Bush thinks God wants him as President
 

REF: http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/...667694439.html


Wow. I respect everyone's faith, but I think there should be a clear seperation of church and state. Isn't a Presidential candidate using his faith as an election gimmick a little too close to breaking that rule?

Mr Mephisto

I don't want to live in a universe where god plays favorites with politics or sporting events.

I'm a Christian and I think his "I'm the Christian candidate, a vote for me is a vote for Jesus." crap is completely evil and decieving. One thing I don't agree with is the super devoutness of alot of Christians when it comes to "Bible morals". Sure the Bible says being gay is wrong, but it also says that men are far superior to women and they should be treated as such. As we all know this isn't true, but people still believe homosexuality is some terrible sin and God will rain acid and brimstone on you if you are. Well, I'll let you be the judge. :|

It isn't getting around the seperation of church and state at all. No candidate has ever been - nor should they be - forced to silence their views on religion. Is it annoying? Yes.

Take a cue from The Daily Show: after showing a clip where Alan Keyes (Republican candidate for Senate in Illinois) said Jesus would never vote for his opponent, Jon Stewart replied, "But who would Jesus vote for if the alternative is Alan Keyes?"

I didn't say it was getting around the seperation of church and state, but simply asked a rhetorical question on whether it was getting "a little close". :)

I'd prefer if neither candidate played the bible card...

Mr Mephisto

I really do not wish to live in a goverment headed by a fanatical christian...

Me neither... and I'm a Christian! :crazy:

You're already living in one. :)


Mr Mephisto

"I feel that God wants me to be president" George Bush

Bwahahahaha, I think I have a new sig.

This freak is sick. Yeah, God wants you to be re-elected so you can start more wars killing more innocent people all while endangering your own country by making it more hated than it already is. Stupid jack ass is mistaking God for Lucifer. I wish his God would strike him dead with lightning.

No, I don't. I think that using one's religion for advantages in the election is a dirty trick, but I find it to be completely unrelated to the first amendment. A candidate being Christian, being STRONGLY Christian, or even believing that God wants him to be president has nothing to do with congress making laws establishing national religions or prohibiting its free exercise. A Christian president, elected by the people, acting like a Christian because he is one is 100% unrelated to government making laws favoring one religion over another.

At the same time, we get to say "This guy thinks God 'wants him' to be president? Good thing I know how delusional he is before Nov 2!" ;)

Nonetheless, freedom OF religion != freedom FROM religion

So, Bush is still hearing voices in his head.

Sounds about right to me. I don't know how anyone can just brush this stuff aside.

I'd be happy with both.

well we know what Pat Robertson thinks of him. And Bush can't be too christian calling Rev. Moon, "a vionary and great american".

Us non americans are wondering how to restore communism to it's former glory, yeah okay it didn't work but hell you got to love the idea when you hear the crap leaking from the base of Bush.

I think that "Beverly Ryan, a retired legal secretary and born-again Christian from West Palm Beach, Florida" has some thinking to do. She is not an acurate representation of Christians, as a lot of christians are not, in fact, morons.

We could all be in for some luck. Maybe God will be the only dude to vote for Bush and everyone else for Kerry.

Can God vote?? and if he could would he??

i'll stop there before i lose the point i was going to make...nope gone. Ohwell. Hope everyone who can vote does. Vote Kerry, Bush has already had his go, didn't go to well from where i'm sitting (here in lonely old England).

fundamentalist christians...yikes....my teenage experience with one of these groups helped me realize how strange they are...they make no distinction between "spiritual" propositions and political ones---which means that, for them, their propositions on the latter are not falsifiable...and that is what makes them unnerving as a political force. you see the same kind of strategies in bush's discourse as well.

What are the odds that when he loses the election, Bush states that god's will wasn't done? Or say that god didn't want him in office. Bit a pickle, that is...

Ok...that just sends cold shivers up and down my spine. That is some scary shit.

I am convinced that if there is a benevolent god he/she will not be on the side of either of the Democrat/Republican professional polititians. Both candidates shamelessly distort the truth.

Coppertop: Bush'll claim that God's will wasn't done, and that we'll be punished for it. And then he'll call up Osama and tell him to go ahead and strike.

For the record, I think the hurricanes were God's punishment for the 2000 election. :D

Wait...you mean that campaigning for the support of a group is bad?

why is this a surprise?

campaigning for their support and reproducing some of the most antidemocratic features of that particular way of thinking are not the same thing. bush could easily argue that he defends their interests, for example, without indulging in the same patterns to frame not just these positions, but the whole of his administration.

that god for example, so far as bush is concerned, thought that the war in iraq was justified played a role in the contempt the administration showed to international and national law in the run-up to and conduct of that war. because the pattern of thinking about politics leaked from the religious into the political domain. i do not know if this is true, but it makes enough sense intuitively that it make this administration pretty alarming.

