Earlier this month, we published a piece exposing how religious-right pseudo-historian David Barton routinely misrepresents history and scripture to support his Christian nationalist political agenda.
In that case, we examined how Barton distorted a speech delivered by Benjamin Franklin during the Constitutional Convention to claim that it was filled with Bible verses.
As we have explained before, one of Barton’s favorite techniques for convincing his audience that America was founded as a Christian nation is to assert that Americans of the founding era were so deeply knowledgeable about the Bible that they referenced it continuously in their writings and speeches. If people today are incapable of recognizing all of those Bible verses, Barton asserts, that is just because they are “biblically illiterate.”
Even though we debunked Barton’s claim about Franklin’s speech, he continues to make this false claim in his presentations to churches around the country. On top of that, he recently started citing additional historical speeches and documents that he claims are overflowing with biblical citations.
Here are just a few of his misleading and grossly exaggerated claims.
When Barton spoke at the Truth & Liberty Coalition conference in Colorado earlier this month, he claimed that Patrick Henry’s famous “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death” speech contained multiple Bible quotations, as did a letter written by President George Washington to a synagogue in Rhode Island.
We don’t know the Bible even as much as our least religious Founding Fathers used to know the Bible. And by the way, other examples, if I take you, for example Patrick Henry, you may be familiar with his famous speech, “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death.” That speech that he gave in the legislature of Virginia—which by the way, the legislature of Virginia met at St. John’s Church in Richmond. So the legislature is meeting in the church? What happened to the separation of church and state stuff we’re told the Founding Fathers wanted? Yeah, the legislature met at the church, and [Henry] gave a passionate speech that day, and in that speech that he gave if you want to read it, it’s 14 sentences long. But the same question [is] how many Bible verses? There were 11 Bible verses. He’s just rattling off the cuff. He is so frustrated with what the other legislators are doing that he just got up and said, ‘Guys, you’re wrong.’ And he just goes into a speech. This is just off the cuff.
By the way, these are the verses. And notice these verses; I’m not sure about you, but I’m going to bet that most people have not memorized Ecclesiastes 9:11 as a favorite Bible verse or Deuteronomy 32. See these verses here? These aren’t the ones that we typically memorize, but this is what they had in their heart, this is what they had memorized, and this is what came out when the time was right and they needed this.
You go to George Washington. In 1789, he becomes president, and in 1790, he decides, “I need to visit every state in the United States because we’ve been separate nations, we need to know that we’re a nation, so I’m going to everywhere, every state.” And in 1790, he had plans to go into Rhode Island, and as he was going into Rhode Island, plans were announced that President Washington is going to visit Rhode Island. There’s a Hebrew congregation in Newport, Rhode Island, that wrote Washington a letter, and it was just an effusive letter, it said, “We so thank God for what you’ve done, what you’ve done for religious liberty, what you’ve done for our freedoms, we think God has raised you up,” and they just gushed all over him. It was just a really nice letter. And so Washington replied back to them, and in reply back—it was a cordial letter, kind of a presidential letter—he said, “Thank you. That’s really nice.” And the letter that he replied back to them in had a total of two sentences. In two sentences, he quoted 10 Bible verses. His letter to the Hebrew congregation is just about Bible phrase after Bible phrase after Bible phrase. That’s what he used to craft that reply.
So when you look back at Founding Fathers, you find that they knew the Bible, they knew it very well, they studied it well.
The first thing worth noting regarding Barton’s claim about Henry’s speech is that the legislature of Virginia did not meet in a church. Henry delivered his famous speech during the Second Virginia Convention, which was only held in St. John’s Church because the colony’s royal governor, Lord Dunmore, had dissolved the state’s House of Burgesses near the start of what eventually became the American Revolution. Secondly, Henry’s speech was not written down or transcribed at the time, and the version of the speech known today was reconstructed from the recollections of witnesses years after Henry had died. Thus, nobody really knows exactly what Henry said that day.
No man thinks more highly than I do of the patriotism, as well as abilities, of the very worthy gentlemen who have just addressed the House. But different men often see the same subject in different lights; and, therefore, I hope it will not be thought disrespectful to those gentlemen if, entertaining as I do opinions of a character very opposite to theirs, I shall speak forth my sentiments freely and without reserve. This is no time for ceremony. The question before the House is one of awful moment to this country. For my own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery; and in proportion to the magnitude of the subject ought to be the freedom of the debate. It is only in this way that we can hope to arrive at truth, and fulfill the great responsibility which we hold to God and our country. Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offense, I should consider myself as guilty of treason towards my country, and of an act of disloyalty toward the Majesty of Heaven, which I revere above all earthly kings.
Mr. President, it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that siren till she transforms us into beasts. Is this the part of wise men, engaged in a great and arduous struggle for liberty? Are we disposed to be of the number of those who, having eyes, see not, and, having ears, hear not, the things which so nearly concern their temporal salvation? For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst, and to provide for it.
I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past. And judging by the past, I wish to know what there has been in the conduct of the British ministry for the last ten years to justify those hopes with which gentlemen have been pleased to solace themselves and the House. Is it that insidious smile with which our petition has been lately received? Trust it not, sir; it will prove a snare to your feet. Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a kiss. Ask yourselves how this gracious reception of our petition comports with those warlike preparations which cover our waters and darken our land. Are fleets and armies necessary to a work of love and reconciliation? Have we shown ourselves so unwilling to be reconciled that force must be called in to win back our love? Let us not deceive ourselves, sir. These are the implements of war and subjugation; the last arguments to which kings resort. I ask gentlemen, sir, what means this martial array, if its purpose be not to force us to submission? Can gentlemen assign any other possible motive for it? Has Great Britain any enemy, in this quarter of the world, to call for all this accumulation of navies and armies? No, sir, she has none. They are meant for us: they can be meant for no other. They are sent over to bind and rivet upon us those chains which the British ministry have been so long forging. And what have we to oppose to them? Shall we try argument? Sir, we have been trying that for the last ten years. Have we anything new to offer upon the subject? Nothing. We have held the subject up in every light of which it is capable; but it has been all in vain. Shall we resort to entreaty and humble supplication? What terms shall we find which have not been already exhausted? Let us not, I beseech you, sir, deceive ourselves. Sir, we have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne! In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation. There is no longer any room for hope. If we wish to be free—if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending—if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained—we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms and to the God of hosts is all that is left us!
They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? Sir, we are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power. The millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable—and let it come! I repeat it, sir, let it come.
It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace—but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!
And here are the Bible verses that Barton claims Henry quoted, as displayed in a slide in his presentation.
As with Barton’s claims about Franklin’s speech at the Constitutional Convention, there are some obvious biblical allusions in Henry’s speech, such as his assertion that “Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace—but there is no peace,” which is a reference to both Jeremiah 6:14 and Jeremiah 8:11 where the phrase appears. However, it is hard to understand how Henry’s use of this phrase can count as two biblical citations.
