None dare call it theocracy

October 28, 2006

Guest Post by Morbo

Amy Sullivan, a moderate Christian whose writing pops up in places like The Washington Monthly, Salon and The New Republic, thinks the Democrats have not exploited former White House Faith-Based Office staffer David Kuo’s revelations as much as they could.

In a New Republic online piece Sullivan writes:

The problem is that Kuo’s book creates cognitive dissonance for liberals. Conspiracy theories about theocracy have haunted liberals for the last few years, and, if you believe that religious conservatives lead Bush around by the nose, evidence to the contrary is impossible to absorb. Everyone on the left “knows” that the faith-based initiative is a slush-fund, a jackpot for religious conservatives. If it turns out instead to be a political sham that produced only 1 percent of the new funds it promised for faith-based organizations, liberals need rethink their theocracy-phobia.

I’m not a fan of Sullivan’s, and as usual I find it difficult to determine what exactly her point is. She seems to be arguing that because the faith-based initiative was, according to Kuo, largely a political stunt, claims that Bush is beholden to the Religious Right must collapse.

But this analysis is facile and suffers from a glaring oversight: The initiative is far from the only thing Bush has done to please the Religious Right.

Let’s consider some of those other things Bush gave them:

* Abortion: Bush’s first act in office was to sign an order prohibiting taxpayer money from going to any group that promotes legal abortion. The group is denied this funding even if they aren’t using tax fund for abortions. If they merely believe abortion should be legal, they can no longer get tax support for any population-control or public health program.

Bush’s Justice Department has repeatedly sided with “pro-life” groups in every major legal case dealing with abortion to reach the Supreme Court and lower federal courts.

* End-of-life/Privacy: Bush interrupted a vacation to fly back to Washington to sign a bill designed to keep Terri Schiavo alive even though polls showed most Americans opposed to government intervention in what should have been a personal family matter. He did this because the Religious Right demanded it.

* Gay Rights: At the behest of James Dobson, Bush backed a constitutional amendment banning “same-sex” marriage. His political advisors worked hand in glove with anti-gay groups that placed ballot initiatives in several key states in 2004.

* Contraceptives: The Bush FDA blocked over-the-counter approval for “Plan B” for three years, even though most medical professionals support greater access to this medication. Rules in effect will continue to make if next to impossible for young women to get in time. His administration supports the so-called “right” of pharmacists to refuse to fill doctor-prescribed birth control pills on moral grounds.

Bush has directed millions to religious groups overseas to fight the spread of AIDS by endorsing abstinence programs – even though medical experts caution that this approach will not work and is even dangerous.

* Stem Cells: Bush vetoed a bill funding stem-cell research, even though most American back this research, recognizing that it holds the potential to cure people of debilitating diseases. He did this because the Religious Right told him to.

* Federal Judges: In perhaps his most crucial concession to the Religious Right, Bush vetted his two Supreme Court nominees with pressure groups run by TV preachers. One candidate, Harriet Miers, had to withdraw after the Religious Right turned against her. Lower federal court judges have also been subjected to a Religious Right litmus test.

* Sex Education: Most Americans support comprehensive sex education in public schools and other public institutions. Yet federal funds support can go only to “abstinence-only” programs that are ineffective, inaccurate and often rife with sectarian dogma. The Religious Right supports this approach, and so does Bush.

* Creationism/Intelligent Design: Bush and the Religious Right support watering down instruction about evolution in public schools, even though virtually no serious researcher in the biological sciences doubts the reality of evolution.

Sullivan thinks liberals are paranoid to say that the Religious Right wants a theocracy in America. I wish she would attend some of their meetings, as I have done.

The Religious Right says all abortions should be illegal because of its interpretation of the Bible. It opposes gay rights because of a passage in the Book of Leviticus. It says the Bible debunks evolution. It insists that if science and the Bible clash, science must yield. Religious Right leaders frequently claim that the Bible speaks to all areas of life, including politics. Religious Right activists believe the symbols of the majority faith should adorn our public schools, courthouses and other institutions. They want their prayers to open the school day. They seek to curtail access to books, movies and other media that offends their religious sensibilities. On their best days, they might extend a measure of limited toleration to non-Christian faiths, but never full rights. (And don’t even ask what they want to do to non-believers.)

Does this mean we are doomed to live in a society like that described in Margaret Atwood’s novel The Handmaid’s Tale? No. But if the Supreme Court, stacked with ideologues in the mode of Antonin Scalia, conjures up bogus “secular” justifications for various laws that are really based on religious understandings, we will sooner or later find ourselves in a society where someone’s interpretation of the Bible of religious creeds becomes the basis for many public policies.

Let’s say that in five years, no matter who is sitting in the White House, women are unable to get an abortion in many parts of the country because Roe v. Wade has been overturned. Let’s say pharmacists have a legal right, thanks to a federal law, to refuse to fill certain prescriptions. Let’s say your kids learn next to nothing about evolution in science class because of pressure from the Religious Right. (This is already the case in many parts of the country.) Let’s say gay rights have been curtailed and new laws have been passed barring gays from adopting children or becoming foster parents. Let’s say efforts to pass a new stem-cell bill have failed.

Sure, that would not be as bad as living under the Taliban — after all, no one is being stoned in the streets for blasphemy — but I fail to see how you could call a country like that anything but a “theocracy lite.” Whether Amy Sullivan cares to acknowledge it or not, this is where the Religious Right, often with Bush in tow, would like to take us.

