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The "God Bless America" test
Seattle Times | 4/22/08 | David Domke and Kevin Coe

Posted on 04/22/2008 9:15:17 AM PDT by Eva

For Barack Obama, campaign 2008 has been a series of absurd but consequential tests.

First, there was the faith test: Profess publicly that Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior. .......

Then there was the patriotism test: Recite the Pledge of Allegiance and wear an American flag lapel pin......

Having passed the God test and the country test, Obama recently has been subjected to the God and country test: Embrace the nation's beloved slogan, "God bless America."

When the Rev. Jeremiah Wright's remix of this political favorite began to hit the airwaves, ...Obama... attempt damage control, appeared on cable news....

Three days later, though, Obama concluded a speech in Pennsylvania by saying "God bless America." .....

..... the fact that Obama — or any other candidate — must face such a test points to the deterioration of the American political environment.

But Reagan brought "God bless America" into the mainstream by regularly using it to conclude his speeches. Since then, presidents and other politicians have used it nearly to death. ..... "God bless America" has become the Pennsylvania Avenue equivalent to consumerized Madison Avenue staples.

That's the problem with the "God bless America" test: Like most of the other tests that constitute modern political discourse, it doesn't mean anything.....

Asking candidates to demonstrate their God and country bona fides by parroting a political catchphrase is insulting and unnecessary. Journalists' and pundits' time would be far better spent interrogating the actual beliefs of those candidates so willing to ask God to bless America. After all, had the phrase not been rendered all but meaningless through overuse, "God bless America" would have to be taken as a serious theological proposition.

Today, it's just more of the noise that passes for serious political matters.


TOPICS: Philosophy; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: obama; obomber; patriot; patriotism; religion; revwright; wright
These writers are the authors of a book, the God Strategy: How Religion became a political weapon in America.

I guess these guys came out with their book a little too late to help Barack Obama. The left thinks that it is Obama's religion that is doing him in; it's not. Obama's problem is that his religion is nothing more than a political philosophy, Marxism.

1 posted on 04/22/2008 9:15:18 AM PDT by Eva
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To: Eva
That's the problem with the "God bless America" test: Like most of the other tests that constitute modern political discourse, it doesn't mean anything.....

Not to you, certainly, not to Holy Hussein, and not to the publishers of the Seattle Times.

2 posted on 04/22/2008 9:18:18 AM PDT by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
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To: Eva

They are wrong. Obama hasn’t passed the country test. I think he’s a commie.


3 posted on 04/22/2008 9:20:11 AM PDT by TigersEye (Berlin 1936. Beijing 2008. Moscow 1980 Olympic Games for murdering regimes.)
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To: Eva
The left thinks that it is Obama's religion that is doing him in; it's not.

Correct. What's doing Obama in is that a lot of people simply don't agree with him politically.
4 posted on 04/22/2008 9:20:40 AM PDT by arderkrag (Libertarian Nutcase (Political Compass Coordinates: 9.00, -2.62 - www.politicalcompass.org))
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To: Eva

Definition of a democrat: Politics is everything and everything is politics.


5 posted on 04/22/2008 9:23:27 AM PDT by Some Fat Guy in L.A. (Nope. Not gonna do it.)
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To: Eva
The author is a anti-christian bigot.

Yeah...thats right a bigot. Most likely an ACLU card carrying bigot to be more exact.

The problem with this article is that the author seeks, once more, to make any link between Christianity and our country a falsehood of sorts. After all we are a country that has “Separation of Church and State” you know that recent phenomena INVENTed out of thin air by people who have been controlling the academic side of our nation for some time. They have been successful in making a lie truth and the truth a lie.

No one here can show any evidence that the US being a Christian Nation harms them, hinders them or in any way causes offense...it is purely PERCEIVED and the perception has become the reality.

We are to blame too...for we never revealed these people loud enough or with enough enthusiasm to get the rest of the sheeple to do something about it...namely never vote the likes of them into office.

What to do now? Proclaim the truth...stop apologizing for it and show them for what they are at every opportunity and like Hillary's sniper story it will eventually fall apart.

6 posted on 04/22/2008 9:23:57 AM PDT by ICE-FLYER (God bless and keep the United States of America)
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To: Eva
That's the problem with the "God bless America" test: Like most of the other tests that constitute modern political discourse, it doesn't mean anything...

It sure means something if a feller has trouble saying it.

7 posted on 04/22/2008 9:28:20 AM PDT by SamuraiScot
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To: Eva

Don’t you people see? The tenets of conservatives’ beliefs are “weapons”; the tenets of liberals’ beliefs are, well, just “obvious”...


8 posted on 04/22/2008 9:28:39 AM PDT by Migraine (Diversity is great...(until it happens to YOU).)
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To: Eva

But Hussein passed the global jihad test, for sure.


9 posted on 04/22/2008 9:30:55 AM PDT by roses of sharon ( (Who will be McCain's maverick?))
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To: Eva

“the fact that Obama — or any other candidate — must face such a test points to the deterioration of the American political environment”

try running a candidate who doesnt hate the foundation that this country was built on, and you wont have these pesky questions about patriotism.