While Henry’s language that “the battle, sir, is not to the strong alone” finds an echo in Ecclesiastes 9:11, it is hard to determine where the other Bible verses Barton cites supposedly appear in Henry’s speech:
Jeremiah 50:22: The noise of battle is in the land, and great destruction!
2 Chronicles 32:8: With him is an arm of flesh, but with us is the Lord our God, to help us and to fight our battles. And the people took confidence from the words of Hezekiah king of Judah.
Daniel 4:17: The sentence is by the decree of the watchers, the decision by the word of the holy ones, to the end that the living may know that the Most High rules the kingdom of men and gives it to whom he will and sets over it the lowliest of men.
Psalm 75:7: but it is God who executes judgment, putting down one and lifting up another.
Joshua 24:15: And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.
2 Thessalonians 1:6: since indeed God considers it just to repay with affliction those who afflict you.
Deuteronomy 32:4: The Rock, his work is perfect, for all his ways are justice. A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, just and upright is he.
Matthew 20:6: And about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing. And he said to them, ‘Why do you stand here idle all day?
The same goes for Washington’s letter to the Touro Synagogue in Rhode Island which, contrary to Barton’s assertion, is much longer than just two sentences:
To the Hebrew Congregation in Newport, Rhode Island
[Newport, R.I., 18 August 1790]
Gentlemen.
While I receive, with much satisfaction, your Address replete with expressions of affection and esteem; I rejoice in the opportunity of assuring you, that I shall always retain a grateful remembrance of the cordial welcome I experienced in my visit to Newport, from all classes of Citizens.
The reflection on the days of difficulty and danger which are past is rendered the more sweet, from a consciousness that they are succeeded by days of uncommon prosperity and security. If we have wisdom to make the best use of the advantages with which we are now favored, we cannot fail, under the just administration of a good Government, to become a great and a happy people.
The Citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for having given to mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy: a policy worthy of imitation. All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people, that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights. For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens, in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.
It would be inconsistent with the frankness of my character not to avow that I am pleased with your favorable opinion of my Administration, and fervent wishes for my felicity. May the Children of the Stock of Abraham, who dwell in this land, continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other Inhabitants; while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and figtree, and there shall be none to make him afraid. May the father of all mercies scatter light and not darkness in our paths, and make us all in our several vocations useful here, and in his own due time and way everlastingly happy.
Go: Washington
Here are the Bible verses Barton claims are cited in Washington’s letter, as seen in his slide presentation:
Once again, there are a few Biblical allusions in Washington’s letter, such as his line about “every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and figtree,” which is a reference to language found in 1 Kings 4:25 and Micha 4:4, which Barton yet again inexplicably counts as two citations.
Washington’s language about “the father of mercies” does echo 2 Corinthians 1:3 and the line about “the Stock of Abraham” mirrors Acts 13:26, but the remainder of the Bible verses cited by Barton are difficult to place:
Isaiah 35:10: And the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.
Proverbs 4:18: But the path of the righteous is like the light of dawn, which shines brighter and brighter until full day.
Psalm 119:105: Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.
Ecclesiastes 3:11: He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.
Ephesians 4:1: I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called.
Deuteronomy 12:10: But when you go over the Jordan and live in the land that the Lord your God is giving you to inherit, and when he gives you rest from all your enemies around, so that you live in safety.
As with his claims about Franklin’s speech, there are nowhere near as many Bible citations in Henry’s speech or Washington’s letter as Barton claims there are. In fact, most of what Barton claims are quotes from Bible verses amount to little more than vague similarities in language.
What’s more is that rather declare this to be an explicitly or exclusively Christian nation, Washington assured his Jewish recipients that “All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship,” and that “happily the Government of the United States … gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance.”
The irony of Barton’s complaint about modern Christians being so “biblically illiterate” that they can’t recognize all of the Bible verses allegedly contained in documents from the founding era is that it is precisely the biblical illiteracy that Barton decries that allows him to get away with routinely misleading his audiences, confident in his knowledge that they are largely incapable of detecting his lies and misrepresentations and will never bother to investigate the baseless assertions that he makes.
These false claims have a political purpose. In 2022, Barton traveled around the country on behalf of an organization called Faith Wins, working to mobilize Christian voters heading into the midterm elections by telling them that, according to the Bible, they were responsible for choosing our elected leaders.
An example of the sort of disinformation Barton peddled was on display when he spoke at Radiant Church in Colorado last September. During his presentation, Barton falsely asserted that jurist James Kent set up federal circuit courts and that the concept of circuit courts was rooted in 1 Samuel 7:15-16. That passages reads, “Samuel continued as Israel’s leader all the days of his life. From year to year he went on a circuit from Bethel to Gilgal to Mizpah, judging Israel.”
“James Kent, he’s known as the father of American jurisprudence,” Barton said. “He’s one of the two guys who helped set up the American judicial system. And when he set it up, he set it up with circuit courts. … Back at the beginning, when we had the original Supreme Court justices, they got on their horse, and they rode from town to town and from state to state to have court meetings.”
“And so we have this concept of circuit judges set up, and the guy who set it up said, ‘Well, we got it out of 1 Samuel 7:15-16,’” Barton continued. “It says that Samuel judged Israel, and Samuel rode the circuit. [Kent] said that if that’s the way the Bible does judges, then that’s a good way for us to do judges too.”
We had heard Barton make this claim multiple times before, but didn’t realize how wrong Barton was until we recently read the book, “John Jay: Founding Father,” by Walter Stahr. Jay served as the very first chief justice of the Supreme Court, a position to which he was nominated by President George Washington in 1789 on the same day that Washington signed the Judiciary Act of 1789, which created the federal court system.
As explicitly laid out in the Judiciary Act of 1789, Jay and his colleagues were required to travel among the 13 circuit courts established throughout the nation and hear cases in conjunction with local district judges.
While Kent was an acclaimed jurist in the Founding Era, he played no role in crafting this legislation, establishing circuit courts, or in helping to “set up the American judicial system.” In fact, Kent never even served in Congress, and the Judiciary Act of 1789, which laid out the concept of circuit courts, was drafted by Sen. Oliver Ellsworth of Connecticut.
Barton, of course, provided no evidence to support his claim regarding Kent’s supposed biblical inspiration for creating circuit courts during his presentation. But when Barton made this same false claim in his 2012 book, “The Founder’s Bible,” he cited “The Memoirs and Letters of James Kent.” Predictably, if one actually checks Kent’s memoirs, all that is found is an undated passage in Kent’s diary noting that “the Jewish judges rode the circuits” along with the quote from 1 Samuel.
This is, once again, an example of Barton exploiting the biblical and historical ignorance of his own audiences to feed them a false narrative regarding the founding of this nation that serves primarily to promote his own modern-day right-wing political agenda.
