AMERICAN JIHAD

[sha]

AMERICAN JIHAD:

Tue Jul 2, 9:02 PM ET

By Ted Rall

The Triumph of American Theocracy

 

 

SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA-When someone tells you they're fighting for

freedom of religion, there's a good chance they're really fighting

for their freedom to make you follow their religion.

 

Muslims, repeatedly accused of religious intolerance by American

Christians since The Thing That Happened Last Fall, divined the

intent behind Bush's statement, never retracted, that the United

States' drive to topple the governments of Afghanistan ( news - web

sites) and Iraq was a righteous "crusade." Indeed, the

administration's "war on terror" has since involved a medieval-

flavored assault on Islamic countries and groups. This holy war

includes a military invasion-more than 100,000 U.S. troops have been

stationed at new permanent bases in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan,

Tajikistan and Afghanistan-all Muslim countries. And in on the

Palestinian-Israeli conflict, Bush sided decisively withon Israel's

vile Ariel Sharon ( news - web sites) by calling for Yassir Arafat's

ouster.

 

Anyone who hates Arabs is an ally when you're waging redneck jihad.

 

Post 9-11 the Bushies rightly decried Taliban fanaticism (after

sucking up to them, after funding them), but Mullah Omar looks nearly

enlightened in light of the recent paroxysm of Bible-thumping among

American leaders.

 

The United States is substantially more religiously diverse than

Afghanistan, not that you could tell by watching Bush, his Cabinet,

the Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court ( news - web sites).

 

First came a U.S. 9th circuit Court of Appeals ruling on June 26th,

overturning a California law that requires public schools to lead

students in the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance-which includes

the phrase "one nation, under God." This law is plainly inappropriate

in a country that prides itself on free speech and free will. Forcing

anyone to say anything, much less making children pledge loyalty,

would be far more appropriate under a totalitarian dictatorship. This

is America. My right to say my country sucks when I think it does is

what truly makes America great.

 

"Under God" was only inserted into the Pledge in 1954, at the height

of McCarthyism. In a vote straight out of Politburo democracy,

Congress passed the amendment unanimously, without debate, after a

campaign by the right-wing Knights of Columbus.

 

It's self-evident that a state-led pledge instituted at the behest of

a Christian organization to acknowledge the existence of God violates

the Constitution's First Amendment ban against the state sanctioning

religion. "The recitation that ours is a nation `under God' is not a

mere acknowledgement that many Americans believe in a deity,"

correctly wrote Judge Alfred T. Goodwin. "Nor is it merely

descriptive of the undeniable historical significance of religion in

the founding of the republic. Rather, the phrase `one nation under

God' in the context of the pledge is normative."

 

A Judeo-Christian God isn't "normative" in a country that's home to

millions of Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists and atheists. Our remarkable

diversity precludes identifying any particular belief as the norm.

But many so-called Christians obviously don't trust God to understand

this, and feel compelled to shove Him down nonbelievers' throats in a

most un-Christian manner. Those who consider God too wimpy to win His

own converts include the members of Congress who passed resolutions

condemning Judge Goodwin for respecting the Constitution they swore

to uphold. Bush's press secretary, Ari Fleischer ( news - web sites),

issued a tacit presidential invitation to California schoolchildren

to disobey the court's ruling. And Attorney General John Ashcroft (

news - web sites) teamed up with California governor Gray Davis to

help the school system appeal.

 

Democrats Robert Byrd and Tom Daschle joined a chorus of aggro-

Christians who are hell-bent on forcing the daughter of an atheist to

say she believes in "God" whether she does or not, goddammit. Byrd

called the court "stupid.Just nuts," Daschle added. Some are

worried that other church-state linejumpers-the "In God We Trust"

motto on our currency, requiring officials and court witnesses to

swear on a King James Bible, politicians saying "God bless America"

after speaking-may be threatened by the "one nation under God"

decision.

 

We should be so lucky.

 

Bowing to a wave of distinctly un-Christian death threats, Goodwin

issued a 60-day stay of his own ruling. Experts expect the right-wing

Renhquist court to reverse the 9th circuit's decision-and the

Supremes gave them plenty of reason for this belief on June 27th.

That's when the same 5-4 majority that gave us the Bush interregnum

endorsed Cleveland's patently unconstitutional school voucher

program.

 

It's pretty hard to separate church and state when state is funding

church, but that's what happens in Cleveland's voucher system: 96.6

percent of taxpayer money originally collected for public schools

goes directly to religious schools. But America's Christian jihadis

are willing to trash the First Amendment-the very protection that

allows them to worship freely-because controlling young minds means

owning the future.

 

Islamic extremists learned this back in the `80s when guys like Osama

bin Laden ( news - web sites) laid out millions of dollars to found

madrassas throughout war-torn areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Those religious schools were often the only place a young boy could

go for shelter and food; as young men they emerged from years of

indoctrination as hardened jihadis ready to die for Allah. These are

the fanatics now out to destroy the United States and other Western

nations. To be fair, however, there is a huge difference between

those extremist Islamic nations and our own American theocracy.

 

In Pakistan and Afghanistan, the government would never ask taxpayers

to pay for religious schools.

 

(Ted Rall's new book, a graphic travelogue about his recent coverage

of the Afghan war titled "To Afghanistan and Back," is out now.

Ordering and review-copy information are available at nbmpub.com.)

 

http://story.news./news?tmpl=story&u=/020703/7/1seou.html

 

[theist]

What garbage.