Billy Graham, Anti-Semite and Homophobe

Billy Graham, one of the founders of the religious right, died this week. Following are a few views on Graham from people who are not fans of the religious right.

Friendly Atheist writes that Billy Graham’s Body Shouldn’t “Lie in Honor” in the Capitol Rotunda

Evangelist Billy Graham, who died this week at age 99, was known for being an informal advisor to presidents of both political parties as well as one of the most admired people in America for decades.

That’s the white-washed version of his legacy.

He also helped inspire the modern Religious Right, left behind a son who’s best known for making life worse for LGBTQ people and women and minorities, disparaged Jews over their “stranglehold” on the media, and was hardly a champion of civil rights in the 1960s even when his support could’ve helped African Americans.

That’s the full legacy. You can’t talk about Graham without noting those glaring flaws in his life.

And that’s why it’s inappropriate for Republican leaders to honor him by bringing his body to the United States Capitol Rotunda next week so that people can pay their last respects.

The post later cites a letter which the Freedom From Religion Foundation sent to Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell protesting the honor. From that letter:

Graham’s career was devoted to revivals, Christian conversions, hellfire preaching and the insertion of his brand of religion into what is supposed to be a secular government governed by a godless Constitution barring establishment of religion or governmental preference for religion, FFRF points out. One of Graham’s dubious accomplishments was to successfully lobby Congress to pass a law declaring an annual National Day of Prayer. This law enacted at Graham’s behest, which FFRF has previously challenged, has entangled religion and government, spawned countless inappropriate prayer breakfasts, prayerful governmental events and prayer resolutions at all levels of government. In doing so, it has sent for generations a message that evangelical Christians are “insiders” and non-Christians and the nonreligious are “outsiders.”

FFRF also highlights how irresponsible it is for the U.S. Congress to venerate and honor a noted anti-Semite. The secret taping system that recorded President Nixon’s conversations and led to his Watergate downfall captured Graham’s anti-Semitic musings with Nixon. “A lot of the Jews are great friends of mine, they swarm around me and are friendly to me because they know that I’m friendly with Israel,” Graham told Nixon. “But they don’t know how I really feel about what they are doing to this country.”

Graham was on the wrong side of the leading issues of his time. The day after Martin Luther King Jr. wrote his letter from the Birmingham Jail — a letter addressed to white religious leaders like Graham who were doing little else other than “mouth pious irrelevancies and sanctimonious trivialities” — Graham mouthed a few more, arguing that King should “put the brakes on a little bit.” Graham seemingly never met a U.S. war of aggression he didn’t favor or encourage the occupants of the Oval Office to wage. As columnist and former priest James Carroll observes: “Billy Graham was the high priest of the American crusade, which is why U.S. presidents uniformly sought his blessing.”

Graham vociferously opposed gay rights and marriage equality, saying “we traffic in homosexuality at the peril of our spiritual welfare.” The Billy Graham Evangelical Association once said that Vladimir Putin was “more right” on LGBTQ rights than then-President Obama. Graham, in his 90s, wrote a full-page ad appearing in several North Carolina newspapers “to urge my fellow North Carolinians to vote FOR the marriage amendment” in May 2012, which passed, banning gay marriage until later nullified. He belonged to a denomination that refused to ordain women. The “Billy Graham” rule directing a man to not be alone with a woman other than his wife continues to influence evangelicals, including Vice President Mike Pence, isolating career women in the process.

Religion Dispatches protested calling Billy Graham America’s Pastor:

Let’s try this simple test. Would a good pastor suck up to presidents and other powerful people, granting them general absolution despite their known crimes (and yes, here I am thinking primarily of Napalmer-in-Chief Lyndon Johnson and of Tricky Dick Nixon, the president with whom Graham had the closest relationship)?

For that matter, would a good pastor reinforce a parishioner’s Jew-hatred, as Graham clearly did vis-a-vis Nixon (although he later claimed that he forgot saying these appalling things)?

A Defeat For Trump And The Religious Right In The GOP Tax Bill

This week has seen some good with the defeat of Roy Moore, some bad with the ending of net neutrality, and we appear to be closer to the Republicans passing a “tax reform” package designed to greatly increase the wealth of the ultra-wealthy. There is a one piece of good news related to the tax bill today. As the Republicans are forced to pass this through budget reconciliation, there are limits on what can be included. The  Senate parliamentarian has ruled that the repeal of the highly popular Johnson Amendment cannot be included.

The Hill reports:

The Senate parliamentarian has blocked language repealing the Johnson Amendment and allowing churches and 501(c)3 nonprofits to endorse candidates and engage in partisan politics from inclusion in the tax bill.

Sen. Ron Wyden‘s (D-Ore.) office confirmed to The Hill on Thursday night that the Senate parliamentarian had determined the inclusion of the Johnson Amendment repeal did not meet Senate rules that require elements of the tax bill to have something to do with the budget.

The Senate is seeking to move a House-Senate conference report under special budgetary rules that prevent Democrats from using a filibuster. To use those rules, all parts of the bill must have a budgetary effect, and the parliamentarian ruled the Johnson language did not meet that standard…

The proposal was a major priority for President Trump, who vowed to repeal the amendment during his 2016 presidential campaign, saying it would “give our churches their voice back.”

Specifically, the House bill would have temporarily allowed nonprofits to engage in political speech in the ordinary course of its activities, so long as the organization didn’t incur significant expenses while doing so.

The Johnson Amendment, named for then-Sen. Lyndon Johnson (D-Texas), has been part of the tax code since 1954. It prohibits churches and other tax-exempt organizations from participating in some political activity.

This is another political setback for Trump, who has (fortunately) failed at getting through much of his agenda or fulfilling most of his campaign promises. To put it in language which Donald Trump would understand, he is a loser.

While a defeat for Trump and the religious right, most Americans should be pleased by this development. A poll earlier this year showed that 72 percent of Americans want to keep the Johnson Amendment. Many church leaders also agree in supporting the Johnson Amendment.

The Washington Post also notes that repeal would have allowed a further increase in dark money in politics:

There were concerns that a repeal would create a new dark-money channel for powerful donors to quietly funnel funds to political candidates. Under the House plan, both the Clinton Foundation and Trump Foundation would be able to openly get involved in U.S. political campaigns, for example.

