20081218

fisa to warren (and beyond)

It is pretty amazing that the Obama team would select Rick Warren to deliver the “invocation” at the inauguration in January. The gay community in particular is aghast, given Warren’s outspoken anti-gay views, as well as his vocal support for Proposition 8.

Obama’s supporters seem to have short memories. I don’t, unfortunately. Yeah, I did vote for Obama in November, but I’m not sure if I did it out of support, or just to piss off the right-wingers. Obama’s mantra of “Change” was revealed to be nothing but a cheap catchphrase way back in June.

That’s when Obama endorsed the FISA Expansion Bill, which retroactively legalized BushCo’s evisceration of the Fourth Amendment. When pressed on the issue, his defense used the same fear-mongering language of the Republicans. It was that moment when the tone of his presidency was set for me.

It was just a couple of weeks ago when everyone was up in arms over Obama’s protection of Joseph Lieberman. The Democrats were so eager to achieve that 60-seat majority in the Senate that they simply forgave Lieberman all his sins, despite knowing full well that he would side with his true Republican allies when the pressure was on. Also, the Democrats – like the Republicans – also believe that they are above the law and the people they purportedly represent; Lieberman had committed no crime, because there was no one (important enough) to commit a crime against.

One might be tempted to ask why, in the 21st century, it is necessary to include an “invocation” to the imaginary Great Sky Fairy when inaugurating a new president. If anybody bothered to read the Constitution – besides us radical leftists, that is – then they’d realize that the president serves the people, not “God”.

Furthermore, one might be surprised that even Obama and his progressives feel that they must kowtow to the demands of the Religious Right. They have fallen for the myth that fundamentalist Christianity represents a valid theological position, instead of being a reactionary social movement wrapped in a corrupt heresy.

Or maybe Obama feels that this gesture will placate the rabid denizens of the far right that he is not, in fact, the “Antichrist”. If so, then he is obviously willing to cast aside the support of his own people for a group that will never, ever, ever support him. This shows once again the absurdity of American politics, in which the majority can repudiate the proto-fascist ideas of the fringe, and yet, when all things are said and done, our leaders still embrace that fringe.

FISA. Lieberman. Warren. Who wants to bet that the next betrayals will be named after torture, Guantanamo, and Iraq?