WWTBAM Bored

Posted: **Thu May 22, 2008 1:59 pm**

John Hagee, the controversial evangelical leader and endorser of Sen. John McCain, argued in a late 1990s sermon that the Nazis had operated on God's behalf to chase the Jews from Europe and shepherd them to Palestine. According to the Reverend, Adolph Hitler was a "hunter," sent by God, who was tasked with expediting God's will of having the Jews re-establish a state of Israel.

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Posted: **Thu May 22, 2008 2:35 pm**

OK.

And the point is?

There are nut jobs on both sides of the aisle and everywhere in between mostly depending on ones personal perspective.

If McCain or Clinton or Obama is on record as recognizing one of them as having particular significance to them then perhaps it is of note.

Otherwise I don't see the significance.

Posted: **Thu May 22, 2008 2:49 pm**

Explain to me how this is relevant.

McCain, when asked, has rejected Hagee's extreme positions. Hagee, incidentally, is not running for president.

So why is what Hagee says relevant? Before you shout "Wright!", you must realize that there are major differences. Hagee isn't McCain's personal pastor. He's McCain's intellectual and spiritual inspiration.

Basically, each time you bring up Hagee, you really bring up Wright, and if I were an Obama backer, that's something I'd avoid.

Posted: **Thu May 22, 2008 3:19 pm**

Weyoun wrote:Explain to me how this is relevant.

McCain, when asked, has rejected Hagee's extreme positions. Hagee, incidentally, is not running for president.

So why is what Hagee says relevant? Before you shout "Wright!", you must realize that there are major differences. Hagee isn't McCain's personal pastor. He's McCain's intellectual and spiritual inspiration.

Basically, each time you bring up Hagee, you really bring up Wright, and if I were an Obama backer, that's something I'd avoid.

Being an intellectual and spiritual inspiration is an even closer relationship than merely a pastor.

Posted: **Thu May 22, 2008 3:32 pm**

“Obviously, I find these remarks and others deeply offensive and indefensible, and I repudiate them. I did not know of them before Reverend Hagee's endorsement, and I feel I must reject his endorsement as well,” McCain said in a statement to CNN Thursday.

He added that his relationship with Hagee did not compare with Obama’s lengthy association with Rev. Jeremiah Wright. “I have said I do not believe Senator Obama shares Reverend Wright's extreme views. But let me also be clear, Reverend Hagee was not and is not my pastor or spiritual advisor, and I did not attend his church for twenty years. I have denounced statements he made immediately upon learning of them, as I do again today,” said McCain.

The Arizona senator had earlier renounced comments from Hagee that termed the Catholic church "the great whore" and "an apostate church."

Update after the jump: Hagee rescinds McCain endorsement

Posted: **Thu May 22, 2008 4:11 pm**

Bob Juch wrote:Being an intellectual and spiritual inspiration is an even closer relationship than merely a pastor.

Except that Wright wasn't "merely a pastor." Before the publicity, Obama had called Wright his "spiritual mentor" and the inspiration for his first book (the title of which was taken from one of Wright's sermons).

Personally, I find both of them pretty despicable. And I don't buy either of them saying they didn't know.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 3:37 am**

Bob Juch wrote:
Weyoun wrote:Explain to me how this is relevant.

McCain, when asked, has rejected Hagee's extreme positions. Hagee, incidentally, is not running for president.

So why is what Hagee says relevant? Before you shout "Wright!", you must realize that there are major differences. Hagee isn't McCain's personal pastor. He's McCain's intellectual and spiritual inspiration.

Basically, each time you bring up Hagee, you really bring up Wright, and if I were an Obama backer, that's something I'd avoid.
Being an intellectual and spiritual inspiration is an even closer relationship than merely a pastor.

Unfortunately, I left a "not" out there. Hagee is NO SUCH THING, and pretending otherwise is laughable.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 5:15 am**

Now that Hagee is out of the picture, the media should now focus on McCain's other crazy spiritual adviser, Rod Parsley, who claims that gay people have a life expectancy of 45 years old.

EDIT: McCain has released a statement saying that he now denounces any statements made by Parsley. I guess we'll wait for the next statement denouncing the next nutbag preacher.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 5:41 am**

Bob Juch wrote:
Weyoun wrote:Explain to me how this is relevant.

McCain, when asked, has rejected Hagee's extreme positions. Hagee, incidentally, is not running for president.

So why is what Hagee says relevant? Before you shout "Wright!", you must realize that there are major differences. Hagee isn't McCain's personal pastor. He's McCain's intellectual and spiritual inspiration.