Hypocritical Christians Cite Ten Commandments & Story of Joseph and Mary To Defend Roy Moore

The original reports of sexual molestation of a fourteen year old girl committed by  Roy Moore are bad enough. The responses by some on the right in defense of Moore present another story of the hypocrisy of many on the right. For example, see the attempt to defend Moore on religious grounds as reported by Religion News Service:

Conservative Christian supporters of Roy Moore are defending the U.S. Senate candidate against allegations of molesting a teenager decades ago — and one of them used the biblical story of Mary and Joseph to rationalize an adult being sexually attracted to a minor.

These supporters don’t expect voters will abandon Moore — a former Alabama Supreme Court chief justice and darling of a segment of the American religious right, in the Alabama race for a seat in the U.S. Senate — for the same reason they didn’t turn away from Donald Trump when several women came forward during last year’s presidential campaign with allegations he had sexually assaulted them.

“It comes down to a question who is more credible in the eyes of the voters — the candidate or the accuser,” said Jerry Falwell Jr., the president of evangelical Liberty University who has endorsed Trump and Moore, both Republicans.

“The same thing happened to President Trump a few weeks before his election last year except it was several women making allegations,” Falwell told RNS in an email. “He denied that any of them were true and the American people believed him and elected him the 45th president of the United States.”

…American Family Association President Tim Wildmon, who has endorsed Moore, told RNS in an email the report “does not change our support for Roy Moore.”

“I don’t think this kind of story will change support for him among Christians since he has categorically denied it. Most will see it as dirty politics,” Wildmon said.

Liberty Counsel Chairman Mathew Staver also continued to back Moore, saying, “Having personally known Roy Moore and his wife of 32 years, Kayla, I know him as a man of integrity who respects women.”

Conservative radio host Sean Hannity invoked the Ten Commandments to suggest the women who spoke to the Post could be lying.

“We do have 10 commandments. One of the commandments is, ‘Thou shalt not bear false witness.’ We know human beings break, with regularity, the other nine commandments. Did they break this one? I mean, it’s something to think about,” Hannity said on his show.

And Alabama State Auditor Jim Zeigler used the biblical account of Jesus’ birth in Moore’s defense.

“(T)ake Joseph and Mary,” Zeigler told the Washington Examiner. “Mary was a teenager and Joseph was an adult carpenter. They became parents of Jesus. There’s just nothing immoral or illegal here. Maybe just a little bit unusual.”

While the article quotes several conservatives defending Moore, it also includes a number of conservative politicians criticizing Moore, along with conservative religions leaders:

Ed Stetzer, the executive director of the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College, made clear in a blog post on Christianity Today’s website: “THIS IS NOT WHAT EVANGELICALS BELIEVE.”

“Bringing Joseph and Mary into a modern-day molestation accusation, where a 32-year-old prosecutor is accused of molesting a 14-year-old girl, is simultaneously ridiculous and blasphemous. … Even those who followed ancient marriage customs, which we would not follow today, knew the difference between molesting and marriage,” Stetzer wrote.

Many other conservative Republicans, including Jonah Goldberg, have also condemned Moore beyond those quoted in this article.

Beyond these attempts to defend Moore, there was a rather disgusting attempt by one Alabama State Representative to blame the victims to the point of wanting to bring charges against the women making the accusations against Moore:

Republican Alabama State Representative Ed Henry said on Friday that he wanted someone to bring charges against the women who accused GOP Senate candidate Roy Moore of making sexual advances on them when they were teenagers.

In an interview with The Cullman Times, Henry raged that the women interviewed in the Washington Post’s bombshell report about Moore’s sexual behavior waited so long to publicly accuse him of having improper relations with them when they were teens.

“If they believe this man is predatory, they are guilty of allowing him to exist for 40 years,” Henry fumed. “I think someone should prosecute and go after them. You can’t be a victim 40 years later, in my opinion.”

I do not think it is necessary to comment on the various reasons that women, especially teenage girls, are often in a poor position to report abuse.

SciFi Weekend: Doctor Who, Thin Ice; The Handmaid’s Tale; Catastrophe; American Gods

Thin Ice had the most complete story so far this season, but the highlight of the episode remained the relationship between Bill and The Doctor. The episode dealt serious matters including racism and class, but it was the meta discussion of time travel and the Doctor which was most interesting.

The Doctor and Bill continued in their rules of tutor and pupil with Bill asking questions throughout the episode, also providing an opportunity to give some comments on the show in Moffat’s final season. This was Bill’s first real trip into the past and, being well-aware of science fiction tropes, Bill asked what the “rules” are. “You travel into the past. There’s got to be rules. If I step on a butterfly it could send ripples through time that mean I’m not even born in the first place and I could just disappear.” Her concern was that, “Every choice I make in this moment here and now could change the whole future.” The Doctor replied with justification for the often careless manner in which he interacts with the past in pointing out that this is, “Exactly like every other day of your life. The only thing to do is to stop worrying about it.”

Except for poor Pete, written out of history, and even deleted from the memories of viewers and from recordings of the last two episodes. We haven’t seen anything like this since Cold Blood in which Rory was sucked into a crack in the universe and erased from history. Perhaps Pete will return, possibly as another Auton duplicate, as Rory later did.

There was also repetition of the Doctor being a bit of a thief, along with his his limited control over the TARDIS: “I told you, you don’t steer the TARDIS. You reason with it… and successfully most of the time… She’s a bad girl this one. Always looking for trouble.”

Bill had more serious questions and observations. She noted that “Regency England, a bit more black than they show in the movies.” The Doctor replied, “So was Jesus. History’s a whitewash.”

She realized that there was a lot more to the Doctor than a university professor after seeing his lack of a response to the death of a child. She asked him how many people he has seen die, and then how many he has killed. He had no specific answers. He did say, “I’m 2,000-years-old and I’ve never had the time for the luxury of outrage.” I wondered how long it would be until Bill saw through that lie, and it occurred later in the same episode.

