home

Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card

By Jeralyn, Section Other Politics
Posted on Sun Jun 12, 2005 at 12:43:47 PM EST
Tags: (all tags)
Share This: Digg! StumbleUpon del.icio.us reddit reddit

Texas Governor Perry may not be as adept as Bush and Rove at playing the evangelical card, but this is still pretty scary.

Even for Texas, the scene was remarkable: The governor, flanked by an out-of-state televangelist and religious right leaders, signing legislation in a church school gymnasium amid shouts of "amen" from backers who just as well could have been attending a revival.

The protesters were out, but there needs to be a bigger public outcry against this sort of thing.

It wasn't just the blatant blend of church and state that made the gathering in Fort Worth unusual. Advance publicity also attracted about 300 angry protesters - unheard of for the routine business of ceremonial bill signings.

< Site News | Joe Biden Feels a Draft >

  • The Online Magazine with Liberal coverage of crime-related political and injustice news

  • Contribute To TalkLeft


    • Display: Sort:
    Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card | 11 comments (11 topical)
    Re: Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card (none / 0) (#1)
    by jarober on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:57 PM EST
    So the next time a Democrat campaigns in a black church, I expect that you'll throw a fit and state that it's scary, hmm?

    Re: Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card (none / 0) (#2)
    by glanton on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:57 PM EST
    Strangely, I gotta go with JR on this. I don't see why it's a problem for a politico to attend~campaign in a church, or even signing a bill in one. Only if the bill itself violates church/state divisions--i.e., imposes some fundie vision onto those of us who live in 2005--does it become frightening. This is different from what Chan Channing in North Carolina did, for example, when he tossed out members of his congregation who voted Democratic. That was the action of a moral and metaphyscial worm. None of this changes the fact that Perry sucks--he's an opportunist and a pretty incompetent one at that. To be an ineffective Republican Governor in the clone state of Texas is to take incompetence to new levels. He's probably going to get his tail kicked down here by Hutchison in a GOP primary before 2006.

    Re: Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card (none / 0) (#3)
    by ppjakajim on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:58 PM EST
    glanton - You agree with JR? Good heavens, I thought I felt the world stop for a second. Two quick points. First, you are right. I don't see how politicians speaking in a church violates the constitution. Secondly, I still get a chuckle watching the Left go into spasms when a cross is waved... Must be some vampire in the group genetic make up. Are you sure you're not a closet conservative? ;-) BTW - I have never heard of a Baptist church where the preacher can throw people out. If done, it is done by the elders.

    Re: Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card (none / 0) (#4)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:58 PM EST
    I bet the gov. believes in Santa Claus too. Maybe he'll sign the next bill at the North Pole or the Easter Bunny's rabbit hole.

    Re: Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card (none / 0) (#5)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:00 PM EST
    Black churches catering to Democratic politicians back the correct and proper causes, not like those evangelicals.

    Re: Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card (none / 0) (#6)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:00 PM EST
    Uh, Democrats don't sign bills at black churches...unless you have proof...

    Re: Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card (none / 0) (#7)
    by Sailor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:00 PM EST
    "And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hyprocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly." (Matthew 6:5-6)

    Re: Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card (none / 0) (#9)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:00 PM EST
    is the quote from Matthew an admonition to evangelicals to shut up? hypocrites have a right to speak the same as anyone else. if you don't see liberals going into such conniptions, you haven't read many papers lately(in case you didn't realize it, the evangelicals are the equivalent of the jihadists-it makes libs feel braver to oppose them when compared to actual head cutters).

    Re: Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card (none / 0) (#10)
    by glanton on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:00 PM EST
    Ed, I'm assuming since you use the word "conniption" you're responding to my post. If so you do it quite poorly, as you fail to address the second sentence in my second paragraph, which explains the driving force behind the vitriole you complain of. Be intellectually honest and ask yourself, why do secular people as well as religious people to the left of Falwell fear the current evangelical uprising? It has nothing whatever to do with disrespecting religion. It is because we don't want to be subjected and held accountable, at the point of a gun, to your sense of OUGHT. The jihad comparison becomes frighteningly apt when you have United States Senators talking about the death penalty for abortion doctors and insisting that they ought to have the right to incacerate homosexuals. It becomes frighteningly apt when you have ever-growing pressures on the FCC to 'crack down' on "objectionable" material aired on the public waves. So too does it become apt when you have theater houses, art galleries, and the like getting hammered with audits and citations at a rate unseen since the McCarthy era; and meanwhile our public schools find themselves dragged backwards right into the teeth of the Scopes Trials. Even our hospices now become your playground. You cannot, will not live and let live. All must pray to your God or their citizenship is negotiable. Why then does it surprise you that in sticking your righteous beaks into our private lives, you often inspire resentment and even hatred?

    Re: Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card (none / 0) (#11)
    by ppjakajim on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:01 PM EST
    Glanton - My, my, touchy aren't we? I hate to tell you this dear boy, but your sense of humor is as hidden as your conservative actions. Tell us, what evil did the Preacher do to you? My comment re the cross? Just hit the TL archives and check out the threads that have anything to do with religion. The spasms of outrage produce enough bile to slime the entire US. Blagh - Signing a bill in a church is not illegal, immoral or fattening.

    Re: Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card (none / 0) (#13)
    by Dadler on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:00:01 PM EST
    Jim, As to your "liberals fearing the waving cross" -- just hogwash, man. Religion, crosses, faith, sprituality, the mystery of existence, all of them are perfectly harmless and inoffensive to me UNTIL they start speaking and seeking power using the same kind of theological and social absolutism that our buddies in Al Qaeda would love to hear. Being a rational creature in a cold, indifferent, irrational universe is a terrible burden for many people. It's hard on the mind and the "soul". Why man created gods and goddesses and religions in the first place. For comfort and solace, for some response to the "why are we here?" question that is SOOOO endlessly confounding and, as far as we know, always will be.

    Texas Gov. Plays the Evangelical Card | 11 comments (11 topical)