Well, I agree with you djtestudo. I don't think it is. It's perfectly acceptable.

But claiming you are God's chosen one is bad.


Mr Mephisto

Gotta love the hypocracy...
 

Wow...it just amazes me. I'm a conservative, but not very religious. It just amazes me however that when a republican expresses his faith, he's a zealot, but when a white democrat shows up with Jesse Jackson at an African American church and makes a stump speech from the pulpit (which could cause that church to lose it's tax exempt status, but since it's a democrat they get away with it) it's an opportunity to reach out "to the people" and there's nothing wrong with it. Hell, the only time some of those people go to church is during an election year- that's nothing but pure opportunistic hypocracy, and it is frustrating as all out.

i think you are confusing different types of christian discourse--protestant fundamentalist discourse is a particular type--it does not cover all christian discourse--the conceptions of the relation between political and religious speech in this space is not the same as what you would find in other types. i do not see any blanket condemnation of christians either as a whole or as a diverse set of political actors here--but there **is** something basically wrong with claiming that god wants bush to be president, there is something basically wrong with an administration that thinks it is in direct communication with god---if you take the idea of democracy seriously at all, that is a problem. but again, this is a function of alignment with a particular variant of christianity--it does not extend to all of them.

Let me repeat what I said just two posts above.

It's perfectly acceptable to campaign on religious grounds or to appeal to religious groups.

It's just plain scary to claim you are chosen by God to rule the free world.


Mr Mephisto

The trouble with people who think they are an agent from God is that they believe anyone who disagrees with them must be destroyed because they are evil. I find it scary that someone who believes they are an agent from God has the power to start a nuclear war.

What amazes me is that Christians vote for this man when he thinks Rev. Moon is a "great American and true visionary".

What's sad is 30 years ago had Bush said that, the people voting voting for him and calling him a great Christian, would boo him off the stage (and rightfully so). Amazing what strange bedfellows politics makes for.

Can I say Christ was a bumbling fool, start my own cult, give N. Korean leaders my military subs and MILLIONS of dollars for their nuke weapons programs and buy a paper, print what a political party wants to hear and get called "a great American and Vissionary."

With Bush in power? Yes. Yes you can.

:)

Mr Mephisto

The fact that we have to deal with religious rhetoric entering the political realm is not only disturbing, but it's dangerous at the same time. The apathetic majority of America is impressionable enough to believe that religion now plays some key role in the scheme of politics, which is horrid.

Yes, everyone has the right to free speech and yes, everyone, if they wish, can talk about their religion. BUT, the point here is not that one should silence their beliefs or negate their 1st amendment rights, but that one should NOT be dragging their individual faith into their policies as a means of validation for said policies or to appeal to religious fanatics.

Religion has absolutely no place in American politics, and it never should. The president is meant to be a leader of the masses, and the masses do not all conform to the same religious beliefs as the man in office. To bring the morals of a faith not accepted by all not only hinders the rights and views of the citizenry, it goes against everything that this country was founded on.

Mr. Bush and every other religious nut that has been given publicity (Jerry Falwell et al) are not only disintegrating the inalienable rights and privacies of the people, they are slowing down the progress of humanity by pressing the viewpoint that faith plays some role in politics.

Perhaps the 11th commandment G-d should have given to us is, "Thou shalt keep thy religion to thyself."

To be fair, I don't believe Bush thinks those who disagree with him must be destroyed. That may be a bit of a jump in reasoning.

Bush is not an evil man. I honestly believe he is a "good man" who is doing what he thinks is best. The problem is that I disagree with almost all of his policies. What HE thinks is best, I think is worst. Add to that the fact that he is surrounded by big business cronies and we have a recipe for disaster. This, of course, is just my opinion.

Also, with regards to people in power who have access to nuclear weapons and believe they are agents of God, the same applies to Israel really. And they haven't used them aggressively.

Mr Mephisto

Simply put, Bush is an ignorant, dillusional man, that may have good intentions, but is just so out there that he is completely unfit to command the most powerful country in the world. The world already thinks were a bunch of assholes for voting him in in the first place. I really don't think it's wise to elect him back in again. Truthfully, if Bush wins this election, I think I've lost all faith in humanity. :|

Actually, Jesus had disciples so that they could spread their religion to everyone else. I hate to get religious on y'all, but you're asking for it. Bush believes he is a servant of God, and he wants to follow the plan that God has for him. Bush saying that God wants him to be President is completely logical if you assume that he is doing what God wants him to do. I know that he tries...that he prays and thinks about the decisions that he must make on a daily basis.
If Kerry truly is a follower of God, then he believes that he is doing what God wants him to...but he's most definitely not going to say that because it's unpopular to the non-religious.

when there's a Bush, a Colon and a dick in the room, someone's gettin fucked.