The Doctor had fun with Bill beyond his reference to Pete. He allowed her to watch the lights because she was having fun, and then mentioned seeing lights as a side effect of time travel. Later he told her to let him do the talking because she has a temper. Moments later he slugged  Lord Sutcliffe (also showing his capacity for outrage).

Of course the Doctor wasn’t entirely cold about the death of the boy. He just has seen enough to know when he can and cannot do something. His overall view was more humane: “Human progress isn’t measured by industry. It’s measured by the value you place on a life. An unimportant life, a life without privilege. The boy who died on the river, that boy’s value is your value. That’s what defines an age. That’s what defines a species.”

The episode took place in the Frost Fair of 1814, the last in a series of actual events when the the River Thames froze over. Being 2000 years old (or actually older if the events of past seasons are taken into consideration), and prone to hanging out on earth, it is no surprise that the Doctor was there before. A Good Man Goes to War reveals that he was there with River Song, with Stevie Wonder performing:

River: It’s my birthday. The Doctor took me ice skating on the River Thames in 1814, the last of the great Frost Fairs. He got Stevie Wonder to sing for me under London Bridge.
Rory: Stevie Wonder sang in 1814?
River: Yes, he did, but you must never tell him.

(As a totally irrelevant aside, Stevie Wonder was once dining at the same restaurant I was at while traveling to Washington, D.C.)

There was an old Companion Chronicle audio story in which the first Doctor, Vicki and Steven visited the Frost Fair of 1814. The Doctor also promised to take Clara to the Frost Fair in The Caretaker (and actually did in a novel) The Doctor’s lack of interest in rules of time travel in his discussion with Bill is consistent with his lack of concern for returning to the same place–which would be forbidden in other time travel stories. This includes the breaking of time in the Legends of Tomorrow season two finale.

Bill did verify that her trip did not brake time, and Doctor Who has already established that humans have an incredible tendency to forget the extraordinary events depicted on the show. Bill used Search-wise.net for her research–a site which actually exists for television purposes.

The Doctor and Bill returned to the Doctor’s office in time for tea, but Nardole figured out that they had been traveling in time when he saw their change of clothing. He did not appear to figure out out that he had no chance to win the coin toss. For the sake of continuity, he did make reference to how he was reassembled between The Husbands Of River Song when he was decapitated and The Return Of Doctor Mysterio. He returned to the vault where we learned that someone or something inside was knocking, perhaps the Master, except that he knocks four times. Knocking also foreshadowed a past regeneration.

The Handmaid’s Tale premiered on Hulu, with the first three episodes being released. The show displayed a very bleak future in which Christian fundamentalists have established a dictatorship. This would be more plausible in a Muslim country, especially considering recent events in Turkey. It seems more plausible here, and  especially timely, after the election of Donald Trump, with the lack of respect for reproductive right’s and a woman’s right to control her own body taken to even more horrifying extremes. (To be objective and nonpartisan, Democrats cannot totally place the blame on Donald Trump and Republicans for rightward movement in this country considering their lack of concern in nominating a candidate such as Hillary Clinton who has a terrible history on First Amendment issues, including separation of church and state. While obviously Clinton would never support the mistreatment of women in this manner, her work with The Fellowship while in the Senate did help facilitate the goals of the religious right in increasing the role of religion in public policy.)

Elisabeth Moss does an excellent job as Offred (presumably given this name as she belongs to Fred), who is forced to conform outwardly. The totalitarian society shows how those without power being under constant surveillance, appearing to have no chance to rebel, or even safely be themselves with others. Inwardly it is a different story: “My name is Offred, and I intend to survive.” Her internal thoughts provide necessary relief from the overall story. There are also breaks from the main narrative to see how America went in that direction. Martial law was initiated, supposedly on a temporary nature in response to a terrorist attack, and later women were prohibited from having money or holding jobs.

The supporting cast also does an excellent job, especially Alexis Bledel (renamed Ofglen, following the same pattern), who managed to portray with her eyes alone the horrors of what she was exposed to in the third episode. Yvonne Strahovski is also excellent. 

Showrunner Bruce Miller discussed changes in the television show from the novel, including what happened to Ofglen (with spoilers for the third episode):

You take the character of Ofglen (Alexis Bledel) in a different direction very early on in the series. Can you talk about the decision to have Ofglen forcibly undergo genital mutilation surgery and how that changes things for her character moving forward?
Miller:
In the book, Ofglen just disappears and we hear that she killed herself. There’s no real way to confirm that. This was just one of those cases where you just follow your curiosity and you say, well, what happened to her? And I was fascinated by the idea, personally, of seeing how some of the institutions were being reproduced in Gilead. And the institution of the criminal justice system seemed fascinating in a world with institutionalized sexism and misogyny and biblical laws that were being taken literally. So that kind of lead us down a path of, OK, if I want to see how all of those things go, it would be very interesting to follow those things to the end. And making the decision about the female genital mutilation was really just kind of a practical discussion. A world that happened by accident is different than a world people created on purpose and here, Gilead is a world they created on purpose. There’s motive behind it, human motive. So what we’re trying to do is say, OK, what would they do to someone like Ofglen? They don’t want to kill her or send her away. They want to maintain her fertility as part of their reproductive system and their focus on that. So how would they try to control her?

And also taking into account, Margaret Atwood has said many times and we’ve certainly took on this adage, that nothing should happen in the show that doesn’t happen in the world. We don’t want to make up cruelties just for the sake of doing it. Then it turns into pornography. It turns into violence. It’s commentary and it helps you understand the world if you take things that happened in the world. Female genital mutilation is certainly something that happens all over the world. The difference here is that it doesn’t usually happen to white girls, but it does happen all over the world. We spoke to the U.N. and we spoke to the councils they sent us to about how it happens and why it happens and what it’s used for and how it’s done. We took it really seriously. We didn’t want to do it for shock value, even though it’s very shocking. You want to do it because it seems like the thing that Gilead would do. It’s a difference in the book, but it’s also something that takes place out of Offred’s point of view, at least in the show and also in the book. So we felt like we weren’t straying so far because it was something that could have happened in the world of the book and could have happened to somebody else. But anything we did that was not in the book or anything we changed, we were incredibly serious in those discussions about why to change things.

