Quarter-billionaire Mitt Romney to Soledad O’Brien on CNN:
“Romney says, “I’m not concerned about the very poor. We have a safety net there. If it needs a repair , I’ll fix it. I’m not concerned about the very rich…. I’m concerned about the very heart of America, the 90-95 percent of Americans who right now are struggling.”
O’Brien asked him to clarify his remarks saying, “There are lots of very poor Americans who are struggling who would say, ‘That sounds odd.’”
Romney continues, “We will hear from the Democrat party, the plight of the poor…. You can focus on the very poor, that’s not my focus….”
Some statistics:
•Nearly 47 million people were in poverty in the US in 2010, up from 37.3 million in 2007. That was the 4th year in a row in which the number of people in poverty increased. In the 52 years that poverty rates have been being published, this is the largest number ever.
•20.5 million Americans are in “extreme poverty.” That is, their family income is $10,000 or less a year for a family of 4, about half that of the poverty line. But since they’re so well taken care of, Romney is not interested in those 20 million people. Or maybe it is because he knows that they don’t typically vote, being too busy on Tuesdays trying to make a living.
• There were 17.2 million households or about 1 in 7 that were food insecure in the US in 2010, the highest number ever recorded. (“Food insecure” means “at risk of going hungry.” About 1/3 of these households, or over 6 million, actually went hungry at some points of the year because they were not able to afford food. This hunger encompassed the children as well. Romney’s safety net is leaving millions of children hungry at times. He seems to get plenty of nice meals.)
=============== .. you have posted some on this and the title is a bit familiar, but a search didn't get it, so ..
Are the faithful really more charitable? .. Guest post: .. flip flopped ..
Today we have a guest post by the estimable Sigmund, who analyzes recent claims that religious people donate more to charity than do nonbelievers.
Faith and Charity – what the evidence reveals
by Sigmund
While many on the pro-faith side of the science/religion debate are hardly shy about claiming nonscientific but “equally valid” means of acquiring knowledge, in particular, religious experience and revelation, there remains one circumstance in which the religious do insist on empirical data: when it appears to support their particular religion.
One such topic is the question of whether religion promotes increased levels of charity. Several previous studies have tacked this topic, most coming to the conclusion that higher religiosity is positively associated with higher levels of charitable giving—both religious and secular -—and that religious individuals are more likely to volunteer to help out in the community.
However, the question of religion and charity is not a simple one. A complicated relationship exists between political viewpoint, levels of religiosity and practical measures of involvement in a religious community such as frequency of church attendance.
Direct donations to churches and to religious charities make up nearly half of all charitable giving by US households. It is questionable, however, whether this figure alone is evidence that church donations help the needy of society at large rather than simply support the religious organization itself. Mark Chaves, in his book Congregations in America, .. http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674012844 .. points out that even religious congregations that promote social service activity spend less than 3 percent of an average congregation’s budget on these programs.
However, despite the low percentage of charitable spending by churches as institutions, religious individuals seem more likely to donate to charity. As noted by Arthur Brooks in “Religious Faith and Charitable Giving” Policy Review (2003), .. http://www.hoover.org/publications/policy-review/article/6577 .. “Believers give more to secular charities than non-believers do.” This tendency towards charitable giving was not simply a question of religious people financially supporting their own church, as the average religious household’s donations to nonreligious charities is 14 percent more than that of the average secular household.
The question therefore remains what particular factors motivate individuals to donate to charity. Is it a question of religious belief, practice or political ideology, or are there other factors that may be of primary importance in encouraging higher levels of charitable donations? Of particular interests to readers of WEIT is the question of whether religion is a cause of charitable giving or is simply facilitates it as a side effect of particular practices that could also exist in a non-religious context. In other words, is it belief in God that makes people charitable, or the sociality that goes along with belonging to a church or a religion?
written by sociologist Brandon Vaidyanathan and colleagues from the University of Notre Dame and Calvin College. The studies examine whether earlier conclusions about religion, politics and charity can be clarified by a finer analysis of recently collected sociological data.
To address these issues, the authors examined several sets of sociological survey data involving the nexus of religion, politics and charitable giving.
In ‘Religion and Charitable Financial Giving to Religious and Secular Causes: Does Political Ideology Matter?’, .. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1468-5906.2011.01584.x/abstract .. published in the ‘Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion’ the authors examined which factors best explain the finding that individuals who describe themselves as evangelical Christians donate higher amounts to charity compared to religious liberals. Conservative academics, such as Brooks, have suggested that political ideology is the key issue here: in other words, political conservatism, to which evangelical Christianity is closely associated, encourages a higher level of personal charitable donations than does political liberalism, which promotes the notion of higher taxes being used to help the needy.
Using data produced by the Panel Study on American Ethnicity and Religion, Vaidyanathan and colleagues concluded that:
“For both religious and nonreligious giving, the effect of political ideology is completely mediated by participation in religious and civic practices. These findings support recent arguments on “practice theory” in cultural sociology and suggest that it is less the effect of ideology than of active participation in religious, political, and community organizations that explains Americans’ financial giving to religious and nonreligious organizations.”
In other words it is the community aspect of religion rather than political viewpoint that seems to be the most important factor in donation to charity. Those individuals who were less regular churchgoers – such as the average mainstream Protestant—donated on average considerably less than did evangelicals. On the other hand, evangelicals who were less regular churchgoers donated less, while non-evangelical liberal Christians who were more frequent churchgoers tended to donate more.