The way Bush feels is the same way any Christian would feel: like God has a plan for them, and that that plan is running for President. Can't criticize him for that.

Any Christian would feel like God wanted them to be the leader of the free world?


Erm... I don't think so. Also, I don't believe any Christian feels that God has a plan for them. Perhaps if you are an Anabaptist or Calvinist. But free will and a conspicious absense of predetermination are fundamental tenets to most Christian churches.

So, no. You can criticize him for that.


Mr Mephisto

I have a question for you Quick, (I maybe wrong but I get the impression you are religious?), after reading what I have said about Bush's praise on Rev. Moon and knowing what Rev. Moon stands for and believes, how can you say that Bush is truly religious? I'm not tryin to flame I'm honestly trying to understand because it seems like such hypocrasy to me.

Bush called the man Rev. Moon, (who has said he is the Messiah and runs the mother of all cults, has given leaders of N. KOrea MILLIONS of dollars for their nuke programs, has sold them his warfare capable subs (liked to know how Moon got them to begin with)) a great visionary and American, simply because Rev. Moon owns the Wash. Post and prints what Bush wants to hear.

How can you vote a man as President that praises someone that says he is the Messiah and he's going to finish Jesus' work because Jesus screwed up (I linked all this in another post), yet claim the other candidate isn't religious because he doesn't push his religion onto others?

I'm sorry after I researched the Moon, GOP, Bush connections there was not a chance I would vote for him no matter what. Because I just think Bush says he is Christian to use that base. I know of no Christian that would ever support or say "great visionary and American" in praise of a man that claims to be the Messiah, or holds coronations in Congress for himself declaring himself religious leader of the world. Tio me that is too much the book of revelations (and I'm not a big believer in the book but research it. This doesn't come from "out there conspiritorial sources" it comes from MAJOR NEWS WIRES, Rev. Moon and the WT itself.

(I linked to all these on another post, if anyone wants me to link again I shall.)

As for my views on topic:

I respect a man and his religion and believe it is great to be religious, as long as if you hold a public office your views are not pushed upon me. (EXAMPLE: I don't think a judge having the 10 commandments is wrong, I think a judge that I think a judge quoting scripture during the case or in his opinions, however is wrong. I believe a president or congressman holding prayer sessions before meetings is great, I think a president or congressman using their religion to make laws (i.e. abortion, gay marriage, etc.) they do is wrong. I believe if a community votes religious and passes laws based on their beliefs we should respect that. Noone is forced to live in that area, it is not a federal case, it should never be. I don't believe religious people have the right to impose bans across a whole state or the country because then you are talking total diversity and dictating their views to others.

How many Christians do you talk to? I have so many friends that would tell you that God has a plan for them. Free will and predetermination are a completely separate issue--I believe you have a choice whether or not you follow God's plan, and surely no one follows it exactly. We're not puppets on a string.

And I don't believe that God wants me to be the President. Bush believes that God does want him to be President, and I respect that. This is not a reason to vote for him(or against him)--John Kerry as a Christian should feel the same way.

In response to pan6467, I agree that Rev. Moon (is he a reverend?) is a major quack. Maybe by visionary Bush meant delusionary...
Also, I didn't say that Kerry isn't religious, I said that he doesn't show his religion the way that Bush does. I completely agree with your understaniding of the separation between church and state, and I too think a Constitutional ban on gay marriage is dumb (it would never pass, so I'm really not concerned about it).
I really do believe that Bush is a Christian, and I can tell from the way that he talks about his religion, and the way that he lights up when he talks about it. But again, that's not the reason to vote for him(or against him).

of course it is a reason to vote against him--
unless you share the same set of assumptions, bush's entire worldview is irrational. for it to function as irrelevant, you would have to yourself be a fundamentalist protestant.
i was raised catholic and have never met anyone who ascribes to catholicism who imagines the relation of god to believer in the same terms as a fundamentalist protestant.

and who are the fundamentalists to impose their particular, kinda bizarre understanding of what constitutes "real faith" on others?

and what turn of events has brought us to the point where they do not have to frame themselves as being a particular set of believers, operating in particular cirumstances, on the basis of a very particular set of assumptions about the nature of belief?

and what does any element of that belief system have to do with democracy?

how could you expect someone who thinks god whispers in his ear to take opposition seriously?

and how is the inability to consider what opposing viewpoints have to say not a recipe for irrationality?

and how has the bush administration not demonstrated this problem again and again and again?

and if this is not a criterion that can and maybe should influence how you vote, then what is?

Religion should have no place in politics... As a Canadian I am always astounded at the amount of influence religion has in US politics. We had a Federal politician who tried to play the religion card (Stockwell Day). He ended up losing many votes because no one trusted him to keep his religion out of the office.

...and people say there is no difference between Canadians and Americans...