He also discussed how timely the series is:

A lot has been said about how timely the series is. Do you feel any concern that, given the current state of our society, The Handmaid’s Tale might hit a little too close to home for many viewers who would rather avoid facing these ideas head-on?
Miller:
I’m not worried. I hope it hits a little too close to home for viewers who are feeling anxious, because I think there are some great lessons to be learned, which is that the world can change in big ways and we should be very mindful of keeping an eye on our freedoms. As in the show, we see in the flashbacks, how in big and small ways the world can change and the things that we say and the things people say, they’re going to end up mattering in people’s personal lives and that we live in a country where we enjoy lots of freedoms and that those freedoms are not to be taken for granted.

The other thing is that if it does hit close to home, it also offers some really good examples of what to do. Offred is in an incredibly difficult circumstance, and yet she finds ways to express herself, she keeps her sanity, she keeps her heart alive. She also pulls levers of power. She manipulates the people around her to both increase her chances of survival, but also to build some sort of life. She makes connections with people even when they’re scary. I think in a way that’s inspiring. If Offred can do that in that situation, maybe we can do something in this situation. I think Margaret said it in the book, which is, “just do something.” And hopefully you walk away with that. And the other part is that there is a part of doe-eyed optimism on my part, when you look in the flashbacks, the world is so jarringly different. Our messy, noisy world where people are kissing in public and on their iPhones and stuff, you learn to appreciate it, or at least I did. Spending so much time in the fictional world of Gilead, you learn to appreciate how nice it is to have a messy, noisy world and what a pleasure that is. So if you walk out of there going boy, we actually have a good thing going even though it annoys us sometimes, that’s the nerve you want to hit, which is people saying, “Oh, actually there are some good things. Let’s fight to preserve them.” As opposed to, “Things are sh–ty, let’s just throw up our hands and abandon them.

While there were changes from the book, he also discussed how he consulted Margaret Atwood in an interview with Time:

The show definitely expands on what’s happened in the book. You get more backstory. You get to see what happens from the perspective of other characters. How did you decide what to expand and why, and did you discuss those decisions with Margaret Atwood at all?

Everything’s been a conversation with Margaret. It’s very unusual with something this iconic that you would have the author still living. Margaret is an expert in her own way of seeing this particular piece of work adapted: It’s been a play, opera, movie. So she had a lot of experience with what things need to change for different forms for this story. Where I might have had trepidation changing things because of my affection for the book, she certainly did not.

If we changed something, we did it thoughtfully and for a reason. We discussed the repercussions of each change with Margaret. It’s been a very active conversation back and forth. And I’ve been through the story a lot. We’ve picked it apart in the writers’ room. Elisabeth, in particular, has been through the book and educated herself to the nth degree. She’s memorized whole sections of it. So we took great care, and most of the changes we’ve made were actually extrapolations: Taking a thing that was a sentence in the book and turning it into a whole episode.

While Handmaid’s Tale is a must-see show this season, it is disturbing and bleak. My wife and I found that comic relief was necessary after watching three episodes. Fortunately Amazon has released the third season of Catastrophe. If  you haven’t seen this, I recommend going back to the start. Each season takes under three hours to watch. It is sort of like doing You’re The Worst with older, but still highly flawed people, and setting it in the U.K.

For the benefit of those who watched the second season, the events at the end of the final episode have considerable impact as the third season began. A similar formula was used, with an event at the tend of the final episode of the third season likely to have further ramifications in the fourth. Fortunately the series was renewed for both a third and fourth season at the same time, so we will see where this goes.

Sadly, the series has become of significance for science fiction. Carrie Fisher reprised her role as Rob’s mother in an episode which ironically dealt with death and loss. This was the role she was filming before flying from London to Los Angeles the day she had her fatal heart attack. A tribute to Carrie Fisher was attacked to the episode.

The highly anticipated premiere of American Gods is on tonight. (Gillian Anderson in the above picture.) Bryan Fuller and Michael Green discussed the show with Uproxx:

The novel tackles just about every Big Theme there is: politics, religion, modernity, sexuality. Do you two think about America in these grand terms as well?

Fuller: It’s hard not to think of America in grand terms in the current political climate because the country has shit the bad. We’re facing a violent time of great crisis, and that calls into question what we believe in, where we’ve placed our faith, how we navigate the secular and the search for something more meaningful. Then there are those who are not searching, because they’ve made up their minds that they’ve experienced the extent of the world that they need to, and have no cause to look further. That’s so limited and narrow of an approach to living, so you’ve got to challenge people on what they believe. Challenge the conservative Christians who don’t understand the concept of Christianity, or else they’d never pair those two words together.

Green: The book is sexual, and that’s nothing we’d ever shy away from, but we wanted to make sure our depiction of sexuality would be relevant to the show. Where nudity becomes dicy for me, as a viewer, is when it’s cuttable. That’s the definition of ‘gratuitous,’ when it doesn’t need to be there to enhance enjoyment of the show. And that’s not the show we set out to make. We wanted all the sexuality to be grounded in character, so you can’t tell Bilquis’ story without the scene. We wanted to do the scene between Salim and the djinn with fidelity to the book, but also give a graphic depiction of gay sex that no one could say wasn’t beautiful. We wanted to show the majesty of this religious experience mediated by sex, and put it beyond judgement from those viewers who usually feel uncomfortable with same-sex depiction.

American Gods is a finite work, but the nature of TV is that when something’s going well, people want more of it. What do you think about the future of this project? American Gods has an end; does the show have one as well?

Fuller: I think the show should have an end, but that does not mean the show cannot spawn other shows that live on beyond the scope of American Gods. If we were to secure the rights to Anansi Boys, that would be our first choice for a spinoff. We love Orlando Jones and what he brings to the mythology of this series, and we love the story of that book. We’d love to get our hooks into that and branch that off if this show ends up being successful.

Den of Geek also has an interview with Bryan Fuller which tied it into contemporary politics:

Thinking about Mr Wednesday, the figure of the con man has scarcely felt more relevant to US politics.

[Laughs. Loudly]

And to the US Media.