We need your help. Every day, Right Wing Watch exposes extremism to help the public, activists, and journalists understand the strategies and tactics of anti-democratic forces—and respond to an increasingly aggressive and authoritarian far-right movement. The threat is growing, but our resources are not. Any size contribution—or a small monthly donation—will help us continue our work and become more effective at disrupting the ideologies, people, and organizations that threaten our freedom and democracy. Please make an investment in Right Wing Watch’s defense of the values we share.
When the Family Research Council held its annual “Pray, Vote, Stand” summit last week, Christian nationalist pseudo-historian David Barton was given a prime speaking slot, along with dozens of right-wing pastors, activists, commentators, and members of Congress.
While introducing Barton, FRC’s president Tony Perkins declared that what critics deride as Christian nationalism is simply true American history, and he credited Barton for having “done more than anyone else to help Americans, and Christians in particular, to know their history”—a history that Perkins claimed has intentionally been “hidden” by mainstream historians.
Perkins is correct in noting that nobody has been as influential as Barton in convincing millions of Americans that the United States was founded to be an explicitly Christian nation. And that is a problem, given that Barton’s misuse and misrepresentation of both American history and theBiblehave beenwell-documented.
Barton’s willingness to misrepresent history and scripture to promote his right-wing political agenda was on display when he spoke at Calvary Church in Moline, Illinois, last Wednesday as part of the Faith Wins voter mobilization effort.
One of Barton’s favorite methods of convincing his audience that America was founded as a Christian nation is to assert that Americans of the founding era were so deeply knowledgeable about the Bible that they referenced it continuously in their writings and speeches. The problem today, Barton insists, is that modern Christians are ignorant of both history and scripture and are thus incapable of recognizing the fact that our founding documents are chock-full of Bible quotes.
The irony of this assertion is that it relies on the very ignorance Barton decries in order to be effective, as anyone willing to look into the claims Barton makes will inevitably find that he is lying.
While speaking at Calvary Church, Barton trotted out a new example of this technique, when he claimed that first- and second-grade students attending public schools in New Jersey in the early 1800s were required to memorize large portions of the Bible as part of their curriculum.
It’s interesting to go back in those early records and see what was being taught in the schools. For example, let me take you to some early schools. I want to take in New Jersey. And in this case, I’m just going to choose 1816 [in] New Jersey. They’re going to show you what happens with first- and second-graders in New Jersey. Here’s what they say. It says, ‘All the scholars of the first and second classes commit to memory portions of the New Testament or Psalms, a lesson of the Catechism, several hymns, and the text of the preceding Sabbath.’ Everybody in public school in New Jersey, if you’re in first and second grade, this is what you’re getting memorize. And by the way, what are the texts of the preceding Sabbath? That means whatever Pastor Tim talked about on Sunday, we’re going to memorize those Bible verses; so whatever verses he referenced, we’re going to memorize. A public school is doing this? Yes, absolutely. This is what public schools did.
As we all know, some kids are sharper than other kids, and they talked about one of the kids that was really sharp. They said, ‘One of the scholars has committed to memory the Book of John, and the first 30 Psalms, together with 119th Psalm.’ A [student] in first and second grade memorized the Gospel of John, 30 Psalms, and Psalm 119. He was really sharp. The rest of the kids weren’t quite so sharp. Here’s what it said about the rest of them, ‘The majority have committed to memory the Gospel of John.’ The average kid has memorized the Gospel of John. Everybody does that in first and second grade, but we got one kid that added 30 chapters out of Psalms and Psalm 119. Really? Common for first and second grade is everybody memorizes the Gospel of John? Maybe one in 1,000 Christians today has memorized the Gospel of John, and that was first and second grade stuff back then.
Thanks to the quotations Barton cited, we were able to track down the document he used in making this claim. It was a report from the board of directors of the Free School Association of Elizabeth-Town published in a periodical called The Christian Herald and, predictably, Barton was blatantly misrepresenting it.
The first thing one notices upon reading the report is that the reference to “the scholars of the first and second classes” does not refer to what today would be called first and second graders. The report explicitly states students are “divided into seven classes” based upon their reading and writing abilities and that “most of the children in the fifth class were unable to read when they entered school.”
It is unlikely that first- and second-graders were memorizing entire books of the Bible, as Barton claimed, while fifth-graders were unable to read.
But more importantly, the document further reveals that this was not a public school at all, as Barton claimed, but rather a Sunday school.
As it notes, the students were “taught on the Lord’s day, immediately after the conclusion of public worship in the afternoon.”
In fact, the document itself confirms that these students were enrolled in Sunday school when it notes the existence of “two other Sunday schools” that were not under the board’s control.
As author James J. Gigantino II explained in his book, “The Ragged Road to Abolition: Slavery and Freedom in New Jersey, 1775-1865,” the Free School Association of Elizabeth-Town grew out of the so-called “Sabbath school” movement, in which “schools sponsored by churches and private donors took over black education and continued white paternalistic control over it. These schools were led by white teachers and administrators, focused primarily on reading, writing, and basic mathematics, and taught biblical reading knowledge and prayer to instill religious and moral lessons in their students.”
From “Church of the Founding Fathers of New Jersey: A History,” a book chronicling the history of the First Presbyterian Church Elizabeth, it is clear that these were indeed Sunday schools set up by Rev. John McDowell, the author of the document that Barton cited.
One of the great and enduring achievements of the church during John McDowell’s ministry was the founding of the Sunday School. The first Sunday Schools in America were founded about 1805 in Boston and Philadelphia. The movement spread rapidly to other cities of the country, but not always with success. In many places, the schools were virtually forced upon the church members and the communities, and after a brief trial period, they were abandoned.
Reverend McDowell decided that the idea of founding a Sunday School was good, and used a very cautious approach in establishing the first school in this area. He enlisted the support of his Session, and then contacted Reverend John Churchill Rudd, Rector of St. John’s Church, and Reverend Thomas Morrell, minister of the Methodist Church, to ask their support. Both men became convinced that the purpose of the proposed Sunday School was good, and the three clergymen began to “sound out” their congregations on the idea. The groundwork was laid in 1812 and 1813.
By the spring of 1814, enough parents were convinced that religious training for their children was a desirable thing, so the school was opened, meeting in the Public Academy located on the north-east corner of the church property. Presbyterian, Episcopal, and Methodist children met together, and were taught by the three ministers, at the first sessions. At once the school was a success, and at the end of the first month, it was necessary to open a second school for the Negro children of the town. The colored Sunday School was taught by a student who was studying theology with Reverend McDowell. An organization calling itself the Free School Association of Elizabethtown was set up to handle the administration of the Sunday Schools, with Miss Maria Smith as superintendent.
According to professor John Fea, chair of the History Department at Messiah University and author of “Was America Founded as a Christian Nation?,” a search of American newspapers and periodicals published in the early 1800s “clearly show that this is a Sunday School.”