In the remaining two studies, ‘Substitution or Symbiosis? Assessing the Relationship between Religious and Secular Giving’, .. http://socialforces.unc.edu/content/90/1/157.abstract .. published in the journal ‘Social Forces,’ and ‘Motivations for and Obstacles to Religious Financial Giving’, http://socrel.oxfordjournals.org/content/72/2/189.abstract .. published in the journal ‘Sociology of Religion’ the authors tackled the question of whether charitable giving to religious causes impinges (either positively or negatively) on giving to secular causes, and examined, in an interview setting, the reasoning of the faithful themselves about their charitable donations.
In the former paper the authors confirmed earlier studies showing that higher religious donation is associated with increased donations to secular charities.
Examining three waves of national panel data, we find that the relationship between religious and secular giving is generally not of a zero-sum nature; families that increase their religious giving also increase their secular giving.
They concluded that ”this finding is best accounted for by a practice theory of social action which emphasizes how religious congregations foster skills and practices related to charitable giving.”
In other words, certain practices encourage traditions of giving that result in individuals becoming more likely to donate to charities as a whole, both religious and secular. This conclusion resembled that of Brooks 2003 study in that practical advantage of religious practice appeared to create an environment for teaching practices to the younger generation—in this case the positive practice of donation to charity.
The final study involved the question of explaining of the self-described motivations for charitable and religious contributions, taken from personal interviews and church financial information from the Northern Indiana Congregational (NIC) study. This paper confirmed some of the findings of the previous two papers.
One feature worth noting from personal interviews was that much of the pattern of charitable donations seemed highly socialized—in other words, it was something an individual’s parents had done and the offspring were simply carrying on a family tradition. In other cases it seemed normative—individuals were doing what they thought everyone else was expected to do in the congregation. One interesting finding was described as “giving illiteracy”: data showed that a large fraction of religious people claimed to have donated far more than the church financial records reveal they actually gave.
While these studies may provide some small comfort for faitheists who claim that religion has certain valuable aspects .. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2011/sep/30/heathens-progress-part-one-stalemate .. with positive effects on society, the effects themselves are clearly not exclusive to religion, but are, rather, a side effect of the congregational nature of religious practice. Membership in an active community, religious or secular, promotes the communication of information about specific social problems that can be addressed through charitable donations or through volunteering time and effort.
What remains an open question is whether secular-based alternatives can replace the current church led dominance of the US charity scene. Nevertheless, the fact that 60% of religious charitable donations are provided by just 5% of congregants suggests that religion is itself an inefficient device towards this end.
Finally, I should note that the studies discussed here are confined to the United States. The picture of charitable donation in societies with lower levels of religiosity .. http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/sep/08/charitable-giving-country .. suggests that church attendance is hardly a prerequisite for altruistic behavior, for some of the least religious countries are among those donating the highest amounts to charity.
American Election Watch 1: Rick Santorum and The Dangers of Theocracy
by Maya Mikdashi
[GOP Candidates at New Hampshire Debate; Image from NYTimes.com]
One day after returning to the United States after a trip to Lebanon, I watched the latest Republican Presidential Primary Debate. Unsurprisingly, Iran .. http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/3920/sanctioning-iran_an-interview-on-irans-ruling-bloc .. loomed large in questions related to foreign policy. One by one (with the exception of Ron Paul) the candidates repeated President Obama's demand that Iran not block access to the Strait of Hormuz and allow the shipping of oil across this strategic waterway. Watching them, I was reminded of Israel's demand that Lebanon not exploit its own water resources in 2001-2002. .. http://www.waternet.be/jordan_river/wazzani.htm .. Israel's position was basically that Lebanon's sovereign decisions over the management of Lebanese water resources was a cause for war. In an area where water is increasingly the most valuable resource, Israel could not risk the possibility that its water rich neighbor might disrupt Israel's ability to access Lebanese water resources through acts of occupation, underground piping, or unmitigated (because the Lebanese government has been negligent in exploiting its own water resources) river flow. In 2012, the United States has adopted a similar attitude towards Iran, even though the legal question of sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz is much more complicated and involves international maritime law in addition to Omani and Iranian claims of sovereignty. But still, US posturing towards Iran is reminiscent of Israeli posturing towards Lebanon. It goes something like this: while the US retains the right to impose sanctions on Iran and continuously threaten war over its alleged pursuit of a nuclear weapon, Iran should not dare to assume that it can demand the removal of US warships from its shores and, more importantly, should not dream of retaliating in any way to punitive sanctions imposed on it. One can almost hear Team America's animated crew breaking into song . . . “America . . . Fuck Yeah!”
During the debate in New Hampshire, Rick Santorum offered a concise answer as to why a nuclear Iran would not be tolerated and why the United States-the only state in the world that has actually used nuclear weapons, as it did when it dropped them on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki- should go to war over this issue. Comparing Iran to other nuclear countries that the United States has learned to “tolerate” and “live with” such as Pakistan and North Korea, Santorum offered this succinct nugget of wisdom: Iran is a theocracy. Coming from a man who has stated that Intelligent Design should be taught in schools, that President Obama is a secular fanatic, that the United States is witnessing a war on religion, and that God designed men and women in order to reproduce and thus marriage should be only procreative (and thus heterosexual and “fertile”), Santorum's conflation of “theocracy” with “irrationality” seemed odd. But of course, that is not what he was saying. When Santorum said that Iran was a theocracy .. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/georgetown-on-faith/post/religion-at-the-gop-debate/2012/01/08/gIQA65pAkP_blog.html .. what he meant is that Iran is an Islamic theocracy, and thus its leaders are irrational, violent, and apparently (In Santorum's eyes) martyrdom junkies. Because Iran is an Islamic theocracy, it cannot be “trusted” by the United States to have nuclear weapons. Apparently, settler colonial states such as Israel (whose claim to “liberal “secularism” .. http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/3007/the-making-of-a-secular-democracy_law-marriage-and .. http://www.albawaba.com/editorchoice/secularism-israel-still-threatened-ultra-orthodox-community-408211 .. is tenuous at best), totalitarian states such as North Korea, or unstable states such as Pakistan (which the United States regularly bombs via drones and that is currently falling apart because, as Santorum stated, it does not know how to behave without a “strong” America) do not cause the same radioactive anxiety. In Santorum's opinion, a nuclear Iran would not view the cold war logic of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) as a deterrent. Instead, the nation of Iran would rush to die under American or Israeli nuclear bombs because martyrdom is a religious (not national, Santorum was quick to state, perhaps realizing that martyrdom for nation is an ideal woven into the tapestry of American ideology) imperative. Santorum's views on Iran can be seen one hour and two minutes into the debate.