Well, you have a con man who is saying ‘let’s make the gods great again’.  There is a certain angle of that story that is much more resonant and relevant now than it was prior to the election in November. Being in post and watching those episodes as we’re cutting and putting them together was an interesting experience – to be watching the show before the election and then watching the show after the election and realising just how resonant it has the potential to be in that climate. Particularly as an immigration story, since both the Trump election and Brexit were platforms of anti-immigration and fear of the other and exploiting that fear in citizens, it feels like we are inadvertently tapping into a conversation that we need to have and continue to have as we figure out a way to celebrate differences and not condemn them.

This story is a ripe opportunity for social comment.

Absolutely.

In particular the idea of people being whipped up into a war whose only purpose is to further the power of a couple of individuals…

It’s tragic on one level and then on another level it’s an opportunity to take a look at where we are. Sometimes you have to take a step backwards to move forwards. It feels like with both Brexit and the Trump election, we’re two nations taking a step backwards. As disappointing as it was to see hatred and fear rule the day for both of us, it was a great disappointment to say the least, it makes it even more vital and important for us to encourage conversations and also to encourage the fundamentals of listening to somebody. That’s the biggest issue, certainly what’s happening in America, is the unwillingness to listen to somebody else’s point of view.

That’s something that I love to do, even if I violently disagree with somebody, I’m fascinated with how they’ve come to their decisions. Talking to people in the States who voted for Trump, and not wanting to shut them down, like, oh my gosh, you are supporting somebody who has bragged about sexual assaults and has a clear disdain for many groups of people, but instead wanting to find a common ground because what I think all of us found in both of our situations was that everybody made up their mind and there was nothing that was going to change them regardless.

Trump and Republicans Escalate War Against Planned Parenthood And Women’s Health

Republicans love to use rhetoric such as talking about small government and freedom, but their real goal is to use big government to impose their religious views upon others. Maybe deep down Donald Trump even realizes that these actions by the religious right are morally wrong, as the usually loud mouthed president signed a bill targeting Planned Parenthood in private. CNN reports:

“President Donald Trump privately signed a bill on Thursday that allows states to withhold federal money from organizations that provide abortion services, including Planned Parenthood, a group frequently targeted by Republicans.

“The bill, which the usually camera-friendly President signed without any media present, reverses an Obama-era regulation that prohibited states from withholding money from facilities that perform abortions, arguing that many of these facilities also provide other family planning and medical services.

“The bulk of federal money Planned Parenthood receives, though, goes toward preventive health care, birth control, pregnancy tests and other women’s health services. Federal law prohibits taxpayer dollars from funding abortions and Planned Parenthood says 3% of the services it provides are abortions.

Republican who support such measures cannot claim to be for either liberty or small government. This also contradicts all their rhetoric about keeping government from getting between patients and doctors.

Donald Trump And The Hypocrisy Of The Religious Right

trump-grab-them-by-the-pussy

One of the many strange aspects of this election has been how Donald Trump has won over the religious vote. While Trump never appeared to have much interest in religion in the past, Hillary Clinton is one of the most religious politicians in public life. She spent her years in the Senate working with The Fellowship, supporting an increased role for religion in public policy. However, while generally conservative on social and cultural issues, she fails the right wing litmus test on reproductive rights. This is clearly a far greater sin to the religious right than Donald Trump’s admitted abuse of women.

As I noted yesterday, the release of the tapes in which Trump discussed his abuse of women led to the condemnation from many Republicans, but at least one representative of the religious right did not alter his support for Trump: “One of Trump’s most prominent social-conservative supporters, Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, told BuzzFeed’s Rosie Gray: ‘My personal support for Donald Trump has never been based upon shared values.'”

Buzzfeed found another representative of the religious right who continues to back Trump:

“Voters of faith are voting on issues like who will protect unborn life, defend religious freedom, create jobs, and oppose the Iran nuclear deal,” Faith and Freedom Coalition president Ralph Reed said in an email to BuzzFeed News. “Ten-year-old tapes of private conversation with a television talk show host rank very low on their hierarchy of concerns.”

Asked if he had any comment on the tape itself and if he was definitely standing by Trump, Reed said, “I think the statement is self explanatory.”

Ben Carson also defended Trump:

“Dr. Carson believes that people can change and be better,” Carson aide Armstrong Williams told BuzzFeed News in an interview. “You know, these things happen. I’m sure somebody could find a video of Bill Clinton talking like this — are we gonna say Bill Clinton was the same person as president that he is today? Obviously not.”

Armstrong continued, “People commit adultery. It happens. Ministers. Heads of state. Everyday people. People are human, they do human things. It’s nothing unusual that somebody committed adultery on their spouse. Women do it. Men do it. Should we be shocked by it? No.”

…He concluded the interview by saying, “Hey, the flesh can be weak, my man.”

While it is possible that Bill Clinton has also talked like this, it is worth remembering, as Buzzfeed pointed out, “Republicans frequently argued in the ’90s that Bill Clinton’s affair with Monica Lewinsky was disqualifying in part because presidents should be held to a higher moral standard.”

Several Republicans, including Senator Mike Lee of Utah and Jon Huntsman have called on Trump to drop out of the race. While this is unlikely to happen, I have previously posted some interesting links in this post on the ramifications of a candidate dropping out.

I think that Trump already had little chance of winning the election (unless something major happened which was favorable to him). The tape therefore probably won’t change the presidential election result. However it does put the entire GOP in a bigger hole. Previously it looked like the nomination of Clinton seriously hurt the chances for the Democrats to take control of the Senate. That might now be a possibility again.

Debunking the Ralph Nader Scare Tactics For Supporting The Lesser Evil

Trump Clinton Illusion Free Choice

Many of us have principles and will not support either Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton. Many Clinton supporters have shown no understanding of the basic democratic principle that we have the right to support or not support whichever candidates we choose. They make bogus claims that not voting for Hillary is a vote for Trump. If true, the opposite would also have to be true–our decision to not vote for Trump by their logic would be a vote for Hillary.

Clinton supporters raise Ralph Nader and the 2000 election, but this is wrong for so many reasons:

This assumes that the Democrats are entitled to our vote, and that if there weren’t third party candidates running, those on the left would automatically vote for the Democrat. Wrong. Many would stay home, or leave the presidential spot empty, if there was no other choice.