Look at what's happening in Europe. The whole European Commission (sort of like a cabinet for European politics) is being rejected by the European Parliament because one of them has gone on record with his devout Catholic views...

As Charlatan says, religion has no part in politics.

Mr Mephisto

Why do you believe that Bush thinks "God whispers in his ear?" If he thought that, he would seem as crazy and radical as "Rev." Moon over at the Wash. Post. I seriously doubt that most Christians believe such a thing, so why pinpoint the President as one who does so?

And perhaps other countries have shunned religion from politics because their culture has become more secular. If you are really true to yourself, and your religion is part of who you are, how can it not be a part of the choices that you make? In other countries, there may be a majority who do not share these beliefs, and therefore disagree with the choices a religious politician would make. But right now in America, for the lives of a large number of people, the ties of religion are strong.

Don't forget who first implemented the idea of separation of church and state. It has a certain interpretation which has already been discussed on this thread, and, in my opinion, it is not the interpretation that has been given in the last few posts. Respectful disagreement--let me leave it at that.

dictators always think they're chosen by god to do atrocities...

Senator Harkin believes that God wants Kerry to win. http://www.cedarvalleydailytimes.com...ews/news01.txt.

I'm so confused now.

Let's hear some Harkin bashing.

According to Osama Bin Laden, god wants Americans dead... so someone's story doesn't match here!

*shakes fist at the sky*

*sigh* A world without religion would be far more peaceful. I wish there was a way to just have religion cease to exist.

LOL, God is causing too much death :D.

Agreed. Let's kill god!

Moon owns the Washington Times. Not the Wasington Post.

Just FYI.

Erm... I don't think you know what you're talking about. One of the most popular books on the Christian circuit right now is "A Purpose Driven Life" by Rick Warren. It is basically explaining that God has a plan for you in your life, and that if you really want what is good for you, you will pray to him and his will (or his plan) will be carried out. The free will part comes when you accept it or not. This isn't a new concept. You are thinking of predestination, which the Calvinists and Anabaptists both believe, which you probably learned in your high school history class. This says that God picks who goes to heaven or hell before they are born. So if Bush is following God's plan, of course he thinks God wants him to be President. Read into a religion a little bit before you talk about it.

tspikes,

Thank you for the personal attack.

With regards to predetermination, you're right. I got the word mixed up.

I do know what I'm talking about. The fact that someone called Rick Warren wrote a book saying that "God has a plan for you" is entirely irrelevant. I was born a Catholic (as were millions of others) and we do NOT believe God has a plan to each of us. As I said earlier, the concept of free will is fundamental to (the vast majority of) Christian churches. Free will implies that it is up to the individual to decide what they do, where they go, how they act etc.

The whole idea that God has a "plan" for everyone is anathema to a lot of Christians.

Please come down off that soap-box, lose the airs and graces, and keep your nasty remarks to yourself.


Mr Mephisto

First, as a Catholic, I want to point out that I agree with Mr Mephisto.

Second, I question anyone who 1) states that they have God on their side or 2) states that they are doing God's will. I don't think any person with a sensible view of religion can claim to know what "God's will" is. That, there is a big difference between "I am doing God's will" and "I believe this is what God would like me to do in this situation." The latter doesn't bother me since it acknowledges that, while the person believes they are doing the right thing by God, they do not know God's will and, therefore, are open to acknowledging in the future that they have made a mistake. In short, I'm leery of anyone who claims to have God "on their side."

As far as religious involvement in politics, I see a disturbing trend in the western world toward wanting freedom FROM religion. The fact is, as much contempt as one may have for religion, this philosophy infringes on the first amendment rights of people to openly practice their religion. When one says "religion has no place in politics," it should be seen as to mean precisely what the first amendment says it does: the government cannot make any laws favoring any religion (or lack thereof) over others.

If a politician is Christian and pro-life for example, there is nothing wrong with that politician saying "I am Christian, therefore I am voting against this abortion bill." Religion is a fundamental part of who a person is and therefore cannot be expected to be ignore when making decisions. This is where the democratic part of our republic comes in: if we don't like the way the politician is voting or going to vote, we get to not vote for him. It's simply silly to expect that all politicians will flat out ignore their religion, being such a fundamental part of their person, when they vote. This is what WE are for, to say "I don't agree with how you will or how you have been doing your job (perhaps because I don't agree with your religion's stance on many issues) and will therefore not be voting for you."

I will never fault a politician for caring about his religion and letting it guide him and his actions. Likewise, I will never vote for a politician who's views do not match my own to a fair degree. Furthermore, even if a politician's views DO match my own, I will never vote for a politician who claims to have God on her side, as if there was some phone line she could use to call God up directly and ask what to do. This shows that, while the politician may agree with me, their logic and pragmatism is fundamentally flawed.