Why is logic such a foriegn concept to the RW?
CivilLibertyRocks
Thursday, July 13, 2017
Why is logic such a foriegn concept to the RW?
I could start with the idea that religion is inherently illogical, but the warped version of Christianity pushed by RWers is a slap in the face to honest followers of that faith. Unfortunately, since Jerry Falwell’s Moral Majority helped push Reagan’s destructive agenda, conservatives have handcuffed themselves to these radicals. Far too many in elected positions at all levels actually display a theological intent. (Full disclosure, I'm a confirmed atheist.) In the RW perversion, any other faith or sect is not just wrong but worthy of their most vehement disdain.
Many of these RW religionists claim affinity to Judaism, but that's just because Israel plays a vital role in their end-of-days mythology. Islam, which prays to the same supreme entity, is reviled — but bigotry against Muslims is at the core of the discrimination these days, not differences in tenets. Hypocrisy is prevalent in this because while they push for anti-Shari laws, they try to pass legislation with exactly the same misogynistic prohibitions and fealty to faith.
The most bigoted of far right conservatives gladly work with the religionists as both seek control of social mores, especially concerning reproductive issues. The conservatives, particularly the tea party faction, wish to absolve government from honoring that pesky preamble to the US Constitution: “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.” Note the highlighted words. The RW focuses on the carefully constructed negative connotation of “Welfare” — an image they’ve fostered as depicting lazy, corrupt people who leech from hard-working folk — hard-working white folk.
President Reagan’s “welfare queen” was never Caucasian. He never said so, but made it clear nonetheless. He knew how to work his base, the incorrectly named “Moral Majority.” (This is the “instincts in common” which Lindsey Graham should have referred when he wrongly praised Trump’s useless missile strike on Syria.) The religionists were happy to sign on to the Reagan administration’s plans to cut support for the welfare crowd because they were seen as immoral as well as moochers, evidenced by supposedly high crime rates and single mothers in the inner cities where most of them supposedly lived. It was irrelevant that not one aspect of the stereotype was based on fact.
Trump’s pandering to his base uses the same deliberate misconceptions. He even taps the religionists who conveniently overlook his obvious ignorance of Biblical scripture and obvious lack of morality (see “Access Hollywood” video) because he vows to continue misogynistic attacks on women's reproductive rights and continues the crime-ridden inner city meme. He also feeds the insecurity of those white religionists with his vows to “build the wall” and ban immigrants to protect us from Mexican rapist druggies and Muslim terrorists.
That white insecurity was recently voiced by Rep Steve King: "We can't restore our civilization with somebody else's babies." His term, “our civilization,” was dog whistle for those who fear the fact that whites are rapidly becoming a minority in this country. Radical so-called Christians are also concerned about this. Besides their self-righteous moralistic opposition to abortion, they also look unfavorably on birth control because they want their numbers to increase — more soldiers in God’s army. The failure to see the oxymoronic aspects is due to the perverse tunnel vision of their extreme views.
Religious moralistic fervor prevents them from recognizing that denying reproductive choice, especially to low-income minorities, is a self-fulfilling prophecy in losing majority status. Yet they cheered Trump's first volley in this counter-productive quest. Trump used an executive order to not only reinstate “global gag rule” but make it more restrictive by cutting funds to any clinic that even mentions abortion as an option. (Obviously, free expression is also not something Trump cares about.)
Republicans in Congress add to the perversion of logic by cutting funding for maternity care in their latest farce of a healthcare bill (Joy Ann Reid called it TRyanCare.) The failures in syllogism are obvious here also. Conservative politicians and their religious allies claim to champion “the pre-born.” More rational folk fail to see how reducing pre-natal care furthers the aim of protecting those “pre-born.” This willfully ignorant stance is also behind the decades-long attacks on Planned Parenthood.
On March 30, 2017, Vice-President Mike Pence broke a tie in the Senate for a bill allowing states to defund Planned Parenthood. Trump will undoubtedly sign it if it makes it to his desk. ( http://www.politico.com/story/2017/03/mike-pence-johnny-isakson-planned-parenthood-vote-senate-236702 ) With Republican governors and legislatures holding a majority of states, this will result in the closing of even more of the already too scarce clinics, many of which provide vital pre-natal care to those same “somebody else's babies” as well as low-income women of all ethnicities.
It never ceases to astonish me that these phony moralists cannot see the links between readily accessible and affordable birth control and reductions in abortion rates. The only explanation can be their efforts towards theocracy. Many, including elected officials, readily admit this unconstitutional bent while claiming to be the true patriotic Americans who cling to founders’ “original intent.”
The latest bill to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, the tax cut for the wealthy ineffectually masquerading as a healthcare bill, continues all the unChristian and bigoted ideology described above. Donald Trump eagerly embraces this bill, though it's doubtful he’s aware of any of its details. (It's well known his narcissistic attention deficit proscribes him from reading anything longer than a couple paragraphs, especially if his name doesn't appear.)
Mitch McConnell and other conservatives with healthcare insurance supplemented by tax dollars claim that accessibility is the focus of our health insurance needs. This ignores the gulf between accessibility and affordability. The free market forces of capitalism they idolize will bring down costs, they say, even though such price wars have never been a factor in health insurance, not to mention health products and medicines. The working folk who bought into Donald Trump's bald-faced lies about his support for them are the ones who will pay with their lives if this tax cut for the wealthy, known as Trumpcare, passes. The hated “welfare queens” and other denizens of the feared inner city will also pay — along with the rural poor who are unmentioned perennial victims of RW war-on-the-poor efforts.
All this brings me back to the original idea — logic is a foreign concept to the RW. And the more radical they are, the less logic is a graspable concept. Republicans claim to be the working man’s party (gender bias intended) who aims to decimate government’s control when the only regulatory guidelines they target aid corporations in theft of wages and destruction of a healthy environment. They claim to be the righteous, moralistic party yet want to remove accessibility to basic healthcare, including necessary prenatal coverage for the female family members of their supposed base of working men. (It should also be pointed out that Planned Parenthood’s low income clients include men, belying their false depiction as nothing more than wholesale abortion mills.)
They claim to be the true patriots who honor the US Constitution and its founding tenets while denying the Establishment Clause and suborning a president who openly violates the article against emoluments. (Their support for a president they disparaged before Nov, 2016, despite the mounting evidence for Trump's collusion with a foreign adversary to interfere in our elections and his admitted obstruction into that offense is a whole new blog. Or three.)
While claiming to be faithful Christians, they fully support the radical factions who make a complete mockery of the tolerant socialism Jesus taught and focus on the hateful bigotry of the Old Testament evident in books such as the much-cited Leviticus.
Ari Veshi posed a question on his MSNBC show on July 12, 2016, pondering just what it will take for Republicans to finally denounce the disaster known as the Trump Administration. It apparently will take a great deal of blatant, obvious, and utterly irrefutable physical evidence of clearly illegal activities. My fear is that even meeting those requirements won’t be enough for a faction that is so deathly allergic to logic.
If You Really Care about Pregnancy Discrimination You Should Care about Reproductive Justice! https://nwlc.org/resources/if-you-really-care-about-pregnancy-discrimination-you-should-care-about-reproductive-justice/
Senate is moving quickly to dismantle Title X preventive health care protections. House already. Trying to use the Congressional Review Act, a rarely used law, to undo the protections set in place by President Obama's rule: https://www.democraticunderground.com/11389836
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