Instead of trying to outbid the Republicans by offering religious groups even more “faith-based” money, perhaps the Democrats should remind pastors that real freedom means the right to raise your own money for your own projects — and then recommit the nation to meaningful religious liberty that recognizes that you always have the right to worship (or not) wherever you please but never have the right to demand that the machinery of the state impose your faith on unwilling participants.

Can’t Bush be pushing all the Faith based initiatives as a political sham and still be beholden to maintaining? It is like having all the downsides of being locked into an untenable poeition without the positive aspects of at least BELIEVING it.

  • if you believe that religious conservatives lead Bush around by the nose, evidence to the contrary is impossible to absorb

    but isn’ t this the sort of manichean worldview that separates the religionists from the rest of us? I think that is one of Amy Sullivan’s bigger faults is that she automatically assumes that the rest of us either think like religionists or ought to.

    It is very easy for anyone capable of a nuanced and thoughtful view of things (maybe the key word in Ms. Sullivan’s assertion is “believe”), to observe, understand and accept that Bush may have filled his Administration with people whose agendas are to break down the walls separating church and state while simultaneously privately considering that some of the more idiotic and self-serving religious leaders actually are quite “nuts. It is quite easy to observe understand and accept that Bush and Co would dangle the promise of plenty of easy money as a simple ploy to attract Christian voters with no intention of actually following through on the money, yet still pursue policies that advance the cause of theocracy. The two are not mutually exclusive.

    I really hate when people like Amy Sullivan attempt to tell the rest of us how we should think and then assume that her own flawed thinking should be the model for all of us.

    I’m not a big peronal fan of Andrew Sullivan but last night he linked to an invaluable piece by Gary Wills which runs circles around anything Amy Sullivan is capable of. Anyone interested in church/state issues under the Bush regime should find it very damning – and maybe it’ll make Amy Sullivan STFU – although I quite doubt it.. LINK

  • Bush seems to overpromise and underdeliver on everything–faith-based funding included. And he seems contemptuous of everything, especially government and other alpha-males.

    It’s good to see so many religionists realizing that government money is never no-strings-attached.

  • What Sullivan misses is that for the powerful theocracies are not about God or faith, but about the powerful having a hold over the populace.

    The people who currently run our country would love to have a theocracy even if they are not truly or honestly religious themselves, because it is an easy way to control the gullible.

  • Abortion? Gay marriage? Birth control? I just don’t seem to recall that being discussed anywhere in the Gospel. I do seem to recall an awful lot about caring for the homeless, the poor, the down-trodden, etc. That seems to have been missing from your list of priorities Morbo. Could it be, heaven forbid, that they aren’t priorities? Gasp!

    Great post, btw. Your creeping loss of rights is believable and frightening.

  • I always have a hard time trying to figure out what Sullivan’s points are in whatever she writes, too. In part, I think, it’s because her point is the same as most “moderate” pundits. She wants the Democratic party to adhere more strictly to *her* personal beliefs, and not those of anyone she disagrees with about anything. (In this way, moderates are the new Greens!)

    But the problem is, it’s really hard to fugure out just what her beliefs are supposed to *be*. The Democratic party should be *more* receptive to people who feel uncomfortable with abortion? More receptive, say, that *always* having presedential and vice-presedential nominees and *almost always* have congressional leadership who are personally oppoosed to it? Well, I don’t know how you get more receptive to the anti-choice crowd than that without making abortion illegal, but apparently that’s not what she wants to do either.

    So, what’s her point?

  • I can agree with Amy Sullivan on the concept that when “gifts” like the Kuo book fall into the hands of Democrats they often fail to make the most of the opportunity.

  • I don’t care much whether Bush reneged on his promises to the fundaloonies or not. Nor do I care much whether he is a true believer or is merely stringing the fundies along contemptuously. What matters is that Bush is setting horrible precedents.

  • The Press seems to have done our Job for us surrounding this book. It’s not like we get invited to Hannitys show to discuss our view of it. The Lefts ways to the media are still limited, and in the middle of a election, largely based on local issues our focus has been just where it needs to be.
    If this news had been released before the last election, it would have given us the election. This election is not about Bush in such a way to use this against a Congressperson. Given time, and the right settings, we will use this book like a silver hammer. I have spoken with many of the Born Again group about this book, and it is making it’s way to the roots and it’s not a pretty thing for the Neocons.

  • “Liberals need to rethink their theocracy-phobia.” What the hell does that mean? We should be less afraid of theocracy? Sullivan strikes me as an apologist for the “religious right”, the people that used to be called “the moral majority”. Her shtick encompasses one idea: that liberals and Democrats need to be “more religious” and “less hostile to religion”. She never explains exactly why we should do this other than to suggest that this would make Democrats “more acceptable” to the Dobsons and Falwells and their low-brow followers.

    Excuse me, but I’m quite comfortable with my theocracy-phobia. Now fuck off, Sullivan. Go kiss Bumiller’s ass.

  • Bush’s goal was never to make faith-based social services “work.” His goal was to use tax money to reward his electoral supporters (who, in turn, are using a lot of that money simply to learn how to get more of it). They, then, among other noxious effects, are able to use their newfound status to achieve positions of power or to support like-minded people in doing so. Whether or not Bush believes is immaterial; the point is that people who do believe as the Christian nationalists do eventually get positions of power in politics and/or the bureaucracy.

    And for every Christian nationalist who genuinely believes this is what God wants for America because it would make America a better place, there are at least two who just want the power for its own sake.

    It’s stealthy and indirect and gradual, but it is definitely happening. And there are good reasons why the Framers banned it when they wrote the establishment clause of the First Amendment.

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