Most of us do not live in battleground states, leaving us free to vote our convictions without affecting the outcome. Plus Clinton is pulling away in the battleground states and Nate Silver reassures us that Clinton will win anyways. Considering what an inept campaign Trump has waged since clinching the nomination, he is probably right (although Quinnipiac does show them deadlocked).

Hillary Clinton is not Al Gore. She is far closer to George Bush. We were outraged by Bush’s neoconservative foreign policy, but Clinton is the neocon hawk running this year. We protested Bush’s assault on civil liberties, but Clinton also has a far right record on civil liberties issues, sounding much like Donald Trump on restricting civil liberties to fight terrorism. We objected to an increase in government secrecy under Bush, but Clinton has a long record of opposing government transparency. Bush’s administration was remarkable for expanding the influence of the religious right.  Clinton worked with The Fellowship to expand the influence of religion on public policy when in the Senate. Plus Clinton has been on the wrong side regarding the corrupting role of money in politics, on the environment and climate change, on the death penalty, on single-payer health care. She is even to the right of Donald Trump on drug policy and the drug war and on the wrong side of trade issues.

If you think having George Bush elected in 2000 was a terrible thing (and it was), it makes no sense to argue that Hillary Clinton should be president when she supports so much of what made Bush such a terrible president.

If anything, Nader has been proven right by the Democrats nominating a corrupt warmonger such as Clinton. This clearly shows the dangers of “lesser evilism.”

When does the “lesser evilism” stop? We are warned about what happened when Bush beat Gore and told me must support Clinton because of Trump, but Clinton has supported most of the evil done by Bush. Next election will the Democrats nominate someone like Trump and will we be told we must support him if the Republicans nominate someone even more evil?

Some Clinton supporters have been rather bad winners, attacking those who disagree with them on social media for expressing our opinions. Life is more than a binary choice between the limited options provided by the major parties. It even might be argued that a function of the major parties is to limit debate to the limited issues where their candidates disagree.

In reality, Clinton and Trump are both in the authoritarian right segment of the political spectrum, not differing by as much as supporters of either would admit. Those of us who hold opposing views are going to continue to express our views on the issue, regardless of whether we have a presidential candidate who is likely to win. We will continue to oppose oligarchy, neoconservative military interventionism, restrictions on civil liberties to supposedly fight terrorism, the corrupting role of money in politics, destruction of the environment for profit, and an increased role of religion in public policy–even if the Democratic nominee is on the wrong side of each of these issues.

SciFi Weekend: World’s Finest, Supergirl and The Flash; Another Death on The 100; Gilmore Girls; Studios vs. Religious Liberty Law; Gilmore Girls; Bernie Sanders on Colbert; Donald Trump Heroin

Superman-Flash-Supergirl-Flash-comic-book-cover-Worlds-Finest_edited-2

When I was younger and reading comics in the 1960’s, World’s Finest featured a team up between Superman and Batman in every issue, and at other times in its history it included other DC superheroes. While Superman and Batman are together in the same movie this month, television teamed up Supergirl and The Flash instead. Lacking the rights to Superman, ideas from the comics are often adapted to Supergirl (as Batman story lines have been adapted for Arrow).

I also clearly recalled the classic Superman cover with Superman racing The Flash. Supergirl used a similar poster to promote the show, and TV Addict has put the two together in the graphic above.

Melissa Benoist and Grant Gustin had terrific chemistry together in this Glee reunion. I don’t know if them having worked together in the past helped, and it certainly helped that both characters are similarly light. I doubt we would have seen the same chemistry with an Arrow/Supergirl crossover, unless Supergirl became a Felicity-substitute for Oliver.

Their awkward meeting can be seen in the video above.

The premise was actually explained further on Tuesday’s episode of The Flash in which Barry traveled back in time to seek ways to become faster to fight Zoom. Fortunately the show kept technobabble to a minimum and concentrated on the chemistry between the characters–although I do wonder how Barry would be able to get back to his original earth. I can envision this as a Barry from yet another earth who is spending years traveling from one earth to another in search of home. While there was a brief discussion of parallel earths, it was pretty much limited to Winn’s “That’s cool.”

The show had many other great lines. Supergirl was still trying to regain the support of the people of National City after the episode in which she was exposed to red kryptonite and briefly became a menace. She expressed her frustration and the drastic measures she was utilizing: “I saw that winning the people back wasn’t going so well. I have tried everything I can think of. Last night, I helped a family assemble their IKEA table!” The Flash demonstrated his super speed to Supergirl by quickly running out for ice cream. Supergirl’s response was perfect: “That’s cool.”

Cat might have been fooled by Supergirl’s secret identity (although now that she knows there is a shape shifter around, I’d would expect her to figure out how she was tricked). She had no difficulty figuring out that Barry was the new speedster in town, but she did not like the name of The Flash: “The Flash sounds like someone whose only super-power is jumping out of an alley in a trench coat.”

There was a reference to  CW, which The Flash is on: “All four of you, standing there, doing nothing. You look like the attractive yet non-threatening, racially diverse cast of a CW show.”

While I could have easily spent the hour just watching Supergirl and The Flash hanging out together, there was even a plot to the story. If there were two superheroes, there had to be too super villains working together, Siobhan (Italia Ricci) and Livewire (Brit Morgan):

Siobhan: “You want to kill Cat Grant and Supergirl, and I want to kill Cat’s assistant, who’s protected by them both. Figured we could team up.”

Livewire: “Like an evil Taylor Swift squad?”

Worlds-Finest-crop-740x431

Nerdist has information from Greg Berlanti and Andrew Kreisberg on the repercussions of the cross over episode:

“We always wanted to do it,” says Berlanti of the crossover. “From the day we cast Melissa [Benoist], the notion of her in scenes with Grant [Gustin] or someday maybe, in the best of all worlds, with Stephen [Amell] as well…it’s exciting to think of them on screen together. And there was a similar tonality to the shows. But a few things had to go right. We were introducing this notion of Earth-2 and the Multiverse on Flash, and that had to work for us. We always said very openly that Flash and Arrow exist in a universe where there’s no Superman, or you would have heard about him. They would have had at least one conversation about him, and certainly Supergirl as well. And he exists on this show.”