When it comes to Islam, religion is scary, violent and irrational, says the American Presidential candidate who is largely running on his “faith based” convictions. This contradiction is not surprising, given that in the United States fundamentalist Christians regularly and without irony cite the danger that American muslims pose-fifth column style- to American secularism. After all, recently Christian fundamentalist groups succeeded in pressuring advertisers to abandon a reality show that (tediously) chronicled the lives of “American Muslims” living in Detroit. The great sin committed by these American Muslims was that they were too damn normal. .. http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-lowes-muslim-20111213,0,5909694.story .. Instead of plotting to inject sharia law into the United States Constitution, they were busy shopping at mid-western malls. Instead of marrying four women at a time and vacationing at Al-Qaeda training camps in (nuclear, but not troublingly so) Pakistan, these “American Muslims” were eating (halal) hotdogs and worrying about the mortgages on their homes and the rising costs of college tuition. Fundamentalist Christians watched this boring consumer driven normalcy with horror and deduced that it must be a plot to make Islam appear compatible with American secularism. The real aim of the show, these Christian fundamentalists (who Rick Santorum banks on for political and financial support) reasoned, was to make Islam appear “normal” and a viable religious option for American citizens. Thus the reality show “All American Muslim” was revealed to be a sinister attempt at Islamic proselytizing. This in a country where Christian proselytizing is almost unavoidable. From television to subways to doorbell rings to presidential debates to busses to street corners and dinner tables-there is always someone in America who wants to share the “good news” with a stranger. Faced with such a blatant, and common, double standard, we should continue to ask “If Muslim proselytizers threaten our secular paradise, why do Christian proselytizers not threaten our secular paradise?” .. http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/1322/what-is-sharia
As the United States Presidential Elections kick into gear, we can expect the Middle East to take pride of place in questions pertaining to foreign policy. Already, Newt Gingrich who, if you forgot, has a PhD in history, has decided for all of us, once and for all, that the Palestinians alone in this world of nations are an invented people. .. http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/3783/the-invention-of-the-palestinian- .. Palestinians are not only a fraudulent people, Gingrich has taught us, they are terrorists as well. Candidates stumble over each other in a race to come up with more creative ways to pledge America's undying support .. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/rick-perrys-israel-appeal/2011/09/20/gIQAjmzliK_blog.html .. for Israel. Iran is the big baddie with much too much facial hair and weird hats. America is held hostage to Muslim and Arab oil, and must become “energy efficient” in order to free itself from the unsavory political relationships that come with such dependency. Candidates will continue to argue over whether or not President Obama should have or should not have withdrawn US troops from Iraq, but no one will bring up the reality that the US occupation of Iraq is anything but over. .. http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/3645/the-iraq-we-are-leaving-behind_interview-with-jada .. But despite the interest that the Middle East will invite in the coming election cycle, there are a few questions that we can confidently assume will not be asked or addressed. Here are a few predictions. We welcome additional questions from readers.
Question: What is the difference between Christian Fundamentalism and Muslim Fundamentalism? Which is the greater “threat” to American secularism, and why?
Question: The United States' strongest Arab ally is Saudi Arabia, an Islamic theocracy and authoritarian monarchy which (falsely) cites Islamic law to prohibit women from driving cars, voting, but has recently (yay!) .. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jan/05/knickers-saudi-arabia-women .. allowed women to sell underwear to other women. In addition, Saudi Arabia has been fanning the flames of sectarianism across the region, is the main center of financial and moral support for Al-Qaeda and is studying ways to “obtain” (the Saudi way, just buy it) a nuclear weapon-all as part and parcel of a not so cold war with Iran. Given these facts, how do you respond to critics that doubt the United States' stated goals of promoting democracy, human rights, women's rights, and “moderate” (whatever that is) Islam?
Question: Israel has nuclear weapons and has threatened to use them in the past. True or false?
Question: How are Rick Santorum's views on homosexuality (or the Christian right's views more generally) different than President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's or King Abdullah's? Can you help us tease out the differences when all three have said that as long as homosexuals do not engage in homosexual sex, it's all good?
Question: Is the special relationship between the United States and Israel more special because they are both settler colonies, or is something else going on?
from "Roughing It - A Personal Narrative [ http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0451524071 ]" as he tried to figure out the Mormons during his two day stop over in Great Salt Lake City on his way to silver mines of Nevada
All men have heard of the Mormon Bible, but few, except the elect have seen it or at least taken the trouble to read it. I brought away a copy from Salt Lake. The book is a curiosity to me. It is such a pretentious affair and yet so slow, so sleepy, such an insipid mess of inspiration. It is chloroform in print. If Joseph Smith composed this book, the act was a miracle. Keeping awake while he did it, was at any rate. If he, according to tradtion, merely translated it from certain ancient and myteriously engraved plates of copper, which he declares he found under a stone, in an out of the way locality, the work of translating it was equally a miracle for the same reason.