“This once again shows that Barton fails to understand the larger context of the periods from which he cherry-picks his facts,” Fea told Right Wing Watch. “It would have taken Barton less than an hour, with the historical databases available to professional historians, or even just a search on Google Books, for him to dig up multiple primary sources showing that the ‘Free School Association of Elizabeth-Town’ was, in fact, a Sunday School. In fact, ‘public schools’ as we know them today did not exist in the early decades of the 19th century. This is the kind of sloppy work—void of any concept of context or change over time—that has characterized Barton’s entire career as a Christian Right activist who raids the past for something useful to help him advance his political agenda in the present.”
We need your help. Every day, Right Wing Watch exposes extremism to help the public, activists, and journalists understand the strategies and tactics of anti-democratic forces—and respond to an increasingly aggressive and authoritarian far-right movement. The threat is growing, but our resources are not. Any size contribution—or a small monthly donation—will help us continue our work and become more effective at disrupting the ideologies, people, and organizations that threaten our freedom and democracy. Please make an investment in Right Wing Watch’s defense of the values we share.
Read the full article. There so much more. No paywall. As Right Wing Watch has exhaustively documented for years, Barton tours the country, telling avid Christian audiences that virtually every line of the US Constitution and the Declaration of Independence was taken verbatim from the bible. Barton is such a notorious liar that even his own Christian publishing house retracted his book. And now he’s advising the Speaker of the House.
Christian nationalist pseudo-historian David Barton claims that Patrick Henry and George Washington quoted numerous Bible verses in their speeches and writings. We decided to take a look at Barton's "evidence" and—surprise, surprise—he was lying. https://t.co/6U0sfA5eHdpic.twitter.com/fetyq3BxqF
We hate to sound like a broken record, but if Christian nationalist pseudo-historian David Barton is going to keep making false claims, we're going to keep pointing it out: No, James Kent did not create the federal circuit court system based on the Bible. https://t.co/xG7v7bD7zjpic.twitter.com/SzmWlynPiQ
Pseudo-historian David Barton is constantly finding new "proof" the US was founded as a Christian nation. Lately, he's been claiming that 1st & 2nd grade public schools students in 1816 were required to memorize large portions of the Bible. They weren't. https://t.co/4fWoDnQL0mpic.twitter.com/iam7YY4h7x
the founding fathers knew of the massacres that happened in europe over whether you were protestant or catholic so, of course, they did not want that to happen here, and thus we have freedom of religion. Stupid republicans.
“Many professional historians dismiss Mr. Barton, whose academic degree is in Christian Education from Oral Roberts University, as a biased amateur who cherry-picks quotes from history and the Bible.”
Jay W. Richards, senior fellow at the Christian conservative Discovery Institute, said in 2012 that Barton’s books and videos are full of “embarrassing factual errors, suspiciously selective quotes, and highly misleading claims.”
Same as Creationists who are all lying amateurs who cherry picks quotes, articles, and outdated materials from the Bible, history, and especially science.
so true,some nutcase politician from NC runs bible classes on sunday..tells the kids that satan created ALL the fossil evidence,just to confuse us and ,that the earth is truly only 6k years old (sigh)..Bartons got plenty of company in the b/s dept.
It was noted that Jefferson felt that the inclusion of any Christian language must be excluded, as he felt that in the future, that enlightened Americans would move away from Christianity, but such any Christian language included in the Constitution might invalidate or complicate its interpretation by a more enlightened America.
…And look where we are with theocrats at the gates, claiming gawd is in the Constitution…somewhere.
Christianity is the most perverted system that ever shone on man. -Thomas Jefferson, letter to his nephew “The United States is in no way founded upon the Christian religion.” — George Washington & John Adams in a diplomatic message to Malta “This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it.” — John Adams in a letter to Thomas Jefferson “I do not find in orthodox Christianity one redeeming feature.” — Thomas Jefferson “Lighthouses are more useful than churches” — Benjamin Franklin “The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the Supreme Being as his father, in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva from the brain of Jupiter.” -Thomas Jefferson, letter to Adams
It’s fascinating watching a major country turn into an extremist theocracy in real-time. Historians are gonna have a field-day. Foreign historians, you understand. Only bible history will be allowed in the USA.
Wake up US public. The Christian theocratic take over of the government is well underway. This is just like Afghanistan and Iran, other countries where religions were allowed to start shaping and making the laws. Individual rights, progressive societies, even science and medical knowledge becomes restricted and regressive to a time of what was written in old holy books as people interpret them now for their own power and profit. Lying and out right making things up is OK to these people in order to institute the Christian dominated society ruled by church doctrine rather than by the will or for the good of the people. This fake historian has rewritten history, simply made up stuff, ignored other stuff and has been used for decades in home and religious schools to spread a false fake understanding of history that now those who were taught it as kids are in positions of authority in state legislatures and as judges to enforce those lies and myths. I remember James as a teen coming to our home after school telling us all about how the founding fathers were highly religious Christians, the laws of the country were founded on Moses and the bible, and that worshiping god was why we became an independent nation, because god himself bless his holy Christian nation. And we had to work hard to get back to that ideal so god would be happy and give us more blessing. After all, it was the liberals with their sexual immorality and push to undo gender roles, take women from the home raising children, and perverting god’s ideal lifestyle of marriage and men’s right to dominate. They also were trying to take god away from everyone and all that was making god angry and he might smite all of us. Such nonsense we had to gently correct for him. Then he would go home to his highly religious very unchristian parents who pushed religion but did not live it. It is scary what is happening. We need to stop it. Hard stop. Hugs
Barton has been a staple of Texas’ Christian conservative movement, offering crucial support to politicians and frequently being cited or called on to testify in favor of bills that critics say would erode church-state separations.
David Barton, left, of WallBuilders, poses for photos at a Texas Eagle Forum reception at the Texas Republican Convention in Fort Worth on June 7, 2012. Credit: Bob Daemmrich for The Texas Tribune
For nearly four decades, Texas activist David Barton has barnstormed statehouses and pulpits across the nation, arguing that the separation between church and state is a myth and that America should be run as a Christian nation.
Now, he’s closer to power than perhaps ever before.
One day after little-known Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Johnson of Louisiana was elected as the new House speaker last week, Barton said on a podcast that he was already discussing staffing with Johnson, his longtime ally in deeply conservative, Christian causes.
“We have some tools at our disposal now (that) we haven’t had in a long time,” Barton added.
Johnson recently spoke at an event hosted by Barton’s nonprofit, WallBuilders; he’s praised Barton and his “profound influence on me, and my work, and my life and everything I do”; and, before his career as a lawmaker, Johnson worked for Alliance Defending Freedom — a legal advocacy group that has helped infuse more Christianity into public schools and government, a key goal of Barton’s movement.
Barton, who lives in Aledo, has been a staple of Texas’ own Christian conservative movement, offering crucial public support to politicians and frequently being cited or called on to testify in favor of bills that critics say would erode church-state separations — including in front of the Texas Legislature this year.
Johnson’s election — and his proximity to Barton — is a massive victory for a growing Christian nationalist movement that claims the United States’ foundation was ordained by God, and therefore its laws and institutions should favor their brand of Christianity.