Basically, each time you bring up Hagee, you really bring up Wright, and if I were an Obama backer, that's something I'd avoid.
Being an intellectual and spiritual inspiration is an even closer relationship than merely a pastor.

Um...OK.

If you say so...if "merely" a pastor means being a mentor and the guy that married Obama and baptized his kids.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 5:41 am**

NellyLunatic1980 wrote:Now that Hagee is out of the picture, the media should now focus on McCain's other crazy spiritual adviser, Rod Parsley, who claims that gay people have a life expectancy of 45 years old.

EDIT: McCain has released a statement saying that he now denounces any statements made by Parsley. I guess we'll wait for the next statement denouncing the next nutbag preacher.

At least he's doing it a bit quicker than say...20 years.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 5:47 am**

At the risk of sounding "politically incorrect"...the Bible many times talks of God turning evil into good, and using evil world leaders to fulfill His will (although usually it was to chastize Israel).

The Bible never said that the person that was doing God's will MEANT to do it, or that such a person was "approved by God".

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 7:02 am**

Jeemie wrote:At the risk of sounding "politically incorrect"...the Bible many times talks of God turning evil into good, and using evil world leaders to fulfill His will (although usually it was to chastize Israel).

The Bible never said that the person that was doing God's will MEANT to do it, or that such a person was "approved by God".

An example of this is the Joseph (as in Technicolor Dreamcoat) story.

What happens if Joseph's brothers don't sell him into slavery? No one predicts the famine, and everybody starves.

One of the things that makes God...well, God...is His ability to take the evil people do and bring good from it. That doesn't make the evil less evil.

It is very early in the morning for reflections on monotheism. I must have some V8.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 8:11 am**

NellyLunatic1980 wrote:Now that Hagee is out of the picture, the media should now focus on McCain's other crazy spiritual adviser, Rod Parsley, who claims that gay people have a life expectancy of 45 years old.

EDIT: McCain has released a statement saying that he now denounces any statements made by Parsley. I guess we'll wait for the next statement denouncing the next nutbag preacher.

You mean like Donnie McClurkin the "cured" gay who says that he will help people get over their homsexuality with the aid of his inspirational teachings. Obama had him performing at a campaign event in South Carolina last fall even after the news about McClurkin's beliefs became public.

The gays who support Obama are willing to overlook this little gaffe all the while castigating McCain and Hillary for supposed anti-gay statements (when the governor of NC said that compared to Hillary, Rocky was a pansy, they got all upset about Hillary's anti-gay agenda). When will all of these people wake up and realize that Barack Obama does not care for anyone other than Barack Obama. Not for gays, not for blacks, not for the working class, not for progressives.

And there is a tape of Michelle in Rev. Wright's church giving a speech about "whitey" that the Republicans have and are just waiting for the right moment to release, which explains why Obama is anxiously attempting now to remove Michelle from list of valid campaign issues. According to Obama, the only valid campaign issues are (1) all McCain's and Hillary's weaknesses, and (2) just how wonderful hope and change are.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 10:13 am**

sss said:

And there is a tape of Michelle in Rev. Wright's church giving a speech about "whitey" that the Republicans have and are just waiting for the right moment to release, which explains why Obama is anxiously attempting now to remove Michelle from list of valid campaign issues.

What's your source for this, Atheist-Breath?

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and guess that he or she has something to do with the Clinton campaign.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 12:28 pm**

Any believer in an omnipotent God would have to believe Hitler WAS fulfilling His will. How could it not be? It doesn't mean that God commanded Hitler, but it does mean he at least allowed it. If it was not his will he would have stopped it.

Jews, Christians, and Muslims should all believe this.

There could be different rationales for why it was God's will, but the fact that it was his will should not be disputed among the three religions.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 1:05 pm**

What happens if Joseph's brothers don't sell him into slavery?

I've always figured the same rationale applies to Judas.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 2:28 pm**

BackInTex wrote:Any believer in an omnipotent God would have to believe Hitler WAS fulfilling His will. How could it not be? It doesn't mean that God commanded Hitler, but it does mean he at least allowed it. If it was not his will he would have stopped it.

Jews, Christians, and Muslims should all believe this.

There could be different rationales for why it was God's will, but the fact that it was his will should not be disputed among the three religions.

If one of these days if someone ties you down and rapes you and cuts your wookus off and leaves you for dead and you're saved because your daughters find you before you've bled to death, I'm sure you'll say to yourself something like"Man, I hate when that happens" or "Sucks for me." But, you'll know at least that God's cool with that.

I don't have to think like that since I don't fit into any of the three categories that you mentioned (even though I do go to church and what not).

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 2:59 pm**

wbtravis007 wrote: (even though I do go to church and what not).