The book seems to be merely a prosey detail of imaginary history with the Old Testament for a model followed by a tedious plegiarism of the New Testament. The author labored to give his words and phrases the quaint old fashioned sound and structure of our King James translation of the scriptures. The result is a mongrel, half modern glibbness and half ancient simplicity and gravity. The latter is awkward and constrained, the former natural, but grotesque by the contrast. Whenever he found his speech growing too modern, which was about every sentence or two, he ladeled in a few such scriptural phrases as, "exceeding sore," "and it came to pass," etc. and made things satisfactory again. "And it came to pass," was his pet. If he had left that out, his bible would have been only a pamphlet.
The title page goes as follows: "The Book of Mormon, an account written by the hand of Mormon upon plates taken from the plates of Nephi. Wherefore, it is an abridgement of the record of the people of Nephi, and also of the Lamanites - Written to the Lamanites, who are a remnan of the house of Israel; and also to Jew and Gentile. Written by way of commandment and also by the spirit of prophecy and of revelation - written and sealed up and hid up unto the Lord that they might not be destroyed, to come forth by the gift and power of God unto the interpretation thereof - sealed by the hand of Moroni and hid up unto the Lord, to come forth in due time by way of the Gentile - the interpretation thereof by the gift of God.
An abridgement taken from the Book of Ether, also, which is a record of the people of Jared, who were scattered at the time the Lord confounded the language of the people, when they were building a tower to get to heaven - (hid up is good, and so is wherefore, though why, wherefore? Any other word would have answered as well, though in truth it would not have sounded so scriptural.)"
Next comes the testimony of three witnesses. "Be it know unto all nations, kindreds, tongues and people unto whom this work shall come, that we, through the grace of God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ, have seen the plates which contain this record which is a record of the people of Nephi and also of the Lamanites, their brethren and also of the people of Jared, who came from the tower of which hath been spoken. And we also know that they have been translated by the gift and power of God, for His voice hath declared it unto us. Wherefore we know of a surety that the work it true. And we also testify that we have seen the engravings which are upon the plates and they have been shown unto us by the power of God and not of man. And we declare with words of soberness that an angel of God came down from heaven and he brought and laid before our eyes that we beheld and saw the plates and the engravings thereon. And we know that it by the grace of God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ that we beheld and bear record that these things are true. And it is marvelous in our eyes. Nevertheless, the voice of the Lord commanded us that we should bear record of it. Wherefore to be obedient unto the commandments of God we bear testimony to these things. And we know that if we are faithful in Christ we shall rid our garments of the blood of all men and be found spotless before the judgement seat of Christ and shall dwell with Him eternally in the heavens. And the honor be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost, which is one god, Amen. Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer and Martin Harris."
Some people have to have a world of evidence before they can come anywhere in the neighborhood of believing anything, but for me when a man tells me that he has seen the engravings which are upon the plates and not only that, but an angel was there at the time and saw them see him and probably took his receipt for it, I am very far on the road to conviction no matter whether I have ever heard of that man before or not, and even if I do not know the name of the angel or his nationality either.
Next is this, "And also the testimony of eight witnesses. Be it know unto all nations, kindreds, tongues and people unto whom this work shall come, that Joseph Smith,Jun., the translator of this work, has shown unto us the plates of which hath been spoken, which have the appearance of gold and as many of the leaves as the said Smith has translated we did handle with our hands; and we also saw the engravings thereon, all of which has the appearance of ancient work and of curious workmanship. And this we bear record of with words of soberness, that the said Smith has shown unto us, for we have seen and hefted, and know of a surety that the said Smith was got the plates of which we have spoken. And we give our names unto the world, to witness unto the world that which we have seen. And we lie not, God bearing witness of it. Christina Whitmer, Jacob Whitmer, Peter Whitmer, Jun., John Whitmer, Hiram Page, Joseph Smith, Sen., Hyrum Smith, Samuel H. Smith."
And when I am far on the road to conviction and eight men. be they grammatical or otherwise come forward and tell me that they have seen the plates too, and not only seen those plates, but hefted them, I am convinced. I couldn't feel more satisfied and at rest if then entire Whitmer family had testified.
The Mormon Bible consists of fifteen books, being the books of Jacob, Enos, Jarom, Omni, Mosiah, Zenif, Alma, Helaman, Ether, Moroni, two books of Mormon, and three of Nephi. In the first book of Nephi is a plagiarism of the Old Testament which gives an account of the exodus from Jerusalem of the children of Lehi. Then it goes on to tell of their wanderings in the wilderness during eight years and their supernatural protection by one of their number, a party by the name of Nephi. They finally reach the land of Bountiful and camp by the sea. After they had remained there for the space of many days, which is more scriptural than definite, Nephi was commanded from on high to build a ship wherein to carry the people accross the waters. He travestied Noah's ark but he obeyed orders in the matter of the plan. He finished the ship in a single day while his brethren stood by and made fun of it and of him too, saying, "our brother is a fool he thinketh that he can build a ship."
They did not wait for the timbers to dry but the whole tribe or nation sailed the next day. Then a bit of genuine nature cropped out and is revealed by outspoken Nephi with scriptural frankness. They all got on a spree. They and also their wives began to make themselves merry insomuch that they began to dance. to sing and to speak with much rudeness, yeah, they were lifted up to exceeding rudeness. Nephi tried to stop these scandalous proceedings but they tied him neck and heels and went on with their lark.
But observe how Nephi, the prophet circumvented them by the aid of the invisible powers. "And it came to pass that after they had bound me in so much that I could not move, the compass which had been prepared of the Lord did cease to work, wherefore they knew not wither they should steer the ship, in so much that there arose a great storm, yea a great and terrible tempest and we were driven back upon the waters for the space of three days. And they began to be frightened exceedingly lest they should be drowned in the sea. Nevertheless they did not loose me and on the fourth day which we had been back, the tempest began to be exceedingly sore. And it came to pass, that we were about to be swallowed up in the depths of the sea." Then they untied him. "And it came to pass, after they had loosed me, behold I took the compass and it did work wither I desired it. And it came to pass that I prayed unto the Lord and after I had prayed the winds did cease and the storm did cease and there was a great calm."