“Johnson’s rise means that Barton and his fellow Christian nationalists now have unprecedented access to the levers of power on the national stage, paralleling the access they already have here in Texas and some other states,” said David Brockman, a non-resident scholar in religion and public policy at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy.
Barton and Johnson did not respond to requests for comment this week
Barton has spent nearly all of his life in North Texas, save for the few years he spent at Oral Roberts University, an evangelical school in Tulsa, Oklahoma. After graduating with a degree in religious education, he returned to Aledo and worked as a math and science teacher, basketball coach and, later, principal at a K-12 school that grew out of his parent’s Bible study group, according to a 2006 Texas Monthly profile of him.
In 1988, Barton founded his group, WallBuilders, to “exert a direct and positive influence in government, education, and the family by educating the nation concerning the Godly foundation of our country” and “providing information to federal, state, and local officials as they develop public policies which reflect Biblical values,” according to the group’s website.
Since then, Barton has been arguably the most influential figure in a growing movement to undermine the establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment, which states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.”
Barton claims the clause has been misunderstood. He argues that most of the Founding Fathers were “orthodox, evangelical” Christians, and that it would thus be more accurate to read the establishment clause’s use of the word “religion” as a stand-in for “Christian denomination.”
“We would best understand the actual context of the First Amendment by saying, ‘Congress shall make no law establishing one Christian denomination as the national denomination,’” he has said.
Barton also argues that the country’s founders “never intended the First Amendment to become a vehicle to promote a pluralism of other religions.”
In his mind, the wall separating church and state was only meant to extend one way, protecting religion — specifically, Christianity — from the government, but not vice versa.
“‘Separation of church and state’ currently means almost exactly the opposite of what it originally meant,” his group’s website claims.
And he argues that most of what he considers society’s ills — from school shootings, low standardized test scores and drug use to divorce, crime and LGBTQ+ people — are the natural consequences of abandoning the Judeo-Christian virtues, as articulated in his form of Christianity, that he says are the bedrock of the nation’s founding. Sometimes, he’s drawn fire for those views — such as when he said the lack of cure for AIDS was God’s vengeance for homosexuality or when he compared the Third Reich’s “evils” to the “homosexual lifestyle” in 2017.
Barton, a self-styled “amateur historian,” has for years been debunked and ridiculed by actual historians and scholars, who note that he has no formal training and that his work is filled with selectivequotes, mischaracterizations and inaccuracies — critiques that Barton has claimed are mere attacks on his faith. He has been accused of whitewashing the Founding Fathers — particularly, their slave owning — to fit his narrative of a God-ordained nation. He has acknowledged using unconfirmed quotes from historical figures. And Barton’s 2012 book, “The Jefferson Lies,” was so widely panned by Christian academics that it prompted a separate book, “Getting Jefferson Right,” to debunk all of his inaccuracies, and was later pulled by its Christian publisher because “the basic truths just were not there.”
Despite that, Barton has remained a fixture in conservative Christian circles and Republican Party politics. He served as vice chair of the Republican Party of Texas from 1997 to 2006 and, in 2004, was tapped for clergy outreach by President George W. Bush’s reelection campaign. In 2010, his fellow Texan and prominent conservative personality Glenn Beck praised him as “the most important man in America right now.” Barton was an early and important endorser of Sen. Ted Cruz’s unexpected first win in 2012. And in 2016, Barton ran one of multiple super PACs that were crucial to Cruz’s reelection.
“Having David Barton running the super PAC gives it a lot of validity for evangelicals and pastors,” Mike Gonzalez, the South Carolina evangelical chair for the Cruz for President campaign, told the Daily Beast at the time.
In Texas, Barton has become increasingly instrumental among GOP politicians. He and WallBuilders currently work closely with Rick Green, a former state representative and current leader of Patriot Academy, a Dripping Springs-based group that trains young adults, churches and others how to “influence government policy with a Biblical worldview” and borrows heavily from Barton’s teachings.
Barton has also railed against the Johnson Amendment, which prohibits tax-exempt groups, including churches, from direct political advocacy. And he is frequently called on to support laws that would infuse more Christianity into public life — including in public schools. In May, he and his son, Timothy Barton, testified in favor of a bill — which later failed — that would have required all Texas public school classrooms to display the Ten Commandments.
During the hearing, Barton’s work was praised as “great” by Sen. Donna Campbell, R-New Braunfels. His theories were echoed by Sen. Mayes Middleton, R-Galveston, who said that church-state separation is “not a real doctrine.” And the bill’s sponsor, Sen. Phil King, R-Weatherford, extolled Barton and his son as “esteemed witnesses.”
Other prominent Texas Republicans have similarly echoed Barton’s views, including Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who has called the United States “a Christian nation” and said “there is no separation of church and state. It was not in the Constitution.”
“We were a nation founded upon not the words of our founders, but the words of God because he wrote the Constitution,” Patrick said last year.
The mainstreaming of Barton’s views has corresponded with a series of U.S. Supreme Court decisions that have allowed for a greater infusion of Christianity into the public sphere, and a burgeoning Christian nationalist movement on the right that was turbocharged by former President Donald Trump and his promise to white evangelicals that “Christianity will have power” should they support him.
February polling from the Public Religion Research Institute found that more than half of Republicans adhere to or sympathize with foundational aspects of Christian nationalism, including beliefs that the U.S. should be a strictly Christian nation. Of those respondents, PRRI found, roughly half supported having an authoritarian leader who maintains Christian dominance in society. Experts have also found strong correlations between Christian nationalist beliefs and opposition to immigration, racial justice and religious diversity.
Johnson’s election to House Speaker shows how normalized such beliefs have become, said Amanda Tyler, the executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty, a Washington, D.C.-based group that advocates for a strong wall between government and religion. She noted that some Republicans — including U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Georgia, have embraced the title of Christian nationalist in recent years.
Tyler said that Johnson’s views are particularly concerning because of his background as both a Southern Baptist and as a constitutional lawyer. Baptists, she noted, have a long history of advocacy for strong church-state separations because of the persecution they faced during the country’s founding — a stance that she said Johnson has betrayed throughout his legal and political career.
“He has worked actively for these principles that further Christian nationalism,” Tyler said. “I am also a Baptist, and to see someone who is a Baptist really reject foundational concepts of religious freedom for all — concepts which are really core to what it means to be a Baptist — is also very disheartening.”
Johnson played a central role in attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election by crafting a legal brief that was signed by more than 100 U.S. House Republicans in support of a lawsuit filed by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton that sought to have election results thrown out in four swing states by President Joe Biden.
At the same time that he was aiding the legal charge to overturn the 2020 election, Johnson was also cultivating closer ties to figures in the New Apolostolic Reformation,a fast-growing movement of ultraconservative preachers, televangelists, self-described prophets and faith healers who abide by the “Seven Mountains Mandate” — a Christian nationalist-adjacent theology that says Christians must fulfill a divine mandate to rule over all seven aspects of society (family, religion, education, media, entertainment, business, and government) in order to usher in the “end times.”