But the multiverse would prove the easier hurdle of the two shows converging—even though they live on different networks (CW for The Flash and CBS for Supergirl. “It was more challenging in that way because it’s not so convenient. It’s two separate cites that they shoot in. You wanted the show to work and stand on its own, and CBS has its own audience. We thought we might wait until the second season,” explained Berlanti. “But after Christmas we came back and we were planning out the final third of the year and we saw a way that we thought we could do it; and it felt like the right time for him to enter her world and help her out. So it all came together. We went to all the powers that be and said, ‘I think we had indicated maybe we’d wait a little longer. But we’d really like to do this now.’”

…But will there ever come a day where Kara returns the favor and visit Barry on The Flash”

“We would love that,” said Berlanti. “Just like we love this and are excited about this. I think we want to wait and see the audience reaction to something like this. But just as storytellers and fans of the actors, obviously. We love it when we can figure out a way to do it creatively and hopefully everybody enjoys it.”

Of course, the Multiverse does add a tiny wrinkle to this: wouldn’t that mean a Kara already exists on Barry’s Earth? And if so, what might a version of her look like there?

“I would think that any Kara that exists on Earth-1 would also have to have been an alien,” explained Kreisberg. “There can’t just be Kara Danvers from Poughkeepsie. That’s the fun of the Multiverse. We have a really exciting, fun doppelgänger coming up on the penultimate episode of The Flash that we haven’t announced yet. That’s just another one of those ‘Oh, that would be really cool…’ It’s surprisingly easy to justify any of these decisions. Usually when we’re in the writers room, and arguing the merits of doing something or not doing something, it really comes down to ‘Is it cool? Is it fun?’ The logic of how we get to it we find we can make work, especially if you don’t dwell too much on it. Because at the end of the day the audience wants to see the fun thing, they want to see the Flash and Supergirl together. So getting them across—he ran a little too fast with his tachyon drive—it wasn’t a lot of shoe leather to make it happen. Then you get forty-two minutes of the fun stuff.”

As a lifelong fan of the DCU, we posited the idea of Melissa Benoist appearing on The Flash as the Power Girl of Earth-2 to Kreisberg. His thoughts? “Sure,” he laughs. “[It’s] a different costume, but sure!”

As for why the two iconic heroes are first meeting on Supergirl as opposed to The Flash, Berlanti explained that it was “because it was his capacity to come this way,” adding that they “never really considered it the other way” and that “it’s maybe a little bit more fun at first to bring the veteran from that show to the chemistry of a new show.”

As for whether or not the time-traveling heroes of the Flash spinoff Legends of Tomorrow could appear on Supergirl via their ship the Waverider, Kreisberg got our hopes way up, saying that, “The Waverider can go anywhere.”

That last line also explains how Rip Hunter once said, “I’ve seen Men of Steel die and Dark Knights fall. Your entire 21st century world will suffer.” Superman and Batman apparently do not exist in the Arrow/Flash world but did exist in Rip’s past. Does this mean that the characters picked up by Rip are actually working to save a different earth?

"Worlds Finest" -- Kara gains a new ally when the lightning-fast superhero The Flash suddenly appears from an alternate universe and helps Kara battle Siobhan, aka Silver Banshee, and Livewire in exchange for her help in finding a way to return him home, on SUPERGIRL, Monday, March 28 (8:00-9:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network. Pictured left to right: Jeremy Jordan, Grant Gustin, Mehcad Brooks and Melissa Benoist Photo: Robert Voets/Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. © 2016 WBEI. All rights reserved.

More at TV Line, including some comments related to what I wrote above about Supergirl’s secret identity:

In discussing this crossover’s genesis, Berlanti also hints at the idea of Supergirl and Green Arrow interacting, saying, “From the day we cast Melissa [Benoist], the notion of her in scenes with Grant [Gustin] – or someday maybe in the best of all worlds with [Arrow star] Stephen [Amell], as well – it’s exciting to think of them on screen together.”

…If Cat was so easily able to decipher that Barry is The Flash, then how can she still be in the dark about her assistant’s secret identity? “There’s a number of people that assume that she does know and just doesn’t say anything,” Berlanti notes. “Both are safe bets. We haven’t firmed up if and when we [will] clarify that point. I think it’s kind of enjoyable to appreciate the show both ways.”

The 100 Steaiing Fire

When watching most television shows and a character’s life is in danger, the assumption is that they will survive. (Spoilers ahead). The opposite is true on The 100–especially when the character is played by an actor who has a role lined up on another television show, such as with Ricky Whittle. This is the second major death in a short time. Lincoln’s death has not been met with as much controversy as Lexa’s, but there has been some protests over how he died.

gilmore-girls-reunion

Amy Sherman-Palladino never got the chance to use the four final word she planned for The Gilmore Girls as she left the show in its final season due to a contract dispute.  She kept them secret in case she ever had a chance to use them, and it has been verified they will be used in the Netflix revival. There are many possibilities from, “Luke, I love you” to “Mother, you are insane” to “Rory, you were adopted.”

I recently posted on how Marvel Studios and others protested the “religious liberties” bill in Georgia. The loss of potential income to the state appears to have been more important than appeasing the religious right as Governor Deal has vetoed the measure.

Dave Schilling gave his ideas on who different television characters would vote for at The Guardian. For example:

Mulder & Scully

Mulder’s naturally rebellious, so he’d have to be for Bernie Sanders. All the revolutionary rhetoric would appeal to his lack of trust in government. Scully, on the other hand, is highly religious and less prone to seditious behavior. Still, I don’t think she’d ever vote for any of the Republicans because of their denial of climate change science and anti-choice policies. I’m going to guess Hillary on this one.

Bernie Sanders played Wheel of News on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert on Friday. The segment ended with Sanders shooting the T-shirt cannon. Video above.

After the Michigan and Missouri primaries, Donald Trump put on an infomercial and talked about all the products with his name on them, even if not very truthfully. Now there is a new product to add to the Donald Trump line, Donald Trump Heroin. Mediaite reports:

A New Hampshire woman was arrested a few days ago for selling heroin with the name of none other than Donald Trump branded on the bags.