Equipped with their compass, these ancients appeared to have had the advantage of Noah. Their voyage was toward a promised land, the only name that they gave it. They reached it in safety.
Polygamy is a recent feature in the Mormon religion and was added by Brigham Young after Joseph Smith's death. Before that it was regarded as an abomination. This verse from the Mormon Bible occurs in chapter two of the book of Jacob. " For behold, thus saith the Lord. This people begin to wax in inequity, they understand not the scriputures for they seek to excuse themselves in commiting whoredoms because of the things which were written concerning David and Solomon, his son. Behold, David and Solomon truly had many wives and concubines, which thing was abominable before me, saith the Lord. Wherefore, thus saith the Lord, I have led this people forth out of the land of Jerusalem by the power of mine arm, that I might raise up unto me a righteous branch from the fruit of the loins of Joseph. Wherefore I, the Lord God, will not suffer that this people shall do like unto the people of old."
However, the project failed or at least the modern Mormon end of it, for Brigham suffers it. This verse is from the same chapter. "Behold the Lamanites, your brethren, whom you hate because of their filthiness, and the cursings which hath come upon their skins are more righteous than you, for they have not forgotten the commandment of the Lord, which was given unto our fathers, that they should have, save it for one wife. And concubines they should have none."
The following verse in the chapter nine of the book of Nephi appears to contain information not familiar to everybody. "And now it came to pass that when Jesus had ascended into heaven the multitude did disperse and every man did take his wife and his children and did return unto his own home. And it came to pass that on the morrow, when the multitude did gather together, behold Nephi did and his brother, whom he had raised from the dead, whose name was Timothy, and also his son, whose name was Jonas, and also Nathoni, and Mathonehah, his brother, and Cumen, and Cumenomni, and Jeremiah and Shemnan and Jonas and Zedikiah, and Isaiah. Now these were the names of the desciples of whom Jesus had chosen."
In order that the reader may observe how much more grandeur and picturesqueness as seen by these Mormon twelve accompanied one of the tenderest episodes in the life of our Savior than other eyes seem to have been aware of I quote the following from the same book of Nephi. "And it came to pass that Jesus spake unto them and bade them, arise. And they arose from the earth and he said unto them, blessed are ye because of your faith. And now behold my joy is full. And when he had said these words he wept and the multitude bear record of it and he took their little children one by one and blessed them and prayed unto the Father for them. And when he had done this he wept again and he spake unto the multitude and saith unto them, behold your little ones. And as they looked to behold, they cast their eyes towards heaven and they saw the heavens open and they saw angels descending out of heaven as it were in the midst of fire. And they came down and encircled those little ones about and they were encircled about with fire and the angels did minister unto them and the multitude did see and hear and bear record and they know that their record is true for they, all of them, did see and hear every man for himself and they were in number about two thousand and five hundred souls and they did consist of men, women and children." And what else would they be likely to consist of?
The book of Ether is an incomprehensible medley of history, much of it relating to battles and seiges among peoples the reader has possibly never heard of and who inhabited a country which is not set down in the geography. There was a king with the remarkable name of Coriantumr, who warred with Sharrod and Lib and Shiz and others in the planes of Heshlon and the valley Gilgal and the wilderness of Akish and the land of Moran and the plains of Agoth and Orgarth and Ramah and the land of Korihor and the hill Cumnor and by the waters of Ripliancum, etc, etc,etc.
"And it came to pass after a day of fighting that Coriantumr, upon making a calculation of his losses found that there had been slain two millions of mighty men and also all of their wives and all of their children." Say, five or six million in all. "And he began to sorrow in his heart..." Unquestionably it was time. So he wrote to Shiz asking for a cessation of hostilities and offerning to give up his kingdom to save his people. Shiz declined except upon the condition that Coriantumr would come and let him cut his head off first. A thing which Coriantumr would not let him do.
There was more fighting for a season. Then four years were devoted to gathering forces for a final struggle. After which ensued a battle which I take it, is the most remarkable set forth in history, except perhaps for that of the Kilkenny Cats, which it resembles in some respects.
This is the account of gathering and of the battle. "And it came to pass that they did gather together all the people upon all the face of the land who had not been slain save it was Ether. And it came to pass that Ether did behold all the doings of the people and he beheld that the people who were for Coriantumr were gathered together to the army of coriantumr and the people and the people who for Shiz were gathered together to the army of Shiz, wherefore they were for the space of four years gathering together the people that they might get all who were upon the face of the land and that they might recieve all the strength which it was possible that could recieve. And it came to pass that when they were all gathered together, everyone to the army which he would, with their wives and their children, both men, women and children being armed with weapons of war, having shields and breastplates and head plates, and being clothed after the manner of war, they did march forth one against the other to battle."
"And they fought all that day and conquered not. And it came to pass that when it was night they were weary and retired to their camps. And after they had retired to their camps they took up a howling and a lamentation for the loss of the slain of their people. And so great were their cries, their howlings and lamentations that it did rend the air exceedingly. And it came to pass that on the morrow they did go again to battle and great and terrible was that day. Nevertheless they conquered not and when the night came again they did rend the air with their criess and their howlings and their mournings for the loss of the slain of their people."
