{"id":6983,"date":"2006-03-28T11:20:44","date_gmt":"2006-03-28T16:20:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/?p=6983"},"modified":"2006-03-28T11:20:44","modified_gmt":"2006-03-28T16:20:44","slug":"the-religious-right-presents-a-list-of-demands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/the-religious-right-presents-a-list-of-demands\/","title":{"rendered":"The religious right presents a list of demands"},"content":{"rendered":"

The “[tag]War on Christians[\/tag]” conference got underway in DC yesterday, and if there’s ever been a larger group of people with an unjustified victim’s complex, I can’t think of it. About 300 attendees were presented with “a gloomy picture<\/a> of a war by ‘neo-pagans’ against ‘values voters.'”<\/p>\n

“Let’s not say, ‘Oh, it’s not that bad,’ ” said the Rev. Tristan Emmanuel, director of the Equipping Christians for the Public Square Centre in Jordan Station, Ontario. Secularists, he added, practice “Christophobia,” which he deemed “an irrational fear of anything Christ-based.”<\/p>\n

“When you listen to their rejection of our participation in the public square, it’s visceral,” he said.<\/p>\n

Ron Luce, president of Teen Mania Ministries of Garden Valley, Texas, told the audience that only 4 percent of today’s “millennial” generation of teenagers are evangelical Christians able to transform the culture. “If we only have 4 percent, we all lose,” he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Of course, it wasn’t all just “neo-pagans” this and “Christophobia” that. The conference also marked the release of the “Values Voters’ Contract with Congress<\/a>,” with a list of items the religious right groups, leaders, and activists want congressional Republicans to work on this year.<\/p>\n

“It’s time for the values voters to tell the government what we expect of them,” said Baptist minister Rick Scarborough<\/a>, who tried to create a mini-theocracy<\/a> in his Texas hometown before creating Vision America, which organized this week’s “summit.” Scarborough added, “This contract tells Congress they can count on our vote if these things become front-burner issues.”<\/p>\n

It was, in this sense, a threat as much as a demand. If congressional Republicans want far-right foot soldiers for the 2006 cycle, Scarborough argued, then the religious right expects certain wish-list items to get serious attention in Congress.<\/p>\n

So, what’s on the list? The better question would be, “What isn’t?”
\n
\nThe “[tag]Values Voters’ Contract with Congress[\/tag]” is billed as necessary because, as the document explains, “liberals” have “waged an insidious campaign to corrupt and destroy the moral foundations of our liberty.” The “contract” claims to have 10 items, but what it actually has is 10 headings<\/i> with multiple requests each.<\/p>\n

It’s far too long to republish, but the full list is here<\/a>. It includes the religious right’s greatest hits ([tag]school prayer[\/tag], ban on [tag]abortion[\/tag], ban on [tag]human cloning[\/tag] and embryo research, [tag]gay marriage[\/tag] amendment to the Constitution), several items that are already legally protected (“[tag]under God[\/tag]” in the Pledge, the right of churches to speak out on moral issues), and a few items that don’t seem to have any connection to a religious agenda at all (tax cuts, increased border security, restrictions on eminent domain).<\/p>\n

Remember, before you laugh these folks off as fringe activists that no credible person should take seriously, take a look at the conference’s guest list<\/a>, which includes three leading House Republicans (Tom DeLay, Todd Akin, and Louis Gohmert) and two leading Senate Republicans (John [tag]Cornyn[\/tag] and Sam [tag]Brownback[\/tag]), the latter of which is considered a credible presidential candidate in 2008.<\/p>\n

In 2006, these fringe activists are taken seriously by the Republican establishment. It speaks volumes about the current state of the party.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The “[tag]War on Christians[\/tag]” conference got underway in DC yesterday, and if there’s ever been a larger group of people with an unjustified victim’s complex, I can’t think of it. About 300 attendees were presented with “a gloomy picture of a war by ‘neo-pagans’ against ‘values voters.’” “Let’s not say, ‘Oh, it’s not that bad,’ […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6983","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6983","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6983"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6983\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6983"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6983"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6983"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}