10 posted on 04/22/2008 9:32:38 AM PDT by tm61
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To: ICE-FLYER

I read, on a web site that was explaining the relationship between Liberation Theology and Marxism, that they considered secularists to be capitalists who believe in freedom of religion, and that Marxists believe in freedom from religion.

That is what we are hearing from the left now days, the demand for freedom from religion. That is why the Marxists redefined religion in the Liberation Theology, to provide for a generic kind of God whose tenets can be universally accepted without accepting any of the dogma.


11 posted on 04/22/2008 9:35:17 AM PDT by Eva (CHANGE - the new euphemism for Marxist revolution)
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To: Cicero

Hey, don’t lump me in with the non-believers!


12 posted on 04/22/2008 9:36:11 AM PDT by Eva (CHANGE - the new euphemism for Marxist revolution)
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To: Eva
I've got a test for ya:

How about the "I hate my country test," whereby you ONLY state the negatives, ONLY talk about how we're "losing" in Iraq and "that we have no reason for fighting the Islamic whackos" anyway, and the ONLY god they will acknowledge is some Gaia/druid or rock.

Oops, most of the Dems passed the test.

13 posted on 04/22/2008 9:37:53 AM PDT by LS (CNN is the Amtrak of News)
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To: TigersEye

They are wrong because the writers think that Obama wants to separate church and state. The truth is that Obama’s church is nothing but his political philosophy.


14 posted on 04/22/2008 9:37:56 AM PDT by Eva (CHANGE - the new euphemism for Marxist revolution)
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To: Eva

Liberals range of intelligence: From the brain-damaged, to the brain-dead.


15 posted on 04/22/2008 9:39:09 AM PDT by Free ThinkerNY ((((Truth to a Liberal, is like a crucifix to a vampire))))
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To: Some Fat Guy in L.A.
Definition of a democrat: Politics is everything and everything is politics....especially in Liberation Theology.
16 posted on 04/22/2008 9:39:36 AM PDT by Eva (CHANGE - the new euphemism for Marxist revolution)
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To: SamuraiScot
It sure means something if a feller has trouble saying it.

I agree.

17 posted on 04/22/2008 9:40:56 AM PDT by Eva (CHANGE - the new euphemism for Marxist revolution)
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To: Eva

“We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst.” — C.S. Lewis


18 posted on 04/22/2008 9:41:49 AM PDT by paterfamilias
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To: Migraine

Christian beliefs can only be considered weapons by those who feel the need to duck and cover their actions.


19 posted on 04/22/2008 9:44:11 AM PDT by Eva (CHANGE - the new euphemism for Marxist revolution)
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To: paterfamilias
“We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst.” — C.S. Lewis

Oh, I like that quote! Can I use it for my tagline?

20 posted on 04/22/2008 9:46:37 AM PDT by Eva (CHANGE - the new euphemism for Marxist revolution)
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To: Eva

Oh, sorry. By “you” I meant David Domke and Kevin Coe, the authors of that question.


21 posted on 04/22/2008 9:55:53 AM PDT by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
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To: Eva

The Pope’s last words in America were “God Bless America”.

Unlike politicians like Obama, the Pope actually meant it!


22 posted on 04/22/2008 10:05:10 AM PDT by oldbill
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To: Eva

Be my guest. I don’t think C.S. would mind


23 posted on 04/22/2008 10:48:40 AM PDT by paterfamilias
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To: Eva
I wish folks would drop accusing them of the “Freedom from Religion” line because that is soft pedaling it. They are ANTI-Christian Bigots and should be called such. In the United States you have enjoyed freedom from religion since July 4th, 1776. They know this too. But the freedom from religion is only a way to suggest, falsely, that they are forced in the United States to observe anything.
24 posted on 04/22/2008 11:13:43 AM PDT by ICE-FLYER (God bless and keep the United States of America)
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To: ICE-FLYER

I have previously stated that the left wing sees Obama as the political anti-Christ with a lower case “a”, rather than the Biblical Anti-Christ. I stopped using the phrase because it was being misinterpreted. Yes, the leftists hate Christianity and Judaism because both religions answer to a higher power than the state and are based on the exercise of free will.


25 posted on 04/22/2008 11:25:27 AM PDT by Eva (CHANGE - the new euphemism for Marxist revolution)
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To: Eva
But Reagan brought "God bless America" into the mainstream by regularly using it to conclude his speeches.
Is it just me, or is it not true that all presidents have signed off that way?

This smells like a way to diminish a tradition by assigning it to a single recent president.

Although Reagan was sincere when saying it.


26 posted on 04/22/2008 11:31:00 AM PDT by conservatism_IS_compassion (The Democratic Party is only a front for the political establishment in America - Big Journalism.)
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To: conservatism_IS_compassion
Oh, but the writers did mention one other president that used the phrase, Richard Nixon. Yes, it was a way to diminish the meaning of the phrase, because we all know that the left thinks that neither Richard Nixon nor Ronald Reagan ever said anything meaningful.

Richard Nixon used it to conclude an April 30, 1973, speech about Watergate.

27 posted on 04/22/2008 12:17:34 PM PDT by Eva (CHANGE - the new euphemism for Marxist revolution)
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