"And it came to pass that Coriantumr wrote again an epistle unto Shiz desiring that he would not come again to battle but that he would take the kingdom and spare the lives of the people, but behold the spirit of the Lord had ceased striving with them and Satan had full power over the hearts of people. For they were given up unto the hardness of their hearts and the blindness of their minds that they might be destroyed. Wherefore they went again unto battle."
"And it came to pass that they fought all that day and when the night came they slept upon their swords and on the morrow they fought even until the night came and when the night came they were drunken with anger, even as a man is drunken with wine and they slept again upon their swords. And on the morrow they fought again and when the night came they had all fallen by the sword save it were fifty and two of the people of corinatumr and sixty and nine of the people Shiz. And it came to pass that they slept upon their swords that night and on the morrow they fought again."
"And they contended in their mights with their swords and with their shields all that day and when the night came there were thirty and two of the people of Shiz and twenty and seven of the people of Coriantumr. And it came to pass that they ate and slept and prepared for death on the morrow. And they were large and mighty men and as to the strength of men."
"And it came to pass that they fought for the space of three hours and they fainted with the loss of blood. And it came to pass that when the men of Coriantumr had recieved sufficient strength that they could walk, they were about to flee for their lives, but behold Shiz arose and also his men and he swore in his wrath that he would slay Coriantumr or he would perish by the sword. "
"Wherefore he did pursue them and on the morrow he did overtake them and they fought again with the sword. And it came to pass that when they had all fallen by the sword save it were Coriantumr and Shiz, behold Shiz had fainted with the loss of blood. And it came to pass that when Coriantumr had leaned upon his sword, that he rested a little, he smote off the head of Shiz. And it came to pass that after he smote off the head of Shiz, that Shiz raised upon his hands and fell. And after that he had struggled for breath, he died."
"And it came to pass that Coriantumr fell to earth and became as if he had no life. And the Lord spake unto Ether and said unto him, Go forth and he went forth and beheld that words of the Lord had all been fulfilled and he finished his record. And the hundreth part I have not written." Seems a pity that he didn't finish for after all his dreary former chapters of common place he stopped just as he was in danger of becoming interesting.
The Mormon Bible is rather stupid and tiresome to read. But there is nothing vicious in its teachings. Its code of morals is unobjectionable. It's smooched from the New Testament and no credit given.
At the end of our two days sojourn we left Great Salt Lake City hearty and well fed and happy. Physically superb, but not so very much wiser as regards the Mormon question than when we arrived perhaps. We had a deal more information than we had before of course but we didn't know what portion of it was reliable and what was not, for it had all come from acquaintances of the day, strangers, strictly speaking.
We were told for instance that the dreadful Mountain Meadow Massacre was the work of the Indians entirely and that the gentiles had meanly tried to fasten it upon the Mormons. We were told likewise that the indians were to blame partly and partly the Mormons and we were told likewise and just as positively that the Mormons were almost, if not wholly and completely responsible for that most trecherous and pitiless butchery.
We got the story in all these different shapes, but it was not til several years afterward that Mrs. Weight's book, The Mormon Prophet, came out with Judge Cradlebough's trial of the accused parties in it and revealed the truth, that the latter version was the correct one and that the Mormons were the assassins. All our information had three sides to it and so I gave up the idea that I could settle the Mormon question in two days. Still, I have seen newspaper correspondents do it in one.
I left Great Salt Lake a good deal confused as to what state of things existed there and sometimes even questioning in my own mind whether a state of things existed there at all or not.
Flash back half a century and you'll hear much of the same agitated rhetoric that we hear today. On February 9, 1950, Senator Joseph McCarthy stood before a woman's Republican Club in Wheeling, West Virginia, and declared that the U.S. was engaged in "a final, all-out battle between communistic atheism and Christianity." The odds, he intimated, were very much against us.
"The reason why we find ourselves in a position of impotency," he said, is "because of the traitorous actions of those who have been treated so well by this Nation."
It has not been the less fortunate or members of minority groups who have been selling this Nation out, but rather those who have had all the benefits that the wealthiest nation on earth has had to offer--the homes, the finest college education, and the finest jobs in Government we can give. This is glaringly true in the state department . . . .In my opinion the State Department . . . is thoroughly infested with Communists. I have in my hand 57 cases of individuals who would appear to be either card carrying members or are certainly loyal to the Communist Party, but who nevertheless are still helping to shape our foreign policy.
McCarthy was right about the high stakes of the Cold War; it was also true that of the handful of high-placed traitors who had been exposed, at least one of them had attended prestigious schools and won conspicuous honors (though he'd endured a childhood that was filled with privations and tragedies). History has not been kind to Alger Hiss; the overwhelming consensus today is that Whitaker Chambers told the truth about him. But if there was a whiff of factuality in some of McCarthy's accusations, he demagogued them shamelessly. McCarthy's infamous list of State Department employees (which he initially claimed had more than 200 names on it) was never made public and almost certainly never existed.
Six weeks after the Wheeling speech, at a press conference in Key West, Fla., a reporter asked Harry Truman if he thought that McCarthy could prove that "any disloyalty exists in the State Department." The president didn't mince his words. "I think the greatest asset the Kremlin has is Senator McCarthy," he said. When pressed, Truman explained himself further, sounding very much like one of the combative, center left-leaning commentators on the political scene today -- E.J. Dionne, perhaps, or Mark Shields:
The Republicans have been trying vainly to find an issue on which to make a bid for the control of the Congress for next year. They tried "statism." They tried "welfare state." They tried "socialism." And there are a certain number of members of the Republican Party who are trying to dig up that old malodorous dead horse called "isolationism. And in order to do that, they are perfectly willing to sabotage the bipartisan foreign policy of the United States. And this fiasco which has been going on in the Senate is the very best asset that the Kremlin could have in the operation of the cold war. And that is what I mean when I say that McCarthy's antics are the best asset that the Kremlin can have.