According to the Union Leader Correspondent, Darcie Hall was busted after a confidential informant managed to organize two heroin buys––one at a McDonald’s, another at a mini-mart. She had been under investigation by the police and the state attorney general’s drug task force.

And the detective who saw the heroin bundles wrote in his affidavit, “I also observed that each wax bag was stamped with a ‘Donald Trump’ logo.” (Make Heroin Great Again was probably too on-the-nose.)

Plus The New York Post reports on women who not only support Donald Trump, but are stripping down or him. Pictures included.

Press & Bloggers Show Sanders Was Right In Accusing Clinton Of Practicing Revisionist History On DOMA

The Clintons have never been very supportive of social liberalism, and now that the liberal views they often showed little regard for during Bill’s presidency have become mainstream in the Democratic Party (and much of the country), Hillary is trying to rewrite history. Bernie Sanders pointed this out at the Jefferson Jackson dinner last weekend. His statement is being backed up by the press, bloggers, and people on Twitter who remember the truth.

The Washington Blade wrote:

Sen. Bernard Sanders isn’t the only one taking Hillary Clinton to task over her recent assertion that the Defense of Marriage Act was a “defensive” measure to prevent worse discrimination against LGBT people.

A number of gay rights activists took to Twitter to say Clinton engaged in historic revisionism during her appearance Friday on “The Rachel Maddow Show” when she said DOMA was a means to stop the enactment of a U.S. constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage entirely. Many of those activists also tempered their objections by saying Clinton is generally doing right on LGBT rights during her campaign…

The notion DOMA was passed to stop passage of a Federal Marriage Amendment has been disputed by Hillary Clinton supporter and former Human Rights Campaign chief Elizabeth Birch, who wrote an op-ed saying “there was no real threat” of a constitutional measure in 1996.

Bloomberg Politics also sees this as revisionist history:

Bill Clinton’s aides and confidants admitted to the New York Times in 2013 that he knew DOMA was wrong and discriminatory toward gays and lesbians. His former press secretary Mike McCurry said: “His posture was quite frankly driven by the political realities of an election year in 1996.” Democratic consultant and Clinton ally Hilary Rosen added: “In my conversations with him, he was personally embarrassed and remorseful.”

Neither said it was a strategic move to prevent something worse. And indeed, that might have been difficult. The Federal Marriage Amendment wasn’t introduced until 2002. It didn’t become part of the Republican Party platform until 2004…

Prominent figures in the LGBT community, meanwhile, rejected Clinton’s recollection of history.

“Hillary’s version of DADT and DOMA is so wrong. The only ‘defensive posture’ was for their personal politics not LGBT,” activist David Mixner said on Twitter. He added: “The LGBT community should NEVER allow any politician to revise our noble and courageous history for political purposes.”

Radio host and HuffPost Gay Voices editor-at-large Michelangelo Signorile called Hillary Clinton’s version “revisionism” and said on Twitter that it was “simply not true that DOMA was signed to stop something worse.” He continued, “Hillary doesn’t need to re-write Bill history to make her better. She’s fine, has promised a lot.”

Bill Clinton even resorted to using ads opposing gay marriage when running for reelection. While Hillary’s positions do sound much better today, we cannot count on positions she has taken for political expediency to persist if the next poll or focus group suggests she should take a different position.

AmericaBlog also showed that this is not the first time the Clintons have resorted to this type of historical revisionism, along with noting that, “Sanders is a co-sponsor of the Equality Act in the Senate, and has opposed anti-gay discrimination laws going back to his campaigns for mayor in the 1970s.” Last month PolitiFact ruled that a statement from Chuck Todd was true that Bernie Sanders was “there” on same sex marriage twenty years ago.

Hillary Clinton’s conservative social views, seen in her membership in religious right organization, The Fellowship (also known as The Family) while in the Senate, makes many liberals wary of trusting her on social issues (along with economic issues, civil liberties, and foreign policy). The American Humanist Association has noted how much she is like the Republicans in pandering to religion:

American Humanist Organization Religious Pandering

They also noted that Bernie Sanders has expressed views in line with theirs:

American Humanist Organization Sanders Humanism

It comes down to a difference in their philosophies which as led Sanders to take the correct fork in the road, while Clinton has so often been wrong, whenever there have been big decisions during their careers. We need a president who makes the right choices at the time, not one who will admit her mistakes and change her views years down the road.

Mike Huckabee Backs Instituting Slavery For The Poor

Huckabee Twitter Pic

There were certainly opinions I disagreed with in this weeks’ Democratic debate, but no views were expressed which were totally off the wall. Republicans provide a steady stream of such opinions, often with the worst coming from those who prefer religious law to secular American law. Think Progress reports that Mike Huckabee even agreed with instituting slavery in a recent interview:

Host Jan Mickelson began by bemoaning that the “criminal justice system has been taken over by progressives.” In order to fight back, he argued, conservatives should look to the biblical Book of Exodus. “It says, if a person steals, they have to pay it back two-fold, four-fold,” Mickelson explained. “If they don’t have anything, we’re supposed to take them down and sell them.”

Mickelson went on to argue why jails, which he claimed are a “pagan invention,” are inferior to slavery: “We indenture them and they have to spend their time not sitting on their stump in a jail cell, they’re supposed to be working off the debt.”

“Wouldn’t that be a better choice?” the host asked.

“Well, it really would be,” Huckabee replied without missing a beat. “Sometimes the best way to deal with a nonviolent criminal behavior is what you just suggested.”

Huckabee, who was a Baptist pastor before entering politics, is no doubt familiar with the Exodus 22:3 passage to which Mickelson referred: “Anyone who steals must certainly make restitution, but if they have nothing, they must be sold to pay for their theft.”

But U.S. law, unlike biblical penal prescriptions, forbids selling human beings like chattel. The United States also bans debtors’ prisons and the Supreme Court has ruled that it is unconstitutional to imprison people who are too destitute to pay court fines. (Contra these bans, manylocalities are being sued for still running debtors’ prisons.)

Considering that Huckabee is not the only member of the religious right running for the Republican nomination, maybe the candidates should be asked about slavery, and perhaps other aspects of Biblical law, at the next debate. They might have to do something to keep the debate lively with Donald Trump threatening not to participate if he does not get his way on the rules.