Driven by that theology, New Apolostic Reformation figures played major roles in the lead up to the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, combining Trump’s lies about a stolen election with claims that they were engaged in “spiritual warfare” with their political enemies and, thus, extreme and anti-democratic measures were not only necessary, but God-ordained.
Disclosure: Rice University, Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy and Texas Monthly have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete list of them here.
Reread the title. How can shooting captives in a prison be justified. If the police / prison guards herded all the prisoners in to a small places and started to mow them down with gun fire, it is about what Israel is doing to Gaza. Hugs. Scottie
Israeli air strikes devastated parts of the Jabalia refugee camp in north Gaza this week, flattening buildings in a densely populated area where, Palestinian authorities say, at least 195 civilians were killed and scores more are still missing.
Israel says the attacks successfully targeted Hamas military leaders, their fighters and the tunnel network they dug beneath civilian areas and used for operations. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has pledged to destroy Hamas – the Palestinian Islamic militant group that controls the Gaza Strip – in retaliation for its Oct. 7 attacks on Israel that killed 1,400 people, mostly civilians.
The strikes at the Jabalia camp – the largest of several refugee settlements in Gaza – have fuelled international concern at the mounting humanitarian toll of Israel’s offensive.
In the wake of the first airstrike on Oct. 31, which left deep craters filled with broken concrete and twisted metal in the midst of Jabalia’s tightly packed buildings, the Office of the U.N. Human Rights Commissioner Volker Turk said in a tweeted statement that the scale of the destruction and the high number of civilian casualties aroused “serious concerns that these are disproportionate attacks that could amount to war crimes.”
Turk had previously said on Oct. 7 that he was “shocked and appalled” at the killings of civilians, hostage-taking, and rocket attacks on Israel by Palestinian armed groups.
Hamas gunmen rampaged through Israeli border areas on Oct. 7, in the deadliest day of the nation’s 75-year history. Israel says around 240 people were taken as hostages into Gaza, where they are believed to be held in Hamas’ extensive tunnel network.
*** There is a drawing of the area and the places of strikes and other stuff talked about. I am unable to copy and paste it here. Please go to the link above to see the information. Hugs. Scottie ***
Erez crossing
Jabalia
camp
Refugee
camps
Evacuation
zone border
GAZA
STRIP
ISRAEL
Airstrike
Rafah
crossing
Jabalia camp
Satellite map of the Gaza Strip, showing the eight refugee camps. The Jabalia refugee camp is highlighted and the site of an airstrike within the camp shown.
Israel’s ensuing bombardment of the small Palestinian enclave of 2.3 million people has killed more than 9,000 people, according to health authorities in Gaza. Food and water are scarce, and medical services are collapsing.
At least five other refugee camps in the coastal enclave have been hit during Israel’s ongoing offensive, according to satellite images analysed by Masae Analytics. An Israeli military spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the images.
The United Nations refugee agency for Palestinians said that schools used as shelters by thousands of people have been damaged in the Jabalia, Beach and Al Bureij camps, and nearly 50 of its buildings and assets have been affected across the 360 sq km Gaza Strip. The U.N. agency said that more than 70 of its staff have been killed.
Israel has held Hamas accountable for the civilian death toll in Gaza, saying that it is using Gazans as human shields. Israeli officials note they have repeatedly warned residents to evacuate northern Gaza in recent days.
Reuters has used satellite images, pictures and videos shot by its journalists in Gaza to piece together an account of this week’s attacks in Jabalia.
GAZA STRIP
3
4
2
6
1
5
Evacuation zone
Beach camp
2
Rafah camp
Jabalia camp
3
1
90,713
2023 Population: 133,326
116,011
Buildings damaged
in refugee camps
as of Oct. 29
0.5 km
N
Maghazi camp
Bureij camp
Khan Younis camp
6
5
4
88,854
46,629
33,255
Maps of six refugee camps in the Gaza Strip, the Rafah, Jabalia, Beach, Khan Younis, Bureij and Maghazi camps. Estimated damage to buildings within each camp is shown. All have significant numbers of damaged buildings.
At 1.4-square kilometres, Jabalia is the largest of eight refugee camps in Gaza and is home to some 116,000 registered refugees, many of whom are dependent on food, medicine and other aid provided by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA).
The densely packed camp was set up in 1948 to shelter the wave of Palestinians who fled or were driven from their homes amid the fighting that accompanied the creation of the modern state of Israel. Palestinians lament this as the Nakba, or catastrophe. Israel contests that it drove Palestinians away, saying it was attacked by neighbouring Arab states.
The Jabalia camp decades ago evolved from its original temporary tents and huts into a maze of concrete and breeze-block buildings separated by shoulder-width alleyways.
Living conditions are poor: conflict and years of Israeli-led blockade on Hamas-run Gaza have led to high unemployment, poverty, contaminated water and a shortage of building supplies for new homes.
*** Below is a chart / drawing of the area and where the camps are that are being struck. Again it wouldn’t copy over, to see them please go to the link above. Hugs. Scottie ***
Jabalia
camp
Schools and
kindergartens
Hospitals
and clinics
Mosques
Airstrike
250 m
Map of the Jabalia camp with building footprints shown. Buildings which contain schools or kindergartens, hospitals or clinics and mosques are all highlighted. There are many of all categories both within and around the camp. The site of an airstrike within the camp is also shown.
The camp has long been a flashpoint for tensions. Jabalia was where the first Palestinian intifada, or uprising, against Israeli occupation erupted in 1987 after an Israeli truck driver crashed into a vehicle carrying Palestinian workers, some of them from the refugee camp.
Ever since it has been a hotspot. In 2008, Israeli ground forces went into Jabalia when Hamas began firing longer range rockets into Israel, killing more than 60 Palestinians during the military operation.
In 2009, an Israeli air strike killed senior Hamas leader Nizar Rayan and members of his family in an airstrike on his home in the camp.
Reuters live footage at 1224 GMT on Tuesday Oct. 31 showed the first sign of the air strike on the Jabalia refugee camp: the camera shakes and then captures a plume of black smoke rising over northern Gaza. Details in the camera shot – a water tower, minaret, solar panels – matched satellite images of the area and confirmed the blast was in the Jabalia camp.
First reports of the airstrike appeared online around 1235 GMT, a few minutes after the blast was seen in Reuters footage.
Standing at the edge of one of the craters in the wake of the attack, Abdel Kareem Rayan, a resident of the camp, held a paper listing the names of the 15 family members that he said he lost. “They were innocent, just staying (in the camp). What wrong did they do?” he said.
Smoke billows above a building. People and medics rush to the scene of an Israeli attack that hit the Jabalia refugee camp in north Gaza on Wednesday, Nov. 1.