Six decades later, Glenn Beck reminded his viewing audience that if McCarthy was "an imperfect vessel," the era he gave his name to was "America's turning point." "It's frightening. It's frightening," he emoted. As reviled and mistreated as McCarthy's memory may be, he might well have saved the Republic from its own worst elements. "It's the truth and here is why you need to know history, because it's repeating itself," Beck continued, wielding the tactic of guilt by association that was McCarthy's metier.
I want to talk a little bit about the parallels between the Obama administration and the FDR administration as it comes into play with communists. We have Marxists, Maoists, communists in and around the White House influencing and actually working with [it]. We had that with FDR. Both denied it at the time.
On July 21, 2010, Glenn Beck appeared on the air with a copy of a "plan to destroy the United States of America." "If you want to understand what is happening in this country," Beck said, "if you want to understand how this is all coming together and what their designs are, all you have to do is read You Don't Need A Weatherman To Know Which Way The Wind Blows." Surely the word "plan" excessively dignifies the Weathermen's manifesto, a pastiche of over-heated revolutionary rhetoric, most of it channeled from the writings of Frantz Fanon, Che Guevara, and Mao Tse Tung, but there's no denying that its authors sought to fan the flames of revolution. The Weathermen were Marxist Leninists; they preached and practiced violence.
But what relevance could this artifact of late '60s campus radicalism have to do with anything that's happening today? It's simple--some of the people who wrote it are still alive, and active in politics. One of them--a Chicago academic--even had some dealings with Obama before he became president. "We see it was submitted by Bill Ayers," Beck explained, "Who is friends with the president, no matter what they say." And then he connected the rest of the dots, from Ayers' spouse Bernadine Dohrn all the way to the billionaire George Soros.
As long as we're on the subject of history repeating itself, it's worth pondering what Harry Truman might have made of the likes of Glenn Beck. Perhaps he would have pointed to this telling passage from the bestselling book Glenn Beck's Common Sense:
If the Progressive cancer were limited to defined political systems, it would be fairly straightforward to isolate it, treat it, and eventually be free from the disease. But it's not. It's infiltrated both political parties and the entire political class . . . The Progressives on the right believed in Statism and American expansion through military strength, while the Progressives on the left believed in Statism and expansion through transnationalist entities such as the League of Nations and then the United Nations . . . One of the hallmarks of Progressive thought is the concept of redistribution: the idea that your money and property are only yours if the State doesn't determine that there is a higher or better use for it.
Beck tells the same story that McCarthy did and he harnesses it to the same political purposes. All of the Republican talking points that Truman identified back then are present in Beck's ostensibly non-partisan rant today: the evils of Statism and the Welfare State, the virtues of Isolationism and the specter of internal subversion. Except in Beck's telling the enemy is Wilsonian Progressivism rather than international Communism (though to Beck they amount to essentially the same thing). Reading McCarthy's words out of context, you'd hardly know that the US was flush from its enormous victory in the Second World War and well on its way to an enormous, decades-long economic expansion. Reading Beck's today, you might think that the world was still poised on a knife's edge, divided between "two vast, increasingly hostile armed camps."
Anyone can play six degrees of Kevin Bacon--it doesn't take many steps to connect Glenn Beck to political pariahs who were as subversive in their day as Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn were in theirs. If you wanted to smear Beck by association, you could start with the author of the original Common Sense. "Our churches, our synagogues, our mosques--we must stand for the things we know are true," Beck orated from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in August, 2010. But In The Age of Reason, Part First, Section 1, Beck's admitted idol Thomas Paine--a man he has called a "heroic patriot"-- stated that "I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church." Imagine if Barack Obama, Bill Ayers, or for that matter Woodrow Wilson or Teddy Roosevelt had formulated such an anti-Credo.
But perhaps all that Thomas Paine stuff was just a subterfuge. Maybe Beck was really paying a sly tribute to Conde McGinley's infamous magazine, also called Common Sense, which was active from about 1947 to 1972. "Anti-Semitism is the chief stock in trade of Common Sense," stated a preliminary report on neo-Fascist and hate groups that was prepared in 1954 for the House Un-American Activities Committee (not exactly a bastion of leftism). Common Sense "distortedly defines communism as 'a false face for Judaism,'" it continued.
Typical of headlines which appear in the publication are: 'Jewish Leaders Are Crazy For Power,' 'Zionists Threaten Russia With War,' 'Brotherhood'-Jew Trap for Christianity', and 'Invisible Government Rules Both Parties: Adlai and Ike Marxist Stooges.' Articles in Common Sense have even attacked water fluoridation as a Red plot by 'the Invisible rulers,' aimed at mass destruction of the American people.
Both Eustace Mullins and Elizabeth Dilling were frequent contributors to Common Sense--and books by both authors have been touted on Glenn Beck's TV show. Tit for tat. If Glenn Beck can draw lines on a chalkboard, so can I.
Mind you, I don't for a moment believe that Beck endorses or emulates McGinley's brand of anti-Semitism. Most likely, he hasn't even heard of him. It's not unlikely that Beck's first-hand knowledge of Thomas Paine's writings doesn't extend very far beyond the extracts that he and his co-writers padded out Glenn Beck's Common Sense with. He probably doesn't know about Paine's favorable views on progressive taxation or what Paine had to say about the Bible: "It is from the Bible that man has learned cruelty, rapine, and murder; for the belief of a cruel God makes a cruel man."
"Beck has successfully grown a mass following," Alexander Zaitchek marveled in Common Nonsense: Glenn Beck and the Triumph of Ignorance, "while stumbling through a remedial self-education in U.S. democracy, which reflects the carnival mirrors inside his mind as much as it does the reality he struggles, in ever-so-profitable futility and desperation, to comprehend." For $9.95 a month, his fans can learn along with him, by taking on-line courses at Glenn Beck University, "a unique academic experience bringing together experts in the fields of religion, American history and economics."