That is why I specified the three religions. I have no idea what religion you might be.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 3:55 pm**

BackInTex wrote:Any believer in an omnipotent God would have to believe Hitler WAS fulfilling His will. How could it not be? It doesn't mean that God commanded Hitler, but it does mean he at least allowed it. If it was not his will he would have stopped it.

Jews, Christians, and Muslims should all believe this.

There could be different rationales for why it was God's will, but the fact that it was his will should not be disputed among the three religions.

This can be better sorted out by understanding that "God's will" can refer to several different aspects of God's action. Usually, what we think of as "God's will" is God's intention, but, as Leslie Weatherhead lays out in God's Will (a readable 85-page book available at Amazon for just $5.50) there are three different things we talk about while describing them all as "God's will" - the Intentional Will of God, the Circumstantial Will of God, and the Ultimate Will of God.

I think Weatherhead would say that what Hitler did was certainly NOT God's intentional will. God's intention - His desire - is that everyone follow Him act in love toward each other. But, sin gets in the way (because God has allowed free will) and therefore God brings good out of the evil that occurs in the world - out of circumstances, therefore God's circumstantial will. Finally, God's Ultimate Will is His omnipotence, that ultimately all creation will be reconciled to Him, every knee will bow, etc.

I'm not doing the book any justice in this short paragraph, but I commend it to anyone who wonders how the Bible can say that it is God's Will that everyone be saved and how at the same time clearly some will not be.

A final example: In the very beginning of the book, Weatherhead talks about an acquaintance who is a doctor whose wife had died. The doctor says, "Well, it was God's will." Weatherhead asks if that means that all the time the doctor was trying to heal his wife, was he fighting against God's will? He goes on to say this doesn't make sense - and so begins an examination of what "God's Will" means.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 7:03 pm**

McCain SOUGHT the endorsements of Hagee and Parsley.

There was no long-standing relationship, no history. He wanted their audiences, their supporters, on his side.

I give McCain the benefit of the doubt here. I truly don't think he believes those hateful things.

It took longer than it should have to renounce them.

What I can't figure out is why didn't his campaign vet these guys better before McCain sought their endorsement in the first place?

It's not as if they aren't on TV, aren't visible. That's what I don't understand.

This is a guy who's been around the block a few times. He knows how to campaign. He knows better.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 9:09 pm**

mellytu74 wrote: I give McCain the benefit of the doubt here. I truly don't think he believes those hateful things.

What things are hateful?

...quotations from the Texas preacher expressing his belief that the rise of Hitler and the Holocaust were part of God's plan to hasten the creation of Israel. "Obviously, I find these remarks and others deeply offensive and indefensible, and I repudiate them. ", McCain said.

O.K. So McCain either does not believe in God, or he believes Hitler was more powerful than God.

Now THAT, I find offensive.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 9:33 pm**

BiT --

I am a Catholic.

I do not believe my church is The Great Whore.

Pastor Hagee does.

I find that hateful.

Posted: **Fri May 23, 2008 10:21 pm**

mellytu74 wrote:BiT --

I am a Catholic.

I do not believe my church is The Great Whore.

Pastor Hagee does.

I find that hateful.

I can see where that might be insulting, maddening, and perhaps hateful towards the Catholic Church leadership, but it is not hateful to the Catholic faithful. But I can see how you might. I'm sure if someone, say WBT might attack my faith, I might see that as hateful, too.

Posted: **Sat May 24, 2008 8:52 am**

BackInTex wrote:
mellytu74 wrote:BiT --

I am a Catholic.

I do not believe my church is The Great Whore.

Pastor Hagee does.

I find that hateful.
I can see where that might be insulting, maddening, and perhaps hateful towards the Catholic Church leadership, but it is not hateful to the Catholic faithful. But I can see how you might. I'm sure if someone, say WBT might attack my faith, I might see that as hateful, too.

Yes, I can, BiT.

Posted: **Sat May 24, 2008 9:03 am**

BackInTex wrote:
wbtravis007 wrote: (even though I do go to church and what not).
That is why I specified the three religions. I have no idea what religion you might be.

I was a good Methodist boy growing up -- (went to the church that Bix goes to now) -- and now go to a Lutheran church. I normally keep my real views to myself on this.

After a lot of searching and thinking everything through, I came to the conclusion that it made more sense to just get back to the basics -- Zeus and them. I guess it's really too late now to do much about the havoc created by those who lost their faith and came up with all this other stuff, but still.

WWTBAM Bored

McCain Backer Hagee Said Hitler Was Fulfilling God's Will

McCain Backer Hagee Said Hitler Was Fulfilling God's Will