*** There is a video of the bombing and people running with injured people / children while others rush to help. But it wont post here, to see it please go to the web site at the link above. Hugs. Scottie ***
Professor Justin Bronk, Senior Research Fellow for Airpower and Technology at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), a defence and security think tank headquartered in London, said that the Reuters images of the Oct. 31 attack showed “multiple sizeable bomb craters.”
Bronk said that, while it was hard to do an exact weapons identification from photographs, the craters were consistent with the Israeli Air Force’s standard guided air-to-surface Joint-Direct Attack Munitions (JDAMs) – specifically GBU-31 2000lb or GBU-32 1000lb JDAMs.
“The primary use for the GBU-31 family of 2000lb JDAMs in U.S. service is for striking relatively deeply buried targets or for demolishing large structures,” he said, adding that U.S.-led coalitions in Iraq and Afghanistan generally tried to use munitions with significantly smaller warheads such as Hellfire missiles or the GBU-38 family of 500lb JDAMs in densely populated areas. “However, these munitions lack the capacity to reliably penetrate and destroy structures several stories underground.”
Israeli defence officials have said aircraft were involved in the attack. A military spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the munitions used. The Pentagon declined to comment on the assessment.
*** Below is a single image of a complex tool on the orginal post that takes the before of the city and as you move the slider shows you the complete under devestation of that same city now. Hugs. Scottie ***
Oct. 31
Nov. 1
Satellite imagery shows that the location of the strike was near the intersection of Al Mouhawel and Al Almey streets.
Israel’s military said the Oct. 31 attack killed a significant military leader of Hamas: Ibrahim Biari, commander of the Jabalia Battalion and a ringleader of the Oct. 7 attack on Israeli towns and kibbutzim.
Israeli military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said that Biari was also “the dominant leader” of Hamas fighters operating in northern Gaza from a network of tunnels beneath the camp.
“He was killed while situating himself inside the Jabalia Camp – with dozens of additional terrorists around him in the same area – which contains a headquarters and other operational facilities located in buildings within the civilian camp,” Hagari said on Nov. 1.
Hagari said the strike caused the collapse of the tunnels and underground military infrastructure, which in turn brought down additional surface structures.
Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem denied there was any senior commander present in the camp. Hamas’s armed wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, said seven civilian hostages were killed in the strikes on Jabalia, including three foreign passport holders. Reuters was unable to verify that independently.
The second airstrike hit on Wednesday Nov. 1 in the Falouja neighbourhood of Jabalia refugee camp, approximately half a mile from the site of Tuesday’s explosion.
The blast flattened several big apartment buildings. The Interior Ministry in Gaza said the strike had destroyed an entire residential block, which Reuters was unable to confirm.
As the wounded were being carried from the scene on blankets and in the arms of residents and rescue workers, one local man told Reuters he said been praying in a local mosque and had rushed out when he felt the blast. “It is a massacre,” said the man, who did not give his name, as emergency workers tried to free survivors from the rubble by hand.
Israel’s military said the second strike killed Muhammad A’sar, head of Hamas’s anti-tank missile unit.
According to the health ministry and the Hamas government media office, at least 195 people were killed in the two airstrikes on Oct. 31 and Nov. 1, which left 120 missing and more than 700 wounded.
A third Israeli airstrike hit the Jabalia refugee camp on Nov. 2, Reuters reported. The bombardment hit the UNRWA-sponsored Abu Hussein school, where many displaced Gazans were residing, according to eyewitnesses and a statement from the U.N. agency. Injured camp residents were rushed to the Indonesian hospital. Reuters was unable to determine the number of casualties.
Palestinians search for casualties a day after Israeli strikes on houses in Jabalia refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip, Nov. 1, 2023. REUTERS/Mohammed Al-Masri
Israel said it has so far killed 10 Hamas commanders responsible for planning the Oct. 7 attack. Hamas – designated as a terrorist organisation by the European Union and the United States, among others – called in its 1988 founding charter for the destruction of Israel.
On a visit to Israel on Friday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken reiterated that Israel has a right to “do everything possible” to ensure that there would be no repetition of the Oct. 7 attack.
But he called called for a humanitarian pause: “It is very important when it comes to protection of civilians who are caught in the crossfire of Hamas’s making, that everything be done to protect them and to bring assistance to those who so desperately need it, who are not in any way responsible for what happened on Oct. 7.”
Speaking shortly after Blinken, Netanyahu said: “We are proceeding with all our might, and Israel refuses any temporary ceasefire that does not include the return of our kidnapped hostages.”
Top photo
A man reacts as Palestinians search for casualties a day after Israeli strikes on houses in Jabalia refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip, Nov. 1, 2023. REUTERS/Mohammed Al-Masri
Note to analysis
Building damage provided by Masae Analytics change detection analysis based on Copernicus Sentinel-1 data. The analysis uses satellite images to estimate areas within the Gaza Strip affected by bombings since the Israeli campaign began. Analysis is further reviewed for false positives (areas that appear damaged in the analysis, but are not) and false negatives (areas that do not appear damaged, but are) by cross checking with other high resolution satellite imagery, media reports and other sources.
Great history lesson on how Israel was created and the people already in Palestine. The person being interviewed, Bassem Youssef, goes back to 1914. Lance gives more information towards the 42 minute mark. This is a great listen if you want to know about this conflict. Hugs. Scottie
While most (myself included) thought this would be another satire filled embarrassment for Piers Morgan, Bassem Youssef uses the platform to educate the world on Palestine.
I have been reading rumors that Mike Johnson was a regular in a popular gay bar and was well known to go home with men. He also is said to be currently exchange emails with the boy about their shared “addiction to porn and masturbation”. He adopted the boy who was 14 when he was a single man, just as Matt Gaetz adopted the preteen Nestor. I am not able to confirm yet the gay rumors, and there is no reason to suspect child abuse just because he was single at the time of adoption, but I do find it weird to be sharing with your son that you have an addition to porn and love to masturbate? But I am sure the truth will come out. So many of these rabid anti-gay religious people are gay and think god will cure them. It is the same with gay guys who go into the military to “man up and go straight”. It doesn’t work. Hugs. Scottie
“It’s time for an honest conversation about homosexuality. There’s freedom to change if you want to. Our race, the size of our feet, the color of our eyes, these are things we’re born with and cannot change. But what these adult advocacy groups like the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network are promoting is a type of behavior. Homosexual behavior is something you do. It’s not something that you are.” – House Speaker Mike Johnson, speaking about the now-defunct ex-gay torture group Exodus International and his joint mission with them on a Christian counter protest to the annual anti-bullying Day Of Silence. As you’ll see in the clip below, Johnson goes on to blame the acceptance of homosexuality for the fall of the Roman Empire. Yes, really.
The real choice is to be open about who one is (bi, queer, whatever) and thus live a happy, productive life! Or, to pretend to hide (closet) oneself from who one is and thus make themself, and everyone else as well, miserable!