Anyone can quote selectively; anyone can hurl irresponsible and inflammatory accusations. But I do admit that it puzzles me how, on the one hand, Beck can ascribe such awesome powers to Adam Smith's Invisible Hand of the marketplace, while on the other believing that we live in a world that is almost entirely shaped by the machinations of a malign few, a world in which the likes of Bill Ayers--the leader of a fringe movement forty years ago that accomplished exactly none of its goals and a distinctly minor league academic today--is yet believed to be a formidable power behind the throne, and in which a community organizing group like ACORN (now defunct, thanks to Beck's and his peers' untiring efforts) can marshal enough strength to subvert our whole political process. But neither Beck nor his listeners are going to be swayed by anything I might write. To quote Thomas Paine again (The Crisis, Number Five), "To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason . . . is like administering medicine to the dead."
Though Beck's visibility on television has decreased since his contract with Fox News expired at the end of 2011, his paranoia-fueled flag waving has already earned him a fortune; the passion he puts behind his message--of "self-empowerment, entrepreneurial spirit and true Americanism--the way we were when we changed the world, when Edison was alone, failing his 2,000th time on the lightbulb," as he puts it--is clearly heartfelt. But why does it resonate so powerfully with so many ordinary Americans who, lacking his extraordinary vocal endowments and his vast talent for self-promotion, can ill afford to give up such government entitlements as Social Security and Medicare?
Richard Hofstadter provides historical perspective. In his essay "Pseudo-Conservatism Revisited" he cited Symbolic Crusade (1963), Joseph R. Gusfield's study of the temperance movement, for its insights into politics that are driven by status values rather than economic ideas. Gusfield distinguished "between the political aims of those he calls 'cultural fundamentalists' and 'cultural modernists' . . . Both are engaged with politics, but the fundamentalists have a special edge because they want to restore the simple virtues of a bygone age and they feel themselves to be fighting in a losing cause."
On many occasions they approach economic issues as matters of faith and morals rather than matters of fact. For example, people often oppose certain economic policies not because they have been or would be economically hurt by such policies, or even because they have any carefully calculated views about their economic efficacy, but because they disapprove on moral grounds of the assumptions on which they think the policies rest.
A prominent case in point is the argument over fiscal policy . . . As a matter of status politics, deficit spending is an affront to millions who have been raised to live (and in some cases have been forced by circumstances to live) abstemious, thrifty, prudential lives. . . when society adopts a policy of deficit spending, thrifty small-businessmen, professionals, farmers, and white-collar workers who have been managing their affairs by the old rules feel that their way of life has been officially and insultingly repudiated.
Like Father Coughlin, Billie James Hargis, Pat Robertson, James Dobson, and so many other right wing media crusaders before them, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levin, and Laura Ingraham understand that for many religious Americans, "evil" is not just an adjective but also a noun. When the Puritans first arrived in New England, they believed they were reclaiming a wilderness from Satan. Many traditionalists on the right, whether Christian Millennialists or not, feel much the same way.
To them, Godless Communism or Secular Humanism isn't the absence of a religious orientation so much as they are Satanic religions in and of themselves, whose acolytes glorify evil, promote the slaughter of innocent, unborn babies, and persecute believing Christians. Blue State America is Rome in the time of Christ. Whether its depravity is manifested in the form of sexual libertinage, income redistribution, spiritual or economic incontinence, blasphemy, women's and gay rights, or the threat of "race mixing," anathema and even violence are completely appropriate responses to it.
As melodramatic and overwrought as Glenn Beck's and W. Cleon Skousen's forebodings for the Constitution might be, I suspect they are informed by a specific Mormon prophecy that resonated with both men's sense of self-importance. "When the Constitution of the United States hangs, as it were, upon a single thread," Brigham Young wrote in 1855, referring to Joseph Smith's still earlier "White Horse" prophecy of 1843, "They will have to call for the 'Mormon' elders to save it from utter destruction; and they will step forth and do it." Above and beyond that, I suspect that Beck's conspiracy theories serve an essential psychological purpose--they provide both him and his listeners with a sense of order and control (something that was clearly missing from Beck's life during his alcohol and cocaine-addled years in the radio wilderness). Conspiracy theory has been a goldmine for Beck as an entertainer too, both figuratively and literally--not only has it made him rich, it provides him with an inexhaustible source of material, no small thing for someone whose job requires him to extemporize for hours every day. If Beck has made himself more ridiculous than his rival Rush Limbaugh (who also failed on television) ever did, he can still indulge his megalomania with a radio audience that is larger than the populations of many countries.
For politicians, conspiracy theory provides both a ready-made rallying cry (I know who's responsible for your misery; follow me and we will bring them to grief) and an all-purpose escape hatch (how can we possibly prevail against an enemy that's so elusive and powerful?). Cult leaders, dictators, and demagogues are all avid promoters of conspiracy theories--nothing fosters dependency on a leader and solidarity among followers like the threat of persecution. "Collective fear," Bertrand Russell wrote in "An Outline of Intellectual Rubbish" in 1943, "stimulates herd instinct, and tends to produce ferocity towards those who are not regarded as members of the herd . . . Fear generates impulses of cruelty, and therefore promotes such superstitious beliefs as seem to justify cruelty. Neither a man nor a crowd nor a nation can be trusted to act humanely or to think sanely under the influence of a great fear."
Whether a product of one's own forebodings or a cynical attempt to promote them in others, conspiracy theory creates a feedback loop that is almost impossible to escape from.
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