare industry, you don’t have a right to be in healthcare industry, you don’t have a rights to you’re beliefs about abortion.
So all these conscience-protection regulations we’ve had are going away, but that makes sense if they didn’t come from God. And when you have a secular viewpoint—and that’s why it is so important to continue to preserve and fight for little bitty acknowledgments of God because it keeps reminding us that wait a minute, God’s part of our government, God is involved in our philosophy of government, God is part of what we have in our documents. We got to remember that. When you forget that, when you forget that God is part of the equation, you will lose your prosperity, you will lose your rights, you will lose your stability, you will lose all those things that have been at the base of that. So, this really is a big deal.