I’m always reminded of the line from the movie Auntie Mame (1958) with Rosalind Russell as Mame Dennis where she says, “Life is a banquet and most poor suckers are starving to death!“
This fall of the Roman Empire hypothesis is so irritating, because it is demonstrably false. Homosexuality was considered to be a normal facet of human sexuality in Europe for millennia. Rome fell after it was Christianized and Abrahamic prohibitions were introduced into Europe for the first time.
Wow, they really are recycling all the oldies for this tour.
When someone says “every empire that fell accepted homosexuality”, I ask “name me one empire that didn’t fall.” They can’t. Empires rise and fall. Empires eventually overreach. It’s unsustainable. So of course they always collapse. It’s just a question of when.
Nor is homosexuality mentioned in “The Fall of the Roman Empire” (1964). I’m not ready to watch all three hours to be sure of that, although there are some compelling gladiator scenes.
It just bugs me when I see that crap pushed. I took a couple of courses on Rome back in college (yay, History 114A through 114C!), and the collapse of the Western Empire is a *huge* subject, one that I doubt people like Johnson have ever studied in any detail.
Some of the thesis of E. Gibbon’s “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire” was that Christianity, and it’s divisions, politicization, and diversion of resources of the Empire to the Church, was responsible for the Empire’s fall. It’s not generally accepted today, but his critique is worth noting. When I tell people talking about “Roman Decadence destroyed the empire” that Rome didn’t fall (in 410 CE) until Christianity was Established as the sole religion, and Alaric the Goth was as Christian as Pope Honorius, they don’t believe me. And then there’s that inconvenient Byzantine empire surviving another 1000 years…
I would dispute whether it was known as “homosexuality,” as such.
Our concepts of sexuality and sexual orientation really emerged in the 19th century, and I think it’s questionable at best, to impose these concepts onto antiquity.
Sexual behavior was all about the person who had the POWER to do what he (yes, always he) wanted. Generally, however, high status males were presumed to want to reproduce, legitimately, to produce an heir(s). Anything other than that was, again, about the power to do it. Women, slaves, certain untouchable classes had NO power, and anything could be done TO them.
I reeeeeeeeally don’t want to Go Back to what was considered “normal” in antiquity.
Read the full article. PREVIOUSLY ON JMG: Wommack says homosexuals should have a “warning label on their foreheads.” Wommack says he prayed away “the curse of mildew.” Wommack says Jesus protects Christians from COVID by “turning off your virus receptors.” Two dozen Christians get infected with COVID at Wommack’s illegal bible conference. Wommack says he knows COVID is “no big deal” because his wife and son were “raised from the dead.”
I went to the link in the story above. This guy is one hell of a piece of shit hate preacher. He wants a complete take-over of civilian life, politics, government, every aspect of your life he wants to control. It is a total power grab for him and his followers, in the name of his god of course. Someone has to speak for god, he was just the one chosen to rule your life. Some of the batshit crazy stuff in the article will chill you on what these people believe. And they’re doing it by stealth and then steam rolling over ever right of others to form their perfect society in the name of their god, you know the one that god wants so to hell with your wants or needs. And as you can see they will break the law because god’s will is far more important than the laws of men. Plus once in power they will brook no disagreement with them, 1st amendment be damned. Some quotes listed below. There is much more of the danger these people represent in the article and the Joe My God post also.
“We have enough people here in this school we could elect anybody we want,” he said at a meeting of the Citizen’s Academy, an event held at Charis by the Truth & Liberty Coalition, a nonprofit organization also founded by Wommack.“This county ought to be totally dominated by believers.”
When voters in 30 school districts go to the polls Tuesday (Nov. 7), they will find ballots primed with candidates recruited and trained by Transform Colorado, a movement, launched by Truth & Liberty, “that unites Christian leaders to restore biblical values in the public square,” according to its website.
As in Woodland Park, where Wommack succeeded in getting his chosen candidates elected to City Council and gaining a majority on the school board, the goal, in the words of one victor, is to oppose “the teachers’ union and their psycho agenda.”
Truth & Liberty has lately served as Wommack’s main tool in reversing Colorado’s shift from red to blue, a tragedy he blames on “demonic” liberals. As proof, Wommack has claimed his “spies” in the local school system had found hundreds of obscene books.He warned that public schools taught fourth graders how to have anal sex and that they placed litter boxes in classrooms for students who identified as dogs or cats.
Wommack is harsh in his opposition to LGBTQ rights. The day after five people were killed and 18 injured in a Nov. 19, 2022, shooting at Club Q in Colorado Springs, Wommack said he was “not endorsing” violence against LGBTQ people but complained they received too much sympathy, calling homosexuality “one of the major threats of the devil.”
But once elected, Woodland Park’s new conservative majority worked quickly — sometimes meeting in private, she alleged, in violation of state law — to turn the district upside down.
The district became the first and, so far, only locality in the U.S. to adopt the controversial American Birthright social studies curriculum, which has been rejected by Colorado’s State Board of Education. Since it was adopted, some students have been required to perform make-up work to qualify for college admission.
The school board also put a gag order on faculty and staff who disagreed with the changes, firing some who aired their concerns anyway. Recently, more than 80 teachers and staff signed a letter condemning the new “culture of fear and silence” and calling for solutions that “prioritize our children’s futures over politics.”
The district now budgets more than $200,000 a year for legal fees, more than 10 times its legal budget five years ago.
Despite the controversy, Wommack has given the new board his full support. Charis bused nearly 100 students to a May meeting where a vote was being held to elect a new superintendent, displacing hundreds of parents and teachers who were barred by capacity regulations. Some citizens now gather as much as five hours early at board meetings to make sure they can speak and vote.
Students from Charis, which operates a Practical Government school, also often sign up for many of the limited public speaking slots, using their allotted time to criticize “violent, extreme radicals, communists and socialists taking over our schools.”
Health and wealth preacher Andrew Wommack teaches that Christians should "reform nations" and rule over the godless. His Truth & Liberty Coalition has started by pushing its candidates in some 30 school districts across Colorado. Read the full story:https://t.co/mPdQYmnSwh
People ask: how do we know who the stealth candidates are so we can vote against them? This is how. Look for who the christfascists are voting for and vote for anyone else. It’s not perfect (some can still slip through) but it will help.
I agree with the idea but…how do I find out who the Republicans are supporting? I can sometimes know when I see school board candidates signs on the same lawn as a Trump one but, mostly, I have to try and read between the lines on their webpages to see if they’re idiots or not…and some hide it really well!
They’re not just targeting trans kids. For example, in states where these extremists have seized control of education, they’ve banned books, pedagogical content and practices and entire subjects, adopted curricula and standards and materials that turn the clock waaaay back on the rights and recognition of BBIMP, immigrants, Jews, people practicing minority religions, women and girls, disabled people as well LGBTQI+ people.
By Kyle Mantyla | September 29, 2022 4:11 pm
/https://static.texastribune.org/media/files/ce3304c12c048d392c33fa8f29b1eb09/BD%20INC%20Barton%20David%202012)
Scottie's Playtime 